#479: Mary Karr — The Master of Memoir on Creative Process and Finding Gifts in the Suffering

"For me, the solution to fear is curiosity and presence. I can’t be terrified and curious at the same time." — Mary Karr Mary Karr (@marykarrlit https://twitter.com/marykarrlit) is the author of three award-winning, bestselling memoirs: The Liars’ Club https://www.amazon.com/Liars-Club-Memoir-Penguin-Classics/dp/0143107798/?tag=offsitoftimfe-20, Cherry https://www.amazon.com/Cherry-Mary-Karr/dp/0141002077/?tag=offsitoftimfe-20, and Lit https://www.amazon.com/Lit-Memoir-P-S-Mary-Karr/dp/0060596996/?tag=offsitoftimfe-20. She is also the author of The Art of Memoir https://www.amazon.com/Art-Memoir-Mary-Karr/dp/0062223070/?tag=offsitoftimfe-20, which lays bare her own process as she breaks down the craft of memoir, and Tropic of Squalor https://www.amazon.com/Tropic-Squalor-Poems-Mary-Karr/dp/0062699822/?tag=offsitoftimfe-20, her latest volume of poetry. A Guggenheim fellow in poetry, Karr has won Pushcart Prizes for both verse and essays. Other grants include the Whiting Award, PEN/Martha Albrand Award, and a Radcliffe/Bunting Institute Fellowship. Karr is also the Peck Professor of Literature at Syracuse University. Please enjoy! * This episode is brought to you by Wealthfront http://wealthfront.com/Tim! Wealthfront http://wealthfront.com/Tim pioneered the automated investing movement, sometimes referred to as ‘robo-advising,’ and they currently oversee $20 billion of assets for their clients. It takes about three minutes to sign up, and then Wealthfront will build you a globally diversified portfolio of ETFs based on your risk appetite and manage it for you at an incredibly low cost. Smart investing should not feel like a rollercoaster ride. Let the professionals do the work for you. Go to Wealthfront.com/Tim http://wealthfront.com/Tim and open a Wealthfront account today, and you’ll get your first $5,000 managed for free, for life http://wealthfront.com/Tim. Wealthfront http://wealthfront.com/Tim will automate your investments for the long term. Get started today at Wealthfront.com/Tim http://wealthfront.com/Tim. * This episode is also brought to you by ShipStation https://www.shipstation.com/?ref=tim. Do you sell stuff online? Then you know what a pain the shipping process is. ShipStation https://www.shipstation.com/?ref=tim was created to make your life easier. Whether you’re selling on eBay, Amazon, Shopify, or over 100 other popular selling channels, ShipStation lets you access all of your orders from one simple dashboard, and it works with all of the major shipping carriers, locally and globally, including FedEx, UPS, and USPS. Tim Ferriss Show listeners get to try ShipStation https://www.shipstation.com/?ref=tim free for 60 days by using promo code TIM. There’s no risk, and you can start your free trial without even entering your credit card info. Just visit ShipStation.com https://www.shipstation.com/?ref=tim, click on the microphone at the top of the homepage, and type in TIM! * This episode is also brought to you by Helix Sleep http://helixsleep.com/tim! Helix was selected as the #1 best overall mattress pick of 2020 by GQ magazine, Wired, Apartment Therapy, and many others. With Helix http://helixsleep.com/tim, there’s a specific mattress for each and every body’s unique taste. Just take their quiz—only two minutes to complete http://helixsleep.com/tim—that matches your body type and sleep preferences to the perfect mattress for you. They have a 10-year warranty, and you get to try it out for a hundred nights, risk free. They’ll even pick it up from you if you don’t love it. And now, to my dear listeners, Helix is offering up to 200 dollars off all mattress orders plus two free pillows at HelixSleep.com/Tim http://helixsleep.com/tim. *** If you enjoy the podcast, would you please consider leaving a short review on Apple Podcasts https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-tim-ferriss-show/id863897795?mt=2/iTunes? It takes less than 60 seconds, and it really makes a difference in helping to convince hard-to-get guests. I also love reading the reviews! For show notes and past guests, please visit tim.blog/podcast https://tim.blog/podcast/?utm_source=podcast&utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=podcast-description. Sign up for Tim’s email newsletter (“5-Bullet Friday”) at tim.blog/friday https://go.tim.blog/5-bullet-friday-1/. For transcripts of episodes, go to tim.blog/transcripts http://tim.blog/transcripts. Discover Tim’s books: tim.blog/books http://tim.blog/books. Follow Tim: Twitter: twitter.com/tferriss https://twitter.com/tferriss Instagram: instagram.com/timferriss https://instagram.com/timferriss/ Facebook: facebook.com/timferriss https://www.facebook.com/TimFerriss/ YouTube: youtube.com/timferriss https://www.youtube.com/timferriss Past guests on The Tim Ferriss Show http://tim.blog/podcast include Jerry Seinfeld https://tim.blog/2020/12/08/jerry-seinfeld/, Hugh Jackman https://tim.blog/2020/06/26/hugh-jackman/, Dr. Jane Goodall https://tim.blog/2020/04/16/jane-goodall/, LeBron James https://tim.blog/2018/11/27/lebron-james-mike-mancias/, Kevin Hart https://tim.blog/2020/05/20/kevin-hart/, Doris Kearns Goodwin https://tim.blog/2018/09/07/doris-kearns-goodwin-leadership/, Jamie Foxx https://tim.blog/2015/12/06/jamie-foxx/, Matthew McConaughey https://tim.blog/2020/10/19/matthew-mcconaughey/, Esther Perel https://tim.blog/2017/05/21/esther-perel/, Elizabeth Gilbert https://tim.blog/2020/05/08/elizabeth-gilbert/, Terry Crews https://tim.blog/2017/12/20/terry-crews-how-to-have-do-and-be-all-you-want/, Sia https://tim.blog/2020/08/12/sia/, Yuval Noah Harari https://tim.blog/2020/10/27/yuval-noah-harari/, Malcolm Gladwell https://tim.blog/2016/06/21/malcolm-gladwell/, Madeleine Albright https://tim.blog/2020/05/27/secretary-madeleine-albright/, Cheryl Strayed https://tim.blog/2017/03/30/cheryl-strayed/, Jim Collins https://tim.blog/2019/02/18/jim-collins/, Mary Karr, https://tim.blog/2020/11/11/mary-karr/ Maria Popova https://tim.blog/2014/10/21/brain-pickings/, Sam Harris https://tim.blog/2020/05/15/sam-harris-2/, Michael Phelps https://tim.blog/2021/01/21/michael-phelps-grant-hackett/, Bob Iger https://tim.blog/2020/01/16/bob-iger/, Edward Norton https://tim.blog/2019/10/31/edward-norton-motherless-brooklyn/, Arnold Schwarzenegger https://tim.blog/2015/02/02/arnold-schwarzenegger/, Neil Strauss https://tim.blog/2014/06/24/neil-strauss/, Ken Burns https://tim.blog/2019/09/12/ken-burns/, Maria Sharapova https://tim.blog/2017/08/26/maria-sharapova/, Marc Andreessen https://tim.blog/2016/05/29/marc-andreessen/, Neil Gaiman https://tim.blog/2019/03/28/neil-gaiman/, Neil de Grasse Tyson https://tim.blog/2019/10/03/neil-degrasse-tyson/, Jocko Willink https://tim.blog/2016/09/21/jocko-willink-on-discipline-leadership-and-overcoming-doubt/, Daniel Ek https://tim.blog/2020/12/03/daniel-ek/, Kelly Slater https://tim.blog/2020/09/08/kelly-slater/, Dr. Peter Attia https://tim.blog/2019/11/27/peter-attia-fasting-metformin-longevity/, Seth Godin https://tim.blog/2016/02/10/seth-godin/, Howard Marks https://tim.blog/2018/09/25/howard-marks/, Dr. Brené Brown https://tim.blog/2020/02/06/brene-brown-striving-self-acceptance-saving-marriages/, Eric Schmidt https://tim.blog/2019/04/09/eric-schmidt/, Michael Lewis https://tim.blog/2020/05/01/michael-lewis/, Joe Gebbia https://tim.blog/2018/03/08/joe-gebbia-co-founder-of-airbnb/, Michael Pollan https://tim.blog/2018/05/06/michael-pollan-how-to-change-your-mind/, Dr. Jordan Peterson https://tim.blog/2021/03/01/jordan-peterson/, Vince Vaughn https://tim.blog/2017/05/31/vince-vaughn/, Brian Koppelman https://tim.blog/2020/04/23/brian-koppelman/, Ramit Sethi https://tim.blog/2019/05/07/ramit-sethi/, Dax Shepard https://tim.blog/2020/11/18/dax-shepard/, Tony Robbins https://tim.blog/2014/10/15/money-master-the-game/, Jim Dethmer https://tim.blog/2020/05/18/jim-dethmer/, Dan Harris https://tim.blog/2020/11/19/dan-harris/, Ray Dalio https://tim.blog/2017/09/13/ray-dalio/, Naval Ravikant https://tim.blog/2015/08/18/the-evolutionary-angel-naval-ravikant/, Vitalik Buterin https://tim.blog/2021/03/08/vitalik-buterin-naval-ravikant/, Elizabeth Lesser https://tim.blog/2021/03/16/elizabeth-lesser/, Amanda Palmer https://tim.blog/2019/04/18/amanda-palmer-2/, Katie Haun https://tim.blog/2021/02/18/katie-haun/, Sir Richard Branson https://tim.blog/2017/10/09/richard-branson/, Chuck Palahniuk https://tim.blog/2020/09/02/chuck-palahniuk/, Arianna Huffington https://tim.blog/2017/10/18/arianna-huffington/, Reid Hoffman https://tim.blog/2015/08/31/the-oracle-of-silicon-valley-reid-hoffman-plus-michael-mccullough/, Bill Burr https://tim.blog/2017/09/17/bill-burr/, Whitney Cummings https://tim.blog/2015/06/26/whitney-cummings/, Rick Rubin https://tim.blog/2015/05/15/rick-rubin/, Dr. Vivek Murthy https://tim.blog/2020/03/26/vivek-murthy/, Darren Aronofsky https://tim.blog/2017/09/09/darren-aronofsky/, and many more. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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

• 0:00Tim Ferriss?

  Hello, boys and girls, ladies and germs. This is Tim Ferriss and welcome to another episode of The Tim Ferriss Show. My guest today is Mary Karr, @MaryCarrLit on Twitter. She's the author of three award-winning bestselling memoirs, The Liars' Club, Cherry, and Lit. She's also the author of The Art of Memoir, one of my absolute favorites, which lays bare her own process as she breaks down the craft of memoir, and Tropic of Squalor, her latest volume of poetry. A Guggenheim Fellow in Poetry, Carr has won Pushcart Prizes for both verse and essays. Other grants include the Whiting Award, Pen Martha Allbrand Award, and a Radcliffe-Bunting Institute Fellowship. Carr is also a Peck Professor of Literature at Syracuse University.

• 0:42Tim Ferriss?

  You can find her online at marycarr.com, on Twitter @MaryCarrLit. This episode is brought to you by ShipStation. The holiday season is fast approaching, and we know that people will be buying more stuff online than ever before. All of these trends to e-commerce have been accelerated due to COVID and much more. If you're an e-commerce seller, are you ready to meet the demands of a record-breaking online shopping season? Be ready with ShipStation. ShipStation.com is the fastest, easiest, and most affordable way to manage and ship your orders. In just a few clicks, you're managing orders, printing out discounted shipping labels, and getting your products out fast. Happier holidays for you and your customers.

• 1:26Tim Ferriss?

  ShipStation takes the hassle out of holiday shipping. No matter where you're selling, on Amazon, Etsy, your website via Shopify, or other platforms, ShipStation brings all of your orders into one simple interface. And ShipStation works with all of the major carriers, USPS, FedEx, UPS, even international. You can compare and choose the best shipping solution every time, and you can access the same postage discounts that are usually reserved for large Fortune 500 companies. It's no wonder that ShipStation is the number one choice of online sellers. And right now, my listeners, that's you guys, can try ShipStation free for 60 days when you use offer code TIM. Just go to the homepage, shipstation.com, click on the microphone at the top of the homepage, and type in TIM. T-I-M. That's it.

• 2:11Tim Ferriss?

  Go to shipstation.com, then enter offer code TIM. Shipstation.com. Make ship happen.

• 2:21Tim Ferriss?

  This podcast episode is brought to you by Helix Sleep. Sleep is super important to me. In the last few years, I've come to conclude it is the end all be all, that all good things, good mood, good performance, good everything seem to stem from good sleep. So I've tried a lot to optimize it. I've tried pills and potions, all sorts of different mattresses, you name it. And for the last few years, I've been sleeping on a Helix Midnight Luxe mattress. I also have one in the guest bedroom and feedback from friends has always been fantastic. It's something that they comment on. Helix Sleep has a quiz, takes about two minutes to complete, that matches your body type and sleep preferences to the perfect mattress for you. With Helix, there's a specific mattress

• 3:05Tim Ferriss?

  for each and every body. That is your body, also your taste. So let's say you sleep on your side in like a super soft bed, no problem. Or if you're a back sleeper who likes a mattress that's as firm as a rock, they've got a mattress for you too. Helix was selected as the number one best overall mattress pick of 2020 by GQ Magazine, Wired, Apartment Therapy, and many others. Just go to helixsleep.com/tim, take their two-minute sleep quiz, and they'll match you to a customized mattress that will give you the best sleep of your life. They have a 10-year warranty, and you get to try it out for 100 nights, risk-free. They'll even pick it up from you if you don't love it. And now, my dear listeners, Helix is offering

• 3:43Tim Ferriss?

  up to $200 off of all mattress orders and two free pillows at helixsleep.com/tim. These are not cheap pillows either, so getting two for free is an upgraded deal. So that's up to $200 off and two free pillows at helixsleep.com/tim. That's H-E-L-I-X, sleep.com/tim for up to $200 off. So, check it out one more time. Helix, H-E-L-I-X, sleep.com/tim.

• 4:16Tim Ferriss?

  This episode is brought to you by AG1, the daily foundational nutritional supplement that supports whole body health. I do get asked a lot, what I would take if I could only take one supplement. And the true answer is invariably AG1. It simply covers a ton of bases. I usually drink it in the mornings and frequently take their travel packs with me on the road. So what is AG1? AG1 is a science driven formulation of vitamins, probiotics, and whole food sourced nutrients. In a single scoop, AG1 gives you support for the brain, gut, and immune system. So take ownership of your health and try AG1 today. You will get a free one year supply of vitamin D and five free AG1 travel packs with your first

• 4:56Tim Ferriss?

  subscription purchase. So learn more, check it out. Go to drinkag1.com/tim. That's drink AG1, the number one. Drinkag1.com/tim. Last time, drinkag1.com/tim. Check it out.

• 5:15Speaker 01

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

• 5:21Tim Ferriss?

  No, I would assume appropriate time.

• 5:25Speaker 02

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

• 5:37Tim Ferriss?

  Mary, welcome to the show.

• 5:39Speaker 03

  Hey, Tim. Thanks for having me.

• 5:41Tim Ferriss?

  And I appreciate you putting me at ease when I mentioned that I have copious notes in front of me. And that's usually an indication that I am nervous and

• 5:50Speaker 03

  Not you. You do this all the time. You're gonna kill it. It's gonna go great. I'm convinced.

• 5:56Tim Ferriss?

  And thank you. And you reassured me by saying, I make really good waffles.

• 6:00Speaker 03

  That's what I do. I'm like a nona. You gotta think of me as a nona out here. Podcastville.

• 6:08Tim Ferriss?

  Let's rewind the clock as a first step in Podcastville. And maybe we can talk about known as in the family lineage of sorts. And I want to talk about, or have you speak to, a guy redoing your mother's kitchen and holding up a tile. Could you perhaps elaborate on that, please?

• 6:26Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah. Right after my first memoir was published, we were having my mother's kitchen re-tiled. My sister and I were there and that, yeah, and the tile dude prides off a tile and he holds it up and it has a little round toilet and he, and he looks at my little fluffy haired, gray haired mother and says, Ms. Carr, this looks like a bullet hole. And my sister says, Mom, isn't that where you shot at daddy? And she says, no, that's where I shot at Larry. Over there is where I shot at your daddy. So people ask me why I wanted to be a memoirist. I'm like, why would you make stuff up when that's who your mother is?

• 7:05Tim Ferriss?

  So for those who have no context, I'd like to provide a bit more context. Where was this kitchen or where is this kitchen for that matter?

• 7:14Speaker 03

  This kitchen is in southeast Texas. It's a town that I write about to protect the mayor and the school principal and the people who didn't sign off on what I said about them. I call it Leach Field, but it's really, it's east of Port Arthur, Texas, a small town in east Texas. I call it the ringworm belt.

• 7:34Tim Ferriss?

  Which, which I've also heard you describe as a swampy town. So moisture, humidity, ringworm, as a former wrestler, I can say those things combined to produce ringworm.

• 7:44Speaker 03

  Exactly. Yes, no, that's it. And industrial, like a lot of oil refineries all around. So not Vienna, you know, not Paris in the twenties, I guess is the way I would put it.

• 7:56Tim Ferriss?

  No, I'm going to hop around like Memento the movie if I must, and I must because that is my way. And you've written extensively about your childhood. You had in many respects, an extremely difficult, painful childhood and will probably unwind some of that. Now you've written extensively about it and you've also mentioned about writing memoirs.

• 8:21Tim Ferriss?

  And if this is a misquote, please call me out. Quote, "I've said it's hard. Here's how hard. Everybody I know who wades deep enough into memories waters drowns a little." And certainly in your book, you paint a high resolution picture of just how painful that can be. And certainly, an element might be catharsis, but it is painful. And I would love for you to speak to the catalyst for beginning to publish this type of work, write and then publish this type of work.

• 8:52Speaker 03

  The publishing is nothing compared to the writing, I think. Publishing for me was great because they gave me money and I didn't have any. So that was, that was good. But yeah, I, I think I had a flamethrower on my ass. Can I say ass on your show?

• 9:05Tim Ferriss?

  You can say ass. Not only are three letter words allowed, four letter are allowed as well.

• 9:11Speaker 03

  Oh, there we go. You know, I was a weird little kid and I was just, my mother was capital N- nervous and married seven times and twice to my daddy. And, and both my parents drank hard. It was Texas, everybody was armed and we were a loud, combative house. So I loved my parents. I mean, that's what I should say. It's, I don't think anybody who's read anything I've written about them would challenge that, but it was not a safe childhood. And yes, it had its fair share of, of blows. I mean, I always, you know, look, I was born in the richest country in the world. Um, my skin color is something the whole country privileges. Um, you know, I'm a college professor.

• 9:54Speaker 03

  I've, you know, I grew up skinny and my teeth came in relatively straight and I have a lot of advantages. So whatever I went through, a lot of people and people I grew up with and loved had it way worse and didn't make it. So I think I was haunted. I was a haunted little girl. I tried to kill myself when I was a kid, when I was still in grade school. I took a bunch of aspirin. It said pain relief and I thought, okay, this is what I want. And so I didn't have a choice. I was, in some ways, not having a choice was a lucky thing because I went into therapy very early. I managed to get, after leaving school without a diploma, I managed to weasel my way into

• 10:37Speaker 03

  college and had a really kind professor. And his wife kind of took me under their wing and urged me to go into therapy when I was 19. And So I was sitting in rooms, talking to, you know, codependent social workers, starting when I was a kid. And all of that helped, but I guess I've been really blessed with a lot of outside help. I'm a big, big fan of the mental health professional and librarians and English teachers and those kind souls you meet along the way.

• 11:10Tim Ferriss?

  So you have kind souls that you meet in person. You mentioned a few, and I want to talk more about weaseling into college in a few minutes. But I've read a lot about your reading, if that makes sense.

• 11:23Speaker 03

  Yeah, I read a lot. Yeah.

• 11:25Tim Ferriss?

  Some might envision in their minds, I, the childhood you described as a family of illiterates, nobody picked up anything other than People Magazine, but that was not the case.

• 11:36Speaker 03

  No, that's a huge advantage. Yeah.

• 11:38Tim Ferriss?

  Describe that a little bit. And also, if I could tag on an additional piece of that question, I've heard you describe finding and reading poetry as eucharistic. And I would love for you to just speak to that as well.

• 11:54Speaker 03

  Yeah, I started reading poetry when I was a little girl and I, you know, reading is socially sanctioned disassociation. You're, if, you know, if you can't, they won't let you drink or, you know, geez heroin when you're a little kid, but, but you can disappear down a valley of Winnie the Pooh or Charlotte's Web or, and in some ways, the poets I read, I think a lot of, I think poetry really captured me early. And my, my mother had, who was a painter, had gone to art school in New York and was enormously well-read. There were books all over my house in a place for the nearest bookstore. The bookstores in my town sold, you know, bibles as big as station wagons and, and, you know, little,

• 12:39Speaker 03

  little dashboard icons, but there weren't a lot of, there wasn't a lot of literature to buy. But I found a home in the, the little library was a three block walk from my house and I could disappear down the snowy valley of a book and I was somewhere else. And so, poetry saved my life. I mean, my best friends were poets. I, I think the way people worship saints and, you know, have crosses blessed, I felt that way. I, and if you think about the idea of the Eucharist, we weren't Catholic, we were atheists. My father was a union organizer and said, you know, church is a trick on poor people to, to get their money away from them. And my mother was a kind of Marxist lady who was very smart

• 13:23Speaker 03

  and, you know, just a loose, a little bit of a loose cannon. So, we were not churchy in the Bible Belt. And, um, yeah, you take some, when you read a poem, you know, you, you put it in the meat of your body. I mean, you're a body person. I'm a body person. I feel like you take somebody else's suffering into you and it changes you. It, it transforms you. I had this idea of being a poet, starting when I was five or six years old, that I wanted to be a poet. It was the strangest thing because there were no poets around. No one had ever, no one I knew had ever met a poet.

• 14:01Tim Ferriss?

  What was the feeling that elicited that desire? Was it just the tangible brilliance in some type of wordplay? Was it a kinesthetic reaction to the aesthetics of certain poets? What was it that produced that desire?

• 14:21Speaker 03

  Wow. You said it better than I could, Tim. You win. I mean, it's not a joke that I used the Riverside Shakespeare as a booster seat. That's literally what happened. I sat, when I had to reach the table, I sat on this giant edition of Shakespeare my mother had that was very water stained. And it was a, you know, a book that I read very early and I started memorizing, not Shakespeare poems, but the speeches from...

• 14:51Speaker 03

  Hamlet and Romeo and Juliet and Macbeth and, and Richard the Third. And I would memorize these speeches and say them to my, you know, hungover mother. And she liked it, you know? It was something she, I got her attention that way. She was a very, to say she was not nurturing. I mean, Lady Macbeth is probably not nurturing the way my mother was not nurturing. I mean, she, she was, her disinterest in being a mother was profound. Let's just put it that way. She once said to me when I was early, early on, when I was getting sober, I, she was supposed to watch my little boy, who was then a toddler, when I went to an AA meeting.

• 15:34Speaker 03

  I came back one day and she was like, she said, I can't keep him. He's just too, I mean, I was gone for an hour and a half. She said, I just don't do kids. And I was so mad. I said, mother, you had four children. What do you mean you don't do kids? You don't cook? You don't clean? You haven't had a job in 40 years? What exactly do you bring to the party? And she thought for a minute and she said, um, a lot of fun to be with. Yeah, I forgot to do anything for any other living human being, but I am fun to be with, which was not untrue. So I guess I had an aesthetic sense. She played music. She played opera. She played blues. Janis Joplin grew up in my hometown, or rather, I grew up in her hometown since she was older.

• 16:19Speaker 03

  Her brother would be in my high school carpool. So there was a lot of music I listened to. And I think poetry was part of that, the form, the shape. I, you know what it felt like, Tim? I felt less lonely. I was a lonely person. And I would read these poems and I felt like someone understands me. Someone knows what it feels like to occupy this body.

• 16:45Speaker 03

  And I remember trying to tell other little kids in my neighborhood about it, about poems that I liked. There's an E. E. Cummings poem I once tried to tell some girls about in my school. You know, it's just, "Spring and the world is mud luscious and the little lame balloon man whistles far and we and Eddie and Bill come running and it's spring and the world is a puddle wonderful and the goat-footed balloon man whistles far and we," something like that. I can't even remember it, but it's so long ago.

• 17:13Tim Ferriss?

  That's pretty good for not remembering.

• 17:14Speaker 03

  I can remember little bits of it, but I remember these girls in my school just going, "What are you talking about? Like, that doesn't make any sense." And I'm like, "What about it doesn't make any sense?" You know, it's about it's being spring and she's like, "Well, what is the mud luscious?" Like, that's not even a word. I mean, no, it's like muddy and luscious and delicious. And it's like, how is mud delicious? You know, it's like, I'm like, "No, like, y'all aren't getting it." And I thought they were messing with me. It seemed so obvious to me how great this was. So I learned to shut up about it very early, you know, by like, third, fourth grade, I learned, "Just don't,

• 17:57Speaker 03

  you like this stuff, nobody else. Your mother likes it, your sister likes it, your daddy likes it. Nobody else is gonna like it. You shut up."

• 18:04Tim Ferriss?

  One expression that I think was in The Art of Memoir, I've read it in other interviews, and again, I'm probably gonna paraphrase here, but that poetry should disturb the comfortable and comfort the disturbed.

• 18:18Speaker 03

  Yes, I wish that were my line. Isn't that a great line?

• 18:21Tim Ferriss?

  It's so good. Where is that from? Or do you recall where you learned it?

• 18:25Speaker 03

  Yes, I know vaguely where it's from, but I can't remember the guy's name. You can Google it. It's

• 18:30Tim Ferriss?

  We'll find it.

• 18:31Speaker 03

  Early 20th century, maybe 1920s to 1950 journalist guy. So, I'm sorry, I didn't, I don't cite him. I wish I could take credit for it. But, yeah, all art should disturb the comfortable and comfort the disturbed, and all therapy should, and most foods. You know, it's not a bad goal to shoot pork at the beginning of a day.

• 18:54Tim Ferriss?

  How did you weasel into college?

• 18:56Speaker 03

  How did I weasel into college?

• 18:58Tim Ferriss?

  If you could flashback, because I would imagine that there's some listeners like me who are just in their mind's eye, seeing this little girl sitting on Shakespeare and out of focus behind her head in the same kitchen are bullet holes in the tile. Imagining the experience and the experiences, although truly you endured some horrific, horrific things, but wondering how does someone in that position get into college?

• 19:32Speaker 03

  Well, really?

• 19:33Tim Ferriss?

  Especially when they're missing, at least based on some of my homework, for instance, 87 days of school in the sixth grade, things like this. How on earth does someone get into college? Was it your wielding of words and an essay that just unlocked it? Was it something else?

• 19:47Speaker 03

  I won an essay contest when I was in high school. I remember, I think it was from the National Council of Teachers of English. And I had some professors, actually, my, my mother had gone back to graduate school and got me a recommendation from this teacher of Chinese history who felt me up, sexually assaulted me in his office and then wrote me a recommendation. And so maybe that helped. Actually, what I think helped, when I look back on it, was I had, I opposed the Vietnam War and I wore black armbands on Moratorium Day. And, and that's the kind of thing that where I grew up, you know, I remember my coach,

• 20:29Speaker 03

  the football coach, pinning me up, physically, like pinning me up against the lockers by the front of my shirt and holding me against the lockers and threatening me essentially to take my black armband off. So I did things like I didn't stand up for the American flag. I mean, I don't know, I thought I was Colin Kaepernick or something. It didn't win me any friends, let me just say that. But I later found out, when I got to my school and I had a, had to have a lot of jobs to go there, because it was a private school, it was McAllister College, it wasn't, it was, it's a very good school. And I later found out that the assistant principal of my high school, who had thrown me out a lot for things like my skirt was too short, one time he threw me out for not

• 21:13Speaker 03

  having a bra on and I said, what makes you think I don't have a bra on? And then he called in the gym teacher to look under my shirt and confirm. In fact, I didn't have a bra. So I was just, I was a pain in his ass. And I later found out that he called McAllister and told these people in the admissions office that I was a bad citizen, that I wouldn't stand up for the pledge of allegiance and stuff. Well, they hear this old redneck assistant principal and they hear about this little girl who's doing this and they think, she sounds great.

• 21:43Tim Ferriss?

  She's perfect.

• 21:44Speaker 03

  Perfect. So I actually think my misbehavior that got me in so much trouble and made him hate me so much. I once had an algebra teacher reveal to me, he really is after you. Like, you're not paranoid. Like he's, he's really, he wants you out of here. And so I actually think, I don't know how I got in. I don't know how I got in. It was clearly a mistake. I made a D in art, you know, my senior year. And my mother was a painter. So I mean, all I had to do was slap art on something and I would get, have gotten, you know, a B. And I couldn't, I couldn't handle the pressure. It was too hard. So I don't know how I got

• 22:26Speaker 03

  to college. But once I got to college, I've got to say, I really, well, everybody else was complaining about their parents and the, you know, I don't know, that you, that you couldn't, weren't supposed to smoke pot in your, or whatever they were mad about. I was like, this is great. This is, all these people read books and they'll talk to you about them. And I made straight A's and I got a scholarship and it was just shocking to me that I might succeed at something, you know?

• 22:57Tim Ferriss?

  What about the environment? Aside from people who read books and are willing to listen, if it was the environment, maybe there are other variables led to the straight A's? Was it being outside of your home environment? Like, what was the recipe that contributed to that sort of conversion of sorts from D for defiant to straight A? Maybe you were still defiant, but you got straight A's?

• 23:19Speaker 03

  I wasn't defiant. I was, I wanted to please people. I mean, I think I had a lot of jobs. Like I had a job, I had one of those hairnet wearing jobs at the food service where I had to go in at like four in the morning and like cook scrambled eggs and wash dishes and stuff. And so I think in some ways I had to organize my time, but I had been living with a bunch of drug dealers before I went to college out in Southern California. We moved out there initially. We lived in cars and stuff. And then we got some, a couple of us were slinging dope, mostly pot and psychedelics, although one guy had robbed a drugstore.

• 23:57Speaker 03

  And it was just, it was, I hitch, was hitchhiking one day from Laguna Beach to San Clemente, where my friends were surfing, and I got picked up by a guy who really scared me. I thought he was gonna rape me and had to jump out on the side of the road. And it's interesting because there were six of us who lived in that house when I left home. And of the six, four went to jail and two of those were dead before they were 20.

• 24:29Speaker 03

  And only me and one other guy, my, who's still my best friend, Dooney, wound up getting sober. And we both kind of made it, quote unquote, him in construction in Southern California and me doing whatever it is that I'm supposed to be doing. So I was scared. I was scared by how dark things that I brought to darkness with me. You know, you get to Southern California from where I grew up and you're like, where has all this been? You know, everybody's orthodontured and, you know, you know, people's teeth are great and nobody's missing any digits or anything. They, nobody's, you know, everybody looks so amazing and everything's so beautiful.

• 25:10Speaker 03

  And you're like, God, I've never seen anything like this. Golly. And so you would think everything would have been great, but you know, as you know, when you have a lot of trauma growing up, you bring the darkness with you. So I had this idea after the, I was hitchhiking and I got scared. I had to jump out of this. I tried to, went to jump out of this guy's car. It was a Volkswagen and that had no backseat and had a bunch of garbage in it. And I pulled up on the handle of the door and it just went floppy round and round and round, like it was locked and I couldn't get out.

• 25:47Speaker 03

  And so the window was open, stuck open, wouldn't go up, wouldn't go down. And I stuck my arm out the side of the window and opened it from the outside and jumped out and went down this like embankment on the side of the road. And I was, I was really scared. I was, you know how those moments of trauma are. I was scared like I had been when I was a little kid and there were bullets flying around my house. And I thought, I know, you know, I'll go to college in Minnesota. And I mean, it's just, that was the other thing. Everybody in Minnesota is so damn nice. Have you ever been there?

• 26:21Tim Ferriss?

  I have, I have. Spent time there.

• 26:23Speaker 03

  It's just, I couldn't, I used to make a joke about, about my call, an unkind joke. I'd say, if you're not a virgin when you get here, you will be when you leave. It was just, everybody was so damn nice. Oh my God, I'd never seen such nice people in my life. And it's still, I got there and I did extremely well for two years and I won all these prizes. And then I dropped out. I couldn't handle the prosperity, you know, I couldn't handle the success. So I was a long way, it took me a while to finally start getting sober, I guess. I guess that was a lot of my problem.

• 26:59Tim Ferriss?

  Which we will definitely talk about. I want to dig into that. And I also am going to ask you, just to plant a seed about how those mentors initially convinced you to go to therapy. But first, I want to bounce around chronologically.

• 27:15Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 27:16Tim Ferriss?

  Because from these origins, I've, in the process of doing my homework, read about your graduate seminar at Syracuse described as hyper selective. And you're certainly a writer and poet of great note at this point, right? Lots of people know who you are, lots of people love your work, lots of people love you describing the craft and process that goes into your work. How do you select the students who make it into your graduate seminar? Or how did you?

• 27:50Speaker 03

  I mean, I do it. It's I wish I wish they would just give me a wand and I got to pick all my people. But interestingly, I've been teaching there, gosh, 30 years, something like that. I only teach in the fall and I go and I commute and from New York City. So we do it based on the work. We do it solely based on the writing. And, you know, some years, George Saunders, my colleague, George Saunders, had gotten so, has gotten so famous that, you know, he attracts a lot of people and have a lot of people who teach there are through flowers. Juno Diaz has taught there. We just, we have gotten up to, you know, 1,200 applications for 12 positions.

• 28:37Tim Ferriss?

  Just a quick thanks to one of our sponsors and we'll be right back to the show. This episode is brought to you by Wealthfront. Did you know if you missed 10 of the best performing days after the 2008 crisis, you would have missed out on 50%, 5-0% of your returns? Don't miss out on the best days in the market. Stay invested in a long-term automated investment portfolio. Wealthfront pioneered the automated investing movement, sometimes referred to as robo-advising, and they currently oversee $20 billion of assets for their clients. Wealthfront can help you diversify your portfolio, minimize fees, and lower your taxes. Takes about three minutes to sign up, and then Wealthfront will build you a globally diversified portfolio of ETFs based on your risk appetite and manage it for you at an incredibly low

• 29:20Tim Ferriss?

  cost. Wealthfront software constantly monitors your portfolio day in and day out, so you don't have to. They look for opportunities to rebalance and tax loss harvest to lower the amount of taxes you pay on your investment gains. Their newest service is called Autopilot, and it can monitor any checking account for excess cash to move into savings or an investment account. They've really thought of a ton. They've checked a lot of boxes. Smart investing should not feel like a roller coaster ride. Let the professionals do the work for you. Go to wealthfront.com/tim and open a Wealthfront investment account today, and you'll get your first $5,000 managed for free for life. That's wealthfront.com/tim. Wealthfront will automate your investments for the long term, and you can get started today at wealthfront.com/tim.

• 30:07Tim Ferriss?

  You end up with these 12 gems of assorted colors and kinds.

• 30:14Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 30:14Tim Ferriss?

  What is day one, class one, what does that look like?

• 30:17Speaker 03

  Oh, you're thinking when I teach my memoir class. Yeah, well, I used to do, I used to do this thing. Yeah, that's so funny. I used to do this thing where I would stage a fight in my class with someone who was opposite from me. And so let's say, you know, like my colleague, George Saunders, who is just the sweetest guy, I can't even tell you. I was in the car with him once and there was a bug on his shirt and I was like, George, there's a big beetle on your shirt. And he'd be like, well, he has to be somewhere.

• 30:53Speaker 03

  You know, I'd be like, kill it. And he's like this Tibetan Buddhist with this amazing practice, you know, just the sweetest guy. So George comes in and starts arguing with me that my classroom is in fact his classroom.

• 31:09Tim Ferriss?

  This is in front of all the students?

• 31:11Speaker 03

  In front of all the students. And it's for them, it's the first day of school and it's like having their parents fight. And I script it so that I say only nice conciliatory things. I back up, he walks forward, he's bigger than I am. And then it ends with him like throwing the papers up and, you know, telling me to go fuck myself or something. And or telling me to go hang, maybe, I don't know if you can say the F word. Can you say the F word?

• 31:37Tim Ferriss?

  F word is not only allowed, but endorsed.

• 31:40Speaker 03

  Okay, good.

• 31:41Tim Ferriss?

  I grew up on Long Island. You're in good company.

• 31:43Speaker 03

  I feel so much better. Just telling me to go fuck myself. And then we ask the students to write. So let's say there are 17, 18 students in this class, 20, somewhere between 15 and 22. And they're all smart and they're all young. They were all incredibly juiced on adrenaline and cortisol because they were scared and it's a public scene and they don't really know each other that well and they don't know us that well. So they're all extremely alert. They're hyper vigilant. And we ask them to write down what happens and everybody writes something just a little different. Interestingly, people will describe me in very aggressive terms.

• 32:27Speaker 03

  Like even though I'm the one backing up and I'm saying, "Well, I can clear out during the break, George, but like, I don't understand why you're so upset." And he'll say, "You don't understand why I'm so..." I mean, and he walks forwards and I'm backing up and my head is down and I'm doing every conciliatory gesture I can think of. And people will say, "You know, she stood her ground like a bulldog," or "She had military strength facing off against him." And one year I did it with my student assistant, who was an undergraduate, just a beautiful young track star, Betsy. You know, Betsy just threw her papers up in the air and was screeching at me.

• 33:09Speaker 03

  "Well, you know, she's this kid and here I am, this professor with, you know, fancy clothes in a position of power." So people would, in that class of undergraduates, assume that I had done horrible things to Betsy that had... In one class, there was a young woman, one of the ruses I set up is that I leave my cellphone on so I can start to argue with George before he comes in and then ask the students, you know, "How often did he call? How long between each call?" And ask them to guess things or remember things about time. And some people, "He calls three times." Some people will say, "He called once." Some people, "Four times."

• 33:49Speaker 03

  So all those details are very influenced by who they are. The young woman with sickle cell anemia will have this enormous compassion for me because I'll say, "I have to leave my phone on. I'm waiting for medical results." And she'll assume I'm waiting to hear if I have some awful ailment. And she sees George as a complete beast and me as this woman, perhaps ill, who dragged herself to class, while everybody else in the class thinks, "What a diva. She's answering her phone in the middle of class. She can't wait an hour to get medical results." I mean, come on. So... There are always people in in class who have identic, you know, have those perfect memories. I remember one kid,

• 34:34Speaker 03

  often they're musicians. This kid was a jazz saxophone player who was very famous in Brooklyn for giving these amazing house parties. I think he made a living giving house parties for like, I don't know, years. So this kid had this amazing memory. He got, we had a script and he remembered the script exactly. He remembered what George had on. He remembered where we stood. He remembered that I backed up every step. And then when he wrote it, he wrote it exactly as it happened. He didn't miss anything. And he said, George was the aggressor, but I wonder what she'd done to make him act that way. I guess the purpose of the exercise is for you to realize that you remember through a filter

• 35:19Speaker 03

  of who you are. Memory is not a computer. It's not a perfect storage system. Obviously, we, even these fine minds of these young people, very alert and paying attention in their first class and wanting to get everything right and do well, misremember. And what's more, what I want them to think about is how they are not just perceiving things, but beaming the world, the landscape into being with whoever they are inside. It's important as a writer of anything to realize what kind of filters you're strapping on that prevents you from seeing what's going on.

• 35:59Tim Ferriss?

  I would imagine that is an opening exercise that a lot of your students remember, speaking of memory, for a very, very long time. What other exercises or aspects of your teaching, it could be in in any setting, do many of your students remember or have stick out for them, would you imagine?

• 36:23Speaker 03

  I think a lot of practice things, a lot of, I think it's important as a writer or as in anything to develop, you know, habits. I mean, you talk about this and. For our body, for our work week, you've developed a lot of practices in your life to shape your life so that you were kind of operating, you know, to constantly be growing and developing. And so, things like keeping a commonplace book, just keeping a notebook where you write down beautiful pieces of language.

• 36:54Tim Ferriss?

  What is a commonplace book? That is where you capture the sort of beautiful turns of phrase that you encounter?

• 37:00Speaker 03

  Yeah, things you read. So you might copy poems, you might copy, "Over here is something you overheard on the street." There was a guy standing on my street, this is like a couple of years ago, when I first moved into this apartment, screaming murder or suicide at the top of his lungs. And everybody was walking around the street, walking around him. And it was early in the morning, and I walked up to him and I said, "Excuse me, sir." He was screaming murder or suicide, murder or suicide. And I went up to him and

• 37:37Speaker 03

  said, "Sir, isn't there like a third alternative? Like, isn't there a door number three?" And that little encounter I wrote down, but, but things I overheard-

• 37:51Tim Ferriss?

  Well, hold on, hold on, that's too much of a cliffhanger. So what happened when you said that?

• 37:55Speaker 03

  Well, you know what was beautiful? I went into, I was going in to get a pastry for a friend of mine who was visiting from London. I got him one. I thought I'd bring him a pastry when I came out. But when I walked into the bakery, he was looking at the sky, you know, with a curious look. You know, he was thinking, like, "Isn't there a door, isn't there a door number three? Isn't there another, gosh, what might just be a door number three?" But mostly, what I write down are pieces of language, or things, poems that I read, paragraphs, anything, so that you're just constantly copying. In

• 38:36Speaker 03

  longhand, you can't type it, you're, you're constantly copying things that are beautiful, you're constantly guzzling beauty, you're guzzling the beautiful language, so that you're kind of steeped in it, you know, like a fruitcake and good, and good brandy.

• 38:56Tim Ferriss?

  Is the value of the commonplace book and using it this way in the writing down? Or do you have some approach to review or using that later?

• 39:11Speaker 03

  You know, I occasionally, I mean, the great thing about them is that if you get on an airplane or you're going along, you sort of know what you're reading. But I've also been doing this. A poet named Stanley Kunitz, who was a poet laureate in like 1978 or something, told me to do this. So I've been doing this since 1978. Also, every time I give a lecture, I put the quotes I use in the lecture on on index cards. And so I have like, you know, I've been teaching for 40 years. I mean, I have 40 years of index cards with quotes on them. It's oddly satisfying. I don't know what it is. It's but it's just like it's like a sit up you do. It's like a push up you do. It's something you don't really,

• 39:54Speaker 03

  I often don't look back on. I think it's in the writing down. I think it's in the practice and kind of it's like an altar. You're making an altar for yourself every day.

• 40:06Tim Ferriss?

  You know, I wanted to might as well use this as a segue. Alter. Could you speak to the importance or utility of prayer in your life?

• 40:17Speaker 03

  Yeah, I mean, I'm a prayerer. I was an atheist my whole life and I got sober in 1989. And believe me, I drank my share. I did my part. I remember some guy I went to high school with telling me I was when my mother was still alive, I was home. And he says, You don't even you don't even drink anymore. You don't even smoke pot. I was like, No, Jack Lannan, I, I don't, I don't do that stuff anymore. It's like, Why? I was like, Well, it just didn't agree with me. You know, it made me do things I didn't want to do. And he says, I just think you're a quitter.

• 40:54Speaker 03

  I just think you're a quitter. I just think you gave up. I mean, what is smoking pot gonna do? You're never gonna like rob anybody's television or anything. He said, well, that's true. That's true enough, Jack Lander. But you have had this job pumping gas since the 11th grade.

• 41:10Tim Ferriss?

  Please tell me this guy's name was actually Jack Lander.

• 41:15Speaker 03

  His name was Jack. We called him Jack Lander because of a sad tooth thing he had. And because we were not ones to stand on ceremony. And he said, I said, you have had this job since the 11th grade and you're 50 years old and you have an ambition deficit disorder. By my yardstick. So, no, but he would say, Jack Lander, he'd say, don't call me that no more. I'm like, what do you want me to call you? Like, that's your name, dude. That's been your name since you were 15. That's your name.

• 41:49Tim Ferriss?

  What does prayer look like for you? What is praying?

• 41:52Speaker 03

  Well, I think it started off, I think poems are my first prayers, the ones that I read. Like I said, I felt less lonely. So I started praying not out of any virtue, not, I didn't believe in God. I had no, I had no religious training whatsoever. When I was a little girl, you know, people would say, would talk about Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny. I thought they were kidding. I thought they don't really believe this horseshit. I mean, you know, I knew, I figured out pretty early on, you know, by the time I was like seven, six or seven, people were serious. They prayed when people weren't looking at them. I couldn't believe it. It was shocking to me. And daddy would say, well, you know,

• 42:33Speaker 03

  folks ignorant, you know, what you gonna do? So I had not a religious bone in my body, but I did notice when I tried to stop drinking that I couldn't, like, like that I tried to stop drinking for two or three years. And I tried by myself and I tried drinking only beer and I tried drinking only alone. I tried drinking only with other people and I tried drinking only wine. I tried drinking with food. I tried drinking, you know, weekends, I mean, I just somehow I had crossed some line where I just couldn't, I couldn't stop drinking. And I went to get help and I went to sat in church basements and I hated everybody I saw who was sober. I just hated them. They just seemed like, you know, the guy selling incense at the airport.

• 43:18Speaker 03

  I just didn't like them. Um, they just didn't look fun and I just, they were so nice too. It was like getting to Minnesota. They're, hi, you know, welcome. I'd be like, oh God, I hate these people. And finally, the last time I drank, the last night I drank, I had gotten, I'd gotten together for like, it was the longest amount of time sober I'd had since I was 15 and I'd gotten together 90 days sober by going and, you know, sitting in church basements and talking to people who were sober. And I got a 90 day chip and then I had to give this talk. I had to give a poetry reading at Harvard.

• 43:53Tim Ferriss?

  Sorry to interrupt, just since I don't have much familiarity, when you say 90 day chip, is that some like literal token that you were given?

• 44:00Speaker 03

  It's, it looks like a poker chip. And so like you get one, the first day you go and then you get one at 30 days and, and 60 days and 90 days. So this was for me, an epic accomplishment. I mean, there was no time that I ever ran the 100 yard dash in that was as important to me as that 90 day chip. And I was happy that I was sober. I felt better. I was sleeping better. My kid was better. Everything was better. And I had to give this poetry reading at Harvard College and I didn't, I was nervous. I'd never given a reading without drinking. The reading went okay. I, I was teaching at a bunch of places, including one class there and I went out with some of my students and the next thing I know, it's three o'clock in the morning and I'm, my

• 44:45Speaker 03

  car's spinning out on Store Drive and, in Boston and, and I'm going towards this concrete and I somehow didn't crash the car and I somehow got home and. And so, at that point, everybody had been saying, you know, "Gotta get on your knees and pray." And there was this great heroin addict, recovering heroin addict, Janice, at this halfway house where I did volunteer work. I drove people to meetings, basically, and would pick people up and drive them to meetings. A lot of disabled people. And Janice said, "Just get on your knees." And I'm like, "Janice, you know, I don't... What kind of God wants me to grovel and go,

• 45:26Speaker 03

  'Oh, God, you're so great, ooh.'" And she said, "You don't do it for God, you asshole." In that Boston accent, "You don't do it for God, you asshole." I'm like, "Well, who am I doing it for?" She's like, "You're doing it for yourself. Just get on your knees. Just say, 'Help me stay sober.'" In the morning, "Get on your knees." And I'd say, "Thank you for helping me stay sober." And so, I'd be like, "Okay." So, I'd get on my knees, "Help me stay sober." And at night, I'd say, "Thank you for helping me stay sober." Well, some weird thing started to happen. I mean, sometimes I would literally shoot the finger at the light fixture because I just thought, "I hate this." You know what's terrifying about praying is the loneliness of it. I always tell people,

• 46:08Speaker 03

  young women I sponsor, "You show more faith praying when you have never prayed before than any nun. To sit in that silence with all your fears and all your self-doubt is so scary and hard. If you have a big loud head like I do, and like, I have a big inner life, and my mind never has anything good to say. It thinks it can kill me and go on living without me." Something started to happen. I would have these moments of quiet. And the only way I can describe it is it was south of my neck. It was like in the

• 46:48Speaker 03

  middle of my chest. If I was living my life with my head like yammering at me like a chihuahua all day, "Do this, don't that, stupid bitch. Put that down. Pick that up. Go over there." I mean, it was just...

• 47:03Speaker 03

  Eat this, don't eat that, call him, I hate him. You know, like, just these moments, like, in the middle of my chest would be like this broad expanse of quiet. And I remember one particular day, our little shitty car broke down. My kid was a toddler and he was, I had to pee, we were on the road. I didn't break down, I had a flat and didn't have a spare, a working spare. It was rush hour, we were on Memorial Drive, we were trying to get home. And I just, in that moment, what I normally would have done, you know, I would have been there, you know, like, throwing the jack around and trying to get the car jacked up and in a state of indignant fury that, I didn't believe in God, but I believed that

• 47:47Speaker 03

  there was fate that had doomed me to misery and that the guy with the Jaguar would always get my parking place right before I pulled in. And I believed, I had a head that had memorized the bad news and spewed it out all day. And I remember that day, it was, the sun was setting, I just got out on the side of the road, I got Deb out of his car seat and the sun was going down and he was looking at me afraid that I was gonna be, like, angry. And I just sat there and he said, he was hungry and I didn't have anything to eat in the car and I'm sitting there and I said, "Let's just look at the sunset a minute and then we'll, we'll go, we'll walk and we'll get some help."

• 48:29Speaker 03

  And we were just sitting there looking at the sunset and this truck pulls up with these Goomba guys from, from this 12-step meeting. And they have ginger ale, they have a jack, they have a way to tow my car, they give Deb potato chips and it was just like, you know, all I have to do is just find some space in my body and just wait for a minute. And so I started to notice things happening when I wasn't, been over the day like a dog over, like, a bone that was about to be stolen.

• 49:13Speaker 03

  You know, like, that, when I could just, I could just, like, sit there for a moment. And so I began to get a space in my body and I began to get...

• 49:26Speaker 03

  I began to hear, not the voice of God, I would call it, I would have some leanings, like I would be thinking, I should have just killed myself. Like, literally, this is what I'd be, I should have killed myself. My husband would marry some nice girl who wore berets, and my son would have this great mother, and, and his life would be better if I weren't there. And I would hear this voice in my head that was like, you need a sandwich. Why don't you get a sandwich? Like, it would, it would, it would, why don't you make yourself, like, the biggest sandwich you can make? And I'd be like, ooh, great idea. Like, I just started to have these small, good ideas, that were not like anything

• 50:07Speaker 03

  I'd ever heard when I was afraid before. Yeah, then I had all these crazy spiritual experiences, and, like, one of the things, I had this great sponsor, Joan the Bone, God, I loved her, she was so great. She was the kind of girl who lived in Alaska and would go to the bar when it was like fifty below in a tutu. She was just like a badass. Like, she was just, and she was a Harvard social theorist, too, I gotta tell you, she was just, all that-

• 50:35Tim Ferriss?

  Joan the Bone.

• 50:36Speaker 03

  Joan the Bone, all that, and a bowl of biscuits, yeah.

• 50:39Tim Ferriss?

  Sounds like a, a mobster. What is the, what's, what's the origin of the name? Do you have any idea?

• 50:44Speaker 03

  I just called her that, that was my nickname for her, Joan the Bone.

• 50:47Tim Ferriss?

  I see, I see, alright.

• 50:48Speaker 03

  Joan the Bone. And Joan would tell me things like, I was such an ingrate, she'd say, you have to make a gratitude list. And so, she'd call me and say, what's on your gratitude list? I would say, I have all my limbs. She'd say, no, okay, here's what you're gonna do. You're gonna make a gratitude list every day this month, for every letter of the alphabet, and you're gonna call me and read it to me. I said, shut the fuck up, I'm not gonna do that. She's like, yes, you are, or else, you know, like, I won't talk to you anymore. I'd be like, okay. So, I just started trying, I just started try, instead of sitting there with my arms crossed, and my lower lip stuck out, and my baseball cap pulled down over my eyes, I just started trying shit that people who were happier than me suggested I should try.

• 51:33Speaker 03

  It was so simple. And I started to get a sense. And so one of the things I said to her, she said, "You've got to pray for what you want." What are you praying for? I said, "I pray to stand it." Yeah, not to kill myself, not to-

• 51:46Tim Ferriss?

  To stand it.

• 51:47Speaker 03

  To stand it, just to get through the fucking day. That's what I'm praying for. And she said, "Okay, well, you've got to pray for what you want. What do you want?" I said, "I made $9,000 this year. I would like some money, please." She said, "Well, why don't you pray for money?" I'm like, "You can't pray for that." She's like, "Well, why not?" I said, "Okay." So I would literally get on my knees in the morning and say, "Keep me sober. I would like some money."

• 52:13Speaker 03

  I'm not even making this up. And I would get on my knees and say, "Thank you for keeping me sober. I would still like some money." Three weeks later, after I started, this is a true story, and you can look it up, I get a phone call from a guy who says he's from this foundation. He's giving me $35,000 that I'd never applied for or asked for, that somebody just put me up for. And I so thought it was, I thought it was my friend George playing a trick on me and says, "You know, fuck you, George." And I hang the phone up. And the guy calls back and he asks me on, you know, the speakerphone, you can hear people laughing maniacally. So I've never gotten money from prayer again. But, but, and then Joan of the Vine says, "Well, you must believe that

• 52:56Speaker 03

  there's some sort of God." I was like, "No, because they, they were meeting to give me that prize before I had stopped drinking and started praying." And she said, "Jesus Christ." And I would also talk to her all the time. She would say, "How can there be a God? Because look at the Holocaust." How do, she's like, "God didn't do the Holocaust. People did the Holocaust." Like, "What are you mad at God for? People did that. God didn't do it. That has nothing to do with God." So that's how my prayer life started. It's a bizarre story.

• 53:25Tim Ferriss?

  I like bizarre. So Ignatian exercises. Does that mean anything to you?

• 53:31Speaker 03

  Yes, yes. I became a Catholic. I became a Catholic. And I do something, I practice a kind of spirituality called Ignatian spirituality, which when you become a Jesuit, you go away to the Jesuit place, or the Jesuit making place. So you do a, you, you go to Jesuit school, and then they put, give you this 30-day, these 30-day exercises. And the purpose of the exercises is to find God in all things.

• 54:01Speaker 03

  So like this election. She's just turned around to look at my screen to see if we had a new president. So this election, for instance.

• 54:10Tim Ferriss?

  Just a side note, somebody just sent me a text before we started recording and said the entire country has electile dysfunction, which I thought was pretty clever.

• 54:21Speaker 03

  Why didn't I think of that? Oh, my God, that's so great.

• 54:26Tim Ferriss?

  That was a clever turn of phrase, yes.

• 54:28Speaker 03

  Oh, my God. No, it really is.

• 54:30Tim Ferriss?

  So finding God in all things.

• 54:32Speaker 03

  Finding God in all things. So that means, you know, like when the car breaks down, instead of thinking, you know, your cruel fate, you know, has come to hurt you. So what you do actually, Tim, is in the morning, I do a prayer and meditation thing for 20 minutes where I do like centering prayer for maybe, I don't know, five, six, seven minutes, and then I read a scripture and I meditate on the scripture. And then I have a bunch of people I pray for. I have a list of people I pray for and things I pray for. Then at night, I do something called the examine of conscience where you, it's not like going over your day, making a list of good things that happened or whatever, and then repenting for the bad things.

• 55:16Speaker 03

  It sounds like that, but it's not that. What it is, is you kind of press play on the recorder of your day. So you think, I woke up and so what did I do? Where was I? What mindset was I in? And you close your eyes and you try to review your day, literally like you're watching a movie. And moments where you see moments of grace or luck, or even something, you know, a good sandwich, something yummy to eat, or you're supposed to savor those moments and occupy those moments. And it's a very...

• 55:55Speaker 03

  It's a very body oriented exercise. You're supposed to smell. What do you smell? What do you hear? What do you taste? How do your clothes feel? You're supposed to really recreate that moment in a sensory way. And thank God for the grace or the gift of that. And then you, you kind of press play again and you see moments where you turned away from God or you, you didn't, your best self didn't act and you say, I want to do better next time. You know, instead of snapping at the robo call voice, snapping at Siri because she doesn't

• 56:37Speaker 03

  understand me, I love me for myself alone, you know, to just, ah, you know, I wish I were, you know, tomorrow I'd like to be more patient. Help me to be more patient. So what it does is it made those moments of gratitude. And I also keep kind of a list or journal of those things and a prayer journal, a daily. I don't keep a journal, journal, but I keep a daily prayer journal and, and I just will kind of highlight some of those things. Like for me today, right now, Steve Kornacki's haircut, which I know he does himself. I don't know, the guy who delivers the big map thing on MSNBC. I just like the guy.

• 57:21Speaker 03

  I just like him. Every time I see him, I feel like I'm spending the night at my girlfriend's house and, and he's her nerdy brother who's like secretly hot.

• 57:30Tim Ferriss?

  I had this flash of panic. So I was like, oh, fuck, here's somebody important. I'm not saying he's unimportant, but I'm just saying, oh God, here's another name that I have to pretend I know because I'm on the podcast.

• 57:41Speaker 03

  He's the guy who delivers the darn, you know, what the electoral map says on MSNBC. So if you're a liberal, you're like a nut and you watch this way. Other people watch other things. So he's this really nerdy kind of math goop guy who wears like khakis and a really like a clip on tie and has this really bad haircut. And I just have a complete crush on him. I just crush him. I don't even like young men. I don't. I really don't. You have to have some, you know, you have to have some hair coming out of yours for me to want to date you, but this guy just does it for me. I just like him. I just like him.

• 58:20Tim Ferriss?

  So wait a second. Tie that together for me. Is that, does that have anything to do with the prayer journal?

• 58:25Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 58:25Tim Ferriss?

  Or were you just confessing that? Oh, okay.

• 58:27Speaker 03

  No, no, it's, it's, I have a crush on a ton of this guy who's on TV every day and it tickles me to see him. It's kind of a little thrill. It's a little thrill to see him. It really is. It's so stupid, but it's also, it makes me feel like a child. It makes me feel like, like I'm in junior high school. And so there's something innocent and sweet about it. Also, the fact that he's so dorky, I like. I just like that.

• 58:52Tim Ferriss?

  So you have a prayer journal?

• 58:53Speaker 03

  I do.

• 58:54Tim Ferriss?

  You have the commonplace journal?

• 58:55Speaker 03

  Right.

• 58:56Tim Ferriss?

  Do you have any other journals?

• 58:57Speaker 03

  No, that's it.

• 58:59Tim Ferriss?

  Those are the two.

• 59:00Speaker 03

  The prayer journal, I don't really, I, I only write, like actually write and I, it's mostly kind of looks like a list. Do you know what I'm saying?

• 59:08Tim Ferriss?

  I do.

• 59:08Speaker 03

  It's mostly like a list of things, like the lady, uh, the lady at my drugstore who, my pharmacist, who, uh, they were all out of, you know, the pneumonia vaccine. I get pneumonia a lot and she went out of her way to call me and say, you know, I got you the pneumonia. If you can come in right now, that we had a cancellation, I, you know, I can do the, just kindnesses, moments of kindness, but also moments of presence and awareness of God. A lot of people feel it in nature. I feel a little bit in Central Park, which is all the nature I have. You're out in-

• 59:46Tim Ferriss?

  I am currently in Austin, Texas, which is home base for me.

• 59:50Speaker 03

  Shut the front door.

• 59:52Tim Ferriss?

  Yeah, I've been here for three years. I live in the Republic of Austin.

• 59:56Speaker 03

  Love it.

• 59:57Tim Ferriss?

  Slash Republic of Texas. One of my favorite T-shirts, not everyone's going to get this, but is a shirt with the Texas flag, which says, "Most likely to succeed."

• 1:00:11Tim Ferriss?

  Which I quite like. Yes. So I'm in Texas.

• 1:00:14Speaker 03

  How did you wind up down there?

• 1:00:15Tim Ferriss?

  Would argue that I'm not in Texas.

• 1:00:18Speaker 03

  Of course. Yeah, I know. Right? Listen, do you have a weapon? If you have a weapon, you belong.

• 1:00:23Tim Ferriss?

  I do.

• 1:00:24Speaker 03

  Dog, it good for you. What do you have? Can I ask? Can we talk weapons?

• 1:00:27Tim Ferriss?

  As far as weapons? Yeah, sure. I have a seven millimeter wind mag hunting rifle. I have a Glock 34, which is a nine millimeter handgun.

• 1:00:38Speaker 03

  I know what a nine milli-

• 1:00:39Tim Ferriss?

  I'll you know what it is, of course. I'm not explaining it for you. I'm explaining it just like getting on your knees. Not for, not for God, it's for you. I'm explaining to the listeners. So nine millimeter Glock 34, I have an M and P 45 and a few other-

• 1:00:57Speaker 03

  Do you hunt?

• 1:00:58Tim Ferriss?

  Firearms that I don't use much. I hunt, but infrequently. And that started in 2012. I always had a very negative association with hunting. I just given my exposure to it.

• 1:01:11Speaker 03

  Kind of a great thing.

• 1:01:12Tim Ferriss?

  Yeah, I had a very negative association because I saw very irresponsible-

• 1:01:17Speaker 03

  Of course.

• 1:01:17Tim Ferriss?

  Hunting on Long Island. Yep. And then in the process of working on The Four Hour Chef and learning to forage, I felt it was incumbent upon me to hunt and if I were to consume animal protein. So I had my first deer hunt with an incredible hunter and conservationist named Steve Rennella. And that really completely shifted my lens on how ethical and responsible hunting could be. Now, in Texas, you have the whole spectrum from responsible to, you know, machine gunning hogs from helicopters, which I do not partake in, although people could argue it's an invasive species, et cetera, et cetera.

• 1:02:01Tim Ferriss?

  But yes, so I do hunt infrequently, probably, you know, let's just call it once every year or two.

• 1:02:07Speaker 03

  You know, those javelina hogs are fun to shoot. I'm sorry to say it. I'm embarrassed to say it, but I have shot a javelina hog. So I'm anti-gun but pro-hunting.

• 1:02:20Speaker 03

  So does that make sense?

• 1:02:22Tim Ferriss?

  It does. I mean, I'm just imagining these kind of backwood kiwis in New Zealand hunting hogs with knives, walking into the woods barefoot, which is a real thing. I know one guy who did that. So you can be pro hunting while being anti-gun. I think that's possible.

• 1:02:39Speaker 03

  No, but I mean, if I were to hunt, I would hunt with a gun. But I'm, it's funny. One of my best friends is a young writer named Phil Lamarche, who's one of those guys who stocks his freezer with bow and arrow kill venison. And he called me this week and said of very interest, he'd just killed his deer. And he said, you know, the longer I hunt, you know, the only thing I hate about it is the killing.

• 1:03:02Tim Ferriss?

  I think there's, there's a lot of shared sentiment to that by a lot of hunters.

• 1:03:10Speaker 03

  I mean, the most reverent people I know about the natural world are practicing, many of them are practicing hunters.

• 1:03:20Tim Ferriss?

  True fact. Well, I want to use this to tie a bunch of things together in the most awkward fashion possible.

• 1:03:28Speaker 03

  That's okay.

• 1:03:29Tim Ferriss?

  Because I've been, been trying to force fit a segue somewhere. So I might as well do it here.

• 1:03:32Speaker 03

  Yeah, do it.

• 1:03:33Tim Ferriss?

  And, and that is to hear your description or explanation of how some of your wordsmithing came to be. Part of what I enjoy so much about your writing is that you have this, let me get this right, time critic Lev Grossman said in his review of Lit, Carr seems to have been born with the inability to write a dishonest or boring sentence. That's high praise. Now,

• 1:04:00Speaker 03

  Love him.

• 1:04:01Tim Ferriss?

  The least, the least boring sentence is for me. And God, I wish I could remember it. But you take this, what seems like this sensitivity to language and poetry to create sentences using cat shit sandwich metaphors and so on, which also seems to me, and maybe this is, you tell me if this is warranted or not, but to be a very kind of Texan thing also. It kind of makes me think of like a trial lawyer in God knows where in Texas, right? Who gets up and just demolishes some slick trial attorney from Los Angeles in a complete mismatch, right? I mean, just dismantle someone with these really clever

• 1:04:45Tim Ferriss?

  Turns of phrase, where does that come from? Or how did that develop in you? Because I do think it is one of your, one of your superpowers.

• 1:04:52Speaker 03

  Well, I think growing up in Texas is it's a storytelling culture. You know, I, Texas idiom is poetry as far as I'm concerned. And I had two great practitioners. I'm a seventh generation Texan. On my mother's side and fifth generation of my daddy. So my daddy was a great barroom storyteller. I mean, he was, he was a labor union organizer for the oil chemical and atomic workers local 12, 1242. And he was just funny as a crutch and told these amazing kind of tall tales like out of, out of Mark Twain. But he also spoke in poetry, like he would say, like a woman with an ample behind,

• 1:05:35Speaker 03

  he'd say, she has a butt like two bulldogs fighting in a bag. And for him, that was a compliment. There was nothing insulting about that, that he, he used to call me, I'm a little skinny thing. He used to call me a gimlet ass. Pokie, you need, you need some taller on that ass. You need, you need, you got you a gimlet ass. I don't even know what that is, but I knew it wasn't good. A little flat butt. Or he would say, it's raining like a cow pissing on a flat rock. You can scan that, by the way. It's raining like a cow pissing on a flat rock. It's, it's.

• 1:06:13Tim Ferriss?

  Wait, what do you mean by scan? Real quick, what do you mean by that?

• 1:06:16Speaker 03

  Like, like Shakespeare is iambic pentameter. Or my first love poem that was ever written to me. I saw you on your horse today. Your eyes like eggs, your hair like hay. That's like, it's iambic pentameter. It's da, da, da, da, da, da. So that, that's, it doesn't matter what it is, but you can hear it when I say it, right? That it's raining like a cow pissing on a flat rock. And that you hit that flat rock. It creates, for one thing, it creates a whole landscape in which cows piss on flat rocks. And people stand around and marvel and go, my goodness, looky at that. And then you attribute that to the rain. It's, it's a metaphor.

• 1:07:01Speaker 03

  It operates way beyond the bounds of propriety. It's not how you talk in church. You're not supposed to talk like this. So the minute you say this and somebody laughs at it. You have them. They're in your boat. They have transgressed by laughing at your joke. Well, Daddy was just the master of a story, but he was also a poetic imagery. I mean, to me, that poetry, I grew up, I was steeped in it. My mother, who was an enormous reader, who read, you know, everything, Chinese history and Russian novels and philosophy and just read everything, was just the master of,

• 1:07:45Speaker 03

  you know, I remember when she was dying, somebody, she had all these old men who were always trying to marry her, which, why, but she's dying, she's actively dying, and one of these old boyfriends has come to see her at the hospital in Houston, and the nurse, Ben Soper, and says, "Miss Carr, your husband's here to see you." And she says, "Well, he must look like shit. He's been dead 20 years." And, you know, I mean, she just, she just, she just can't stop herself from saying like the most horrible thing you've ever thought. And so I think between the two of them, and just growing up in Texas, the idiom, the language I grew up with, is epically beautiful.

• 1:08:30Speaker 03

  And the need to not be boring when you speak, you know, people will, "I'm gonna stomp a mud hole in your ass." That is so much better than "I'm gonna whip your ass." It's just like, yeah, right. My friend Dooney got in a fight once with a guy in a bar, and the guy said, and he told the greatest story about it. It was actually the guy he decided to stab. He went out in his truck and got a knife and came back with like a Swiss Army knife. And he starts chasing this guy, who was a state congressman, by the way, I won't tell you his name, but he starts chasing him around this bar. Well, to brandish a weapon in a place where alcohol is served is mandatory, I think 10

• 1:09:13Speaker 03

  year sentence, 7, 10, some big, you know, it's frowned upon. And he's chasing this guy around, and what somebody says to Dooney at one point, "That's a little bitty old knife you got there." He said, "Well, notice he don't wanna get stabbed by it."

• 1:09:29Speaker 03

  And then he runs out and then we hear the sirens. So here comes the say, here comes all the woo, woo. Then he runs out, he gets in his truck and one of those mall cops, security guys runs out and Dooney says, he stands in front of my truck, in front of my headlights. He's got a belt buckle that will pick up HBO. And he, he holds his hands up and goes, halt, halt. And Dooney just puts it in first gear and hits the guy. I mean, he doesn't hit him hard, but he knocks him down and then leaves and gets pulled over and is convinced he's going to prison for brandishing this weapon for trying to hit

• 1:10:12Speaker 03

  this guy. But anyway, it turns out he had to call the guy to apologize. The guy's daddy knew Dooney's daddy. And he said, all he wants you to do is apologize. And Dooney's like, apologize? You know, I'll blow the guy. Like, kidding? I don't want to go to jail. Of course I'll apologize. So, but he, but here's the punchline of the story. And this is what makes Dooney my, still my best friend since I was 15. So he calls the guy out and the guy answers the phone and goes, and Dooney goes, I am so sorry, man, about last night. I am so sorry. And the guy says, you almost killed me. And Dooney says, man, I'm so sorry. I didn't know it was you.

• 1:10:49Speaker 03

  Don't you want to say that though? The next time somebody hap- I didn't know it was you? The next time you do some horrible thing.

• 1:11:01Tim Ferriss?

  Next time I get in a really stupid argument with my girlfriend, that's what I'm gonna use.

• 1:11:05Speaker 03

  Don't you want to say, I didn't know it was you, honey? I don't know. Only in the state of Texas do you have that story. It's just got all the elements of a Texas story. How could I not love it down there? I mean, oh my God.

• 1:11:19Tim Ferriss?

  Let's talk about revision.

• 1:11:22Speaker 03

  Okay, revision. I'm a big reviser. I'm a big reviser.

• 1:11:27Tim Ferriss?

  But so you have said, you know, anyone who's read a rough draft of anything I write is just shocked at how bad it is.

• 1:11:32Speaker 03

  It's terrible.

• 1:11:32Tim Ferriss?

  And what does the process look like? I mean, I know this is a very, hopefully it doesn't sound like a really naive question because I know that there's a, there are many, many aspects to revision. So I'll, I'll lead with just a bit. This is from writer mag.com, but Car says she takes a hard look at every sentence she writes. Can I make this sentence less boring, more interesting, prettier, more colorful, more true? So that's a teaser. What does your revision process look like? Because I've read that you threw out something like 1,200 pages.

• 1:12:02Speaker 03

  Threw out 1,200 pages of lit, yeah. Finished pages too. That's not draft. And that was written over about, I want to say five or six years. And I remember when I threw it out, Tim, I was so upset. I had been, well, first off, they were about, they were about to hang me. I was so late. I was like seven years late on a contract. I mean, they, and so I finally, my agent called me and said, you know, you're gonna, you're gonna have to, I said, you know what? I will sell my apartment and give the damn money back if they don't shut up and leave me alone. Like it's just gonna take me a minute. So anyway, so I'd sent them, I don't know, I'd sent them like 130, 140 pages and my editor

• 1:12:44Speaker 03

  at the time estimated that I had thrown out 1,200 pages. And let me tell you, when she said that they sucked as bad as I thought they sucked. I mean, I knew they sucked when they sent them, which is why I didn't want to send them. I wanted to keep working on them. So I just, I went to bed for like two days and I watched, you know, Dr. Phil reruns and a lot of cooking shows and I ordered a lot of curry. I think I had a whole pizza at one point and slopped around in my bathrobe. And then I called Don DeLillo, who's one of the people I call. It's like, you know, the nuclear button, you know, who's like, just one of the great novelists and who's also happens to be a friend of mine.

• 1:13:29Speaker 03

  And I said, Don, I, I think I'm writing, he's like, what are you crying about? I said, I think I'm writing a bad book. And he said, well, who doesn't? And I thought about that and I thought, God, he's right. Tolstoy's written bad. But I mean, people I read, you know, every writer I know has written a bad book. So, okay, so, okay, so maybe it's just supposed to be a bad book, but it's the book that's standing in line to be written. And I think I got, I became willing to fail, to just say what happened. So basically, what it looks like is just clawing through a line at a time

• 1:14:12Speaker 03

  or a sentence at a time. I think one example I give in The Art of Memoirs is that when I'm, my mother is driving me to college. And I think the sentence I started with was something like, "Mother drove me to college in her yellow station wagon. We stopped every night at the Holiday Inn and got drunk on screwdrivers." I can't remember. Might have said puking drunk on screwdrivers. I somehow was able to remember being in that car. The thing about my mother's yellow station wagon was that it didn't have an air conditioner. And so that at that time, you could buy an air conditioner that's strapped under the dashboard.

• 1:14:57Speaker 03

  Well, it would build up condensation. And when she turned right, and I was sitting in the, you know, shotgun, the water in the air conditioner would spill out onto my bare feet. And it was icy, icy cold water. And I remembered that we had stopped and gotten a bushel of peaches in Arkansas. And she was drinking vodka, driving, drinking vodka and, and orange juice and eating these, watching her eat a peach. You know, when you're 17 years old, to watch your mother eat and show any desire for anything is just so horrifying. You just want to die. There's just nothing uglier than watching your mother eat a peach when you're 17.

• 1:15:40Speaker 03

  You just think, my God, woman, shut your mouth. Take a smaller bite. Jesus, it's not going anywhere. You know? But I, the smell of the peaches and being in the, and suddenly I remembered that I had a copy of A Hundred Years of Solitude.

• 1:15:58Speaker 03

  That I had got, that was her book, but I had started reading and she said, "Read it aloud to me." And I remembered reading that book and driving and I remembered the, you know, you grow up around these kind of Texas dirt farms. I mean, there's plenty of corporate farming in the state of Texas, but then you get to the Midwest and it's just so organized. It's just, there aren't the rusted cars in the yard and the refrigerator on the porch, you know, it's these rows and rows of corn in these big cinnamon colored silos. And I remembered driving into that landscape, up to that college and reading

• 1:16:39Speaker 03

  that book and thinking, "I could be a writer. I could, I, I somehow was able to remember those details and occupy that body in space and time and remember how disgusted I was by my mother and how terrified I was that I wouldn't do well at school, that I would fail. I'd been such a screw up." You know, I'd been arrested the year before with a bunch of kids and there was a bunch of dope and some of them went to jail and I didn't because the judge was a guy who had known my mother when she was a reporter for the local newspaper. And I still remember sitting in, she came to pick me up wearing a leopard,

• 1:17:22Speaker 03

  she had leopard skin pajamas. It was July 4th and she had on a beaver coat with a mink collar and those leopard skin pajamas in this hot night in Coons County, Texas. And here sits this judge behind us, this liver spotted judge with these palsied hands and every meal he's ever eaten on his tie. When she came to pick me up and he said, "I remember your mother. She was the most beautiful woman I'd ever seen." And she said, "Oh, you old fool."

• 1:17:53Speaker 03

  It was just like, oh my God, mother, get me out of here. Sucking up is underrated. So anyway, yeah, I think it's, it's memory. It's, I do an exercise with my, um, I just did it the other day for a colleague of mine, Dana Spietta, a wonderful young novelist I teach with. And she's teaching an undergraduate class and I said, you know, I want to do this right. There are 90 kids in the class. She said, I said, I want to do this writing exercise. She, well, the writing, you know, it's been uneven. And I said, look, trust me, everyone will write well. And you have them focus on a room they grew up in and to try to occupy the smell, to try to remember a room you were in where your mother's cooking, your grandmother,

• 1:18:38Speaker 03

  wherever you had a good meal when you were little. And try to close your eyes and smell that. Because, you know, smell is the most primordial memory and the most emotional memory. And it's stored way back in that snake brain hypothalamus we have that is where all the trouble starts. You try to get in that memory and interrogate your body about what you can smell, taste, touch. And then finally, what you want, what are you yearning for? And what's keeping you from getting it? Maybe it's a bite of the brisket or some of the barbecue or daddy's oysters coming up out of the fryer or what's going to keep you from getting it?

• 1:19:21Speaker 03

  It's my big footed sister who, as daddy said, nothing ever got between her and a bag of groceries. You know, she's going to get all the oysters and I won't get any. And so it's really more about trying to occupy a former self. Cause I think, as you know, just as in trauma, the body remembers, the body also remembers beauty.

• 1:19:43Speaker 03

  It also remembers pleasure and love and those other things too. So.

• 1:19:49Tim Ferriss?

  So the body keeps the score.

• 1:19:52Speaker 03

  Right.

• 1:19:53Tim Ferriss?

  And if you go excavating for these memories, sometimes there are costs associated with that.

• 1:20:00Speaker 03

  Tom, Tom, hard show.

• 1:20:02Tim Ferriss?

  Yeah, I've read that while you were working on The Liar's Club, that you'd suddenly fall asleep in the middle of the afternoon as if you'd driven all night and you would sob, you'd really suffer. What did you do to cope with that pain? And I should just say, you and I were chatting before the recording about trauma a bit. And I've recently described some of my childhood sexual abuse. And the podcast that I did related to it didn't seem to exact a horrifying toll, but the process years before of trying to write about it and getting a very, very rough draft brutalized me.

• 1:20:46Speaker 03

  Of course it did.

• 1:20:47Tim Ferriss?

  And just left me paralytic for, God, more than six months in some ways.

• 1:20:53Speaker 03

  I'm so sorry.

• 1:20:54Tim Ferriss?

  And I just love to... Yeah, thank you for saying that. And I'm horrified by the experience and also fascinated by it in a way because I don't know why those two things should be so different. And I'd just love to hear you expand a bit on the price that you've paid or your experience with dredging up a lot of these memories or recalling them, putting them down, and why writing seems, at least in my experience, to be so different from some other forms of expressing these things?

• 1:21:25Speaker 03

  Well, I mean, because you're alone. You're alone. I mean, that's, I mean, that's for me where the prayer and the God, and the God comes in. I do have a sense now that I didn't have.

• 1:21:39Speaker 03

  Back in the day, I mean, when I, by the time I started writing Liar's Club, how old was I? I don't know, 35? I'd been in therapy for 16 years. And I'd also had a prayer practice for, um, you know, a meditation and prayer practice for some years. I hadn't converted. I wasn't a Christian. I didn't, I was a Catholic. But I was about to become Catholic. And I was very active in recovery programs and I had a sponsor. And I also had, based on all of those efforts, I had done a lot of the processing and recovery.

• 1:22:21Speaker 03

  I had flown down to Texas when I was 23 years old and got my mother drunk on margaritas and told her, you know, "You tried to kill me with a butcher knife and it's not because I was a bad kid and it ruined my life." And what the hell was wrong with you? What was going on with you? You know, I had done a lot of that work before. And I tell people, when they tell me they want to write a memoir about some horrible stretch of childhood or some awful period of trauma, maybe they don't. Maybe they don't right now. So I think I had a sense of, you know, when I was drinking, my idea of medicating myself

• 1:23:04Speaker 03

  or anesthetizing myself, that was all I knew how to do. That was what my parents told me to do. That was all they knew how to do, was try to drink it away. Uh, you know, my daddy was in the Battle of the Bulge. I mean, he went in at Normandy and he came out at Buchanwall. I mean, that's plenty of trauma. Plus, being married to my mother would have been simple. Uh, there was only one person with a weapon, as opposed to the Nazis. So, yeah, I think I'm a big fan of a hot bath. I'm a big fan of nutritious food. I'm a big fan of cardio. Even now, I mean, I'm 65. I don't do five dance classes a week,

• 1:23:49Speaker 03

  but I get up in the morning and I, you know, walk four miles. And then I do Pilates three or four times a week. And I take a dance class a couple of times a week. And All those things keep me in my body. And when I'm in a lot of pain, I take care of myself. When I was drinking, I felt like I had this screaming baby that I was holding, and I was screaming at it all the time to shut up. So, yeah, I think I still have, even writing anything now, I find very... I'm not dealing with anything like that. I'm so much... But I'm also, I'm so much happier now than I've ever been in my life. I mean, I'm 65 years old.

• 1:24:32Speaker 03

  I've never been so happy in my life. I've never been less good-looking, had less social power, had, you know, any of the things that you would think would make me happy, joyous, and free. And I'm just, I wake up every day really feeling lucky to be alive, and feeling loved, and feeling like... Not every day. I mean, I wake up plenty of days and I'm, you know, mad as an old stump pissant, but most of my days are pretty lit up. And it's a lifetime of practice. So, I just, you know, I tell a lot of my students, my young students,

• 1:25:14Speaker 03

  you know, want to write about sexual assault or trauma of various kinds. Well, maybe, you know, why don't you get some treatment for this first? Why don't you treat your heart first? Treat your body, treat yourself with a lot of care, and see if this is what you want to write about right now. Something you can write about maybe five years from now or something, you know.

• 1:25:39Tim Ferriss?

  What advice would you give yourself about therapy if you were talking to your 19 or 20-year-old self? And how were you first convinced?

• 1:25:51Tim Ferriss?

  To go to therapy. I remember you mentioning that long ago.

• 1:25:53Speaker 03

  You know, I didn't have to be convinced. I mean, here's the other thing. Yeah, no. And there weren't a lot of people saying, gee, I wish you'd stop drinking. I mean, I led a pretty isolated existence, the way a lot of people who grew up the way I grew up do. I mean, my idea of telling somebody how I felt, I remember right before I stopped drinking. I remember I was teaching, well, I sort of all over the academic ghetto around Boston. But I remember specifically one day at Tufts, I was copying something for a class. And I was, I was, I had dropped my kid off like vomiting out the side of the car before I dropped him off at daycare. I mean, and then I drove to Tufts and I was Xeroxing something.

• 1:26:36Speaker 03

  And somebody said, how you doing, Mary? And I was like, you know, I want to blow my fucking brains out. And that was my idea of telling somebody how I felt, you know, making a glib, sort of awkward, socially awkward statement to somebody I hardly knew. And I'd been in therapy then for a while, but I was also drinking every day, everything I could get my mitts on. So I don't.

• 1:27:01Tim Ferriss?

  What is good, what is good therapy to you? Because therapy is, is a term that's extremely broad. It's kind of like saying medicine, right?

• 1:27:08Speaker 03

  Yeah, exactly.

• 1:27:09Tim Ferriss?

  There are so many different specialties. What has proven to be good therapy for you?

• 1:27:13Speaker 03

  You know, I think it totally depends on the, on the person. I mean, the best there, the best therapist I ever had, I think, I mean, for me, the difference in therapy and recovery, I think in therapy, I'm, I'm the baby and they're the mommy. And that model, sort of, when I, especially when I first started, I just felt like I needed a lot of nurturing. And I had great therapists, you know, my first therapist, when I look back on things he said and did was insane. He would have been fired. He told me to go down after he'd been seeing me nine months and confront my homicidal, suicidal mother about all this horrible stuff she'd done to me.

• 1:27:56Speaker 03

  And I did it. And he said, I won't see you until you do it.

• 1:28:00Tim Ferriss?

  Wow.

• 1:28:01Speaker 03

  I mean, nobody's ever done it.

• 1:28:05Tim Ferriss?

  In for a penny, in for a pound, yeah.

• 1:28:06Speaker 03

  I know. I mean, I look back on it, I was like, he was crazy. Nobody's ever... I had a great therapist when my son was a baby, who was a psychologist, PhD psychologist, and who really helped me try to learn how to be a mother when I hadn't had one. And all the, you know, feelings that come up around what you didn't get when you were a child, when you have a child, the protection and stuff. It's funny, my son watches me with his daughter now and just says, I don't know, you know, sort of gives me nothing but a stroke. And I said, let me just tell you, I was not this good with you.

• 1:28:49Speaker 03

  Like, I was crazy about you and I loved you, but I didn't have what I have now that I have with her. That's just, it's not even... I don't even break a sweat going in there. I can do this stuff. It's funny, I was in Prospect... I babysit one or two days a week. I was in Prospect Park this week. And I had taken her across the park in a stroller, and a thunderstorm broke out, I mean, pouring rain. And she is the... I've never shared DNA with somebody this good-natured as this baby. This baby coos, smiles, laughs, never cries. I mean, sleeps, eats, is just the best-natured kid. I used to babysit in high school and college. So I've taken care of a lot of babies, and she's just the easiest kid.

• 1:29:35Speaker 03

  I get across the thing, it's pouring rain, and I've got... And she starts screaming, crying, like she's being beaten. And I take her out of the stroller, and I hold her, and she calms down. I go to put her back in the stroller, and she just starts screaming, crying again. Well, it's two miles across a muddy field in the pouring rain and I've got a stroller and a bunch of crap and I've got this, you know, 27 pound unit, screaming unit and uh, I just had no problem doing it. And when I was 40 years old, 35 years old, it would have been like being beaten with a hose. And I just, I just thought, you know what, daddy was in the battle of the bulge. This is not that hard.

• 1:30:19Speaker 03

  You know, I just had the physical energy, even at my age, that I didn't know I had to do it. And I got back to the house and I went to fold up the stroller. There was four inches of freezing water in the bottom of the stroller that I'd been putting her in. And she was soaked through to her skin. Yeah, there was, she was perfectly reasonable to be, you know, now I understand, I could have just emptied it out and put her in the stroller and wrapped her up in a blanket, but I, I didn't know what it was, but I just thought, well, I'll get her home and it'll be fine. You know, I didn't feel like, oh my God, oh my God, I'm a terrible mother and I'm gonna wind up trying to stab her with a butcher knife, which is how I felt when my kid was that age. You know, I didn't know that I wasn't gonna be my mother.

• 1:31:04Speaker 03

  I wasn't, I didn't know that. So scary.

• 1:31:09Tim Ferriss?

  That is scary. Yeah. Super scary. And, you know, it sounds like, please correct me if I'm wrong, but that you've learned in some form or fashion, or maybe many forms and fashions, to wear the world like a loose garment. I'd love to know if you agree or disagree, because based on my reading.

• 1:31:26Speaker 03

  I wouldn't say that.

• 1:31:27Tim Ferriss?

  Well, okay, so at your first confession.

• 1:31:30Speaker 03

  Absolutely not, no.

• 1:31:32Tim Ferriss?

  Priest said to you, "Wear the world like a loose garment." What does that mean to you?

• 1:31:36Speaker 03

  Well, I mean, I think it's not, you know, the problem isn't whatever your mind is telling you, the problem is, the problem is the fear.

• 1:31:45Speaker 03

  And for me, the solution to fear is curiosity and presence. And I can't be terrified and curious at the same time. And so when I was walking the baby across the field, just all I was, was physically uncomfortable. I mean, I was, you know, I was thinking, gee, can I shove this thing and hold her moose, you know, and get everything and get all this stuff? How am I gonna do, you know? And so I went crossways across mud fields. I'm shoving the stroller and carrying her. I didn't know physically if I could do it. I was sort of dubious. I was thought, maybe I can't do this. But all I had to do was do it.

• 1:32:29Speaker 03

  I thought, well, if I get tired, I'll sit down. It'll rain on me a minute, then I'll get up and go again.

• 1:32:35Speaker 03

  Like, that's what we'll do. But I don't know. I, I wouldn't say, uh, it's not my nature to be. Here's the way I put it. I tell people it's like I have a tritony.

• 1:32:46Speaker 03

  It's like, most of the time, I walk fine, I run fine, I can, you know, squat more than my body weight and do advanced Pilates for an hour and 10 minutes. And I'm tough as a boot. But there are days that when, there are days that I don't feel that way, or there are moments where I get, my knee goes out and I fall on the ground. And I, all I have to do is honor those moments. All I have to do is, I have a, I have a heating pad, I have a weighted blanket, you know? And my kids have a pit bull I'll bring to stay with me. Well, an idiot is my little comfort animal, you know? I call people, I still have a sponsor, I still have a therapist I don't talk to all

• 1:33:31Speaker 03

  the time, but I didn't have to be convinced to go into therapy. I knew I needed it. But when I first started it, as you know, it was just so damn painful. And I just, for those of your listeners out there, if you're having a hard time, I just want to say, it's like you lance a boil and the infection's draining off. And if you can just get by that, it's gonna tell you that it's endless, but it's not endless. There's a bottom to it. So did you ever smoke? You never did.

• 1:34:01Tim Ferriss?

  I was never a smoker, no.

• 1:34:03Speaker 03

  Yeah, you're just such a jock. You're such a specimen. You're such a specimen, Tim.

• 1:34:09Tim Ferriss?

  Well, we're all specimens. It depends on how we look on the autopsy table. But the, I was born premature, so I have respiratory issues in my left lung. And that does also, that was part of it. So I had a lot of breathing issues growing up to begin with. And secondly, I was, sports saved me. So sports kept me out of a lot of trouble.

• 1:34:32Speaker 03

  Yeah. You know, I was good at sports and then I quit when I was like, I quit. And I'm much more of a jock now than I was then. You know, I wanted to ask you-

• 1:34:43Tim Ferriss?

  About smoking?

• 1:34:44Speaker 03

  I was gonna ask you about smoking because when you quit smoking, there's a phenomenon that happens. That's, it's also when you quit drinking, but somehow it's more intense when you smoke. You'll have a craving for a cigarette. And the craving is as intense as it was the first day you quit. It's as overpowering, but if you just keep note of how long the craving lasts and how many of them there are. They're as intense, but they're not as long and as frequent.

• 1:35:20Speaker 03

  So it's the same thing about suffering when you first start therapy or you first lance that boil and you're unearthing some of the painful things you grew up with. It's as intense the first day. And you just feel like, oh, my God, I'm in the burn ward and I just got snatched out of the fire. And every ounce of me hurts and I want to run screaming down the street like my hair's on fire. And it just won't last as long as it did the first time. And so for your listeners, if, you know, if you're just, you know, looking at hard things that you grew up with or you're trying to quit smoking, trying to quit drinking, trying to recover from trauma.

• 1:36:03Speaker 03

  I promise you, I will send you money if this is not true. That it will get easier. It's just, it's not linear. And there will be those days when it's as painful as the first day. And you'll think, but I'm no better than I was, but you are. You just, it doesn't feel that way.

• 1:36:21Tim Ferriss?

  Yeah, excellent advice. And just a few more questions. I'm having so much fun. I could go forever, but I

• 1:36:29Speaker 03

  You've got a lot to do, dude.

• 1:36:31Tim Ferriss?

  Ah, do I? Do I though? I don't know. I mean,

• 1:36:34Speaker 03

  Where in Austin do you live?

• 1:36:36Tim Ferriss?

  Well, I spend most of my time downtown for recording and then live in the burbs outside of that. I love it. I love it in Austin and expect to be here for quite some time. I wanted to move here right after college. I didn't get the job and there was

• 1:36:53Speaker 03

  Those morons, they screwed up.

• 1:36:55Tim Ferriss?

  Yeah. Well, you know, possibly. I also think that that could have been in everyone's best interest.

• 1:37:02Speaker 03

  Really?

• 1:37:03Tim Ferriss?

  I think I make it a quite terrible employee in most circumstances.

• 1:37:09Speaker 03

  Me too.

• 1:37:10Tim Ferriss?

  But at the time, at the time, and you know, I didn't expect this to lead here, but at the time that I was not given the the green light to get an offer from Trilogy Software way back in the day. It seemed like a death blow. This seemed like the end of the world because I had put a lot of eggs in that basket. I didn't want to do anything that was recruiting on campus really otherwise. And I listened to and watched your Syracuse University commencement speech and

• 1:37:45Speaker 03

  That's so nice of you.

• 1:37:46Tim Ferriss?

  There's, there's, and then I read, I read a transcript and I think this is from the speech unless it was sort of mistranscribed, but here's the paragraph. Almost every time I was super afraid it was of the wrong thing and stuff that first looked like the worst, most humiliating thing that could ever happen almost always led me to something extraordinary and very fine. So my question is, could you give us an example of that that comes to mind? It could be something humiliating. It could be a favorite failure, but anything that

• 1:38:17Speaker 03

  I'll tell, I'll tell you one

• 1:38:18Tim Ferriss?

  As it turns out.

• 1:38:19Speaker 03

  When I first did a, when I first did a kind of moral inventory and recovery that they encourage you to do, I had a lot of resentments against God, like

• 1:38:29Tim Ferriss?

  When you say they, this is in a 12 step program?

• 1:38:31Speaker 03

  Yeah. And Joan LeBeau, you know,

• 1:38:35Tim Ferriss?

  Joan LeBeau, right?

• 1:38:37Speaker 03

  Like, one of the things I really resented God for, my son, who was just this little beautiful blonde haired, blue eyed and a tank of a boy, a natural kind of athlete. When he was little, he was sick all the time. I mean, he would get a cold and he would get these sinus infections. His fever would go to like 105. We'd rush him to Children's Hospital in Boston. It was terrifying. We're always rushing to emergency rooms because his fever was so bleeding high. And just so terrifying. And so I never slept. I never slept and I was depressed.

• 1:39:19Speaker 03

  I was probably postpartum depressed and, and I was drinking. By then I had started, I'd decided drinking would help me take care of a sick child. Great idea, Mere. It's like the bad mom in the after school special. And, um, and so what? And I remember, so when it came time to do Ignatian spiritual exercises, you're trying to find God in all things. Where is God in that? Where is God in a sick baby? I'll tell you a secret. When I actually looked at my life and the decisions I was making, I would have kept drinking.

• 1:39:58Speaker 03

  If I'd had one of those Playboy babies, you know, that like sleeps 12 hours a night and, you know, never is sick and just, you know, coos and cuddles and like, and, and I had been able to, I would have kept drinking. If I'd had my granddaughter, who's like the easiest, like 12 hour night sleeper, eats everything you give her, laughs at everything you do. I would have kept drinking. I could not physically drink the way a real alcoholic needs to drink and take care of a kid who was sick all the time. Couldn't do it. And work and make a living. I couldn't do all those things. It's too hard.

• 1:40:38Speaker 03

  And so I don't think God sent pathogens into my infant son's body. I don't know how any of this works, but when I asked where God is in this, that physical, my own physical discomfort forced me to get sober.

• 1:40:56Speaker 03

  So my sister died this summer, very suddenly, of pancreatic cancer in less than a week.

• 1:41:02Tim Ferriss?

  I'm sorry.

• 1:41:02Speaker 03

  Yeah, I'm sorry too. You know, we were not in touch. We had a terrible childhood and we had not been really in touch for seven years. And that was my choice. And I remember saying to my therapist, isn't it going to be terrible when she dies? She said, yeah, it's going to be terrible anyway. And although it's horrible that she's dead, there's nothing. I feel my love for her. I don't have to defend myself against my love for her. The way I did when we were estranged.

• 1:41:44Speaker 03

  I can cherish and remember all the times we were there for each other. All the ages we were in each other's lives. And yeah, it's, I would give anything for her to be alive, but I still think our not being in touch was the best thing for both of us. You know? I don't regret that. And there's this amazing gift to me of being in touch now with her son and her husband and her stepchildren. And I would give anything if she were alive. But there are gifts in this suffering that are real spiritual gifts. I practice when things happen that I find very disappointing.

• 1:42:29Speaker 03

  My son had a film coming out, his first feature film coming out at Tribeca Film Festival. And it's a global pandemic. And so there is no Tribeca Film Festival. And he's raised somehow all this money and put years worth of work in and got, you know, and moved heaven and earth. And you know what? The film's being released. He's got a great distribution deal. He just won Best Director at Fright Fest. And, you know, it's unfolding just the way it needs to unfold. It's getting curious about, about where the light is, you know? Just being curious about where the light is.

• 1:43:05Tim Ferriss?

  Getting curious about where the light is and the all powerful reframe. And it is really incredible what can happen, as you said, when you.

• 1:43:17Tim Ferriss?

  Really get curious.

• 1:43:19Speaker 03

  I have to say this on

• 1:43:20Tim Ferriss?

  In the face of fear.

• 1:43:21Speaker 03

  On air, Tim, because I have to say it. I just, I have so many young people who come to me about sexual assault, so many young men who have come to me, my students, young writers, young poets. And your being open about this on this podcast has just been such a gift to all these young men.

• 1:43:42Tim Ferriss?

  Thank you.

• 1:43:44Speaker 03

  So good for you. So good for you. So a horrible thing that happened to you that's being used to help a lot of, give a lot of people hope and it's going to prompt a lot of healing.

• 1:43:56Tim Ferriss?

  I, I hope so. And I, I've seen, seen a lot come out of the woodwork and it's been simultaneously, and I know you've experienced this certainly, it's been simultaneously appalling, rewarding, and brutal in a way. I mean, it's, it's all of those things. I mean, there's a lot of pain and beauty in it. And, you know, I'll just mention that of my closest male friends, and there really aren't that many, I don't collect friends like, you know, little porcelain teacups or whatever people collect. I have a fairly small-ish circle and I would say 30% of

• 1:44:39Tim Ferriss?

  my closest male friends reached out to me after that podcast to describe their own experiences with sexual abuse that I knew nothing about. And these are people I've known for a very long time. So I hope there's healing.

• 1:44:52Speaker 03

  Of course there is. We're living, but look, we're living, look, we're not curled up on the backwards of mental institutions and we both could be.

• 1:45:00Tim Ferriss?

  Yeah, very true. Very true. Well, Mary, we're going to talk again and I want to ask one more, one more question.

• 1:45:09Speaker 03

  Okay, go.

• 1:45:09Tim Ferriss?

  Which sometimes is a dead end and I'll, I'll own that if it is.

• 1:45:14Speaker 03

  Okay, then.

• 1:45:14Tim Ferriss?

  But we'll, we'll see where it goes. The question is, if you could put anything on a billboard, metaphorically speaking, to reach billions of people, however many you want, a word, a phrase, a question, a quote, a poem, anything, what might you put on that billboard?

• 1:45:32Speaker 03

  That's so hardcore.

• 1:45:36Speaker 03

  Oh my God. That is really, God, that's a little.

• 1:45:40Tim Ferriss?

  It's aggressive. It's aggressive.

• 1:45:42Speaker 03

  It's hardcore. It really is. It's a little javelin of hogs. It's a pack of javelin of hogs running out of the bushes at me. Um, what could I, uh, what would I put?

• 1:45:55Tim Ferriss?

  And it doesn't have to be the one and only. This could just be the first billboard.

• 1:45:59Speaker 03

  The first billboard. You know, put down that gun. You need a sandwich. Um,

• 1:46:08Speaker 03

  you need a sandwich and a hot bath. No, I know what I would put. I would put 90% of what's wrong with you could be cured with a hot bath. That's what I'd put.

• 1:46:18Tim Ferriss?

  I love it. I love that. Well, Mary, this has been so much fun.

• 1:46:22Speaker 03

  Been a hoot.

• 1:46:23Tim Ferriss?

  I've really, really enjoyed this. People can find you at your website, marykarr.com. That's Mary K A R R dot com, Twitter at Mary Karr Lit, L I T. So anything else you'd like to say, suggest, ask, request of the listeners?

• 1:46:40Speaker 03

  Let's all heal. Let's all heal as a country, no matter how different we think we are. We're all suffering souls and we all wanna, wanna heal this ribbon country of ours. So that's what I'm wishing for all of us and wishing everybody a lot of love and light today and a big, nice cigar.

• 1:47:03Tim Ferriss?

  Here, here.

• 1:47:04Speaker 03

  We're here.

• 1:47:05Tim Ferriss?

  Get curious. Get curious. Look for the light. Uh, thank you, Mary.

• 1:47:09Speaker 03

  All right, and you take care. You go do you.

• 1:47:12Tim Ferriss?

  I will. And to everybody listening, we'll link to everything that we've mentioned in the show notes at tim.blog/podcast. And until next time, thanks for listening.

• 1:47:22Tim 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? And 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. 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 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.

• 1:48:04Tim 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 podcast episode is brought to you by Helix Sleep. Sleep is super important to me. In the last few years, I've come to conclude it is the end all be all that all good things, good mood, good performance, good everything seem to stem from good sleep. So I've tried a lot to optimize it. I've tried pills and potions, all sorts of different mattresses, you name it.

• 1:48:45Tim Ferriss?

  And for the last few years, I've been sleeping on a Helix Midnight Luxe mattress. I also have one in the guest bedroom and feedback from friends has always been fantastic. It's something that they comment on. Helix Sleep has a quiz, takes about two minutes to complete, that matches your body type and sleep preferences to the perfect mattress for you. With Helix, there's a specific mattress for each and every body. That is your body, also your taste. So let's say you sleep on your side in like a super soft bed, no problem. Or if you're a back sleeper who likes a mattress that's as firm as a rock, they've got a mattress for you too. Helix was selected as the number one best overall mattress pick of 2020 by GQ Magazine, Wired, Apartment Therapy, and many others.

• 1:49:27Tim Ferriss?

  Just go to helixsleep.com/tim, take their two-minute sleep quiz, and they'll match you to a customized mattress that will give you the best sleep of your life. They have a 10-year warranty and you get to try it out for 100 nights, risk-free. They'll even pick it up from you if you don't love it. And now, my dear listeners, Helix is offering up to $200 off of all mattress orders and two free pillows at helixsleep.com/tim. These are not cheap pillows either, so getting two for free. is an upgraded deal. So that's up to $200 off and two free pillows at helixsleep.com/tim. That's helix, H E L I X, sleep.com/tim for up to $200 off.

• 1:50:11Tim Ferriss?

  So, check it out one more time. Helix, H E L I X, sleep.com/tim. This episode is brought to you by ShipStation. The holiday season is fast approaching and we know that people will be buying more stuff online than ever before. All of these trends to e-commerce have been accelerated due to COVID and much more. If you're an e-commerce seller, are you ready to meet the demands of a record-breaking online shopping season? Be ready with ShipStation. ShipStation.com is the fastest, easiest, and most affordable way to manage and ship your orders. In just a few clicks, you're managing orders, printing out discounted shipping labels, and getting your products out fast. Happier holidays for you and your customers. ShipStation takes the hassle out of holiday shipping.

• 1:50:56Tim Ferriss?

  No matter where you're selling, on Amazon, Etsy, your website via Shopify or other platforms, ShipStation brings all of your orders into one simple interface. And ShipStation works with all of the major carriers, USPS, FedEx, UPS, even international. You can compare and choose the best shipping solution every time, and you can access the same postage discounts that are usually reserved for large Fortune 500 companies. It's no wonder that ShipStation is the number one choice of online sellers. And right now, my listeners, that's you guys, can try ShipStation free for 60 days when you use offer code TIM. Just go to the homepage, shipstation.com, click on the microphone at the top of the homepage and type in TIM, T I M. That's it. Go to shipstation.com, then enter offer code TIM.

• 1:51:41Tim Ferriss?

  Shipstation.com. Make ship happen.