$100M hedge fund manager: Do not make the mistake of dying rich

i kinda wanted to be like jesus and just like go forth and build the church i'm not here like guy i i don't wanna be the guy you know a lot of people write books to be the guy i don't wanna be the guy i wanna live my life it's i wanna be jesus but i don't wanna be the guy i feel like i could rule world i know i could be what i want to from at all in it like a days off on a road travel have on that help welcome to the show yeah thanks i don't know if you know what you're getting into so basically we're a bit of a catfish show so the show is called my first million and it's a very obnoxious name that i picked six years ago but it the show got popular so we didn't change it since then and so people come because it they think it's all about making money and getting rich and it kinda was at the beginning and then as we got rich we started to turn our attention as one does to the to living a rich life versus getting rich which is the subject of your book that is i discovered you and so we're gonna talk i wanna talk a little bit about both the making of as well as the using of money and so maybe we start with can you just explain how'd you make your money i made my money the original pool of capital i made my many trading commodities i trade natural gas derivatives started out as like assistant assistant p on as a clerk on the new york exchange floor went the natural gas futures contract started i went really wanted to get into that became an over counter broker made like moderate money as a broker but really hated broker and then when der hit nineteen or or nineteen ninety five they were recruiting a lot of people from new york to come run the do derivative desk in houston texas i'm moved to houston texas and that's when i started as a trader making real money sam when he when when he says and when he says energy he's a energy trader commodities derivatives what does that mean to you understand yeah how much of that do you understand yeah not much frankly we we we create websites that like people come and they either buy something or we make money via ads so when i hear that i'm like are you buying barrels of oil and and and selling it to someone else who needs it i'm kind of an idiot when it comes to up yeah you're basically just betting on price go up price go down or vol go up vol go down with spreads etcetera how did you get good at knowing if the price go up down when everyone every other smart guy is also trying to figure out if the price is gonna go up down how how do you how do you win that game well you know there's there's you know we're really not in competition with the other smart guys like we're kind of glorified insurance agents like we we don't want to trade we get induced the trade based on what the market is doing versus what we perceive for a fair value and so that's kinda like what an insurance agent does right like it's like okay this is the distribution of outcomes here's fair value here's my you know theoretical edge right i'm gonna charge you x for this insurance product can you give can you give like a an even more dumb down example so like for example a a company needs to acquire a bunch of oil are you the middleman man who would go and acquire it and you'd try to get yeah let's say the the winter is coming and people are free price is gonna go up and generally i was always short right because people are always free price gonna go up in a winner for natural gas and we'd be like okay we'll sell you futures contracts they they've locked in a hedge from it going up and i'm exposed from to it going up but you know by and large prices generally went down the winter risk premium usually bled out and the prices would go down and most of the most of the money i made was from being short natural gas over time being a trader like this it's one of the few gigs when you can get pretty rich as an employee working for someone else i think i read that you made close to a billion dollars in profit for the company that you are working for were you personally making any money yeah i mean it i had been smart or smarter about it i would've made a lot more money by having a lot of my money invested in the fund but we had this theory back in a day which was absolutely wrong because i was younger when i look back that it's okay to have no money in a job and it's okay to have no job and money but it's not okay to have no job and no money and so we're like okay if i get blown up here trading you didn't mean i don't wanna have all my money parked in the fund as well now what i didn't take in account is is that i was very young and maximizing risk at that age is probably the way to go and i should have been fully concentrated and and just bet the farm because i was always gonna be able to get another job so yes as a trader most traders at independent hedge funds not necessarily the banks etcetera you eat what you kill so you don't really get anything if you don't make money and then you get a a percentage of the money that you earn when when you do and you're were saying you said why i initially made this this this pool capital like trading were you sort of broke and then you just had like a killer year or a killer deal and it just you had a windfall or were you making it as you went i was i was kinda climbing the the breeding tree first as a broker i was an otc broker which i hated i was good at right but you're gonna make six figures you know you can make more if you like start a firm and be part of the firm but it it's i i the analogy i would use is somebody who buys in sells houses versus somebody who was a real estate agent i hated being in the real estate agent i wanted be a guy who bought and sold houses right and so i wanted be the trader and so you know i i was well off as a broker and got rich as a trader now we've had a couple of different types of investors on the podcast in the past we've had like howard marks red types and i would say a lot of what they talk about there's kind of three ways to win that i've i've picked up so one is superior temperament so you know the kind of buffett model of you know be greedy when others are fearful be fearful others are greedy people who can handle swings better than others and that led to superior returns the second one was like an informational edge they understood something about a technology or a market and where the puck was going and they understood the implications of it better than others did and then the third is just straight up arbitrage you know i'm buying a etf and i realized that the underlying hundred stocks underneath it are not priced exactly in you know in sum to the etf price and i could just kind of with no risk make a spread here and i'll do it until that arm disappears were you one of those three or were you a fourth way of making money i would say we were one and two we weren't the arbitrage we were one and two so the idea is is that you the market is comprised of a lot of people who who are you know some people punt around and just just straight gambling people that need to hedge and then people who really really understand the market very well study every single aspect that to drive supply and demand right and then what may happen and then we'll have a position based on that irrespective of your superior knowledge if you are not stoic about losses and can handle that your prefrontal cortex will not work while your amygdala is going crazy right or you're thinking about wow i lost a bunch of money or you're that type of person that needs five wins for every loss because that doesn't exist in trading and so no matter how how bright you are you need to have that temperament that stoic temperament that ability to handle losses and or or be robotic about trading but your temperament is a little bit different and i've kinda find it more interesting so like we've had like you said howard marx let's say howard is sort of an academic he's like part philosopher part academic same with ray dahlia like they're they're they're sort of this this very unique type of thinker your attitude from just reading about you you appear far more texas cowboy like when i read books about like h l hunt you know one of the guys who like got oil going in texas in the mid you know nineteen hundreds it seems like you have that energy because it seems like you are way more risk on than some of these other guys that we've mentioned is that accurate to certain it depends on the product you're pushing right like our product is like a high vol product and so like i always say that like hey this is a fun to get rich not stay rich and get rich is concentration risk and so like it comes off as like yee but it's really a thought out thing right like you you can invest in my fund you can lose a hundred percent but my fund can also return three hundred right so like you it's really the expected outcome and what what are you trying to do here did you ever almost lose at all yes couple times hey this is one of those episodes so i don't wanna show you my notes but just imagine this is full of notes because the other pages are sean and i i've been sitting here taking notes for this episode and whenever that happens what we decide to do is make life easier for you and put all of our notes into a document that you can just click here in the link below and download it just makes your life a lot easier so no need to take notes just download what we did and we made it pretty actionable very easy to understand so click the link below and get it now enjoy the rest of the episode of bill what were the what were the swings and numbers down fifty percent to plus two hundred and fifty on how much money are we talking about hundred and something million two hundred million you know so a hundred million to two hundred and fifty million yeah but you know in a year and then we go through the winner we build that up we chop wood and we go there and that's why i like to you know we say i said the name of the game is to sustain in the game you know we're in a market that provides edge to people that really study it and keep their wits about them and so if you are able to not completely blow up and get knocked out of the game you will eventually have outs outside returns it's the same thing when insurance like right like you're saying like oh they're are cowboys these insurance insurance guys wrote these insurance policies against hurricanes and then two hurricanes came and they have a a terrible year like some almost get wiped out right but then they keep writing insurance the next year the insurance goes up and they just print money and print money and so unless you're in the arbitrage game oh you will have a bat you will have a very bad year sean this seems like your style a little bit how i do enjoy myself a little gamble now let me ask you a question you you seen today like like you're a pretty chill guy and you have all these hobbies and interest in friends and the kinda well rounded life but everything i know about traders is that they you know i asked one guy well you know were you kind of a man act back in the days like did we were pissing coke bottles on the floor you don't you know it was intense like the intensity of trading is crazy you know you wake up at certain times to check what's going on in tokyo and ba block yeah were were you did you have a decade of your life where you had to be a bit of a manic or no yeah you become obsessed with the puzzle and that obsession helps you have informational knowledge or to think about things that could happen that other people are not thinking about can scoop up the money and so i think that happens to all traders to whatever they're trading right like because it is a very very difficult thing to do it's complex there's many variables moving around and you have capital at risk so you're you're always whenever you have a position you're always working you're never off right knowing what you know now would you advise your younger self to go into that field or would you have said hey just did build build a company that's gonna sell a product no no i wanna i know i would i would went into equities it's just much bigger and it it it's you know guys have six billion dollar funds ten billion dollar funds right with like what i would consider okay track records you know i you mean or not that exciting track records and you get positive drift on your side from the stock market it's just a skill set translate so equities meaning you would you would evaluate different companies and figure out what which one are have basket of stocks it's just so much more capital available for people to invest in equities it's kinda like you know there was a period where there's nowhere else to go type of mentality like we have to be allocated equities and so and you know the fees they charge in equities are are quite amazing on these giant funds right like you have a six billion dollar fund charging one one and a half like what fund cost of that much money to run i think like it does it right so like you're you're you're you're your your maintenance becomes a profit center and then your your upside is just amazing just in terms of the notion dollar amounts and so in terms of like personal wealth like how could have been much richer woulda it went into equities do you do that now with your personal money yeah i do but i'm fifty seven i'm not here trying to have a party at eighty five you know i'm saying like my life is now you know like when if i were younger that makes sense but like for me i'm at the back quarter of my life and so it doesn't make sense for me to be wasting my current years to earn a bunch of capital for future years given my age when you were coming up did you have like a number in mind a goal and then did did you hit that number did you just simply like most people move the goal post and say don't know that's not enough like describe to me kind of your what your relationship was with the number yeah the number was i just wanted to be a millionaire before it was thirty it was kind of the thing you know a blew through it but there was never like a cap number like if i make x i'm i'm going to quit i didn't really think it through at that time about what it was like i was young i wanted girls and wrecked our life and all the bullshit that comes along with it so i didn't have like a really thoughtful process about like what do i want out of life and what does that cost right i just knew that i wanted a lifestyle i wanted to be rich i wanted to be able to get the girls that type of thing right and then everybody kinda paris like i wanna be a millionaire there before x date right it's almost like a miss america cookie cutter answer type thing that click people starting out there they're not really thinking about it it wasn't until later in life that i really was thinking about like what does that mean and what does the number mean and is it even a number right is it really a date when you talking about later in life is that like in the last five years or that was when you were thirty two try he was probably in thirties started really starting cementing the ideas of like the number doesn't matter the age date matters like your net worth peak is actually a date not not a number just given the fact that your body is a decaying asset and its ability to convert that money into fulfillment and useful experiences declines not read a decline starts approaching affinity as you get close to your death bed and so do like more money means nothing at at at a certain point in your life and so that slope matters more and so that isn't when you're twenty that isn't when you're thirty so somewhere between thirty and sixty five that slope starts to really pick up so that more money doesn't really mean anything to you what was that moment that that changed that where you realized there's a different way to live like did you read something did you experience something where you're like where you got smack in the face and you're like there's a better way and this is where i'm gonna carve out this new path yeah it wasn't like i you know was on my horse on the road to damascus in the night fell and got a vision it was more like there were there many things i read a book called your money or your life which kinda introduced the concept that the best definition of money is something you exchange hours of your life for and then that kinda like set off a whole bunch of other thought processes about like okay i'm exchanging hours of my life for capital what's that capital for like one of my values and then started thinking about that like okay i'm giving hours of my life to get hours of other people's life to do x what are those things right and and why you know that that that started coming along and then you know really thinking about death and when do certain things happen like you wanna get the girls but it's not when you're forty you should probably married by that know what i mean like you wanna do all the rock star stuff but it's not you know what i mean it's not a fifty five right and so like it's kinda like what experiences belong when and what does the arc of my life look like how does money fit into that how does health affect affect that and so those thoughts were reinforced by different conversations books had etcetera to come up with like the comprehensive way i thought about wealth health and time and how to allocate those resources throughout my life to get the maximum amount of fulfillment and you know i had to answer what is the purpose of life and the purpose of life is to be fulfilled according to your own values and so then i was like okay what does that mean to me and then how did these variables fit you know and so that was over a time period it wasn't just like oh shit it it here it is i have this formula you know e equals m mc squared or you know you know that that's it it kind of is like that it's sort of funny like the reason sean and i aren't particularly investors but we like having these investors on because it's sort of funny to see them take their rain man like abilities to like analyze numbers but but they use it towards like other parts of life and that's where it starts getting interesting because they're sort of like very rational whereas most people do things just because that's how everyone else does and you start see hearing these like fairly rational somewhat controversial opinions on how to live life or handle risk or whatever whatever and that's where things start actually get really interesting because they kinda break the mold and that's what you're describing and so it's pretty funny to hear you talk about like the balance sheet of life just like a decaying asset that's kind of interesting to me it's funny because you know one of the things that had to impact on me that that was like i was in an argument with a friend on the football team named dwight sis drunk at the university of iowa and we were talking about something i don't know and he was like yeah i don't want that that's what you want like i don't wanna picket fence in a white house or whatever ahead and go get a job and work like that i don't want that cookie i want a different life and i remember thinking like well what could he possibly want like i was so inc with like the bullshit and the chevy chase movies and get married have kids get a nice car climb the corporate ladder that i couldn't even see past that right like and that conversation honking me later on over years combined with other things to like think about okay different people have different values fulfillment means different things what's a values agnostic way to look at these variables in order to to have the most fulfilling life i wanna read you an email i said to my sister and my mom that's from your book it's a excerpt from your book that that resonated so much that i hand typed it back out by hand to that i like that i you y'all aren't gonna read this book but i need you to read this and so it says okay death wakes people up and the closer it gets the more awake we become and when the end is the year we start suddenly start thinking the hell am i doing why did i wait this long and then you go on and you say those people live their life like this they build a well it start to pump water as the well fills they use a cup to scoop out a tiny amount of water they take a sip and then they go back to pumping higher and higher there goes the water and at the end of their lives after a lifetime of pumping they are still thirsty they spent their whole life pumping rather than drinking i you talk about a couple of the principles still you know one timing matters some experiences can only be enjoyed at certain times you can't water ski when you're ninety number two what to worry about you can always make more money in the future but you cannot make more time in the future so it makes sense to not worry about sq our money sq our lives should be a much greater worry that's like the why you write this book why do you think about this is that was very very afraid of wasting my life very very afraid a lot of people they're like they get so caught up in the game of making money whatever and they're like oh i feel losing money i fear losing all all all all i built and i fear losing my status whatever and i'm just like gotcha it i feel fear wasting my life the money is just a tool to get how do you how do you balance career ambition ego and living where you're gonna die soon and and and all that i mean that that's that's really hard yeah i think if you really wanna be successful and and do something different and live live a like a non standard life you really have to crush your fucking ego constantly there are some high ego people that somehow make it or whatever in in a narrow lane but then i i tend to think they suffer the other balancing points and having a real fulfilling life can can you explain what you mean by crusher you go like what did what does that mean for you when when did you do that well most people who don't start a business or don't go chase an opportunity etcetera don't do it because of ego not because of the money risk they can handle the money risk they can handle losing that job in becoming a waiter or whatever but their ego cannot take the status drop they cannot take oh wow i'm now less than my friends on this pull of measuring money making i'm going to look like a fool doing this to other people and so yeah they'll argue with you and give you motivated reasoning that this is why they didn't do it because it was hard or it was you know this was difficult whatever and i always was telling him like i don't give a fuck what the adjectives are i'm don't care if it's salty is it a shot at the life you wanted to live and why aren't you you know why didn't you take the risk and when you really break it down when you really talk to somebody you know see you go they're just chicken shit and and and you know like it's hard like if i don't know a person like i'm not gonna be like calling them chicken shit to your faces but my friends who get the straight dope i'm like you're just a fucking pussy you're just a straight pussy and they know it they know they are they don't they cannot take the ego risk they can't take the judgment of their own selves their parents their friends wider society that they went out try this thing and failed and it's the reason why people root for you to you know quietly root for you to fail when you try something because you expose their their own car let's say you you point out to a friend and you said look man i think you're just being i think you're just being scared i think you're just being pushy about this whole thing is there morse to it than just that's that's what it is get over it hey you need to just do it anyways they still don't do it i mean a lot of them still don't do it for the few that do what works what what what works to get them out of that state mean awareness is have to battle but there's a whole other half that has to be done right like it still has to turn into action right there's a lot of alcoholic etcetera where they're alcoholic and they still drink right like the action plan still has to happen right but let let let's assume that you are a person who is not being soft in living the life that you like what percentage of the year are you actually not being soft like what does what does living to the standard actually look like because it's easy to say that but i'm sure you like you're a human you you you get solved like everyone else yeah so like so like how many times a month are you doing something where you're like shit i gave in i should be doing this i filed my ego or i said i i will i i committed something that i shouldn't committed to or whatever i mean i it's it's a constant conversation i have to have with myself about a lot of things it could be in their interpersonal relationship on having an ego and not saying i'm sorry like i don't wanna i don't wanna look wrong you know i don't don't wanna appear wrong i don't wanna appear like i'm the person it could be like i don't wanna look like an idiot i don't wanna go get up and do this or i i i i i'm being soft about this situation i you know i've had a lot of training and not giving a what other people think both in complements and der division and so it it allows me the freedom to be me and and try things that other the people would be scared to do how often do you get accused of being an asshole like how do you how do you live this life but like you know being a kind and and loving to the people you can care it's very important to be kind i'm i'm a big supporter of people like i i want people to win give them my time and and show up for them but my time is extremely valuable i don't know i probably my wife was like be in an asshole it's probably like month you know i was like give you a month ago or whatever it's usually when it's just like a an a argument and being forceful about being right and you just don't need to be right you need to be loved and like you know let it go type of thing that's a good line and so i i i i think it comes across and i'm also very i'm like you know on the complete an em path to a artist you know kinda over here like one shade in the artist like i i i get people the straight dope and you know i don't pull punches i i don't think you'll feel people get any value from me if i'm performing some sort of social nice i think you should get like the straight doubt from me so i think if you are not aware and value that type of feedback you might be like oh he's an asshole as opposed to wow you actually told me something that my closest friends won't tell me and are giving me the straight dope whether it's accurate or not that's up to you you could take it or leave it but i'm providing you a proper mirror like i'm the type of guy who will tell you like you gotta a boo hang out you know that some people won't i and so like but you got friends and are just like i'm not gonna say anything while you're sitting there talking what a boo out you was like so like it it just you know that's how i show i don't wanna embarrass this here so i'll let you embarrass yourself yeah exactly like you get exactly that type of thing and and for whatever reason you know it doesn't mean they're being an asshole whatever it's just that's their programming you know hey so a minute ago you were talking about like you know you had a friend who was saying look i don't want that kinda cookie cutter life and you realized that you had been wanting this kind of cookie cutter life this this vision that had been set for you whether it's from the movies or your parents or whoever right i think every every man goes cultural osmosis i like to call in you know yeah exactly and and it sounded like you had to go redefine with a blank sheet of paper what do i care about what kind of life do i want you had you had to put some definition behind it something that that meant something to you and even if others wouldn't want that you really wanted it what what did you come up with what what what is the answer to that for you i i really you know it wasn't like i sat down and like i cracked through and sat down with the dolly llama and meditate but i i i realized like hey what i wanted at the time i was gonna go for it and then i realized that a lot of the things that i thought i wanted had just been great marketing either by society or the movies and i had been inc with it and so you know realized i holy shit the foods i like the things i do we're really just programming right i don't need fried crickets because i didn't grow up in asia you know if i grew up in china i that'd be like when can we get some fried crickets man things are really good right to me it's rep repulsive but the only reason why it's repulsive is i didn't grow up eating fried crickets right and so almost all the things that i like were programming not in right and so i i realized that it was gonna take a lot and it's not that all programming is bad like some of them was like i like it copy paste repeat but a lot of the programming did not work for me and was at conflict of what i really wanted and and it was gonna take some thinking and discovery to to actually come to what i what kinda life i wanted you know what what what how these how do these conflict with my values or my values the right values yada yada and that was gonna happen over time it wasn't something it was gonna happen like right away i was gonna re twenty something years of programming in a day right give us a couple a of bullet points what did you what what were some of the principles of tenants that that you did end up replacing that actually you do live by now or you do chase now oh there's a lot i mean the how i react to people when they trust pants against you show up with kindness like you're in jersey city right you're going to clubs somebody many steps on your sneakers somebody might die right like that's a cultural programming what did you decide it you're gonna do i'm not gonna be punching people in the face because they stepped on my sneakers and a crowded so you said okay so rule rule number one i'm not gonna be reactive i'm gonna i'm not gonna be honest yeah i like how well i'm reactive but what are my response cries to certain stimulus right like there's everybody has certain stimulus like somebody dies somebody cheat you somebody does this somebody does x y and z this happens that happens and then you have your responses right out of your toolkit and you know i started to look at of out of all the infinite ways you can respond to a stimuli why was i choosing these ways right and the judgment was does it work or not work for my goals so it there's no you know i mean like it wasn't like a a a judgment in terms of like this is the right way there's runway ways is like does this work or not work for my goals what are my goals so it there's a lot of thinking and going on there about everything like if you know you you you see certain things in the news or people like oh this bad thing happened and they did this and you're like okay why why did they behave that way somebody insults you you tweet what did you say how did you react you know and then you know people write tons of books on this stuff like you know controlling yourself or whatever but ultimately is like you have lots of stimuli and lots of responses and which ones work for you and which ones don't and and with the ones that work you know you rip them out and replace them with something else that's been a you know people ask us we've done almost a thousand of these episodes people like what what are some of the commonalities of people who win and i always say well the first thing is like there's like for every rule that you read about in business like i can point to many examples of people who have broken that rules and are equally successful and success is defined as you know they are where they wanna be but the other thing is that there's this like internal look control amongst winners which is like basically i can only control me how i feel how i the situation it's all up to me those are probably one of the only two things that are true that we've noticed a among successful people but that attitude that you just described is is one of the common ones yeah it's essentially it's maximum accountability right it's just like you or ultimately accountable do do you know your poker are you know daniel the g yes so daniel came on the podcast and you know obviously i wanted to nerd out about poker but we asked him one other question like what was you know important turning point of your life i thought he'd say some tournament win and he was like dude i went to this self help seminar he went to choice yeah i went before him oh you were okay maybe you were the guy told he said and he was like five or six classes after me he was like someone i really respect had done in and and so you know i said alright fine i'll go do it he talked you about this max accountability principle we had to write a story of your life or something that that went wrong in some way you were wrong or you know something that went wrong in your life and then rewrite the story where instead of in the victim mindset but in with hundred percent ownership of your part of that whole thing from and he goes it was the most freeing moment of my life and i and i was really stood out to me i think of a i think a lot of people would benefit if they just re rewrote one story in their life with a from the point of view of maximum accountability did you do that same exercise yeah i've done that and many more on in terms of accountability and and not not being in the victim mindset and it's it's it's a natural thing i mean we've taught it it's in the culture your ego doesn't want it to be wrong so you you know getting the maximum accountability aspect going is is a constant practice right like you never get the perfection you just you constantly have to practice that can i ask about living this life with a family because you guys were you were talking about like the white picket fence and stuff and what's funny is i never wanted any of that then i had kids and i actually had like a retrain room i'm like i actually do like being home at five and not going out at night and i don't particularly love traveling that that much because i wanna be with my family like i wanted a more of a a a boring life and i actually think a lot of like young men in america probably need a little bit of where it's like it's kinda nice to work forty hours a week and also have a family that you're with withheld the time versus partying and and going out how do you live this pretty dope life when you have young kids i i think your kids are are are more grown now but what were you doing when your kids were in school and trying to like live this life or you trying to be fulfilled i'm just trying to balance it i mean i have a eleven month note old now my kids are twenty two and nineteen and they definitely wanna come like i my i had a big party my daughter's like can i come can come i like yeah you can come but you you can't you can't stay was like look you guys have sixth street and all the party and was like why can't us adults hang out and get us sw off like why are you gotta come but she wasn't hang she's was like dad you're cool i wanna hang out now who was before i was like dad you're so strange like why are you so weird like why do you do this like why do people know you and now we hang out and we have a good time and you know traveling and take my kids traveling we try and arrange of life like listen there's something very about a call life that i want later you know i'm ultimately wanna be a farmer and you know i've thought about how do i get everybody into life that i wanna live and you know balance for me is like the pendulum like how do you manage the pendulum swings because your life is not perfectly balanced for each time period right it swings into i'm grinding really hard to i'm vacation really hard i'm partying really hard i'm relaxing really hard i'm i'm you know i'm doing sp spiritual work very hard right it's a swing right it's never the pie cut evenly each day or even each month or even each decade right like this might be the decade of you know learning all this shit and then i'm a doctor and then it's a decade of practicing a matter of like getting buy in and and enrolling other people in the vision and and making sure it works you know there's people who are you know military parents and their their kids travel all over around with them and that's their life and they make the best part of that life there's some people that that's just who they are they don't have a obligation to the united states government they travel around with their kids and they wanna live you know live somewhere my wife and i we're like hey we wanna live in japan for a little bit so we're gonna pack up our little boy and and go to japan it's really about just making it the best ride there's infinite rides i don't think once necessarily better than the other it's really just a preference and then designing the life that you want and and and and trying it out you know i i don't you know there's nothing wrong with people that just like hey i just wanna a nine to five this is a job i'm join the rotary club you know get a nicer car going vacation two weeks a year and then die like there's nothing wrong with that just not for me hey let's take a quick break you know that feeling when strategy is done the brief is written everyone's aligned and you realize someone still has to sit down and actually create all the content that someone is usually you and it's due tomorrow well the breeze assistant from hubspot can help it works right inside hubspot you can draft campaign copy blog posts emails all in your brand voice all using your actual customer data so you don't create just content you create content that converts check out hubspot dot com the agent customer platform for growing businesses can you explain this idea of time buckets not bucket list yeah the idea of like a lot of people think life is like oh i have a bucket list and you know like the movie you know a month before i'm gonna die i'm gonna run around do all these things i'm gonna be happy right my life is complete and the the main thing is is that each purity of life like you don't have one death you have many deaths right there was ecology that died there was a single you that died there was you with young kids that died you know first job for startup up etcetera right and and and they're largely in age brackets right like for most people and so each period in your life certain experiences are optimal depending on who you are in the arc of your life in that time period and don't transfer well to the next time period or they don't transfer at all and so it's like hey if your life if a satisfactory the satisfactory life for you was like i wanna go skiing in my life five hundred times well the distribution of those ski trips are probably gonna come earlier right and if it's skiing with friends is probably earlier right because they get married they have life or whatever and if you just kind of like oh i have a bucket list ski five hundred times and you those activities get shifted later into your life you well you've kinda fucked it up right like because you're really not gonna get those five hundred ski trips right and so life is like tetris you kinda have to get the order right in order to get the high score and fulfillment and so but what that requires you having kind of a a good understanding of what you want out of life and thinking about like okay what i want all life with respect to my kids and my family and my job and my career my own leisure my own he activities my own alt altruistic activities etcetera you're not gonna know it all because life is discovery right you don't know what you want you discover what you want but having kinda like a time bucket of each period of your life maybe three to five year brackets and saying okay what experiences what choices do i wanna make in this period when in this period in this period and when you do that you're go oh my gosh i have this here and it should be here and this here and it should be there right and then you'll have a much more fulfilling life because you'll actually get to do both of them as opposed to up the order and not getting it at all do you do any type of annual planning yeah wait we we do we do like kind of a period time bucket period like this is what we wanna do like we know while kai is you know under five we definitely wanna go live in a different country particularly japan and we're like okay how long is that gonna be and it's just gonna be a summer is it gonna be a year it's gonna be two years you know we're actively discussing like how that fits you know what's going on and and then all the other things you know people haven't multi multifaceted multi varied experiment running their lives right like how do all these pieces fit in and it's kinda fun doing that do you sit down with your wife and you're like okay you like because we talked bit jesse it's and i think sean does this now where he like do you do this sean were you like like jesse where like plans his like quarterly trips i carve about three days now a year because it just seemed crazy me that wasn't spending one percent of my year just trying to think through how to spend the other ninety nine percent and so now i spend three days and i i try to get creative and and think about what i want this year to look like and what would be the most exciting version of the year and then i put dates on stuff and i i try to make it happen then yeah that's awesome i mean we sit down frequently but our our our life and our travel schedule is so packed and into so many we're reacting to a lot of events right like we're in the playing a game like catching events like and and trying to move them around can we go but then the larger arc conversation like where do we wanna be and set up camp what culture do we wanna discover you know what i mean what activities those are go ongoing but what what what part of your life are you most dissatisfied with right now and i asked this because i think when people listen it's cool to hear somebody who's got this shit together and inspires you but also it's good to remember like everybody's still a work in progress right everybody's got some level of wet met they're still trying to shift around whether it's their health or their relationships or whatever i have to say health adherence right now like i got married four years ago four was a forty year twenty four years ago and you know i was eight percent body fat v two at the top one percent yada yada yada and now probably like sixteen eighteen percent body fat and v two is like barely at the mid for my age which is not the way to be and so i would say that's probably the most dissatisfaction i got a lot of victim stories of like you know i get up twice a night because we have small baby i'm too tired to do the things you know it just went through a pregnancy and just kinda ate like you know that was a a prisoner on death row you know what i mean like but that's just all bullshit so like i'm just being lazy and not doing the things so i broken all all the all the stay in top one percent health and i'm i'm you know down to mid or below in certain areas that's not too bad though i mean and and it's also i think like i just had kids too and and i'm i'm i i was peak now i'm a little less peak but it's like for some reason i in this phase i'm like i'll be a little less in peak i accept it i i i would say it's actually pretty horrible because you're using the us averages the us averages have like a forty percent obese rate so i actually think it's pretty pretty bad no but i mean looking at you now looking at you now i think you said you're fifty seven i could be like you you're you're probably decently fit yeah i mean but depends what you want out of life like you know my doctor has a thing called the center centurion olympics and it's kinda like okay in the last decade of your life what activities would you like to do they have like i don't fifty or whatever activities but you pick them and then things are like pick up a small child walk a hike have vigorous assess for x minutes do these things so you pick ten that are important to you right be able to wake wake surface wouldn't it mind right and they run the calculations on like here's your v two now and here's the decline that you would have like for each client where i'm at and then the activities on one side of what you can do and it's one of the things i tried to do in the book way back when before like the technology and stuff was there is kinda like how many watt hour how many watt hours per kilogram of energy do i need to cli the stairs to do x activity etcetera and here it's basically v two max is kinda like the best indicator and and the things the things i wanna do on my last decade of life like eighty percent of them i cannot do at this current trajectory so you're saying that bad like now but i'm kind of fucking future bill over and i don't wanna fuck future bill over that much so you really have to think about the like this whole book is i think about the total arc of your life and your total fulfillment and and the net present value of that and i'm completely fucking over future bill right well this is actually interesting because most people are probably over the future yourself you just said you're you're you're screwed it up what are you gonna do change i've taken some of the capital and you know we just hired another trainer that that's here that can work you know come with on time i'm actually evaluating that person or another person to be like travel would be too because i travel so much and that's always an excuse and it's like well i have somebody who just travels with me in there a trainer then i i don't you know what i mean i got somebody to like keep that motivation and accountability like if i can't be accountable i need the outsource accountability but i need to do whatever i can in my power to make sure that i don't go over future bill you have a you know you wrote the book and the book has an amazing title like one of the best book titles i ever and i've studied the excitement it's almost too good you don't even need to read it yeah yeah exactly you can give somebody the the book cover and they can they should judge by cover so the book is called die was zero what was the original title gonna be and how did you what would you wake up one day and have that did you you hire somebody to come up with that line like what where did that come from no we we were it was just like we came up like ten or twenty titles like what is this book gonna be you know i with nothing maximize your life like kinda like descriptions of the book and and the ultimate concept is is that like you use all your resources here on this vacation on planet earth you leave it all on the field right so you die you know in the and people or are attached to the money aspect of it so die with zero just hit it's like there it is and it's also die with zero regrets right like it's like if you if you leave everything that if you do your best and you leave everything on the field you have zero regrets like most people say do you have regrets i go yeah and all my regrets are a version of when i didn't do my best so whether i lost my temper i did this or i behave this way or was a you know it's fat now shape it's like i didn't do my best and therefore i have regrets when i do my best that's all i can do there's no regrets it's unfortunate like unfortunate things still happen but i don't regret that like i don't regret my ass you know what i'm accountable for and then the the publishers love this like you know they were a little was a little bit worried about like well people getting on airport writing i to an airport you know and it's there is like die you know you know like that's gonna be hard sale in an airport but it was like it just hit and says it's like it's was provocative and we went with it i've used your book it's changed two parts of my life the first is now when i take vacations the way that we roll is we get a big house and for those who can afford it we say here's the dates that we are going everyone's welcome come come and vacation with us like you are to like my parents or my in laws right and it's pretty awesome it's made vacation so fun and then the second thing is i have in laws who created a business and they're very successful and one day they're having a conversation they're like look when we die here's what we wanna leave everyone and i was like look here's what i think you should do you're not asking for advice it's your money do what you want but you should do one of these three things the first thing that you should do give it to us now we don't need any money so that's probably the least good one but if you do wanna give us money give it to me right now but don't do that one probably the second thing is go and do something for yourself be selfish whatever you wanna do that makes you happy just go and spend all the money yourself or the third thing go and do something that we could all enjoy together you guys have been talking about getting this bit bigger vacation home don't even think twice get it and we will all enjoy it with you or if you wanna go on this awesome vacation let pay for all of us we'll go we'll go with you and they're starting to do it and it's made life so much more fun and so they actually got a a new vacation house that like like it's kinda like vacation homes are like definitely a hack for like really wealthy people because if you get place that's big enough for everyone to be really comfortable you one hundred percent spend more time with your family that's what i've noticed about yeah about that but it's in it's changed everything for us yeah like you you they're now because i had this conversation with you they're gonna have a more fulfilling life not gonna be like eighty five on their deathbed going like why did i do this or i didn't get as much time with so so during this time period etcetera like you've completely eliminated that future regret and it still exists by the way like there's still fear like everyone particularly if you're like retired or like will i have enough to take care of myself that that still exists but i do think like having a large dose of enjoy it now is good yeah i mean what fear should be greater having a little bit of money and you know eating beans or wasting your entire life and missing out on your own life you know so i i think you know for me it's it's it's it's the latter you must get stories like this all the time somebody reads the book and they make a change and you know that's obviously gotta be fulfilling what are some of the stories that stand out to you or what's a pattern you've heard from a lot of people who've read the book like a like kind of like what sam saying you know a change of decision what comes to mind is a lot of like the inheritance one because everybody's kinda like that just if it makes no fucking sense it's so obvious and then they read in the book you're like you're right this is so fucking obvious like why am i waiting to die to give somebody their inheritance like an inheritance shouldn't be a request they're not kids they're sixty etcetera so that's like most of like the older cohort like that that have discretionary income or they plan on leaving something behind they somehow changed their estate planning and they're actually taking a state planning seriously other than oh when i die whatever's is left is gonna go to this person this person this person the second one is is like we've completely you know people shifted retirement dates they've completely re thought what they should be doing in the time bucket they're they're they're they're having or they've done it for their parents they're like i've made my parents retire and their sole job is staying out with their grandparents like at that like that's it like your job is now able to hang out with the gram i'm sorry with the grandchildren and and and and just spend time with them and be around right or done this or you know what i mean these things i was putting off or you know i just kinda woke up to what i wanted and then they they're now doing that what about people who who don't have money have you had what are some interesting examples of people who you learn who who have read your book who are just who are retired teachers or our teachers you know not wealthy people oh they they they have money there's somebody in a military reached out and it's like yeah it doesn't make sense i have a guaranteed pension until i die why am i saving up all this money like they have no risk right like they're they're a military pension right they have no risk right like so they're like what is this lump of cash doing there right when i know i'm gonna get x per per month like they they started going to live life the other people don't money is like they're making different decisions right because really it's about how do you allocate your time right it's really about choices right money is just one of the tools you have in your toolbox your health and your time right and so like they're making different decisions on how they spend time and who they're spending it with you know that costs no money right making a decision to go see your mother or go play cards with the boys right or or play basketball with the boys or watch tv right neither decision requires much money or money at all right it's but how do i allocate my time in this time period and where does my time belong right some of people like yeah i'm now driving my kids to school and not complaining about it or i'm reading them books more or etcetera right it wasn't a money decision it was a how do allocate my time decision and then i go some of them was like the health part really hit me the idea that i won't be able to do certain things in the future people like i'm getting in better shape right so there there's there's things like that so people look at the three variables and they look at kinda like which one which tool am i not using properly a lot of people most of it by and large focuses on the money either earning it right like i'm spending you the other side i'm spending too much i'm screwing over my future self right there are things that should be delayed right but you know somebody has something to optimize to get a more fulfilling life who amongst those three tools their wealth their health and their time by far my favorite story in the book is is at the beginning it's the story of when you're you're working somewhere in your twenties so he didn't have a ton of money at the time had a job yeah it's my least favorite story and you know he goes and you're like dude i can't just we you know how we're gonna get six weeks off he's like we're not who we're gonna quit and we're gonna go and we'll try to get a job when we get back and you did what you thought was the responsible thing he seemed reckless you seem responsible for not going yeah and you know you're like as soon as he got back i could see the glow in this monkey face and i knew i did it wrong like he he had made the credit right and he got he his job was waiting for him we were fucking pee on i mean like what what what what were are we doing what did we have to lose and then you said you you finally went in your thirties he like you know it's not cool staying in hostel when you're thirty three backpack back through your buyers yourself because your friends are going sleeping on trains you know yeah you're a millionaire but i'm sleeping on trains and going you it just didn't happen i was too boo you know there there's not just the physical aspect of it is just the aptitude you know like like like like kinda like your your personal you know like glow sticks and raving and clubs used to be fun you know it's not as fun anymore i really when i was in my early twenty i used to call myself a fifty thousand dollar million there because i would host these conferences and that i would make fifty or hundred grand or something and then i would go and ride my motorcycle across the country or do some type of trip for like six or eight weeks and it literally costs like i think i i paid eighteen hundred dollars for a six week trip to ride my motorcycle i i stayed it i use couch surfing dot com so i like it which was fun right it was like fun just like when someone's couch and like get to know them and it was the most fun that i ever had and i looked back at that and i was like i'm so thankful that i was kinda silly at that era and was willing to do that and it was so much fun and it kinda creates this like write a passage a little bit when you do travel like that when you're young and you are reckless and it was so much it was so impactful for my life and i would never do that now not i would like it it was too grimy i wanna do that shit it would you be be of his story i'm like so fucking i'm like goddamn damn i want his life you dude i get of my younger life at times and and what's interesting is i don't want that i don't if you offer that i could go do that now i don't wanna do that when it was fun to want that then and to be able to do it yeah that's a that's a great example of time bucket like that experience belonged to that time period and does it transfer well to the next one even though you can still do it you just don't you don't want to i don't want to yeah so have you completely slay the money mom's like do you do you at wake up and do you like do you have businesses are you like investing are you trying to have businesses still work it's not it's not that you can't work or you can't enjoy solving the puzzle like we get addicted to puzzles and those tough puzzles become fun to us it's just that you know using your resources joint you know i use the resource right like there's no amount of capital i can't convert into fulfillment for me what what what do you do now for work so i have two startups ups one's called sky five one's called sim max they're one's a geo special intelligence platform kinda like uber for satellites like you can order on your phone a satellite image and i have an intelligence phone called sim and i still trade around the hedge fund but i make sure that in each time period the things i really want out of life right that there's value into doing that and so if if i was if i if i was sitting here and i go you know to the day i die i'm not gonna spend the money a have like i i had no need for any other money there's no additional foam to the to a marginal dollar quit it all and a heartbeat right just stop like what are you doing you know but there is marginal utility for me for some people who their concept doesn't enough they hit it like hey i just like playing checkers with my friends i grow potatoes in my yard i you know i go school whatever you know i do whatever like for them it's a different decision right like it's like no wasting what is it for you because you said ultimately i wanna be a farmer so that doesn't cost that much right well so my farming year are really you know like know i'm gonna spending a lot less money in years but like if i keep my v two here and hire as i should you know there's a lot of other activities and things i would like to do i really fell in love with yacht they're very expensive i do like private travel it's a time saver and the party actually starts when you get on the plane as opposed to when you get to the destination so i do i do think it's worth working for that but it at at a certain time i'm almost getting close to the age where it's not really worth working for it it's not worth giving up current hours of bill and other activities for future bill to have this thing you know what i mean and so i'm constantly measuring that and you know it's also prob list like i i could lose money i could i make a bunch of money etcetera dude every every man it's like they think of either world war two or the roman empire and they think of retiring on land and being a farmer i i i i i did that once i tried it it went for me not at that not not in that time bucket so yeah out of the time bucket yeah but what what's walk walk me through this vision what are you gonna do alright you're talking about later in life yeah i just what's this farm vision i mean i just wanna have like a hobby and not like a big giant farm with a tractor right how many acres like couple acres some gardens maybe grow some tomatoes or whatever you'd be surprised guarded it's like a large it's a large it's a large garden large garden you you have a texas ranches are pretty big i i have twenty acres i had twenty acres and the t called it a ranch chat yeah that's a ranch yet you need like a thousand acres like like i got a ranch you know yeah i thought i was gonna be cool and they were like sick yard so no i want like basically a large garden big big gardner some bees you know you had bees yeah you gotta the be easy the the adult thing right like yeah i'd bees i had honey it was great b bee keeping is probably the only ranch adjacent activity that is not a lot of work and is worth it yeah and i love the poll so that would be great you know just kinda enjoying grandchildren and friends and visiting and like you know you when you're younger you're seeking adventure right you're looking to create a story right like you're looking to create stories and memories and when you're older you have stories looking for friends to talk about them right and so when you're older when my you know my needs are finally gone i guess there's knee replacement surgery behind my back and i'm tired and my mental acuity on on the decline in lung capacities on the decline you know the things that i will do because they you know it's difficult to walk four miles or it's difficult to let it they my world is going to shrink and i'm gonna be looking for friends this whole stories and i wanna have a bunch of stories to retire you know retire my memories and do the simple things enjoy the simple pleasures of life so a lot of times people at the podcast they'll reach out to me and they're wondering hey same sean how do you meet all these amazing entrepreneurs how do you find all these stories well i have a hack you see i actually have a community called hampton it's a community for entrepreneurs doing at least three million revenue although we do on average something like twenty five million dollars in revenue we have the founders of door a fig of blue shoe all these amazing companies are part of hampton and what's interesting is because of the environment in hampton which frankly very similar to my first million we have a very unique high trust environment when people applying and go through this vetting process they're putting in groups of like eight or nine other entrepreneurs and they get real about everything that's going on in their life and in their business and sorta like when people listen to m they get in fire to come up with new solutions for business that's what happens in real life in hampton it's life changing and so if you're a founder of a startup that does at least three million in revenue and you just wanna go ahead and pull forward five or ten years worth of success then check it out the url is join hampton dot com again the url join hampton dot com when's was last time you worked from an office and has that impacted your life i have office you know but i i don't go into office i mean have this like kind of like like an ankle monitor called a cell phone that allows me to trade from anywhere but it's always with me so i can trade and do work from anywhere and so it's like you know know it's like i am t to the work world but it does make for great office spaces right like when i'm on a boat on vacation my office is the boat on vacation wherever i am that's the office right so it's both a blessing and a curse because i it extends the amount of neurons that i apply to these puzzles these work puzzles and i'm not so sure if that's a good thing or bad thing i'm constantly evaluating it given how old i am sean do you miss having an office because sean is the same thing sean diego and works from your house not at all i do like i did have a commute at one point where i was biking and walking to work i think that's the only part i missed is like the habit of getting up in the morning and getting outside and and walking or biking but now i just do that with my kids school drop off that that scratches that itch for me i never wanted i never wanna go to an office again i like having a dope home office and i have one or two people that will come over and work from here and then and then they get out of here half with you the day and then i i'm i'm just back at home you know i i'm not looking to go into an office you love that sam you you love going into an office i i do i do like it so i go to my office three days a week i'm at i'm at my office here and so i i live in manhattan and so it's nice to have the separation because like we don't have like texas size houses here but like i there is something that i like about getting dressed up and like i like laying out my workloads the night before i kinda like that routine i know it sounds like i love that too dude i'm kind of a square in that regard i i like the routine of like getting here and going home there's something about it that i enjoy but i do find myself significantly more productive at home yeah i mean you know when i talk to people about like offices are going with it you know when we d it it's like well i like the people and i like spend time with people and like you know the walk here or whatever and i'm like you can do that without having the office you can actually take those people out to dinner and spend more quality time as opposed to right next to them while they're doing this and you're doing this you can actually just take a walk to the central park and back and forth and make that part of your routine you know you can actually have them have a walking working thing and walk around the track and work with the phones and devices you can reconstruct it and it might be better but some people you know whatever whatever your value systems are you it's better for young people though and so one of the reasons my company to be have an office is i remember i was talking we were one of our employees was in manhattan and i was zooming her when she was in her shitty apartment and i'm like this is a horrible existence are you miserable she goes i hate this i was like we gotta get an office like this it it was wasn't it was not particularly fun i think for a twenty two year old to be working from home think it's a lot more fun when you have children or when you're the boss yes i would i would agree that like i think we need to help the younger generation connect with other humans because there's so many devices that are actually connecting them from other humans it's the illusion of connection with the social media the in person mixing and hanging out in discussions and meeting that art is being lost amongst younger generation so i do i am a proponent of that sean did you see this story about this painting that he just bought it was it was they they did a good job of i i think it was on the wall journal covered this painting bill that you got i think it was called sugar shack have you seen this sean i saw this a long time ago youtube video you you spend some un godly amount of money on this painting what's the story i mean it's a it's a very unique piece in in american art particularly because one you know when you say like well who who was the african american vinci or or whatever and the answer is no one because they were slaves and so it wasn't until after slavery and the form formation of families and they started growing up where people can actually fourth paintbrush and have the time to actually pain and so you kinda get like your first generation of like masters african american masters and the narratives that they would paint about born in like the forties or fifties or second generation depending on what you use is like nineteen ten nineteen twenties and then the forties and so this artist was a football player was a a artist and a athlete body and started painting and he was painting in this particular painting was about sugar shack which he had passed growing up in the south it's like a party house about black in the south during segregation which is a uniquely american theme right like you can still leave ice ice rink or whatever but it's uniquely american and not not necessarily from like oh my gosh slavery is bad or segregation was bad but just like you're just not gonna get that narrative right looks like jazz is the the only original american art form like this painting is very very unique culturally by like the first or second generation masters and it was featured on marvin marvin gaze album that one of grammy and it was on the opening or out of good times which norman lea was like kind of the first producer to put stories of young black families on tv back in the seventies and so this is very culturally relevant very historically significant a narrative that's not gonna be painted in china anywhere else etcetera so it was uniquely american and and i was in love with it i had seen it since i was a kid and any black person in my age range knows about this painting has seen this painting and other works by barnes and when it came up john the message me sent me an email and he goes hey isn't this the painting you've been looking for okay i've been looking for because there's two copies of it one it was painted it was in a back of the artist's car marvin ga sees is the painting freaks out he's like can i have this i must have this for my album and when the biggest music star at the time asks you for a painting and you're shooting struggling artist you do what he says so he changed the painting and painted on you know marvin gaze thing and it's on it's on i think as album called after the dance but that wasn't what it wasn't about that right so he went and made another copy of it okay he painted in another exact copy of it for what the painting was really about and so i tried to buy that piece from eddie murphy and basically got crickets you know like wouldn't wouldn't respond and then i john call me goes this is up and i almost cried when i heard about it and i was like okay i'm not gonna telephone off in this thing because what if the telephone goes down like i had all this nervous say i'm gonna fly and as a first live auction i been to and i flew to southern abuse and i stole that painting you know so like a lot of people focused on the price and it's just like you paid this much there was a one of four war that went for a hundred million dollars what did you pay i i don't know what you pay the total price of fifteen million described the auction battle it was it was chaos because they did some chic can so there's an evening auction and a and a day auction and and the evening auction is particularly the more expensive works right but this this had an estimate that did not fit the evening auction right like in an estimate of two hundred fifty two it it's like it was in a hundreds of thousand top million right like a millions and i was just like you know people are were like what what why the fuck is this in the evening auction but i so i knew there were some players who who wanted to get this thing but i figured like okay oh bit of three million take it scare everybody off and walk out the building with this with this painting and it just like was chaos like seven like everything was pretty scared like you know you know whatever it was anywhere hoping pin what i was tempted to do i have a bit here to this was like a trading pit it was like trading places for the first time is so and then you can hear me yelling out two million and then touch your minutes three that three minutes it just goes crazy until we get to like around seven million and it's like three people than two people and then it's just eye and this other bidder are going back and forth on this painting you could see them right you're you're there alive they're there alive you know the guy was bidding against me was like two seats ahead of me was empty roman he was right there and it was just he and i going back and forth and me pausing and me thinking like look what is going on here like who was he i don't know he was he was a art consultant a very respectable art consultant working for somebody who never revealed who the buyer was the only thing that was odd aside from me you know i talk is that touring the middle of bidding which you know bidder just don't talk you don't talk to each other whatever he turns around to me and he goes i'm not going to stop and then i said to him well then i'm going to make you pay and then you know kinda like chuckle who heard all that laughed and then it kept going and you know during the they during in the before the auction started i told my wife said listen they don't worry about me if i faint or anything just keep bidding and it's a true story i said do not and there was like a painting that i went before and i was like i should i should this is really good pain should buy it i was like no you need to save your money just in case thank god because i was way over the amount i was willing to pay for this before the auction started going but i you're what did you think your backs was thought it was pay like three to five million dollars you know and it was what fifth you said fifteen fifteen at the end did you were at the end were were you wobble were you well you shook a little bit you were like i'm going i wasn't in i was in my eyes were wiring i was i was so happy and i was just you feel what what what do you feel like you feel like a historian or something like you're like like you're the steward of history like what what why would did this is this so important that you have yeah i mean like the role of the collector is to signal to future generations what is worth preserving so what you see in museums etcetera were were the commissions of wealthy people back in the day or things that they collected you you you you may not be seeing the best art actually statistically speaking you probably are not seeing the best art right like some of it was probably burned or was in people's houses or or whatever and didn't make it or or didn't show what you're seeing is is what prior people had signaled to future generations what was worth preserving and so given that context of this piece and and in the historical context i gave you of like american art particularly african american art there was just an arbitrage going on because of the perception right there's a lot of people that like oh black eye should own and i'm like no black eye should own it the world you own it a russian billionaire should own it look but we get to steal this because people have these kinda like you know historical racism in the york community where museum would not collect african american art it would not put it in or not have and then now kinda that makeup up here that kinda like social stigma of of you know who should own this art whatever it's it's stuck in even the black community i'm got like you guys are idiots like it's creating an arbitrage between the valuable things that should be signaled than preserved for future generations and what the market is paying so i was ecstatic i felt like you know i ar arbitrage the market i i i i like i had made it i had finally made it that i can actually own this painting that i used to watch on tv all the time so it was i was super happy that's so awesome it's it's also awesome to like i think it's cool to be like this kinda like man's man and also like be into some of the other shit it's like this it's a very ec person did you guys see that story about sylvester sal apparently in the eighties he bought this a monet i think it was called haystack stacks i think he bought it for a hundred and ten thousand dollars in the nineteen eighties years later he had some bills to pay or something like that and he sold it for three million and then like five or ten years later that same painting sold for a hundred and thirty million dollars yeah yeah and he was telling the story and he was like i was so foolish to sell he's like because art it doesn't require upkeep like i don't have to like move it or fix it or repair it he's like i was foolish why did i why did i sell this and it was a really cool story to see but but also it's like sylvester sal alone you know he's supposed to be this like guy's guy yeah he writes us badass movie by himself so he's clearly has an artistic side and he spots a monet but before the world does and it's just kinda cool to see like an a ec human beam oh you should you should watch the there's an interview with him about rocky and the characters and him writing the characters he is an artist he wrote that and it's like when he talks about the development of characters and what it's about it it's it's an it's an amazing thing like this sequel is all about the boxing and clever lang or whatever but like i think he he became an action start but like he's an artist like people multifaceted it so you know you look at like the highlight of my life on instagram or you look at whatever and you might like have an idea or a good view into certain facets of people's lives but like everybody's is a multi cut diamond and and some of those facets that you don't see are actually a bigger part of their lives in a strange way by having that bidding war telling this story getting the buying it at the price you did you increased the value of the art right so it's like it's kind of reflective in that way where the art actually increases in value because you paid more and because of the way it went down in in a strange way yeah i i mean i signaled to the market barnes works are important at least is a grade works right like every arctic has their a work their b work their c work fifty work and you know etcetera and so the market got a signal and there was another piece at auction that i wanted to buy and then i couldn't afford it because you know that was a piece that had i bought that first i probably would bought it for a couple hundred grand it went for like two million to some some asian buyers or something like that right and then and this was the the day auction right is the the cheaper stuff right and so i completely reset the barnes market you know and and it wasn't me it's just the market became aware right like you know when people like well why did you pay this much of why is this significant you know i i have like three you know art net interviews and wall street journal and interviews and i i i went over the thesis and everybody's like you're absolutely right there's this photo like holding up your arms yeah you it's a great photo yeah i woulda have held up my arms when the guy turned around and said i'm not gonna stop and then you had a cool thing to say back you know how hard it is to have a cool thing to say back in the moment like know i would have already been celebrating the victory of having the cool shape the cool one liner ready to really lock stock and barrel right then not like ten minutes later thinking of what i should've have said no i don't know it's just it just flowed you know it it was it was a it you know some people it's like i gotta have this car or i i made it when this this this was the thing you know and i'd i'd become a a a pi minor art collector thief of collecting black works and my friend john arnold was helping me he's a extremely astute collector he saw first he's was like would you i said what do you think he goes it's exquisite and so and he's the one who notified me because i was after it and and and kind of guide me on like collect like collect what you like you know collect a works etcetera and so anyway yeah it it it does help but i don't expect to close the arbitrage out in my lifetime i'm just you know i get the show people and carry it now right now it's on loan in a museum i think it's in in ohio and then it's going to art basel on loan and then it's on it's on loan it's on a lot of loans like people borrow it don't office does that work so they're paying you to be able to exhibit it no okay they take they pay the insurance and they carry it etcetera first guy it my kids were like don't you dare bring that to the house you can have fifteen million dollars hanging on the wall we're gonna get robbed and so then like they were all scared like somebody the adult people know who you are and they're gonna come come take the painting so it so it's it's on tour right now man thank you so much for coming on i you and i don't know if you noticed we've been trained dms back and forth like four years now trying to get you on you know we we've have all types of amazing people come on i think you're and not we don't look up to everyone we like most of them we don't look up to everyone but i think you're one of the handful that we you really have some parts of your life that we really really really admire and you know we ask ourselves like like this this flavor of advice what would they advise that we do in this period of our life and so you're you're definitely in the mix so we appreciate you yeah i tell people i'm not a role model but i can be an inspiration you don't wanna live my life i make way too many mistakes but you can you know the words are pure right like a lot of like and i i i don't wanna be famous or too famous you don't wanna be too famous because you can't get negative a party and anything you know without you being in the paper i always telling people and i reserve the right to get negative a party it's kinda of my line and and you also then become in service of this persona right like if you become that guy and the words are pure right the words in the book of pure the story is a pure like the concerts is a pure am but you're kind of gotten famous you're you're you're sort of famous right now like like d with z level is okay popular yeah yeah z level okay you know what i mean don't wanna be like you can't enjoy life you can't go walking wait were you popular before you had the book yeah for different reasons i was trying to poker poker i was running around a he life when i got divorced i was running around girls and i was like gonna i was gonna go climb the fame game right and i was like you were like a dan area guy weren't you yeah i was like a i was like i'm not a damn errand guy he's a different guy but like yeah i was in this whole like i'm just gonna date a bunch of people i'm gonna have like kind of this movable feast of a life you know like the sun also rises hemingway type life you know what i mean traveling around living this life and i saw the value in fame was was like this is great marketing like you can get a lot of girls you know being famous and then i saw that it robbed you of your life fame shrinks your world and you go into a bubble you can't you can't walk around you can't do things you can't whatever and i saw that with michael phelps and i saw that with dan we would go play i'm like okay we're in capri we're gonna go out and walk these shops or whatever and they can't go because of all the you know damn dan my come you know all those type of things and i i thought oh that's hell that would be hell for me because i like traveling and i like exploring new cultures and like meeting new people and if i have this fame persona that like one can't do it without security people constantly interrupt you in two you play up to that you become a slave to that persona but if your persona is i'm the nice guy then you're always playing the nice guy even when you don't wanna be nice or you need to be forceful or assertive right not even a dick but just assertive right or if you're always a calm guy you have to always play the aggressive or if you're always the body builder aggressive action star you're always playing a role of like i'm the rock can you smell what i'm cooking when you might be into like lily in beef forming you know you have to play up to it and so i care about being able to have the most fulfilling life and so that's why you never wanna be that famous you could write another one my wife says hell no it takes a lot of time but i actually i'm being sent there it is s inductive do you guys know tim urban of of course so and so like he's like we should write a book together we like we have a bunch of ideas and we write a book together that's a crazy combo and she just goes that would be fun he goes yeah so we we i've been like yeah i just need to kill a couple projects so i can have the time what topic right now i have a no new project thing for my wife and she's right like she's helping me accountable that have the most fulfilling life but like i if i i i do i do this is doctor to me what what topic don't know yet we've been thinking about a cuff what what's what's what's what's what are you obsessed with well there was there's a lot of things on like relationships and purpose you know the the one thing about the book i don't tell people is like whether whether their values you know like you you choose your values right and what what is fulfilling and and and so i have i have a couple of theories about purpose and fulfillment like i think there's a lot of purpose born out there i think it's complete bullshit i think the purpose of life is to be happy and purpose comes in design and there's a lot of design cues from your your biology that tell you your purpose the same design queues and a pair of scissors that tell you it's for cutting right and so i think i have some theories about that i'm a go into the long story about it but there's does there's a couple of things relationships the like a lot of people wanted the cookbook version of this book they're like great i get the high level concepts tell me what to do you know i don't think i wanna do that but you know i can nixon some of that well a lot of the books now are having like handbook which i actually they got i think those are cool i like a i know that there's design your life which was that stanford course they had like a handbook i did that like ten years goes awesome nobody does the handbook though dude it was great you buy nobody does them yeah you can give to i'm nobody's gonna fill it in yeah it's it's it's it's tough i i left it for other people to write the computer programs to write the handbook to the to actually do the math you know to have you know i want them to be in my church and go build it i kinda wanted to be like jesus and just like you know go forth and build the church i'm out here he i that type of thing you know like i i i don't wanna be the guy you know a lot of people write books to be the guy i don't wanna be the guy i wanna them my life wanna be jesus but i wanna be the guy i was the guy i just wanna be the look jesus got nailed to across my friend like the yeah there's a price to pay exactly you could write yeah i get nailed to the fame right like a lot of people great books and like they have the chorus and the podcast and the thing as a matter of fact there's a guy coming out named austin who he like the number one fan my number one fan of the book gives out the book all the time spoke at like conferences about the but my my book and he's like hey can i do a die with zero podcast i'm like have at it have fun i there's look what i'll do one show but i don't wanna be the guy right like i wrote the book to like have a fulfilling life not to get famous hope we appreciate you joining see man alright appreciate it guys thanks for asking me alright that's it that's a pod i feel like i could rule world i know i could be what i want to from at all in it like a day's off on a travel never looking back alright my friends i have a new podcast for you guys to check out it's called content is profit and it's hosted by luis and ph ka after years of building content teams and frameworks for companies like red bull and orange theory ness luis and fans are on a mission to bridge the gap between content and revenue in each episode you're gonna hear from top entrepreneurs and creators and you're gonna hear him share their secrets and strategies to turn their content into profit so you can check out content is profit wherever you get your