MrBeast's Former Advisor: Social Media Is Brainwashing Millions of Kids | Ep. 434 with Antony Gordon Founder of Lighthouse Edutainment

0:00The proverbial 800-pound gorillas in Silicon Valley, they are brainwashing tens of millions of kids. They absolutely know that there are features on the platform that are exacerbating anxiety and stress, and there's only one reason why they're there, and that's money. This is Antony Gordon. For years, he was the strategic advisor to the biggest content creator on the planet, Mr. Beast. Now backed by billionaire Ron Burkle, he's built Lighthouse Edutainment. He's co-producing VidCon, and he's coming for big tech. What did you learn while working with him that the public would never see? Jimmy became who he is for many reasons.

0:39One is no one sees the five years that this kid was behind the scenes, 18 hours a day watching YouTube videos. If TikTok disappeared tomorrow, would teenagers actually become happier? We did a focus group. That 2000 Gen Z age binary question. Would you rather be happy or famous? They think famous means happy. I had an open it with Mark Zuckerberg. I said, Mark, here's what you're missing.

1:11We just asked this question to the guru, the guru dev. And I think it's really fitting to ask you. When we think back, if we go 50 years from now, 100 years from now, when we look back, do we say that social media was the worst thing for humanity or the best thing for humanity? It's an outstanding question. Tell me if you think this is a duck. Technology is neutral. It's the way you use it. If you ask me, say, Anthony, answer that question in a binary way. Is it good or bad? I would for sure go with bad. Why? All the research shows that in the genesis of social media, the concept was to have students at college connect, develop social connectivity, not feel lonely.

2:01It's the exact antithesis today. It's the loneliest, most depressed, and most anxious generation. And I'll go a little bit further, if I may. Social media is focused on the amygdala. So the amygdala is emotions, flight and fight. The way the brain develops is the amygdala develops first. Later on, meaning only in your early 20s does the prefrontal cortex start developing neurologically, which is critical thinking. So these kids are completely responding emotionally. no sense of let me let me stop and think whether it's the smartest thing to be bungee jumping off and what i've spoken to obviously a ton of these of these kids there's such a remorse when they look back and they start thinking about things that they did which is purely impulse so what you've got is a you've got a passive repository because these kids don't filter and everything that's been poured into their poor little forming brains they just assume is gospel and the and what obviously my pet peeve is is that the proverbial 800 pound gorillas in silicon valley they know this and they know that they are brainwashing tens of millions of kids and not necessarily imparting a message and content that's going to make them live a wholesome and happy life wow do you think that's because of monetization 100 how do i know this this is i believe this is public knowledge metta did an internal research so it wasn't excellent with their own people part of the research which is now leaked out and it's and i think it's been disseminated to a lot of people is that if we get rid of likes and comments clearly is going to be a diminution in anxiety and stress.

4:03Why? Because you've got this whole generation gets their sense of self from external validation. So goodbye likes, goodbye comments. It becomes more of what it was supposed to be. However, you've got a public company that has to make money. And so they absolutely know that there are features on the platform that are exacerbating anxiety and stress. And there's only one reason why they're there. and that's money because they keep them coming back longer so you have an interesting career you recently left an individual who you were working with to pursue this this mental health crisis and um what a mission his name is jimmy aka mr beast yep what did you learn while working with him that the public would never see i think knowing your audience and i love the show because I think you guys do what Harvard Business School, and I'll say that as an alarm doesn't do, and that is you give people who've got an idea the confidence and the intestinal fortitude to believe that despite my background, I can make this dream come true, which is an amazing thing because there's a lot of people that say, but for the money, but for...

5:18So I'll answer according to the audience and then behind the scenes, obviously what is comfortable and okay to say. for your audience, I can tell you, Jimmy became who he is for many reasons. One is insane focus, hyper focusing, meaning this is unfortunately the generation of the shiny object and distraction and attention. This is a guy that could be elephants walking by. If he's on set, that's all he sees. And that's been in the moment. So one is about focus. Two, if you ask me what's the most important thing for your audience for the success of any business is one word execution there are hundreds of ideas that i've heard hundreds of pitch what's the not sexy part roll up your sleeves and grind so he's a grinder in insane work ethics you got focus work ethic and then he's the wayne gretzky meaning wayne gretzky became one of the greatest ice hockey players of all time, not because he was skating to the puck.

6:24He was skating to where the puck's going to be. You've got to think of trends. You've got to think of what, if I'm in the audience, if I'm a 16, 17-year-old kid, what's going to resonate with me? What am I worried about? And who do I want to be? If you can be the person that's imparting that content and be completely relatable, you're going to crush it. So I would say it's those three legs of the stool, you know, as a general thing. What behind the scenes that I think most people probably don't know, and I think he himself says it's not necessarily healthy, is not too much sleep, living literally for periods of time in the studio.

7:08The truth is, it's the kind of dedication that Elon Musk had, the kind of dedication Steve Jobs had. Unfortunately, you asked me whether I think it's good or bad social media. One of the subtle messages that social media has imparted this generation is it happens quickly. You know, you get a touch of a button. No one becomes an Olympian. No one becomes... There's no shortcuts. No one sees the five years that this kid was behind the scenes 18 hours a day watching YouTube videos. There's no such a thing as an overnight sensation, you know. Wow. I'm going to do it off the record. I saw the interview with him and Joe Rogan.

7:45Yep. And he looks very nervous there. Jimmy did? Yeah. I don't know. I could be wrong. That's an interesting observation. He's an introvert. So you've got to think, when you're in front of a camera, when you see him, he's got a personality bigger than life. Yeah. An introvert is a person who's not energized. I'm an extrovert. So I'm energized by people and I play off people. So number one, he's an introvert. Number two, think of this. This is a young kid, Greenville, North Carolina, never exposed to the glitz and glamour of LA and New York. And boom, he suddenly went viral. And within a very short part of time, he became a household name.

8:24And he's in front of one of the biggest podcasters. I think there's a bit of an imposter syndrome. Like, I'm going to wake up tomorrow and it's all gone. The third thing is there was a journey. And he's definitely through that trajectory. There was a journey from taking him from a YouTuber to a brand. He's a brand today. A YouTuber is a person who has incredible ideation, understands his audience. and when it's action, he rises to the occasion. When you're a brand, you've got to understand that there's multiple streams of revenue, how you show up. I think, not I think, I know he's matured unbelievably in the last couple of years.

9:03What you picked up is correct. I think as a general rule, he's much more comfortable in front of a computer or figuring out than he is having banter with people. Well, I wonder, I always think, I mean, whether it's him or there's other people, could be Joe Rogan, whoever. If you have hundreds of millions of subscribers, which means you have hundreds of millions or billions of people watching. Yep. That comes with a massive responsibility. So I wonder, not even just counting him, just in general. What does that do to people on top of that? Now we're saying you are a brand. You're now going to be responsible for other people's livelihoods.

9:43You're responsible for investors. errors what does that do to a person he daniel just nailed it firstly he happens to be a very nice guy which means i'll give you an example i don't know about a year year and a half ago we had a coffee meeting at soho so he's walking with a hoodie people recognize him there's a lot of high profile public personalities that people go up to them and they get hit up a lot yeah they get really upset and he's always got a smile he's always ready for to take a selfie his natural proclivity is that he's a great kid yeah you got to realize what daniel said is very true you're living in a fishbowl imagine how exhausting it is that you can't walk from here to seven you know without getting hit up yeah everyone needs a time to recharge and especially you know when you're when the tank's running dry it's tough so i think and i'm very biased because his wife now got married so his wife is a south african clearly buys she's got a very i think uh centering calming effect on jimmy so i think that through his maturity and now that he's a man great balance yeah um anthony if tiktok disappeared tomorrow would teenagers actually become happier it's an outstanding question can we drill down on what the premise is here there is something that this the western ethos has done which is a huge mistake they've conflated fun and happiness they're very different things fun we've got a six flags going the roller coaster popcorn what's happiness if you and your husband hear a song that just hits the soul and a tear wells up is that a tear of fun or happiness it's a tear of happiness if you watch a sunset the difference between the fun and happiness and this is hopefully going to answer your question is funny it's ephemeral it's passing it's here today god happiness is something that hits the soul happiness is something that's very visceral and it touches on one thing that this is hopefully we'll get there that this generation is missing and that's meaning and purpose the happy moments don't mean that you don't have pain don't mean that you have suffering the worst thing about tiktok is that it's trained kids to think that in in bite sizes which is not realistic and it's also unfortunately taught kids that a cute little dance or funny face is going to bring you purpose and meaning and a wholesome and it's not that if you daniel touched on it why would i leave you know go from is because i believe that we are going through the biggest global pandemic of our times in terms of mental health directly triggered by social media.

12:33Social media does some very good things. Believe me. That's why I hate being binary. But I'm speaking to angel parents. Parents have lost a kid due to suicide. Yeah, it's hard. It's horrific out there. And I obviously, I don't blame the kids. But the people who are really behind the scenes and are counting the money, they know what's going to cause stickiness. they know what's going to cause you know kids to come back and i don't necessarily believe it that it's in the kids best interest so you have these people now that like you said they they don't they lack purpose the purpose is to go on and make a dance and upload it to social media but then you realize it's empty yep and then they're chasing followers but what does it even mean when you're chasing a follow like what even is a follower beautiful so how is this how how are you thinking about this it's very good we did a focus group i don't think it's going to freak you guys out because you guys are way ahead i'm already freaked out i would say about 2000 gen z age binary question would you rather be happy or famous what do you think these kids said They were wanting to be famous.

13:53Everyone wants to be famous. Think about that. Is that nuts? Okay, so why did they all say, to a T, why did almost everything happy? Why did they all say famous, Kate? Because they think fame means happy. Yes. Let's ask the other question we asked them. Would you rather be rich or famous? Same thing. Almost everything said? Famous. Famous. They have no concept of wealth. They just want to be famous. That's like their ideal hero. Okay, I'll even go deeper than that. One of the best things I learned at Harvard wasn't in a classroom. It was their long-term happiness study, which went over 85 years.

14:32Here was the conclusion in a nutshell. The things that make you the most happy are not things, they're people, they're relationships. It's the very famous story of the founder of, there's so many of these rich people that we represent. Some of the richest people, and I don't wish this on, trust me, but they're miserable. They're dysfunctional people. They don't have a relationship with a significant other. Their kids are estranged. It goes back to you're not going to get, if you stop eating, you're going to starve. If you don't fill your soul, if you don't have any meaning in your life, you're in existential crisis waiting to happen.

15:14Yeah. We've had a lot of those. We have friends that's about to inherit billions of dollars and really unsettled. And it's very fascinating. The pressure of a family to keep that wealth is breaking everyone apart. So let me tell you, on that point, Kate, it's amazing that. I hope you didn't tell them this, but this is statistically a fact. There's a disproportionate amount of juvenile delinquents. There are heirs of hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars. Why? The natural feeling of having worked for something, you get a feeling of ownership that you've, by the sweat of your brow, if it's given to you, it's indignifying.

15:57Yeah. That's why they're always seeking to do their own thing. Yeah. It's like, just take the money. Why, what would you do? But they, it's very different. They want to prove something and they are, it's hard for them to succeed because they don't have the fundamentals of grit. because everything is given and easy once you're doing your own it's a struggle let me tell you a cute story to make to make the point let's cause god michael so michael's graduating from harvard medical school he walks out with his family into the the driveway and he sees gary the next door neighbor and he's peeking over he sees the hat and gown it's so michael's like he said gary i'm graduating today's my big day at harvard why don't you jump in the car join us come to the graduation gary jumps the car with michael the graduate to be drive to cambridge they in harvard yard and they call in the different names of the graduates and suddenly they call gary's name and people are pushing him and he gets on the stage people are going nuts and the dean gives him a you know his hand claps gets off the stage how does he feel how does gary feel he was the next neighbor he feels like an idiot he's done nothing he knows he shouldn't be there the crowd uncr I think other parts of Europe are talking about doing so I guess delaying not just smartphones but delaying usage of social media is that a solve so this is the famous form versus substance debate so a few months ago in new york there's a fireside chat um and this is it's on video somewhere where where i asked a similar question to jonathan hey jonathan wrote the anxious generation definitely you know become a thought leader in the space his focus is exactly that let's keep the hypodermic needle with a little screen away from kids a little bit longer our focus at lighthouse is the content if you change the kind of content if you are able to to help kids realize slow down to the speed of life if you're able to tell kids that not everything that you're hearing and seeing on social media is going to lead to a life or happiness that's our focus so i think it's a combination between the two i think if you're just telling kids a little bit later, if they expose a little bit later and the message is still, it's all about getting rich and it's all about leaning against the Bentley when you can't even afford the hubcaps, it's a problem.

18:30So you've got to do both. Anthony, entrepreneurs are building platform designed to maximize engagement. At what point does engagement become exploitation? It's a great question. One of the things that we said when we were brainstorming about Lighthouse is our goal is that there's tens of millions of people out there that are leading lives of quiet desperation so our goal is to help people realize that the content being disseminated through multiple media channels is again not necessarily in their best interest the motive of the people that are creating this content is not necessary i want you to have a happy i want you to put your hand in your pocket and take it so our goal is to give out that message in the most dynamic way we obviously got to keep the lights on but our goal is to disseminate the message first and our hope and it seems to be working that if people realize that we're genuine that we're sincere that we're altruistic um that people want to support our community as opposed to cross-selling you know products and t-shirts and merch we're trying as as best as we can to stay on point to stay to the mission without overly commercializing because people do feel taken advantage of being exploited well i mean it seems like attention is the new gold everyone says attention right it's all about the attention that you can create because i always look at it if i can create something and someone is willing to pay for it it must be important but it seems like people are willing to pay an endless amount of money right now for attention who is getting rich off that that we don't know so you're 100 first you're 100 right that attention is the benchmark mark to answer your question here's what's happening the quality of content and what kids are exposed to is dropping to the lowest possible common denominator so they can gain attention and that degradation of morals and integrity in order to get eyeballs it's impacting millions of kids It's basic stuff, like in terms of honesty and morality, the message that is being disseminated is so cheapening fundamental values that you guys have in terms of who's benefiting.

20:49It's the 800-pound gorillas that are the source of, obviously, that are the source of spewing out this content. They only get paid when the community increases. They only get paid when there's more subscriptions, when there's more cross-selling, and when there's more stickiness. whatever they have to do to ensure that they're doing which in my personal opinion means they've lost their moral compass and there are i know a number of engineers highly talented people at the biggest tech firms that i've spoken to that said they just can't do this anymore because they know they're using their god-given talent and they're studying and they think to build something that's that's going to impact and harm millions of kids yeah very sad um i know we talked about happiness earlier what's something that everyone believes about happiness that's completely wrong firstly the fact that money equals happiness has been completely dispelled i can give you a plethora of research that shows that all the research shows that if you can maintain basic necessities there's no correlation between anything above that and happiness so the idea that money buys happiness the lamborghini won't buy me happiness nothing would certainly won't buy you happiness And I'll just underscore that for your audience.

21:59The entertainment industry is filled with a lot of unhappy people. If you look at the calendar, what month or days of the year, God forbid this should ever happen, is the highest amount of suicides in the entertainment industry? Just to answer your question. Think about it. It's always a holiday. Very good. Excellent. So December the 23rd till January the 4th. Why? because when the world goes to sleep and there's no movies and no one you have to stop and face life and people realize they've ascended up the ladder and it's leaning against the wrong wall and there's posters and pictures there's no one they can call they don't have true relationships and they don't like themselves because they've compromised on basic values for a quick buck or to get another like if you are not at peace with yourself and if you are continually compromising your basic values in order to get quite and quite bigger it all comes crashing down so in terms of happy in terms of happiness money we should completely jettison that the second thing is when we did research here's what we found there's a direct correlation between happiness and meaning and purpose in life Nietzsche said that you know you have to have once you figure out the why you can always figure out the how if the whole purpose of life is to become an influencer and then you start it's a slippery slope and it's a very sick superficial sad world we're all screwed we all screwed who are we really influencing exactly have you have you ever studied the happiest countries in the world because we did yes we went to finland just to all scandinavians always well why do you think that is we went to finland yeah tell it what was no we I actually asked people like, are you guys really happy?

23:46He said, no, I think it's made up because they actually asked that question during summer when the sun is out. I know that it's supposed to be. But they said it's very hard for entrepreneurs if they want to do more in life because the culture would tell you just be happy and content with what you have, but what if I wanted more? So that's a very fascinating. You do this like anecdotally. Yeah, so we just went to people and said, are you yeah we were like what makes you guys we asked everyone we could you're the happiest place on earth but what makes you happy i want what's the secret and none of them said that they were happy they just said that they're not unhappy they're content and they said we are taught to be content now we were like that is interesting and then they're trying to prove that maybe it's the park they have natures like and but then they were kind of backtracking i don't know we should not be the happiest place on earth like wow but that's a everything opposite what the the country is promoting it's a very long discussion this but they all the scandinavian countries always are in the top 10 in the index of the happy country so there's a sociological thing called propanequity which means you're influenced by people around you if the people around you are told to be happy there's a notion of you can't walk around with a sour face this is an example of how they underscore this an experiment they had about over 30 people in a room and they had a person who was outside the room who was this who was the subject they walked in they did this like in a very natural someone told a joke and all of them there was no joke the person felt so terrible they just cracked up because that's the social sense of i don't want to feel like an outlier that's part of what's happened in scandinavia it's very interesting that they do do this in the summer Do that exact thing in the pretty cold winter.

25:31It's not a legit answer. It's a control. That's true. Maybe it's put out by somebody in Scandinavia. Yeah, that's somebody to meet you. It's a marketing employee. It's a PR. It's a PR. It's a PR play. So what do you think every parent of someone who has a child that would fit into the Gen Z, what is something that all of them need to know that they might not understand? Here's what I tell a lot. I speak to a lot of these parents. And I try and say it by building a theater in the mind because people remember things. I say to the parents, it's your 90th birthday. Huge chocolate cake comes out, 90 candles.

26:15Next to you is your significant other, your kids, your best friends, the boom mics going around. What do you want people to be saying about you? That's your legacy. No one is going to say, wow, here lies Joe. He had 3.2 million followers. Here lies Gary. He had a Ferrari. At the end of the day, the things that have longevity, that have meaning, it's all about how you made a difference in this world. It's all about how you gave back. It's all about character. It's all about your sense of integrity. That has to be underscored to your children. It's got nothing to do with collecting toys, and it's got nothing to do with looking at your next-door neighbor.

26:56It's, what are you making of yourself? What kind of a human being are you making of yourself? That's the tragedy of this generation, is that they don't focus on self-esteem and building the internal world. And therefore, the whole sense of self is directly related to third-party validation. And if this person doesn't like or check, then what am I? The only way to build self-esteem is to do esteemable acts. Speak to a person who's tried this. There was a fire in Malibu. we asked people, volunteer, we need, and we spoke to these kids afterwards. They felt fantastic. They got out of their hoodie little lock and they felt they were doing things and making a difference.

27:37If you don't exercise the muscles of the soul and the heart, they're going to atrophy and you're going to have an empty shell and you're going to walk around like most people, unfortunately, completely focused on what other people think of you. There's a supposed movement. I know you're going to talk about AI in a second because it's interesting around ai but there's a supposed movement that people in their 20s let's say 20s they want to get a flip phone yep they want to drink alcohol less yep um they're not really partying it's a very different culture that i don't know if they're going to bars and clubs so much anymore uh and it seems like they're almost revolting against but yet they're still depressed so you've just nailed one of the biggest sociological trends that's happening in the world what we see and i've obviously been involved in a lot of focus groups and studying there's a pendulum swinging back where there's a very intuitive sense that social media comparison that's not going to lead to the life of happiness so they're trying to go back to certain basic things as they're saying is um back to flip flams etc etc but if you are dumbing yourself down in technology but you're not changing your goals your values your happiness is not going to change if you make your goal in life with other people like me if you make your goal in life whether you're driving a test if you know if you downsize the technology is not going to change you've got to change if you change the way you look at things the things you look at change if you start understanding that life's about the most important relationships that you have which is the relationship between your significant other yourself and the relationship with God as soon as you take God out of the equation meaning whatever that God is to a person how do you possibly help a person overcome the vicissitudes of life if there's no rhyme and reason if we hear to collect toys click likes and we get put into a box and get eaten by worms kids the idea of meaningless life and judging ourselves by externality has been a death sentence for this generation and you're 100 right they are rebelling that's part of what we do we're trying to give them the content to rethink certain things as opposed to just the idea of no premarital intimacy you you've got the external idea but that you've got to drill down and understand what are your values who do you want to be that's what we we focused on anthony will ai make this problem better or dramatically worse i'm very very scared of ai the number of young people that have a very deep relationship with this synthetic ai character is off the charts and that's not scary to have an ai girlfriend you're right oh he has a supposedly you're not alone anymore but i've had this argument i had an open letter with mark zuckerberg mark zuckerberg said the answer to this mental health thesis is to have bots which are therapists which are automate so i said mark here's what you're missing you're an engineer i come from the world of mental health no matter how many bytes and pixels you've got a machine can't be empathetic and sympathetic i'll give you i'll give you something that that made sense i'm a volunteer emt first responder right when we go to a scene what am i doing what am i doing when i'm holding his yeah checking the pulse very good what else am i doing touching the skin there's something about the one when he feels that he's not alone do you know what that does to your cortisol you know what that does to the fact that what his blood pressure his basic it's it's unbelievable that a machine can't do if you've got someone who says you're going to be okay you know i saw some a clip that you did which which is just before i was coming here during the crash if i tell me if it seems like you lost everything and you went through a brutal time so he can say to someone who's lost everything i know how you feel i've been there you're going to be okay yeah he can say it because he's been there no matter what you say to a computer whatever cadence you're not going to get that same sense of true human touch and a visceral connectivity ai hasn't been through it no exactly that's why we need a human hug the hug everyone needs a hug very good i do like the people that go around and they give hugs on the street so what do they do there's something about do you understand what happens with human touch yeah it changed your system function yeah like everything which is the exact reason why i don't like robotic massage we tried to robot robot massage she liked it i didn't like it and because there is like when you're not feeling good and you want to get a massage there's some there's a connection like it's not just like you're saying the pressure it's the human connection because i don't i don't like robot massage i'm gonna say something very controversial this this can go both ways there has been research that shows the difference later on in life between a baby that has to navigate through the vaginal canal which is a normal nat versus a c-section What's the difference?

33:02C-section, they're not rubbed. On the way through the birth canal, there's a sense of, it's a real sense of a warmth. A C-section is a sudden thing. And I'll take that to another level. The difference between kids that grow up in a home where there's not a demonstrative parent, there's no hugging, they become avoidance. Emotions of being vulnerable is very scary. Very guarded. Very guarded. and they're never real, and they're scared of life. That's what AI is doing. You cannot replace... You guys have been married for how long? Eight years. Okay. When your husband looks across the room and just gives you a certain look, you know what he's thinking, right?

33:46AI can't do that. There's no history. There's no sense of a unique narrative. No, it's me. I already know what he's thinking even before. It's like, you can't lie to me. I already know exactly what you're trying to say. Oh, no. Every time I try to lie. It never works. No, I know you so much. I'm probably the worst person. Why is it that a person says, I just need a hug? Yeah. AI can't do that. And it's a big, big mistake. If they're trying to send a message to this generation that everything and anything that you can get from your friends, your family, you can now get online. The human visceral connectivity, the eye contact with the real eyes, that's the windows to the soul.

34:28I don't care how realistic it is. You'll never, ever simulate that. We really have unicorn kids because none of them like social media. Are you serious? Yeah, no social media footprints. And we even force them to have one just to communicate when it's traveling. If you have no signal. How old are your kids? They're 19 and 22. None of them have social media. By choice. By choice. You guys are very fortunate. And they don't like using AI. because I have to ask my son to like, hey, can you write this script? And I said, oh, it's going to take me eight hours or two days. Like, just you say, I'm not going to do that.

35:04I'm not going to cheat. Let me ask you another question. You asked about happiness? Are your kids living at home or not? No, they're on their own. Okay. When they come home, I don't know, Thanksgiving, whatever. When they come to the table for whenever you have a family, do they bring their cell phone to the table? No. They don't even answer my calls. They never answer my calls. I mean, we didn't plan this, right? You have no idea how blessed you are with kids like that. Firstly, they're not going to be reactive kind of kids. There's a part of the brain that doesn't atrophy. And there's so much of their life that's real.

35:40Anxiety is when there's a huge disparity between, what's your kid's name? Joshua and Luke. Joshua in real life and Joshua in cyberspace. The bigger the delta, the more the anxiety. And there's a feeling of some of these kids, I'm going to be found out. they know that i can't afford that car they know that this is completely just a green screen it's a plastic world the world now and i see it the whole pendulum be authentic be real it's you guys are very very fortunate i wonder if you were to ask parents that are more active on social media like obviously like our business is on social media right but we're not like i wouldn't say that we're influencers or content creators but we have business and the business is tied to social media and we we are good about disconnecting right but i wonder if it's we also use ai every you know all the time you have to for you guys yeah i wonder if it's people like that like similar to us their kids maybe aren't because they don't want to do what their parents does you know they see i wonder if those if you could do a study to see so here's what all the research shows kids will never listen to what you say but they will remember what you did If you're telling your kids, the life lesson is you always tell the truth.

36:50And there's a knock on the door. And the father says to his little kid, tell them I'm not here. What do you think the kid's going to remember? Lying. You can never have hypocrisy with kids. They're watching you like a hawk. And you're their role model. And you're not going to be on a pedestal until they hit a certain point. They'll never forget how they feel, how you make them feel. and the role models that's how it's pedagogical that's how they learn yeah simple rapid fire okay you ready shoot one app you delete forever one app you would delete forever i think tiktok one habit every teenager should have every teenager before they make any decision should count up to five backwards because when you count backwards you have to use a certain part of your cognitive critical thinking before you say what you're about to say to that person in class before you kiss the girl next to you just count backwards because there are a lot of people in orange jumper suits making number plates in the texas sun today that would love to have that five seconds because they've messed up their life five four three two one what's overrated what's what's completely overrated is the synthetic sense of likes and you can buy likes today you can create a synthetic community that should not have any bearing on yourself with what's underrated what's underrated is people that are prepared to forfeit their instantaneous gratification for long-term goals this has been great like a lot of good moments in there like i'm my wheels are spinning right now so you have a new book coming out the happiness scam yep so here's what i've learned in many years with the biggest youtuber with you know sitting with focus groups with pop culture has imparted a lot of isms and ideas to the world that they assume is going to lead to a life of wholesomeness and happiness.

38:51My book is dispelling seven of the most universally accepted pop culture isms so that people can live a wholesome and happy life. I'll give you an example. Love at first sight. People out there just believe that this concept that's been perpetuated by Hollywood, by movies, is a truism. Lust at first sight? Maybe. but the con you are so belittling and cheapening what love is if boy he walks into smoky bar looks at the girl and that's love love is not an emotion love is a byproduct of giving the more you give the more you love which is by the way one of the reasons is a general rule parents will love children more than the children love the parents it's a byproduct of giving i've said this and often you know on on speak engagements and someone always comes to the podium afterwards and says you know we have a special needs child and I've never understood why do I love this it's from giving when you understand that love is not whatever Hallmark tells you it is but the more you give the more you love that that's an example of of helping people realize that it's not an instantaneous thing it's not something that you know 30 seconds you guys have been committed and married think of how you felt about each other 18 years ago versus now that's from investing a part of you that's from giving a part of you i'll give an example another follow your passion that's become a milieu of call you gotta be very very careful just follow your passion there are a lot of unfortunately homeless and very depressed people that just pressed and pressed eject and were blindly following their passion you've got to you've got to balance everything with the reality of the fact that the bills are not going to stop coming if you want to the idea of following your passion is purely emotions it's amygdala you've got to balance everything with critical thinking the most successful people in the world even if you sleep on the couch for a while even the idea of just jumping and then thinking is this is a message that this generation's got that's i know i know i pick up the pieces you know they just why did i that's counting backwards those kind of things money brings happiness so what i've done is i've taken seven of things that unfortunately kids just assume why have i done this because you cannot lecture to gen z they won't they won't listen if you prioritize it but if i say to them what my ted talk said to them that i used to think that pain that pain was a bad thing that's a pop culture and then i i as i got older and i started researching i realized that pain is not bad pain is the price that you're going to have to pay for anything that's great you want to become the best marathon runner it's painful as soon as you say that pain is bad which is the message this year then you'll use anything to mute pain substance abuse pornography but if you understand that if you want to be great at your chosen vocation and discipline it's going to be painful the book basically takes seven of these cardinal pillars that pop culture has made into cliches and helping these kids say, one second, is this really the truth?

42:04Is this really going to lead to a life of happiness and wholesomeness? Once you've got a kid to dispel the myth, you've got to avoid, and you can then fill that void with hopefully some ideas that will help them live a much more wholesome, healthy life, which is our goal. I thought it was love at first sight. How did you think about me when we first met? I knew that. Weird. As I said that, Pandora's box open. I thought I was weird when we first met, so that's good. It was weird at first sight. He's very weird. I like him. You should marry him. That's what I did. What made you think that, how did he go from being goofy, weird to your husband?

42:39I think we really enjoy each other's conversation and company. It's fun. Fulfilling. So would you agree with my thesis that the first interaction wasn't love? It was intrigue, curiosity. Yeah, it's curiosity. Because he's very weird. Like, how can I not figure this guy, he's very weird. Like I've never met such an eclectic person. That's how I was even more curious. Like I need to find out why. So that discovery become like, huh, maybe there's something. I've always said this. Women are mostly attracted to humor. That's a big, more than anything else. Like if you are not considered maybe a great looking individual, you are funny.

43:20I mean, you basically elevate yourself. Movie star looks and he's hysterical. Look at all this comedian. They get all hot chicks. That's true. By the way, It's very true that because humor is one of the biggest parameters of EQ. I did a lot of stand-up comedy in South Africa, and here's what I learned. If you get on a stage and you have to use four-letter words and embarrass people, then get off the stage. Humor is about self-deprecating. You're laughing at life. You should never, ever laugh at someone else's expense. It seems like he's a very kind person, I think. He is. I only laugh at myself.

43:56Exactly. That's the healthiest humor, by the way. And then I turn around and I cry. But Anthony, this is Anthony Gordon, man. This has been great. Can't wait for the book. You guys are amazing, man. You solve happiness. I mean, you solve happiness and you've now, you know, 8 billion people will thank you for it. So I hope that even if you get 20%, you're good. You're good. From your mouth. And that's really the whole goal. I've seen, I mean, my life represented the proverbial rich and famous. so I'm saying just like you felt I've been there I've seen these people and the role that I play is not the lawyer I don't know become their confidant it's amazing that people are looking for the things that money can't buy they're looking for the things that when they look back at their life they're going to be proud of it's not the message they're getting on pop culture yeah amazing thank you for joining us great pleasure you guys are terrific keep up the good work