Join Dean and Dan as they talk about the innovations that come from procrastination.
Links:
StrategicCoach.com
DeanJackson.com
Transcript: The Joy of Procrastination Ep052
Dean: Mr. Sullivan.
Dan: Mr. Jackson. It's one of the predictable pleasures in both of our lives.
Dean: It really is. Isn't it? I realized that I had not confirmed with... You have someone new doing your...
Dan: Caroline. Yeah, Caroline.
Dean: Yeah, Caroline. Yeah, yeah. But I knew that you knew, that I knew that you knew I would be there.
Dan: Yes, because we're 12 months in the schedule.
Dean: That's exactly right.
Dan: Yeah.
Dean: It's so relaxing that way.
Dan: Yeah. Yeah. I just have it in my calendar, so I just at the beginning of the week I just look in the calendar and 12:30, 12:30 Orlando time.
Dean: And Toronto time, conveniently.
Dan: And Toronto time, conveniently. So, I got back from Genius Networks, which was really terrific.
Dean: Yes, this is the first one I've missed in I think 10 years almost.
Dan: Yeah.
Dean: Yeah.
Dan: And your presence was missed. Yeah.
Dean: Well that's...
Dan: Personally. I'm just saying personally.
Dean: Yeah. I understand.
Dan: There wasn't a public announcement or anything.
Dean: No moment of silence or anything.
Dan: No moment of silence. Yeah. No Remembrance Day. This is actually the 100th Remembrances Day today. I have a connection with that Babs's grandfather, a colonel, West Point graduate was the highest-ranking American officer killed during the First World War.
Dean: Wow.
Dan: Yeah. July 22nd, 1918 he was killed. We had known that, and that's the sort of historical information that I kind of feast on. I like having anchors in history, and that one, and he went to West Point. He graduated in 1983 from the military academy at West Point, and there was a big plaque noting the fact that he had been the highest-ranking American officer. And he was a colonel, so that kind of tells you the Americans kept their generals safe.
Dean: Yes. Exactly. Wow.
Dan: Then, we had a reunion, so in 1993 we were invited to the reunion of the ... So, the 100th graduating class of West Point, and there weren't a lot. There were only about 60 graduates that year, and everybody showed up. Every family who had had an ancestor graduate in 1983 had a member there, which I find really it was kind of striking, but it tells you that the military probably keeps track of their relationship networks better than probably any other human activity on the planet. There was a lot of military in the later generations. Babs's family, on that side, goes all the way back to the Revolutionary War.
Their family had somebody fight in every war since the 1770s, 1780s up to Desert Storm.
Dean: Wow.
Dan: In the early 1990s. Yeah, so A truculent group of people, the Smiths. Very very truculent Smiths. Yeah. In the Civil War, they fought on both sides, which probably was not unusual.
Dean: Wow.
Dan: Mm-hmm.
Dean: Not, worth noting, one of the two of us on the call is a veteran.
Dan: Yes, I'm a veteran. But you're the son of a veteran.
Dean: That's exactly right. That's exactly right.
Dan: Yeah. It's getting rarer and rarer. There's only two of us in my company who have military experience. One of my tech people actually fought in the Serbian Army just before the ... I'm trying to think. He fought in the Serbian Army after the collapse of the Soviet Union. That would've been part of the Soviet Bloc before the collapse, but he was in a tank. He was actually a radio guy in a tank. That's getting to be a kind of rare experience, military.
Dean: It really is.
Dan: Yeah. I will tell you this, we have a lot.
Dean: Yeah, because if you look at so many of my uncles and stuff.
Dan: Yeah. You have a lot, I bet.
Dean: Yeah, military in that generation. I mean, I've got, let's see three or four uncles that were in Vietnam, and my grandfather, who was deceased now but was in World War II, as well. Yeah, an important thing.
Dan: Yeah. Babs's father, so I was talking about the grandfather, the one who was killed, but her father was also in the First World War. Her father was born in 1898, so Babs's, kind of rare that you have a parent who was born in 1898. You know?
Dean: Mm-hmm.
Dan: He was also in the First World War. From her description of what he did for the 10 or 15 years afterwards, it's very clearly a case of PTSD.
Dean: That probably wasn't even thought of as a thing then. Yeah.
Dan: Yeah, they called them shell shocked.
Dean: Okay, yeah.
Dan: That was the term that was used after the Second World War. That they just were too close-
Dean: It's amazing when you think about how long ago 1898 is.
Dan: Yeah.
Dean: Yet, you're talking about somebody's grandfather, right?
Dan: No, this is the father. This is the father actually. Her father's 1898, and her grandfather was born in, I think in probably 18, probably 1870, 1870s. Somewhere around there.
Dean: Right, that was really interesting that I was hearing. I was listening to Joe Rogan with his podcast, and he was talking about how we think about the 1700s, like when we were writing the constitution, and doing all that stuff, and all of the slavery, and all of the stuff that was going on is really only three people ago, really. He put it in context, right? When you think about, it sounds like forever ago, but it's really three people ago that was what was going on.
Dan: Yeah.
Dean: That's really interesting context for it.
Dan: Yeah. I think I recorded this on some other podcast, but I knew a woman who was born in 1873 that I talked to, and she knew somebody who had been born in 1795 that was alive in the ... Yeah, no, he was from 1795. Yeah, she knew him. I'm talking to a person, and we span now four centuries, I'm in the 21st. I talk to somebody in the 20th who was born in the 19th who knew somebody who was born in the 18th, so it's three people. Yeah.
Dean: Yeah. Amazing.
Dan: It's kind of interesting to think about it. I was just thinking, it was a little comment I was reading on the internet yesterday. They said people talk about the past like it's gone, but actually 90% of what we live in is actually the past going forward.
Dean: Right. That was the context of Joe Rogan's thing that he was talking about. The, if we can somehow revive Thomas Jefferson right now, he'd be shocked. He goes like [inaudible 00:09:10] that we're still using the Constitution. He was going, "You guys are still using that? You didn't come up with anything new?" It was pretty funny, actually, the context, the way he was joking about it. It's such enduring. I know that you always point to the Constitution, and you point to the founding fathers. That that's something that is enduring. You know.
Dan: Yeah.
Dean: When we were talking about the influence things that matter for hundreds of years.
Dan: Yeah.
Dean: Yeah.
Dan: And actually, if you do sort of Google, you know how Google will identify mentions of things, and they can do it backwards. You know.
Dean: Yes.
Dan: Google will go back all the till I think the Constitution was 1787 when it was ratified. So, it's 230 years that the Constitution has been the basis for thinking about government in the United States. The interesting thing about that, it has been far more mentioned as time has gone by. They didn't really talk about it all that much in the first 40 or 50 years, and it's not until you get up near the Civil War that it really starts being talked about, because all of a sudden there was a constitutional crisis with the Civil War.
Dean: Yeah, it comes up when people are trying to get away with stuff. That's when it comes up.
Dan: Yeah. A lot of people, they say that the Constitution is what governs us. Actually, it isn't the Constitution governs us, it's the Constitution governs government.
Dean: Yes.
Dan: It's actually the rules by which government has to operate.
Dean: Yeah.
Dan: It's probably the only instrument on the planet that actually does that. I say that because most people, here in Canada we have a constitution, but it actually kind of governs the people, and it seems like a doubling down. You have the government, and then you have a constitution, which governs. But the United States is pretty clear that the Constitution is actually people's lives. There are all sorts of limits that actually keep the government from getting too involved in your life and my life.
Dean: Mm-hmm.
Dan: Yeah. I'm appreciative. I just want to take a moment and say that I appreciate that there's something that keeps government from being too involved in my life.
Dean: Me too.
Dan: How do you feel about that today?
Dean: I feel great about that today? I feel that that's really the thing that ... We just had the elections here, and we're going now through, right here in Florida there's all the kerfuffle, and they're demanding a recount.
Dan: It's like an encore.
Dean: Gillum retracted his concession.
Dan: Yeah, well Gore did too, you remember, in 2000.
Dean: Yeah, exactly.
Dan: Gore. Yeah. He was sure, but then he wasn't so sure.
Dean: Right.
Dan: Yeah. You know, the great hero in that respect is Nixon, because Nixon had enormous grounds for having a recount in the United States against the Kennedys in 1950. Specifically, with one too many cemeteries voting in Chicago, which was crucial.
Dean: Oh, my goodness. Yes.
Dan: Oh yeah. You live after death in Chicago as a voter.
Dean: Oh boy.
Dan: Anyway, they talked to him about it and he says, "No," he said, "It would be too upsetting to the country to do that." He says, "We'll go with the score." A lot of people have negative attitudes towards Nixon, but I thought that that probably was a good move on his part. I think that Gore would be remembered better if he hadn't put everybody through that for six or seven weeks. The folks in Florida who are pushing this probably will be not remembered well for it.
Dean: I think you're right.
Dan: Yeah. Okay, so that wraps up U.S. politics for the session.
Dean: The U.S. politics compilation. And we'll be right back after this brief break.
Dan: Yeah.
Dean: So, tell me-
Dan: So, tell me. Okay. Yeah.
Dean: I wanted to ask you about your takeaways from the annual event.
Dan: Well, the big one was actually, for me, the Robert Cialdini of persuasion theme was there, and he gave a great talk. He always, he's very insightful. Then Joe had me up on the Saturday. So, it's Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, and he had me up first thing on Saturday, and it was just an interview. His question was how I prepare myself for a conference like Genius Network. In other words, how I get ready, because I do quite a bit of thinking before I go into something like that.
Dean: Right.
Dan: So that I'm not reactive when I get there. In other words, I know people who take 10 pages of notes when they're there, and it's not my style to do that, because I more or less want new information about things that I'm already focused on, so I do a Strategic Coach impact culture, and I layout seven or eight things that I'm really interested in. For example, I'm really interested in holograms, and I knew there was going to be a major presentation on holograms, so I wanted to move forward on that. But Joe asked me what my attitude was paying the amount of money that I pay to Genius Network, because we're in the hundred thousand, Babs and I are in the hundred thousand group. He said how I look at that, and he said, "Well, that's a lot of money."
I said, "Well, it's a lot of money if it's a cost, but it may not be a lot of money if it's an investment." That was the discussion that I had. Then I talk about the difference between having a consumer mindset when you attend Genius Network, or whether you have a transformer mindset. This is just a little fork in the road that I did a podcast with Shannon Waller here at Strategic Coach and I said, "What I notice is that the unhappiest people in life, not just in relationship to a conference like Strategic Coach, but just unhappy, period, are people who essentially have a customer viewpoint towards life.
In other words, that things are supposed to be done for them. Then they sit in judgment of whether enough has been done for them to come up to their standards. Okay?
Dean: Yes.
Dan: So, they're a critic, actually. They're taking a very critical attitude toward three days, and they pay $10,000 if they are not a member. This $10,000 for three days of sitting, and listening, and talking. And they have complaints, because out of their critical attitude they're saying, "Well, I thought they would do this for me. I thought they would do this for me. I thought the experience would do this, but there's a gap, and I have a complaint about the gap, and I think it's so-and-so's fault for doing this."
What I notice about customers is that it starts with criticism. They believe that they are the judge, and they've got standards that the experience has to live up to. No matter how good the experience might be, there's a gap between what actually happened and what they were expecting, and they have a complaint about that gap, and therefore they have to find someone to blame for it. I said, "You know, if your mind works that way, there is no experience you're ever going to have in your life that's actually going to make you happy. You're always going to be kind of disappointed at the end.
That's one fork in the road. Where the fork in the road takes you. Well, the fork, that's one side of the fork. The other side of the fork is being a transformer, where you fundamentally commit yourself to actually making a contribution. In other words, while you're there you're going to make a contribution, and it would be to other people, or to the audience in particular, and that you're going to collaborate with the people who are actually there to make this contribution. And out of that, you're going to create something. You're going to create something new.
If you contrast criticism versus contribution, complaining versus collaboration, and blaming versus creating, you see that that's a very significant difference. A very significant difference between those two approaches.
Dean: Wow. It's funny, because you say that and people end up thinking, "Well, did I get a return on my time?"
Dan: Yeah.
Dean: Like it's up to the person who's holding the event to drive that. That it's their responsibility. That, "Did I get that?"
Dan: Yeah.
Dean: Yeah, and you're saying, and this is something that Joe and I've had a lot of conversations about this idea of the return on genius. And not that it's something that Joe's responsible for providing. He's creating the environment for it, certainly, but when we look at what is actually going to be a return, it's going to be an idea, or it's going to be a capability, a collaboration. Or, in some cases, it could be a client. Whatever it is, but you have to be aware when you're going into a situation like that. That's what you're saying. Preparing and knowing like what are you looking for in there.
The outcome that you're going to get, how you measure, I would imagine would be primarily the ideas that you're getting, simply because you know that the seed of an idea can have in your hands an amazing outcome. Like I remember you talk about in your very first Genius Network meeting the idea of going 10 times. Even when Joe said that, that that's his expectation for you, that you get 10 times return, and if you can't then maybe it's not for you.
Dan: Yeah.
Dean: Which is great, and kind of saying that, and it's cute, and it sounds confident, endearing, but when we really broke it down it's like equipping people is an important part to help them recognize where that return's going to come from. But your idea of that 10 times immediately then led to the thought of that as a foundational thing. That 10 times ambition.
Dan: Yeah, a whole new book. Yeah.
Dean: Yeah, the 10x Ambition Program came.
Dan: The Ambition Program. Yeah, yeah, and it came in that first hour of conversation, and then I gave a report to Joe after five years. Babs and I have been in the 25K for five years, so we had like a quarter-million-dollar investment over a five-year period. I said just with the creation of the 10x Ambition Program, at that point after five years we had gotten a $16 million return on the $250,000. It was a 64 times return. I said, "I don't care what you're investing in. 64 times in five years is good return."
Dean: Yes.
Dan: So, when I started the 100K, started two years ago, estimated that in five years we'd have like a million dollars investment in the 100K and I said, "Well, I'm looking for 64 million. I'm just going to say that." So, when I go to Genius Network, I'm looking for where's the 64 million coming from. You know.
Dean: Right.
Dan: And how do I have to be thinking about what I'm doing right now for 64 million to be the outcome here. But I couldn't do this sitting at home by myself. The fact that Joe has created his Genius Network, and then there's others like Peter Diamandis with Abundance 360.
Dean: Yes.
Dan: That's another environment that I go to. Our podcast series that you and I have, I'm looking there. The big thing is I'm not a customer of life. I'm a transformer of life.
Dean: Right. That's good.
Dan: Yeah, no. I think it makes a big difference, and I think the educational system just generally experienced. In other words, you just more or less do what they say starting at the earliest grades, and going through to perhaps a graduate degree, I think probably teaches people how to be customers and not transformers. Certainly, the general consumer culture teaches you to be a customer, doesn't teach you to be a transform ... I don't think it teaches you to be a transformer.
Dean: Yes.
Dan: I think that comes from someplace else.
Dean: Yeah, it gives you the raw materials to transform.
Dan: Yeah.
Dean: Very interesting.
Dan: Yeah, and it's really interesting when you take it back to our original procrastination model that if you're a customer attitude towards life, and you have a bigger and better goal, and you're approaching it as customer, first of all you'll criticize your bigger and better goal, and probably take all the energy out of it. I think people who have a critical mind are not great at goal-setting, because they approach things from a critical standpoint, and one of the things they'll criticize is themselves for having bigger and better goals in a world where there's so much inequality. And what gives them the right to have bigger and better goals in a world where there's so much inequality?
So, I think that a lot of people don't have bigger and better goals in today's society, because it makes them feel guilty about what they already have, and should they really be thinking about having more.
Dean: Yeah, there's so much of the mental stuff going on with that. Isn't it?
Dan: Yeah.
Dean: And when you're really, like I've just had this last little while here where we've been going through this exercise of creating 1,000 who'd-up hours, and then realizing that I've already got those 1,000 hours, and thinking about those now as an opportunity to invest those hours really just in my unique ability. I just look at so ... It's almost, I think that the clue for people that they're in their unique ability is when probably from themselves and a little bit from others, they get the sense that it can't be just this. That that just doesn't seem like even work, or whatever somebody would define it as. That makes such a difference.
Dan: Yeah. It's a really interesting thing, because I'm noticing that if you buy into this critical way of looking at things. First of all, there's an implicit that things are supposed to be done for you. If you're a customer, that means that someone else has to have created things that they're trying to sell to you, or to provide to you. And that means that you're not really bringing anything of your own capability to this situation, except being a critic, and down the road a complainer and a blamer. So, Perry Marshall, who you know.
Dean: Mm-hmm.
Dan: Perry made a great statement. He was on another podcast series that I have with Mike Young called The American Checklist and he said, in American history, if you look, because the whole discussion was about America. It's about 400 years now. A lot of people think of America being as old as since the Revolutionary War and the Constitution, but actually there's 150 years of history before that. It's about 400 that we're closing in right now, and about 400 years that people have been, people from Europe have been developing themselves and communities in North America.
He said right from the beginning there was this tension between, on the one hand, individualism. That individuals were encouraged to go out and hack out a life for themselves. But at the same time, they were saying that equality, that nobody should get too much ahead of the game. In other words that there's this kind of, we encourage people to go out and map out new territories, and increase their success, but on the other hand you've got this follow-up thing called equality. Yeah, but we don't want you to get too much of a good thing. You know. I think taxes have something to do with that.
Dean: Right.
Dan: Tax just to take some of your gain and get-
Dean: "Hey, come on back here now. Now, don't get too far."
Dan: Yeah. Yeah. It's just a tension, and he said neither side will never enlighten the better of the other for too long before there's a breakout. He said the tension creates enormous dynamism and creativity, and he's got a great line. Perry, he's so articulate, and Perry said on our program, he said, "This is how I think. All Americans are born with an equal opportunity to make their lives as unequal as possible."
Dean: That's brilliant.
Dan: I just found it extraordinarily brilliant, actually.
Dean: That's a great thing. Make their lives as ...
Dan: "Born with an equal opportunity"
Dean: Is it, "Born with an equal opportunity," mm-hmm (affirmative).
Dan: "To make your life as unequal as possible."
Dean: That's so good.
Dan: There's no prescribed way for doing that. So, if you're born with a lot, in other words you're born with a lot, then you can make your life unequal in one way. But if you're not born with very much, you can still make your life unequal by using what you have.
Dean: Yeah.
Dan: But it just seemed to me like just an amazing encapsulation of an entire culture in one sentence. It got my mind going.
Dean: Dan, I was losing you there for a second.
Dan: Yeah, I just said that-
Dean: There we go. Perfect.
Dan: It seemed to me that Perry's statement puts the emphasis that the fundamental capability that America encourages is to transform what you have into something new, better, and different.
Dean: Yeah. When you think about just all the ways, all the opportunities, and all the things that we have available, and that we're seeing now as Cloudlandia, which is not a national thing. Cloudlandia is the world. That's going to have the biggest impacts, when everybody has equal access to Cloudlandia, now we're really talking. That's why the people who are trying to make the biggest difference right now are talking about things like satellite, the internet for an entire African continent, or all those places where the internet, or access to Cloudlandia isn't there.
You imagine that's like such an amazing difference. It's funny how, funny's not the right word, but it's worth observing how our perception of the under developed nations that the human brain, I don't believe, is any different in those areas. Where you'll still have people that are higher IQ, and higher capacity to really catch on and thrive, with that opportunity of being, having Cloudlandia available.
Dan: Yeah. I don't know why my mind went to Tierra del Fuego, even though that's the very tip of South America. Below Tierra del Fuego is Antarctica.
Dean: Okay, wow.
Dan: So, it's the very, very tip. I was thinking of having completely 5G free internet at Tierra del Fuego. That would be sort of a test of how far the system has gone. When that's true, you're in Tierra del Fuego and you say, "Well, of course I've got complete internet access here. Why wouldn't I have?" The only probably remote place would be the scientific station on Antarctica. You wouldn't get complete internet to work there. But the internet seems to me like electrification. You know.
Dean: Right.
Dan: Electrification was an enormous capability. When you think about basically the last 150 years or so, we've had probably the complete electrification of the planet, even if you have to use batteries, or you have to use solar dishes or something.
Dean: Solar. Yeah.
Dan: Yeah, we're getting electrification of the planet. What an amazing transformation that that is. It's probably measured in size of economy, measured in size of population, measured in complexity of human interaction is probably measured by those. Things that were not possible if you didn't have electrification.
Dean: I just watched a TED Talk from 2003 with Jeff Bezos, and he was sharing how innovations, like going back to talking about electrification, that the original use for electricity was not even as electricity. It was to light homes. When everything was being, what you would call electrified, it was only for they had these light sockets that would go, that that was the use for the electricity was to light the homes. All these appliances, the first appliances that were sort of done, they were adapted. There were no plugs in the walls. It was things that you would take out the light bulb, and you would screw in an adapter, screw in a piece that was like a light bulb, that would bind the electricity through to whatever thing you were doing, and there was no off switch on things. It was either electrified, or not. So, you would turn it on or off with the light switch.
Dan: By screwing. By screwing.
Dean: Yes. Isn't that interesting.
Dan: Or, yeah, or the light switch. Yeah, well it kind of tells you too what was most crucial, that lighting was the first. In other words, why did everybody want to have light? Well, first of all, you defeated the dark, and I think that that's so primal in human beings to defeat the dark.
Dean: Yeah.
Dan: Most of human experience was lived in the dark. When the sun went down, it was dark. I'm always amazed, you know when you see things like Game of Thrones or other Medieval, where they're showing Medieval, and they're just showing hundreds and hundreds of torches. You know?
Dean: Yes.
Dan: Really, really, they have hundreds of torches. But if you look at the cost of having torches, they probably had a torch per room, if that. It was not cheap. It was not cheap to bring light through candles or through torches, anything like that. It was not cheap. It's probably been one of the greatest huge benefits that we've had, without realizing it. People are born today and they have no real idea. But I remember it every year, because every year they have a thing called Earth Hour, when you're invited by this worldwide organization to turn your lights off for an hour, out of respect for the earth.
Dean: It's never come across my radar.
Dan: I use the event, but I transform it, in the sense that I turn on every single light that I have, and we have three properties in Toronto, and they do it in the evening, so that you can see the difference. We have all of our exterior lights on, and it's like 60, 70 lights, and I walk through, and I turn every one of them on, and then I sit down for an hour, and just appreciate the fact that we have electricity.
Dean: Luxury in your lighting. Yeah.
Dan: So, I call it Electricity Hour. I said, "I'm very thankful to all the people who have made this possible."
Dean: Yes. That's so funny. But that's kind of where we were talking about, the internet being like electricity as it's spreading across the globe here. The interesting thing that 20 years ago probably the intention of the internet was to give people access to information, and what it's really turned out to be is the killer app is we've got access to each other, to the people.
Dan: Yes.
Dean: That's the real thing that's happened in the last 10 years, as social media has really become what the state of the internet is now. That just opens up. I mean, we're right on the cusp of this, we're able to collaborate in ways that were never possible.
Dan: Yeah, and the interesting thing is you can see with the coining of the term fake news.
Dean: Yeah.
Dan: That we're in the zone of confusion right now.
Dean: Right. There's no middle man. Right.
Dan: Confusion, because the media, first with newspapers, and then influential magazines, and then radio I would suspect, and then television. They irrigated to themselves that they would determine what news was for you. In other words, so they, "We will tell you what is news, and we will only allow those things that we think are news to come to your attention."
Dean: Yeah.
Dan: Therefore, government played a big part in that, because they could censor it. Governments could either propagate a certain type of information, or withhold another type of information.
Dean: Right.
Dan: But what social media has done is bypass that, in the sense that, "Well, no, I'll kind of determine what's information." I can read the New York Times, or I can believe lying Dean Jackson. His views on this. That liar, Dean Jackson, you know the great exaggerator.
Dean: Yes. The great manipulator. Right.
Dan: The manipulator. Yeah. My favorite manipulator, Dean Jackson. On one hand, I have the New York Times, but on the other hand I have manipulator Dean Jackson. I like Dean better. He comes with all sorts of sound effects that the New York Times doesn't come with.
Dean: That's right. That's right.
Dan: With each of us, we have our favorite, and then we have a whole network of other people, and it's actually their information and their take on things which is now becoming more influential in how we think about things going forward than getting it from these institutional sources. I think the institutional sources are feeling the pinch on this, because-
Dean: I think you're right.
Dan: Because they've become more reality show bombastic as we go forward. They're trying to yank our chain with all sorts of scary news and, "This just in latest," and everything else. They're trying to get our attention back, but I think it's a losing game on their part, because you can just not be on their channel.
Dean: Yeah. I think about that a lot, and something you said, it was kind of in a joke about how somebody would advertise the best something in town, or on the street, and then the best thing in the town. Do you remember what you were saying?
Dan: Yeah, yeah, well there were two furniture stores.
Dean: Furniture stores. Okay.
Dan: One of them put a sign out, "Best furniture store on the street." And the other one said, "Best furniture store in the neighborhood." Then it started escalation, so it was an arms race after that, that it got out to the cosmos. "Best furniture store in the cosmos." Once one of them had said, "Best furniture store on the cosmos," the other one came back and said, "Best furniture store on the street."
Dean: Right.
Dan: Yeah, you can see that, but I'm really struck with the power of podcast as an alternative kind of commentary. I think podcasts are really competing very successfully with the commentary that the news media tries to give you. They try to comment on things, and get your attention. But the enormous success of podcasts kind of indicates to me that this is a losing battle on their side.
Dean: Right. Yeah, well we want everything. We definitely want to watch or listen to whatever we want to. There's never been a better time right now for that. I mean, we get to custom choose, but we still only have the same 16 hours, or 100 Jacksons every day in which to consume all of this.
Dan: Yes.
Dean: And our choices are so much greater.
Dan: Well, the other thing is that we're forging our own way, each of us, in life. I think that entrepreneurs are really the most conscious of anybody actually doing this, because you have the core freedoms of freedom of time, freedom of money, freedom of relationship, and freedom of purpose, which can be continually expanded and integrated with each other, so that we're looking ... I'm looking for certain kinds of information. I'm looking for certain kinds of experience to augment the forward motion of the entrepreneurial vehicle that I call Strategic Coach.
Dean: Yeah.
Dan: And I'm looking for information that speeds up Strategic Coach. Therefore, there's no authoritative information out there that can be completely satisfactory to me. They'll provide maybe some insight, momentary insight. But there's nothing out there that really, I would look to as my definitive source of information. In other words, what they say is the bible.
Dean: Yes.
Dan: And, you know, you can see how information's being organized. Every morning I go to an aggregator called RealClearPolitics, and RealClearPolitics will have upwards of 25 articles that have been pulled from everywhere during the past 24 hours. The New York Times, which has always considered itself a definitive newspaper in the world, has to compete to be one of the 25 every day. There are many days when the New York Times doesn't make it onto the list.
Dean: Right.
Dan: So, this massive, massive authoritative organization is now competing to be part of the show, and that kind of shows you the drop-in status, and the drop-in influence that the major institutions have.
Dean: Yeah. Do you think that that kind of then paves the way? I've mentioned I read Dave Pell, from NextDraft. His whole thing is that he does exactly what you're talking about as far as like going, he goes to 100 different places, scours all of the news that's comes out, and in his words he plucks the 10 most interesting things for the day, and delivers them with his summary, a little pithy kind of insert into it with a link, and then he may link to an opposing or a deeper view about that one item. But the way he describes it on his website is that he says, "I am the algorithm."
Dan: Yeah.
Dean: So, it's not a...
Dan: Well, we are. I think that that's a keen insight, actually.
Dean: Yeah.
Dan: Yeah, but nobody knows what the source code is of our individual algorithm.
Dean: Right, so you get this, he's being a who. He's being a who in a way.
Dan: Yeah. We're lucky if we understand what our source code is. We've known each other, increasingly we have more and more conversations over the last 10 years, but if I'm guessing correctly on about what 1% of what interests you, I'm probably doing a good job.
Dean: Right. Mm-hmm.
Dan: I mean, you have vast areas of interest, that when we're away from each other you're exploring all sorts of other things. You know?
Dean: Yeah.
Dan: We each bring back things that we think the other person's going to find valuable.
Dean: Have you seen Future Loop that Eben Pagan is doing something with Peter Diamandis on this.
Dan: Peter. Yeah.
Dean: Yes.
Dan: No, I haven't. I really haven't. I haven't.
Dean: Which is really-
Dan: Is it good?
Dean: Well, he's got a website called futurescope.com, which was kind of the baseline of this, but they're working on a bigger project called Future Loop. But Future Scope is a aggregator of all things, it's about five or six a day items that are near future, or all the things that are in abundance really with AR, with virtual reality, with robotics, with genomics, all of the things that are going to shape the near future, as Eben calls it, and Peter too, the foreseeable, the near future, the five to seven year kind of window. That's really a good thing. I think about that as the opportunity for us to really have things like that, lenses. I think as we all get to the point right now where you could spend all of your time, and not, as you say, swim in all the ocean. You know.
Dan: Yeah.
Dean: That's what we're really in, so it's almost like a leverage thing. If you've got somebody, like your RealClearPolitics, it's a multiplier for you. Because you're trusting them to do what you would do if you had the time to do it, is to go and you'd have to weed through all of that.
Dan: Yeah. Well, it's interesting, and you can get snared. I notice that my discipline for not getting too excited about some new thing has gotten better as I've gone alone.
Dean: Yes.
Dan: One of the things that you and I both can get hooked by things.
Dean: Yes.
Dan: I had an insight that I wanted to pass onto you, because the book that I brought out in September the, My Game Plan for Living to 156.
Dean: Yes.
Dan: I mention the three things that either make you excited about the future or feeling that your life is coming to an end. That has to do with friends, money, and purpose. In other words, if you have lots of friends and your friends are increasing, you think your future's bigger than your past.
Dean: Yeah.
Dan: If your money keeps increasing, same thing, and if your purpose keeps increasing then you always have a future that's bigger than your past. Out of the conversations that have come up over the last two months regarding My Game Plan for Living to 156, My Plan for Living to 156, a fourth thing has popped up, and I suddenly realize that people who have ADD have a huge advantage here, and that is that there's always increasing novelty.
Dean: Yes.
Dan: It's not any great skill of ours. It's just the way that our brains work is that we're constantly drawn to new things that we didn't know about before. That has not lessened with age. In other words, my ability to be caught by some new thing is probably equal at age 74 than it was at age 24.
Dean: That's good to know, because I'm discovering that same thing about 20. I look at the 22, is what I was thinking of that that insatiable curiosity is not, that's not gone away or lessened in any way. Not at all.
Dan: No, and the same thing-
Dean: At 52, and so to hear you say at 74 it doesn't diminish is great.
Dan: No, and it doesn't have anything to do with the capability. I think it's factory equipment, in other words.
Dean: Yeah.
Dan: There's nothing I have to do to actually protect this, or make sure it doesn't go away. It's just that it's always there.
Dean: You have to keep the circuitry working.
Dan: Yeah.
Dean: The brain. I think that having that, and exercising it, and allowing it to run is exactly what keeps the circuitry running.
Dan: Yeah.
Dean: When you're not run on a dead-end cul-de-sac loop. Like you said, when your retirement of cutting self-off. You know, there's an entire set of circuitry in your brain that you can imagine is like just unplugged, and you can imagine the powering down of, we don't need this whole wing of our brain now.
Dan: Yeah.
Dean: You know?
Dan: Yeah. It's like clowns from the circus. We're not going to have clowns anymore.
Dean: Yeah. That's so funny.
Dan: Yeah, we're just going to have possums.
Dean: Yeah, right. Exactly.
Dan: Anyway, but it hadn't struck me how much novelty is part of feeling young, because you feel young because, "Oh, my gosh. I didn't know anything about this. Wow. Wow. This is a whole new thing." That's a young feeling, when you are suddenly struck by something new.
Dean: That's the essence of my, I know I'm being successful when number three is ... I'm working on projects I'm excited about, and doing my very best work. I think that that would apply to you at 74 right now. You're working on things you're excited about, and you're doing your very best work. Yeah. It just keeps getting better and better.
Dan: Yeah. Dean, we're at the closing time.
Dean: Next time-
Dan: Some takeaway. Let's talk each about a talk each about a takeaway from the conversation.
Dean: Okay.
Dan: I have to say, people who listen to this like it when we go back and we-
Dean: Summarize.
Dan: Sort of sum up something that got developed during the hour.
Dean: Yes.
Dan: What would you say?
Dean: Well, I really enjoyed the conversation about your way of preparing for an event, where you're looking specifically for how you're going to drive your return on that event, and not just going and passively sitting and waiting to receive the return. I think that the fact that you have had tremendous return from that, to use that word specifically, is testament to you approach it differently than a lot of people that think, "I'm going to try this," and they come in and they said, "Well, I didn't really get my return," or whatever. That was a good takeaway for me.
Dan: Yeah. For me it's the algorithm idea that you brought up. That each of us, from a standpoint of looking at the world, and sort of filtering information is that we each have an algorithm that has been a lifetime in development. Actually, if you're 52, you have a 52-year algorithm, and I have a 70-year old algorithm.
Dean: Yeah.
Dan: It's looking for a certain kind of information that keeps the morale, the momentum, and the motivation of the algorithm going forward.
Dean: Yes.
Dan: And that's what I'm looking for. So, in a certain sense, you're using the future to actually feed the best of your past.
Dean: Yes. Wow. That's really good, and that keeps it rolling. It keeps it all going.
Dan: Yeah. Anyway, talk to you next week.
Dean: Awesome. Okay, Dan. Thanks. Have a great week.
Dan: Okay, bye.