Rob Dyrdek, Rick Rubin, Alexander Ludwig, Whitney Cummings, Nate Boyer, And Arnold Schwarzenegger On The Power Of Discipline And Dealing With Failure

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2:00Go to HelloFresh.com slash Stoic 10 FM to get 10 free meals plus free breakfast for life. One box with active subscription. Free meals applied as a discount on the first box. New subscribers only varies by plan. That's HelloFresh.com Stoic 10 FM to get 10 free meals plus free breakfast for life. Welcome to the weekend edition of the Daily Stoic. Each weekday, we bring you a meditation inspired by the ancient Stoics, something to help you live up to those four Stoic virtues of courage, justice, temperance, and wisdom. And then here on the weekend, we take a deeper dive into those same topics. We interview Stoic philosophers.

2:43We explore at length how these Stoic ideas can be applied to our actual lives and the challenging issues of our time. Here on the weekend, when you have a little bit more space, when things have slowed down, be sure to take some time to think, to go for a walk, to sit with your journal, and most importantly, to prepare for what the week ahead may bring. Hey, everyone. Welcome to another episode of the Daily Stoic Podcast. I guess here we are at the end of the year. I don't know where you are when you're listening to it. I honestly don't know where I am going to be while you're listening to it, but I'm at the office now just sort of taking care of end of year business stuff, tax stuff, having to remind myself of Seneca's advice about paying the taxes of life gladly, which I don't always love to do.

3:41But trying to work on stuff. I just got the manuscript back of the Justice book, so I have to do the first past pages here to turn those back around before I think the 6th of January. So things are getting real. And yeah, it feels like the end of the year is this kind of like wrap-up period. And then actually, I already have stuff due the first week of January. I'm already in January in my mind in that sense. It's not in the indefinite non-existent future that, oh, that's a 2024 problem. I mean, it is, but it's also a problem for me right now. I got to finding some time to sit alone with that and edit it and start making final changes.

4:21And I can't procrastinate. And speaking of procrastination, last time I'm probably going to be telling you about this here on the podcast. Just a reminder, you still have a couple days to sign up for the Daily Stoic New Year New Year Challenge. The idea is to help you come up with goals, build better habits, become more disciplined to do the things that drive you. It's 21 actionable challenges, one per day, all inspired by Stoic philosophy. I'm doing the challenge. A bunch of My friends are doing the challenge and so many listeners are doing it. It's going to be awesome. We can do it together.

4:50DailyStoic.com slash challenge, or you can sign up for Daily Stoic Life and get this challenge and all the challenges for free at DailyStoicLife.com. Today's episode, we're going to talk about failure, talking about resilience, talking about getting back on track. And I interviewed a bunch of awesome guests, Rob Dyrdek, the professional skateboarder, the host of maybe the most popular show in the history of MTV. I talked to Rick Rubin, perhaps the greatest record producer of all time, who is going And I have a different view on discipline and that he comes to it more from the view of Eastern philosophy, but his great book on creativity is just absolutely amazing and I highly recommend it.

5:27And then I talked with the actor Alexander Ludwig, recent Austin transplant, who did a great episode on the podcast this year. And then I also talked to Whitney Cummings, the comedian about trusting the process and being disciplined in hard times. Congratulations to her, new parent. And then I talked to Nate Boyer, the Army Green Beret and professional football player, and then Arnold Schwarzenegger about powering through, knowing how to stop yourself from quitting. Anyways, all very interesting experts on discipline. And I'm excited for this little compilation here at the end of the year. I hope you enjoy.

6:04And thanks to all the guests on the Daily Stoic podcast this year. And of course, thanks to all of you. like a life is made up of days a day is made up of chunks i think the morning being the most essential chunk of the day like i feel like if you get the morning right a pretty good day inevitably follows what what does morning look like for you what's what's your morning routine well look my mornings are are dependent you know on if i get up at 3 30 or i get up at 4 30 Um, you know, a lot of times, like luckily for me, my wife started, uh, doing like 5am calls, uh, for her business. So she started wanting to go to bed earlier.

6:44I need about seven hours of sleep. So if we get to bed, it's like eight 30 or nine, I'm getting up at three 30 or four. Um, and then I start my day by sending her an email of every single thing that I'm doing that day. Um, and that's generated from my chief of staff. And then I put a love quote on it so that she has insight to everything that I'm doing in that day. I have my coffee pre-made the night before. So it's brewing. When I get up, I take a eight ounce shot of salt water and do five minutes of red light therapy before I head downstairs and have my first cup of coffee before I send her.

7:27Then I send her that email and then I go through all my time from the day before and fill out how my day looked to track all my time. Because I basically I fill out all my time in the calendar that that was blank and it all has tags that pump into a dashboard that shows me where I use all my time. Then I go back to my daily data where every day I track. Did I brain train? Did I meditate? Did I get up before five? Did I get in the gym? Did I eat clean? Meaning I had no sugar, no carbs, no nothing but lean meat and vegetables. And did I not drink? And did I take my supplements? Those are what I track each day.

8:07And then I go through and fill out all of that. Then I fill out how do I feel zero to 10 about my life, work and health that basically make up the data set that I have for years, right, of years of collecting this data. So I could show you how and I sent it to you. Yeah, you sent me your discipline spreadsheet. It was amazing. All that stuff pulls out of my calendar into these dashboards. So I've gamified my discipline. I know that last month I did all of that 100%. You know what I mean? Like I know that there's not ever a day off for me as to me, every day is amazing. And that process is part of that, that sort of day.

8:51But then I brain train and then I qualitatively rate the brain training to see how my mind feels each day. Then I meditate on a manifestation meditation. and then I wake my kids up, take my kids to school and then meet the trainer at the house at 745. That's how basically every day for me starts. Wow. I guess all that data and all that writing is kind of a form of journaling. You're creating messages to yourself based on what you did, but do you have a journaling practice also or is this mostly what you just sort of do in your head? Yeah, look, my journaling practice is through the lens of milestones, right?

9:37Like I'm in this sort of rapid state of evolution and in this continual sort of place of learning and growing and shifting. So I do my five and 10 year or a five and 15 year planning every quarter. And then I update those documents on an ongoing basis. And then I collect milestones of major thoughts and major things that are going on that are that are connected to it. Because the beauty of it, when you look at it all, when you layer it over top, you see how like the happier I am, how much more wealthier I am. You see how much more disciplined I am. You just see how like when you layer the blood work on top of that, when you when you look at all the sets of data that I could lay over top of that sort of core growth of evolution and discipline.

10:31And when you see it all together, the most profound aspect of it is that when I started doing qualitative data, asking myself about my life, how I felt zero to 10 about my life, health and work, the numbers were in 12s and 13s, where today they're at 23s. And it's like you really can see in all of these numbers how much truly happier you are. I can show you in the numbers that I went from working 36 % of my time down to 26 % of my time. And as you master time, time slows down. And then you understand the value of time so deeply that you're so precious with it. And then here's one of the greatest assets of mastering time.

11:22There is no point in my life that I look at my kids and wonder where the time went. There is no point in my life where I ever contemplate the idea of where did the time go? Because I know exactly where all of it has gone. And I created, designed, and optimized it with the intent to enjoy it and experiencing it. And so I feel each and every year of my life as what another extraordinary year in the human experience. And I can't wait to continue to see what the future holds because as tight as I plan it, I continue to evolve and change on such a level. And the universe continues to conspire to bring more opportunities and more interesting things that fit inside the parameter of my willingness to dedicate the time to these things that allow me to continually live this very exciting, rewarding, fulfilling life.

12:24And what do I want to do? I want to live one million hours. That's 114 years and 54 days. You know what I mean? And so I know that I got 8 ,760 a year and that if I do something for one hour a day, that it's 4 % of my life. So watching TV for one hour a day with my wife, I know, boy, that's a bit. I watch two hours of TV. That's 8 % of my life. It's so much more significant when you think about shooting 336 episodes of television. that's only 4 % of your life. And really the value of your time, when you understand it more intuitively, you just use it in a much different way.

13:16I started as a research assistant. So I learned like somebody else's methodology of writing. I learned Robert's. And so I do all my research on note cards, Like these are, these are my note cards. So I do them all by hand and it is so inefficient and so painstaking. And my handwriting gets worse every year because this is basically the only place that I write things by hand other than, you know, our, our, our interview notes. But there's definitely tools that would be better than the way that I do it. But there's something special and sacred to me about the way that I do it. And I loved that story.

13:58It's great. And I would say the book would recommend that you try one of the new methods as well. Yes. Just because, yes, but anytime you get attached to a method for a romantic reason, you know it works. Yes. And I'm not suggesting using another method because it's easier or saves you time. But maybe by experimenting with the other method, you learn something new about your process that you didn't know. And that's always good. It's great to refresh yourself all the time. It happens anyway. I mean, you're not the same person who wrote your first book. Sure. So if you're using exactly the same methods that that guy was using, it might not be optimal.

14:57No, it's changed a ton. But I would clarify, your book is full of paradoxes. I think much more Eastern than Western, your book sort of embrace of paradox instead of sort of singular permanent truth. Because then you tell the story about the man in Calcutta, and then you have this wonderful little poem on page 104. And you say, beware of the assumption that the way you work is the best way simply because it's the way you've done it before. And both of those are true. Yes. That's negative capability. Keith said the mark of genius was the ability to have two contradictory thoughts in your head at the same time.

15:41Beautiful. And I feel like there is something inherently paradoxical about art, which is like sometimes you do it this way. Sometimes you need to do it this way. Sometimes it's all about deliberate practice and putting your ass in the seat and doing it. And then other times the idea comes to you in the shower. Yes, and I think you can extend that beyond creativity to everything in life. I don't know that there's a right way to do anything. I think there's the way we know, and there's maybe a better way, and maybe we'll find out someday. Do you feel like your methodology or how you think about time in this studio has changed?

16:26I mean, you've been doing it 40 years, 50 years? How long? Something like 40 years. How much has your methodology changed? I don't think it changed so much. The main difference is in the early days, I didn't understand as well what was and wasn't important. So I probably put more effort into things that meant less in the early days. I spent a lot of time in the recording studio over the course of my life. for the first 20 years, I was in the studio for 12 hours a day, at least six, if not seven days a week. And in those days, usually in New York, it rooms with no windows and just like no life.

17:14Yeah. And now I aim to spend like from maybe five hours is about the amount of time that I can really focus with all of my attention. Whereas before, because we were in the studio, we felt like we were working, even when we weren't working. So it's like you get to the studio and you order lunch. And it was more like clocking in time. And now I don't clock in time. And we make it a point, we eat before we get there, we work like it's a military operation, and we get out as soon as we can. Not because we don't love it, but because there's life, you know, there is life beyond. And if we get on a roll and something starts going good, we could work all night if that's what it takes, you know, but it's not the standard.

18:09The standard is we come in, we know what we're doing, we get it done.

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20:22Going back to the picking the person you look to. So if you pick the person that was the flash in the pan, ephemeral, I want to be like, I don't know, is Neil Strauss a good example? He's not a flash in the pan. Well, didn't he have the book about nagging? I follow him on Instagram. Oh, yeah, Neil's amazing. He's doing better now, right? Yeah, he wrote the pickup artist book. But didn't he have the biggest book ever, the pickup art? The game blew up, but he's also like the biggest ghost writer that there is. Spooky. Yes. Okay, well, I'm trying to think of someone that was like, James Frey, A Million Little Pieces.

20:57I mean, he ended up being a charlatan. I'm just trying to think of an author, what? I see the book behind you. Oh, really? Yeah. And it was all a shit. I guess he said it was an autobiography, but it was really fiction. Who cares? I'm just trying to think of someone that - Actually, very nice guy. I'm sure. I'm just trying. This is a total. I'm horrible at this. I'm trying to think of where you got the idea that you would go with. Yeah, you think about the one-hit wonders and you go, I don't want to be that person. You don't want to be that. So for me, I was like Rodney Dangerfield. Made it at 60.

21:28Oh, sure. Like, pick the people you look up to and the trajectories you want to emulate and don't even think about those other ones. I can't even think about a flash in the pan. I'm only thinking of success stories. Like, I don't even allow that in my brain, you know? And so for me, I kind of get to go like, oh, I'm, you know, because working as an actress or working on camera, you're always told, like, you got to, like, 30. Yeah, that sort of idea. You start getting off. The music stops for everyone in some way. But, like, as comedians, you just get smarter. You get more interesting. You get more worldly.

21:58Like, the best is yet to come. Yeah. Like, this is just the beginning. Sure. It took me a while to, like, really get in that space. Like, what does a 25-year-old have to say? Right. Like, what do I have to say now? If I'm successful now, like imagine how good I'm going to be in 30 years when I have a kid and have actually like lived some life. And the audience has grown with you and you've just been doing it forever. And I'm a dork. I mean, literally in my office, I have pictures of, you know, like Rodney Dangerfield and Joan Rivers. And like remind yourself, make sure you're giving yourself a lot of data and proof that all that's possible.

22:28I wanted to ask you about that because I think you had this joke once I heard you say where you were like, I don't want my phone to get hacked. not because the pictures that are on because all the inspirational quotes the implication being that there's something kind of lame not because of my nudes because I have a folder full of screen grabs of inspirational quotes it's brutal but there is this sense that I think with some people that there's like something wrong with that or that something like a vision board is lame yeah knowing what you want and trying like there's there's kind of like cynicism is cool and earnestness is lame.

23:02I feel like, you know, yes, I think as you get, I agree on some level, but I committed to not being cool a really long time ago. And, you know, for me, I think it, I just surrender to the fact that really busy brains do well with very clean aphorism, even if it's a platitude, you know, a very simple one, not my circus, not my monkeys. It's like that will go out the window for me when I'm going to a chaotic situation and things are crazy and then I'm trying to micromanage people. Mother martyr micromanage. Those are some things you get when you grow up in alcoholic home. You're trying to fix people.

23:39I'm trying to mentor people. And I'm like, none of this is my business or my problem. Yeah. Not my circus, not my monkeys. Oh, right. You know what I mean? Sometimes you just like need that like little rubber band snap of a thing. um you know there was one recently that i screen grabbed that intelligent people are being silenced so that stupid people aren't offended yeah you know like sometimes i just like have to like write it on a post-it note and put it right there when i'm kind of like oh is this gonna get me in trouble and i'm like oh yeah like i kind of need those guardrails it is it is interesting like first off there's this debate amongst the stoics whether these sort of aphorisms or epigrans or maxims as they call them were necessary like they were like the wise person should just know like you've learned it you just know and and Seneca one of the other jokes is like no actually you need these like little reminders and so that's what he was trying to do he had this exchange with this friend Lucilius they would write each other letters and he says the whole point of this is he's like we should each get like one thing a day from each other like I'll write you a thing you write me a thing and then if there's just one thing that makes you a little bit better that makes you wiser, smarter, fortifies you against adversity.

24:46That's what philosophy is. Yep. And the funny thing is when you look at like high performers, that's actually what, like if you go to the locker room of the New England Patriots, there'd be like little things all over. Inches make champions. Yes, that you'd go, you're getting paid tens of millions of dollars a year. You're incredibly ambitious and driven. You've trained harder, had more expert coaching than anyone. You should know all this. And Bill Belichick is just giving you motivational quotes at the team meeting. But that's actually what it is at that level, right? And people are like, I've been amazed with Daily Stoic and like just the people who just follow this Instagram account and like the - Comedians?

25:32I had Krista Stefano on my podcast. We were talking about it. All my friends that are comics are so obsessed with it. And it's obviously genius, you know, but the simplicity of it. and the surgical, like there's no fat, the economical nature of like the silver bullet of like, that's it. I can't make this quote better. My ego can't get around it. I can't be like, it's not, like it's just true and clean and smart and I can repeat it to someone else. Like that's the best version of what like religion does. You know what I mean? It just like, there's something so soothing about knowing that it's true and it's succinct and I can repeat it to something else and my brain can't overcomplicate it.

26:13I have to surrender to it. These ideas, they've been distilled to their essence by really smart people thousands of years ago. And then the ones that didn't, it's like a comedian, the bad jokes get killed. The ones that aren't. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then all the fat, each time you do it is getting cut out a little bit more. It's being rendered down, rendered down until all that's left is like the essence of it. And that's the hack of Daily Stoic is that it's posting these things that people have been working on for 2 ,000 years. And it's been true for that long. Yes. And I think comedians probably also just like a very well-written line.

26:48That's true. There's an appreciation for, I think, writers too. But we always want to go like, we'll make fun of it, we'll judge it, we'll be like, oh, well, back then they didn't have social media. It's like you can't make fun of it. You kind of just get to surrender to it. And there's something really soothing about that for overthinky-thinky, complicated brains. I remember I talked at the University of Alabama to the football team. maybe six or seven eight years ago and like i'm i'm doing the talk i'm giving my stuff you know i'm in my early mid-20s then i'm talking about ancient philosophy and i could see this person kind of scribbling the whole time writing these very and then the first one to stick the hands up and you know you can't always tell who people are yeah from the lights from the stage or whatever yeah so the lights come on it's time for questions the first person asked the question that was nick saban like he was sitting in the front row there should be nothing i'm teaching this person yeah yeah he's the greatest to ever do what he does he's had all the and there he is like and he's just looking for one little line like one little line that he can repeat at something down that's what he wants and so it is funny that we kind of like kick ourselves or we think we were even a little self-conscious or we hide it that like we like these inspirational things but that's what that's actually the practice of it and that's what like great people do is they just look for these little lines that get them to teach something and that's really what 12-step groups are it's just a collection of lines i'll take it from here i got it yes you know so it's like there's there's some that bother me i'm gonna be honest maybe when someone's like hurt people hurt people i'm like ah or like what doesn't kill you makes you stronger like or it kills you sure and there's sometimes you have to consider the person that says it you know it's like Like, you know, you're kind of like, who said that?

28:31OK, well. And it may be true for them or it's true at that moment in your life. Totally. When I mean, it's like when it's like Marilyn Monroe is like, if you can make a woman laugh, you can make her do anything. And you're like, I feel like that was Bill Cosby's motto. But OK, like I'm the first person to want to, you know, sort of capsize something and make fun of it. But yeah, you're exactly right. Like 12 step programs, people go in and they're like, I'm too smart for this. I don't need this. And this doesn't make any sense. And it's like, well, if it's hysterical, it's historical. and you're like, ugh, I just have, that's just true and really helpful.

29:01And it's because somebody came, like at some point that was an original line. Someone came up with that or they stole it from someone else and they - Yeah, now people say it in spin classes. But like they got it from the ancients or they got it from the Bible. But at some point that quote was not a cliche. It was a new way of expressing a thing. And because it struck on something and then it was repeated so many times And it's this process that's working on it that then it becomes like simple but potentially life-changing advice to someone. Like my favorite one along those lines is that I got from meetings I've been to, which was it works if you work it.

29:40Yep.

29:47if you've endured some things in the past like i you know i i've never i haven't done 100 yet but i went out and did 54 earlier this year and before that i did 31 the year before and i ran my first marathon a few weeks before that and i'd never really done a distance thing before but i did long movements in the military yeah and i just knew i know what that's like to want to quit Yeah, that's really the main skill is like, can you conquer your ability to want to stop doing a thing? Right. The very human desire to stop doing this painful thing. Do you have that muscle, the muscle that says, no, we're going to keep going?

30:22Right. Seneca's line is we treat the body rigorously so that it's not disobedient to the mind. And so if you have that muscle, the muscle that can get in a cold plunge, the muscle that can push through, the muscle that can deal with people saying you suck a lot until you don't suck. That's like the ultimate muscle. It's really crazy what these meat sacks are capable of. It really is. And it's controlled by this little thing up there, you know, mine's smaller than others, but you know, it's wild just to, yeah, just that this thing can do that, can just endure and just keep going through all this pain.

31:04And I wonder, you know, I always wonder, you, you, you probably know more about this than me, a lot more about this, but just like the, the way these, these, you know, the synapses work and like the, the nerves and the pain that we feel, like how much of that is phantom. I mean, I talked to a lot of, a lot of guys I serve with in the military and I got to know through the veteran community that are missing limbs. Right. And it's like phantom pain is a real thing so it's like how much of that is actually phantom pain too you know when we're out there yeah we're like no i have my legs and my legs hurt yeah really bad well like what percentage of that is this actual pain and what of it what percent of it is in our heads certain people feel different levels of that and they're doing the same thing and i don't know it's super interesting to me have you do you know who courtney dewalter is i do i mean i don't know i've never met her but i know exactly who she is no i interviewed her on the pocket she was talking about she calls it like the pain cave so she's like when it starts to hurt i tell myself like i'm entering the pain cave and i want to like see what's back there right so instead of going like my body's telling me this is painful stop which is obviously why your body does it but your body it's like the check engine light or not the check the the the the gas light comes on uh way before the car is actually going to run out of gas or else there's no purpose for the light you know what i mean and so uh if you can have this sort of almost exploratory mindset of like, oh, I want to know what's on the other side of this.

32:30I want to know how far back this goes. I want to know how far I can bend this thing before it breaks. Eventually it's dangerous here, but you do, that's how you end up pushing those, those limits, you know? And it's, it's sort of self-actualizing. Like if you're like, no, this is my limit. I can't go any further than that. That's like as far as you can go. right but if you're like i wonder how far i can go you know you're probably going to go a little bit further and i'm gonna i'm gonna i'm gonna you know i'm not quoting but uh definitely gonna reference a very cliche film in fight club but that scene with the lie on the hand you know what i mean and uh uh that that chemical burn and like feeling that pain and just like being with it and like sitting with it um and working through it and not trying to run from it and not being afraid of it.

33:16Like it is, it, it definitely, there's value in that. There's a lot of value in that. And just understanding like, okay, well, this is, this is absolutely normal. I'm supposed to be feeling this because look what I'm doing right now. Sure. Um, and, and this is good because, you know, it means my body's operating properly and kind of having a different approach to, to that focus. But that's really interesting about the cave too. I hadn't, I hadn't heard that and hadn't thought of it in that way, but, um, just wanting to lean, really lean into that discomfort and pain more and be like, yeah, yeah.

33:45Okay, let's see if I push. Maybe I push a little harder right now, even though I'm feeling more pain than I have. And that's the opposite of what we want to do. That's what the voice in our head is telling us to slow down or to stop. Well, most people are physically capable of running a marathon. Like it's not like this superhuman physical task, right? Like you have enough muscles, you have enough body fat, you can physically do the thing. It's you just don't think you can do the thing. And it's hard to do the thing. So you would stop at some point, right? And then later you'd be like, I feel like I could have kept going, right?

34:23And obviously this is one of the functions of training. You run five miles a lot of times or start with one mile, then you run five miles a lot of times, then you run 10 miles, then you're pushing your training. So you get to the point where maybe you've never run the marathon before. You've never run 26 whatever miles before you've entered the race. But you know, you know, on that race day that you don't really need to be uncertain or question until you've gotten past the point of your furthest training. Do you know what I mean? Like the, can I do this is irrelevant for the first 15 miles if you've done 15 miles before, right?

35:05It's really the 10 at the end is really the only leap, you know? And so if you've done hardship before and you've pushed through, if you've followed processes before, then you know, okay, I'm doing this again. To me, that's always a question. How do you know you can do something you've never done before? You don't. You don't. But if you've done other hard shit, you know, hey, first off, I'm vaguely, I'm familiar with the general shape of what it is to do hard things. Right. And then you also know like, hey, I'm someone who doesn't quit. I'm someone who figures stuff out. I'm someone who asks questions, you know, and you have this, so you don't have certainty that you can do it, but you know you have the ingredients to do it if it is in fact possible to do.

35:57Right. And that's a big part of the allure for me is I don't know. Yeah. I don't know if I can. Like the unknown, I love the unknown. Sure. It's so interesting. And if I've already done something, like I'm already thinking about this. If I'm able to complete, if I'm able to finish Leadville and I get done, like I wonder if I'll have any desire to ever do that again. And not because it was 100 miles and it's a lot of training and it's hard, but it's like, well, I know I can do that now. Well, we make up new reasons. then it's like, can I place, what can I do a better time? You know? That's true.

36:31But just knowing myself, it may be one time. I don't know. I don't know. I mean, that's something else I don't know. Yeah. But yeah, I mean, that's so interesting to me. And I've thought about this a lot lately too, about why, because people ask me often, like, why are you so, whether it's the word is obsessed or interested or focused on like these challenges and doing these things that, like you said, maybe is a once in a lifetime thing for a lot of people, like that one thing. And I think, I think a lot of it comes from insecurity. Really? Yeah, I do. Do you just feel like you have something to prove?

37:06Yeah, I guess so. And I don't know if that's to myself or to, I don't, if it, there's not really a person that I can identify as like the person I'm trying to make me, make, you know, be proud of me or whatever. Did you feel like people were proud of you early in your life or no? um i think sometimes i mean i think my you know my my folks are both very smart very accomplished people they've worked really hard my mom got a phd in a male-dominated field one of the first women which went to cal berkeley and you know my dad is a racehorse veterinarian and you know he got his veterinary degree at uh there's a master's degree at university tennessee and you know they're just they're just very smart people and so that's probably why i didn't go to college right away because it was like, I got to do it my way and I got to find my own path.

37:52And I didn't really work that hard in high school. But I also, yeah, there's nobody, at least in my life, that I was more happy to see sitting in the stands at a game where there was a little league or whatever than my folks, you know, my parents. I wanted to make them proud, absolutely. But yeah, I don't know if it's like a proven something to them or if it's proven to something to 13-year-old Nate that just feels, you know, He's still in there. It's still me. It's the same guy. I mean, I get, you know, I get, I still have these fears. I'm not like unafraid of all these things. I'm absolutely afraid of all these things, but that's, that's why they're appealing to me.

38:35So I don't know, but I just, I still, I wonder if that's it. Cause I think I'm, I'm secure in a lot of ways and like mostly like who I am and you know, what I believe in. And I think my willingness to, um, to really listen to other people's perspective and way of doing things. I'm very open to that. I like to learn and take everything into account. Like I love different, just different perspectives um but at the same time like i'm still obsessed i guess with like finding this next thing and i just want to go do this and and these things sort of come about they're nothing i never thought when i was a kid that i'd be running 100 miles i never thought i was gonna join the military either though it wasn't really something the only thing that was a kid dream was professional sports you know playing football did you feel like you when you did those things did it feel good for a minute or is your mind always on to the next thing no No, it feels good for more than a minute.

39:32It definitely does. I mean, even the, I got to play in one NFL game, you know, and I got cut. And it is what it is. I did everything I could on the field. I actually played well, but it was the next big round of cuts in the preseason in 2015. And that was it. And it certainly wasn't like this, oh, you know, that was cool and that was great, but what's next? It was, you know, I'd spent the next year trying to get another shot, you know, and I had a few teams interested. It didn't happen. And that was it. But I still always think about that and I'm grateful of that. And, you know, it's one of my proudest moments getting to play.

40:17I got an amazing night's sleep last night. One, because my six-year-old fell asleep in the car at like six o 'clock and he transferred him from the car seat to the bed and it stuck, which is just magic. So he's in bed way earlier than normal. But I sleep really well every night because I have a 8 Sleep Pod 5 Ultra, which is 8 Sleep's best product. I've used 8 Sleep for many years now and it's just totally transformed how I sleep, made me sleep better, made my wife sleep better. It's amazing. So basically, Eight Sleep is this topper that goes over your mattress. It can heat and cool both sides separately.

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43:19So you talked in the book, I thought it was interesting, you're saying you see people in the gym, and they're like, I just want to get in shape. And you say, but sort of, for what? Or how? You're forcing them to be specific. This idea of being useful, I think, how would you push people in that direction too, right? So maybe generally, there's very few people that don't want to be useful. We all, I think, inherently want to be useful. But how do we channel that? Or how does a person find their reason or their canvas to be useful? Well, I think the first or the most important thing is what you just said.

43:55to have a clear vision and a clear goal. Yeah. Because when you ask someone in the gym, okay, you want to be in shape, what is the reason why you want to be in shape? Because being in shape, it's just very broad. What does that mean? And how do you get motivated if you don't have a specific goal? Yeah. So I then get into this conversation where people didn't have to really start thinking about. And some people say, well, the doctor told me that I'm now 55 years old, my cholesterol is high, and my blood pressure is high, and they thought that instead of just going on drugs and prescribing me medication, I should try vigorous exercising every day for a little bit, not too long, but just every day something.

44:46And so they do that. But I always tell them, I said, look, if there's a specific score that you have where you say, okay, by Christmas, I want to have 20 pounds less. Now you're shooting for a specific goal, and now you weigh yourself every day. Now you watch what you eat because you always know that you're stepping on this scale, and you want to weigh less and less and less every day. And by Christmas, you want to have 20 pounds less. So you can afford a little bit pigging out at Christmas time or whatever because maybe you feel overweight or whatever. So when we set specific goals like that, or I sometimes talk about it when I was a kid, 15 years old, I wanted to go the next year to the lake where I grew up.

45:29And I wanted to be more muscular and impress the girls. And people say, you were actually saying that? I said, no, I was not saying that to anybody. But it was my goal, and I dealt with it. Sure. I said, I dealt with it and it motivated me to go into train every day. And it's, of course, a stupid motivation, but it works. I said, so I'm telling people, I said, no matter how stupid your motivation is, it doesn't matter how silly it is. It doesn't matter. But pick a goal and then go after that goal. Have a specific reason for it. Because for everything, it gives us more motivation when we have a reason.

46:08It's no different than a kid that is coming out of high school and he now goes to college and he wants to be a doctor. Well, that's a goal. Yeah. Well, that's a big goal. And now all his classes that he would take would be specific classes that would get him to that goal, to make that goal a reality. There's so many that go to university just because they hear always this, oh, this is the American way. you know you got to have a university you have to have a degree and all this stuff but they don't know for what right so they go in there and what do they do they go and they join the university they go and stay in some uh flat house and they get drunk they eat junk food they gain weight and all this and they're drunk more than they're really studying and all this so because they are aimlessly yeah kind of like going through university for and then they're finished and And they don't earn more money because they haven't really shot that they study American history or something that they will not use later on.

47:13Except if you become an educator of some sort, then you can use those things. Or psychology to study or English to study. Yeah, we can use this, but it has to be used for something specifically. So I think it's always good if you say, I want to be a businessman. I want to start a real estate business. And so therefore, all of this that you study is like you study the microeconomics and microeconomics. You study accounting. You get really good in math and algebra and geometry and all of those kind of things. And you really get good in writing business letters and in communicating and in marketing and in publicizing products and all of this stuff.

47:50So all of the stuff that is important to be a good businessman. because no matter what business you're in, you have to be able to sell, to market, to communicate the product, whatever you're dealing with. So then you can take classes for that. So this is why it's more fun when we have a goal. And this is why I stress this in my book about have a vision, have a clear goal like I had when I was 15 years old. I wanted to be the world champion in bodybuilding. I wanted to be another Ridge Park. And five years later, after that dream, And that vision that I had five years later, I was standing on that very same stage in London where Reg Park won his Mr.

48:34Universe contest in 1951, 1958, and in 1965. He won three Mr. Universe titles. And on that very same stage, I stood there in 1966. And then in 1967, I won the Mr. Universe title on that stage. So I saw firsthand how that vision drove me to the gym hours a day where the normal amateur bodybuilder didn't train three, four hours a day. They trained an hour and a half. But I did the weightlifting. I did the powerlifting. I did the bodybuilding. I did the reps and the heavyweights and everything like this. And then by the time after hours and hours of training and torturing myself and going through this, I started winning competitions and junior Mr.

49:19Europe, then Mr. Europe, best buildman of Europe, and then second Mr. Universe, then Mr. Universe with the age of 20. So it was amazing. So now I knew, ah, this is what I have to do for the rest of my life. I have to have a very clear vision. And so then, of course, the vision expands. You say, I want to be not just Mr. Universe. I got to go and become the greatest bodybuilder of all times. So that becomes a new goal that I have to win that many Mr. Universe titles as Reg Park win. I have to win as many Mr. Olympia titles as Sergio Oliver and Larry Scott won. And so I have to just go after those titles.

49:54And so eventually I became the greatest bodybuilder of all times in 1975 after winning the sixth in 1980, the seventh Mr. Olympia competition and the 13th world bodybuilding title. And so it was like, so, and that same idea went into acting. Again, I had a very clear vision to become another Clint Eastwood or Charles Bronson or something like this. So every one of my goals, I approached that way. Well, it's when you have the goal, you have the motivation, which is key. But then something that's really interesting about your career, you also know what to say no to. That might be exciting or lucrative or interesting or standard, but it takes you further away from where you're going, right?

50:36So I think someone who has a strong idea of what they're trying to accomplish, a clear vision, as you call it, strong sense of who they're trying to help or what they want to accomplish, then they also know how to pass on things that are coming their way. They know how to pass on distractions. They know how to pass on temptations. They also know how to pass on doing the same thing over and over again because the next part of their vision actually requires them to go over here. You have to have that clarity. You're absolutely correct, because I remember, for instance, and I mentioned that also in my book, that I was in the middle of my bodybuilding career, winning one missed Olympia competition after the next, and being known as the bodybuilder with the business brain.

51:17because I was going to Santa Monica City College, taking classes there. I was going to West Los Angeles College to take classes, business classes there. I was going to UCLA extension courses because I couldn't go to one university because I was applying for the working permit and not for a student visa. So I only was allowed to take two classes at one place. So I jumped around all over, but I was taking classes and I was getting really, and my thing was business, you know. And I studied how to sell. So I said to myself, I have to become a successful businessman in America and know how to do business here.

51:54So people came to me with business ideas a lot of times. But it didn't really fall into the category of where I wanted to go, which is into the show business. So I was offered by the Jack LaLanne gymnasium empire here in California to run and to manage the gymnasium chain. And with a lot of money, I think it was like$200 ,000. or a year, which is, imagine, in the early 70s. So there's a lot of money. So I said to myself, okay, I will make this money, but now I will have to be in that business eight hours, 10 hours a day. And that would not give me the time to be able to go and take speech classes, accent removal classes, English classes, acting classes, all of the things that I, and worked with stunts and with stuntmen and all this, all the stuff that I needed to do to get into the direction where I wanted to go, which is to become a leading man.

52:58Yeah. So I said, so therefore I would derail myself by saying yes to this. Yes. Great offer. I would derail myself and possibly my dream to make, like Clint Eastwood, a million dollars a movie because that was my dream. So Charles Bronson, Clint Eastwood, and Marlon Brando, they were getting over a million dollars or a million dollars a movie. So that was like the number then. So I said, well, you know, if there's three, that ladder isn't that busy. And it's not that crowded up there. I think there's room for another one. So I felt absolutely convinced. I saw it very clearly for me to be a action hero.

53:41I had no idea how I'm going to get there, but I knew this is where I'm going to go. And therefore, this particular offer had to be turned down to become a manager of a gymnasium chain. And I turned it down. They thought I was crazy. But only then a few years later, when I did Stay Hungry, then I did Pumping Iron, then I did the Chain Mansfield story, then I worked with Kirk Douglas and with Anne Margaret in The Villain. And then all of a sudden I got this big offer to do Conan the Barbarian. And the Conan of Averian was$250 ,000 with a sequel obligation to make a million dollars. So now I said to myself, in 1977, I signed the deal for Conan to do a few Conan movies.

54:30And so I went back to my friend who offered me that. And he said, you see? And he says, no, you're smart. I mean, I get it. I get it now. We have to say no to some things to say yes to other things. When we say yes to something, we realize we're also saying no to other things. Yes, absolutely. And you know, look, imagine when you're governor. I mean, how many things you have to say no to? Sure. Right? I mean, you have your family. You have to work on all the different legislations that are coming to your desk. You have to go out and do fundraising activities. You have to, you campaign literally all the time.

55:10So, I mean, there's just so much work. that you have to do. So you really have to stay focused and disciplined and say, no, do a lot of things.

55:29There was always like nuggets in other books that I read. Like I loved like a lot of different self-improvement books or whatever, and you find nuggets of it. And I love history. Yeah. So every once in a while, I'd hear these things, like a quote from Aristotle, like freedom is obedience to self-formulated rules, right? Or something like that. And you're just like, huh. And then you hear other things. And then it was really your books that introduced me on a whole nother level to it. And of course, Duncan and myself and Duncan Penn, who I think you had on this podcast, yeah, is somebody who I talk about it with all the time as well.

56:03Really? Yeah. Interesting. All right. So walk me through, how does stoicism help you get sober? so people think that rehab people who haven't been yeah um is it's like um i think they have this preconceived notion that that there's like this pill they give you and suddenly it it just all goes away you know and you go to rehab you come out and things are just fine um and what i realized it was for me when I was, uh, there, um, is it's a deep dive into why we make the choices we make and why we're so self-destructive. Yeah. Um, as human beings. And after you do, after you start understanding more about what is kind of triggering you on this journey, the answer to these kind of insecurities is discipline.

57:02And it is a structure. And people, it's funny, as I've read more as I get older and the more things I've taught myself, I've realized that a lot of the spiritual practices or a lot of books that I've read are almost saying the same thing in different ways. Sure. Like the theme that I found most important to me is that for lack of a better word, discipline is destiny. Um, and, and that has been my way out of, uh, the turbulence in my life back, back in the day. Yeah. I think like, uh, if anyone's ever been to physical therapy or rehab from an injury, you get the sense that it's like, oh, I'm going to be worked on, like I'm going to go and I'm going to get massages or this kind of treatment or this medicine, but really they're like, no, here's the work that you have to do.

57:54And it's the same for, I think, the other forms of rehab. You don't go there and then they're like, here are all the secrets to not drinking or doing this or that anymore. What they're like is, here are the things that you have to do every single day of your life. And the second you stop, as they say, they say it works if you work it. If you do that work, then you'll stay sober if you don't do that work, you won't. And it's really, really hard work. It's like the hardest work because it's on yourself and it's against habits or practices or assumptions you've had your whole life. Yeah, 100%. It's, I mean, and some people refer to that as the program.

58:38Yes. Really, it's just your program. It's whatever you need to do every day to center yourself. Yeah. And to feel grounded. and admittedly there's days where I'm not as good. Yeah, sure. And there's days that I am. And I think one of the things I'm really trying to fine tune right now is how to do this when things that are out of my control are taking me out of my element. Like I'm not gonna be on my farm in Bastrop, you know, I'm not gonna be in my element. I'm gonna be traveling and overseas. And I think that is an art in itself is how to do those basic things that will center you for the rest of the day.

59:17Cause that's really all the program is. Once you've understood what is kind of fueling those self-destructive behaviors. Isn't there an acronym for like HALT? HALT, yeah. Hungry, angry, lonely, tired. And then I add thirsty cause I don't know why they don't bring that in too. I'm like, there's times. And basically all that's saying is, here's something I realized. I think whenever you're sitting there and you're going like, man, like I just, I need a vacation. Yeah. Like I just, I need to be in Mexico right now or damn, like I wish my house was bigger. I just wish I was in a bigger house. I find it so funny because I'm like, do you actually want to be in Mexico right now?

1:00:00Or do you like the person you think you're going to be in Mexico right now? And it's the same with that house, right? Like, like, or do you like the person you've become to be in that, you know? And I think, you know, it's, it's, it's, it's kind of the same theme from your book. Um, is just like, you get what you are. Yes. So just be the best version of yourself as possible. It's funny in meditations, there's a passage where Marcus realizes like doing exactly that. He's like, I know you think you want to get away from it all, like in the country or the beach or whatever. And he's like, but actually whatever you need is inside of you right now.

1:00:37It's like you can retreat and go on vacation inside your own soul right now. And I think it's true, right? We think, okay, if I can just get away from all these external things, then I won't feel what I'm feeling. And obviously sometimes that's what we do. And then sometimes we do like a substance or a thought pattern or whatever as the other version of escape. But what we really just have to deal with is whatever that feeling is. And if you can deal with that feeling and process it and work on it, that's actually a more sustainable and permanent solution to that thing. But I think, to me, one of the things that addiction is is like a sort of a proven pattern where whenever you get that feeling, you do that bad thing, that thing you're not supposed to do.

1:01:23And then the relief becomes associated with that feeling, even if it's also destroying your life at the same time. 100%. And it's your coping mechanism. You know, it is your higher power. It's what you go to. Yes. Right. It's like we fall on our habits. And if that's your habit, you're going to fall on that. Right. But I, you know, I'm so grateful for stoicism in my life. And I think that so many young kids right now, especially people growing up in this world with social media and just being flooded by these self-promoting people. and I'm not saying that there's any, like everybody has their own life and I'm not about to judge them, but it's just, if I was a kid growing up and like my idols were some of the things that I see now, it's very scary because I think that it just kind of can - We don't understand that it's not real.

1:02:22Exactly. That it's a performance. Yes. And in some cases it's literally not real because there's filters on top of it and there's editing on top of it And you don't understand that that is not actual life. That is fake life. The highlight reel of people's life. Or, you know, for some of these like business gurus, this is their way of getting you to sign up for something, right? Yes, yes. You think Andrew Tate or whatever is a successful whatever, but actually his only success is selling you stuff. Exactly. Well, you know, speaking of your show Heels, it's like watching professional wrestling and not knowing that it's fake.

1:03:00That it's all scripted, that it's designed to make you feel good about some people, bad about some people, vicariously follow along, stimulate very primal urges, which when it is presented as entertainment, there's absolutely no problem with it. The problem is, it's not. You're following these parenting bloggers and going like, why am I shitty because my house isn't clean like theirs? And you don't understand that they picked this location that they're shooting from because you can't see what's on the other side of the couch, which is the same mess that's in your house or that the house is a rental or the car is a rental or whatever.

1:03:38And, and I just feel like it's this, it's this kind of teaching for people that, that really is the way out. Because if I could sum up everything that I've read into a few words from you, it's, you're going to be okay. You're, it's going to be okay. Follow this. Like, like, because I think that, um, everyone is being made to feel like they're not good enough right now, you know, in the world. Um, and through this, you realize that you can do that for yourself, you know, through these, these small practices that, um, this everyday routine that you don't need validation externally, that this all comes internally and happiness isn't something to be gotten.

1:04:28It is the way.

1:04:40Thanks so much for listening. If you could rate this podcast and leave a review on iTunes, that would mean so much to us and it would really help the show. We appreciate it. I'll see you next episode.

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