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#15 Michael Nazari: Why Are You So Afraid of Failure? A Guide to Career Growth

• Episode 15

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Why are you so afraid of failure?

If you judge everything on the outcome, will you ever do anything?

Meet Michael Nazari, who is dedicated to helping young adults find meaning and purpose in their careers. Michael’s journey was marked by his own search for fulfillment and the courage to experiment with different career paths. In this episode, he drops insights on overcoming external pressures, embracing self-reflection, and discovering what truly brings us satisfaction.

In this episode, Michael provides valuable insights into the realities of entrepreneurship and actionable advice for young adults on finding their path without fearing failure or judgment.

He explores the pressure social media places on success, explaining how to set realistic goals and how the glamorization of entrepreneurship can skew expectations.

With tools like journaling, mindfulness, and mentorship, Michael shares strategies that can help anyone, from aspiring entrepreneurs to young professionals, craft a balanced and fulfilling career.

Whether you're seeking clarity, facing career-related stress, or hoping to learn more about personal growth, this conversation with Michael provides actionable advice for building resilience, self-awareness, and finding peace in your unique journey.

Key Takeaways:

  • The importance of fulfillment in career choices and the value of exploring multiple paths.
  • How self-awareness and understanding personal values guide meaningful career decisions.
  • Why young adults should embrace career exploration without fearing long-term commitment.
  • The difference between glamorized success on social media and the reality of entrepreneurship.
  • Why failure is only a setback if you let it stop you; resilience is crucial to success.
  • The role of journaling, self-reflection, and intentional planning in personal and professional growth.
  • Balancing career ambitions with personal well-being and mindfulness.

If you judged every action based on the outcome, you would never do anything. I often can reflect on that one day you will die and it'll all be over. What would you say to someone who struggles with people in their peer group or their parents wanting to put them down one path? Your parents want XYZ for you, but there will come a time where they're going to be gone. And then it's just you. You think entrepreneurship is glamorized on social media? Some people say that. Entrepreneurship is the best avenue for self-development because either you grow or the business dies. So no matter how much you want something, you have certain needs, you know, that need to be fulfilled. If you require every single thing you do to have a return, you just won't try things. And it really only takes one win to change things. Most people, not even just young people, aren't fulfilled in their work. Welcome to the Fence Fatty Podcast. Appreciate it. Yeah. Is this a big day for you? Yeah. Yeah. You're probably my first official. I've had one podcast before this. It was like two years ago. Patty is like a is that a British term? That's a I think Patty is a British term for an Irish person. Okay. So I think it's kind of derogatory like a patty. And so Pensive is someone who reflects. So an Irish person who reflects was my idea. Yeah. Yeah. That's cool. Yeah. So for people listening, Michael, you are a coach and you coach people on how to find fulfilling work. Yes. Although I don't do that much one-on-one coaching, I might start doing it again in the future. But I always think of myself more as a teacher where I'm researching these ideas. and I'm trying to deliver them in the most practical way as possible. But yes, I have, I've had people that have one-on-one coached to try and land a job, which oftentimes when people are trying to land a job, they're not sure what they should aim for, what type of job. But I tend to tell people I'm a career coach because that's the simplest way to put it. How did you get so interested in the topic of finding fulfillment or finding a meaningful career? So it came out of my own struggle. growing up, from the age of 14, I was obsessed with stand-up comedy. I was writing it when I was a kid. And I was also obsessed with music. So from the ages of 14, even through college, as I was going to college, was like, I'm just going to be a musician. None of this matters. I'm just going to do this degree. But there was a ton of struggle. I'm sure there are resources out there that I could have talked to. I remember going to a college counselor, but it wasn't helpful. And I always was creative. I liked blogging and writing. And I noticed that a lot of the advice online wasn't that helpful. And I remember scrolling through a Reddit community called, it's like, Find A Path or Find Your Path. And I would be scrolling, I'd see so many people struggling through the same things. For me, I noticed like, I was just trying so many different things until I landed this customer support job that was remote. And I realized that solved so many issues that I didn't even think I wasn't paying attention to, just a consistent income. The company itself was cool. I was learning. There was growth, like it was a small startup. that's, I always tell people like, the best place to work when you're young is like a small startup because you're going to learn a ton and they usually don't have enough people so you can say like, hey, here's a problem. Can I work on that? And they'll be like, sure. Yeah. And you get to build your resume and try things out and get paid for it and build relationships. So, and that was all through a customer support job, which you would never think you would ever tell someone that's a dream job. But I tell people the job itself doesn't as matter as much as the company. and the people you work with. So we tend to focus so much on the job itself and the activities you do, the tasks you do in that job compared to like the environment, the company, what's going on with that company, what's going on with those people. And like I mentioned, I grew up a creative person. I had also this, I'm in these like two worlds of I understand what it's like to be a creative person, trying to do your art. whether that's music and also working in tech, working in corporate and in a way balancing those things and just also being a more philosophical person versus a lot of career coaches are just like HR people, which there's nothing wrong with that. They can really help you get a job, but they may not understand the struggles someone is going through of just trying to figure out what they even want to do. So that's why I started fine filling work in 2000. I tried starting in 2018. I w off and on blogging 2019 and then I started posting on TikTok and that's where I had more traction. And then I started being more consistent with it. And like for people listening in their twenties, what should your mindset or your, your logic be for your career for next five, 10 years? One fundamental belief that they need to have or a belief they need to break is that this job I do is going to be the one I do for the rest of my life. Or if I take this data analytics bootcamp, I'm setting that's what I'm going to do for the next 40 years. And that belief stops people in their tracks. I think it was Kierkegaard who was like, if you judge yourself, if you judged every action based on the outcome, you would never do anything. And that's a lot of what people are trying to do is they're looking at this thing that they're considering and they're asking themselves, do I want to do this for the rest of my life? The question for that, the answer for that is always no, because you have no idea what you're gonna do for the rest of your life. There's no way you can predict. So for someone in their twenties, they really need to have not think of it that way and think of what is the next thing? Like what's the opportunity in front of me or what am I interested in? and I mean, one thing they can do very practically is just list 20 things that they're interested in 10 to 20 things of all the things that they might do. Start a podcast, travel, go work at a startup, do this bootcamp and then decide on three of them. Like just circle three of them to test in the next month or two. And then of those three brainstorm, three ways that they can experiment with them in a small way. So if someone was like, I think I want to go to a data analytics bootcamp. Well, a small way to test that is just take a course instead, like a Coursera course, which you can do a seven day free trial. And if you pay for it, it's 50 bucks. and there's ways to get it for free, like through a library, but you always want to, have a small experiment. version of that bigger thing that you're trying. So if someone was like, I think I want to start a podcast. It's like, how about you just interview one person that you found on LinkedIn that was interesting or on Instagram. it's always thinking of a smaller action that you can take. It's very like simple advice, but it's also very good advice. Even for example, starting a podcast, I was on off saying I do that for a while and I could have just interviewed one person. I tested it. Yeah. Because start a podcast, start a podcast is such a one, it's big. And the bigger something is, the more vague it is. Like the virtue of of the larger it is, the lower resolution it is. So if you get more specific, the more clear it is, which also like one reason I think people procrastinate is because they don't even know what it is that they're trying to do. So it's this vague, there's all this shroud cloud around it. And so obviously you're to procrastinate if you don't know what you're supposed to do. But if it was, if I told you, just interview one person or if someone was considering, being a musician, I'd be like, okay, just don't worry about writing your own songs to a cover and go play at open Mike. You know it's it's always thinking of some small experimental way which isn't sexy it doesn't make headlines usually the things the stories that you hear someone who just quit their job out of nowhere and travel the world which does make for a cool story but it's not practical for most people even for myself, I mean I didn't have this advice when I was young I just. I was so like this one job that I had was in person and I was just depressed. I remember like crying on the way to the job, like in the train in Portland. So it was just my feelings told me, you got to get out of this. I could have stayed and it maybe it would have been better, but, for me, it was just, I had to like figure it out and I'm still figuring out like I have a better. I have more clarity on what I like to do. I know I'll do fine filling work until I die. Like I'll always be writing, creating this stuff. What would you say to someone who struggles with people in their peer group or their parents wanting to put them down one pattern, feeling that they're influenced by a certain path that they don't want to go down? I mean, one, there's plenty of ways you can go about it. I don't know if there's like one solution. What comes to mind for me is For one, getting clear on what you want, which is the hardest thing in the world. And one of the hardest things, there's a quote by Alex Formosy which is, figuring out what you want is 99 times harder than getting it. Once you know what you want, if you knew exactly what job you wanted, then it'd be very simple. You just adapt your resume, what do you need to, education-wise. So one thing is, if you know exactly what you want, what those people want for you, it has less grip over you. Because you know, these people might want this XYZ, but I don't want that. Like I don't ever think about having a nice car because I just know I don't care about it. And then the other thing is like, understand that those people aren't going to be there all the time. Your parents want XYZ for you, but there will come a time where they're going to be gone. And then it's just you, whether you're 50 or 60, they will pass away. And now it's just you. And if you did only what they wanted, well, now it's just you with do doing this thing that maybe you never even wanted. And that does happen to some people they realize much later in life. And there are people that change their life well into old age, but understanding that those people aren't going to be there when you go to bed at night, when you wake up, most of the time they're not there and you have to live with your life. So, it's difficult and part of it does come with age as you get more clear about what you want. And as you suffer and realize, I don't want, I can't be attached to it because you see the perils of attachment. The way to become detached is you see that it's like killing you basically in a way and you just will naturally detach. I mentioned you when we were messaging, asked about books and I was like Kapil Gupta, who's a, he writes books and stuff and you could watch his interviews that he's been on. But he has said this thing is like, I don't have to tell you to detach from like Wednesday's garbage. You don't have to detach yourself from like things you don't want. Cause you know, it's just obvious. Why would I be attached to that? So once you see that, in other things of like, people think is totally irrelevant, and it's just going to detract me from what I want. When you truly see that, there won't be any like needing to detach. It happens naturally. But you have to realize that the thing is killing you. Yeah. And, the way to do that, I mean, the only way to do that is by seeing it with your own eyes. I can tell you about San Francisco or I could tell you about New York, but you have to go there yourself and see it with your own eyes. no one can relay experience to you. I have you ever read the books of Darta? No. hell or it's like only 120 pages. Very easy book, but it has like the best wisdom. It's basically the story of the Buddha, but the guy, so dartha meets the Buddha, but then at some point he leaves him. He's like, you have found wisdom, but there's no way you can transfer it to me. He tells him there is knowledge, but there is no teaching. So there's knowledge to be had, but he realizes that the Buddha can't transfer to him. And then he leaves his like tutelage basically. So the way to see that. The way to detach is to just grab the hot pan yourself and find out. One thing I like or one thing that motivates me a lot is stoicism. Particularly that you just come to terms that you'll die. I often kind of reflect on that one day you will die and it'll all be over. Which is quite similar to what you were saying that at the end of the day when you're 60 years old, it'll just be you in the bed. It will just be Michael. It will just be John waking up. So it's you you have to live with. And if I ever get anxiety, I just tell myself that I will be dead soon. Yeah, some I mean, yeah, and you'll see like, I know you scroll like through TikTok or Instagram, and there'll always be people like, who cares about this? Like, I'm gonna die. But there's, there's the person saying that, because they heard someone else tell them. And then there's the person saying that, because they know it. Like, you can teach a parrot, like a bird to say equals MC squared. And you can teach a bird to say anything that's true, but it still has no idea what it's saying, even though it's true. Like, you know, you could teach a parrot to say, I'm going to die one day, but it has no idea that it's going to die one day. So it's the same with people where you can relay to someone, hey, you you're going to, and they can, and they do know, but if they really imagine a day where people are coming into their apartment and packing up their stuff, And their social media accounts are just latent gathering dust and you don't have a home anymore. You don't have belongings anymore. And they've packed up box them up, sold them whatever, you know, really, really sit there and paint the picture of what that will look like and all the things that you wanted to do that possibly you didn't. funny with social media that like even yesterday I put up the first video of me talking and I haven't done that often. I was kind of cringing a bit. doing it. But I was just thinking that like, even if you think back to Facebook, like 10 years ago, like no one even knows what was on that platform. Nobody remember and all these things that are so temporary and yeah, like the times is going to pass anyway. If you do, I don't do it. Yeah, you're gonna like, especially people think like, that thing is gonna take me three years to do whatever. if I mean, usually don't have that timeline, unless you're going to school or something like, if I get a degree, it'll take me three years. Well, three years are gonna pass regardless. Like, if you're if you're 25, you're gonna be 28, no matter what happens. So you kind of want to be dealing with different, you're always going to have problems. You just want to have new problems. You don't want to have the at the age of 35, you don't want to have the same problems as when you're 30, you want to have new ones. And some problems exist throughout, up until we pass away, no matter what. But yeah, you just want to keep like evolving. Keep evolving. Yeah. And yeah, the problems never end. There's no settlement period like, but you just get better at handling them. Like the stuff that I deal with or last minute things that I would never have been able to do when I was in my early 20s, I've been too anxious, didn't know how to handle them. Now in my early 30s, I'm better able to handle them. If you met a young guy or a young girl and they really wanted to be an entrepreneur and they were really enthusiastic about entrepreneurship and what would you say to them? Would you encourage them to take risks because they're young? Yes, but I don't think entrepreneurship has to be risky. I mean, it depends on the endeavor, like the business. If it was a physical product, even then it's not a huge risk. Like these days you can order stuff online very cheaply, but, yeah, I would tell them, continue building your career. You don't have to go all in to entrepreneurship. You can continue working. at a company which may support the entrepreneurship. Lots of entrepreneurs have jobs or came from jobs. Like Jeff Bezos worked a job until he was like his early thirties when he started Amazon. And that job builds your entrepreneurial muscle and being able to understand like customers and just project management and understanding how business works. If someone was in their early twenties, I would say, yes, you should try it. It doesn't, it's not something you need to quit your job over or anything. and identify a problem that you can solve or just something that you're passionate about or something that bothers you. For me, it was always something that bothered me. Like, what got me into fine filling work. was like so much advice about career I see online isn't good. And that's what got me to do this. And that's what gets like Richard Branson. What got him to start Virgin airlines was He didn't like his flight experience. So one method is what bothers you and really developing this sixth sense of paying attention. Because lots of things in our day to day bother us and we don't pay attention. Like, my coffee gets cold too fast. And then that's when people start developing those things you sit your coffee on and it stays warm. Everybody's entrepreneurial path is different. I would encourage them to always be learning, read biographies, those are always inspirational, to see how other people did it. Yeah, so always learn and don't hesitate to get a job and to try to do something while you have a job is kind of key. Yeah, yeah, lots of people, lots of content creators you see, most of them, not most, but like, aside from like Charlie D'Amelio or like the ones who have millions and millions, but if you're more, most, for most people, including myself, it's You slowly build, you figure it out while doing your own job. And there's less stress in that way. You can kind of do what you want rather than I have to make money off of this. And that's different entrepreneurship versus content creation and, you know, influencer or whatever you want to call it. Those are kind of there. They have similarities, but in a way also another way they're different. So it depends what path they want to go. Do you think entrepreneurship is glamorized on social media, on Instagram and TikTok? Yeah. Yeah. I just saw a video. It was like last week of a guy. was like, here's the day in the life of a 27 year old entrepreneur. And it was literally all he did was just go to an event and that was it. that, like that was what it's like being an entrepreneur, which it's mostly boring stuff. You sitting in front of your computer doing work. that's what most. Of entrepreneurship is it's not flying around and meeting people. And I mean, for someone like Grant Cardone or some huge name that's at the, at that point where their presence is all there. They're just a decision maker and they're meeting people and all that stuff. But I know entrepreneurs here and they're great entrepreneurs and it's, it's work. It's like, it's not like making money all of a sudden. So you have to be, you have to understand it's going to take a long time. It's not hanging out with a bunch of people and taking pictures and traveling. So that's, but that's all you see on, on social media. And lot of these guys who promote online entrepreneurship and that it's easy to make money online, a lot of these people have incentives for that narrative to be pushed. They're selling courses or communities. Yeah, yeah. And they'll always be like, hey, in three months you could be making this many dollars. It's like, technically, yes. If you knew, if you had all the experience in the world. and you barely made any mistakes and you were 100 % focused. Yes, you could, you can make a good amount of money in three months, but that's a huge assumption. Like a big part of entrepreneurship is you're going to make mistakes. You don't know what you need to know. Alex Somoza calls it paying down the ignorance tasks tax. so that's what you have to pay down with years of work, but it's worth it because if you think about like going to college, that takes four years. You don't get paid and you're paying them versus entrepreneurship. If I said, Hey, it's going to take four years, you'll make some money and it won't cost you a crazy amount. mean, it depends what you're doing, but if it's a digital in a way, it may not cost you a huge amount. You can do it for very low cost. that sounds like a pretty good deal when you compare it to going to college. And there's lots of people going to college and doing entrepreneurship. So I think going into it with the expectations, with realistic expectations and a problem that you're actually interested in, like that you actually are like, okay, I'm to work on this for a while and not stopping. Like you're going to fail. mean, failure in a way is a myth. there's no failure only occurs if you literally stop and forever. Then I guess, yes, you have failed. in that way. But really, you're just experimenting and you're proving or disproving your hypothesis, you're proving or disproving some idea you had a belief you had what you thought was true. That's all you're doing. It's like Thomas Edison. He was like, I just figured out 1000 ways not to make a light bulb until he did figure it out. And it really only takes one win to change things. And to kind of like totally change your mindset and reinvigorate you. There is an amount there is a a like element of luck. But there's that quote, which is the harder I work, the luckier I am. So there are like, like Steve Jobs tried to do the iPhone or the iPad, iPod way too early at some point, like there just wasn't the technology. And then once the technology was available, then he was able to realize that idea. So Sometimes there is this confluence of what's going on in the outer world and what you this idea you have and they hit at the right time. And that's that thin line between success and failure. But I think most of the time, that's not the case. Most entrepreneurs, it's slowly building, not taking huge bets or huge risks. And so in that way, there, it's not a thin line. You have a larger margin of error. as you go about it. So there doesn't have to be this thin line between success or failure. I think if you're going about it that way, it's not. That's not how most people should go about it. Maybe Elon Musk does. He puts all his money. He puts all his money into one thing like sold PayPal and then put it all into SpaceX or whatever, whatever his next thing was. There are entrepreneurs that do that. But for most people, it's not. It's not recommended that they go about it that way. Have you ever heard the Winston Churchill quote? Where will you be when opportunity taps you on the shoulder? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'll read it out just because I have in my notes, but it's to each their comes in their lifetime, a special moment when they are figuratively tapped on the shoulder and offered chance to do a very special thing unique to them and fitted to their talents. What a tragedy if that moment finds them unprepared or unqualified for that which could have been their finest hour. Yeah, that's a really good quote. Yeah. And it's like, you never know when what you're doing is going to be realized, like when all your investments become realized one day. I always think about, did you ever watch the movie Slumdog Millionaire? Yes. Yeah. So in that movie, like that just normal guy from India, He has all of these experiences that in a way have nothing to do with each other until he's on who wants to be a millionaire. And it just so happens that every question the guy asks, he had some experience of like that guy he worked for was watching cricket and he just remembers one of the cricket players, which helps him answer a question. And so it's actually a big thing with, and I know if this answering this kind of veering off the question, but Oftentimes people will be like, well, is this worth it? Should I do this? I've done so many things. Like I learned coding when I was, it was like in 2000, 15, 16, I was learning coding. was like, I'm going to go to coding bootcamp. I didn't end up doing it, but I use that knowledge in my jobs of like just some random thing I had to like do on my day job. And I learned copywriting. never became a copywriter, but I use that. to write my resume to get me a job. So oftentimes people will be like, well, I took this course and they'll be like, it was worthless. If you require every single thing you do to have a return or every single thing you do to like give you some sort of win, I mean, for one, you'll never do anything. Then that's the main thing is you just won't try things. and you won't pick up on all these things, especially in entrepreneurship. There's just so many things you need to learn and pick things up. It's like, you're filling all these little random holes, but you just never know when it's all going to connect and fill one major piece. So, I mean, there's so many courses that I've purchased and this like addresses when people, so the question I always get is, it worth it? Like people are always like, is this course a scam? 50 bucks, a hundred bucks. And I'm always like, no course is a scam. You're going to learn something. the, the, cocktail you buy for $15, that's a scam. The food that you buy that is like toxic to your body. That's a scam. But the course you investing in yourself, are you going to become a millionaire from it? Are you going to make exactly the amount of money that they say you're going to make? Probably not, but you're going to learn something. So. Yes, like you want to be ready for that opportunity. And the way you get ready is just head down, working on the things that you're interested in that you think are going to be helpful to you. Because you just never know when all of that's going to come together. And you're going to realize, like that information is going to be called upon at some point in your life. think that's a big like pro of content creation and entrepreneurship? Is that If everything you do is worth it, you kind challenge yourself a lot with these things because you get out of your comfort zone and put yourself out there, which I think does have a lot of benefits for your development. Yeah, yeah, some people say that entrepreneurship is the best avenue for self development. Because either you grow or the business dies. Either you grow or your podcast dies, like, it will be a direct reflection of you as a person. So even if you do entrepreneurship, and it doesn't work, like I was working in corporate in May, I left. And so for like, maybe it's what it's been four or five months now. Whether this works of doing it myself, I can't say, but I know I've learned a ton, even just about interviewing and looking for jobs. If I go back and look for a job now, I'm going to approach it way differently than I did before. I'm going to be messaging everyone, DMing people. I've already networked a bunch because I've been doing entrepreneurship. So it's always worth it. It's never a waste as long as you just don't go into massive debt or go to prison. I'll try not to. Yeah. That was like for starting a podcast. That was definitely one of the key things that like motivated moving around like got me like thinking who would I be in 10 years if I just stay doing my job? And that made me afraid because I was just like that person is going to be unlike who like I be that kind of panic a bit because I didn't want to be that guy. Yeah. In 10 years. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah. Like in your job you can look at the people who are 10 years ahead of you. And I'm sure they're great people. Everybody I worked with were all amazing people. I just was like OK well if I just work for 10 more years. And I still might be working like at a company like I like working at a good company. I'm not in this school of thought where, the corporations just sucking your life force dry. Like if you work at a good company, it's good and it pushes you as well. But as opposed to like people in the past 50 years ago, they had pensions and stuff. You don't want to invest everything as far as like career. and income and rely solely on a company. So and that doesn't mean you have to right away, try and make money. like, like what you're doing, do a podcast, do something else that you're interested in, because a company isn't going to always help you in that career development. Career now, I think is more than just the company that you work for, it's not limited to that. So it's better to try other things, and you'll develop skills and those skills will help you in your job and your job skills will help you in your entrepreneurial stuff. So yeah, it's, you want to look where I think it's Jim Rohn and there's some other quote too is where it's like 10 years from now you will surely arrive. The question is where and so you have to be intentional about that. Now you can't plan 10 years ahead. It's a bit difficult sometimes, but you can have a general idea of like, well, when I wake up in the morning, I want to do this and like, you know, you got to get clear on the life that you want. Like, for example, I, when I left corporate, I was doing, so we had like huge layoffs. And I was like, okay, I'm just not going to look for a job right now. I'm just going to do my own thing. So I've been doing fine filling work. And I've also kind of been doing like marketing for other people. I was like, maybe I do like a marketing agency. But then I realized I don't want that life of agency life where It's all different clients and it's very difficult to like systematize. And I know I would be wake up in the morning and working right away and constantly like stressed. So it's, I'm still always experimenting and trying things slowly. I'm honing in. I kind of know what I like, but, you still try things like as you get older. You mentioned Alex Hormozi a bit and like, yeah, think a lot of people know him as a bit of a marketing guru. What do you think of his productivity advice? Do think it can be a bit extreme? Like he's very much so like lock yourself in a dark room for 10 hours until it's Yeah, it's funny you ask that because I actually so here this is a living room in my apartment and in the bedroom I have also a smaller desk in there and The bedroom is blocked out. Like I've blacked out the window. So if I really need to focus, I'll go in there and it is a dark room. And that piece of advice does work. Cause literally if you're having trouble focusing, if you just have less things to look at and all that is there is the glaring brightness of your laptop. You'll focus instantaneously easier. Some things of his I've tried and doesn't work for me, which is like right when you wake up, sit down and start working. I liked, I just need to like wake up a bit more. I am a morning person. Like I wake up at five 30, but, I need some time to like get ramped up and for my brain to start working. So, I mean, I do, I've tried plenty of morning routines. I've tried like journaling first thing in the morning. nowadays I kind of like meditate, read, go for a walk and then I start working. So I think people should just try it. And if it doesn't work, that doesn't mean that you're not disciplined enough for your wrong. As long as you actually implement it for like a week, see how it is maybe two weeks and take what works and leave. doesn't ultimately you will figure it out for yourself. That's what Alex Hermos did. I'm sure he picked up stuff. I remember him saying he hired someone to like help him focus, but ultimately figured out what worked for him. And that's what people have to do. Try what people say, try what Alex Hermos says. and take what works and leave what doesn't and don't take it as personal like man I'm not disciplined enough because I can't do what he's doing. You have to figure it out for yourself there's a great book called. Morning rituals. It's like a red book and it's it's like each. Each chapter is just 2 pages or so and it's about some creative person how they worked and by the time you finish that you realize everybody work different. Everybody had their own. Some people ate like Carl Jung ate a massive breakfast like first thing in the morning. Some people didn't at all. Some people laid in bed and did their work like everybody in that way is different. But you do need something consistent. That was is what was common throughout is everybody has some consistent way of being productive. Consistency I think is key isn't it? That. Yeah. Yeah. And we talk about it so much. it is like, loses its, it loses its, impact because we talk about it so much versus if it was like, if you'd never heard of it before. And I said, Hey, you need to be consistent. And it was the first time you ever heard it. You'd probably take it more to heart. At least that's for me, like, cause I hear this stuff so often, it kind of loses its, novelty and, I tend to not implement it as much, but yeah, you have to be consistent. Your, your physiology gets used to what you do. It's just like, if you have a dog and you walk the dog every morning, then they're going to want that walk every morning and they expect their food at a certain time. We're the same. We're, just mammals. So you have to train your body. That's a lot of what is like Buddhism. And I think what was originally the purpose of yoga was so people can sit in meditation longer. And so it's a lot of what we do as humans is trying to wrangle this physical body so we can achieve this mental spiritual other stuff that we know we have, we're able to do, but it's just this physical body and it's desires and stuff that are constantly getting in the way. We all have needs as humans. Yeah, there is like five needs for humans. don't have them in front of me, but it's like contribution, growth, love and then certainty and uncertainty. So we need like certainty in our environment, but then we all need some degree of uncertainty. Our life gets boring. And I think those five needs only become interesting when like for me, I tried to do monk mode. Have you heard of monk mode? It's like lock yourself away. Like no socializing, like just your goals. And I did it with a buddy of mine who was a very disciplined guy. He's like, into martial arts and stuff. after a month, I was struggling big time, like just the lack of like social contact. And yeah, like so I kind of tapped out after a month. He was able to keep going. He was like, he kind of suited him better, although he did find it lonely also, but I think I'm just more extroverted. But as you said, like my key learning was that you just got to try these things out. And also that it's not discipline. It's just like different needs, you know? like we're mammals at the end of the day. So no matter how much you want something, you have certain needs, know, that need to be fulfilled. Yeah. I mean, a month is pretty good. Like I haven't, I haven't, I've done like a month off of sugar, a month off of caffeine. I haven't done like full on monk mode. and there is something to say about like being totally isolated. I've done, mean, like during COVID I was living in my own studio apartment and it was kind of nice in the beginning because I'd take a walk and the streets were empty. but yeah, we do need that. Yeah. Yeah. I think I mentioned it to you. that I was backpacking last year. I got a five-month sabbatical from work and I was in South America and I had like two periods of solitude on that trip. One was when I was teaching. I was teaching in a small rural village and I was living in a rural village in central Columbia. No Wi-Fi, no, or very limited Wi-Fi. And yeah, I was like very detached from like the normal world as we know it. And I was living in a house with like five other volunteers, it's like a rural house on the edge of the village. And like it was just the most simple, normal, pleasant time ever. Like just walking into work, teaching, and then leaving. And just moseying around the village and like we had like a few like kind of social events where we'd get invited to like students' houses for like dinner and stuff. But like I was just so happy and like way less like kind of like day-to-day anxiety that we experience today. all the other people in the house. We all noticed like everyone's just so happy because like we had that like I think that was lack of stimulation and just detaching from social media and like so transformational. I really came back with a different perspective and like it hasn't left since. It's really nice time. Yeah. Yeah. I kind of did something. I I've traveled a lot alone, like I in Mexico, not, not as much in like remote areas, but, I did like a few months ago in, I went to Portugal and like an hour outside of Lisbon, there's a place called Colares or Colares. and it's like, up in the Hills and I got an Airbnb and it was like, I still had wifi and I still was like, making content but it was just a whole other feeling of being up in the hills it was super quiet no hum of cars or anything and yeah it was a whole other feeling of yeah I just felt giddy like when I went there and I would go to the coffee shop and you know every morning and there were people in the coffee shop and but it was just yeah there is this balance of we tend to go all in like you know full-on monk mode but versus every three months going on a maybe a solo trip or even just with someone or every weekend every other weekend or something going on a solo hike. I used to do that a lot in Portland. I there was a hiking trail near where I lived. every Saturday morning I'd wake up and I'd go walking into like the forest basically in the morning. So it's again it's just a I mean, it's so we say it all the time, but it literally is a balance. can't spend your time all around people 24 seven because there is a distraction and like a posturing when we're near other people that we have to like behave a certain way that you have to balance with going on your own and like re familiarizing yourself with yourself. Yeah. You posturing when with other people. That's very true. Yeah, we behave, we behave a certain way. mean, the more people there are, there's a group identity and I group beliefs and Yeah, like one on one, it's But then when you add two, three people, something happens psychologically. It's a tribe. Yeah, yeah. Now you have a tribe. Yeah. So one on one, it is easier. then when there's a group, there's posturing, there's like this personality we send forth. like a decoy we send and then they send their decoy and our decoys talk to each other. Whereas our real selves are in the back outside the ring. And it's like, send this clone into the arena for us. That's why I want, I became a digital nomad because I wanted to get away from people, but it was just like to be on my own and like to, you know, I had this urge to like leave and do something else and be someone else and You were a digital nomad for a while, but you said that you left that life behind you. Yeah. I enjoy doing it. And for anyone who's considering it, I would say like, yeah, the only way you're going to, if you're considering it, nobody can tell you whether you should or not. You're just going to have try it yourself. and lots of people, can just go for a month and try it. and lots of people can't, it just depends on their work situation. But yeah, I'm glad I did it. But I realized in order to pursue the other goals I had of, just content creation. Like if I was traveling right now, I may not have this bike. I may not have the setup and all that stuff. And it was hard to get consistent with making content and really drill into the ideas. Cause I was always going from one place to another, trying to figure out where I was going to get my groceries, all this crazy stuff. but I still like to travel. And, I realized just last week I went to Tulsa, Oklahoma after not traveling for, mean, it was like two months since I last gone anywhere. And I was like, okay, yeah, I need to do this like once a quarter, basically, go somewhere for a week, maybe and kind of. Shake things up. So I like digital nomadting. I could have done it better. I did it mostly in the U S cause I was trying to figure out where I wanted to live. I also went to Mexico and Europe a bit. but yeah, it is. It is fun. People should try it, but it's not as glamorous. But at the same time, is fun. agree. It's a great experience that I'd recommend to everyone, but there's a lot of uncertainty and almost too much uncertainty at times. And it can be definitely, it can be isolating for a while because you meet people and they leave. Social circles are kind of transient, which can be a challenge at times. Do like to meditate? I meditate. don't know if I like it. no, there's sometimes where I sit down. I'm like, especially when I take a long time off of it, like there was time I took months off and when I go back down, when I go sit down again and start meditating, I realized like, yeah, I need to do this. so yeah, I mean, I started out at college, like, and I forget, I think it was like Tim Ferris. Where I picked it up from, this was 10 years ago. Now it was like 2014. So nobody was really talking about it. wasn't in, it wasn't on social media so much, but there was things like headspace. and yeah, I find 10 minutes a day is good. If I could do more, that's even better. and the thing is, I think lots of like headspace, I feel like didn't teach. meditation as well as like Sam, like waking up app. That one teaches actual meditation pretty well. And I think people should read about like, there's a great book called, it's from the teachings of SN going up and there's a book where someone interviewed him and it's a very thin as most like Buddhist books, often some of the best ones are just only a hundred pages. where he's kind of explaining meditation. And so I think lots of people get into it just from seeing like a video online where it's like, Hey, just sit down, pay attention to your breath, but they're not really noticing. You need to be noticing who's noticing. Like when you're thinking it's not, damn, I was thinking it's who is it that's thinking again? Like where did that thought come from? And you're just building this muscle of separating yourself from the thought. and and less and less you you are less like attached to your thoughts you're less one with your thoughts and you're more the person who's noticing them do you journal I do. It's off and on. Off and on, yeah. There's months where I did it and I have tons of, I mean they're all like back in my mom's, but I've journaled probably since college and sometimes it's helpful, sometimes it's not. But I think it is useful. Like, I mean, I made that video I had made where I was like, you're not going to figure it out through journaling. And some people are like, well, don't, I don't agree. Like intraspection is important. I'm like, yes, but I don't think that's most people's problem. I think most people's problem isn't that they don't, at least in career. The problem isn't that they're not journaling enough. It's probably that they're not experiencing enough or trying enough things. And again, this is not if like this is not either or just do both, but just don't rely solely on I need to do one more personality test or one more journal. but yeah, I mean, I've done all different sorts of journaling, like the artists way there's like the morning pages. It's so hard to get three pages out for me, but, There's that type of journaling I've done. There's just like trying to put out what I feel. If I'm trying to figure something out, writing it out is better. or just journaling on some question. Like I have some list of questions. I haven't visited them in a while, but like questions, like if three years from now you have your perfect, like everything worked out, what did you do today to get there? Or am I exactly where I want to be? If not, why? And like, what? And what do I do to get there? Like, there's those interesting questions that kind of like, you know, if you ask good questions, you'll get better answers. So I do think journaling is useful. Yeah. My kind of journaling practice at the moment is I just do morning pages. It's similar to Julia Cameron. She talks about it in her book, The Artist's Way, where you just literally write down whatever comes to mind. And I usually only do it for like five minutes. Like I don't count how many pages it is. I do it in a Notion database. But it's so funny to read back on what I write in the morning when I'm tired. Like it's literally It sounds like someone else and I read back and I actually laugh at what I say because I'm like, this is actually funny because it sounds like someone else. It's so like the words I use, like what I say, it's a bit small, but neurotic. So I'm like not a boring person. Like it sounds like a crazy person. Yeah. But it's interesting to kind of like get an insight into like what goes on in your head. And it does give me more awareness of just calm down a bit because sometimes It just gives me bit of insight into my thoughts objectively. And it's very hard to be objective about what you're thinking in the present moment. But from reading over my journals and my entries, it does give me that kind of awareness, just take a second and pause before I react. Because I've learned that sometimes I can be erratic or moody, as everyone can, but you really have to see it to believe it. Yeah. Yeah, that happens. Like, yeah, when I look over my journals, and I wish I could maybe one day I'll do it, which is get them all scanned and like put in a chat, you can like, tell me what's wrong with me or just create like a little, right, right, my autobiography based on this, all these journal entries. But yeah, there's something about getting it out into the physical out of your mind and into the physical world, whether it's on a computer or journal that that brings it more into awareness. And it's good to track as well. think it's like very important to track, like journaling as a way of tracking your life. And often I think, what do I even do this month? And then I can flick through my journal entries and kind of realize all of this, all of that. And yeah, that's another benefit I think of it. I realized this one, I bought like this big calendar for, I just started like getting more strict about my workouts and diet. After like a bit I was, and I put on a calendar, like I did the workout for this day, I did the diet for this day and I could see on a week, weekly basis. And after a bit I was like, I'm not seeing results enough. And then I look at the calendar and I'm like, it's been four days. So, just like it's, it's distorted. our perception so often. And one way to address that is by putting things, tracking things outside of your mind, whether that's in a journal or a computer. And whether that's how you feel, what you ate, what you're working on, because I'll look, a month ago, I said I was going to start this course. And now I'm working on this way other thing like, and then I realized how how much I lack focus in that regard. So it just makes things more, in a way objective. It's like getting someone else's viewpoint of you without having to pull someone else in and bring them up to speed. I write down my top 10 goals every day. At start, I found it really beneficial. And like, you know, it sounds like the most basic thing ever for period, maybe like two, three months ago, like it was turning into such a chore to do it. every morning. I was like so close to stopping, but it is actually quite beneficial to do it. And like my goals change, but I think to act of like doing it every morning and taking the five minutes to get out my diary and write it down, it is that bit of accountability to like actually try to the things because I don't do it due to my own like lack of focus or not prioritizing things. Then always feel like such an idiot for like doing it, writing it in my journal every morning and not doing it. Because I'm like, why are you putting it in your journal, but you're just not doing it during the day? like, you don't do this, you're an idiot. Yeah. Yeah. And I had that practice for a while too of writing down my goals. I should probably try to get back into it. Yeah, it is useful to bring it back into awareness. And that book, what's the one by Napoleon Hill? thinking grow rich. Thinking grow rich, he talks about like... Yeah. So there is something about always being aware of it in the mind. I think these things all come in season. there's one thing I like is like 30 seasons and that, you know, you can be disciplined for a while and then maybe another season, then you're a lot less disciplined. But I find that's very beneficial for like cutting through like a lot of the productivity BS are like... productivity, discipline, rhetoric that's on social media at the moment, which I definitely think is quite extreme. Yeah, no, I agree. You have to go in seasons. And that's the problem with like, during a season of work, it's harder to be balanced. Like, like if you're, for example, like if you're working out, and let's say you just want to gain muscle. Well, during that season, you may not work on your flexibility so much. And that's okay. If you just know, the next three months, I'm just going to build muscle. Once I'm done with that, then I'll maintain it and then implement more flexibility training. and same with some other goal of, okay, I'm working on this business a bunch. So I'm only going to work out like three days a week and just maintain what I have. So, yeah, things have to move in seasons and you sometimes you do have to like push really hard to get something over a certain finish line and then keep it in maintenance mode. you met 18 year old Michael, What would you say to him? I would tell him to do everything that he's thinking of just faster. I wish I'd made all the same mistakes just faster. Like I wish I just did them all. So with that 18 year old Michael, would have been like, there's no risks that are going to ruin you or anything. Everything that you're considering, just go ahead and do it. And that's the only way you're going to learn. So yeah, I just wish I spent less time in each position. I remember I substitute taught. did that for like cumulative two years. I did it for one year. I would, then I moved to Spain and then I did it for another year. That was a waste. Like I didn't need to do it for a whole other year. I should have just like gone on to the next thing. one of my favorite quotes is by Henry David Thoreau. let me just pull it up here and I can, it is. So the quote is by Ralph, Ralph Waldo Emerson and it is. Do not be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better. What if they are a little coarse and you may get your coat soiled or torn? What if you do fail and get fairly rolled in the dirt once or twice up again, you should never be so afraid of a tumble. And that's the advice I would have given to him and every young person is to just go. Take action, don't be squeamish about making mistakes. Yeah, it's really cool because as you said, failure doesn't exist. Unless you go bankroll. That's a myth. Or go to prison. Yeah, okay. many people have and they were perfectly fine. If you're in prison, you can just go into monk mode and read. Yeah, true. A very long monk mode. Yeah. Yeah, thanks for coming on today, Michael. I really learned a lot from talking to you and I think you're just very optimistic kind of. Yeah, I'd say you're come across very genuine, optimistic, relaxed person. That's all. Yeah. It was a real pleasure chatting with you today. Yeah, I appreciate this, John. It was fun. Yeah. Yeah. All of your podcasts and how you approach it. like you're really diving into these real questions. So I appreciate it. Yeah. Cheers, Michael. And of course, I'll put your socials and description of the video. And yeah, I'd really recommend everyone to check you out. So I'm really solid. And I would say, yeah. genuine advice that you truly embody and belief. Yeah. Yeah. 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