Episode 59 – Tim Urban – Wait But Why

welcome to the human experience podcast

the only podcast designed to fuse your left and right brain hemispheres and feed it the most entertaining and mentally engaging topics on the planet as we approach our ascent please make sure your frontal temporal and occipital lobes are in their full upright position as you take your seat of consciousness relax your senses and allow us to take you on a dip we are the intimate strangers thank you for listening the human experience is

making a new post every sometimes with my guest Tim urban Tim it’s a pleasure welcome to hxb thank you for having me Tim I I find your your writing incredible man I relate with it so much from your procrastination post to the Elon Musk’s series seems like you’ve written about everything that there is to write about it seems like everything that you’re writing about goes viral and what’s what’s the secret well I think it’s once

you have a decent-sized audience that is aware of what you’re doing and is into it then then I think it’s it’s it’s about kind of delighting that audience and and you you can you know you what you do can spread throughout that audience each time you do it and so that’s gonna seem like a very successful post each time because the audience is of a certain size but I would still say actually most things don’t really go viral in the traditional sense you know

viral to me is when it’s all over the place and it’s reaching all kinds of people who have never heard of of what you’re doing and and that’s not really what I’m aiming to do anymore at the beginning I definitely was because I was trying to get attention for the new thing we were doing and trying to pick topics that would that would really make a splash hand up in that way yeah well let’s well let’s back up a little bit I mean it wait but why is this sort

of content I mean what do you what do you call it now is it a blog still yeah I call it a blog it’s a terrible word it is I call myself a blogger which is a terrible work but yeah it’s it’s I’m writing long-form articles on my own site so whatever that is in the world I I guess that’s them that’s that’s a blog but it’s almost like you have this magical decoder ring where you know you you punch in these numbers and you click viral and it just it explodes so where

did you know where did you start where were the humble beginnings that you know no one ever hears about yeah well I think about 2005 to 2011 I have another blog that was much more of a kind of odd normal blog the articles were much shorter they weren’t Illustrated and they were kind of uh sometimes about my day or about things that annoyed me and that I did that for six years and I wrote 300 blog posts and there’s almost no chance you’ve ever

heard of it because nothing ever went viral on that it was uh it was read by a you know small group of people that really liked it and we had fun and I really liked it writing it but but so that that’s that’s where I you know learned how to write blog posts and kind of found my voice and learned about the relationship with readers and my own process for kind of coming up with ideas and writing you know getting in the habit of writing things down when I

would have an observation during the day and so I kind of learned all the the important kind of skills then for writing a blog and then a couple years after I I stopped writing that I decided with Andrew my business partner we have this other business that we were running together to try to start kind of two how to do the blog again but to really like do it right you know take everything I learned and and try to try to kind of go at it you know in a really

serious way you know we saw all kinds of content all over the Facebook newsfeed and and things like that on Twitter and just just articles that were okay that you know we’re usually very short no big headlines lists a stock photos and sometimes you know they make you laugh sometimes they’d be great but you know very often they’d be okay and and once in a while there’d be something really good and you see it on your newsfeed or somewhere else like

four times or five times and then someone would email it to you and then and then it would appear one of those newsletters you know and and you kind of we kind of thought about and said you know when something when someone really puts everything they have into an article and it’s like this really great thing it seems to make the rounds and so even though there’s kind of a notion of content you know out there then we’re kind of inside of the there’s not a

notion of really good content and so that was kind of the hypothesis and so start to wait but why in 2013 so it’s been three years yeah it’s been about three years let’s explore the the process I mean you you mentioned that let’s let’s explore the process for you I mean how does how does that begin I mean you’d you take notes during the day about what you kind of what annoys you and he said well so in the in the old blog I was doing things you know 19

things I don’t understand and 25 things that annoy me and it’s actually annoying because this was this is one of the things that annoy me now one of the things that annoys me is that I was doing these lists like it’s you know number of things that something you know fifteen things that something that was a format that I was I thought was all you know clever and fresh and I really liked it and it was fun to write in that format and people liked to read it this

was 2005 2006 2007 and in the time since then it has become the most overdone overused format now and someone sees an article that some know something things that something I think everyone just kind of thinks this is gonna be cheap low quality and someone is you know just trying to get clicks and it’s actually a shame because because those those are really fun articles to write now I feel like it’s you know you don’t get the benefit of

the doubt them anymore but that’s an aside so back then it was just yeah I mean I would think of something I would look at the dishwasher and think what the hell goes on in there how possibly does everything in there get clean like what what is happening in there and and out and and the detergent I put in this little thing close it how does it go from this little thing into all those water and not get used up right away I mean I was just very confusing so that

would be an example I would have that thought I would just write it down and then when it was and then I would time to do a blog post and I would go kind of say okay well there’s but there’s a the list of things that don’t understand has now grown again since the last time I emptied it out for a blog post it’s now up to you know 19 I always had 19 things I don’t understand so I would take them and I would write a new post and then

I’d start every time I didn’t understand something I would I would put it in that list until I hit 19 again then I would write a new one so that was my process with the old blog and but now with wait but why you know that the topics are much broader and so now it’s it’s still still put stuff like that others if I have an observation I think I bet you other people think this too I bet no one else knows how to with a dishwasher happen how it works but but no one talks

about I’ll just write it down but also I’ll write down I keep hearing about Bitcoin and I no idea how that works or I’ll think wow there’s so many people in unhappy marriages what the hell is going on there so I’ll go write it down and and you just get if you just get in that habit you end up with this incredibly long list of thoughts and ideas and observations and insights and sometimes this is a great conversation you have at

love with someone and and notes this one of these really just really interesting conversations and you can I will finish that and I’ll think oh wow there’s so many interesting things that came up just now and I’ll just write them down and and that becomes your topic list or that becomes kind of your your your your source material to then build upon I mean I really want to break this down I want to demystify kind of deconstruct

this process what is the first thing that you do in the morning when you wake up so I’ve actually gotten better I used to just take my laptop right down to the bed and start like doing stuff emails which is a terrible thing to do it would then be 2 or 3 hours later and I would still be doing that Haiti myself so I’ve gotten better about not only had the laptop in the bedroom anymore ever so now I I’m much more in control I get up

and I will turn on well it depends if I’m if I’m in a if I’m trying to there’s certain days when I’m in the process of brainstorming or outlining a post and if that’s the case then the morning is precious brain time because your brain is in a very specific very important state so like the first 20 minutes 30 minutes when you wake up it’s this raw state and and you know I actually I actually intentionally try to think about the topic and the brainstorm and

the puzzle I’m trying to put together the night before like right before I go to bed and you know that kind of I think you know that you simply assert you know if you if you’re playing a game incessantly late at night and then you’ll dream about it it’s that kind of thing or your your your you know thinking about one kind of one person a lot you’ll dream about them so because your brain takes whatever it takes a signal from your consciousness about

what should we be trying to figure out in our sleep okay got it and then it works on that while you sleep so I’ll think about whatever the post is I’m trying to do and kind of signal to my brain this is what we need to work on tonight and then when I wake up in the morning if that’s why it’s so bad to pick the laptop up because it just shatters it’s just you just you waste the the insights that they’re right there waiting for you and you just

distract yourself with other things so just I just tried to get up and get in the shower and just start thinking and it’s it’s usually amazing how many new thoughts come in the same way if you want to memorize something you know you do it before you go to bed and then in the morning when you wake up it’s it’s solidified so so that that’s in those days but most days I’m not in that zone I mean they’re just you know writing a post or I’m you know in between coasts

or whatever in those days I’ll turn on an audiobook or a podcast then I’m you know into and I’ll just turn it on my speaker and just kind of carry the speaker around with me as I do stuff which will be showering and I’m not great about breakfast but I’ll try to like have something so that it’s taking any days off I haven’t had a schedule now which I’m trying to stick on because I used to take no days off and I was just always kind of in some state of

either procrastinating from working or working and and so I and I I decided that I needed to kind of force myself to take time off even on those weeks when I felt like I have not been productive enough we just don’t you know that’s when you’ll just get into the trap of you’ll just never take a day off because you so I now say Saturday’s is a day off and I’ll intentionally schedule you know hang out with a friend at 2:30 which is

like being the worst thing I could do if I wanted to be productive that day because when I wake up that’s looming ahead so I’ll never get anything done before that and then by the time I’m back it’s like 6:30 and now so I’ll do those things and purpose to just say wake up Saturday no you know what would nothing productive needs to happen today and what do I want to do so I’ll do that and then I also try not often often not successfully but I try to just at 9:00

p.m. just stop working and and you know then I can start looking forward to you know actually I’m gonna oh I 9:00 p.m. I can do this at 9:00 I’ll do this tonight instead of thinking off at some point I need to do this I’m like I can even do it tonight and I know this sounds crazy too it gives it just like 9:00 is not very early time you’re not so to be working that late but for me it’s it’s I will just continue all the way until I go to sleep and it’s not because

I’m such a workaholic it’s much more because if I know I have all that time I just won’t be productive till pretty late in the day I’ll just I’ll just dick around basically and you know on and off until 5:00 or 6:00 and then I’ll say god I can’t believe I haven’t done anything today and then I’ll just work till 2:00 in the morning and I think I’ve been working on kind of setting aside these no work blocks which I think forces me to treat the work time

more seriously yeah I’ve been I’ve been doing the same thing – the dicking around I’ve been really just I’m a workaholic so for you I mean is there something that you feel determines that you’ve had a successful writing day it’s so black and white for me which is something again I’d really don’t want to be the case because it’s not a very healthy way to be but for me it’s it’s often that I I feel I’m like really unhappy with my work day and then

I just I I got a little stuff done only and the stuff I got done was not the important stuff it was that urgent stuff that doesn’t actually that’s not what matters and or I I’m in one of those zones where I I’m in a really good zone and I’ll like get 14 hours of you know of blog posts to work done and then and then I’m happy about that but then my the rest you know all these texts built up in my phone people being like you know I’m just being non-responsive and

I’m it’s really like you know the answer somewhere in between there and so a truly successful day for me which I which happened more is you know III would get up and I would you know around 10 a.m. I finished all the morning stuff and I sit down and I do emails and meetings and other things like that until about 1:00 I try to schedule things in that window 10:00 to 1:00 and then at 1 o’clock I shut all that stuff down and I dive into

creating whatever I’m working on creating at that time the blog post or maybe a video whatever it is and I work on that until about 9:00 and then I stop feeling great about the digs I just got a ton of stuff done and I’m caught up with my other stuff from the morning and now I can enjoy some time off and then because of that because then I give myself two three or four hours of leisure time I feel fine going to bed at 12:00 or 1:00

which for me is early because uh if I don’t do that what happens is I’ll kind of not let myself do anything leisurely until you know it’s like 12:00 or 1:00 time to go to bed and then it’s like some part of me is like some part of my brain the leisure part is like no we’re getting our time we’re not doing nothing I’m gonna now go see what the sports scores are the day and I’m gonna read this article and before you know it it’s

2:45 and now I’ve like kind of destroyed my next day this is something that I find pretty remarkable about your writing which which I really enjoy is that you have this sort of it’s almost this sort of sardonic sinfully mocking it’s the almost dark style I mean is that me am i projecting do you or do you feel that way or it’s humor ‘fl you have this sense of humor that that relates through your posts but I mean do you do you feel like you’re mocking things in a

way well I think there’s a lot of there’s a lot of things in life in the world to me that kind of just are begging to be made fun of and there’s kind of a lot of things about humans and I’m the specimen number one for myself that are to be made fun of so I’m usually writing from a place of I’ve been dealing with my own like human flaws all week so I’m already in kind of that mood and then I’m also whatever I’m writing about either I’ve been reading a

bunch of experts or watching interviews or I’ve been just brainstorming why people are or do a certain thing and there’s so much ridiculousness and all of that usually that that I do get into I can I can get into it a tone where I’m where I am I just want to point that out either because it’s funny to point it out or because I I want people to be thinking about it more but um but I think there’s also I think kind of beneath that kind of it like that

that’s within like a well of kind of excited optimism as well because I’m also kind of like really like really I really like life and I really like people even like people I don’t like like I like the concept of people and I just a few manatee you know and I’m excited about the future and so so III think there’s um yeah III I hope I hope that it’s not like you know cynical I I like it being kind of mocking without being really negative and cynical

because that’s not really Who I am so I hope it you know I wanted to reflect that yeah yeah I mean I’ve got a few more questions on your writing style that I promise we’ll move on I doubt this is fun for you but I feel like people might want to know you know kind of what but what drives you and how how you’ve you know sort of developed this this style that reaches so many people when you are creating a post is there a process in which you sort of visualize

where the post is going organically piece by piece or how much how much of the story arc have you kind of just decided on already before you begin writing yeah so for me basically all of it that’s a really important thing for me because I need to when I start writing the first word I need to kind of be ahead of the reader I need to be in control I need to kind of know the plan and I want to be I want to be in the mode where I feel like I’m this this

storyteller are talking to people who don’t know the story yet and and it would be a terrible feeling for me to start a story with a bunch of people and and not and just making it up as I go I just would be much worse I would be much worse of telling the story I wouldn’t have the confidence of a storyteller who knows where he’s going I wouldn’t be able to foreshadow I wouldn’t be able to to kind of to set the mood and the way I

want and bring the mood to where I want and all those things and so for me if I wrote if I you know some people I think thrive in a very different way then just start writing and think happen and then they go revise later I hate that because if I just start writing out know where I’m going by the time I figure out where I’m going now I have to go back and fix the tone and everything cuz it’s not what I wanted it to be so for me I would say more than

50% sometimes like even more than like 70% of the total time between when I say okay here’s the topic of the next post let me get started – when I’m published to post more than half at that time happens before I write the first work because there’s always a big you know sometimes it’s just a post like you said about you know procrastination though that kind of those kind of posts are how to take a life-partner those posts are just mostly me thinking about what I

think about stuff and thinking about what I’ve observed in other people and what I’ve gone through myself so I have a lot of brainstorming time and a lot of thinking time or sometimes it’s a post about something in tech or science or something like that history in which case I’m going to be just doing a ton of reading and research and interview watching but either way that process is the beginning where I’m just gathering information and just kind

of putting it in a pile in a in a document just gathering gathering gathering without any discernment yet for what what should or should not make the post or what the actual structure is and then I go through the next process the next stage stage to kind of which to me is the hardest part the least fun part and the part where I definitely am tempted to procrastinate away from it the most which is I’m currently as we speak by the way in a full

procrastination zone from one of those from that some of the second stage I’ve done the fun part I have all the ideas I’m excited about the post and now I have to do the actual kind of homework which is taking that pile deciding what the post actually is what’s gonna get what’s gonna make it into the post what I’m gonna leave for some other post some time what the structure is of the post which can be 200 different structures it’s not like an obvious structure if

you look at a bunch of my posts or any bloggers or you know there’s often you’ll see my posts have many different structures and so you have to kind of decide that and it’s torture because I decide on one I think well this other one you know I don’t like it it’s not quite you know there could what if there’s something more creative and more creative structure and then and then you know actually figuring out there are the outline the arc you know and you know

what is it two three main parts or is it a list of ten things or is it one big story and am I telling this like I’m inventing a character and telling it through them it’s like a fiction is like a seems like a fiction story or am i me am I am I just being me the author that might just be myself and talking to the readers like earnestly you know and so you have to kind of make all those decisions because if I don’t make the decisions like that then they um they

often just get made kind of by accident I don’t think that ends up as good as good a post so that that’s that’s what takes up you know ton of the time but that’s remarkable I love that I mean is there when you look at other blog other blog writers blog posters I mean are there certain weaknesses that you see that that other people are kind of making mistakes that you see that you notice well it’s hard I mean I’m still still trying to figure out kind of how

to do my own thing enough that I don’t think I’m quite ready to kind of critique others that much but one but a couple things I will say that I just noticed both my my old blog writing and some blogs I see today is I think people are sometimes they think they know they they have their journalist voice on you know or something like that they they have a certain tone on that’s not really human it’s journalist II and that I just feel like we’re not in that that era

anymore like I don’t think that if you look at what’s really poppin online now it’s it’s often like a person being a person in in writing versus you know someone you know the okay the ultimate example is like you know 20 years ago like I’ve been front page New York Times article that’s not a human at all that is a very specific voice which is it is you know super formal and it’s not you’re not supposed to see any semblance of personality you know supposed to see

no you’re not supposed to know anything about whoever the human writing it is they are completely hit right and then you go to something like today something like my blog or many others I think comes you know James clear I think of Mark Manson I think of Allie Brosh and hyperbole and a half I think you know these people they are in a hundred percent of a human it’s it’s good when from 0% to 100% now not everyone some people want to have a certain kind of

voice that’s not necessarily them and that’s art and that’s fine but I think a lot of people are trying to go for you know connecting with an audience building a following and they try to and and they they they’re they I think they need to do a better job often of just getting to that you know 90 or 100 percent human level and getting farther and farther because people are scared they think you know I’m a writer III have to be people will think I’m a

better writer if I asked like a writer it’s a no act like yourself you can still have a writing style that’s not exactly how you speak but I just think that that to me is something I think you know modern-day writers should be thinking where do you see your readers kind of going is there any specific topic or John rrah that you see your readers going to or it’s like are they magnetized by your relationship posts or well what I would

say is um you know because I’ve written about a bunch of different things I would say there’s there’s a there are some readers who are just really similar to me in which case they might like a lot of the different things I read written about because the things I’ve chosen to write about are things that I as a person happen to find interesting and you know fun enough to dive into for a couple weeks and some people are really similar to me and if I’m writing

about artificial intelligence they’re like oh that’s that I love that topic that’s so interesting and then if I’m writing about relationships they’re like oh that’s kind of how I think about relationships you know and so those people are course arose right down the middle way Pillai readers those are gonna be the people who like it the most but then there’s some people who they really like posts like artificial intelligence and they like posts about

other technology and Tesla and and they want to hear about the Fermi paradox kind of these heady kind of sciency tech techie type things and those people they know they they all you know if I get an email from one of them they’ll I can tell you know it’s not it’s not surprising when they tell my favorite poster this this and this I’m saying you’re right cuz you’re you like that kind of post and if I write about relationships they might read it but

they might think oh well III thought this was like an awesome tech blog what are you doing and then other people who got you know who first found the blog because of procrastination or because I talked about why you shouldn’t care what other people think of you or you know why people act a certain way on Facebook it’s kind of human psychology kind of poking fun at life but also analyzing you know how we can be better people somehow right those people I think again

some of them also happen to really or be into the to the tech topics but then I think some of those people are kind of like you know they they are sad when it’s when it’s a post that’s not about um you know about something with humanity so I think um I think it just depends I think because when you’re gonna when you’re writing a very broad blog you have the advantage of you’re gonna attract you know there’s gonna be some posts on wait but why for for a

huge group of people you know what they’re doing a huge group of people where at least one post appeals to them well if I were just writing about sports you know now that you know now there’s fewer people that can find something on the site they like so but that’s the advantage the disadvantage is you know if I were just writing about sports there’s the people who like the site they like everything on the site because this is their thing and and the

disadvantage for me is that you know there’s I matter what I write there’s some maple Y readers who are disappointed that that’s the topic because that’s not what they’re interested in so you know I don’t know I just think it’s it’s it’s a trade-off but you’ve built this massive following I mean it’s huge within within three years you’ve built I mean it’s it’s a business I mean you’ve you create a business out of this blogging idea and

and people love it I mean it I mean you guys are getting what like at least a million reader readers a month right yeah and I mean so that must put a lot of pressure on you as well right oh yeah I mean it’s it’s um uh it’s it’s really mind-blowing if I think too hard about like what the numbers look the actual how many people that actually is because that’s just not humans are not programmed to like to absorb that kind of information and to

know to not freak out so if I think too hard about it yeah then I become overcome with pressure and perfectionism where I’m like you know that I can’t put anything you know I even just you know I’ll send you know every post comes along with an email because I’ll ever you know I don’t use the email a story much other than to send out new posts but when I do I’ll often put a little note at the top just a little friendly note saying something that we’re working

on or a new thing that I want to point them to or just to kind of update people on what the plan is for the next month whatever it is and so I just write that read it over once and send it let me think about it like as if I were sending an email to a friend and then once in a while like oh it’ll hit me as I’m doing it how many people are gonna I’m sending that note and then I become paralyzed and I can’t do it I just can’t it’s just

I’ll read it ten times I get incredibly self-conscious that you doubt everything so that’s a it’s not a good creative place to be and if you think too hard so I actually end but the truth is you end up your your brain kind of it you know is happily not conscious of the truth with with the readership and I think for me it feels very similar you know it’s different but it doesn’t feel that different having the million people or so visiting a month now versus having a

thousand people visiting my old blog it just you you know my brains kind of adjust in the same way and even though I know it’s a very different situation it kind of feels the same like I was very gratified when I wrote something I thought was good on the old thing and I in it and I feel similarly now do you feel like do you feel like you’re adjusting your writing style because of how large your user base is no well so that yeah so that’s that’s interesting

because there’s some ways this is I I definitely it definitely affects me in some ways it’s good one way is that I know that if I write anything about Tech history politics anything and there’s something about it that’s not correct or that’s like only talking about one side there’s going to be 15 absolute experts in that thing in the comments section saying how wrong I am which makes me lose credibility to everybody because all the people who

didn’t realize that when they read it because they’re not experts then they read those experts saying and I think oh I can’t trust this guy right exactly yeah so now I’m like and likewise if I ever even accidentally like 1/8 plagiarized something by just kind of doing a diagram and the similar way to someone else the way someone else did I mean I’m gonna I’m gonna people are gonna absolutely call me out on that publicly in front of everyone so

it keeps me I have to be I had to have a lot of um has to be high standards for my fur for fur for accuracy and for originality and that’s a good thing that keeps me like you know just tip-top shape as a writer in that regard I can’t get lazy I can’t get sneaky I can’t get you know whatever on the the time when it can be negative is if you know I I’m someone who I think a lot of writers I think a lot of creative people are sense

like somewhat sensitive and they want to be liked they like to be liked like you know people talk about Obama like that like that’s one of his his problems as the president is he doesn’t like to not be like I think there’s a lot of people who have that quality and it can and it can be problematic in certain circumstances so I think for me like just knowing that a lot of the people who do read the blog like it and like me it’s like I don’t it’s like I then you

can quickly stop take that side of you that’s like edgier that can be kind of a dick that can kind of um kind of uh just make fun of a certain kind of person and a pretty harsh but funny way you can you can quickly kind of put that part of you away and say no no no sorry yeah this is just you know I just I can’t you can’t I can’t say that about and I don’t think that’s not you know Mike because then what happens is your taste starts to be

disappointed by it like what you’re putting out like your like my taste might think oh that’s so funny when someone else wouldn’t some other writer write something but then I find myself you know what if I had that thought I’d be like I don’t know and it’s like no I mean if you got to still stick with your tastes even if some people are gonna hate it and especially some of the people who already really like you who don’t know I always I have such an

affection and fondness for anyone who likes to blog and I just don’t want to like hurt anyone’s feelings who really likes what I’m doing but you can’t let that affect your tone and your and make you worse so I think that that’s something you know that’s that can be dangerous yeah yeah I understand completely you know there’s I’m a huge stand-up comedy nerd I like to study stuff and and there’s there’s this sort of saying it they call it the forever box and

inside the forever box you can say anything literally anything that you want and people just love will love it like you get into this rapport with your audience and they just love what you’re saying and doing so they laugh automatically Elon Musk it this is this is such a huge thing just because I mean if I feel like when Eli Elan musk enters a room like harps play angels sing it’s like there’s this there’s there is something happening with you on must

that you know should be noted and he he invited you to interview him and write a series on him how did that work out yeah yeah that was that was like the coolest definitely coolest thing that’s happened in my life in my life so far so yeah I mean I think he’s a pretty amazing person and the more I’ve learned about him I’ve learned a ton about him and what he’s done in his his life in the last year and I’ve been more impressed so I feel like you know it made me

realize that you know you assume someone who gets talked about so much and prays so much is probably overrated a little bit and actually I kind of think he’s I kinda think he’s underrated I don’t think people get yet you know how incredible what he’s doing is and so so you know I was a I was already you know a pretty big fan and yeah he kind of started and it was a 2015 like early 2015 he started tweeting tweeting out wait but why posts like he did it three

different times and and they know each time was just completely like a mind-blowing day of my life and you know and it started to hit me like okay this dude’s aware of the blog like officially like he’s just and so so that that was awesome and then and then and then his uh his assistant you know reached out and you know and actually you know said he would like to give him the phone one day and just talk about maybe some doing some writing about his industries if

that’s something you might be interested in and they were very polite as if they were kind of like intruding on my time she’s hilarious um and and so yeah so that happened and yeah I and suddenly I’m on the phone with him and really not you know not not what I saw coming plan other than kind of I think he thought that you know my very long form very thorough style was was very was it was it was a good match for his industries and and I think

that’s probably correct because what he’s doing with Tesla what he’s doing with SpaceX um those things are so complex there’s so much background you need to know to understand why those things matter so much and why we should be as the public should be in great support of both of those missions you really need to educate people on those things for them to understand and I know that cuz I didn’t quite get it when I first started this whole thing and then

I started reading and said all oh man like this stuff is you know yeah this is really really important for so many reasons that people don’t get so I think that was the idea he said you know this guy will write a really thorough posts on this and that’s what we need because I don’t have time for a three-hour interview which is what you know he would need in order to to explain everything his interviews are these little soundbites in 20 minutes and they

asked the same circus questions and people ask him about you know PayPal and there’s just no one no one really gives you know he doesn’t have the chance and and his companies don’t really have a mechanism to educate so I think that was the reason behind it and then yeah and then I spent six months writing you know four posts that would that would be like a together a pretty long book yeah that’s amazing it I mean it really does

show I mean you were invited to a TED talk I mean it really does show the success of wait but why just because of all these things I mean it seems like you guys have captured lightning in a bottle here yeah well I I always have the feeling like it’s it’s um it could it could go away and this is not like you know it’s it’s not like we have these you know customers or the count’s and we have like you know contracts with with things like you know business when

you feel like okay we’ve like built something it’s solid like you know blog blog you can be popular and then they can go away so it’s really very a lot of a lot of hum gratitude every day that this is because again I spent six years as a blogger without this happening so really grateful when it is happening and just you know trying to enjoy it while it lasts and hope that it’s a bit of sticks and that I can keep putting things out that uh that kind of warrant

this kind of readership that’s good man I really really respect the the gratitude party I think that’s a that’s a huge deal so Tim let’s let’s get back into your process a little bit I mean when you feel stuck within an idea is there any certain thing that you go to where you feel like it invigorates you or gives you creativity we sometimes I will literally just have to like reset if I’m just in the bad zone I’ll go for a walk I’ll take a shower I’ll go to

sleep I’ll change rooms but honestly is mostly when I’m stuck it’s because I’m avoiding you know it’s like I’ll be working and I’ll kind of hit a bump that’s something that I’m like oh wait that’s a problem that’s not gonna that that won’t reconcile with the other plan I have here yeah something has to change and then and then what I do is then I will start doing something else because that’s pretty hard what I just described and actually I don’t want to

deal with that right at this exact moment so I’m gonna deal with something else and what happens is the bump grows even though the bump hasn’t changed in size in my head the bump becomes a little bit of a hill and then it becomes a mountain and then it becomes Mount Everest as days as you know suddenly 1 2 3 4 days have passed and I have I just got away from my process for 4 days because of a bump that I could have gotten over in 10 minutes if I just

spent like 10 focused minutes working on it so often when I’m having a problem it’s because I’m just avoiding and if the thing that solves it is when I just confront the confront Mount Everest work on it for a second realize it’s just remember that it’s just a bomba fix the bump and then they get all excited and then I keep going but again that that process that that between when I leave the bump to when I get back that can take them that can really eat up a bunch

of days when I’m doing all of this important not important but urgent stuff you know emails and you know meetings and other things that I that are just not the real thing I’m trying to do so to me it’s often the solution is just closed down everything else on my computer and just sit there and look at it and think and get back into it and sometimes 10 minutes later I’m rolling again that’s so so interesting to the whole creative process and and really

you know immersing yourself putting yourself completely into you know writing and and doing it full-time the way that you’re doing it you know is is there is there a post of yours on the site that is kind of a favorite I mean my personal favorite type posts are just type of post that I would like to read the most and that are just masais it’s the for me ironically it’s some of the posts that have no writing at all I did a post called

putting time in perspective I’m looking at that one right now yeah so that post to me was the most fun to do ever because writing is hard and and and and but just you know finding facts about timelines and making this little simple graphic and getting excited about all when this is done this is gonna be such a great graphic you know I’m so excited to own this just to be able to like reference it and I was and I’m like or in and and I was learning a lot so to me

I had a great time making that and that’s like this very few post I go back to myself too because if I start rereading for a second I all I do is well all I can think is all the things I want to change and so I I don’t usually do that but with with that post I go there all the time just to actually get information or just to look at it because I think it’s so interesting just because history so interesting in this spans of time are so incredible and

and that to me that that graphic really kind of just makes you know clarifies that in my head so that to me is like my favorite or you know I don’t know certain you know just a funny answer because that’s again one of the few that doesn’t have my own voice in it and now it’s it’s good an honest answer I loved the novelty aspect that you kind of continue and you you know you’re sticking with the things that that that interest you and you know what you said

earlier about retaining the sense of sort of humanity and the people who are writing to be liked versus actually just being their authentic you know their themselves and and I think there’s I think in today’s society when you know everything is measured by a page view or a click or something it it’s it’s so important that you know you you do have this sense of overwhelming honesty and and the moment that you don’t at the moment that you

kind of playing around and the moment that a person senses that you’re that you’ve just created this post so that they can click on it the sooner that they’re gone and and I mean you just don’t ever see them again well I used to be the case I think that this we are now living IIIi think this is becoming more and more obvious in an era of people like authenticity being the most important thing people don’t want fancy graphics you know high budget

you know corporate graphics you know on something they don’t want journalists voices they they they don’t want you know cheesy ads and marketing messages that are obvious they just people and and they’re starting to really really hate clickbait and and it’s one of these things where you know you can just see it like louis c.k is such a product you know he of course you know he this is like the Louis CK era and almost you know this guy is so honest so authentic

he you know and and and of course he’s the most popular stand-up comedian in the world and I just think there’s that you know Jon Stewart was so you know himself that’s why he was so ragingly popular that this you know the young current young generation like they’d rather you be mediocre and unprepared but raw and yourself then being you know something that is that the bullshitting them for whatever reason and what happens is when you when you’re in that

era people develop a really really fine-tuned radar that I don’t think they had 30 years ago just wasn’t isn’t I don’t think you know I don’t think that it ought anticipate any professionality or other things mattered but so III think that that’s just something that you know it doesn’t matter how is a matter how good you are at being authentic hard and it’s hard to continue to be that way because it’s kind of scary to just be yourself but that’s what people want

they want real people yeah and I think you know what you said earlier about how as you develop this sort of following and as it increases the sure of that the idea of you know okay there’s going to be you know ten thousand a hundred thousand people reading this holy that blows my mind I mean um so it it does kind of change it’s kind of like the Schrodinger’s kind of cat you know is it a lot versus dead and once I got it you know you you find

out but you changed the outcome alright is there any certain thing that you feel like you’ve learned about people through through the success of the blog well it’s a little along the lines of what I just said I think that I think that at least at least my readers I mean they they want substance and they want authenticity and I think people want to learn like I think a lot of people have a craving to learn I mean it’s as crazy structure of our society where you’re

supposed to learn until 22 you know or whatever around 22 and then and then that then you’ve learned stuff and now you go and you do stuff and that’s just so outrageous given that you know you can be the best the most genius scientists of all time people like Fineman and Einstein and Newton they are they have quote after quote after quote about how they know nothing and how they they there’s an ocean of stuff they’ll never know so there’s just manure nning

is so invigorating and it’s so I just I I think it can it can it once you know learning suddenly makes makes it makes that it makes more learning about that topic suddenly super fun and it makes it really fun to talk about it suddenly and it feels really great and it’s also just really interesting if it’s taught in an interesting way I think also a lot of us brand learning as boring because learning in school is boring so I think

that people want to learn a lot more than I think sometimes they get credit for and I think um people want authenticity I think again so many people are kind of scared to just kind of be themselves scared to curse scared to to kind of to kind of just be kind of casual yeah you know that we’re not no one’s wearing suits to work anymore like it’s just a different time it’s just so it’s missing it’s okay to be a human publicly but the whole normal human is

fine it’s like fine you know and people are gonna like you for that and the paradigm has shifted and you know I think people expect different things now we are so inundated with information and if if you watch television I mean spares or so but I mean if you subject yourself for that to that media is constantly pushing all this information at us all the time so I think I think just to remain relatively sane I think we have to kind of limit

and still be very selective of what we decide to feed our our brains our minds yeah I think there’s just I I I’m already just overwhelm the open you know my podcasts happen I see how many multiples hours of great content out though that I’ll never have time for how many audiobooks I have them I think just looking at dad my options in the morning there’s there’s no way and so and there’s so much great like amazing amazing stuff to take in that that it’s

insane how much time I wasted on on taking in bad stuff it’s crazy but I think we all do still it’s just out of habit or out of you know I don’t know like we know it’s like you know it’s almost like to take in something really good I have to commit that’s the activity I’m gonna read this great book right now and and I ended up taking in more content not when I’ve decided to take in content but when I’ve decided to work and I procrastinating and I’m just

for a minute I’m gonna read this stupid thing and then that turns into 40 minutes and now that thing that kind of crappy content consumption took up 40 minutes while I spent zero minutes that day reading something really great that’s sitting in my bag that I’m dying to read so you know I think that um that yeah I just think we should have a meter on reminding ourselves how much great stuff there is every time we’re reading something or consuming something or

watching some stupid video that is not really enriching us or delighting us yeah so to I mean we’re running out of time here I’ve got you know look I really want to drive this this home and I and I I really want the listeners the people who are listening to kind of get to know you better as a person so you know is is there any single one thing that you would I mean how old are you now 34 so is there any single one thing that you would go back

and tell your 21 year old self oh so many things but I think the main thing is just the thing that jumps out at me is you know as far as career goes at least I would tell myself that the world is mostly built you know in Mozilla people who didn’t really know what they were doing and that and then and that everything I’ve gotten you know is seeing the inside of a company or the the way someone has made and an album or something else that you think is this

amazing process you could never touch it’s actually just kind of like flawed people and if you think you’re really good at something you’re probably better at it than the people who were doing it and they’re famous for it you probably are here’s a good chance just because they’re you know just because they’re doing it they’re famous for it does not mean they’re in this it’s not it’s not like sports you know it’s not like I think I’m pretty good at basketball but

I could never be Michael Jordan right you could never be Michael Jordan but that people have applied that logic to a lot of other things art and business they look at you know someone who’s older company for a billion dollars they look at someone who is a number one best-selling author and they they say well that’s the same Fame level that’s the same they’re the top point all one percent just like Michael Jordan so I couldn’t be them and that’s not true

it’s not like basketball at all there’s a good chance person selling their company for a billion dollars is not any better at business than you and I’m really if you think you’re if you think you’re good you think not great but you think you’re a smart person who has a knack for this thing that is a that means a lot if you think you’re a smart person who has a knack for something you you probably can beat the point 1% and really what the main thing that’s

in your way is not the superhuman Kalen because it’s not even that doesn’t exist what the main thing that’s in your way is that you’re not going to go for it you’re not going to charge ahead for ten years and try to do it because you think it’s a it’s a hopeless quest like trying to become Michael Jordan so and but I got daunted by that for I didn’t start something like wait but why with all my might I did all these creative projects

on the side yeah 10 years because I didn’t have the guts to just do it full-time because it felt like a though what are the chances that’s a one in a thousand it’s just completely false and if I could go back I would have told fall head you know headfirst into creative endeavors I thought I was good at full time with my full-time job starting right after college and I 39 years instead I feel like you should drop the mic after that little statement a

beautiful man love that so crucial and and I agree a hundred percent I feel like we’re so misled and I mean our the structure in which we kind of create learning and distribute knowledge is so flawed and the direction in which people are going to chase what they think are their dreams and then realized aren’t and then end up you know quitting their corporate jobs to go and refine themselves again end up on pages like yours or we’re listening to podcasts

like mine what’s next for you Tim what is I mean what is a what – what’s your what’s your next goal what’s your next thing what are you doing next yeah so right now I just my main challenge in life is to try to be as productive with writing as I was in the first two years you know and right now because there’s you know I it’s I I I’m just trying to right now do wait but why well for a while and just you know continue to do this thing but really really be writing

a lot so that’s my first my first goal is just in the near future just write a bunch of really good blog posts very excited about that right now and I feel like I haven’t gotten enough out recently so that’s one thing and the second thing is I think I’m you know looking at bigger kind of a bigger project either either a book or a like a video series or something that to kind of continue to push myself out of my comfort zone and challenge myself with

something like totally new but still with the same but still under you know still with wait the why and still with the same kind of trying to get the same kind of messages out but just trying to do it in a medium that I’m not comfortable with because I think that’s this is still a good time to be doing that so I would say that’s those are the main things on my mind cool a team working where can people find your blog your work um everything

is just at weight but wide calm that’s basically everything that exists for me currently that matters is there so and then you know I always tell people that the best way to the best way to kind of stay in touch like you know if you if you like it it’s just do the email subscription because that’s just know for myself I end up really keeping up with things that they’re gonna email me every time there’s a new post and the ones when they don’t even if I like it I

just forget about it for a long period of time so Tim thank you so much for your time and I love what you’re doing love the message thank you so much for for being here yeah thanks for having me on this is the human experience we will see you guys next week thank you guys so much for listening you