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Let's be unafraid.
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Let's talk about the most controversial things as long as we think we have an interesting take and we think people can learn.
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You said that if your boys could learn one skill Yeah.
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it would be storytelling. 100%.
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Your ability to convince people to invest, to get your viewers to listen.
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I wrote my first book at 52.
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I wish I'd started 20 years earlier.
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In the TED Talk, you do something that comedians do very well and it creates so much life and connection.
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I find that humor is a weapon.
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I put up a picture of that mob chic photo of Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sanchez. And then you just pause.
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And you say I just like this slide.
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It has no context or relevance.
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And they're like, "Well, I like this guy.
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I'm going to give him more permission to change my mind."
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Scott Galloway is what you'd get if Howard Stern, Jim Cramer, and Clayton Christensen had a baby.
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I mean, this man is a master communicator, a master at it.
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And that's what I wanted to learn from him.
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What is it that you do to communicate so memorably?
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Cuz I watched his TED Talk and it's funny, it's got good pacing, it's got good data, and I wanted to learn how is it that you do Let's get into this episode because these 90 minutes absolutely rip.
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When you wrote The Four, you were talking about it and you said that you had thought about writing that book for like a decade. Yeah.
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How did you know that you were ready to finally write a book?
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My first piece of advice to anyone who's an aspiring writer or communicator is the really the key almost 90% of it is just starting. Mhm.
1:33
You know, there's a pretty intimidating moment when you flip open your laptop and you say chapter one, Google.
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Okay, what am I going to write that hasn't been said about Google?
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And the key is just to start.
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And I think most of the magic happens in going back and editing, but just start writing.
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Just say just commit to a certain amount of time and also have deadlines. I need deadlines.
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I guess maybe some people don't.
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I work best with deadlines.
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But I had been thinking about writing a book for 10 years.
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And my dean at NYU said, "If you want to be taken seriously as an academic, you either have to do peer-reviewed research."
2:14
And I said, "I'm not going to do that.
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This is just mutual masturbation.
2:15
That's where all just writing irrelevant research to give citations to your buddies from Carnegie Mellon such that you can all get tenure."
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Uh 98% generously, it's probably 99% of it is irrelevant other than a self a self-invented artificial metric for who's a {quote} good academic.
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Some of it blows up, some of it is relevant. Most of it isn't.
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And I just read some peer-reviewed research in, you know, Journal of Market Research.
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I know this isn't for me.
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But he said, "Well, then you should probably write a book."
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And I had had this thing stirring in me about technology that these companies were becoming increasingly dominant, setting the trends for society, relationships.
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And so when I felt like I knew them well, but again, the key I I wish I'd done it you know, I wrote my first book at what at uh 52.
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You know, I wish I'd started 20 years earlier. Mhm. And also I did a talk.
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My process is I did a talk called The Four at this conference called DLD.
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And I didn't know they were videoing me, but they were.
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They posted on YouTube and it got three or 400,000 views.
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And this guy named Bob Lefsetz, who's an amazing writer, who writes about the music industry, but is able to relate it to life and economics.
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He's got great voice, too. Really unique. That's it.
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Like bad bad format, no design, just literally like he's writing you an email, but he sends it out to half a million people.
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He said, "This is a great talk."
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And that endorsement got it a couple hundred thousand views.
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And then this guy named Jim Levine, who ends up as one of the premier book agents, showed up in my office and said, "You should write a book on this talk."
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And that's been my process since.
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If I have an idea for a book I'll do some newsletters on it or some shorter posts in my newsletter as a kind of a petri dish. And I'll do a talk.
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And if the talk does really well on YouTube I know I might be on to something.
4:14
So I'm able to sort of I have the minor leagues of my books, right?
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That's that's sort of my process.
4:19
You said that the magic happens in the editing process. Tell me about that.
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Well, look, greatness is in the agency of others.
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And a lot of people will say to me kindly, "I can't get over how much content you produce.
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You must work around the clock." I don't.
4:33
I'm at a stage in my life where I want to spend more time with family.
4:38
I want to spend more time spending money instead of making it.
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That's why I'm in Europe.
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My reductive analysis after molesting the planet for 30 years is America's the best place to make money, Europe's the best place to spend it.
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I'm now in the spending part of my life, so we moved to Europe.
4:53
But I have a group of 14 people who work with me who do everything from editing to charts to graphics.
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And on most of my work now I will sit down with someone, give them some thoughts, give them some talking points, and ask them to draft it.
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And I find it just so much easier when I get 1,500 words.
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Sometimes I think I spend more time editing than I would if I'd just written it myself.
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It comes back just bloodied.
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But the next draft they do gets better and better. And I give it voice.
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You know, I I have different metaphors, different examples, but that first draft or even if it's just a couple paragraphs from someone, it inspires some thinking.
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And it prompts me to get going.
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But I don't There's very few things now that other people that I do that other people don't touch.
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If you want unless you're a genius, I think there's some people who are just so amazing what they do, they can go into a room with a typewriter and punch out something that can change the world.
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I think that 51% of what I do or the influence comes from other people scale, other people understand technology, other platforms that I have {quote} weaponized, leveraged, used.
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And 49% maybe comes from me.
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Uh but I now there's there's few things I do that aren't touched and improved dramatically by someone else on the team. So tell me this.
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Day one, I come in, I'm working for you. Yep.
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We got a one-hour meeting. Yep.
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And you say you're going to help me with my communication.
6:26
What is the structure of that meeting?
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What is it that you're trying to tell me to say for the kind of communication I like doing?
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This is what you need to know so that you can do a good job of emulating my voice and helping me communicate in the way that I like to communicate.
6:39
Yeah, I think it's very difficult to tell someone to speak in my voice.
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So uh so for example, I'm spending a lot of time with AI.
6:48
And I'll say write um a 1,500 word post on polarization in the voice of Scott Galloway.
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And AI will write about polarization and it'll insert some dick jokes and some data.
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That's my voice according to AI. And it's very anodyne.
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It's just very difficult to tell someone to be like you.
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And it puts pressure on most of the people who work for me are pretty young.
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What I'll say is you know, this week's post on No No Mercy is on incentives.
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Uh and I like kind of running into the fire and talking.
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I think the moment Britney Britney Griner, the WNBA player, was traded for a arms merchant we effectively took uh Evan I think it's Gershkovich, the the Wall Street Journal reporter, we almost guaranteed they were going to take somebody else cuz I think they created incent we created incentives.
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Um I think using or normalizing uh uh or accepting using humans as ammunition and human shields that Hamas is doing has normalized that tactic and we it works because we uh it's created a great deal of empathy for these people.
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Both of these things are really controversial. They inflame people. And I think I'm right.
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And what I'll say is I'll lay out the argument to the individual and say, "Here's some data.
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Here's what I think we want to talk about it.
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We want to couch it in incentives."
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That way even if someone disagrees with those takes they can see the broader point around incentives and it can catalyze a conversation.
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And I get it wrong all the time.
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Let's not be afraid to be wrong.
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Let's try and be thoughtful.
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Let's try and back it up with data.
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Let's not purposely try to upset people. But let's be unafraid.
8:31
Let's talk about the most controversial things as long as we think we have an interesting take and we think people can learn.
8:36
But when I sit down with one of my analysts, I'll say "This is this is my view."
8:39
And they'll push back and say, "Well, what about this? What about this?"
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And oftentimes we do it with eight or 10 people.
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We do these editorial meetings cuz I I have what I call a half a dozen muses.
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They're generally young people uh you know, super interesting, super bright.
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And they just look at the world through a different frame than me and they have a different life experience.
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And it's so powerful to surround yourself with people cuz they'll say something you didn't even know what you didn't know.
9:05
You didn't realize how out of date your view was.
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And they say something and you just think and you need to be open to it.
9:11
You're like, "They're right. I'm wrong. Let's explore that. Let's push on that."
9:14
But when I sit down with someone, I'll say, "I want to write a post on incentives or a chapter on incentives.
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Here are some things I think you should look at.
9:21
Incentives are basically a survival mechanism, right?
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You get you have incentives to eat, to propagate, to defend yourself.
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W- Where did incentives start?
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And then how do we bring it forward to some things that are going on that might be interesting?
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And even if you don't even if you don't like the examples or disagree hopefully someone walks away and says, "I understand incentives."
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And then I'll talk about in a business context let's talk about compensation. I'm on a lot of boards.
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I find when the CEO's behaving strangely, I can almost reverse always reverse engineer it to their compensation cuz that's the incentive for a CEO is their comp.
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And sometimes their comp is a weird structure.
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I'll sit down with a group of them, sometimes just one.
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They'll go get a bunch of data, they'll come back, we'll do a couple more meetings, someone will draft something, maybe I'll start to draft the opening and closing paragraph or I'll do a draft, and then we all start hammering on it, inserting data.
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And we have a Google Doc that's just changed my life.
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And go in and say, "Need more data here.
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This would be a great place for a chart."
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Or they'll write, "Scott, personal anecdote needed here."
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But to tell someone to mimic your voice is just so hard.
10:31
Well, this is what I want to get into and really learn from you is you can almost think of every reader-writer relationship of what is the distance, right?
10:39
So, I was thinking about who is Scott Galloway and who is he not.
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You are not Michael Porter, you are not Clayton Christensen.
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Like those people, they've great ideas, but I feel no connection to Michael Porter when I read their stuff.
10:53
Whereas with you, that distance the gap closes.
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It's like we're together in the same room.
10:59
Is that something that you've really tried to consciously cultivate?
11:01
And if so, how have you done it?
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Well, one, first off, thank you, that's a generous statement or generous question.
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I find the medium really is the message.
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So, the way someone greets me on the street, I get recognized two to three times a day in London, four to five times in New York.
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When I'm at the Cannes Lions Festival, it's like every 15 ft.
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And I love it cuz I'm a narcissist and I'm desperate for the affirmation of strangers. So, I love it. I absolutely love it.
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I've never understood people who don't like fame.
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I'm like, "Well, just shut the [ __ ] up and it'll go away."
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Um anyways, the intimacy, if someone comes up to me and high-fives me, I'm like, "Prof G." I know they saw a video.
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If someone comes up and wants to have a long conversation or they send a really long, thoughtful email, I know it's been inspired by something I've written.
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That the written word resonates when it's well done and people read it and it moves them, it goes right to their heart.
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Whereas if someone comes up and they start speaking to me as if they know me, just casually, "Oh, hey Scott, you know, how about how about Saka at Arsenal?
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Are they" I'm like, "It's the podcast."
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When you're in someone's ears physically and they're usually listening to you as they're doing something intimate, making breakfast, walking their dogs, they literally begin to believe you're friends.
12:19
And people come up to me and they will say, "How's Leia?"
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my dog, as if they know me and as if they they think we know each other.
12:26
So, podcasting, the most rewarding thing about podcasting, one, it's super profitable.
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It's really rewarding economically if you're in kind of the top 200.
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It's the definition of income inequality gone crazy.
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These, you know, so it's been rewarding on that level. It's fun.
12:41
It's fairly easy for me, but the most rewarding thing is the intimacy it establishes with people.
12:48
And then the other thing is, and it's more purposeful strategy, is the white space I am trying to fill, which is enormous in terms of voice, is to be a white heterosexual male in his 50s talking openly about his emotions. Mhm.
13:03
A 59-year-old man that hasn't gotten over the death of my mother. Right?
13:07
And I say these things, and I talk about how I really miss my mom and she died 20 years ago and I still get very down about it.
13:12
And I hear from these master of the universe men who are like, "I still can't get over my mom.
13:17
I sometimes pull out her picture and just stare at her." Wow.
13:21
And you you you connect with these guys cuz one of the reasons that Premier League football, and to a certain extent, I think some of my content resonates, is there aren't a lot of safe places, I would say, for men my age and my demographic to be open with their emotions.
13:38
We're taught that an expression of this type of vulnerability or emotions makes us less masculine and means we're struggling mentally and means we're weak.
13:48
Uh whereas people, I think, from other demographics are much better at expressing their emotions.
13:52
So, that kind of emotional connection, when you're vulnerable or when you speak openly about something and someone else is experiencing the same thing, but no one's really talking about it with them, that creates connection.
14:01
So, the medium of podcasting creates that intimacy and talking very openly about your emotions from a group that doesn't do a lot of that.
14:12
Miles Davis, the jazz musician, he has a quote that I really like.
14:15
It says, "Sometimes it takes a long time to be able to play like yourself."
14:20
And one of the things that I instantly notice with you right now is the change between our pre-recording conversation and our on-recording conversation was was nonexistent.
14:32
It was just the same person.
14:34
And I find a lot of people the camera turns on and they change into somebody else.
14:39
I do that sometimes, right?
14:41
Like I get a little nervous or whatever.
14:43
I'm like, "Oh my goodness, this is being recorded."
14:44
But do you feel like with you that sort of being able to play like yourself, is that something that you've had to develop over time?
14:49
Or do you think you've always had this ability to just be on camera, be in writing, and really be real and authentic?
14:58
Well, there's two things there.
14:58
So, being real and being authentic, a lot of it comes from blessings.
15:01
And that is I can be real and authentic cuz I don't want to say I can't be canceled, but I can say I don't think it makes any sense for uh I think if you have transgender women in sports that were traditionally sequestered to uh participants who were born as females, I know that's going to piss people off.
15:29
But I believe that, and I consider myself a feminist, that if this continues, we're going to basically sequester all scholarships, money, and accolades to people, and I'll say, to people born with a penis. Mhm.
15:42
Knowing it's going to piss off people, but I think I'm right and I think a lot of people, at a minimum, I think it'll catalyze an interesting conversation.
15:50
And at the same time, I'm like, I don't understand why people demonize trans people.
15:53
That's a whole other conversation.
15:55
But I can say that because I have two huge blessings. I'm economically secure.
16:03
Um and I have people who love me unconditionally.
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And I think if you have both those things, you have the privilege and obligation to speak your mind.
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Because a lot of people in this business and communications will say, "I want to be more authentic.
16:16
I want to be more hard-hitting.
16:17
I want to be more puncturing."
16:18
And I'm like, "Okay, but keep in mind, you might get fired."
16:23
If you I say stupid things all the time.
16:24
I I cross I I I I'm provocative to the point of being offensive.
16:31
And I get it wrong a lot.
16:31
And if I but I to a certain extent, I can't be fired.
16:35
I could be shamed and canceled by the modern public who decide not to listen to me.
16:40
But these are my own businesses.
16:42
I have all the money I'm ever going to need.
16:44
So, I'm in a position of privilege.
16:45
So, when people a big one, too, man. What's that?
16:48
The love's a big one, too.
16:48
I mean, never on this show has someone ever said, "You know who you can write with more voice, more sincerity?
16:54
You need people to love you unconditionally."
16:57
And if you have that, you have a kind of security and a kind of shelter that will allow you to speak the truth.
17:04
I mean, at the end of the day, if [ __ ] really gets real for me and I say something really stupid or the whole zeitgeist of the economy and society turns against me and I'm shamed and I'm kicked out of the tribe of modern-day progressives or communicators, whatever you want to call it, I can still get a big, fat, [ __ ] home in Ibiza and take my sons and my wife there and live a pretty good life. Right?
17:23
I'm not I'm going to be fine.
17:23
I'm not like Kevin Spacey going on Piers Morgan and crying and saying he's losing his house because he got canceled.
17:33
You know, I have economic security.
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That is hugely important.
17:36
I have a a group of people who I respect and really adore, who respect and adore me.
17:41
So, I can I can color, you know, pretty aggressively and occasionally color outside the lines. That's a blessing.
17:51
The other thing is just I have a trick where I I say I'm writing and communicating as if the only audience is my boys when they're 40 and they have some perspective and I'm gone.
17:59
And what I want is I want them to think, "Wow, Dad was smart. Dad was fearless."
18:03
And I have a sense for Dad and a sense for maybe what was going on at the time.
18:07
And they might look back and go, "Jesus, what an idiot."
18:10
But they'll think, "Okay, he was fearless."
18:12
Cuz I think I if there was anything that people I think about that are really have changed the world, I think all of them had one th- you know, a couple things.
18:21
They were outstanding at what they did.
18:23
Muhammad Ali was a great boxer.
18:25
At some point, they were shunned from society.
18:27
They stripped him of his gold medals. And he was fearless.
18:32
Like, you know, I'm not when they wanted to draft him, he's like, "I'm not letting a bunch of white people send black people to go kill a bunch of yellow people."
18:38
Whoa, you do not say that in '60s America, right?
18:44
Impoverished him, never wavered.
18:44
And also, he was just an artistic communicator.
18:48
He was fearless in the the most macho sport in the world, you know, "I am so pretty."
18:52
I mean, no one can tell you to do that.
18:55
So, when I look at my I try and channel my role models.
19:00
They're fearless, they're artistic, they're outstanding at what they do.
19:01
And the way I get that confidence thing, I want my boys to be the audience when I'm gone and I want them to understand me and a little bit about the world, even if I'm wrong. And it's liberating.
19:12
And the other thing, the trick I have, is it's a huge source of power and and courage for me is atheism.
19:22
You know, I I think in a short amount of time, I'm going to be dead and in just a little bit longer amount of time, you're going to be dead and so are these guys.
19:29
It really doesn't [ __ ] matter what we say here.
19:30
I mean, it's it's it's meaningful, but it's not profound.
19:33
We're all Everyone I'm worried about what they think of me is going to be dead and so am I.
19:39
So, why wouldn't you squeeze the [ __ ] out of this lemon called life and say what you're thinking.
19:44
You never want to be You don't want to diminish people.
19:48
You want to try not to be unkind. I I personal attacks.
19:50
I speak very openly and aggressively about people, but I have a code around that.
19:53
They have to be much more powerful than me. That's my code.
19:57
Otherwise, I'd never say anything negative about somebody.
19:58
But why wouldn't you kind of dance on tables and speak your mind?
20:05
And if you get shunned from the community and MSNBC or Fox no longer want you on or a book deal gets canceled or your TV show gets canceled on Bloomberg.
20:16
All of these things have happened to me. Mhm.
20:19
Yeah, it bumps me out for about a day.
20:22
But okay, they're going to be dead, I'm going to be dead. I'm economically secure.
20:25
My kids still want to hang out with me.
20:27
This really isn't that important.
20:29
And I think some of that that lack of fear or recognition, it's all pretty meaningless or you don't really need to be be that worried.
20:39
That's a huge source of like I don't know if it's encouraged, but comfort for me.
20:43
How do you think about pacing?
20:43
Like when you started your TED Talk, you said I got 17 minutes, 20 seconds, something like that.
20:49
And you have a way of communicating where you go boom boom boom boom boom.
20:54
It's fast-tempo without being rushed. Mhm. How do you do that?
21:00
Well, the first is it's a lot of practice.
21:02
Uh I get to stand in front of 300 people and practice a 90-minute talk twice a week for the last 22 years cuz I teach.
21:11
So I have a tremendous amount of practice and I do probably 50 talks a year.
21:15
Big thing there for that, in person, so you can see people's faces.
21:19
You're not doing Zoom talks, you're not doing podcasts like this.
21:21
You're staring into people's eyes and these are college kids.
21:24
And you can tell when they're bored, snap of a finger.
21:26
But in the last 2 weeks, I've been in or 3 weeks, Hamburg and speaking in front of 11,000 people in Cannes speaking in front of a group of, you know, 120 executives and then doing things like this.
21:39
So I get up and down the stack.
21:41
I get a lot of a lot of practice.
21:43
In terms of pacing, my just format is a ton of slides. They prompt thoughts.
21:50
And I'm not scared when I see a slide, if it's not part of the tempo, I just skip it.
21:53
And I have a clock and I just start going.
21:55
And I want them I want people to feel like a piece of beaten flank steak by the time they leave my talk.
22:02
Like, "Whoa, like that was a lot.
22:04
And maybe I'll go back and have to listen to it again.
22:07
But I try to have dramatic pauses.
22:12
I find that humor is a weapon. Totally.
22:14
The hands I'm winning many awards, but the one award I'm most proud of is I won most comical in Steve Martin in my high school.
22:21
And I think humor is an incredible way of softening the beach so that you can invade with ideas.
22:26
People are much more open to their ideas being challenged when you couch it in humor. And I love that stuff.
22:31
So it's it's my style is rapid pace.
22:34
I try to show up with some license and credibility where even if you don't agree with me if I have 148 slides of data then charts that are visually aesthetically pleasing, they go this guy this guy did his work.
22:50
This guy came to play, right?
22:51
And to me you know, people call will call me all the time and say, "How do I become a speaker?"
22:56
And I'm like no one's really interested it's very difficult to establish a long-term career as a speaker just standing up and telling your war stories.
23:05
I mean, if you're Hillary Clinton, you can do that for a little while.
23:06
If you're Dave Chappelle, you know, people go you're funny.
23:10
But even a guy like Dave Chappelle, I got to think he spent hundreds of hours to get to a 45 or 60-minute talk or speech.
23:17
So when I get on stage and I go through 100, you know, 48 slides they know either Scott or someone spent a ton of time.
23:26
I'm just not getting up there and saying we need to be kinder to each other.
23:30
I you know so the the and the slides are tremendously strong architecture.
23:34
It is not easy for me to speak without slides.
23:38
They prompt me, they keep me on pace.
23:38
I know where I am in the presentation. They're my outline.
23:42
They're my teleprompter basically, just my slides.
23:46
So your TED Talk, did you start that in Google Docs or did you start it in a slide deck?
23:49
How did that begin to come together?
23:51
Cuz you worked with the analyst.
23:52
So what was the genesis of that?
23:55
So the genesis was Chris Anderson, the guy who started TED, met with me and said, "We're thinking about having you at TED."
24:01
And I'm like, "Oh, thank you, Lord." What a thrill.
24:05
And he's like, "If we were to bestow this great honor on you, what would you talk about?"
24:09
And I said, "Well, I've been thinking a lot about the transfer of wealth between young and old and how incumbents have weaponized government to the to the detriment of to the detriment of young people."
24:18
I said, "I think there's sort of a war on the young."
24:21
And Chris said, "That's it. War on the young. Boom."
24:25
And then I'll sit down with my team and say, "We're going to talk about the war on the young.
24:27
We're going to talk about social policy, economic policy. Here are some examples."
24:32
And we create in a Google Doc just a frame or skeleton and then my analysts will come back to me once a week for eight or 10 weeks with slides, a slide deck.
24:43
And initially, it's 80 or 100 slides that just have the title of the slide.
24:48
And we go through it and we start chunking it and reorganizing it.
24:51
I'm like, "Get data here.
24:54
Uh I'm really into words.
24:54
I'll say change the title to this."
24:56
What's an example of that?
24:59
Uh instead of, you know, old versus young, call it incumbents versus entrants.
25:05
It doesn't feel as class warfare. Mhm.
25:07
And it makes the point I think more subtly and more powerfully.
25:09
And I'm I'm a big fan of look at every slide and less is more.
25:14
How can we take out as many words as possible and is there ever an opportunity to replace words with visuals because if there's a line in that corner, you and I know immediately what to do. We know to run.
25:26
But if we read on a teleprompter, there is a line in the corner.
25:31
You we interpret images something like 30 to 50 times faster than words because we've been interpreting images whether it's a sun in the midday sky or drawings on cave walls.
25:39
We've been doing that for hundreds of thousands of years.
25:43
We've only been reading words for about I think about 7 or 800 years.
25:47
So images are so much power more powerful if you can get something across.
25:52
Uh so that's the we we Google Doc outline, start doing slides, refine over over over.
25:58
I don't do I think as much practice of the presentation than most people.
26:04
If you'll notice my presentations, I fumble on words.
26:06
I sometimes pause a little bit too long.
26:11
I think some of that helps me cuz it comes across as less rehearsed or authentic.
26:14
The night before, I'll just sit in my you know, sit in a chair in bed and I'll just click through the slides.
26:20
But I can do it pretty well impromptu.
26:20
I don't do a lot of practice, but by the time I get on stage, I've gone through these slides 15, 20 times and really know the data.
26:35
And every time I do a presentation, like the TED presentation that's probably 8 to 12 weeks of someone's labor.
26:43
You know, it's probably 2 weeks of just someone's creative labor and it's probably 6 to 10 weeks of an analyst going through and assembling these slides.
26:51
And then we spend 2 weeks fact-checking it. Like, can we say this? Is this right? Well, what about this?
26:58
We said this on slide 15.
27:00
You know, we QA the thing. It's a lot of time.
27:03
And if you want to I mean, TED doesn't pay.
27:06
But if you want to charge six-plus figures for an hour talk, which I do you've got to show up. You've got to bring it.
27:15
And again, going back to Muhammad Ali, Muhammad Ali said all his fights were won uh not in the ring, but in training.
27:21
And he hated every minute of it.
27:21
And you know, the prep is hard. It's not a lot of fun.
27:27
Um you start to get momentum and excitement when it starts to come together.
27:30
But look, it's just a ton of work.
27:30
The thought that you can just get up there and perform.
27:33
I can't even imagine how much time it takes to produce like a Broadway show or something.
27:38
But yeah, that's kind of that's essentially the process.
27:39
You have said that if your boys could learn one skill Yeah.
27:46
it would be storytelling. 100%. Why that?
27:48
And tell me about the mechanics of storytelling that you were to teach them.
27:52
Like if you were to have a curriculum, what are the sorts of things that you would instill in them?
27:57
Well I mean, remember how ridiculous it was in some of the tonier private schools they were teaching Mandarin?
28:02
And then they replaced civics and history with computer science, which is how we got mendacious [ __ ] like Mark Zuckerberg.
28:08
But the if you could give any skill to your kids that could stand the test of time, hands down it's storytelling.
28:14
I don't care if you're Maya Angelou or Jeff Bezos, they're great storytellers. Right.
28:18
Your ability to convince people to invest, to come to an interview, to get your viewers to listen to convince someone to have a coffee with you uh you know, it all comes down to storytelling.
28:33
And that is I think the premier skill among the most successful people.
28:38
So in terms of in terms of the curriculum first and foremost, it's practice and a certain level of fearlessness.
28:46
I I'm not doing it anymore, but when my boys were younger, when we left the house, I just kind of had one rule.
28:51
We can't go back until you speak to a stranger.
28:54
And my my oldest boy had no problem.
28:58
And my youngest, a couple times we'd have to sit outside the house. It was kind of dramatic.
29:00
And I'm like, "Just go ask them what breed their dog is. Just tell me anything."
29:05
Because I think especially with young men, they've lost the ability to initiate contact with strangers. Terrified.
29:09
Yeah, or they're worried about rejection.
29:11
Or I think a decent skill is to anytime you're in a line, speak to the person in front of you and behind you. It feels good.
29:18
There's supposed to be research that releases a good good hormone.
29:23
And you learn how to open.
29:24
And I think the key one of the keys is learning how to open, like how to start.
29:29
But in terms of storytelling, it's like, "Okay.
29:32
What is the central point or narrative here?
29:35
I think that young people that we have a purposeful transfer of opportunity, prosperity, and wealth from young to the old.
29:42
And I think it's purposeful.
29:43
I don't think it happened accidentally.
29:45
And I think the incumbents are creating this illusion that oh, it's network effects or globalization.
29:51
[ __ ] They have weaponized government and decided young people pay social security and give it to me.
29:57
Young people make it harder to get a degree or get a house such that my degree and my house goes up in value.
30:03
These are This is not accidental.
30:03
That's the central theme. I think it's powerful.
30:06
And then I'll say, okay, now we got need to backfill it with data.
30:11
But it's All right, what's the central what's the core message?
30:13
What's the medium for getting it across?
30:17
And then beyond that, what I would say is my process probably doesn't work for most people cuz I think more most people are going to need more practice to feel comfortable.
30:25
And uh you know, but I don't know.
30:26
I think a lot of it's just practice and finding your own I would imagine that Mick Jagger's approach to storytelling is much different than Malcolm Gladwell's.
30:36
I think it's just sort of finding how you communicate and tell stories.
30:38
We had this The guy who spoke before me at TED was this kind of year-old astronomy professor, and he was in a bad suit and the hunched shoulders and but he was kind of adorable. Right?
30:53
And I got I I'm pretty sure he purposely crumples his suit cuz I think that's part of his brand. Part of the stick. Part of the thing.
30:59
And you'll start to get a feel for what is my storytelling, what is my brand.
31:04
But I think again, the key is just starting.
31:06
Finding audiences, whether it's on Medium, on Tik Tok, uh on in front of a classroom, you know, a book where you can start getting that rhythm and that cadence down.
31:17
Well, the word that stands out is narrative.
31:18
One of the things I've been thinking about is how Loom, the software company, they as a company, they're valued more than the entire category of hey, we're going to record a video of screen sharing.
31:33
They're now valued more than that entire category was before they started the company.
31:36
And the point is that if you can have a narrative, if you can use the right words, kind of get aligned with the arrows of progress in society, you can have investors, shareholders, employees, people feel that there's a certain inevitability to your success. Yeah.
31:51
Well, like it the the CEO of every company at the end of the day, I mean, generally speaking, these companies in a category will kind of look, smell, and feel like themselves, and it's very difficult to maintain a tangible competitive advantage.
32:07
In our market with with the capital markets and financialization of everything, the core competence is storytelling cuz if the CEO can put out a letter that says we're going to focus on value, convenience, and speed, or whatever it is, and it's just so tight and so compelling, you think I want to buy stock.
32:21
And that's Jeff Bezos' 1997 investor letter.
32:23
You read that thing, you just wanted to buy stock. Yep.
32:27
And you if you have access to cheaper capital than anyone else, you can pull the future forward cuz you can just invest at a greater rate than anybody else.
32:36
And then you essentially establish monopoly power and then develop, you know, shareholder value like no one's business and kind of pull run away with it.
32:44
That begins typically with storytelling that results in cheap capital.
32:47
I think that's kind of the basis of our economy right now.
32:52
You know, the guys the guys at uh all of these companies had outstanding storytelling.
32:56
The number of comms and PR people at these companies has gone up sixfold cuz they realized that shaping and crafting and controlling the narrative is hugely important.
33:05
Look at the last few earnings calls for different companies.
33:08
The companies that are able to say, we're leveraging AI, we're at the center of AI, see their stock go up 10 or 12%, and then the companies that feel like they're a victim of AI saying, oh, AI is impacting we're seeing some impacts of AI on our So, the ability to craft a narrative is hugely important, and I think storytelling is I mean, it's just kind of everything.
33:31
People are so busy, they get a snap judgement.
33:33
Does this CEO does this entrepreneur know what they're talking about?
33:39
quite have the words for what you're doing here, but it was informed by your process early on.
33:42
So, you're talking about the Google Docs and hey, we need an anecdote here, a quick story here, but you do something that comedians do very well, which is set up the frame, tell the story really fast.
33:52
And people think, oh, I got to tell a story.
33:54
Okay, now you need to sit down, you need an audience, this captive audience and tell a story for a while. No, no, no, no, no.
34:00
A story, an anecdote, it can be one sentence, five seconds when you're speaking, one sentence when you're writing, real quick, right back to the point.
34:06
And it creates so much life and connection in the writing.
34:10
Well, you also I think it's fun to interrupt the cadence every once in a while.
34:13
So, I might talk I'm going I'm going I'm going to make an a point about the transfer of all social security.
34:17
I stop and I put up a picture of that mug shot photo of Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sanchez. And then you just pause. And then you stop. Everyone's laughing.
34:25
And you just look at it, and then you look at the audience, and you create creative tension, and you stop.
34:32
And they're all like waiting for you to say something, and finally you say, I just like this slide.
34:35
It has no context or relevance.
34:38
And they laugh, and they're like, I like this guy.
34:40
I'm going to Now I'm going to maybe give him more permission to change my mind. Right?
34:46
Uh if it's authentic, being emotional changes the cadence, interrupts the cadence in a powerful way, and they think they listen, they're like, wow, this guy is this guy is, you know, maybe he actually believes this [ __ ] So, there's all sorts of tricks that are emotionally manipulative.
35:03
Putting up a pic, you know, I'll occasionally just throw up a picture of me and my kids.
35:05
It's just emotionally manipulative.
35:07
I know they're going to like me more.
35:10
And so, kind of interrupting the cadence, but but everyone has their own gig.
35:14
I don't I occasionally like to, you know, just do something kind of weird.
35:20
And, you know, the TED Talk I started with a I'm like, what if TED was called The Bold and the Brilliant was a telenovela from Brazil, and I'm like, you know, Malcolm Gladwell and Bill Gates have a night of hot sex and give birth to Simon Sinek.
35:32
That has nothing to do with my talk. Right. But I think it's funny.
35:37
And I think people are going to I think people are going to find it interesting from an academic, and also be yourself.
35:45
You know, try and bring your elements to your personality that the people close to you know, but maybe they don't.
35:48
I'm a profane and vulgar person. Mhm. No kidding. It's not an act.
35:51
I'm genuinely profane and vulgar. I lose some clients.
35:56
Walmart invited me a few times to speak, and after a while they're just like, dude, you're not only in the Bible Belt, you're on the buckle of the Bible Belt.
36:05
And when you start talking about sex and procreating and erectile dysfunction, that just is That is really hard down here, so to speak. And And I get it.
36:15
I'm going to lose some clients, you know, uh the key to being a strong brand is not only who you're for, but who you're not for. Sure.
36:22
You know, you know, so anyways, but that is for me that's genuine, and it's a point of differentiation, but occasionally it upsets people, and, you know, I I lose audience sometimes because of it.
36:36
Well, you say this, making people feel something best any business insight. Oh, 100%.
36:41
It it I mean, if you can make people really feel if you can tap into a dad in the audience and get them to slow down for a moment and say, all this [ __ ] is just a means to the ends, right?
36:56
And the ends is deep and meaningful relationships with your kids.
37:01
And you put a picture up of a dad and his son or a dad and his daughters, and they stop and they feel something, you've won.
37:08
All right, that's all we want.
37:08
We want to feel something.
37:09
We want to we want to feel closer to the people around us.
37:13
We want to feel closer to our family, our friends.
37:15
And if you can give people the pause to feel something, like, wow, I really do miss my dad, you know, I'm oh, [ __ ] I remember the AIDS crisis, and God, that was terrifying, right?
37:30
If you can get people to feel something, or I can't believe that Sheryl Sandberg was running around the world telling women to lean in while she knew they were depressing teen girls. Like, feel that anger?
37:44
I feel anger when I think about that.
37:46
If you can get them to feel something, um or like, wow, I just discovered something. That's interesting.
37:52
I hadn't thought of that.
37:53
I I might you know, I know something now that most people don't know.
37:59
Yeah, but that that that, you know, at the end of the day the everything everything that's instilled in us is to feel a set of emotions that help us survive, propagate, and so, that's the key.
38:10
People want to feel some sort of sensation or emotion.
38:14
How do you think that the pace of storytelling, the pace of communication is different when you're speaking versus when you're writing? That's interesting.
38:23
Um you can take more time to thoughtfully disarticulate an argument when you're writing.
38:31
You know, my I don't know if my So, I have someone read my newsletter as a podcast, and I think it's good, but I don't think it makes for a great talk because with the written word, you can really you can go deeper, you can be much more much more I don't want to call it precise, but you can really expand on a topic, and I think people will give you license cuz they're sitting down.
38:53
They're not at a conference.
38:55
I think with a talk, you've got to be a little bit more Okay, pretend you're speaking to an ADHD 12-year-old male.
39:01
Like, they you've got to keep them engaged.
39:05
You're entertaining them.
39:05
Their expectations when they're watching when they're watching a show or listening to something, that you're competing against Netflix and Tik Tok.
39:12
It's got to be entertaining.
39:12
Whereas when you write something, it's just got to feel like I'm learning something or this is well-written.
39:18
So, I think with with the written word, you have more license to be a little bit more boring.
39:22
The the bad news is you got to be really crisp and tight and organized. Right.
39:27
I can I can go on a tangent when I'm speaking or miss words or have poor syntax, people forgive you.
39:38
The written word, it's got to be pretty near to close to perfect, Especially if you're an academic, you know, people just assume that okay, I I understand there versus there, you know.
39:49
So, I think it's actually I think I mean, I'll turn it back to you.
39:52
I find writing is the most difficult thing I do.
39:55
It's also the most writing, which is a good metaphor for life.
39:58
The The things that are rewarding is the things that are really hard.
40:02
But, I can get up and do a a talk in front of a lot of people.
40:04
I can pull something together in a couple days. Writing a book? No way. It's hard.
40:11
Hardest thing I've ever done.
40:14
And now you're doing one every 18 months? I'm trying, yeah. I'm trying.
40:15
I just signed or I'm about to sign a three-book deal. This the algebra.
40:18
Yeah, algebra of I've done algebra of happiness, algebra of wealth, and now I'm going to do algebra of masculinity, algebra of work, and algebra of mating.
40:29
I never understood why books are books like documentary films are trying to reinvent the wheel every book.
40:35
Whereas the ones that make the most money and have the most impact are Thor, Thor Rangone. Return of Thor. Thor Jr.
40:41
You know, that the franchises that really resonate and pure as hell argue well, that's you know, that's ruined Hollywood.
40:50
But, I'll go see Mission Impossible 11.
40:53
And so, I don't I'm trying to create a series and a franchise.
40:56
I'm trying to learn from the movie business, but uh I'll purposely do I'm doing a three-book deal.
41:03
I'm going to I've committed to getting three books done in 54 months, so once every 18 months. But, I like that.
41:09
I like I need that pressure. I need those deadlines.
41:12
How do you think that your experience building L2 and and brand has informed your work?
41:17
Here's some of the things that I see.
41:20
Algebra, building a series of sequels and having that as a core component.
41:25
Another one's the drawings. I love your drawings.
41:26
They're really cool, right?
41:27
You bring the drawings, you have the the charts, the graphs.
41:29
You're really good at coining phrases, sort of pithy lines.
41:33
And then you're You know what you're going to you're you'll find something and you'll just run with it.
41:36
You'll say, "Hey, we got it. We got it."
41:37
You know, it's like a good marketing campaign.
41:40
Coca-Cola, you know, open happiness, enjoy happiness, whatever it is.
41:42
They've had that for decades and decades.
41:44
It's like once you find something good, just just just live in there.
41:48
How else you think it's informed your career, your work, your writing?
41:53
I think the the benefit is that having built organizations that have been uh successful is that I understand, I think, how to manage people.
42:03
The key, the secret sauce, so my competence is storytelling, but my superpower is attracting and retaining talent and people.
42:11
Yeah, so you mentioned the drawings.
42:11
I couldn't draw anything to save my life.
42:14
And people think I'm doing these sketches.
42:16
They think I'm in a room with a camcorder doodling.
42:17
And they're like, "Oh, it's so impressive what you do." I'm like, "Okay."
42:21
We have two full-time people doing these charts and sketches in a certain look and feel.
42:25
Then we have Katherine Dillon, who runs Prophet Media, who's a professor of the arts at Tisch at NYU, who's probably one of the foremost academics in the world of visual language proofing everything to give it some symmetry in terms of style and voice.
42:42
And I've run companies and I know, I think, how to bring talent together to create a whole that's greater than the sum of its parts.
42:49
I would imagine there's a lot of authors who are incredibly talented, but don't have that skill.
42:54
And also, candidly, don't have the resources.
42:55
I make over I don't know, well over a million bucks a book now.
43:02
I bet I spend half of it before the thing gets published. I can do that.
43:08
So, you know, that's So, I have a huge advantage.
43:10
I I can say to two people, "I'm writing my book on masculinity.
43:14
Go do research on the different ways, the different rites of passage from boyhood to manhood across different cultures."
43:22
And they'll come back with something really solid, which I and I'll say, "Let's chart this."
43:27
So, I have I have a set of resources and I know how to manage them.
43:30
So, I think being an entrepreneur and running businesses it just helped me, if you will, scale what I do.
43:36
How have you honed your knack for interestingness and framing?
43:41
I think it was Jeff Zucker, the CEO of CNN.
43:42
That's what he noticed about you.
43:45
It's just that you're able to say something The words that he used was damn interesting way.
43:47
Is that something that you've honed and consciously cultivated?
43:51
You left out with he says more than anyone when they're referencing my work.
43:55
The What he said before that was, "I don't always agree with him."
44:00
Everybody who com- It's so funny.
44:02
Everyone who comments on my work on social media will say, "Well, I don't always agree with Scott."
44:07
And then they'll say something nice.
44:09
They feel like they have to condition it as, "This guy says some batshit crazy wrong things, but I acknowledge this might make sense."
44:14
Elon Musk actually just said the same thing.
44:19
Um like, "I'm not his biggest fan, but he may have a point."
44:21
Um which is the which is hands down the nicest thing he's ever said about me.
44:28
The Anyways, but I don't Yeah, I don't I don't know I don't know if there's a way to be interested to be more interesting.
44:35
I would say it goes back to find an argument and try and be fearless.
44:39
Try to And I haven't gotten there yet.
44:41
I still think, "Will people like this? Will they like me more?
44:44
Will they approve of me?" I still have that need.
44:47
I still get bummed out when I'm shamed on social media or people hate my work or find it upsetting.
44:55
Um but, I would say the real When I read something really powerful, I just get the sense the person A, they they're wonderful writer, they bring real insight.
45:03
But, more than anything, they're sort of fearless.
45:07
Like, yeah, this may upset some people.
45:09
This may not be My colleague Jonathan Haidt says, "When we all bark up the same tree, we get stupid."
45:13
You know, no one's ever No one's ever fired for being too woke.
45:18
So, I I'm like, "Okay, I'm more interested now in and I don't know what to call it, a balancing a counter narrative, but occasionally just saying things regardless of You don't want to diminish people, but don't worry about who it's going to offend. Defend it.
45:31
Don't try to purposely offend people, but don't be afraid to. It's not That's okay.
45:36
The world is The world may not be flat.
45:38
Was so offensive they got burnt at the stake at some point. Right?
45:42
COVID was in a lab invented a lab.
45:46
Oh, yeah, that's really offensive.
45:50
So, as long as you bring data and your purpose isn't to offend, but to inform, I I think that what makes you interesting is There's so many things like humor, charts, but I don't I don't know if you can train that.
46:02
Well, one thing you did in the TED Talk is you were talking earlier about this war between the young and the old.
46:07
But, the way that you frame it at the beginning and the end, it's the bookend of the talk is, "Do we love our children?"
46:12
And so, now you've taken something and you've gone and you've almost taken the idea and you've like rotated it by 20°.
46:18
So, now I'm seeing this thing This is so much of what good communication is is I've seen this thing seen this thing that I've seen a thousand times, but now, for whatever reason, I'm seeing it differently.
46:30
The frame is different, the lens is different, whatever it is.
46:32
And so often, like we'll just invert this.
46:35
So often when I read writing that just is boring, it's it just puts me to sleep.
46:40
The problem is the frame hasn't changed.
46:42
They're using the same words, the same talking points, and it feels like it's coming from the head and not the heart or something.
46:51
Well, I'm What you're saying reminds me of what Ronald Reagan said.
46:53
"Tell them what you're going to tell them, tell them, and then tell them what you told them." Right.
46:56
So, I like be I like being any with a beginning with a provocative statement to capture their attention.
47:02
And then and then going through your arguments and then revisiting that statement and they see it now in a different way. Right?
47:07
Cuz if I just say, "Do Do we love our children?"
47:10
People are like, "Of course we do. What do you mean? Do we Of course we do.
47:12
That's a stupid question."
47:14
And then you go through this and you say, "Okay, this question is probably requires more thoughtful consternation.
47:20
Like, do our Do our actions really connote that we care about our kids?"
47:28
So, yeah, I don't I don't I don't think of it as The honest answer is to your question is I don't know.
47:34
It's not You know, I'm still I'm still not there.
47:39
I want to be a great writer someday. I'm a good writer. I'm not a great writer.
47:41
I How would you get better?
47:43
What do you want to work on?
47:45
I just occasionally read, you know, I can't I was reading a Stephen King book the other day and I thought, "God, the way the Christmas, the logic, the way he describes things."
47:54
I just think I just It just I was so inspired and so like just bummed out.
48:00
I'm like, "I'm never going to get there.
48:02
Look at what some people can do with a typewriter."
48:06
And I thought I would love to be I think I'm a I'm good verging on great in terms of a presenter, but what I really aspire to be is to be a great writer.
48:15
Cuz I'm not sure if anyone's going to be watching my TED TED Talk on YouTube in 50 years, but the great writers persevere.
48:21
Like, they still move people. And I'm not there yet.
48:26
And I don't know how else to do it other than practice and also reading other great works.
48:31
That's something that's really pathetic and I'm embarrassed by.
48:34
I think in the last 4 years, I've written as many books as I've read.
48:39
I read all day, but I read financial press and articles.
48:43
I read very few books cuz I'm reading and writing all day.
48:47
And the last thing I want to do to relax is read a book.
48:48
I don't find I find it work.
48:52
But, there's just no getting around it.
48:54
I need to read more I need to go back to the, you know, The Alchemist and read you know, John Irving.
48:59
And I need to go back to that stuff.
49:00
I remember I've been watching some wonderful I you know, I'm so excited to watch Dune because I remember reading That was one of You know those books you read in high school that kind of changed the way you look at things and like illuminated you to stuff?
49:14
That Dune was one of those books.
49:14
You know, I thought I was reading a sci-fi book and I think, "Wow, this is about politics."
49:20
Um and so it was so rewarding.
49:20
I'm going to go back and reread that book again.
49:24
But, yeah, I'm I'm still not there in terms of I'm still not a great writer.
49:29
So, what I got from that was descriptiveness that you're going for.
49:33
Yeah, but just the ability the facility with words, the ability to string them together like a chemist that creates an explosion cuz you figure out that if this compound hits this one, it'll result in this.
49:45
And I mean, AI basically recognizes the relationship between words to try and predict them.
49:52
So it'll say the midnight sky is and then it looks at every time that's been written before, it looks at the relationship and it knows to go the next word is the midnight sky is blue.
50:02
And the ability to bring words together in this kind of alchemy of ingredients that results in, you know, a soufflé or whatever.
50:14
Some people just can do that so beautifully and so crisply and using economy of words. And I'm still not there.
50:21
And most of my editing now is I put in metaphors or just talk about emotion and then I go back and I turn an 1,800 word post into an 1,100 word post. Let's get out.
50:31
Let's get rid of all the [ __ ] You know, Steve Jobs said to Phil Knight at Nike when he was on his board, get rid of all the [ __ ] And he said, you walked into their stores and said, get rid of 2/3 of your SKUs, all the headbands and the crap and the the the jewelry and the accessories.
50:51
He's like, this is about shoes and a limited SKU depth of like get rid of all the [ __ ] I was Whenever I edit, I'm like, how do we get rid of all the [ __ ] So here's what I want to do.
51:00
I cut up some little segments from your talk and then I kind of want to know what you're I want to know what you're going for. Sure. All right.
51:08
80% of you 80% of you have absolutely no reason to ever take social security.
51:13
It is bankrupting our nation and we have fallen under this mythology that somehow it's this great social program. No, it's not.
51:21
It's a great transfer of wealth from young to old. How is this happening?
51:30
Because our representatives are in fact representative. Old people vote.
51:35
Washington has become a cross between the land of the dead and the Golden Girls.
51:43
So what stands out to me there is that's a where I wanted to start because you got a story, you got a narrative, you got data, you got a joke. Yeah. What do you see there? Two things.
51:52
Slay dragons and be a class traitor.
51:55
And that is or slay sacred cows, I should say.
51:59
Social security, it's just a conventional wisdom is it's an amazing program.
52:02
It's a third rail, don't touch it, it's perfect.
52:03
Well, okay, maybe it's just a transfer of wealth from young to old.
52:07
Why is the wealthiest generation in the world getting 1. in history getting 1.
52:11
4 trillion dollars transferred from young people who are 24% less wealthy than they were 40 years ago?
52:18
Okay, let's just talk about it.
52:18
I might be wrong, but let's just talk about it.
52:23
And then I think especially in that group, it's fun to be a class traitor.
52:28
And that is all right, everyone here including me, we're paying too little taxes.
52:38
We're part of the problem.
52:38
We've we're old people electing ridiculously [ __ ] old people who just vote us more money.
52:47
And some of the people I really admire, whether it was FDR or Teddy Teddy Roosevelt got elected by rich people who owned railroads and then he came in and said, I need to break you up, you're too powerful.
52:58
The key I think one of the keys to progress in any society is class traitors.
53:01
And so I want to be a bit of a class traitor.
53:03
Probably the industry I'm most critical of is is higher education.
53:08
And I'm part of the machinery here.
53:10
So I was like, what conventional wisdom or sacred cow can we slay to catalyze a conversation as long as we believe it into I think it's fine to say, all right, I'm part of the problem and we're part of the problem.
53:24
Let's be, you know, let's be honest.
53:26
There's something there's a lesson here that I've really gathered.
53:30
I can't believe I didn't see this in years of reading your work, but a lot of times when people are thinking about writing, when they're thinking about communication, they're thinking about how do I be right?
53:41
I've thought that the tagline for our newsletter, and this is a bit of trying to wallpaper of all the [ __ ] I've said that didn't make any sense or being wrong.
53:48
But what I tell the team is our objective isn't to be right.
53:51
We'd like to be right, but our objective is to catalyze a conversation. Huh.
53:54
And that is we might be wrong about social security, but let's at least have a conversation about it and maybe it results I've been invited to speak in Congress and talk about this stuff.
54:10
And it's like, let's maybe we should have a conversation around means testing or raising the age.
54:13
Maybe we should lift the cap on social security.
54:18
You know, I imagine these guys, I'm going to I'm going to guess. I've no idea.
54:21
They make 100 to 200 grand a year.
54:23
By the way, everyone gets uncomfortable when we talk about money. I talk about money. I think it's important.
54:25
I think the zeitgeist of not talking about money is nothing but an attempt by really rich people to keep poor people and middle class people middle class because I know how much money everyone in my company makes.
54:37
There's an asymmetry of information.
54:39
But as the boss, I discourage them to tell each other their salary because I don't want Lisa to know that Bob's making 30% more for doing the exact same [ __ ] thing.
54:49
So be clear, rich people talk about money all the goddamn time. All the time.
54:53
So that was my excuse for saying, okay, let's assume that young talented people are making 100 to 200,000 dollars a year.
55:01
Say this gentleman here is making 160,000 dollars a year.
55:02
In social security tax, he pays 9,000 dollars. He pays 6% of his 160k.
55:10
Last year I made 16 million.
55:13
And some of that, the reason I say that is it's a flex, makes me feel masculine and strong and important.
55:16
But also also I think it's important that people talk about money.
55:22
Rich people talk about money, learn about it. Ask me how I got there. Ask me how I made it.
55:26
Ask me how I'm avoiding taxes. Right?
55:30
And one of the ways that there's more of a transfer of wealth is what did I pay in social security tax? Anyone want to guess? What did I pay? I paid the same as you.
55:38
I paid 9,000 dollars because it is capped at 160,000.
55:43
Does that make any [ __ ] sense?
55:45
Does that make any sense that rich people that you're paying 6% and I'm paying .
55:51
0006% because I'm wealthy?
55:56
So A, most people don't realize that.
55:57
Most people never take the time to go, okay, I know social security is expensive.
56:01
I know I'm paying for it, but I'm paying 6% of my earnings, but really wealthy people are paying much less. And I'm a class traitor. I have credibility.
56:13
I think I have more credibility saying it because I'm one of the people that's making a lot of And by the way, I should also point out I've been broke before. I've been broke.
56:22
This is the third time I've been wealthy because the first two times I lost it all.
56:26
And I've been broke and I grew up with no money.
56:31
So I think I have some credibility talking about this stuff.
56:34
But we want to go after this [ __ ] We want to say, this is unacceptable.
56:38
And catalyze a conversation. Show up with data. Be a class traitor.
56:42
Go after sacred cows and start a conversation.
56:46
And now I'd like to think, I've talked to several representatives in the Congress, okay, should we lower it?
56:51
You could lower social security tax from 6% to 4% give him back 3,200 dollars a year, which is real [ __ ] money if everybody paid 4% on all income.
57:06
Should we have a conversation around that?
57:08
Why am I not paying 4% if he's paying 4%?
57:10
Let's lower the tax to 4% but have everyone pay it regardless of how much money they're making.
57:19
I think that's a really worthwhile conversation.
57:23
And that a you show up with data, you're the person that's maybe not going to going to be damaged by that if it goes through. You're a class traitor.
57:30
You and your rich buddies are Dude, just shut the [ __ ] up, right?
57:33
Do you really need to bring this up? I think that's okay.
57:37
I think it's okay to say, okay, this is how much money I make.
57:42
At NYU, 2/3 of my colleagues that are tenured should be put on an ice flow.
57:45
They're not adding any value.
57:45
And we have to put 3 million dollars in an escrow account because we acknowledge they're about to become economically wildly unproductive. That's true.
57:52
You have to put millions of dollars in an escrow account to give someone tenured.
57:58
Does that make any sense?
57:58
We're acknowledging they're not going to pull their weight. Right?
58:03
Should we be rethinking tenure?
58:06
So I like this stuff and I'm in a position to do it.
58:08
I have again going back to the notion of I have this privileged position of saying these things. Let's do another one. Game tape.
58:16
So tell me what's going on here rhetorically, how you're thinking about the construction of this section.
58:23
People over the age of 60 in the US, pretty happy.
58:25
People under the age of 30, not so much.
58:27
Some of the lowest in the free world. What can we do?
58:30
Nothing wrong with America that can't be fixed with what's right with it.
58:33
We got the hard stuff figured out.
58:35
There are programs to address all of these issues that cost a lot of money. That's the hard part.
58:38
And we have figured this out.
58:42
In just 5 minutes post an earnings call, we can add a quarter of a trillion dollars to the economy.
58:45
We've got the hard part figured out, the resources.
58:51
We have the money, but we decide not to do it.
58:53
This is per capita spending on child care in the United States relative to other nations. This is housing permits. Things are doable.
59:02
So this is what's striking to me about what you're doing there.
59:04
The movement the movement of the presentation. Boom, boom, boom, boom.
59:09
I bet in terms of charts, graphs, there might be 12 different moves and that is a that's a 39 second clip.
59:16
And the movement of your presentations, I think the movement of your work is one of the core things.
59:24
And this to me is like the fundamental question of the episode for me, which is how are you communicating with such movement without it feeling rushed? Hmm.
59:35
Well, and you're being generous, but two, what we do, I spend a lot of time on is what I refer to as the choreography.
59:42
So, it'll take us 10 weeks to pull together 150 slides, but even after all the slides are done, it's 2 weeks of choreography.
59:52
It's chunking, it's pacing.
59:56
Does this slide come after this one or before it?
59:58
What's the dramatic pause? What's the reveal? Right?
1:00:01
And how do you segue into the next You know, it's the choreography, it's the order.
1:00:06
And I spend I think a lot of time just thinking about cadence.
1:00:10
And in that in that specific clip um you know, we're talking about I think we're talking about just A big theme of mine you know, I have some core themes.
1:00:23
Young men are struggling. Right?
1:00:25
The data's just overwhelming. Mhm.
1:00:27
And it's resonating with people.
1:00:29
And I like the recognition I get from from single mothers and from young men.
1:00:33
It makes me feel like I have I'm doing something.
1:00:36
Another core theme of mine is that people are shitposting America without realizing how fortunate they are to be in America.
1:00:44
That America on almost every dimension is doing really better or less bad than any nation in the world.
1:00:53
And then the the theme there was we need to puncture and pull the curtain back behind this weaponization and jazz hands trick of the wealthy which is the illusion of complexity.
1:01:04
Oh, we can't solve these problems. Right?
1:01:08
Google couldn't figure out a way to age gate? Give me a [ __ ] break.
1:01:10
They can figure out if you're about to engage in self-harm and they want to send you more videos or for a young man that wants to be radical They know if you have lint on your phone at a Taylor Swift concert, which means you're probably Android, which means you they you want the cheap seats because you have Android not iOS.
1:01:27
And oh, but they couldn't figure out that you're 15 or that maybe if you're watching SpongeBob SquarePants, you might not be over the age of 16.
1:01:32
They can figure this [ __ ] out immediately.
1:01:36
And the entrance or the the incumbents all want to pretend that it's globalization, that it's uh network effects.
1:01:43
And so, what we're saying in that clip is this is we know how to solve these problems.
1:01:47
It just would require money.
1:01:51
And we have the hard part figured out.
1:01:52
The UK has a real problem.
1:01:52
UK economy hasn't grown in 5 years.
1:01:54
Even if they decide to come up with more vocational programming to lift up young people and really help young men.
1:02:01
They have a real problem.
1:02:01
Where do they find the money when the economy's not growing?
1:02:04
The US we have the hard part figured out.
1:02:06
We have a lot a lot of economic growth.
1:02:11
I was talking to a friend yesterday.
1:02:11
And we And he said, "You know what's underrated? Facts."
1:02:13
I'm like, "What do you mean facts? Facts are useless.
1:02:15
You memorize them in school. What's the point?"
1:02:18
No, no, he's like, "No, no, no, you you don't understand.
1:02:20
Facts give you give your points integrity, a groundedness, a certain rigor and precision in your thinking."
1:02:26
And it seems like I'm connecting some dots here, so you'll have to let me know if I'm wrong.
1:02:31
A lot of your reading is to try to find these data points, these facts.
1:02:35
And then what you're doing is you're looking for these trends, these narratives, these core narratives that underpin your work.
1:02:40
And you're adding these these these facts, statistics, charts, which then ground your thinking in a kind of reality that I think grounds your work.
1:02:53
Yeah, well, thanks again.
1:02:53
Those are generous comments, but unfortunately, there's been an aversion or a lack of It used to be in Congress that the data would come in on jobs and then everyone would rally around the truth.
1:03:07
Now, all right, the Biden administration has created more jobs in 3 and 1/2 years or more jobs have been created during the Biden administration in 3 and 1/2 years than any president has has has has registered in 8 years.
1:03:18
It used to be that all Congress would be, "Okay, something's going right. Good for you. Well done."
1:03:20
Now, it's like they want to reframe it and try and pretend that these aren't real jobs or that's a bounce back from COVID or whatever it might be.
1:03:29
I think you showing up with a ton of data is you saying, "You need to listen to me. These aren't opinions."
1:03:37
Now, there's a frame and people can manipulate data but when you show up with just a ton of data, it's like, "Okay, this person's done their homework."
1:03:44
It's a certain proof of work. It's references. It's It's okay. It's receipts.
1:03:51
These are the receipts for these views.
1:03:53
This is This is the data.
1:03:56
Now, you can frame it and liars use statistics, statisticians lie, whatever.
1:04:00
But it's not just a viewpoint and a narrative.
1:04:02
It's like hit them over the head with stat I was reading a fascinating stat the other day.
1:04:06
I'm fascinated with Nvidia and how much market capitalization it's added.
1:04:09
It's added the market cap of the entire global auto industry plus the GDP of Sweden since the beginning of the year.
1:04:17
And if it's also responsible for half of the returns of the Nasdaq and the S&P, one company.
1:04:23
So, if you take out one company of the S&P 500, the S&P 499 is actually barely keeping pace with inflation.
1:04:30
And if you took out the Magnificent 7, the S&P's is only up 2%, which means that the majority of the economy is not growing faster than inflation if you take out a small number of firms. I find that fascinating.
1:04:39
I find that, "Okay, these indices are actually really misleading because the reality is unless you own Nvidia or an index fund that's invested in Nvidia your returns in the market aren't even keeping pace with inflation.
1:04:51
Like I see that data and it just like, "Oh my god."
1:04:53
It just gets me like just I get my greed glands get going and I'm like, "Oh my god."
1:04:58
I just get like, you know, brain boner and I'm like, "Oh my god, this is going to be like Let's really Let's have some fun with the sheer scale of Nvidia's market cap growth and what it mean.
1:05:08
It's probably Nvidia I mean, it's everything from housing prices are probably going to go up in San Francisco in the next 12 months because you have 15,000 people overnight who now have $10 million in equity.
1:05:20
30,000 employees $2 trillion increase in market cap.
1:05:23
That must mean 2/3 of them have at least $10 million.
1:05:28
What do you do when you're a 31-year-old product manager and all of a sudden you go from being worth 120,000 in student debt to being worth $14 million?
1:05:35
You go and you buy a house.
1:05:39
I'm like, "This alone is probably going to take housing prices up in San Francisco 4 to 6% in the next I just You find ground zero going from 500 billion to 3 trillion in such a short time.
1:05:52
The blast radius is going to be so interesting.
1:05:55
There's going to be so many circles of impact.
1:05:56
So find that one piece of data.
1:06:00
Now, let's really think about what I'll call the second order effects.
1:06:04
I think that's just a ton of fun.
1:06:06
And also it's very retail cuz there everyone's fascinated with Nvidia.
1:06:09
The financialization of everything means that any guy who oversees the greatest increase in market cap in history, Jensen Huang, is now signing women's women's breasts.
1:06:19
He's now the He's the new Justin Bieber.
1:06:20
He's the new Mick Jagger.
1:06:22
So, people are fascinated by that [ __ ] you know, cuz everyone's fascinated by money now.
1:06:26
But I So, I found this data yesterday and I got the team together and said, "Let's do something on second order effects of the wealth accretion of Nvidia."
1:06:35
I just think it highlights how unusual it is. This is a great prompt. Find something big. Data point, story.
1:06:45
Okay, so what you just did is you found that and then you say, "What is the blast radius?"
1:06:48
That's a good word for it. So, blast radius.
1:06:50
Now, let's ask, "What is the cultural blast radius?
1:06:51
What is the economic blast radius?"
1:06:57
And then using that word blast radius, what do you say?
1:06:59
"What are the things the second, third order effects?"
1:07:01
And you just go for a walk.
1:07:02
And you have one data point.
1:07:04
Okay, what's going to follow this?
1:07:06
What's going to follow this?
1:07:07
What's going to follow this?
1:07:07
Okay, so you come back from your walk.
1:07:08
You have 28 different things that you've come up with.
1:07:11
You go to somebody else and you say, "Hey, which four of these do you think are the most legit and the most interesting?"
1:07:17
Now, you're lacing on a little bit of humor here, little narrative there. Now, you have a story.
1:07:22
Now, you have a piece that can really buzz. It's in the zeitgeist.
1:07:24
And it's given you that brain boner like you said.
1:07:28
And you can just go boom boom boom boom boom.
1:07:32
Yeah, and I like the way you said it.
1:07:33
Um but I'm mainly thinking, "Okay, I probably have a 30-minute talk now in my mind on the Nvidia economy."
1:07:43
Or you know, uh you know, the the United sovereign empire of Nvidia.
1:07:48
Nvidia now has the market cap of I think it has the market cap of Sweden. No, more than that. Like Sweden and Denmark.
1:07:56
It's got the economic power of a nation now.
1:07:59
So, but what would that nation look like if it had 30,000 people with that What does it mean?
1:08:05
Is it Is it most like Qatar?
1:08:07
Qatar, I think has 300,000 I mean, it's two or three million people average average household income of 250,000 unless you're a migrant worker, then it's 30,000.
1:08:18
You know, if you think about it So, for example, Nvidia, I worked my ass off for 10 years, executed perfectly to sell my company L2 for 160 million.
1:08:24
Every employee at Nvidia Every employee has created $118 million per employee.
1:08:33
Like that is just so incredible that one individual working at a platform can create $118 million in value?
1:08:36
Like what does that mean?
1:08:38
What does that mean for that person?
1:08:40
What does it mean for taxation in California?
1:08:41
Like I'll give an example.
1:08:43
I'm I'm actually quite a fan of Gavin Newsom, Governor Newsom.
1:08:46
I think leaders should be tall and handsome with good hair.
1:08:49
I think that matters a lot.
1:08:51
But if he can't figure out how to balance the California budget when you have AI creating $2 trillion in the subsequent tax Like then no one can.
1:09:02
Then he's either not doing his job or California is totally ungovernable because he's got the richest dad in the world in form of AI.
1:09:09
And if he can't pay his rent, something's up, right?
1:09:12
So, I'm There's There's a There's a 30- or 60-minute pretty compelling presentation just around the Nvidia economy.
1:09:20
And people don't realize how much it's dominating the S&P or the Nasdaq right now, but I'll start from there and I'll work out.
1:09:31
One more piece of game tape.
1:09:31
I want to read you a paragraph that you wrote many years ago, but I've saved this and we'll talk through the the voice here. Yeah.
1:09:39
Brand, on the other hand, is Latin for irrational margin.
1:09:42
Buying a Porsche or a Birkin bag makes no sense, or at least the prices we pay are certifiably loco.
1:09:51
But the intangibles surrounding the steel and leather objects make us feel younger and more attractive, which leads to irrational decisions that are driven by the third brain, not the ones in your head or your gut.
1:10:04
The third brain, the genitals, is void of common sense.
1:10:06
Brands have no time or patience for people who are rational. Right.
1:10:13
Yeah, look, what I've always enjoyed is um um essentially you're trying to get people So, brands love young people cuz they're stupid and they're in their mating years, right?
1:10:22
You're looking to attract a mate.
1:10:24
You know, you're showing off your that you're in great shape, you're spending a dis- an irrational amount of money to be very attractive to potential mates.
1:10:33
And even after you find a mate, you'll still do this stupid [ __ ] and buy a Dolce & Gabbana shirt that makes you feel 58 again.
1:10:40
So, these emotions, these instincts, they don't go away.
1:10:46
And I don't care how many subscriptions to the Atlantic you have, you are still subject to these same very base, irrational, politically incorrect, you know, notions.
1:10:58
I I wear a Panerai watch in hopes that I can have a random sexual encounter with somebody, even though I'm in a monogamous relationship, cuz that [ __ ] just doesn't go away.
1:11:08
And I think more potential sexual partners are more likely to have sex with me because they believe that their kids are less likely to die if they have someone wearing a Panerai watch protecting them versus someone wearing a Swatch watch.
1:11:19
It means your kids are more likely to survive if you have sex with me than if you were have sex with someone who has an Android phone, drives a Kia, and uses a Discover card.
1:11:28
That says that your kids are more likely to die.
1:11:32
And so, you're more likely to have sex with someone carrying an American Express, wearing a Panerai, and driving a Porsche.
1:11:39
These things are so base and so hard to starch out, and there's evidence everywhere that this [ __ ] is still in full force, but people don't want to talk about it cuz we all like to think we've been evolved or that we've moved on from that.
1:11:54
So, brand is essentially irrational margin.
1:11:57
It's tapping into these these these very base things.
1:11:59
Let's turn 20 cents of peanut butter paste into $3 of maternal love cuz choosy moms choose Jif, right?
1:12:07
Let's turn a shitty mediocre beer into something funny that's about friendship because those frogs are so goddamn funny.
1:12:15
I mean, there's just And then the the reason brands hate old people and the reason why Fox, whose average age of viewer is, let me think, dead, is effectively they they don't make as much money as CNN despite having much much broader viewership, bigger numbers, is because they're old people.
1:12:34
And this is what sucks about old people is they get smart.
1:12:36
They start spending money on things like their kids' education and um you know, a nice vacation.
1:12:43
My father walked in, I remember a few Thanksgivings ago, and clapped together a pair a pair of shoes that he got from Costco, white tennis shoes that he got for eight bucks.
1:12:50
He's like, "These last 2 years, I've purchased six pairs.
1:12:54
This is the last pair of shoes I will ever own."
1:12:56
He's decided his entire shoe budget for the rest of his life is $48. Brands hate that. Brands hate that.
1:13:05
Young people decide that oh, the as they enter their puberty and their mating years in an attempt to impress friends and strange men and strange women, start making irrational decisions.
1:13:14
And that is essentially all branding is how can I how can I get you to make a stupid decision that results in incremental shareholder value?
1:13:23
That is all it is, full stop.
1:13:26
Okay, so here's what we're going to do as we're about to close.
1:13:28
We're going to do a quick fire round, so I'll just pose Okay.
1:13:31
different prompts to you and then we'll do quick answers and then we'll end with life is so rich and call it a day. Perfect. For writers. Yeah.
1:13:37
The ratio of time you spend sweating to watching others sweat is a forward-looking indicator of your success.
1:13:45
The people who survived are the strongest.
1:13:47
If you're a young man under the age of 30, you should be able to walk into any room and know that if [ __ ] got real, you could kill and eat everybody or outrun them.
1:13:53
Physical strength and fitness is paramount to success.
1:13:57
The thing that is most common among Fortune 500 CEOs is not their race, their gender, where they went to school, it's that they work out.
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480 of them report they work out at least four times a week. We are hunter-gatherers.
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We are meant to be outdoors.
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We are meant to be sweating.
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We are meant to be hunting, killing.
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We are meant to be physically active.
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And if you want to be less depressed, if you want to clear your mind, if you want to get out of funk of a funk, the ultimate antidote therapy uh pharmaceutical is sweating.
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And show me someone who who spends 2 hours a night watching ESPN and spends all Sunday watching football, I'm going to show you a future of of anger and failed relationships.
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Show me someone who goes to Pilates and CrossFit four times a week and uses sports as a means of deepening relationships with others once or twice a week, I'm going to show you a future of success.
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Apply this one to writing.
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Your number one highlight on Goodreads.
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Don't follow your passion, follow your talent.
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Yeah, anyone who tells you to follow your passion is already rich.
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Find something you're good at and get amazing at it, become a ninja-like master, and then the accoutrements of mastery, economic relevance, comradery, prestige, a larger selection set of mates than you deserve, will make you passionate about whatever that thing is.
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No 8-year-old thinks, "I want to grow up to be a tax lawyer or the best tax lawyers fly private, get invited to interesting conferences, marry people more interesting and hotter than them, and get to vacation at the Aman which makes them passionate about tax law."
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People, especially young people, mistake hobbies for their passions.
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Be a baller in an industry that has a 90-plus percent employment rate, and then do what I do.
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Go to Wimbledon and buy great seats.
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Don't try and be a tennis player.
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I'd rather be Federer than me.
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He has a better life than me, but I'd rather be me than the number five best tennis player in the world.
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I get to go to Wimbledon on much better terms than him.
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So, be the person that goes to Wimbledon, relax, and has a great time instead of the person that dreams of Wimbledon, and 99.
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9% of them end up calling you at 28 to start their career. Find your talent. Find your talent. That's your job.
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Building off that, the relationship between general and specific.
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What I've taken from you is find something specific that you can be an expert in and write about that.
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Well, what you want to do with an employee, and it's trite advice but true, is you want to act like an owner.
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So, I was on the board of Panerai, and we would say, "Act like an owner."
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You can tell when someone is working in a restaurant and they see a piece of a straw on the floor, they immediately run over and they pick it up.
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Almost like they own the place. Act like an owner.
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The same is true in terms of content. Own something.
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Find a niche, no matter how small it is, that you can own.
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I know more about 18th century hotels in London built in the 18th century that are desperate for a renovation. Own it.
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Identify all of them, write about them, and then broaden to London hotels, and then broaden to the hospital the specific crowds out to general.
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You want to own something.
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And even if it's super narrow, the key isn't how narrow, you can expand from there.
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The key is you got to own it.
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You want to be the foremost, most thoughtful, articulate person on a topic.
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And in order to do that, you got to start really narrow.
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But I think I think again, as an employee, act like an owner, and as an author, own something.
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Own something from the beginning, and then as you have credibility and domain expertise, you can start broadening out. Last question. Life is so rich.
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Why is that phrase so important?
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Why is that how you sign off all your emails?
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Uh I you know, I I I struggle with anger and depression, and one of the things I try and do is take pauses and just realize my blessings, how amazing how amazing things are.
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I'm trying to take time to appreciate some of the things I didn't appreciate, nature, friendship, meeting new people, uh the things you can do with money, and I know that sounds crass, but I think a capitalist society is amazing.
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You know, I never had an appreciation for art or food, really leaning into my friendships.
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So, I'm just trying to really personally, it's it's guidance for me, and also to share that it's very difficult to be in the moment.
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If you're if you struggle with anger and depression like I do, you're constantly in the past.
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Like I'll think about what I got wrong here and I'll dwell on it.
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I'm also successful, so I'm thinking a lot about the future, and we're trying to raise a successful generation.
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You're trying to trying constantly to get them out of the present and focus on the future to lay gratification.
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The problem is if you get to a certain point in your life, what you realize is you're in the past being hard on yourself, you're in the future planning, you know, for the for success.
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You're never really actually in the moment.
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And so, life is so rich is an attempt for me to just slow down and really enjoy myself and appreciate how wonderful it is because my biggest fear is I end up at the end, and I believe it's the end.
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I believe at some point I will look into my son's eyes and know our relationship's coming to an end.
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And my biggest fear, and I remind myself of this fear, is that I'm going to look back and go, "Wow, unbelievable prosperity."
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A series of experiences I would have never imagined.
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People who love me, who I love immensely, but I was never really there.
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My life didn't really happen.
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I was in the past, I was in the future, never really there.
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So, life is so rich is sort of a call sign for me to say, "Okay, slow down and just really take it in."
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Well, thanks for doing this.
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The thing that I'm really going to take with me is the the point about unconditional love.
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And seeing a prism for writing that's timid or fearful as maybe unconditional not feeling a sense of unconditional love is really the culprit there and not something that has to do with technique or some stupid grammar or syntax. That's right. Fearless. Be fearless, right? Yeah. Thanks for doing that. Thanks, brother. That was good. Thanks. Enjoyed that. Yeah.
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We're talking about the craft of writing here and one thing I've noticed is that in the world of food, so much of what I read is overdone and overwritten.
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I think of cookbooks, I think of elaborate descriptions on bougie restaurant menus, and I don't know about you, but all that has deceived me to thinking that writing about food has to be complex in order for it to be successful.
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But I've come to realize that's just not true.
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You don't need fancy language to write about food.
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Common language works just fine.
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And for an example, I want to look at John Steinbeck and his book, his masterpiece, East of Eden.
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And as I read this paragraph, I want you to notice the simplicity of the language here, okay? It goes like this.
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The apple pie was golden and fragrant.
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Its crust delicately browned and sugar crusted with the faintest hint of cinnamon wafting up.
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The apples inside were tender but not mushy.
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Each bite offered a balance of sweet and tart that made my mouth water.
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The warmth of the pie coupled with a scoop of melting vanilla ice cream made each mouthful a little piece of heaven, evoking memories of long and lazy autumn afternoons.
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First of all, that is beautiful writing.
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And second of all, I'm hungry. I want that apple pie.
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Because this paragraph is alive, isn't it?
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And the words are so simple.
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There's nothing pretentious.
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There's nothing pretentious about it.
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But what's going on here? Let's break it down.
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Steinbeck's description comes alive because it's so layered.
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What he's doing is he's appealing to multiple senses.
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There's sight, there's smell, there's touch, there's taste, there's all four.
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And you can see the golden, the delicately browned and sugar crusted crust. You can see it.
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You can practically touch the warm pie, the scoop of melting vanilla ice cream.
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And then, you can taste the faint scent of cinnamon that's wafting up, the tender but not so mushy apples.
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You can taste all of that.
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And it's the collection of these very descriptions, the diversity that he has going on here.
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That's what's giving this paragraph life.
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And then, there's the pacing.
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Steinbeck wants you to linger on the details.
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He wants you to slow down and savor the paragraph with the same kind of presence that you'd bring to a delicious slice of apple pie.
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And I want to look at how he does that with structure and with punctuation.
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So, we look at this paragraph. There's three sentences.
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And the whole paragraph is a single fluid continuous thought that goes from top to bottom.
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Every sentence roughly the same length. What does that do?
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Is it gives every sentence equal weighting.
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There's no one place that he really wants you to focus.
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Within those three sentences, there's a total of seven commas.
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And what those are doing is they're just serving as gentle pauses. Gentle pauses. Gentle pauses.
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Because Steinbeck is asking you as the reader to just slow down and feel the deliberate and unhurried pace that he's describing right here when he's talking about these long and lazy autumn afternoons.
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He just wants you to peace out, relax.
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It's sort of like being on a hammock, you know?
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And then finally, there's the sequencing.
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Which pulls you into the intimacy of the moment.
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It's like a slow zoom in shot in a film where he's starting from far away and just moving closer and closer and closer and closer, adding suspense to the moment. How's he doing that?
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He's going from eye to mouth to mind.
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So, how can you apply this to your writing?
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Well, if there's one takeaway I want you to remember, it's this.
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There's no need to show off with super duper fancy $100 words.
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You don't have to do that.
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You can have an uncommon effect on your reader by using common language to describe a common experience, just like Steinbeck.
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And I do a writing example like this every single week.
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If you want to check them all out, go to writingexamples. com.
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And when you get there, you can enter your email right at the top of the page.
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And if you do, I'll just send you an email whenever I publish one. So, that's once a week.
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And then you can just learn all about the craft of writing.