#557: Q&A with Tim Tools for Better Sleep, Musings on Parenting, The Different Roles of Fear, The Delight of Deepening Friendships, The Purpose of College, How to Boost Your Mood, HRV Training, and More

If you are highly functioning and things are going well, it would be hard for me to say that you should automatically use psychedelics ... They are not a panacea, there are risks involved, and you can open up Pandora's Box and experience things that will require processing. So, if you don't have space in your life to do that, you don't have slack in the system to contend with material that might come up, then you should consider very carefully whether or not this is a good time or if there is any good time for you to use these compounds.

Even without sun exposure, I think there's tremendous value in, as soon as you get up, doing 5-20 minutes of exercise. It could be just about anything that moves your body. And I do think that motion—whether that's jumping rope, kettlebell swings, something dynamic, swimming—is of great value. It seems to really turn on my neural drive in a way that helps my cognition and mood tremendously for the rest of the day.

That is how you build confidence: through competence. You can't think your way, reason your way, into confidence if you haven't actually put in... the flight time and mileage to develop skills and resilience under duress. You have to do things to develop persistent and durable confidence.

Very often, I find that if I apply myself fully to being excellent, or at least diligent, in an experiment for two weeks or projects for six months... the opportunities that I will have and the lenses that I will gain through which I can look at the world and my life are things I cannot predict at the outset.

Without the Oura Ring, I would not have realized that if I have a sauna right before bed or too late at night (within three hours of going to sleep), it interferes with sleep and also negatively impacts HRV the next day. However, if I have a sauna at, say, 4 or 5 PM, a few hours before dinner, it dramatically improves HRV for the next day or two.

I do think that the infantilization of not just adults but children in the United States, handling everything and everyone with kid gloves, ultimately produces very, very fragile people. And if the culture, by and large, wants to swing in that direction, that's fine, but I will want to ensure that my kids are as resilient and confident and optimistic as possible.

I would say that 'Of Wolves and Men' by Barry Lopez... is one of the best nonfiction books I've ever read in my life. It is incredible. It is just, just phenomenal.

I believe material beats method. So, what you choose to study, what you choose to practice, is more important, ultimately, than how you practice, because you can get very good at efficiently studying or practicing things that are of very little importance.

I think that almost everyone would benefit from having the option of a gap year in the United States.

At this point in time, for most people, if we're approaching it from a professional perspective, the vast majority of people will benefit from having a college degree.

I absolutely do not recommend psychedelics if you have had multiple psychotic episodes or if you have a family history of schizophrenia or personal experiences with schizophrenia or multiple personality disorder or anything like that. These compounds can absolutely... accelerate the onset of some of these conditions or exacerbate the symptoms and severity of some of these conditions.

I would suggest you think about creating a podcast by asking, 'How can I make this worth doing personally for me?'

I am paying incredible attention to climate change and thinking about it on every possible level. I would say that it, singularly, is what produces the most existential anxiety and preoccupation in me.