[MUSIC PLAYING] ERIC M. RUIZ: Tom,
welcome to Google. TOM BILYEU: Thanks
for having me, man. I'm excited to be here. ERIC M. RUIZ: Yeah,
it is our pleasure. So as I mentioned
before we got going, we're very big fans
here of Quest Nutrition. TOM BILYEU: Yes. ERIC M. RUIZ: Yes. TOM BILYEU: It's exciting. ERIC M. RUIZ: S'mores is
the flavor of the day. And I can't wait for Thursday,
which is cookies-and-cream. TOM BILYEU: There you go. All right, those are
two heavy hitters, man. Respect on the choices. ERIC M. RUIZ: Yes, well,
thank your facilities. So Tom, you have a wonderful
story, a very fascinating resume, if I do say so. So let's start from there. You majored in film at USC. TOM BILYEU: Yes. ERIC M. RUIZ: Then you
went into technology. TOM BILYEU: Right, obviously ERIC M. RUIZ: Obviously-- and
then you went into nutrition. Can you walk us through
that road that you took? TOM BILYEU: Yeah,
there were a lot of changes that
happened in my life that made those things happen. So in film school-- USC Film School is,
statistically speaking, harder to get into than Harvard Law. And I managed to
get into USC Film. I was thinking, hey, I'm
the business over here. Like, I'm just
going to crush it. And the first year, I did. And I did very, very well. And that set me up, in
my final year at USC, to be able to do a thesis film. And only four people
in the entire class get to do a thesis film. And I was chosen as one of them. So I went from no
one thinking I'm going to be able to
get into film school-- the career counselors
at USC literally told me to stop taking film classes. They're like, you're
not going to get in. We see this happen all the time. People think they're
going to get in. They don't. And so I said, look, I'm
going to take somebody out from the admissions committee
and just pin them down and say, what do I need to do to get in? So I did that. I took one of the guys out. And I said-- I got a 990 on my SATs,
and I took it twice. And I'm saying that
here in Google. So I know you guys got some real
SAT scores, which I did not. And so the counselors are
looking at my SAT scores and saying, this
isn't going to happen. I'm sitting down
with one of the guys in the admissions committee. I said, look, those
are my SAT scores. What do I need to do to get in? And he said, look, we accept
people at two phases-- one, as an incoming freshmen,
and then your SAT scores matter a lot, and then as
an incoming junior. And your SAT scores
don't matter at all, because they're meant to
just tell me how well you're going to do in school. But by then, you'll have
had two years here at USC. I'll just look at your grades. So I'm a freshman at this time. So he said, look, if you get
grades that are good enough, I'm not even going to
look at your SAT scores. So I took that as,
that's my mission. So I went and locked myself
in a dorm room for two years. I didn't date. I didn't party. I didn't drink, do drugs-- nothing. I worked and I studied. And that was it. And so I end up getting
into film school. So get into film school--
then I do well in film school, get the senior thesis film. And I think, this is it. I'm on lock. I'm going to crush this
senior thesis film. I'm going to get out. I'm going to have the
three-picture deal. I'm going to go
take over Hollywood. It's going to be amazing. I'm going to be rich and
famous by the time I'm 26. And that's-- ERIC M. RUIZ: The dream. TOM BILYEU: --that, right? It's all coming true. And then I failed so miserably
on my senior thesis film, so publicly and
so embarrassingly, that it absolutely
destroyed my sense of self. And so, as I'm
crashing and burning-- because it's pretty
dog-eat-dog in the film industry in Los Angeles in
that little microcosm of film school. And so people are laughing
about how poorly the film went and all that stuff. And so I-- ERIC M. RUIZ: So
that's how you failed? In regards to the reception
the film received? TOM BILYEU: Yeah,
it really was bad. There's just no two
ways about that. Even if people had been like,
oh, Tom you tried so hard, it just was a bad film. It was so bad, in fact, that
I stole the master film. So it can never
be watched again. I want to be really clear about
how truly bad this one was. And so, in that
moment, I realized-- and it's funny how
often people push back. What I realized was, I did not
have talent as a filmmaker. And that's such a deeply
uncomfortable thing for people to say or to hear. And it was for me at
the time for sure. And it's not for me now, at all. Because now I don't worry
about innate talent. I only worry about
a growth mindset-- being able to get
good at something. And so-- [COUGHS] excuse me. I'm dealing with a cough here
if I had understood at that time that I could get
better, it wouldn't have created the panic. But I didn't think
I could get better. So that was the first movement. Then, once I leave film
school, I'm totally lost. I realize I'm a talentless hack. I don't know what I'm going
to do with my life anymore. I decide that the
only path for me is going to be to become
the king of remedial jobs. And I wanted to feel
good about myself. And so I was going
into positions where I'd be
interviewing, where I knew I'd be smarter than
the person interviewing me. And the likelihood of me getting
the job was virtually 100%. And so that was where I was. And I was selling games retail. And this is after
getting a degree and having tens of thousands of
dollars in student loan debt. I'm working in these
really dead-end jobs, just trying to make
ends meet and trying to figure out what I'm
going to do with my life. ERIC M. RUIZ: So you
purposely aimed lower. TOM BILYEU: I, literally,
purposely aimed lower. And it was an ego-boost. And it was great. And then luckily,
somebody offered me a job teaching at a film school. And I thought, OK, well,
those that can, do. And those that can't, teach. So this is perfect. And I start teaching. And I realized, whoa. I'm embarrassing myself
in front of the class. Oddly enough, I
actually don't know enough to be teaching this. So I'm going I have
to go home at night and learn enough in the
lesson to be able to come in the next day and teach. But then, as I start doing that,
I actually start improving. And so I start
thinking, well, can I help them make
their films better? And if I can, can I
make my own better? ERIC M. RUIZ: Mm-hm, so at this
point, you're-- what?-- like, two years removed from school? What time frame are
we looking from USC? TOM BILYEU: Yeah, so at exactly
that, about two years out. ERIC M. RUIZ: Mm-hm. And so you're teaching. You're touching up
on your own career, I suppose, as a filmmaker. And then how did
that lead into-- oh, wait!-- nutrition. TOM BILYEU: So now
we have to cross the chasm between
considering myself the king of remedial
jobs, then realizing that I can help these people
make their films better and, by the transitive
property, I should be able to make my films better. So that is the beginning of me
really thinking about a growth mindset which, up
until that point, I had never had
a growth mindset. And Carol Dweck had not yet
written her seminal book "Growth Mindset" on the topic. So-- ERIC M. RUIZ: And can
you explain a little bit about the differences
between that growth mindset and the fixed mindset? TOM BILYEU: Yeah, definitely. So somebody that
has a fixed mindset believes that their talent and
intelligence are fixed traits, that whatever you're
born with, that's it. That's as good as
you're ever going to be. And so, hey, make
the most of it. Somebody that has
a growth mindset realizes that that's just
your starting off point. And while we may not
all be equal from where our starting off point
is, the human animal is, literally, designed from the
ground up to be able to adapt. And so it begins to
be a question of, how much are you willing to adapt? What price are you willing to
pay to get great at something? And so teaching-- I'm determined to survive
this interview here. Teaching was the
first thing that really began to give me that
sense that, OK, wait a second. I could put time into this. I could learn. I could grow. I could get better. And while I'm teaching,
these two guys come in and they see me teaching. And they were very
successful entrepreneurs. And ironically, they
were bodybuilders. Now, as a kid growing
up, I promised myself two things-- so growing up in
Tacoma, a slightly chubby kid in a morbidly obese
family that teetered between blue collar and white
collar, I'd promised myself, one day, I'll be rich. And one day, I'll
have six-pack abs. And so these two guys walk in. They're rich. And they have six-pack abs. And they were like, hey,
you're pretty bright. We're about to
start this company. We need a copywriter. Why don't you come be
a copywriter for us? But don't think of
yourself as a copywriter. Understand that you
can have any role that you want in this company. You just have to become the
right person for the job. And so I was just
young enough and just hungry enough to really
transform my life and make something of it
that I leapt at the chance. I left my teaching position. I went out, started
working with them. And through that
process of building that company-- and this is a
very long story that I think is powerful and interesting. But I'll spare you, so that we
can cover some other topics. But it ends with me having
an emotional crisis-- and two really. The first emotional
crisis is I'm arguing for things
that I know are worse for the company, which
means that they're less likely to make me rich,
but because they were my idea. So I'm fighting tooth
and nail for an idea that I know is
wrong-- that I know will move the company
backwards-- that I have a voice in my head
screaming, you know this isn't going to work! But I so want to be right-- I so needed to be right,
that I keep pushing. And I keep arguing. And then finally, one day-- because my partners are
much smarter than I am. And I'll define
intellect as the ability to process raw data rapidly. So they could just process
raw data very fast. They could think through the
situation faster than I could. Because of that, I was always
feeling badly about myself, because I just couldn't
out-think them. And because, at that point,
I had a fixed mindset and I valued myself in being
right, good, smart, worthy-- all permanent states-of-being. Because someone with a fixed
mindset believes everything is a permanent state-of-being. So I needed to
win this argument. And ironically, I end up winning
the argument to my detriment and realize, OK, now what? And I have this
moment of crisis. I always tell people,
what I really want in life is to be rich. But I'm acting as if
what I really want is to just feel
good about myself on a neuro-chemical level. ERIC M. RUIZ: So in a way,
you fighting for this idea that you knew was wrong was
your way of asserting control over the situation? TOM BILYEU: It was my
way of being right. And because I valued
that and my self-esteem was built around being
smart and being right, if I was around people
who were smarter than me and I was always wrong,
then I had no self-esteem. And so I literally then
end up asking myself that very question,
which is, just be honest about what you want. If what you want is to
feel good about yourself, then you need to leave
this environment. Because you don't feel
good around these people. They're smarter than you. They've got more
good ideas than you. So leave. But if, on the other
hand, what you really want is your goal-- you
actually want to get rich, which was my
obsession at the time, then you've got to
figure out another way to think about your self-esteem. And that's what I did. So in that moment,
I realized, I needed to switch what I built my
self-esteem around to something that is anti-fragile. Now, at the time, I didn't
have the words "anti-fragile." If you guys have read Nassim
Taleb's book by that name, then you know what he means-- something that is resilient
or strong or tough. They're still all defined
by their breaking point. But something
that's anti-fragile actually gets stronger
the more you attack it. And so I was trying
to think of, what is something that's going
to make me feel better about myself? The more I realize I'm wrong--
the more I realize that I'm stupid, not the smartest
person, had the worst idea, that I'm not yet good
enough-- all those things-- how do I make that not a
liability but my very strength? The very thing
that's driving me? And that became flipping what
I built my self-esteem around to building it around
identifying the right answer faster than anyone
else, always being willing to admit
when I was wrong, and actually taking
pride in that. So that, in a business meeting,
if 30 seconds before I'd been arguing tooth and nail
about an idea-- it's mine! I believe in it! I'm going after it!-- and then somebody
says something and I realize they're right then, on
a dime I would stop and say, you've got the right answer. And then I would become the
energy behind that idea. And that was the
first real crisis. ERIC M. RUIZ: Of
re-adjusting your expectation around your self-esteem
and your values. TOM BILYEU: 100%-- and as
soon as I made that switch, I started moving up in the
company very, very quickly. So now, flash
forward a few years. I become an owner in the
company through sweat equity. The company is
worth-- at the height, I think it was valued
at, like, $22 million. So on paper, I'm a
multimillionaire. My salary is higher than
it's ever been in my life. And now, I'm
completely miserable. And I'm like, I'm
living the cliche of "money can't buy happiness." And I'm like, this is a joke. This was so predictable
and so easy to see coming. How have I actually gotten
caught in this trap? And I begin to realize that
I wasn't pursuing things that gave me more energy. I was pursuing something
that was taking more energy than it was giving. I wasn't pursuing something
that I was passionate about. And what I didn't yet
understand about money is that money is, in
and of itself, inert. Nobody, save for maybe Scrooge
McDuck and possibly Warren Buffett, would actually get off
on swimming in their own money. So it's not the money. When you talked to Warren
Buffett, part of what drives him is, it's a scorecard. He gets off on the scorecard. But if you don't, if that's not
your thing-- and it's not mine. So I'm building this business. I'm learning all these skills. I'm coming in. I'm working my ass off. I'm working seven days a week. I'm not taking days off. I'm damaging my
relationship at home. And all for what? Money. Now, the vast majority of
my wealth, at the time, was tied up in the
equity of the company. Which basically
means, you have none. So most people don't
even understand the difference between
paper money and liquid cash. Paper money is not interesting. They'll write about
it in Forbes magazine. And kids will come up
to me freaking out, because they know my
net worth is crazy high. And I'm like, the only
thing you should care about is, how much money
do I have where I can go now manifest
something in the real world? Build a business, buy
something-- whatever. And that's a totally
different game. So at that moment, I'm
thinking, this is total misery. I want to wake up
every day and enjoy my life, to have
more energy being given to me than taken away. And in that moment, I
realize, the game I'm playing isn't money. It's not success. It's brain chemistry. And if the game that I'm playing
is brain chemistry-- which I'll say another
way-- deep and lasting fulfillment-- the thing that,
as a human, makes us feel good. The thing that we're
all secret deep down-- no matter what you
tell people you're chasing, the thing
you're actually chasing is fulfillment. You want to feel good
about who you are. You want to feel good
about your contributions. You want to feel good
about meaning and purpose in your life. So those are the
things, ultimately, the people are chasing. They think that money is
going to give that to them. And they're wrong. And that's how they keep
getting caught off-guard. Now, the reason that
money is this trap-- that everyone can
tell you is a trap-- and yet it will still capture
you, is because money is real. And it's really powerful. And the things that money
lets you do in your life is almost unimaginable
until you have money. And I see now, what
I'm doing, finally now having real liquid
assets that are significant-- guys, think for one
second right now. Imagine, closing your eyes
and thinking about that thing you most want, the thing
you want to build-- it's something beautiful. It's something you want
to leave for humanity. I will just assume it isn't
dumb shit, like a car. It's really something. It's something you
want to build and give. And it's going to be-- I don't think in legacy. But I get the sentiment. It's going to be your legacy. It's going to be that
thing that outlast you or helps other people or
offers jobs or builds something that we all want. The only thing stopping
you from doing it-- you're going to say it's time. But it's not time. It's money. And that's how
money gets people. Because once you know what
you want to build with it, then it's really powerful. But if you're chasing money in
and of itself, you'll burn out. I promise. You won't enjoy your
life, because you're not thinking about that
end result. So anyway, at the height of all that-- making money, wealthy on
paper, totally miserable-- I go into my partners. And I say, here's
your equity back. So literally, me essentially
sliding $2 million back across the table. Thank you, I'm quitting. I can't do this anymore. I'm not willing to
keep chasing money. I want to feel alive. That was the statement
I kept saying. I want to feel alive. I want to go do
something that brings me that sense of fulfillment. And this isn't it. And they said, look, come
out to dinner with us. They were taken aback-- very surprised. And-- ERIC M. RUIZ: You just
give them back $2 million. TOM BILYEU: Gave them
back $2 million in quit. And it was like,
this is good-bye. And so it was super abrupt. They said, come out
to dinner with us. And I go out. And they said, we could
do this without you, but we don't want to. And that phrase changed
the course of my life. Because what it allowed me to do
was connect to something other than the money. And so, for the first
time-- by that point, we were six or seven years into
the company of, literally, just around the clock--
around the clock. To give you an idea
of how hardcore I was and how I had worked
my way into equity, starting as a copywriter-- I rented an apartment
that I timed, so I could make sure that, if
my business partners-- which remember, at that time, I was
just a copywriter-- if they were to ever call me, at 2:00
in the morning on a Saturday, that I would be to their
house in less than 10 minutes. So I timed-- my wife would
find an apartment she liked. And then we would drive,
first to one partner, then back, then to
the other partner, and see if both of them were
less than seven minutes-- was what I was aiming for. And that was how we
picked our apartment. So that's how die-hard I was. Now, they had made the same
offer to everybody, basically, in the company. They would say, we don't
look for employees. We settle for employees. But we're always
looking for partners. And so I had really
taken them up on that. And that's how all-in I was. So now, after doing
that for so many years and realizing it didn't bring me
the fulfillment that I wanted, my wife having to pull
me aside and saying, you're damaging
our relationship, because you work so
much, my response wasn't, I want
balance in my life, because I don't
believe in balance. And if you guys have
ever see my content, you'll never hear me preach
about balance or patience-- none of that. Because I have none of it. What I'm talking about
is, one, understand that passion is a process. So there's no passion
lurking within you right now. There are areas of interest. Your job is to experience
a whole bunch of stuff, find those areas of interest. ERIC M. RUIZ: Mm-hm, and
then build them out, right? TOM BILYEU: Correct, and I
can talk about that later. But just to finish the story
of how I end up in nutrition-- so when they say, we
could do this without you, but we don't want
to, I realized, whoa. I needed that, to
connect to you as people. We talked a lot about
this brotherhood. We had a brotherhood. And that brotherhood, I
realized, over the years, had become incredibly
valuable to me. And it was a huge
part of what helped me change as a human
being-- was being connected to other people who
thought like I thought, who would do something as
crazy as get an apartment and time it and all that,
because they had a goal and they were working
towards their goals. And we just talked
the same language. And so hearing that
again, I was like, OK. I can get behind that. But if we're going
to work together, there's just a few
things that have to be true from my perspective. Maybe it's not the same for you. But for me, here is what
it would have to be. It would have to be a company
predicated on value-creation. It would have to be something
that we're passionate about. We'd have to be
building community. And we would need to be really
ourselves-- who we truly are, which was all a reaction
to what we'd been doing in the technology company. Which was all-- by the
way, I can't believe I'm giving this talk in Google. I was earning Google AdWords. Like, that was my life. And so there was no-- I wasn't communicating
with another human being. I was in the bidding
system and all of that and what are my
competitors doing? And how does that
impact my bidding? And this was, like, in-- what?-- 2005? 2006? And so I didn't have a sense
of connection to the consumer. And so I really wanted
to connect with them. I wanted to build a community. And so by the time we end
up launching the company-- this is now 2009, 2010-- Facebook is coming along. Everybody is starting
to think about, as individuals,
how do we connect? And then I started
thinking about, how do we connect as the
company to the consumer? And thinking-- really,
what social media is is just a megaphone. And it's going to give
people the opportunity to say something
about your company within minutes of an
interaction with your company, to a global audience. And so I was like, if you guys
can get excited about that-- and I'm quoting Kevin Kelly's
"1,000 True Fans," and all that. Because in my desperation,
I'd been reading about stuff, just trying to figure out,
what's another way to do this? And so they said, we
actually feel the same. We want to do something
that's passion-based, predicated on value, allow
us to build community. They loved it all. And so, for three very
different reasons, we ended up on nutrition. I grew up in a
morbidly obese family. So for me, it was, I needed
to have a mission that was so big and so compelling
that it gave me energy, that I could show up every day
and fight for people that I could think about. And there's an awesome
quote often attributed to Mother Teresa that says,
Nobody will act for the many. But people will act for the one. So if there's someone you can
picture, someone you know, someone you love, you'll
go to battle for them. So I knew, I'll show
up everyday and fight for my mom and my sister. And I know that they're going
to die too early if we can't figure out how to solve
this problem of making food that people want
to eat taste good. And so that became the
mission of the company-- was to end metabolic
disease and to do it by making food that people
can choose based on taste. And it happens to
be good for them. ERIC M. RUIZ: Interesting--
and so this process-- and you've finished
school-- you-- copywriter. You've grown through the ranks. And now, it's pivoted
into a nutrition company. So then how do we go from
nutrition to Impact Theory? TOM BILYEU: Yes-- yeah-- ERIC M. RUIZ: Which is about
storytelling and empowerment. TOM BILYEU: Yes, so if you know
the classic hero's journey, then this is-- at the end of Joseph Campbell's
classic "Hero's Journey," the part that isn't
often talked about is the hero returns home to
bring the message to others. So whatever that
journey just taught him, he's going to come back
now, and he's going to help other people with that. And while I don't
consider myself a teacher, returning to film is very
much me returning home. It's where I started. It's my first love. It's my deepest passion. And it is all of those
things, because of its ability to impact people. So the irony is, I wasn't
trying to return to film. What I was trying to do is
pull people out of the matrix. So I think, in movies-- they've
always just spoken to me, maybe more than most. And the movie "The Matrix"
came out March 31, 1999. It just had its
19-year anniversary. And I remember
going to a preview screening of that movie. Because I'm a comic nerd. And I was at a comic convention. They were handing out tickets. And when they're walking in to
the opening scene, basically-- and the agents show up and
the cop goes, don't worry, we can handle one little girl,
and agent Smith goes, no, Lieutenant, your men
are already dead, and then they cut to Trinity-- she jumps into
the air-- freezes. In that theater
that I saw that in, everyone screamed in unison
and started clapping. Now, I had never experienced
something like that ever in a movie before. The spontaneous eruption
of the entire audience in the middle of
something that wasn't like a scream or a yell--
it was, like, celebratory. They couldn't believe
what they were seeing. And then, ultimately,
as the movie plays out, it's a movie about belief. And it was coming
at a time in my life where the only
thing I believed was that I was a talentless hack
and that I had no idea how to make my life come true. So seeing this
metaphor for belief-- and that what Neo
really has to figure out is that he's the
one and that, first, for him to finally come to
believe in himself enough that he is the one, someone else
and tell him he's not the one. And so he's got to go
on that whole journey. And he's got to
try the impossible. And he's got to be
willing to face failure. And the fact that it works
is because nobody was ever, before him, willing
to face the failure. And so because he's willing
to face the failure-- and if you remember
the movie-- he fails. He dies. But it's only in
remembering-- wait a second, these are just rules, and
I can break the rules-- that he then comes
back and realizes, once he understands
the rules, once he believes in himself
enough, then he can do all this incredible stuff. And I don't think we
actually live in the matrix. And if we do, I don't think
that it really matters. But as a metaphor, I think
it's the perfect metaphor for the human experience. Because what you
believe about yourself will entirely dictate what
you do with your life. Now, let that hang in the air. Now, as that's hanging in the
air, let me tell you a story. I started big
brothering when I was 18-years-old for a kid
in the inner cities-- one kid named Richaun Jackson. Richaun-- I didn't
know this at the time. But he was in an
abusive household. He'd been adopted. And his mother was just brutal. And he always wanted
to spend time with me. And so at first, it
was just supposed to be an eight-week program. I was going to go in and
help him with his homework. At six weeks, they
tell you, hey, make sure you warn
them that you're only coming for two more weeks. I warn him. He goes nuclear, unlike anything
I've ever seen in my life-- freaking out, crying,
fighting with other kids-- just like a whirling dervish. It was pure insanity. I finally get him over. And I said, is this
because I said I'm only coming for two more weeks? He says, yes. I say, all right, look. I'll make you a promise. If you'll settle down
and do your homework-- because he was always
hard to wrangle-- if you'll settle down
and do your homework, as long as I live in Los
Angeles, I'll tutor you, deal? Deal. That ends up being an 8 1/2
year relationship that sees me helping. I become the
guardian of the court when he gets taken away from
his abusive adoptive mother. And I remember thinking,
this kid's amazing. Like, he's so interesting. And he's so
interested and just-- it's just, he's amazing. But he once said
to me the phrase, I already been had that. And I said to him, you
already been had that? And he was like, yeah. I already been had that. And I was like, you
already been had that? And in that moment, I
realized, he actually thought that's how you said it. And so he goes, well, that's
how my teacher says it. And I was like, oh my god! And so here I am. I'm 19-years-old. And this crashing
realization hits me that, because of
where he's born, his options have
just been limited. Then, if you ask him what he
wants to do with his life, his dreams are small. He's got no big dreams. So I'm like, wow-- strike 2. And then, of course, data
now has come out just in treasure troves
about how much your zip code is going to
determine your future success. But I was living it. I was seeing it
happen before my eyes. And then-- flash forward. In Quest, manufacturing--
in manufacturing, you're in inner
cities, because that's where the zoning happens
so that you can actually get the kind of square
footage that you need. And so now I've
got 1,000 employees that all grew up like
Richaun and 1,000 people with small dreams. And I started, in the
interviewing process-- because in the beginning,
everyone interviewed with me. Whether you were the
chief sales officer or you were the janitor,
you interviewed with me. And so I saw thousands. I've probably
interviewed-- oh, man-- probably close to 3,000 people
at this point, which is crazy. And every one of them, I would
ask the magic genie question. A magic genie's about show up. They're going to grant you
one wish and one wish only. You can't wish for something
for somebody else-- to cure cancer or bring somebody
back from the dead-- whatever. It's got to be for you. What do you wish for? Every single person--
every single person said the same thing. Any guesses what they said? AUDIENCE: Limitless wishes. TOM BILYEU: That would
have been so smart. I did tell him they couldn't
wish for more wishes, so I didn't get that one. They never would have
thought to do that though. So not a single
person ever said that. First, they said a job. Fair enough, right? You're here for an interview. You think that's
what I want to hear. You think it's a trick question. So then I would say, I
get why you said that. That's not really
what you want, is it? No-- hahahaha-- it's not. OK, what do you really want? Money. OK, fantastic. How much money? I never got any
answer other than one. And the answer was $1
million every time-- over-- ERIC M. RUIZ: And they
could wish for anything. TOM BILYEU: Anything--
over and over and over. You could ask for $1 trillion. And you ask for $1 million? And it actually
started to scare me. Now, that's a really long story. But you need to understand how
deeply that embedded itself. You've got Richaun and
me, feeling like I totally failed to help him
avoid what I could see was going to be his future. And then you have
1,000 Richaun's. And now, I feel responsible
to help change their belief system. And I believe, if I can
change their belief system, I can change the
course of their life. And so we start in the
[INAUDIBLE] Quest University. And I tell people, making
the protein bars is just your tuition. What you're really
here to do is figure out what you want
to do with your life and then get the skills that
you would need to go and further yourself down that path. And I realize, there's 25
things that I'd done to my mind that, if they did
to their minds, they would truly have
a growth mindset. So I write the Impact
Theory belief system out. It's the 25 things anyone
needs to believe and do, in order to be able to manifest
their dreams-- to actually make them come true. And then I started the
interview show and all that. And then, as I go
through this and realize that the vast majority
of these people do not respond to the message-- so think about how
many people really respond when you just give
them the direct answer-- this is how you do what I've done. Most people, they don't listen. It's not entertaining
enough, right? So they just ignore it. Like, I'll just
tell you, right now, the secrets to the
universe-- anything you've ever wanted to know. They've already been
written in a book. You literally don't
need anything else. It's already written. If you were willing to
go out, read, research, put in the work,
practice, test-- it's already all there. What people really
want is entertainment. ERIC M. RUIZ: A story. TOM BILYEU: 100%-- so
I'm a big believer-- don't try to change behavior. Try to leverage it. So if you said, Tom, you
have to change the world. Would you rather leverage
people's reading behavior? Or would you rather leverage
their viewing behavior? The answer to me is very simple. I'd rather control Netflix
than the Library of Congress, if I want to make real change. Because one is, on the surface,
just more entertaining. It's passive. You don't have to work as hard. You don't have to flip pages. You don't have to
face-- like, for me, I always had to face the
inadequacy of how slowly I read. Whereas, movies-- it was a truly
emotive, emotional experience. So when I started looking
at, OK, how do I really-- no bullshit!-- how do I change
the lives of these 1,000 people or the hundreds of millions
of people that they represent? How do I actually get them
to adopt a belief system? The answer is narrative. ERIC M. RUIZ: Joseph Campbell-- TOM BILYEU: Joseph Campbell. ERIC M. RUIZ: And
speaking of which, I love what you said about-- you
cannot change human behavior. You can only leverage it. It's written down right here. And to go back to Campbell,
he said something that was super profound as well. He said, if you want
to change the world, you have to change the metaphor. And I think that's what
you guys are attempting to do with your structure, your
programs, and your interviews. And to take this back
towards empowerment-- and you and I discussed
this a little bit before we got on stage. But I graduated in
2010, at the height of the recession-- so a
very similar situation where there are no jobs. It's frustrating. I'm angry. I'm upset. I can't rely on my
parents, because they're in a worse situation than I am. And you kind of descend
into this pit of hell where you're angry,
you're frustrated-- all of these things. And my question to you
is, I wonder, as well, before you can take
the empowerment-- before you can own
up and say, actually, I've got this or I can do this-- if you have to go through
those trials and tribulations before you can come back up. TOM BILYEU: I don't
think you have to. But I think that
most people will need that to be the thing that-- they find themselves
so profoundly unhappy that now they're moving
in the opposite direction. ERIC M. RUIZ: The rock bottom. TOM BILYEU: It's emotional
rock bottom-- exactly. So it's not a
necessary component. I think there are people
that do it without it. But I think that, oftentimes,
the people that bounce back the farthest in
the other direction are the ones that hit hardest. ERIC M. RUIZ: And in
some of your shows and our conversation, we've
talked about this idea that it's all your fault.
And at first glance, it sounds very mean. Like, everything that
happens is your fault. But I think, behind it,
there's this nugget of wisdom where, if you can train
yourself to keep things within your realm of
control, you'll always make the best of a situation. I remember, when I was really
young and I fell off my bike, I wasn't wearing my knee pads. I was upset. And I was sad. And my dad's first
reply was, well, who told you to ride
without knee pads? Like, you were in control
of that situation. And it sucks, at
first, to hear that. But in the long run,
it sort of builds this resilience
and this capacity to keep things within
your realm of control. Now, to bring this
back to a question, Dr. Jordan Pearson would
argue that, when something goes wrong, you start by
looking externally and seeing, like, OK, what was I
actually responsible for? And what happened outside
of my domain of control? Whereas I think,
perhaps, you and I would agree that maybe it
should start internally. OK, how was I
responsible for this? Was there anything I could
have done differently? And only then look
outwards-- would you agree? TOM BILYEU: Yeah, I think that
the reality is that I don't care about what the reality is. That's the truth. And this is where I think
people get really hung up with my message is, you're
not experiencing life as it actually is. You're experiencing life through
three pounds of mush that is a tri-layer brain
that is, first, trying to keep you alive-- so your most base
instincts in what they call the lizard brain. Then you've got the
mammalian brain layered on top that's designed to give
you the emotions that you need to move in a specific direction
with a lot of authority and a lot of intent,
and then the thing that makes you uniquely human,
the neocortex, which allows you to
ignore, essentially, those baser instincts. But if you know something,
like, the deep limbic system-- when it's inflamed, it processes
data as being more negative. So to give you an idea-- and this is one of the
most fascinating things about the brain. As Shakespeare noted, there
is nothing good or bad, but thinking makes it so. There's nothing
good or bad, right? There is just stimulus. And then there's a response. ERIC M. RUIZ: Things
happen, and then-- TOM BILYEU: Right. ERIC M. RUIZ: --we
give it a meaning. TOM BILYEU: But
people think that it is objectively a certain way. So now, because they think it
is objectively a certain way, they feel they are
supposed to react, based on those emotions
that are getting kicked up in their mind. What I'm saying
is, absolutely not. Those emotions
may not serve you. They're certainly not aimed at
moving you towards your goal their job is to keep you
alive, plain and simple. So that's not necessarily very
helpful in a modern context. So if you want to always be
moving towards your goal, you want to be
optimized, you got to learn to get control
of your emotions. You've got to learn to
understand to tell yourself a narrative that isn't
predicated on necessarily identifying what is objectively
true, because I don't think that we experience
the world that way. It's identifying, what's going
to work to get me to my goal? And that, to me-- my whole thing is, goal first. Everything else works
backwards from that. ERIC M. RUIZ: Mm-hm,
like, starting from the grand strategy. Identifying it and
then building the steps backwards-- to reverse
engineer it, essentially. TOM BILYEU: Correct. So the reason I say
everything is my fault and that I use those words
is, it's a litmus test. If you're still having an
emotional reaction to the word "fault" and you feel
compelled to argue with me, because you think that
I'm victim shaming-- it just tells me
immediately where you are in your own journey. Like, if you're
going to waste time getting lost on the words you
don't like, instead of going, is there a part of this
message that's usable for me, yes or no? Then it's a filtering mechanism. People that haven't gotten
past that first layer-- they first have to address
that, whether or not they want to be
goal-oriented or not. ERIC M. RUIZ: Yeah, definitely. And like, I speak with
the college students through tours or
intern programs. And the thing that I really
try to convey to them is, look, whatever happens,
there can be some good from it or some benefit
derived from it, if you choose to look for that angle. I'm always reminded of
the stoic story of-- I forget the philosopher's
name at the moment. But he was involved
in a shipwreck. And his friends immediately
went to console him, to say, oh, what a shame. We're so sorry that you
lost all these things. And his reply was,
essentially, lost? I'm free now. I'm not held down by
all of my possessions. This is fantastic news. And so I think that that's
where a lot of our peers get lost in-- is the
lack of realization that anything has a benefit,
if you can look at it that way. TOM BILYEU: And I'll
give you something else. And this is something
that I'm working on. And so bear with me as
I stumble through this. This is one of the most
important things for anybody to realize. And anybody that goes to that--
the world is working against me-- like, that's
their default answer-- what they have not
yet figured out is that skills have utility-- skills have utility. There's something
in the way that we educate that leads people
to believe that skills are this temporary thing that's
merely meant to help you pass the test, to get the grade, to
get moved onto the next thing. And we've lost an
understanding-- certainly outside
of engineering-- that skill has utility. And what I mean by
that is I believe the very purpose of
life, the whole reason that we're all here, is
to-- close your eyes. Imagine a world, the world that
you want to become reality. Open your eyes. Go acquire the
skills you will need to actually build that world. ERIC M. RUIZ: Mm-hm, embark
on your hero's journey. TOM BILYEU: Right. And it's, acquiring those
skills no longer is a metaphor. You're actually getting skills
that allow you to do things. And so people understand
skills in that context when they are an engineer,
because they know, well, if I know this
programming language, then I can actually
write code that can be executed in this way. An architect-- if I learn
engineering principles, I can build buildings that
aren't going to fall down. They understand that. But once you get
into the humanities, people no longer think about,
oh, skills have utility. Like, they actually
do something. Like, if I'm a teacher,
I should really probably learn about the developmental
cycle of children. Why? Because I need to control them. If I can get them quiet, paying
attention, in an optimal state for information, then I can
make them better students. That's the utility. Because of the things
that I'm learning about how to get them to be
quiet and where I want them and all that, I can get
them in their seats. I can get them paying
attention, prime them. Like, maybe what I
have to learn about is the correlation between
exercise and cognitive optimization-- whatever it is. But learning those skills-- if you get really
good at that, it means your students
will walk out of your classroom
better prepared, better grades, more
knowledge, go on to do better. Like, they found in the
Stanford marshmallow test, the single most correlated
factor of success is the ability to
delay gratification. Well, now, imagine
you're a teacher and you learn to teach kids
how to delay gratification. That may be the single
most important thing those kids will ever learn. And because you
learned that skill, now that skill has
massive utility. But people don't approach
the world that way. They're always looking for,
what's the broken system? And I'm saying,
forget about that. Figure out how to fix a system. That-- fine. But don't waste
your energy trying to figure out what's
broken in the system until you know how
to fix a system. But most people don't. They want to learn
how to squawk. They want to go, I
know it's broken. Anybody can give you
that really cool speech about how the current
education system was designed to create factory workers. OK, we all know it. But is anybody
fixing the system? No. And it's not going to get
fixed until somebody goes, I have to learn the very
nature of fixing systems. That's the skill
I have to acquire. And I know what its utility is
and then the expected outcome in the real world. So when I hear people
where their reaction is to bitch about a problem--
like, you and I were talking. You being Hispanic is
working against you. Jason, you being an
African-American, it's working against you. You're going to
have to go uphill. But now what? You going to sit and
complain about it? Because it won't help you. So if you have a goal-- it's like, it does suck that
women have to work harder to get to the same place that,
as a white male in America, I have to get to. But if it is true, if we're all
going to accept that it's true, we can all sit there and go, we
need to focus on the systems-- fair enough. And I'm glad that
some people do that. The other option,
though, is to say, well, I completely control me. And the one thing I will
tell any human being alive right now-- there is
always room for the best. And once you're able, through
your skills that have utility, to move somebody else
closer to their goal, you will become a hot
commodity, no matter what-- no matter what! Think about the scientists. What were the scientists
after World War II? Right before they were
scientists for us, they were Nazis. But we were way happy
to let go of that, because they had crazy-- ERIC M. RUIZ: Yeah, yeah. TOM BILYEU: --skills
that we needed, right? So really what it comes down
to is, what are your skills? If you've got skills that can
be used to build something beautiful, to do something
wonderful to the world, to help people move
towards their goals, that will excite the masses,
because they want that thing that you're going to create--
that it's going to improve people's lives-- but only thing that mattered
in all of that was you got really good at something. And somewhere along
the way, we lost that the punch line
is, no matter what you do to the system, you-- you, as an individual-- need to
get extraordinary at something. And so my encouragement
to people is, go get extraordinary. Don't worry about whether
the system is broken or not. We built Quest, a
$1 billion company, in less than five years, coming
out of the Great Recession. So what was it? More millionaires were created
in the Great Depression than any other time in history? It just comes down
to somebody goes-- honestly, this is how
I react-- the system is too big and complicated. I'm too afraid to try to get
caught up in fixing that. I'm too big of a chicken. There, I just said it. I'm too big of a chicken
to deal with that. But I can deal with myself. I can go get extraordinary. So focus on that. Go get extraordinary. Go become the best of-- whatever it is you want to be. But go become the best of it. And see how the
world opens to you. ERIC M. RUIZ: I love it. I love it. And also, it gets
much more difficult and, I would argue, noble
to work on yourself, as opposed to bitching
or complaining about an esoteric system,
which is very loosely defined, depending on who
you're speaking with. And I think that's
where we're at. And that's how I
think we can empower individuals to become the
best versions of themselves. Because then, in
doing that, they help their communities,
their cities and, hopefully, the world. TOM BILYEU: Totally agree. ERIC M. RUIZ: Awesome. Tom, we have a lot
more to talk about. And unfortunately, we're
very limited on time. So I want to open up to
questions from the audience. Mr.-- AUDIENCE: Actually, this
question is to [INAUDIBLE].. ERIC M. RUIZ: Here,
you want the mic? AUDIENCE: Oh, yeah. [INAUDIBLE] ERIC M. RUIZ: Boom-- look at that. AUDIENCE: Check,
check-- all right. Perfect. ERIC M. RUIZ: My Derek
Carr impersonation-- AUDIENCE: So this question
actually just popped into my head while you were
talking, because I totally-- as fanboy-ish as it sounds,
I'm just put it out there. I 1,000% agree with
everything you've said. And then, I thought
about, when you said, just go be extraordinary. And I'm curious to
myself, because I'd also agree with the idea that human
beings can be extraordinary at, literally,
anything and all things that we haven't
even thought of yet. So when you set out on your
quest to become extraordinary, and when you set on your
quest to become extraordinary, was it just, let me become
extraordinary in general? Or did you actually
focus on, I'm going to become
extraordinary at this. And final question-- what
do you consider yourself to be extraordinary at? TOM BILYEU: Awesome--
so I don't think there is "extraordinary in general." And my biggest lament-- my biggest heartbreak-- is
that every entrepreneur, to a person without exception,
will come to me and say, OK. I've got this vision. I've got my mission. It's crystal clear-- my
business plan-- ready to rock. And as you begin to push
and poke, you'll realize, they have no clarity whatsoever. And the best analogy
is someone will-- and this is how the
entrepreneurs approach me. I want to win a gold medal. And they think
the fact that they want to win a gold
medal is clarity, man-- that they've got it unlocked. And I'm like, awesome. In the Olympics? Yes, in the Olympics? OK, cool. Summer or winter games? Summer. OK, fantastic. Tennis? No. Swimming? Yes. OK, great. The medley? The backstroke? Until you get down to the very
specific event in which you want to win that gold medal,
you don't know how to train. Then that's where
it becomes an issue. So somebody wants to be
extraordinary in general-- how do you train? What does that mean? So I need to know exactly,
what do you want to do? So for me, the thing that I
want-- and I won't say that I'm yet extraordinary in anything. And that's a very stoic stance. And hopefully,
everybody takes it. Like, the more you
learn, the more you realize you have to learn. So the thing that I'm committed
to becoming extraordinary at is telling stories
that change people at the belief system level. So that's my goal, where
I'm just entertaining them. They don't know that
anything else is happening. But that a generation or two
generations from now, nobody would think to tell their
kids anything other than, everything is your fault, Timmy. Come on, you know better. At the end of the
day, your life is a reflection of your choices. And they won't even remember
that it was Jiminy Cricket style character that told
Pinocchio that in a movie that I made. They just have the
words to repeat. It's that belief system. It's baked in. It's part of the
cultural subconscious. We're all talking about it. We all respond to
each other that way. So that when somebody is, woe
is me, we don't feed into that. When somebody is saying,
oh, the system is broken, we immediately go, rad. What do we do about it? How do we fix it? What skill do we
need to go repair it? But that's not the public
discourse right now. The public discourse right
now is, you're victim shaming. No, I'm not. I don't want them
to be a victim. You're going to be
victimized in your life. Of this, I promise you. But you decide whether or
not you're a victim, which is a state-of-being. So all of those things right
now are hotly contested. What I want to do,
through entertainment, is just make it
patently obvious how we should all be
thinking and acting to make our dreams come true. So that's the thing I
want to be extraordinary. And then, I think there was
one more part to that question. AUDIENCE: So the
question is loaded. Well, actually, know. You answered both, because
it's a two-part question. TOM BILYEU: Perfect. AUDIENCE: What did you set
out to be extraordinary at? What do you consider
yourself extraordinary at? And then what are your
comments on seeking to be extraordinary in general. TOM BILYEU: When I think about,
what is the meaning of life?-- I really believe,
nature made a choice with every creature it creates. And it, essentially, is a
bifurcated path-- number one is, I'm going to preload
you with all the algorithms. We call them intuition
or your instincts. And so you come with instincts. And like, a horse foal, when
it comes out, it can walk. It can run. It can jump. It can feed. A human baby, on the other
hand, when it's born, is a lump of flesh. It poos in its own diapers. You could lay it
next to a bottle and it would still
starve to death. We are completely dependent. Because what we want
to do is actually finish the maturing of
the brain on the outside, in the stimulus to which
we need to become adapted. So the reason that humans
have become the ultimate apex predator, unlike anything
this world has ever seen before ever, is
our ability to adapt. Now, if you believe
that adaptation is the absolute core
of what makes us great, it is our defining
characteristic, then it becomes a
question of, well, how does nature
make sure that we do what nature wants us to do? So if nature wants
us to adapt, it's going to make it pleasurable. So when you think about
what humans really want, I think it's a deep and
lasting sense of fulfillment. It's the happiness that lasts. It's the non-transient, "bowl
of ice cream style" happiness. And it's the, I
just saved somebody from a burning building. It's the, I have helped
these children's lives. They're going to
go and be better. It's things like
that that make you feel good about who you
are as a human being and what your contributions are. That actually comes
from suffering. It comes from working hard. It comes from putting in
that effort, because that's what you have to do to adapt. You adapt to a stressor. You adapt to pain. You adapt to difficulty. You get stronger under
heavier and heavier weight. That's how it works. That's just the call
and answer of nature. So that process is
intensely pleasurable, in the sense of fulfillment. So going out and
doing the hard things to see how much
of your potential you can actuate--
pursuing greatness in a very specific
direction-- is, I believe, the only thing
that will make people happy. So when I look at depression,
anxiety, all on the rise, all rampant--
people feeling lost, not knowing what they want to
do, where they want to be-- the answer is, decide
you're going to be extraordinary at something. Because it gives you more
energy than it takes. And there's a whole process. I'm not going to go into it now. But get that thing in your life. And then go after it with
everything you have-- with total disregard
for balance-- that you pour yourself
into it, in a way. You give yourself over to it. And I think we have
one more bifurcation. You've got the family, which
provides a similar sense of deep fulfillment. And I think that's a
perfectly valid choice. And if you don't hear
the incongruous nature with what I'm saying, I'm
not saying it very well. But those are the two paths
that I see humans go on. People that are
parents, they really-- the kid was born-- changed
my life perspective-- totally done, right? Like, you know the
talk and how it feels. And then on this side, you've
got an equal lack of balance-- all in-- totally
committed-- do or die. I would give myself over to
this thing that I'm building. And that's where I'm at. I've chosen not to have kids. It's not the path I'm on. But I've given myself
over in a similar way. And I get a similar sense
of deep fulfillment. ERIC M. RUIZ: Great. AUDIENCE: Great, thank you. TOM BILYEU: Yeah, for sure. AUDIENCE: In terms of
adopting this growth mindset or just developing
yourself as an individual, how big of a role would you say
is managing your relationships? And how important is it
that people around you adopt, more or less, the same
mindset or support this mindset that you're adopting? TOM BILYEU: So you're now
poking me in my soft underbelly. Which I appreciate you
asking the hard questions. As a CEO, it is
ridiculously important to make sure that your
team is on this page, that they are totally
bought in, that they're thinking the same way
and acting the same way. Otherwise, your culture begins
to fragment and get toxic. As a person just
out in the world, it's amazing to surround
yourself with other people that think like that. Because they're going
to reinforce it in you. And that's such a beautiful
thing to have in your life. And they're going to push you
and escalate you to be better. But also, as an individual, no
one should be able to stop you. And so whether you're working
in a toxic environment or not and everybody else
acts like a dumb ass-- like, when people come to me
and they write in and say, hey, I'm working
in an environment-- because I'm a huge believer. If you guys have read Ray
Dalio's "Principles," read it. It's incredible. But every time I
recommend it to somebody that works in a
company where I imagine the culture, for one person
to change, would be so hard, I do have little pangs of guilt. But here's the truth. You could put me in any
organization in the world. And the strategy that I would
adopt, if I wanted to move up and I wanted to
change the culture, would be to become
useful to other people with no need to get the credit. Because secretly, I
know, deep down inside, when people steal from you, they
know they're stealing from you. Not that they're
going to feel guilt. I don't need them to feel guilt.
I want them to be terrified of losing proximity to me. Which now, all the
sudden, means people begin to orbit around me,
because I'm helping their life. Then, all the sudden,
it's just, oh, why is everybody
orbiting around him? They're always turning to him. And you ever notice,
everybody knows. If I took whoever is
running a meeting, suddenly, there'll
be a second person that all eyes will
start going to. And that person is the
unofficial leader of the group. And I would immediately,
as fast as I could-- by giving value to other people,
by not caring about getting any credit for my own ideas, but
pumping out ideas at a more rapid pace, by
being extraordinary, by making sure that I'm better
than this at everyone else, by being more prepared,
by putting in more work-- all of that-- that people would begin
to rotate around me. It's a longer strategy. But in that situation, now
you've got a lot of cloud with people. And so when you say, I don't
do that, I don't steal ideas, all the sudden,
then people would start to feel guilty about
stealing ideas from you. You start to see a
shift slowly over time. So I won't over-answer your
question, which I've already gotten real dangerous to. I'll stop there. But I'm really,
really fascinated about antagonistic
group dynamics and how to change them by
being the unchangeable, of just, like, having
a true north about what your ethics are and just
always being true to it. AUDIENCE: So I was
wondering if you could talk a little bit
about clarifying your goals and what you're chasing,
and how much of that is just choosing something
and committing to it and going after it,
and how much of it is really a process of
figuring out what you want and chipping away at that
and getting very clear on it through some internal process. TOM BILYEU: Here's
the amazing part. You've actually already
answered the questions. And most people only get 1/2. So it really is both
of what you just said. You need to do the work,
first, of being like, what do I really want? And so now, I'll walk
through the process that I alluded to
a couple times. So passion is not a
lightning rod moment. It is not something that's
hiding inside of you. It is a process. You're an architect,
not an archeologist. So what you're going
to do is you're going to go experience
a whole lot of stuff. And Kevin Kelly, the
founder of Wired magazine, talks about not
prematurely optimizing. And I think that
that's so important. So in life, if you
don't have a passion, you want to go experience
a lot of things, with almost total disregard
for what that might be. When you encounter something
that you find interesting, engage with it more. As you engage with
it, see, is this turning into a real fascination? If it's turning into
a real fascination, then ask yourself a
very simple question. Do I want to become the
greatest in the world at this? And if the answer is, yes-- if the thought of that
fills you with excitement-- winning that gold medal
or designing that thing or whatever-- you
think, oh my god! That would be amazing! And the thought of actually
putting in that work's kind of cool-- like, I want to
develop that skill set, now you're going to go down
the path of gaining mastery. And I'm stealing
this from a guy named Cal Newport in a book called
"So Good They Can't Ignore You." And I think that
passion is like love. I don't believe that
there is one-sided love. I think that's infatuation. Love is where you're
in a real relationship. There's give and take. There's vulnerability. There's all the things
that make real love this beautiful interplay of
two brains that are actually in sync, as in, you can
see it in an fMRI scanner. It's really crazy. That's love. Infatuation is the
stage before that. So you don't know if you
have a passion for something until you're gaining
mastery, you're sincerely pursuing becoming
the best in the world at that. And those skills have utility. And as you put that
utility to the test, in service of something
bigger than yourself, helping other people,
you will get energy from that, as a social
creature, knowing, I've worked my ass off for this. Greeks have a name for it. It's called "techne." I've work my ass off
for this set of skills. And it actually
helps other people. And it makes me feel good. And I'm contributing. And so that thing, where
I show up every day and, technically, I'm at
work, but I'm actually building something that's
helping people and that makes me feel really good-- one, it's hard and I'm
pushing myself and I love it and it's interesting. And then, on the other
hand, it actually helps-- and it's that dope interplay. Now, where people get stuck is-- we were just talking about this
before we started the talk-- most people are
standing in that room. They've got 1,000 things
they're interested in. They can't bring themselves to
shut any one of those doors. And because they don't shut
any one of those doors, they never walk through
the one remaining door. And so I always tell people,
your job is to shut doors. Literally, the
word "decide" means to close, break it up, in Latin. Or to cut-- excuse me. It means to cut--
cut something out. So you're cutting out
the 999 other options and going with just the one. And if you have to do it
at random and just shut, blindly, 999 doors, fine. Go through that one. See, is it a fascination or not? And if it's not, come back. Open a new one and move. The only thing that's really
going to ruin you as a person is indecision. It's the only thing
you should fear. ERIC M. RUIZ: Well, guys,
thank you so much for joining. Tom, thank you for coming by. TOM BILYEU: Thanks
for having me. It was great. ERIC M. RUIZ: It was a
pleasure and a privilege. Yeah, thank you. TOM BILYEU: Absolutely. [APPLAUSE]
