Bookworm Transcripts

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Mike, I've been very proud of you lately.

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Because I've been bugging you about GitHub or what?

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No, not that you're bugging me.

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It's that you've got an adventure that you have embarked on with diving into Git and GitHub.

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And you can do pretty well with it from what I can tell.

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So I'm proud of you.

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Well done.

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That's not a task that many people can pull off successfully.

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So good job.

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Well, thank you.

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I have hosed my entire Obsidian database twice.

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Good work.

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Good.

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Originally, I had a backup.

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So they will download it and replace everything pretty quick.

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And I've given up on the large file storage completely.

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Okay, sure.

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But I think I'm okay with that.

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The original thought was that I would download the MP3 files from all the podcasts that I record.

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Sure.

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And then store them with Obsidian and have that all backed up to GitHub.

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But GitHub has file limits of a hundred megabytes, which a lot of the bookworm episodes are over because we tend to talk a lot.

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I tend to talk a lot.

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And that was causing issues.

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I never could get that to work.

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I move my vault around multiple times, reinstalled, get set up a new repository, whatever multiple times.

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And it's working now.

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So we're just going to leave well enough alone and use the embed URLs just like when we publish them.

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I mean, I don't really think we're going to lose access to the episodes that we published anyways.

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Maybe, you know, I'll download them all and just throw them in a folder somewhere just so I have them.

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But this is good enough.

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I basically want to just be able to go back reference an episode, have the audio there and all the links and everything from stuff that we've done.

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So this is like a backup backup system?

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Yeah.

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Well, I have everything in Dropbox.

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And then I am using the Obsidian sync service because I think that a mobile app is pretty imminent.

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And I'm pretty sure that you're not going to be able to just point it at a Dropbox folder for the mobile app.

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They're going to have to force you to use their sync service.

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So sure.

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And if you sign up now, it's like 50% off for a lifetime.

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So I did that.

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And then I got the GitHub backup because I was still uncomfortable with Obsidian.

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Like it sits on top of all these text files, right?

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But I am scared that there's going to be something, especially with third party plugins.

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They say in the forums all the time, like if you are using third party plugins, we cannot troubleshoot for you.

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There is a potential for data loss and we don't know what these other developers are doing.

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So just don't use third party plugins.

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It's kind of scary the language that they use.

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Sure.

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So all that to say, I don't really feel comfortable just running up sitting on these text files and assuming that it's not going to be doing something destructive.

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And if I'm going to put my life in in this, I want to have those text files backed up since they are plain text files and they can be backed up.

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And it's possible to do that.

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That's the nice part.

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Yeah.

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So I'm I'm with you in that like I set up the whole git thing on mine as well.

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Once I got my whole signing key problem solved, it's been going pretty well.

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So yeah, no, I think it's a cool idea.

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I have the opposite approach with plugins though.

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I throw all of them on there that I want and why did to I do to but I get it from a tech support perspective.

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They're saying, well, we've made this API for these developers and they can basically do whatever the heck they want and we can't control it.

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So if your stuff gets hosed, it's not our fault.

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Right.

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Right.

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Yeah.

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And I get it.

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I get why they do that.

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You know, they they are protecting themselves.

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So it makes sense.

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Yeah.

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On time.

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Oh, the other thing with this, which is really cool, by the way, I mentioned last time, I think that I really enjoyed doing all my writing in obsidian.

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So that I think is going to stick on the Mac.

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Interesting.

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But on iOS, I have started using one writer, which is not my favorite markdown editor on iOS, but the best one that I found that just looks at all the contents of your Dropbox folder.

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So it's pointed to the same vault location and basically I can make live edits to those text files and it shows up syncs instantly to obsidian on my Mac, which because I want to do my writing in obsidian, you know, ideas you captured there, they get developed there.

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They eventually get published from there.

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Well, I finished the article, copy paste the markdown and publish it via WordPress most the time.

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But like from start to finish, everything is happening inside of obsidian.

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When I am not at obsidian, I still want to be able to go in and make some edits and one writer allows me to do that.

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So nice, pretty happy with the workflow at the moment.

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Nice.

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I use pretext on my phone, but I'm just doing quick ads to text files there and then syncs via iCloud back to my computer and then.

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Whatever happens from there is just extra.

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So fun times.

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One thing I want to point out because I think this was kind of fun this past Wednesday.

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So this is a little over a week ago as the recording releases.

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My oldest daughter helped me on a webinar, which was fun.

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Nice.

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She so Emma, my eight year old daughter, my oldest showed us her bullet journal for analog Joe.com, which was very fun.

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I think a couple of the folks in the chat today were there.

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So it was very fun.

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She has been telling folks that she got to do a webinar like ever since then the last couple of days.

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She's telling anyone and everyone that she had a chance to do a webinar.

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So it was fun.

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It was a cool, cool, proud dad moment going on there.

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Yeah.

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Thanks, Carol.

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She did great.

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I thought she was good.

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Anyway, parents things.

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The other thing I want to point out.

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I don't know how to say this name.

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I'm going to go with Bogdan.

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I'm guessing Bogdan.

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Bogdan Bogdan on the bookworm club.

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So club.bookworm.fm put together a mind map for deep work.

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Now this is going way back in the archives, right?

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Yes, it is.

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He worked on this mind map and gave us a link to his mind map.

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And I thought this was very interesting because I feel like it kind of rivals some of what you do, Mike.

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That's OK.

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It was very interesting.

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Did you look through this?

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He did it on X mind.

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Yeah.

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So I don't approve of the app choice.

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But I like that it's as simple as just drop a link and boom.

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Here you go.

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Well, yeah, I can.

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I've been doing that with my node too.

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They have a service called my mind node, which I was actually embedding inside of a city.

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And the problem there is that my mind node isn't actively developed.

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And I think some of my larger maps broke it.

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OK, sure.

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So I'm back to embedding the PDFs.

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Unfortunately, I still like my node though for the actual mind maps.

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I think it's a phenomenal application.

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This looks great though.

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I mean, there's some stuff on this one, which I'm assuming there's like additional

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notes for like those couple of lines before things because not every node has those,

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but some of them do.

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And I can't seem to do anything with those.

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I don't know why, but yeah, this is this is cool.

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And this is the way you should take notes when you're reading books, in my opinion.

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False.

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I disagree.

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Minds with the notebook.

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Put in a page number.

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Write your note.

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Be done.

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Very simple.

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I don't know.

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I'm going to throw a shout out here for Nick Milos linking your thinking class, which I'm in the middle of.

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And it's it's good.

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It's it's not it's not exactly like how does that all cast in, but kind of.

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OK, he explains essentially like how to organize your notes from so they can be

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navigated from the top down and from the bottom up, which increases discoverability when you're

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kicking things around and you're kind of intentionally note making instead of just note taking.

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So you've got all these notes from your books, for example, and then you have like he calls it an MOC, a map of content, like everything in obsidian.

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Like that's all your book notes.

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It's kind of like your warehouse and then your MOC.

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That's kind of like your workbench.

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And that's where you're taking the thing notes from like this is what Charles

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Duhig says about the habit loop and then you're interjecting your own opinion notes and like this is why I think it's wrong.

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I like James Clear is model better.

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And so that's been really helpful and I guess from going through this, I realized that for a long time, I was doing the note taking part real great.

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I had all this stuff captured in these mind maps and even dumped it into Rome, but then it wasn't colliding with anything and it wasn't really it wasn't really giving me any sort of value.

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It takes more work to make notes instead of just take notes and figure out the connections, but ultimately that's where the payoff is down the road.

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So I've got lots of work to do there, but I would say, you know, if you're just taking notes in the notebook or if you're just taking notes on a mind map, either way, like the real value is not just in jotting them down.

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It's what do you do with those notes after you've captured them and how do you connect them to everything else?

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Sure.

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Interesting.

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There's so many different places we could go there and I feel like if we try, it's going to get long.

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So that said, let's jump into today's book because I think this is going to be an interesting conversation and I'm itching to get to it.

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But today's book is thinking in bets by Annie Duke, making smarter decisions when you don't have all the facts.

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And it's a national bestseller.

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Annie Duke is a poker player and has done very well in her poker playing career and has a lot of interesting things, lots of numbers in this book.

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And I think, well, I'm curious, you know, I tend to ask this about every time, but Mike, what was your original expectation for this book?

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Because I feel like this is kind of the whole judge of book by its cover sort of thing because I had it introduced to me by our friend of the show, Josh.

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So I had a little bit of background about what to expect from this because there was a short conversation that I had about it beforehand.

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You didn't have that benefit.

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So I'm curious what you were expecting to get from this before you started it.

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I wasn't expecting anything to be honest.

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Sure.

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So a little inside baseball, I guess, but maybe you feel the same way.

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Maybe yours is a little bit different.

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But when it comes to bookworm and we take turns picking the books, I usually think through in probably too much detail, like the books that I'm going to pick and why.

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And then the ones that Joe picks, I'm just like, OK, I got to read it anyways, whatever.

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So I don't do a lot of research on those.

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I'm going to read it anyways, so at this point, whatever.

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It doesn't matter.

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I don't get a choice on this one.

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So no research done.

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OK, that's fair.

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Yeah.

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Now if you're asking for initial impressions, though, from once I knew what it was about, I don't think it's quite what I expected.

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I don't know exactly what I expected, but I guess I figured it would be more heavily anchored in the poker stuff.

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More of her story and lessons that she's learned, like she would be the main character in the spotlight, so to speak.

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And I'm kind of glad that she wasn't.

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I feel like the approach that she took is really good.

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This reminded me a lot, actually, of the maybe not the style exactly, but the approach of never split the difference by Chris Voss.

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Sure.

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Yeah.

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Because his role and Annie's role as a poker player kind of set the stage for like, I have a level of expertise in this area that you probably don't have.

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Yeah.

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There's a very, very good chance that like the person picking up this book, there is no way they are going to be qualified to say, well, that's that's wrong.

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You know, sure.

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So it would be easy to default to that, I think, where it's like, it's all about me and here's everything I know about this particular topic, but she did a really great job of tying it to general life principles and just better decision making in general, especially that last chapter with all the different stories and approaches.

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You know, I feel like the, the, she at the beginning of each chapter, she kind of sets like an analogy.

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And then that's like a consistent theme throughout that, that whole chapter.

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And I feel like that was, that was really a well done.

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It was easy for me to follow, even though I know nothing about poker itself.

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Interesting.

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I feel like I know a lot about poker and I shouldn't like there's, there are a lot of stories in here, right?

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So some of the big names in poker come up, like Phil Ivy, Phil Helmouth.

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I don't remember seeing Tom Dwan in there and Duhr as they call him.

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So like there's some of these names like, oh yeah, I recognize a lot of these names and these people.

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I don't know why.

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I probably shouldn't know these guys, but it is fascinating to see a lot of what she has to say about translating some of the way that poker players think about things to everyday life to big time business decisions and such.

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And it's, it's just interesting.

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I think so let's, let's jump in here with the intro, I think is a good place to start because it's kind of what we're talking about why this isn't a poker book is the title of this intro.

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And it kind of ties into the first chapter, but I'll wait on that.

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And she does in this intro kind of explain how her goal here is to show you how things in the poker world work.

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And then how those methods of thinking are either beneficial or detrimental in your everyday thinking.

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So I just that I don't know it's it's a fascinating way to come at this.

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I've not really seen anyone take concepts from say Texas Holdham and apply them to how to decide whether to buy a business or fire your president of the company.

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I've never seen that.

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Yeah, and that that thread, you know, how she ties those things together.

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She's really good at sticking with that throughout the length of the book.

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And as someone who's not familiar with this world at all, I feel like that makes it more approachable.

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You kind of always have a reference point.

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Whereas a lot of the other books that we read for Bookworm, I think they kind of assume like a base level of knowledge on a topic once they really get into it.

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Even the ones that try to start real basic, they try to they try to accelerate quickly and get to the point where like, okay, it's leave that stuff behind.

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And now it's talk about the good stuff.

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But because she kind of keeps referring to the story about the president, you know, stuff like that, it makes it feel more connected.

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Yeah, and I think that makes sense.

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I mean, there's there are a lot of different ways that she could take this right.

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Seeing the patterns that evolve.

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Well, let's let's kind of transition into the chapter one because I feel like this is going to get kind of into the meat of this and it'll expand on kind of what we're talking about.

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But chapter one is the title is Life is Poker, not chess.

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How many times do we like I feel like I've heard and seen people refer to life as a chess game?

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I feel like I've heard that quite a bit.

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This is this is something she tends to do like breaking down some of what you've had as preconceived notions.

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So I think it's really fascinating to see that, but I feel like I've heard people refer to life as chess quite a bit.

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Like you're always maneuvering your way through decisions, communications and discussions, but she kind of breaks that apart and shows that with a chess game.

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There are only so many moves.

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There are only so many ways that you could make a move or decide to move, which means that there is a mathematical process and a correct answer.

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Right? So you can get to a point where you can get the quote unquote correct answer in chess.

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You can break it down to that level.

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The trick is time, right?

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How do you calculate that?

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How quickly can you calculate that?

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That's the chess grandmaster title.

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Those folks are simply calculating that at a faster rate than the rest of us.

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And that's kind of what they're getting at here, whereas poker is completely different in that you're dealing with people and emotions and decision makers, which means that your decision making is going to flux.

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Thus, there are things that they just talk about percentages.

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This person has an 18% chance of winning.

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Thus, I'm going to bet against them because their chance of winning is so low.

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Like that's the type of mentality that people come into it with in the poker world.

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And thus she's trying to show us like if you take that and expand it, and we'll talk about this more as we go.

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If you expand that out into the rest of like decision making, it can be very beneficial to helping you make better decisions.

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Sure, I get the point that she's making here, but I feel like it's not quite as clean cut as she makes it out to be.

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So I kind of feel like talking about chess simply as an algorithm, so to speak, kind of shows a limited knowledge of chess, which is fine.

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I was a chess nerd growing up.

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I was on a chess club.

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I went around played in all the tournaments.

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And so I can tell you that there isn't a simple formula to follow.

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It's not simply, did you make the best decision?

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There are different like openings and strategies and there's no like one right way to counter a specific opening.

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You know, like one that comes to mind.

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There's probably like three people listening who will know what this means.

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But like typically white goes first and they make a move.

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Usually it's one of the center pawns and you move it two squares forward.

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One of my favorite defenses to that, not because it's advantageous necessarily, but just because it throws people off is this carol con defense where you move like one of your other pawns on the side, like only one space.

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And there's a whole bunch of options that that opens up to you.

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And so if you know all of these different openings and all of these different strategies, you can see that and be like, oh, I know what response that is.

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And they're probably thinking this way, but it's not like, well, I'm going to do this and then obviously they're going to do this and then I'm going to do this and aha.

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Now I got them.

00:19:56

I think the difference here really is that when you're talking about playing poker, a complete game, so to speak, is over in a matter of minutes.

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And so you get a lot more, a lot more samples to work with.

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But if you were going to view like a game of poker as like a tournament that she's going to, she kind of gets into that in the end is like, you may start off hot and then you're going to lose a bunch and it's going to kind of even out in the end.

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You know, you can't really just take one of those hands in isolation and say, this is the best strategy.

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There is a lot of luck when you do view it in such a narrow slice.

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But essentially what she's saying is that over time, like those are going to average out and you're going to make the best decisions regardless of the outcome.

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That's kind of what she talks about.

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Like the Seahawks coach, when they decided to throw in the one yard line in the Super Bowl and it got picked off and they lost.

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Like that wasn't a bad decision.

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It was a bad outcome.

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And then all of the Monday morning quarterbacks like, oh, obviously he should have ran the ball, but you got to disconnect from the outcome when you're gauging the quality of the decision.

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And I feel like there's a lot more similarity there between chess and poker than she communicates at the beginning.

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But I understand what she's saying to that luck plays a bigger role than you might realize.

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And chess seems like the kind of thing where it is primarily based on your skill and the level at which you're able to outthink your opponent.

00:21:35

Yeah, like the chat is saying, like you have to know what your opponent is trying to achieve in chess in order to accurately play that way to have the correct answer to get to, I think, because how many times you hear the stories about.

00:21:48

Maybe not too often, but you hear the stories about grandmasters and chess that do something unorthodox and it throws their opponent off.

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And that's that's how they end up winning, right?

00:22:01

Because they can play that game.

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Think about like deep blue back in the day when there was the IBM computer, you know, it knew every right move to make, but it couldn't beat a person because a person makes a move in the computers like, well, what the heck are they thinking with that?

00:22:15

You shouldn't have done that one.

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That was a bad idea.

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And now I don't know what to do.

00:22:19

Like that's yeah, exactly.

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And that's fascinating.

00:22:21

Like the whole Pete Carroll story, like everybody knows this.

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It's been thrown down in the highlight reels so many times where Pete Carroll and the Seahawks make this decision to throw on the one.

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You're on the one yard line and I remember watching that live and it was one of those things where if you were able to process your thoughts on that very quickly.

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I remember watching it thinking they're going to throw that's genius.

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Everyone is going to think that they're going to run and then he throws it and it's intercepted and I thought that was a terrible decision.

00:22:55

Like instantly, that's the way my brain worked whenever that happened live.

00:22:59

I remember that distinctly and partially because the story has come up so many times now and I think it's so interesting that we do like this is one of the key takeaways that I've had from this is like we tend to think that the outcomes dictate how good our decision was.

00:23:18

Like how well did we make that decision based on what turned out at the other end and that's not necessarily the case.

00:23:26

Like it's okay to have a bad decision or to have a good decision with a bad outcome those do exist but we don't really think about it that way doing.

00:23:36

So I don't know I thought that was a like whenever I read her.

00:23:40

This concept of taking the results away from the decision and making those two different components and it's not all tied together.

00:23:49

Like I had to set the book down and just kind of huh.

00:23:53

That one kind of got me you know how we've talked about like if you get one solid thing from a book it was worth reading the book I think that was it for me.

00:24:00

It was very early on.

00:24:02

Sure.

00:24:03

The big thing in this chapter that stood out to me was that we're uncomfortable with the idea that luck plays a significant role in our lives.

00:24:13

Yeah, and we try to find reasons for things and sometimes they just don't exist sometimes it's.

00:24:23

A low probability but it still is a chance and happens and you can beat yourself up about decision that you made and try to figure out what to do better next time but there's both skill and luck at play here.

00:24:39

And I guess as a systems person that makes me a little uncomfortable too but she reconciles it basically by saying that doesn't mean that you don't.

00:24:52

Way the options that you don't consider the inputs that you don't make adjustments but just that you are making your adjustments based on increasing the probability of the desired outcome.

00:25:05

And then at that point you have to disconnect from it and not judge it based off of that.

00:25:10

You go ahead and tweak whatever you need to tweak to try to get the outcome that you want and then you just see how it plays out at that point.

00:25:20

And you remove emotion from the formula which is a lot easier said than done.

00:25:25

Yeah, yeah for sure.

00:25:27

One of the stories I don't remember I think it's in this section where she's talking to I think it was the CEO of a company and they had recently removed the president of the company.

00:25:41

Because I think in this case they were two separate people and they had removed the president and had a whole bunch of bad things happen it had ended up being a rough round for this company and she was in consulting with them and walked through the entire hiring process that they've been trying they'd had to potential hires that both failed and they felt like it was a bad decision to remove this other guy.

00:26:09

The original president and they walk through the whole thing she walked through the whole thing with them and came to the conclusion that it was a good decision.

00:26:18

They just hadn't had a good result from it yet and that they needed to not give up on it yet even though they were considering hiring this guy back.

00:26:28

So it's like okay yeah that that kind of strikes home a little bit in that.

00:26:32

It's okay to have those two split so I again I appreciated that that concept.

00:26:39

It's okay to not know it's okay to not have complete certainty that something is going to work out a certain way right which as someone who tends to over research every decision that I ever make.

00:26:51

I fall into this.

00:26:53

Sure so there's a lot for me to learn I think from this book.

00:26:59

This initial section when she's talking about the whole idea of just playing the percentages so to speak.

00:27:08

That sounds really appealing it sounds like that's a huge mental burden I don't have to carry around anymore.

00:27:17

But it's having gone through it it's really hard for me to.

00:27:21

To act to live that out.

00:27:24

It's really hard for me not to connect to the outcome which is probably the whole point but.

00:27:29

I don't know maybe that's just my personality that makes it harder I mean how did you how did you feel.

00:27:36

About that the whole concept of like you make your decision and then you just kind of let the chips fall where they may maybe you're going to get beat on the river you have no idea but don't get upset about it it's not bad luck it's not you lack a skill like you made your choice it was a good choice and now you just live with the results.

00:27:53

Like me personally I I move very quickly after decisions are made.

00:27:59

You've worked with me long enough like when when a decision is made like I'm running with that decision all the time that's that's the way I operate.

00:28:10

I understand that some people make a decision and they still like there's still kind of processing the decision as the actions start with it.

00:28:20

I I have set that aside already I'm I'm the decision is made the answer is go.

00:28:26

And all of the potentials other than that decision I have forgotten very quickly and I'm just trying to implement whatever that decision was like that's that's how I.

00:28:39

And I've been this way as long as I can remember there's my wife nuts but I know that this is something that I do so.

00:28:49

For me to try to like okay whenever I've made a decision am I going to agonize over did I make the right decision or not I don't really.

00:28:59

And it's because I've.

00:29:02

Probably already forgotten all the stuff that went into making that decision again like the people who work with me on a day to day basis it's kind of frustrating because like well this was the decision we made and.

00:29:15

Do you remember that like we had this two week conversation leading up to that decision.

00:29:19

And you don't remember any of that no because we made the decision and now I'm trying to put it in place what did we talk about again I remember like I've just always been that way you're moving on you're not.

00:29:32

Going back and analyzing it to make sure you made the right decision and I guess my personality maybe the reason that I do that is because I feel like.

00:29:41

Maybe I missed one piece of information and now that something has occurred because of this decision maybe I can like quick go back and alter the course before I get too far down this path and realize this is really the wrong one.

00:29:57

I don't know I'm projecting it at this point but I recognize that this is something that I agree with.

00:30:04

As she's explaining it intellectually but living it out it's very difficult feels like fingernails on the chalkboard of my soul.

00:30:12

I think there's so two chapters ahead from now.

00:30:16

I think this might come up again because.

00:30:19

Like mosquito is saying in the chat.

00:30:22

Some books talk about a decision journal where you can write down the process you go through to come up with a decision so that you can then look back on it.

00:30:31

This is something I thought about doing quite a bit because although I don't think your view of this is probably what she wants you to do my view is not what she wants you to do either.

00:30:43

Like making the decision and moving on I don't think is 100% the correct.

00:30:49

Way because I'm so far into the completely forget about what went into it that.

00:30:56

I don't really learn from it so again well come back to that I think so anyway life is poker not chess.

00:31:03

I think there's potential.

00:31:06

Like she's trying to make a point yeah and she's largely right yeah I think there's some like if you want to nitpick and get into the nitty gritty you could probably argue that.

00:31:17

And say no you're wrong if you want to stand on that hill but I think.

00:31:22

Ninety five percent she's correct.

00:31:25

Well the thing is like she's using at the beginning of the book as a start comparison of like this is the right way to think versus the wrong way to think.

00:31:35

And it feels kind of like she's advocating for making the transition from thinking about it this way to thinking about it that way because this old way you're viewing things a certain way.

00:31:48

And there are certain rules that people play by in this sandbox and you may think that those are tied to reality they really not there just exists within this this game and then so she's like substituting that with a totally different alternative with poker and I guess what she's what I am saying is like.

00:32:08

The rules that she's advocating for implementing like they do exist even in the other thing to that she's using as a model of like don't think this way.

00:32:17

Sure so really what is happening here is I'm realizing that this is.

00:32:23

Essentially this gets spread across even further than she's advocating it for.

00:32:30

Because she's saying you don't think about this just in terms of poker think about this in terms of life all the decisions that you make.

00:32:36

You know except for chess because chess is this way like no actually chess is that way to like this is more universal than you may realize walking into this.

00:32:45

Yeah I feel like she wants to make a point right so yeah anyway the second chapter here is one a bet.

00:32:51

And so think about the layout here.

00:32:55

She's she does the intro why this isn't a poker book which I think makes sense because a lot of people read the intros before they purchase the book like they're at the bookstore and they'll read that before they decide to.

00:33:08

To purchase the book so like that I get.

00:33:11

A hundred percent I get why she's done that and she talks about life is poker not chess she's kind of laying the foundation for yes it's okay to use.

00:33:20

Poker.

00:33:22

Processing and decision making in life like she's kind of setting that foundation.

00:33:28

And then she steps into want to bet and probably the way that I could summarize this is kind of an explanation of what bets are.

00:33:40

And how they are happening day to day and one of the pieces that really stood out to me in this is that decisions that you're making are bets.

00:33:54

And I've never thought about them that way but it makes a lot of sense because again think about the structure here.

00:34:01

Bets have percentages tied to them just by the nature like it's a game of odds right and if you're making a bet and a decision is a bet.

00:34:11

Because the decision rarely has a hundred percent chance of something going the way you expect it to and when you start thinking this through it rarely is a hundred percent might be ninety nine percent you could probably say always.

00:34:26

I'm thinking of like again I don't watch poker on TV but that's probably where you would see this sort of thing is like well with these cards that play in the cards that are out on the table and the cards that are still in the deck this is the percent chance that someone's going to win the hand.

00:34:43

You can probably take that approach with everything in life and only after the result has actually happened is there ever truly a one hundred percent chance of that sure outcome.

00:34:53

Yeah but I mean this is the point of the chapter right in that yes these decisions have probabilities tied to them.

00:35:01

And part of the work is deciding what those probabilities are what are those percentages that's the hard part in the scheme of this and again like you were saying earlier a game of poker averages around two minutes.

00:35:17

Some of them are quicker I mean think about that's the average so there's some of them that are going to play eight hours at a time yes yes.

00:35:25

So if you get two minutes like thirty games in an hour.

00:35:31

For eight hours you're doing two hundred and forty games in a day.

00:35:34

Spot.

00:35:36

You're not playing two hundred forty chance I can tell you that no no not at all so the opportunity for feedback there is of course huge.

00:35:47

We'll get to that one next but.

00:35:48

I don't know I don't know that I have anything else to say about the specific one but it's you know one of that.

00:35:54

It's simply encouraging us to think about things in terms of probabilities as opposed to yes or no black and white yeah.

00:36:03

I think the feedback loop that you alluded to that's an important next part of this but sticking in this chapter for now the thing that I really liked here is that are both.

00:36:17

Beliefs are based on hearing and then they have.

00:36:19

Two different formulas for how we think we form beliefs and how we actually form our beliefs so how we think we form our beliefs we hear something we think about it determining whether it is true or false.

00:36:32

And then the third part is we form our belief but actually what happens.

00:36:37

Is number one we hear something number two we believe it to be true and number three only sometimes later if we have the time or the inclination we think about it.

00:36:47

And we bet on it determining whether it is in fact true or false and that's kind of.

00:36:53

I opening when you.

00:36:56

Have somebody call you out basically and say so this is how you think you're forming your opinions and the beliefs that you have but actually there's a lot less intentional thought that goes into it than you think there is.

00:37:07

Yep largely it's just the information that you're feeding on and then you're synthesizing this and you're not even stopping to think about whether it's the.

00:37:16

Whether it's the right way or whether it's true.

00:37:18

And I can't argue with it I think she's absolutely right.

00:37:22

It's again hard to hear though based on my personality and tending to view things as I make a decision I see the outcome I modify the systems and I do something else based on the certainty of that outcome tied to the quality of the decision that I made.

00:37:43

Yes the minute that you disconnect that like it's all broken.

00:37:48

I lose yeah it's not necessarily a bad thing you know I would like to think that I am a fairly open minded person and I'm willing to have my beliefs and opinions challenged by the books that we read on one level I kind of think like if you're not having your opinions and thoughts being challenged like what's the point.

00:38:13

You don't need to just reinforce the echo chamber.

00:38:17

I mean this is getting into later on and like the quality of the discussions and the groups that you tend to associate yourself with but if you want to find the truth you got to have a diversity of opinions if all you're hearing is the same thing over and over and over again you probably have a strongly held opinion.

00:38:32

But there's a good chance that it's not correct.

00:38:36

Right right this is this is the hard part with this right yes you have to be willing to admit that the foundations that you stand on with all your decisions could be wrong.

00:38:48

Like what is the percentage that what you're standing on is.

00:38:52

A hundred percent quite low so.

00:38:57

What is it and in what realm are we talking about so it's it's very common you know you and I will oftentimes.

00:39:06

We have whole systems right we have routines and.

00:39:09

If that routine yields the output that we want I made a good decision I built a good routine right like that's how we think about this yeah but what if.

00:39:20

There's some external factor that you didn't consider that played into that what if that routine in that habit is built in front of a window and you have sunshine in on you and it's actually nothing to do with you having that routine or habit it's actually the.

00:39:36

Fact that you're sitting in the sun like you know what I mean like there could be some other factor.

00:39:41

That's helping you be more productive in whatever situation there is another factor because she says you'll never know all the information yes yes.

00:39:52

Yeah one of my this is later but I think it's it's interesting in this in the context here that she does these trainings for.

00:40:00

Poker players who are trying to make it in in that world and.

00:40:06

She will show hands that she's played and then talk you through all of the little decisions that she has made going through that and then ask them to make decisions based on what they've.

00:40:16

Seen and then she'll have them put that in you know give them that decision before she shows the result but then she never shows the result doesn't show you how the hand ends yeah because it doesn't matter.

00:40:30

It doesn't matter it doesn't matter what what the end result was the point was you went through this whole thing.

00:40:38

To make a good decision and you made the right decision the outcome doesn't matter and that is hard to hear.

00:40:46

I don't want to hear that like no I want to know what the outcome is don't tell me it doesn't matter does matter.

00:40:52

Yeah the other thing here with this like motivated reasoning so we tend to want to confirm our beliefs avoid challenging the validity of confirming evidence and ignore or work hard to discredit contradictory information.

00:41:07

So basically want to hear something that supports our ideas and assume that it's true and everything that speaks against it we want to discredit.

00:41:15

And she's got a whole section in here on fake news which I thought was interesting because she makes the point that the concept of fake news is actually hundreds of years old.

00:41:26

Yep but she also says that the Internet is a playground for motivated reasoning and I totally agree with this before I read this I was talking to somebody about.

00:41:40

The news and how like nothing good comes from reading the news because most people who read the news will find a news source that supports their.

00:41:52

Political leanings and then they will just go to that source and think that they have the truth and this is where like you kind of creep into some of the conspiracy stuff and wake up sheeple don't you know this.

00:42:06

Like well no you don't even know this like you're getting fed partial truths and disinformation.

00:42:13

Which the definition of fake news is interesting it's intentionally false it's an intentionally false story planted for financial or political gain.

00:42:21

Bingo I mean this is totally what what any news source is going to do because they are going to try to increase their profit their revenue how do they do that they get more eyeballs on their stuff get more people signing up for.

00:42:36

So this is I read the section and like a hot light bulb went on and like this is totally a great blueprint for how negative this cycle can can become.

00:42:46

And before I read this book I was talking to some of the number one thing that you can do if you really want to understand what's going on in the world is let's say your conservative go read CNN.

00:42:56

Yes.

00:42:57

Go read something that you totally disagree with.

00:43:03

Because you go into it then not just assuming everything that you get is true but you're weighing all of those different pieces of information and I thought this was this is really interesting this book was great for me because it showed me that you really want to get.

00:43:19

To the truth you've got to embrace the other side you have to get the other opinions you have to consider all of the possibilities you cannot.

00:43:29

Just take a small sample size no matter where that sample size comes from you have to consider everything in the I mean I've been railing on the news for a while now but.

00:43:41

This is reinforces this is reinforces the the belief that like there's nothing good that comes from.

00:43:49

There's a she has a like a bank of questions that you can ask as trying to find the chapter that she introduces these but she has a whole bunch of questions you can ask essentially yourself to determine.

00:44:02

Are are you sitting on a false foundation like are you sitting in the echo chamber as we're referring to haven't found these questions but it's a lot of simple things like it have you used the words certain words and stuff you know what I'm referring to but I can't find it at the moment.

00:44:19

I should have written down where it was at but I think it's chapter 6 she does have a whole like multi page section on like these are the traps that you can fall into if you find yourself using this language this is the trap that you fall into right.

00:44:31

Nobody is going to take the time to self assess all of the things that tumble out of their mouth right right but if they did you would be confronted with the fact that you are not as sharp as you think you are and this echo chamber.

00:44:49

Everybody who hears that term echo chamber.

00:44:51

This is a gross generalization but I believe it's true I should say and not but it's one thing she talked about.

00:44:59

I got to get better at that I believe that.

00:45:03

Everybody would say oh yeah I'm able to overcome.

00:45:08

The echo chamber and correctly identify.

00:45:13

You know what's true and what is it just like everybody thinks that they're a good driver and that quick checking their text doesn't really affect them but the statistics will show that if you do that you are going to fall prey to this.

00:45:34

I don't know how else to describe it but just recognizing that like you're not a superhero when it comes to this stuff and you are susceptible to it just like everybody else so don't try to fix everybody else that's a big takeaway for me is.

00:45:52

Focus on yourself and make sure that you're seeing things right making sure that you have a diversity of opinions make sure that you are understanding that you are not.

00:46:03

Understanding all of the different options and again you know let the chips fall where they may that's kind of the whole point you can't control the outcome you can't control other people are going to.

00:46:15

To receive stuff and act on it.

00:46:18

And I can I guess tell you from personal experience that that's just stressful when you do start thinking like oh I wish you know I want them to.

00:46:28

To see this the right way you know you're not going to change anybody except yourself so start there.

00:46:35

So I found some of these questions it's actually towards the end of the last chapter.

00:46:39

I know in the end of this chapter we haven't got to bet to learn yet.

00:46:43

How do I know this where did I get this information who did I get it from what is the quality of my sources how much do I trust them how up to date is my information.

00:46:52

How much information do I have that is relevant to this belief what are the things like this have I been confident about that turned out not to be true that's probably when we don't want to talk about.

00:47:01

What are the other plausible alternatives what do I know about the person challenging my belief what is their view of how credible my opinion is what do they know that I don't know what is their level of expertise.

00:47:14

What am I missing like think about those questions yeah.

00:47:18

All right here you go here you go this one just came to mind you you're not you're going to not like me for this.

00:47:22

Ask those questions about your view on email.

00:47:26

Right right so I have a way of doing email Mike doesn't like it don't end.

00:47:34

That viewpoint Mike if I challenge you on that belief.

00:47:38

What happens if you ask some of these questions right so if we were talking about this how do you know that the way that Joe handles email in that I leave things in my inbox.

00:47:48

And sometimes uses a task list how do you know that that's a bad idea are you sure that it's a bad idea what makes you think that it's a bad idea what are the sources that tell you it's a bad idea like those are all the you get what I'm saying like this starts to get uncomfortable quickly.

00:48:03

When we start talking about some of these core things that you and I both promote and encourage but we don't want to think about these things like no I have the right answer.

00:48:14

Yeah well that one specifically I do think there's a note there's data to support get out of your email and don't go data.

00:48:22

What sources should I trust them should I not.

00:48:25

I guess that's up to you.

00:48:28

This but anyway I'm just making a yeah in the that's the type of thing that she's.

00:48:34

Referring to here like what are those sources now emails and easy one to throw out because it's fun and simple and what we're talking about next.

00:48:44

Correct correct if you want to and we're not going to explore this because this would be uncomfortable for real but think about mask mandates think about the pandemic and how it's handled what happens if you start asking some of these questions of the sources of information that you use to make your decisions exactly.

00:49:01

On either side of that fence doesn't matter which one you land on if you think masks are great thing and everyone should wear more you think they're terrible thing and no one should wear.

00:49:10

No matter what your viewpoint is what happens if you start challenging your own sources and try to explore the alternatives what happens.

00:49:16

I don't know I feel like that's what a lot of this book comes down to is like you're never going to know everything.

00:49:22

So if you're going to really make a firm stance for or against something.

00:49:28

Pick your spots and make sure that you've got a lot more information than just your experience right.

00:49:37

Which I think is a good spot to go into the next chapter here which is bet to learn.

00:49:42

Fielding the unfolding future and you know what you're saying applies really well to this because this gets us into this kind of feedback loop mechanism right where you can learn from the bets that you've made the decisions that you've.

00:49:57

Chosen to act on and she has this learning loop.

00:50:02

And it goes like this you have a belief.

00:50:05

That then leads you to bet on something which then comes to an outcome.

00:50:10

Which then leads you to make a second bet on something else right gives you another belief that then you're betting on and it kind of creates this loop right.

00:50:19

And then she has a follow up to that is kind of a modified learning loop where you have that same belief you're making that bet you have that outcome.

00:50:29

That then you can learn from either like you can have a success or a failure depending and you can either succeed via luck.

00:50:40

Which kind of takes you out of the loop yeah the loop breaks yep you're breaking your way out of the loop if you attribute things to luck.

00:50:49

In this case or you can learn from it which helps you develop a skill which then guides your beliefs into making better bets right so it becomes that circular.

00:51:01

Peace but that only applies.

00:51:03

If you do two things one you have to know how you got to making that bet that decision.

00:51:10

I can't have forgotten it and moved on.

00:51:14

And to you have to be willing and take the time to learn from it and process it and one of the things that.

00:51:20

One of the stories that was from the section that I was fascinated by in the world of poker fill IV is.

00:51:27

Someone no one wants to play against.

00:51:31

I don't think unless they're simply arrogant but the man is tough to beat and he even after winning.

00:51:43

A poker tour bracelet.

00:51:45

He's at the celebration dinner processing all of his potential mistakes with the other professionals.

00:51:53

What you just won the whole thing and you're sitting here agonizing over all the things you did wrong or could have done wrong and didn't like.

00:52:05

Okay well if you're in those shoes and that's how you're acting after this and the part that gets me on this is the man knows.

00:52:17

All the details around each of those decisions not only what he did but how he got to every single one of those decisions and that's something that I sat there and thought huh.

00:52:30

I couldn't tell you why I chose to pick what I picked for lunch let alone.

00:52:36

I'm why I chose to do who knows what but anyway I was fascinated by it feel like I'm a lot like him.

00:52:45

Are you you remember all the agonizing steps like I have no clue none I've forgotten at all.

00:52:52

Yeah well I shouldn't say I remember all of the steps per se but I do spend an inordinate amount of time overthinking things and if I were to take more diligent mental notes I'm sure I would have like pages and pages of the thought process documented

00:53:18

and I do find myself going back and second guessing things and kind of recalling that stuff and it's just kind of the way that I'm wired actually writing it down doesn't help me very much.

00:53:31

It takes more time first of all and it doesn't release me from going back and rehashing all of this in my brain sure I wish there was a simple way to just make it stop.

00:53:47

Make a decision to move on like you do.

00:53:49

Yep but I can't.

00:53:52

I feel like between us there's a middle ground that we're supposed to find yes I forget things you shouldn't agonize so much like there's there's a middle ground there somewhere right so my wife is I think similar to you like she will research things to the end degree and then question it beyond that.

00:54:12

Let's just just can we just go now did I make the right choice yeah.

00:54:16

Should I quick cancel the order and get the other one instead right right wait I found a better Airbnb maybe we shouldn't go to that one yes what I'm packing like let's not struggle is real.

00:54:29

So I feel like to really tell but from the reading this book.

00:54:36

She's making the argument that you're right there's a middle ground here and I need to move in that direction a lot of the details that she shares.

00:54:45

I feel are very effective in helping me to let go.

00:54:49

Like the self-serving bias where she talks about how when we get a positive outcome we made a right decision so to speak we tribute that to our skill.

00:55:02

And when we get a negative outcome it doesn't go well we attribute that to what.

00:55:08

And she tells the story of what was that guy Nick the Greek yeah in the section and he kind of had this crazy strategy that almost never works but when it does he was a genius and when it didn't.

00:55:19

He was just unlucky yeah we all have different examples in our lives that we could point to where we fall into that sort of trap so recognizing that these.

00:55:31

Outcomes that we get are actually the result of an influence of luck and an influence of skill.

00:55:37

This is freeing in a sense because it means that not all of the burden on making the right decision again right being tied to an outcome and she challenged that belief in chapter one.

00:55:51

That that's not all on me.

00:55:53

There's an aspect of this that I can't control so why worry about it right.

00:56:01

And this is there's a story in here as well it's a very short one about.

00:56:06

The poker brat Phil Helmouth who famously at one point in the middle or at the end of the game I think he just got eliminated or lost a hand or something and he set up and said I'd win every time were it not for luck.

00:56:21

And you have to stop and think about that it's very wrong in what he's saying and people have famously you know.

00:56:29

Chided him for that but it's kind of made the rounds but it's not necessarily luck it's just that someone else made a better bet or the odds fell against you.

00:56:42

Like you know what I'm saying like it is a whole learning process that you have to go through thus this cycle and.

00:56:50

That's what you have to learn from and that's the pieces that you know this this whole bet to learn like you're going to be making decisions like her encouragement in this is to.

00:57:00

Be willing to learn from the decisions and the bets that you're making like that's that's the main takeaway here.

00:57:07

Yep agreed she does talk about the habit loop a little bit which made me sad because I don't like that habit.

00:57:15

Yeah yeah yeah yeah you have your specifics with habits now I do I have firmly held opinions about habits which may or may not be wrong.

00:57:28

It's 70% all right this brings us into the next chapter here the buddy system.

00:57:36

And this is this can go a lot of different ways right there's a lot of potential ways that this comes about and one of the the easiest to explain I think is just that sometimes someone else has to point out the flaw.

00:57:54

Or has to point out that something is not as it appears and you know this this is the classic right if you think about how some people who go through many boyfriends or girlfriends like they're just dating constantly and it's always new.

00:58:09

New people and they just keep complaining about how there are no good.

00:58:13

Potential mates out there at all well wait hold up.

00:58:18

All of them can't have that many.

00:58:21

Issues.

00:58:23

Maybe it's you who are the problem like that concept right when you have to pull someone aside so then you letterman.

00:58:29

Yes totally when you when you have to pull on the side yes maybe you are the problem.

00:58:35

Letterman story was interesting but I couldn't cut I couldn't fall at well enough to be able to reiterate it so.

00:58:42

There's that I thought it was great the letterman story basically he has on this person I wasn't familiar with who she was but my understanding is she was a.

00:58:53

Reality TV star which reality TV you know built on drama.

00:58:59

Honestly I don't know why anyone know what that's really it's real Mike that's not.

00:59:05

All right all right whatever.

00:59:07

There's enough drama in the real world why would you add more but that's just me.

00:59:14

So she is on and she has.

00:59:21

Kind of inserted herself into a lot of very dramatic situations and that is an opinionated statement I understand that but David Letterman basically calls are out on it on the show and he's like well maybe the problem isn't everybody else that.

00:59:38

You have trouble with maybe it's you and then he tries to save it.

00:59:42

Yeah you know he says I know a lot of times when I assume everybody's need I really just realize that I'm the idiot and then all the news headlines the next day we're like David Letterman calls this lady.

00:59:51

The idiot.

00:59:52

Maybe not his best moment but well honestly honestly I'd never really watch David Letterman when he was on I have seen some people talk about how they miss late night talk show host like David Letterman because he was just so smart and he was able to have like these conversations that no one else does and when I read that I'm like yeah I can't see Jimmy Kimmel doing that.

01:00:21

You know Jimmy Fallon any of any of the people who are on right now they're not going to do that.

01:00:26

And I feel like maybe that's what they're talking about when they say they miss someone like Letterman who just is insightful enough to call those things out and yeah you could say that specific one maybe he shouldn't have.

01:00:37

Shouldn't have done that.

01:00:40

But the larger point she's making in this book is that you need people like that and you need to respect their opinion when they do say actually maybe you're the problem.

01:00:51

You need people who are going to help you understand and see the truth she calls this truth seeking which I think is great.

01:01:01

She talks about how this is kind of like a central tenant of groups like AA she talks a little bit about a true seeking charter which I thought was great like if you're going to form a group around true seeking these are the things that should be in there to have a focus on accuracy should have accountability and should have an openness to a diversity of ideas.

01:01:21

Where my brain went when I was reading this whole section about groups and seeing other perspectives and seeing your blind spots and being held accountable instantly was masterminds.

01:01:33

And I have been in masterminds that have both succeeded and failed based off of the things that she listed in this true seeking charter although I never would have articulated it that way before.

01:01:49

Basically the last mastermind that I was a part of it and it kind of dissolved it was the fault of basically everyone excusing everybody for being busy.

01:02:08

And internally I felt that friction I was frustrated and I wanted to be like hey guys come on we agreed to do this but also didn't really feel like it was my place to say that it was.

01:02:20

Shared initially this sort of thing but I feel like it's easy to get it's easy to move past this and if you're not constantly being pointed back to this.

01:02:32

True seeking charter or you're taking action on the things in this true seeking charter it's very easy to drift away from this in the moment that you start drifting away from this is the moment that you start having excuses for.

01:02:43

Not just not showing up to the meetings but the case of a you know you can always find an excuse for going back and having a drink in the minute that everybody else in the group starts to just accept that and like.

01:02:58

Enable that then the whole purpose of the group is broken yeah the whole thing I feel like this is really powerful and is kind of a sales letter for masterminds.

01:03:10

But also even if you set out to have a true seeking group like this at the beginning you have to work to maintain it as well.

01:03:19

Sure.

01:03:21

Yeah and I think there's a lot to that this is this plays in a little bit with some of the social group gathering type books that we've.

01:03:30

Read like groups tend to help each other get better over time and that's that's a lot of what.

01:03:36

This is iron sharpens iron as we say in the Christian world but like that concept so what's better though you know that I think that needs to be defined because better could be well you make me feel better about my beliefs correct.

01:03:50

Not better yeah yes truth is better that's that's a perception versus reality right yeah are you making me think I am better or you actually helping me exactly better I think those are two separate things I kind of meant the latter of course but.

01:04:06

The the easy part is to just pacify people like what you're talking about a mastermind I've never really been in.

01:04:16

A successful mastermind I wouldn't say because the ones that I've been a part of have always been like what you're saying an encouragement to continue complaining about how I have too much to do and I'm not getting it done like it's more of a.

01:04:31

Oh yeah you're doing great you have so much you got going on like no I've committed to too many things and I'm not actually completing them.

01:04:38

And no one is calling me out on it and as I've looked back on that I realize like yeah they just kind of made it easier for me to give excuses.

01:04:45

So I don't really do masterminds you need a coach not a cheerleader yeah yeah someone who's going to call you out yeah that's essentially what it comes down to yeah which I think is a good point to jump into this next chapter descent to win.

01:04:59

And this is one of those it has a bunch of these questions right and it has a bunch of like the terms to watch out for and such I think that's this where this is least are down.

01:05:09

And this is where like if you're saying certain things like oh it's only this one time or maybe you know it could be or oh I'm absolutely right like if you have terms like that that you're saying.

01:05:26

Be careful start asking questions thus the descent this dissenting piece like.

01:05:34

Ask some questions and be willing to challenge things that you generally hold true which is not a simple thing to do but that's essentially what she's saying and that you have to be willing to ask questions you know if you come back to the poker world here.

01:05:50

If you know that someone has like there's a given situation and a certain poker player has folded on the turn every single time when they've had that situation come up.

01:06:04

And you're playing against them like you need to ask that question like well have they been setting me up because now this is a bluff and they're going to go all the way through maybe the others have been bluffs and now they're going to follow through on it they're not actually going to fold when they get to the end and then you're going to be the one that's on the hook like there's so many different ways that that could.

01:06:26

Play out but you have to be willing to ask those questions is this still solid because things can change over time thus the dissenting.

01:06:33

Yes.

01:06:34

One other kind of transitionary point here between this chapter in the last chapter.

01:06:41

So this chapter is all about descent and opinions that are contrary.

01:06:46

But the one before that we're talking about the the groups one of the pitfalls that I fall into is assuming that the people who are in my group.

01:06:50

So one of the pitfalls that I fall into is assuming that the people who are in my group are all truth seekers they are not.

01:06:58

Oh sure.

01:06:59

Sometimes they are and you have to recognize basically who's signed on to the true seeking charter before you apply this with.

01:07:07

Broadly with a bunch of different people but that being said you know the descent part to this is interesting because there are people that.

01:07:16

Will share information with us and they've got a platform to speak into our lives and so we just automatically accept whatever they say there are other people who doesn't matter what they are trying to tell us how true it is.

01:07:32

We completely dismissed the validity of what they are saying because of the the person that it is coming from.

01:07:41

And I recognize this in my own life I need to do a better job of this because.

01:07:50

She mentions that when we have a negative opinion about the person delivering the message we close our minds to what they are saying we miss a lot of learning opportunities because of it.

01:07:59

So I don't really have an action item associated with this because it's impossible to measure but I want to do a better job of judging the idea or the message.

01:08:11

And separating it from the messenger.

01:08:15

Now that's easier said than done and also I feel like there's so much information that you do have to kind of curate your sources and not pay attention to everything that tries to come into your field of view.

01:08:31

But I want to avoid making snap decisions in the moment about something especially if it's contrary to what I know or believe.

01:08:42

I want to be skeptical basically about my own.

01:08:49

Beliefs my own opinions because she makes a point in this chapter how skepticism is not a bad thing it isn't confrontational like we think.

01:09:01

It is but it does embrace that uncertainty and it assumes that we don't know everything and so you start from that place of being not sure.

01:09:10

I think that's the big thing for me is to be curious about things enough to go into it thinking that I don't have a firmly held opinion in one way or the other so I'm willing to be swayed on different things.

01:09:27

Obviously you can't take that approach to everything in life though I don't think I think you do have to have some places where you are holding some strong convictions like.

01:09:37

This is who we are this is what we stand for so.

01:09:41

But when it comes to the things like the email example that you mentioned earlier because I had that thought to like everything I know about the productivity world everything I know about task management everything I know about email.

01:09:53

Am I willing to be wrong about that.

01:09:55

Because if you're willing you're more likely to be correct exactly and I'd like to think that I am you know you see a lot of apps like hey for example rethinking how email is done and it's based on that assumption that well maybe you know the way we've always assumed email should work.

01:10:17

Isn't the way that email should work so I feel like a lot of the innovation that can come from different apps in the technology space like.

01:10:25

Requires this sort of skepticism on our work flows and systems.

01:10:31

I work in it and technology and there are so many things that can go wrong.

01:10:38

With technology that it forces me to be willing to ask questions in order to figure out what's exactly happening so that I can get a read on what I should.

01:10:50

Do like that's a very common thing for me partially because.

01:10:56

When people bring a problem to me it's very uncommon that they're using the correct terminology or that they're really exactly what's happening.

01:11:06

My email quit working okay well my initial reaction is.

01:11:12

Do you have internet like do you have a network connection like that's my initial.

01:11:18

Gut feeling because that is the most common.

01:11:21

Problem but there are so many things it could be right it could be.

01:11:26

Expired credentials it could be for whatever reason the email database got corrupted it could be.

01:11:32

The computer actually can't get logged into the server like it might not have the network it might not have the Wi-Fi might have turned off like there's so many things it could be.

01:11:42

That I'm kind of forced to be a skeptic with that sort of thing like I have to ask those questions skeptics probably not the right word in that scenario but.

01:11:51

I have to ask a lot of questions to determine what's actually going on another example would be.

01:11:57

I'm running the sound system for our church on a Sunday.

01:12:02

And someone comes up to me and says.

01:12:05

The base guitar is too loud now for those who work in this sort of thing know that that's not possible but.

01:12:13

At least that's my opinion like I love base guitar I'm a fan I concur base can always be louder it's my opinion but.

01:12:22

There is an upper limit it's just very very high anyway if someone says that.

01:12:28

Like what you're saying depending on who the messenger is it may dictate how I respond if that person is someone else on our sound team.

01:12:35

I'm going to respond very differently than if it's somebody that I've never seen before yeah if it's somebody else on my sound team I'm very likely to like.

01:12:44

I didn't catch that what when was that where are you sitting like I have some different questions.

01:12:51

Whereas if it's somebody that I've never seen before my questions are usually like all interesting you know.

01:12:57

What did you what made you think that was there a certain thing like I'm going to approach it very differently.

01:13:04

If I don't know who that person is but I think that's because of trust in.

01:13:09

That source right so you're trusting the expertise of the people or the lack of.

01:13:16

That you know circle of competence like they're saying in the chat like that's it's kind of in that.

01:13:21

That's space but again.

01:13:24

When someone challenges you with your beliefs whether it's task managers or emails or sound systems.

01:13:31

Being a skeptic is often a good thing.

01:13:34

For two reasons like we're saying like one it kind of solidifies your own view if it confirms it falsifiability yeah yeah it to like it can potentially show you where you are wrong.

01:13:46

And that's okay but anyway the sent to win in both cases you win this circle of competence I think is interesting because I can see that being true in your case you know you are not going to take a recommendation from someone who is outside the circle of competence.

01:14:02

But I what the thing that challenges me is if someone is within the circle of competence.

01:14:09

But I just don't want to listen to them for other reasons yeah maybe it's the personality maybe it's because they've got a different view of something.

01:14:17

I don't know I want to be able to receive their message and wait for myself rather than just discounting it because it's from somebody that I don't like for example right right so I think there's a distinction to be made there but.

01:14:34

Yeah I agree I also thought that was interesting in this chapter the whole idea of the devil's advocate I didn't know the story behind this.

01:14:42

This is from the Catholic church they have this practice when someone is up for a sainthood they will have somebody that they call the devil's advocate which is that their job is to argue against sainthood for that individual so to dig up.

01:14:56

Every reason why they should not be in not be included as a saint I think that's kind of interesting.

01:15:04

And I feel like this is an approach that you could take with a lot of the stuff in your own life you don't necessarily need an external party.

01:15:13

To argue the other side and a lot of situations maybe it's better for you to do some fact finding and argue that yourself.

01:15:25

Because then you won't you won't get as emotional because you know what are you going to get mad at yourself that.

01:15:32

It's a lot easier to get mad at somebody else and so you remove that from the equation and you just are letting the arguments of the messages battle it out in your head that is a.

01:15:46

Pretty cool idea and a very effective approach yeah and that's that's a great point for this last chapter here right let it battle out in your head adventures in mental time travel is the last chapter.

01:15:59

And this this is it's one of the longest in the book and it is specifically.

01:16:08

At the beginning of it anyway talking about make your bets make your decision or even before you've done that I guess this is more before that but.

01:16:17

You can play out the different scenarios right this they do this in poker all the time if I.

01:16:22

Check instead of that.

01:16:24

What are the potential players behind me going to do.

01:16:28

And then they can play through all of those different scenarios and they walk through all the different.

01:16:34

Options that they could take and if you can do that kind of mental time travel as she's calling it you can lead yourself to seeing some of these outcomes.

01:16:44

And then making a choice based on which ones are most likely like it kind of sets you up to try to figure out which ones.

01:16:51

Are the better to take and more likely to take there's so many different ways that you could take this particular chapter but that was the one that stood out the most to me.

01:17:01

I love the story at the beginning of this the framing for this whole chapter of entries and mental time travel because they talk about the.

01:17:09

The the framework that most of us use to think about time travel from back to the future.

01:17:17

It's kind of funny to think that like everything we use to influence like how we think this should work comes from these movies that were made in.

01:17:29

Was it the eighties yeah it was funny because the second one where they actually are in the future.

01:17:35

That was not too long ago like the time when I forget the exact date but they move forward to yeah so you watch those movies now and you see.

01:17:44

Like what they thought it was going to be like in 2015 or whatever.

01:17:48

We don't have the hoverboards you know a lot of ways is a lot of things that are a lot further than they could have could have projected which is kind of right kind of funny.

01:17:57

But the main point that they have throughout that whole series of movies is that as they're going back and forth don't run into your other self because if you do that you could break the whole.

01:18:09

Time continuum.

01:18:11

The whole universe just you know goes up in a puff of smoke yeah yeah and she kind of uses that to say actually that's wrong and what you want as you're doing this mental time travel is you want.

01:18:23

Future self past self current self to be colliding into each other all the time.

01:18:29

Which I think is a kind of cool way to think about this she introduces the topic of temporal discounting which is the practice of favoring present self at the expense of future self and there are books that we've read.

01:18:42

About that specific topic but when you think about.

01:18:49

A decision that you made in the past versus a decision that you're making now versus that decision being made in the future.

01:18:56

I feel like if all you did from this book was start thinking about that in in those different.

01:19:05

Perspectives you would instantly start making better decisions.

01:19:11

Talk about the 10 10 10 framework like what are the consequences of this in 10 minutes in 10 months or 10 years we've heard that before at least I have a I don't know if it came from any of the books that we've read I'm sure you've heard it too sounds very familiar so I think it did yeah yep and then she reframes that is how would I feel today if I had made this decision 10 minutes ago 10 months ago 10 years ago.

01:19:31

So between those two models I feel like you've got a really effective framework for thinking about this from the perspective of past self present self and future self I don't have an action item associated with this where like I'm going to start exercising this specifically.

01:19:48

But I see the value in taking that approach yeah the the there's a story in here about Jerry Seinfeld.

01:19:57

And talking about he told a deal in a skit I think that.

01:20:02

Night Jerry likes to stay up late and do things and then morning Jerry hates night Jerry for making his decisions like.

01:20:13

And then she uses those terms throughout a lot of this last chapter of morning Jerry and night Jerry so night Jerry needs to keep morning Jerry and mind.

01:20:23

When making decisions so think about what your future self is going to have to deal with based on your current decisions that's the biggest takeaway here and it's super interesting you know we talk about so many times.

01:20:37

In the productivity space about setting yourself up so that you know setting your clothes out the night before so that when you get up in the morning it's easy to get started with exercise I know Sean Blanc I don't know if he still does or not had the note card the index card that he would put on his desk of the thing he needed to write the next morning so that.

01:20:53

When he got there he had the our idea already set ready to go like that's the concept that we're talking about here in prepping things so that when you get to it in the future it's easy.

01:21:04

And you can you can be better off prepared so yes mental time travel very interesting it's an interesting way to think about it to.

01:21:12

It's true it's true also talks about pre mortems here.

01:21:16

I forget exactly which book that first came up in I know we've discussed that before it's come up in a lot of the.

01:21:25

Make time I'm pretty sure it's in there there's quite a few of those they have like a whole bunch of different types of productivity strategies they're usually in those sure.

01:21:34

That topic though is interesting and again you could write a whole book on this specific point but she does talk about at the end here that negative visualization actually makes you more likely to achieve your goals.

01:21:49

I instantly thought of the book by Oliver Berkman that we read on that the antidote.

01:21:57

But I don't think that's the takeaway I got from that book.

01:22:03

No no I feel like that's the takeaway when I read that though my goal this is the takeaway that should have been from the antidote.

01:22:11

Sure sure.

01:22:12

That's probably the takeaway from Ryan holidays.

01:22:18

Book which one is it still this is the key yeah where the concept of momento mori comes up remember death and like if you remember or think about worst case scenarios you're more likely to be happy.

01:22:33

And in doing so you're actually able to better visualize potential outcomes and thus.

01:22:41

Better at making decisions for the positive so it all kind of ties together this is where you start seeing those through lines through a lot of these books right.

01:22:51

Yep cool cool well do you have any action items from it I didn't write anything down because this is this is one of those like I feel like it's it's one of those informs the way you think about things and it doesn't really say.

01:23:02

Here's something you could do that are practical generally yeah I do have a couple action items so.

01:23:11

I caught myself at least once in this episode.

01:23:14

Of trying to not use the word but using and instead.

01:23:20

This is.

01:23:22

In the chapter 5 what talks about descent to win and this is from a section specifically on communicating with the world beyond your group.

01:23:32

So assuming that not everybody has signed on to the true seeking charter how do you live this stuff out with people who aren't thinking the same way which is kind of.

01:23:40

Then the eternal struggle for me sure yeah so I talk about expressing uncertainty lead with this and using and instead of but in the reason that they say it is like if you're talking with somebody else.

01:23:53

And you say yes but you've instantly negated everything that they've said and now they're not connecting to what you're trying to say so and is like a connecting word instead of but.

01:24:07

As I read this I couldn't help but remember our buddy Josh telling me this years ago and being convicted.

01:24:16

That I've fallen into this trap I mean I have no other excuse so this is what I'm talking it up to you knew better I knew better well so okay if I've heard this before and I haven't done this why haven't I done this kids with my brain is working.

01:24:31

Reading this book I'm thinking to myself well I must have discredited Josh and some level.

01:24:38

Be in terms of being the messenger of that specific thing otherwise I would have acted it out it's probably not quite that simple and I do actually value what Josh has to say but.

01:24:50

The proof is in the pudding right like did I do it or didn't I do it I didn't do it so and this is kind of to her whole point of like when we recognize.

01:24:59

The arguments the people are making disconnect them from the messengers we have a lot more opportunities to learn.

01:25:04

So basically I feel like I failed this test at one point now I've got a chance to repeat it yep and so I'm going to try to do that.

01:25:12

Again you're not going to be able to measure this unless you know next episode I guess if I continue to talk about yeah I agree with you Joe but.

01:25:20

So that's that's something I want to change and then the other thing again very general nothing specific here but.

01:25:29

When I am communicating with groups specifically.

01:25:34

I don't know if I get every group that I'm a part of to just disconnect from the outcomes based on the decisions that we make probably not but I am not going to share the outcomes.

01:25:45

I'm not going to volunteer that information anymore.

01:25:48

I because I can totally see how that just reinforces a lot of times wrong opinions you can take those facts you talked about this in one of the books that we read how you are in charge of collecting data and you could take that data and make it support whatever story you wanted to tell from it I feel like I've been guilty of that with.

01:26:10

Some of the the numbers and the outcomes from things in my own life so I want to disconnect that from the decision making process and who knows how successful I will be.

01:26:21

Yeah it's totally fair.

01:26:23

Well again I didn't write anything down on this I mean you've got a couple solid ones there maybe I feel bad for not writing down but anyway that brings us to.

01:26:35

Style and rating and I will tell you that.

01:26:39

Every time I've listened to like the top.

01:26:42

1% of poker players.

01:26:45

I'm not a huge poker fan I don't encourage people to play poker but every time I talk to these top or listen to or hear from these top 1% poker players they're always brilliant people it seems like.

01:26:58

I know there are some exceptions of course but most seem like they're just crazy smart.

01:27:04

And you probably have to be to make it to that level and poker so.

01:27:10

I have a very hard time refuting anything any says here.

01:27:15

I think that there's a lot of value in this book it is definitely change the way I view a lot of things I certainly think about things and probability since reading this and I've never done that before I know I started to kind of consider it whenever I had the discussion.

01:27:35

On the twitch stream that introduced this book to me thus the reason we're reading it here so like I had a little bit of that background and it kind of made me wonder about things but this kind of solidifies that whole process and it's kind of changed.

01:27:50

Quite a bit for me as far as like what do I just accept.

01:27:55

Without question and what is it that I do question and how do I question and what questions do I ask and how do I.

01:28:02

Divorce the decision in the bet from the results of that decision like those are all things that.

01:28:09

I have never considered.

01:28:11

And that's where I find like the value in these books right if I you can get one or two really good ideas that change the way that you view things overall like that was a good read that was that was a solid.

01:28:24

Choice good decision.

01:28:26

How to rate this I think I have to put this at a 5 oh like she's she's top not just for a storytelling and the whole thing is laid out.

01:28:38

Really well in a way that builds on top of itself and just from a book stands like that's it's just done really well it's not 3 parts made me happy and it's again layered it builds on itself and it does so in a very.

01:28:54

Methodical and well done manner so.

01:28:58

I'm a big fan I would highly recommend this to folks and I understand why it's a national best seller and I'll stick with my 5 oh I'm going to I'll stay in behind that one.

01:29:08

All right it's a really good book I don't think it's 5 oh territory.

01:29:14

I will say that she is a phenomenal writer it's a very interesting book from the lens of or the perspective of her being a professional poker player I was not interested in that angle at the beginning in the least in fact that was a detriment to me picking up the book.

01:29:34

Sure if you hadn't picked it for bookworm there is no way I would have chosen to read this book.

01:29:42

But I actually got a lot out of that up that her perspective and she helped me to look at things that I have heard before in a different way I feel like there's a lot of stuff that was kind of adjusted a little bit and kind of clicked into place for me and how I think about things.

01:30:04

The reason it's not a 5 oh book in my opinion is so let's say you you get that big aha moment from this book and you start thinking in bets what does that actually change for you.

01:30:23

There's a good chance I think that maybe your day to day doesn't change a whole lot at all you're still making decisions maybe the process that you use to make the decisions is different but there's a good chance I think that even the decisions that you make are the same.

01:30:41

So it's not the kind of like Victor Frankel type book where you read this and you're like oh that was a tipping point and how I viewed the world.

01:30:51

This is kind of nice to know information in my opinion it's not like totally earth shattering but it is really really good that's the only negative thing I can say about it.

01:31:03

That's really not a negative thing to be said I think the structure of the book is really well done I like the fact that there aren't three different sections and there's only the six chapters the chapters are really long the book is like 230 something pages.

01:31:21

And there's only six chapters which is a little bit tough for me the way that I like to read books means that I'm going to push through and finish the end of the chapter and sometimes that means I got 30 more pages to go.

01:31:33

So like last night I'm up till midnight because I want to finish that last chapter I don't want to be hanging and then finish it today but that's just you know me personally.

01:31:46

I mentioned at the beginning she shares some stuff at the beginning and then kind of uses those as anchors throughout the rest of the book and the chapters she does kind of the same thing she's got like a model that she presents at the very beginning which is tied to a story which is.

01:32:02

Usually very well told and then kind of the supporting arguments throughout that chapter then kind of fit in nicely around that she always ends it real solidly with like a one or two sentence thing that leads into the next chapter.

01:32:15

Very very well done from a writing perspective so I'm going to put it up 4.5 and again that's not really anything negative about the book other than the topic itself you know yeah it's nice that I'm making better decisions but it doesn't.

01:32:30

Impact me I think the way that like the vicar Frank will type thing does the last book I read a 5.0 was the mental models.

01:32:39

I brought up a couple of those mental models as we were going through this today so I feel like that again is like the type of thing where this is impacting my daily life.

01:32:49

I'm not sure this book will maybe it will maybe you know you talk to me in a year in every single important decision I'm making I'm filtering through the lens of past present and future self using that 10 10 10 framework.

01:33:05

I kind of don't think so but very good book so thanks for picking it.

01:33:09

Well I'm impressed this could be like for you this could be like how to read a book territory right like we both didn't care for.

01:33:17

For that book is not not to 5.0 territory I would be right like 3.5 or something but we still reference that book today like it's one of those like is just kind of gone on and on so they can do that sometimes it does happen so anyway put it on the show.

01:33:35

What's next Mike the next book is a world without email by Cal Newport which hopefully gets released on time so we can finish it before recording.

01:33:46

We both love Cal Newport stuff I think you are a little bit more excited about digital minimalism than I was right so this one will be really interesting because I feel like we both are big fans of deep work.

01:34:03

I kind of wasn't such a big fan of digital minimalism you were now I have a feeling he's going to confront the way that you deal with email and so are you going to love this or you going to hate it.

01:34:17

He's going to confront me not you right well me me too but they just in the title a world without email so take your email out of the picture and just based on conversations you and I have had that doesn't really work for you so I could totally see you being like.

01:34:33

Yeah sorry Cal this is where we split ways.

01:34:36

Yeah it very well could be this will be the reversal of digital minimalism is my expectation that's where I said it could be yeah so I think it'll be interesting but I really do like Cal Newport stuff.

01:34:47

I really like the way that he writes and I really like the way that he thinks I feel like he does a really great job of thinking things through and presenting.

01:34:58

Sometimes controversial arguments yeah in a way that is hard to argue with.

01:35:06

And so this will be a fun one either we're going to be like yeah he's absolutely right here or we're going to be really nit picky about everything that he has to say and be like all that's.

01:35:17

That's Cal he's living in a dream world you know but either way it should be a fun discussion.

01:35:21

Sure yeah.

01:35:24

Well after that one we're going to dive into and I have some reasons for this you've probably seen this in the outline already.

01:35:31

The art of witty banter the clever quick and magnetic by Patrick King.

01:35:38

I feel like you and I do enough with our voice and talk enough that this could be very beneficial for both of us.

01:35:45

That's that's my expectation I do enough with video and with other folks that I would like to learn how to be a little more witty but.

01:35:54

Maybe that's just me being selfish and I feel like taking everybody along for the ride could be kind of fun so anyway the art of witty banner we'll see what that one's like all right that'll be fine smiling.

01:36:05

This is one of those like what are you doing Joe this is a scenario this is crossing over into toastmasters territory feel like it's going to be hard for me to disconnect my experience there with the content of this book.

01:36:19

I don't like to I really want to see it through that lens I really want to see your opinion of it given that background all right.

01:36:26

Sweet great fun I actually have a gap book this time Mike all right what is it.

01:36:32

I am three force the way through purple cow.

01:36:36

By Seth Godin it's been very interesting so yes I finished up thinking in bed some was diving into purple cow knowing.

01:36:44

That's a world without email hasn't even released yet so I'm not going to have it in hand I had purple cow on the shelf picked it up it's been interesting so yes purple cow Seth Godin all right can't go wrong with Seth Godin can you absolutely not how about you anything in the middle.

01:37:00

I do a book I'm going to at least start before the calendar one arrives I am going to read the road less stupid by Keith Cunningham.

01:37:09

I have started this book before I have not finished it I am aware of like the synopsis like I know it's in it basically but I want to dive into it a little bit deeper.

01:37:20

Sure I have it on my books off sorry here so I'm gonna pick that one up cool.

01:37:27

Well thank you to all of you who are with us today live thank you to those of you who have joined us if you want to do that in the future pay attention to the bookworm FM twitter handle and you'll see.

01:37:39

When we're recording and have the live link and stuff bookworm FM slash live if you want to jump ahead and subscribe there also big thank you to all of you who are subscribing members bookworm FM slash membership and that will help us keep the lights on it pays for hosting.

01:38:00

Helps us keep things moving we're very appreciative to those of you who do that but you also get some cool things like an awesome wallpaper there's all of my mind node files the mind maps and such are there as well and something we don't really talk about a whole lot I think this is still up right now cotton bureau you can still get bookworm t-shirts I think.

01:38:23

Right sweatshirts yep t-shirts and sweatshirts if you're interested in those those are available just go to bookworm FM there's a thing in the menu that will take you.

01:38:32

Where you need to go for that so again thanks to all of you who support us.

01:38:36

All right so if you are reading along pick up a world without email by Cal Newport and we will talk to you in a couple of weeks.