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The Tim Ferriss Show
#402: Books I've Loved — Seth Godin and Esther Perel
#402: Books I've Loved — Seth Godin and Esther Perel

#402: Books I've Loved — Seth Godin and Esther Perel

The Tim Ferriss ShowGo to Podcast Page

Esther Perel, Tim Ferriss, Seth Godin
·
24 Clips
·
Dec 16, 2019
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Episode Summary
Episode Transcript
0:00
Optimal mental this altitude I can run flat out for a half mile before my hands start shaking and oils you a personal question a cybernetic organism living tissue over metal endoskeleton.
0:24
This podcast is brought to you by Hugh is inhuman hu Hue Hue founded by family tree. Oh Jason carp, his wife Jessica and his brother-in-law Jordan Brown started off as a Paleo inspired restaurant in New York City in 2012. I actually came across that restaurant when I was doing a book launch staying at the Ace Hotel and thought to myself. This is the best place I've ever found in New York City. It's just incredible and now they make amazing plant-based healthy snacks, including their award-winning paleo.
0:54
In dark chocolate I discovered the chocolate a few years ago and got totally hooked on my podcast road trip to current state prison. I was going to do a podcast behind the wall inside a maximum-security prison, which I did at the time Jason carp the co-founder. I mentioned Peter Tia and others were all in the same car and Jason brought a case of huge chocolate for our for our ride. I ate a ton of these bars at least four of these bars in one sitting
1:23
and I didn't crash which was sort of miraculous to me. Maybe it's because for instance their simple bar has only three ingredients organic cacao organic cacao butter and organic coconut sugar without any soy or other junk or maybe it's just because I was I was timing them out and eating one bar every 30 minutes in any case since then and because I love their products and their philosophy. I become an advisor to you and I've also tried everything there honks which are chocolate covered nuts and berries.
1:53
The almonds are my favorite if we are looking there that's one of my favorites and their grain free keto friendly crackers. Their stuff is Simply Delicious and deliciously simple. They really really pay attention to Quality. Their tagline is get back to human because they believe people can feel and perform better when they eat foods with cleaner simpler less processed and less industrial ingredients. They avoid emulsifiers palm oil Dairy soy or sunflower lecithin sugar alcohols a whole list and
2:23
everything is certified gluten-free kosher non-GMO. So pretty much if you were trying to avoid something that bugs you it is already been taken off the table and the most important thing to remember is there stuff is delicious. Absolutely delicious. I really recommend you try them out and you can get 15% off your Hue order again. That's hu York you order by visiting Hugh kitchen.com forward slash Tim hu kitchen.com for / Tim and using discount code Tim at checkout.
2:53
Them make haste their holiday shipping cutoff is December 18th. And these are perfect for the holidays. I'm telling you. These are the most delicious chocolate bars I've ever had and I'll get to what I recommend. So get 15% off by visiting Hugh kitchen.com forward slash Tim and entering discount code Tim T IM at checkout and on that page. So go if you want to see one of my favorites go to Hue kitchen.com forward slash Tim. You will see a number of things including the nut Butters gift box.
3:23
And this includes a number of different bars that have nut butter inside these chocolate squares you get cashew butter plus vanilla bean. That is the one that I had four bars of on this car ride. You get almond butter plus puffed quinoa. I think I had another two to four of those on that ride, then hazelnut butter and cashew butter plus raspberry, but these things are amazing. You will not be disappointed. So check it out. Go to Hue kitchen.com for / Tim.
3:54
And use promo code Tim to get 15% off.
4:00
Hello boys and girls. Ladies and germs, this is Tim Ferriss. Welcome to another episode of the Tim Ferriss show where it is. Usually my job to sit down with world-class performers of all different types startup Founders investors chess Champions Olympic athletes, you name it to tease out the habits that you can apply in your own lives. This episode. However is an experiment and part of a short-form series that I'm doing simply called books. I've Loved I've invited some amazing past guests close friends and new faces to share their favorite books.
4:30
Describe their favorite books the books that have influenced them change them transform them for the better and I hope you pick up one or two new mentors in the form of books from this new series and apply the lessons in your own life. I had a lot of fun putting this together inviting these people to participate and have learned so so much myself. I hope that is also the case for you, please enjoy.
4:56
Hey, it's Seth Seth Godin. I'm an author and entrepreneur a blogger and a teacher. I've written 19 best-selling books packaged a hundred and twenty others, but the most effective project I've created is the alt MBA. I'm here to honor Tim and a half a billion and to talk about a bunch of books that have stuck with me through the years. I want to start an end with particularly profound ones, but each one matters a lot to me and I think
5:26
It will
5:26
resonate with the people who are listening to this. So let's get going.
5:32
The gift by Lewis hide we gave the gift too many of the first thousand or two thousand people who took the alt MBA the gift is a dense extraordinarily research book written by a brilliant writer and it's not about what you think. It's about. It's not about reciprocity. It's not about the hustle. It's not about giving gifts. So you will get things. It's about the Muse about being a genius. It's about culture.
6:02
And it's about Society. It's about the fact that the thing that binds us together isn't trade nor is it as Graber would say debt? No, the thing that binds us together is the fact that we are able to create something because we got a gift from who knows where and that we could turn that thing. We created into a connection we can do it by sharing and as we share with one another
6:32
Open doors for other people and every once in a while. I feel a little bit burnt out and I'll open up any section of the gift to read about the Shoemaker to read about Calvin to read about genius to read about Potlatch and it will stick with me. Next on my list is a book written by Tom Peters that most people have not read. It's called the pursuit of wow from 1994. I met Tom in 84, right?
7:02
After in search of Excellence came out. It was just a random connection. But ever since then I have been inspired and Amazed by his energy and by his passion and this book captures so much of it. You don't have to read many of the books. I've written if you just read the pursuit of wow, what Tom is talking about in this book and he's not afraid to use exclamation points underlines Bold and the occasional illustration or photo is
7:32
That people who care can make a difference and that business as usual just isn't going to cut it anymore. As Tom Peters would say make it excellent period thank you Tom for showing me that putting energy into the work really can pay dividends after that three books to share that have basic concepts in them that once you see them you cannot unsee them. The first one is a book. I wish I had written there aren't many
8:02
Me books. I haven't written that. I wish I had written in this is one of them the long tail by Chris Anderson. You may have heard about it, but you probably haven't read the book as closely as you might if you care about how ideas spread in our culture and you want to understand issues around scarcity and abundance about how we pick what we want in an era when The Gatekeepers have left the building. Well the long tail
8:32
We'll help you see it the idea that the power law curve really is symmetrical the idea that people who aggregate many many choices as so many of the behemoths and social media have done our building something that's going to continue to change the culture. The second one also based on a curve is crossing the Chasm by Jeff more. There are many editions of this book. I like the older editions, but that's just because I'm a boomer
9:02
But crossing the chasm helps us understand that it is a myth an incorrect myth of false myth to believe that we can start with an idea for a few people and ride it from early adopter to early majority late majority to laggard that in fact, there is a Chasm. There is a hole in that whole fell the Apple Newton, which you probably don't even remember it turns out the Newton was a success when it first.
9:32
Came out that they sold a hundred thousand of them in the first month or two and then it hit the wall and then it went away and the reason it went away. Is it fell into the chasm and you need to see the chasm be prepared for the chasm walk into the chasm knowing that getting to the other side is a lot more difficult than it looks or you can happily dance with the early adopters. One thing that's fascinating about Tim's career.
10:02
Is what a great job he did from the very first book of going from the Geeks the Nerds the early adopters who were hacking their lifestyle all the way across the chasm to a half a billion downloads and the third strategy book is called thinking in bets by Annie Duke. Yes that Annie Duke World Poker champion, and the first chapter alone will change your life thinking in bets helps us understand what it actually means.
10:32
Means to make a decision because decisions and outcomes are different things and a good decision may very well lead to allows the outcome. That doesn't mean it wasn't a good decision two more books in then I'll let you go back to hacking your lifestyle. These books touched me at an emotional level in my book you are turned. I tried to capture some of this energy, but the women who wrote These two books can do it far better than I ever could.
11:02
Could the first one is a poem it's now in a new format. I published it in its original format. It's a poem called be and it's by Sarah Kay The One and Only Sarah Kay spoken word Maestro. You can see her Ted Talk. It's the only Ted talk I've ever seen that was interrupted by a standing ovation be is a simple poem from a mother to her daughter and I have to confess I get choked up.
11:32
Every single time I read it if you've got a mother or if you've got a daughter, this is a great gift a great book to share with them. And the last book I'll talk about is by women who has changed my life since the day I met her her name is Jacqueline. Novogratz. The book is the blue sweater. Her next book is coming out early 2020. I hope you'll look for it. The blue sweater is the true story of how one woman has decided to change philanthropy.
12:02
Mm development and the way to billion poor people who just happen to be poor. They don't deserve to be poor two billion people who are currently poor engage with markets engage with the privileged part of the world and engage with each other the blue sweater begins with an astonishing story about just how small our world is when Jacqueline was growing up. I believe it was in Virginia. She used to wear the sweater.
12:32
Her uncle had given her it was a blue sweater that had some mountain ranges needlepointed on it. Well after being humiliated in high school, she and her mom brought it to the Goodwill box and dumped it in there fast forward 10 years later. She is a jogging in Rwanda at six o'clock in the morning and she sees a kid across the street in Rwanda. She chases the kid down the street which must have been frightening.
13:02
And indeed catches up to him grabs him by the collar and looks on the inside of the sweater and they're written in marker is her name all the way across the world. This world. We live in it doesn't have enough dignity. It doesn't have enough connection that the gifts we share need to be based on abundance. It's not I don't have it because you have it. It's now we both have it and what the Acumen fund has done.
13:32
Is built a different model of how people can engage with one another to make change happen.
13:40
So that's my list of books books about strategy books about inspiration books about how we live our lives. But one thing that I have learned from a lifetime of being in the book business is that the book business isn't a business. It's a passion and an organized hobby. It's a chance for just 20 bucks to own something that you can keep on your shelf and go back to again. And again, there's a proustian reaction I have when I see a book it's not the same.
14:10
When it's on audio or a Kindle, but I don't care how you consume these ideas. I just hope that you do and then that you live them and share them because seeing the world as it is and then choosing to make it better. I don't know what more we could ask for. Thanks for listening to me today. Go make your Ruckus.
14:33
Hi, I'm mr. Parelle. I'm a psychotherapist and author a Ted speaker and a podcast host. If you haven't read my books mating in captivity or the State of Affairs, you may actually recognize my voice from my podcast. Where should we begin where I bring you into my office to listen in on real-life couples therapy sessions or my newest Spotify project house work which brings lessons from couples therapy to the corner office all my work.
15:03
Involves helping individuals couples co-founders family members colleagues deal with the hidden dimensions of the Hidden forces that underlie relationship Dynamics because I believe that it is the quality of our relationships that determines the quality of our lives and that cultivating relational intelligence today is a new bottom line and certainly in the workplace. I'm here to honor Tim who's been a friend and a most wonderful.
15:33
Operator and all his many listeners and I want to share with you a few books that have shaped the way I think about relational intelligence. I've deliberately chosen books. Actually that have very little to do with the business world. I come from psychology. I work as a psychologist, but every one of these books is going to give you or at least has given me tremendous insight into our life both at home at work and I would say in our society at Large.
16:03
Because I work with people who are in situations that are highly contentious groups individuals teams co-founders the book of Marshall Rosenberg, nonviolent communication a language of life has been really a classic. It's actually a book that doesn't age. But to reason that book spoke to me is because as a child of two Holocaust Survivors have often lived with this one question or in fact, not often. I think this question has followed me.
16:33
My whole life. What is it that disconnects us from our compassionate nature and leads us to behave violently and exploitative lie, but on the other end, what is it that allows some people to stay connected to their compassionate nature in the most challenging of circumstances the way that that this book highlights the importance of language the speaking and listening the language that suits and repairs and the language that creates ruptures.
17:03
Is that are often Beyond repair? I think that this book is a classic for anyone who is thinking relationships fighting for your marriage by Howard Markman Scott Standley and Susan blumberg on its surface. It's a book about merits of course, but you just go one layer deeper and it's a study of the underlying issues that shape the way that we relate both with my couples and my corporate clients. I quite often pull from Markman steer. He's too
17:33
Says what's really going on behind the Manifest and it's very simple to capture is this underneath many of the relational impasses are conflicts. You're going to find three major Dynamics a fight about power and control a fight about care and closeness and a fight about respect and recognition. So it's either about power about trust or about integrity. I think that those three dimensions pretty much stand at the helm of our
18:03
Ation of life so that book will help many people personally as well as professionally can love last the faith of romance over time by Stephen Mitchell. Mitchell's book was part of the spine of my book mating in captivity because he highlighted an inherent tension that spoke a great deal to me and it's detention in how we try to do to reconcile in one relationship to fundamental sets of human needs.
18:33
Need for stability our need for safety for security together with the Need For Change passion novelty and mystery these two sets of needs that he described. So well that spring from different sources and also pull us in different directions how we straddle security and Adventure tradition and change familiarity and Novelty comfort and Edge. I think today is a central challenge for couples as well as for companies.
19:03
A little philosophical book it really requires sitting but it's a gem of a book and he died an untimely death at 53. And so in many ways I have often found that I was able to give voice to some of these ideas posthumously every one of the books that I'm thinking here are books that really shift my thinking they shifted the Paradigm for me. I came one way and I finished the book and left another way and zygmunt. Bauman is book liquid.
19:33
Is another one like that. He's description of nomadism gave me a whole new path of thinking because he looks at nomadism as this trait of our liquid life where we float through life like a tourist where we change places and jobs and spouses and values including our religious in our professional affiliations what he highlights is how we've dismantled the traditional structures and networks that used to give us support and now we live in a precarious.
20:03
Various life under conditions of constant uncertainty where the burns of the self have never been heavier. I would be remiss if I didn't bring in my own Mentor Salvador minuchin who was the founder of structural family therapy came from theories of communications and systems thinking because it is probably the foundation of much of my thinking you can read family healing you can read structural family therapy.
20:33
Which is the real theoretical basis of it, it will change your whole way of understanding relationships. But I think what it really did for me is I used to come and think about problems from a individualistic point of view and he gave me a map for thinking about relationships systemically tracking the invisible rules that govern the maps of relationship between people how do we actually go about disrupting dysfunctional relationship patterns be they couples or families or in
21:03
Options and how do we help people switch them to healthier ones this idea that pathology isn't necessarily inside the person but created by what happens between the two people or the idea that in relationships. It's easy to look for a villain and a victim but it isn't necessarily so what I can say is that every one of these books is in my mind when I do the sessions for housework.
21:33
It is how I think it is what leads me to do the interventions that I do and I hope that you will enjoy these books as much as I do. I thank you for listening and I would like to just ask you a couple of relational intelligence questions. What are some of the stories that you tell yourself that don't serve you anymore. Give me a time when you changed your mind. What would you say is the best?
22:03
piece of advice that you've ever received
22:08
Would you say that you were raised more for autonomy or for loyalty? Enjoy the readings and enjoy the conversations.
22:19
Hey guys, this is Tim again. Just a few more things before you take off. Number one. This is five. Bullet Friday. Do you want to get a short email from it? Would you enjoy getting a short email for me? Every Friday that provides a little morsel of fun for the weekend and 500 Fridays a very short email.
22:38
Rice share the coolest things I've found or that I've been pondering over the week that could include favorite new albums that have discovered. It could include gizmos and gadgets and all sorts of weird shit that I've somehow dug up in the the world of the esoteric as I do. It could include favorite articles that I've read and that I've shared with my close friends for instance and it's very short. It's just a little tiny bite of goodness before you head off for the weekend. So if you want to
23:07
to receive that check it out. Just go to four hour workweek.com. That's four hour workweek.com all spelled out and just drop in your email and you will get the very next one and if you sign up, I hope you enjoy it.
23:21
This podcast is brought to you by Hugh as inhuman h, uq q founded by family tree of Jason carp his wife Jessica and his brother-in-law Jordan Brown started off as a Paleo inspired restaurant near city in 2012. I actually came across that restaurant when I'm doing a book launch staying at the Ace Hotel and plus I myself was this is the best place I've ever found in New York City. It's just incredible and now they make amazing plant-based healthy snacks, including their award-winning paleo.
23:50
Vegan dark chocolate I discovered the chocolate a few years ago and got totally hooked on my podcast road trip to current state prison. I was going to do a podcast behind the wall inside a maximum-security prison, which I did at the time Jason carp the co-founder. I mentioned Peter Tia and others were all in the same car and Jason brought a case of huge chocolate for our for our pride. I ate a ton of these bars at least four of these bars and
24:20
One sitting and I didn't crash which was sort of miraculous to me. Maybe it's because for instance their simple bar has only three ingredients organic cow organic cacao butter and organic coconut sugar without any soil either jump, or maybe it's just because I was I was timing them out and eating one bar every 30 minutes in any case since then and because I love their products and their philosophy. I become an advisor to you and I've also tried everything they're honks which are chocolate covered nuts and berries.
24:50
The almonds are my favorite. If you're looking there that's one of my favorites and their grain free keto friendly crackers. Their stuff is Simply Delicious and deliciously simple. They really really pay attention to Quality. Their tagline is get back to human because they believe people can feel and perform better when they eat Foods cleaner simpler less processed and less industrial ingredients. They avoid emulsifiers palm oil Dairy soy or sunflower lecithin sugar alcohols whole list.
25:20
And everything is certified gluten-free kosher non-GMO. So pretty much if you are trying to avoid something bugs you it is already been taken off the table and the most important thing to remember is their stuff is delicious. Absolutely delicious. I really recommend you try them out and you can get 15% off your Hue order again. That's hu your Hue order by visiting Q kitchen.com forward slash Tim hu kitchen.com for / Tim using discount code Tim at checkout.
25:50
Gout T. IM they cased their holiday shipping cutoff is December 18th. And these are perfect for the holidays. I'm telling you. These are the most delicious chocolate bars I've ever had and I'll get what I recommend the get 15% off by visiting Q kitchen.com fold, / Tim and entering discount code Tim D IM at checkout and on that page. So go to want to see one of my favorites going Hugh kitchen.com old / Tim. You will see a number of things including the nut Butters gift.
26:20
And this includes a number of different bars that have nut butter inside these chocolate squares you cats cashew butter plus vanilla bean. That is the one that I had four bars of on this car ride. You get almond butter plus puffed quinoa can add another two to four of those on that ride, then hazelnut butter and cashew butter plus raspberry, but these things are amazing. You will not be disappointed. So check it out go to Hue kitchens.com for /
26:50
Tim and use promo code Tim get 15% off.
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