Mark Manson: What People Don't Tell You About Success with Lewis Howes

I told my said I feel like I'm in kind of like one of those situations where I've got like movie TV show and album going on at the same time except for me it's book book audiobook yeah all at the same time and I was like how the hell do you do it and he just kind of laughed and he's like you know what you know what the trick is I said what he's like what you do is you just bite off more than you can chew you said agree to do more than you think is possible and then you just go do it [Music] welcome everyone back to the school of greatest podcast we've got the legendary Mark Manson in the house my man good to see you brother suit super pumped you're back on because well we had you on about a year and a half ago I think your year and a half ago but the book had done like 2 million copies yeah and now it's you tell me seven and a half million worldwide is that the number yes so for those who haven't seen subtle art of not giving a the book is everywhere every bookstore every you know Target Costco airports everywhere you go you see the book I mean if you're on a camel and nepali price you'd see it someone who's having their backpack they like screw life's P the 95 so congrats on all the success thanks man 7 half million copies how many people have sold over seven million copies of a book it's probably like a less than a thousand books yeah I have no idea I think it's I saw a list once of all the the 10 million copies sold books in the last like 20 years and there was only like eight of them or some oh my god so I could hit there in the next year or two probably hopefully fingers crossed it's incredible man you never know I I don't I try not to like they project yeah I try not to get too attached to it are you seeing week after week sales are growing still or is it kind of steady they started they peaked I would say mid last year like yeah mid or early 2018 it's kind of slowly like so now they're like very gradually coming down like now I'm I think like 30 on Amazon words before I was like 10 so as opposed to a hundred thousand a week it's like 70,000 copies a week I would at some point you were doing that probably right um you know holiday season gets really yeah yeah but yeah I mean it's it's still doing super well that's I mean it's still in the times listing everything it's amazing how many weeks on the list 120 120 weeks on the New York Times is crazy is there any other book I guess five love languages although I love languages it's like a 400 we forever forever I mean there's some like Gladwell stuff whose yeah you know it's amazing yeah that's amazing yeah I had Rachel Hollis on and she's she's one and two on the New York Times list recently for her new book and I think she sold three million copies or something in her book in a year which is yeah crazy I feel it was so when my next one comes out I feel like her and I are gonna like just monopolize the whole time first four books with you guys yeah in some order it's amazing man I wanted to ask about this because we were talking before we start recording about the Liz Gilbert conversation how she had this TED talk I think it was a while ago about how you know when she eat Pray Love came out I think it sold 10 million copies yeah and she had this realization that her best work is behind her and maybe it's not her best work her best-selling work mm-hmm and we are saying how there's nothing that prepares you one for being a huge success sure and blowing up you wanted it to be but you weren't really sure that it would be this big yeah and then to how do you handle almost knowing that it's gonna be so hard to recreate the same success or greater yeah for the rest of your life well you just accept that you're not in and you know maybe I will but you I can't you just have to accept you know like a book like this a book like Eat Pray Love like it's such a it's not even once in a lifetime you know it's books like this come around once every five years you know and it's it's basic it's it's like getting struck by lightning twice in a row and so if you think if you aim to do it twice you're just gonna drive yourself insane because there's just so much that's outside of your control and so for me what actually what kind of got me out of the fetal position every day was just accepting that you know it's like I'm probably never gonna have a book that's gonna do that well I'm still gonna do very well you know my other books can sell very well and can be great and can help a lot of people and but it's it's you can't get too attached to that number because you're just you're gonna torture yourself yeah for the rest of your life so yeah I just I had to learn to let go of it I had to learn to be like you know it's great that it did that I'm extremely proud of it but it's gotta move on gotta find the next thing all right you know challenge I think of the Olympic gymnast mm-hmm like this 15 year old Olympic gymnast that wins the gold medal yeah or it's like your greatest moment where a million people watched you in you know 14 15 16 years old yeah you're on the cover of every magazine you're the the talk of every talk show and you wind and Matt the metal and then what do you do the rest of your life yeah you will never recreate that and you did this at 15 16 17 and how do you how does someone like that who has such a big success except yourself you know it sounds easy you just have to accept but how do you really how do you accept yourself and this is like first world problem like oh you you won the gold medal of as an author yeah yeah how do you but you're gonna live a long life you know it was the goal and I'm gonna write a dozen more books exactly and some of them will flop and others will be bestsellers it so if everything if it's subtle art is just always mind metric I've got a lot of decade of like misery in front of me yeah it's just you have to be realistic about it and I think the other thing too is is understanding that you know what I did some mental jujitsu and I was asking myself you know what's what's more valuable to the world is writing a book that affects a million people a little bit or 10,000 very profoundly deeply you know who's to say which one of those two things is better or more important more valuable sure the selling a million copies is sexier you know it gets you more attention you do more interviews but there's a strong argument that affecting 10,000 people very deeply is arguably more valuable contribution to the world and so I started thinking of things in that way and and and it just it took me a long time to kind of detach myself from that because it's I think when you're starting out as a writer and despite you with podcast and everything it's you you get it you love seeing the numbers go up you know it's like every year the number is higher than the year before and and it it feels good motivates you you feel inspired you like hell yeah I'm growing I'm getting better and at some point though like once that number gets high enough you gotta let go of it you just you gotta let go of it because it's not sustainable once it's that high you know and it's it's you're gonna run out of oxygen and and so it was a difficult process to kind of get back to like okay I need to write a book step one write a book I love you know because when I started so this next book everything is I started out I was like alright you know I gotta I gotta keep the training going you know and so I I like started trying to write stuff that you know I thought subtle art readers we're gonna really love and and yeah it just it felt very empty it started to feel like like a job forced yeah which I didn't become an offer to have a job I became an author so you know I can do what I love and and I just kept scrapping it I'm like no no this is this isn't going well and eventually I'd just get back to like okay I need the right for myself first yeah then once I have a book that I'm proud of that I think is great then I can look at it and say like okay like how can we you know maybe change this or market this so that'll sell a lot of copies you know that's step two but step one it always has to be in a creative process it always has to be about yourself first mm-hm and otherwise it's just it's not art anymore yeah it kills the meaning right right it's a llama so you went through a process of huge success but it also sounds like a little sadness mm-hmm and forcing yourself to try to create the next hit because of the pressure from publisher or whatever you had and the deal you had yeah and not being satisfied with the results you were creating yeah I mean it's there was definitely external pressure you know publisher and everybody but there was a lot of Internet of course I want to see my number go up you know it's like my I want my 20 19 to be bigger by 2018 and it's at a certain point you can't control that anymore you know and the other thing that happened it's funny because I think it was around the time I was here because I think I think we talked like a year after it was out or something a year and a half after it was that I actually got really bummed out which is something I thought I was insane at the time so so this is this is one of those things people don't talk tell you about success is that if you have this dream for like your whole life and then you accomplish that dream you don't have a dream anymore and that's terrifying because it's you wake up and you're like oh crap what do I do with myself you know it's like okay I got money and I got like like a lot of fans but like I had this dream like I don't I don't know what to dream for anymore and and so I went through this period for about six months where I was just like really like wow and well what's the point of all this you know like what I worked so hard for twelve years to get to this point and what just to play Zelda all day like is that is that it like I'm 33 you know like is this really all it's gonna be because you're driven how many articles for your website hundreds you know I I started in in oh seven Wow online and so yeah in it it took the way I describe it is that it took time to find new dreams new things to new visions for like the future that I want from ya and and it's funny because since I went through that I've got I got a group of friends who are like in the startup world in out in New York and I I know a couple guys who have like exit it had really successful exits and they go through depression also or like a sadness and yeah I I remember talking to one of my buddies about it I was like yeah man I'm like I'm really bummed out and I feel insane like I I feel like a crazy person and he was like oh yeah that's normal you know he's like yeah startup guys go through that when they exit their company cuz it's he's like yeah you work for something you wake up every single day for ten years for a certain reason and then that reasons gone and so you just lay in bed you're like whoa what am I gonna do today yeah after you spend the money on a few fancy toys or the trips or whatever then you're like okay now what's my purpose yeah it's fun for like a month you know it's it's take the wife to Paris you know go to a fancy restaurant or to you know take your parents somewhere and then and then you just kind of sit on the couch and they're like know what yeah I think dreams are some of the most important things and when we don't have a dream we don't have a mission or place in life and I remember a similar feeling when I was playing when I was doing the decathlon in college it was my goal to be an all-american yeah so I had to qualify for the national championship first and that was a process of qualifying then I got the national championship and I have a I had a place in the top eight to be an all-american yeah so my whole goal was like how do I get number eight because I was brand new at the decathlon I just started practicing six months prior well I was like I just need to get aids place and it doesn't matter yeah no one's gonna know if I'm a Thor first it's just All American yeah yeah and I remember I got eighth place and I was on the podium and I got my you know trophy or whatever and I was very emotional and I had these mixed feelings in about ten minutes after I was really angry my parents were there my coach is like it was a big celebration and I was at the dinner table I just didn't want to be around anyone yeah I was kind of a jerk I was just like didn't want to look anyone in the eye I was frustrated out because I I think I realized I didn't know what does it do next sure it's like everything I've been working for so dedicated every morning it happened no one yeah and that's a scary thing well and it's some of that anger too it's because when you do accomplish that goal or that dream and it's like let's be honest the reality is never as nice as it was in your head the feeling you don't really get the feeling that you were looking for yes yes and it's in your the same person and you've got the same problems same insecurities and you just work your ass off for this thing that's you know and it's gone within hours you know the feeling is gone you think it's gonna give you something yeah or change you in something yeah and it's like no you wake up the next day you're the same dude you still feel like a piece of crap I still feel like here yeah yeah sure what it might be but it's funny because everything we're talking about so I I gotta fit the new book in here everything's everything is a book about hope so kind of going back to bringing up these two threads together I eventually reached the point where I was like you know I pitched a bunch of book ideas to my publisher and you know they're like oh it's on brand and this is great you know it's gonna be a good follow up or whatever and it just nothing was working and then I reached that point where I'm like I got to go back to basics I gotta write something it's true to myself you know my formula through my whole career has always been my writing is basically just a very public form of therapy so like whatever issues I'm going through I write it out and I write it out in such a way that you know hopefully other people can get something out of it as well that's for me for the podcast - I even all the people that I need the most help with yeah you know on relationships for business or whatever totally and so I went back to him like all right I need let's start out by writing about what I'm struggling with and so that that's where the whole theme of hope came in is it's like I didn't know what the hope for anymore hmm and that strangely enough that caused me to be just as depressed as low points in my life where I had no money and my girlfriend left me and I also had nothing to hope for and so it made me realize that you know what's going on in the material world is totally you know not the point it's a side effect what matters is do we have that vision of hope in our mind do we see a possible future for us to step into that will make our lives better and as soon as you take away that vision we don't know what to do with ourselves and we we despair essentially mm-hmm so that's the starting point of the book is how how we need to constantly be constructing these dreams and these visions for ourselves and what happens when they're taken away and how are they taking away or if we achieve them and they're taking over and they're no longer there yeah achieving them is one way of taking away taking them away it's not interesting yeah and and then of course I get into all sorts of sorts of other stuff but it's it's so how does someone develop a sense of hope when they feel stuck or when they feel they've gone through a big breakdown in their life yeah you know whether it be the relationship the career them money so I think that's where a lot of kind of the classic self-help advice comes in you know you start with something simple and small you set small goals you know you stare stab think one thing at a time start with yourself treat yourself better you know get good sleep eat a little bit better you know start with basic or have a single yeah and then they start to build upon themselves and the funny thing was is that you know it was the exact same with with my issue too it's like like I said I just sat around played Zelda for like three months and like and it was it was strangely just like one of the most awful periods of my adult life uh but I was like I'm living the dream right this is the dream right you know like trying to convince the cherisher but yeah it was the same thing it's like all right man get back in the gym mm-hmm you know take on some new projects I told my agent I'm like just go find me something like anything you know is that one Will Smith came about go find me anything no he came a little bit later but it was you know I was working my way out of this you know by the time his people contact yeah gotcha so how how do we develop a sense of hope for ourselves how do we you know create a new vision a new dream a new game plan yeah moving forward in any moment so the two the two things that I talk about in the book is one you need to develop a sense of values you need that you need to essentially value something so for you to have any vision of hope in the future something needs to be better or worthwhile like it needs to be valuable in a life you're looking to create yes and it can be anything it can be you know helping helping out the kids at the local school it can be building a company it can be buying a new car whatever it's but it's something needs you need to decide that something is more valuable than what you have today and oddly a lot of people struggle with that hmm they don't know which way to go they don't know what a better life would look like or they want to do so many things that they knew nothing yeah I've seen that also it's like well I want to I love this and that and all these other things I don't know which direction to go yeah and so they don't go anywhere so it's like you got to pick that one that is kind of the central value in your life and then the second component is that you need to feel that you're capable of getting there so it's like if I if I if I decided that the goal of my life is to be you know the prime minister of checklist of akhiya you know it's that's not gonna happen that's just unrealistic and so if you have this vision that it's just completely detached from reality and you see this a lot people will pick goals or dreams that are just so out there it gives them an excuse to not do anything hmm you know it's like oh well there's no way I can make it anyway so I might as well just sit around sit around the Doritos or whatever plays out all day exactly exactly exactly it's like I'm not gonna sell 10 million books again so I'll place all that you know like so it's it's about finding a vision that can kind of bring both of those things together it's about being realistic about who you are where you are and also having a solid making a solid decision about like what is better in the world what is a worthwhile pursuit really so that's the first kind of step is figuring out what that is for you the better value yeah but not being so unrealistic but I think you also want to be like you want to push yourself a little bit too probably right totally yeah cuz there's another otherwise you're not improving you don't wanna be a safe thing yeah if I want to do a little bit scary yeah like no that's challenging let me go after that yeah okay yeah and and and one thing I talk about later on in the book is that there's kind of like I think there's a there's like a a Goldilocks amount of stress and pain in our lives if there's no pain in our lives then there's no scent like you said there's no sense of sacrifice that there's anything valuable that we're working towards and so then we lose hope we lose meaning so you're saying we we shouldn't experience pain in this process yes how much pain should we experience well it's the Goldilocks thing so it's if you have no stress or pain then everything is just gonna feel meaningless because you're not actually sacrificing you know you're not actually like giving anything up to achieve something but if you have too much stress or pain then you become traumatized hmm and you damaged yourself so there's like there's a sweet spot of like you want enough stress and pain so that it gives you that sense of meaning and accomplishment but you don't want too much that you give up and cave in and that's not simple I mean it's it's something it's kind of listening to your body listening to your heart yeah and make sure you're checking in with yourself every every week yeah when the perfect metaphor is like working out you know it's like if you go into the gym and you uh you know you walk on the treadmill like we've all seen those people who like come in the gym and like are walking like two mile an hour on the treadmill on their phone you know it's like that's not a workout you're not giving anything out of it but at the same time if you go to the gym and you just destroy yourself for hours can't walk for two weeks yeah you're gonna get injured you're gonna you know you're it's gonna backfire so so it's the same thing with our psychology you know if we're too pampered if if everything's too easy if everything is given to us without any reward or effort we we essentially remove a sense of value from our lives and and and that removes a sense of purpose and so that kind of that causes crisis of hope people struggle with depression and anxiety and things like that when things are too easy we don't have as much hope as what you're saying yeah Wow yeah so what are you doing now that you've got all these first world problems life is very comfortable everyone wants to talk to you Will Smith's knocking on your door to read books you've got you know all the food and luxury in the world how do you develop how do you create pain for yourself I'm almost like you have to force it you do I mean you really do especially once you and this is actually one thing I talk about in the book is that as because there's a little bit of a paradox going on in society today which is you know were by most metrics were safer healthier wealthier living longer than ever in human history mm-hmm there are fewer Wars or fewer diseases yet everybody's like freaking out constantly you know anxious overwhelmed suppressed depression anxiety yeah medication drug reductions everything and then you look at like all the political crap that's going on you know so as people are just there's like this almost fever-pitch thing happening in society the SPAC despite the fact that everybody like everything is actually the most comfortable it's ever been and so one of my arguments is that the more comfort and luxury we experience the more we have to be selective like we have to consciously choose our discomforts and our stresses you know it's back in the day if you were like a farmer in the 1800's you know or if you're or if you're like a subsistence farmer around in India like it's you don't feel worried about any of this stuff it's it's like you get up and work every day your vision of hope is I need to feed myself and my family and I need to get up to work every day or else we're all gonna starve you know so it's it's a very simple it's very easy for that that farmer to like find meaning in their life but when you're like living in a nice condo in LA and you've got like awesome opportunities happening and cool new sushi restaurants opening everywhere and awesome vacations down in Tulum like post mates every day just give it exactly like it gets you you have to seek out that stress because if you don't if you don't pick those things to challenge an distress yourself you're gonna start succumbing to all the little things you know you're gonna start throwing a fit if the post mates guy doesn't bring enough Forks you know your eyes yeah I'm gonna call the manager like you know it's like dude that's not a real problem you know you know so you need this you need this this is what I talked about Salar you need to start picking your problems so for me and I've really experienced this the last few years is my life gets even more luxurious and easier like I have to be a lot more conscious about choosing my struggles choosing what pain I want to put myself through in my life because if I don't if I don't choose that pain then I'm gonna be back on the couch playing Zelda yeah what are the pains that you're choosing for you're so one thing I'm doing I'm doing a speaking tour this summer and that's terrifying that's like I think I'm doing like 14 cities theaters like a thousand people hour-long talk I'm mortified I'm like absolutely mortified but it's good because it's like it's push I'm pushing myself and I'm pushing like pushing my skills and my ideas you know and we joke about you know Will Smith knocking on your door like dude that's a lot of pressure men like yeah get a guy like him and he comes to me and he's like hey man I want to write a book about I just turned 50 I want to write a book about my legacy and it's like that's on me you know it's like don't this up so I mean it's but that's all good good pressure it's good stress in it it's it's good it's good fear because these are the feeders that I want these are this is the stress that I want and so I think it's just it's so important today that I think as a culture we're just getting away from that everybody wants to be coddled and protected all the time and it's like you can't like not only can you not be coddled and protected all the time but it will backfire you know the more you're protected the more your feelings are always protected the more sensitive you're gonna get to every little thing that goes wrong yeah I think Jordan Harbinger when I had him on he said don't protect your kids yeah he's like don't keep your kids safe obviously want to keep them safe please like share don't protect them from their vulnerabilities like allow them to get stronger yeah through the pain yep you know and the strong they're become the more resourceful they'll be independently yeah in the future it's interesting because I think a lot of people want a place safe and I'm always looking for ways personally to challenge myself physically mentally emotionally everyday even if you just do a hard workout a day sure Tiffany who's running the video over here she gets up at 5:00 a.m. and runs at least three miles every morning she and she posts about it and it inspired me cuz I'm like man I miss mine I miss my workout today she's getting up at 5 a.m. and doing this workout like it's inspiring and it that can be all you need to do for the day yeah you don't need to freaking crush every part of your day and lean into all this pain emotionally physically mentally but if you focus on something every day was painful yeah like I'd rather sleep in yeah for an hour I'd rather not run this far I'd rather not write this many pages in my new book I'd rather just play games anyway we can push ourselves just a little bit more is going to make us more fulfilled as well yeah so how did this Will Smith thing come about you know some of our crushing few million copies sold yeah and he just gets her cell phone and calls you his agent leave pretty much the opposite [Laughter] eight different gatekeepers before I even when you reached out to him first no no no so he's actually he's been looking to do a book for a while yeah and and he read I think his manager read subtle art gave it to him he read it and really liked it and and so then he kind of tapped his team said yeah let's talk to this guy so I had this was he was late 2017 I was actually out here I went down the so nice to do well first I had some phone calls and then I'm with that Missoni studios met with his team and we need to make sure that our values align and that we feel the same way about a lot of issues so we got along it went great and then they told me their they were like and like okay cool so I think the next step is for you to actually like meet will and see if you guys fill it out get along well and I was like cool awesome they said uh you know we'll be in touch okay like four months go by really don't you don't hear anything crickets crickets I'm like all right and the whole time in my head I'm like alright I'm not gonna you know don't count your eggs before they do your chickens before they hatch or whatever the saying is like it's like I'm just not gonna expect anything and I'll just be glad if it happens so so you're playing Zelda for four months yeah and so suddenly I get an email and they're like like hey so will wants to meet you we want to fly you out to London because he was doing the Aladdin movie yeah I was like okay cool you know just let me know when I'll check my schedule and then they come back this was like on a Tuesday and they come back Morrow they're like Thursday like two days from that I was like are you people insane you know it's so I had a conflict you know I had like at an event or something I'm like I can't go and they're like okay then like two months later two months ago but someone's later oh yeah and then and then they come again and they're like like okay so you're gonna you're gonna fly out to Miami you're gonna meet them and this time I was ready you know they're like you know tomorrow I'm like cool I'm in ticket never comes and then we kept going through this for like months really and I I actually haven't talked to them about it but I'm pretty sure it was intentional it was to see if I would basically be a prima donna like if I'd be like this is you don't respect my time like how can you like how can we collaborate if you're not even gonna like you know it's his life is so crazy in his schedule so crazy and like he can literally just get on a plane and fly to another continent for an afternoon and then fly back like that they need to make sure that I'm gonna be okay you know like I'm not gonna take it personally if he gets on a plane and goes to Africa and I'm like just twiddling my thumbs on the runway like I'm not gonna get upset about it so finally about after about six or eight months of this you know I they said you know can you come down in two days I'm like yeah plane ticket comes through finally and I'm like alright here we go and so I went down to Georgia and met him on he was doing he was on the set of Gemini man and yeah he comes out just Fresh Prince man same as ever fine just good from the kid the first moment he's just goofing off like just totally goofing joking laughing nicest guy in the world and then yeah I ended up I spent about four days with him and and it was no pressure was just you know talk get to know each other and then at the end of those four days it was actually funny we're at where I'd dinner with like a group of like ten people and I'm sitting across from him like like this and we're all we're like just joking around his kids are there and we're just having like a nice relaxed dinner and almost sudden in the middle of the meal I was I was going home like the next afternoon in the middle of dinner he just looks at me and he's like so mark we got a book or what and I was like the whole room goes silent like oh I taught him I was like well I've got some ideas but you know let me write him up and I'll show him to you in the morning and he's like all right yeah let's do it and so run back to my hotel room and I'm like you know one of my ideas yeah it's like okay god I gotta come up with an idea no I I did have a I did have an idea that I felt really good about so I went back to hotel room wrote it up met him for breakfast pulled out my laptop showed him like a brief outline and yeah within 30 seconds he was like this is it Wow this is it yeah he's like done so what's pretty inspiring man it's crazy it was absolutely absolutely crazy Wow yeah what can you share about the product the book and the interviews you've done with him and the whole process since that moment sure you guys take it to a publisher right away did it take him another eight months I mean well yeah Austin's like so we did that was about a year ago so we did publisher pitches in the summer so he and I met about once a month for three or four months just to get a proposal together get like an outline proposal for people who don't know I know you know if I like you the process of making a book is you you write out kind of like a 20 to 30 page proposal which is you've got an outline you have a sample chapter you have maybe an introduction and then you take it to all the publishers and they they bid on it they give you they offer you a certain amount of money or whatever so we did that and then he came here to New York over the summer and we did we took all the publisher meetings and it was funny because it together you did it yeah we did it together was that like being in the room with him just being like yeah no it's being in the room with him it's um I just I I always tell my friends it's like an alternate universe because it's just the the attention like the energy and the attention just there's like this vortex around him and in any room that he goes into I mean part of it is just the level of his charisma but part of its the celebrity thing part of it you know like if he goes into a hotel lobby it's just bananas like people forget they're working security guards like leave their post to come take a self you know it's crazy it gets it's completely nuts so the publisher meetings were really funny because you know a lot of them were like very very starstruck a lot of them brought like teams of like 12 people or like just like four yeah it's like it's like okay you know these three people need to be here those nine definitely do not but you know so it was a little bit of a circus but it was I mean it was it was a hell of an experience I mean and you know those two like when you when you and I pitch to a publisher you know you swept out to New York you get in a taxi you go to their office you like show up you like you're like you know here's my idea you know you try to sell it to them and you get maybe 10 minutes at most 15 and then you hop back in a taxi and you like go to another office and and it's we basically just post it up in a penthouse in a hotel and they just shuttled all these publishers no way yeah it came to you they came to us we had we ever happens we had multiple rounds of bidding so I think like 23 publishers bid on it the first round and then we took the top six and went to the second so it was just surreal I mean the whole time I was just like enjoying the ride he'll sell it so the lessons you learned from an author perspective on how to approach publishers differently whether you're a big star like Will Smith or not how could you take that lesson going into your next pitch alone so actually one of the cool things about hanging out with will is it's like I'm learning a lot from him too along the way and a lot of it's not stuff that's gonna be in the book a lot of its just kind of business sense type things you know he's been in the entertainment biz for since he was 17 mm-hm and he's been at the top of music TV film everything and so one I remember one time he was telling me he said that after they did bad boys or in the early 90s when he was like bad boys was like his for everybody members Independence Day but bad boys was actually like his first feature film that like mm kind of blew up and he said that after they did bad boys him and Martin Lawrence he said that the studios were really unsure if they could if it would sell well internationally and and so we'll went to the studio and he was like hey man any country you want me to go to like I'm in let me know and and so the studio's started sending him you know to London to Germany to Russia to South Africa and he'd do every trip you know he'd hop on the plane and fly to one then do a premiere do like 20 interviews hop back on the jet fly back to LA and he'd he'd do that on the weekends while filming Fresh Prince Wow and he said that Martin Lawrence didn't didn't want to do the traveling and then he said that what he noticed when it came time to do the next movie he start like studio started giving him much nicer offers and giving him a lot more attention and he said that what he learned is he said that it's being an actor the job isn't the movie he said the movie is only half of your job as an actor the other half is you got to go out and sell it to people and I really took that to heart because that's it's a perfect it's the same way and publishing as an author totally it's like and there's so many authors out there who spend two years on their book and then they're like well okay I'll post it on Twitter but you know why should I have to do anything you know you guys should go do it and and so my approach especially this time around is like this is part of the job you know and even with subtle art I I kind of griped and complained a little bit you know it's like man I'm doing all these podcasts like what the hell is my publisher doing from you know it's like what is this cool greatest show yeah but but now you're doing this tour yeah I'm doing a tour I'm doing and it's my attitude this time around is completely changed it's like this is part of the job this is part of why they're paying me yeah you know so like I flew out here I flew out here to LA on my own dime I'm doing like seven podcasts and YouTube shows you know on my own I'm not asking for anything I'm not like not sitting around you know demanding more attention and sure you know it's like no this is part of the job so luckily he got lots of dimes saved up yes that's interesting yeah I've heard him talk about the before where he's like known for being one of the people that stays the longest on like the red card red carpets like him and Tom Cruise like having battles to see who could stay the longest time the most autographs take the most photos and he would always lose I guess a Tom Cruise or something yeah yeah she was dated for 24 hours just like taking photos until he saw Will Smith yeah that's cool so that's that's one big lesson what else what other lesson have you learned from him so far can I spend like 30 hours with him I think you said yeah I've done a number of trips with him there's a lot of little life things you know he told me it was funny because this fall so when I was finishing like my book that's coming out next week when I was finishing everything this I actually so let me back up for a second so this fall he typical will style like just I got an email from his manager saying like hey you want to go like you want to do a trip with will next week I'm like yeah of course where we going and she's like India and then Dubai and oh and he's gonna race like f1 cars yeah and I was like okay I feel like I'm in alright so I end up like on like five days notice I end up on this two-week trip with will to India and Dubai and so I'm doing I'm doing wills book I'm finishing my book I'm doing this project for audible I'm doing like an audible original and I'm running a website with 2 million readers mm-hmm and I'm in the middle of India with will you know so and I'm like jet-lagged out of my mind and and so there was a there was a few months this fall where I was probably the most stressed I've been since I started my business like just not sleeping constant anxiety just working insane hours and so I'm like this huge ball of stress and I get on this plane and I'm in the middle of India with will and and so private jet yeah well once you get there it's my idea but so I'm sitting there on the jet with will so stressed out on the jet with will yeah yeah my life is so hard but like I'm sitting there with Wilin and we were talking about we were talking about his career in the 90s so he would film fresh prints the week fly somewhere to do some promotional thing on the weekends and then during breaks and this between the seasons is when he would he would film his next movie Wow so I mean he's just basically going seven days a week oh and he's like recording music Big Willie style and the soundtrack to men in black and like all this stuff so I asked him I kind of told him the situation I was in and and I asked him I'm like God I told my said I feel like I'm in kind of like one of those situations where I've got like movie TV show and album going on at the same time except for me it's book book audiobook yeah all at the same time and I was like how the hell do you do it and and he just kind of laughed and he's like you know what you know what the trick is I said what he's like what you do is you just bite off more than you can chew he said agree to do more than you think is possible and then you just go do it and it's it sounds so simple but it was like one of those moments we're just like a switch clicked in my brain and I'm like wow that's crazy because you like we all know we're capable of doing so much more than we actually do but the only way you can really tap into that is to just overcome it like just overcome it yourself and you find a way like you just find a way to do it and so he's like yeah man you just bite off more than you can chew and start chewing it yeah you probably eliminate a lot of the down time that wastes time - you're not playing video games for three hours a day or watching TV you're just focused yeah yeah it's purely out of necessity like it's just pure like on that India trip I was up at I mean I was jet-lagged but I was up at 4 a.m. writing my book for six hours before meeting up with him and then spending the afternoon with him you know and then when I would go back to my hotel at night my team in the US was waking up so I would check in with them on the website and then I'd go to bed and then I'd wake up at 4:00 crank on my book for six hours go meet up with will work with him for a few hours go back to hotel check in with my team and I did that the entire trip and if you would ask me like if I was capable of doing that two years ago I would Finn like are you are you insane like absolutely but it's just I see when I'm with him I see him do it you know like he'll go film all day and then he'll come back to the house and meet with his social media team and plan videos for that month until like 10 o'clock and then he'll go to bed he'll be up at 5:00 working out and it's like that's just he's been doing that for 30 years the Machine man for 30 years what about someone who's listening you says well it doesn't sound like a very balanced life and that's gonna create overwhelm and burnout and stress the sheriff's is gonna you know ruin everything for me I think there's I think that's a really good point and it's I think what because I've had periods in my life where I have worked kind of insane 16-hour days or whatever and it's just exhausting and stressful and everything else in my life kind of falls apart where's with him he somehow does it like gracefully and I think got a family he's married his job yet yeah and I think part of it like he told me he told me something really cool and it's funny because again it's advice that you hear a lot but it's just the way he put it was very powerful so when you hear people talk about delegation or like oh yeah you should anything that you're not great at and you should like hire somebody who is and it's like that's fine he said the same thing but he talked about it in like a moral way like he basically said he's like if I'm doing something he's like I'm world class and a couple things yeah and so if I'm doing things anything else if I'm doing anything else then I am ethically like isn't ethical problems like hurting the world to say exactly he's depriving the world another thing that he's world-class at and he said if I'm not hiring somebody who's world-class at the thing I'm bad at I'm doing the world a disservice by not them not doing their world class that is powerful I was like oh damn dude yeah you're right yeah you're right yeah Wow man what do you think his greatest challenge is being being a superstar that everyone loves that he gets opportunities left and right what do you see is like his biggest struggle or a way for him to get to the next level seeing it from the outside well I think I think the challenge for him lately is in this Tyson a lot to what we were talking about with with my last book his biggest challenge the last ten years has been redefining what the next level is reinventing himself yeah because it's free for years and years and years it was always bigger movie next movie big a movie and he hit a point where he was like I need to I need to change my metric for like what the next level is now and that that's how those book came about like this is this is why we're writing the book is he wants to share that process you know of like look I went out and conquered the world achieved all these things but like at the end of the day this is this is how I kind of like these were my struggles and how I had to kind of reorient my life mm-hmm in my later years so it's gonna be amazing book the amazing book it's gonna be his whole life all the all the nitty gritty details a lot of stuff he hasn't talked about before and then about kind of how his whole philosophy and mindset has changed the last six or seven years wow that's cool if you could give him one piece of advice what would it be that would better in his life he said you mark give me the piece of advice that you think I mean you've seen me for the last year now you've seen my team you've seen my delegation process you see me on flights you see me late night you seem you have a lot of fun and conquer the world what piece of advice would you have for me to get to the next load I don't know man I'm gonna have to pass on that one no advice you know maybe you left the wait wait wait for the hallway well wait for the bus no it's not that I don't have anything I would say but I think it's it's personal enough and the books not out mm-hm sure that I would when the books out and then it will will see the advice yeah and so this book everything is a book about hope why should we who is this really for who needs this right now yeah and why should they get it right now so the people I wrote the book form it's there are two things kind of going on in our culture today one is what we mentioned which is the increases in depression anxiety suicide drug overdoses like all those things are on the rise and it's I think there's a real lack of you know our culture's approach to those issues is you know either just medicate it or you know oh go see a therapist somewhere you know like we don't want to deal with it like it's just it's not talked about not not only like depression itself but why these things are becoming more prevalent what is it about our culture's that the technology is it social media is it you know political issues like what is going on is that's causing these these demographical things to start happening and then the second one is why why does it seem like we why do we all have seemingly have the feeling that the world is going to hell even though it's not like what like if you I you and I both have to be on social media I know when you get on it's like you see the same things I do and everybody else does like you would think some days I get on Twitter and you would think that like the apocalypse is upon us you know and it's and it's just people freaking out about this or that and they freak out and they argue and they bicker and they you know try to tarnish each other and try to ruin each other's reputations and then the next day it's something else and and so the book is also look at how you know really what is it about the way we're getting information that causes these perceptions you know that causes what is it about the Internet and the technology that has changed our relationship with our culture so much so that we're like it the feeling is that we're always adversarial yeah and I think I think one part you know one component everybody likes to either blame the media or they everybody likes to blame social media or everybody likes to blame you know like Facebook or Trump or whoever and it's I think there's something underlying all of them there's like something more fundamental I think they're those are all effects of like a more singular cause yeah so yeah it's it's deep stuff and it's hopefully it's you know Mike my goal with it is to just help people a little bit like things like my perspective to find perspective because I think I think really the only way we're gonna get through this is by really understanding how our relationship to these technologies affects us emotionally and it's nobody's fault it's like it's just our brains evolved a certain way and that these technologies they react they cause reactions that we aren't even aware of yeah I just had Cal Newport on recently oh yeah yeah writes about the deep work and essentially digital minimalism yeah he's not on social media at all yeah and his thesis is you know social media is essentially ruining us yeah you know the addictive nature of it keeps us trapped to feel anxiety to feel stress to feel comparison to feel overwhelmed and it's hard to do meaningful fulfilling work in our lives yes when we're constantly in that loop of feeling trapped in a dead absolutely and one thing I talk about in the book is that I really think technology for how great it is it is developed to take advantage of our psychological flaws rather than compensate for them you know so it's like our brains just don't worry rational creatures we've got all sorts of biases and prejudices and all this stuff and instead of developing technology that like helps us get over those flaws that technology taps into them because it it makes it more profitable yeah so it's it's a look at how that happens why that happens and you know how can we kind of armor ourselves to to keep it together it's a powerful man the book you guys can get the book right now it's all about hope if you need help in your life everything is it's a book about hope exciting ties man you got a lot going on it's really cool to hear the stories and I'm excited to hear more about how this book the results of this book and how you feel in six months to a year from this your next project with Will Smith and everything else you have coming out after that so I'm excited to hear about all this man final two questions before I ask the final two questions I don't acknowledge you again mark for showing up because some people when they hit the top they can just stop ya and take it easy and plays out it for five years so you did that for a little bit yeah but now you're showing back up in a better way and you're challenging yourself physically emotionally spiritually intellectually everything to to go beyond where you're at right now in a different way yeah you know maybe it's not hitting the same measure of success but going deeper maybe it's trying a different thing that you're not comfortable with sure and I really acknowledge that for you man because it could be super easy to just say I want to ride this for the next 5-10 years yeah and you know I want to make sure the audience knows zelda's a really good game yeah you know I'm not ripping challenging but yeah it's sitting on that couch man it's it's like and again this is this is what kind of infused the new book is like I my big discovery after subtle art is like I'm not happy without challenging mm-hmm when you remove all the challenge it just I break down I think most of us are not happy without a challenge if we're just sitting on a beach every single day it gets like tiring it's boring yeah I mean sure maybe it's nice for a few months if you've been working your butt off for your whole life but it's like we find fulfillment in the service of others you know challenges we face and overcome we don't find fulfillment from just laying in a hammock 24/7 yeah absolutely having everything handed to us and it's funny because you got to learn that lesson over and over again so you know you you are brain just keeps tricking you it's like whoa yeah that's true but if you do this one thing then it's gonna be great you know it's like no it's never it's never done and I think it's important to make sure you give your body and your mind time to rest and recover and yeah you know to be on the beach for a week or two or whatever it may be to you to reflect to have that offseason to recharge but that shouldn't be the norm there's gonna be every single day so this was called the three truths you answer the last time but I want to see if you have different truths I'm not even sure if you remember what's your answer I don't yeah I know so now that a year and a half has passed and you've done so many new things you've learned new things in your life imagine this is the last day of your life 100 something years from now and you picked the day and you've accomplished everything yeah you achieve everything you want yeah you reinvent every year you have an amazing life sure but it's your last day and you've got to you've got a you've got to go and all of your work has to go with you so no one has access to your written word anymore yeah but you get to leave people with the message three things you know to to be true about everything you've experienced in your life okay and this would be the thing that people have to remember you by three lessons or three truths by Mark man so what would you say and I'm gonna look back to see what they were last time but I always always man you always throw like the bomb most difficult philosophical questions as if you're like so what do you three truths for what's coming up for you now from everything you've learned you know I think I I would say you know I'll say the three truths that are like most salient for me today that I've learned recently or felt very intensely recently one is definitely that one that it that I said that like I need I need some stress to be happy like it's funny because my 20-17 I didn't do a damn thing well I did some things but like I sat around a lot and mail a bunch of money and then 20 18 I was like working stressed out of my mind and my if I had to do one of those two years over again I'd do 20 18 like no question totally do it again and that was a big realization that it's like for whatever reason like I some stress and anxiety makes me happy like makes me feel good so I'd be one too I would say and again this is might be salient just because we only because we just talking about it I would say that there's no actual end point to any of this there's no there's no one goal that you're gonna be like awesome great career I'm done yeah I'm done like there's no you know it's probably the same thing with kids or family or like there's just the way that we are constructed psychologically is such that everything we're we're always mildly dissatisfied and that's by design and that's what's gotten you know that's what's created civilization in the world and it's if I think it's just important to hold that in our mind and be realistic about it you know it's it's don't like don't delude yourself that if you just have this one thing if you could just go you know live on an island or if you could just get this car or whatever that it's everything it's gonna be great it's not it's not third one third truth so hard man this is why write books all right so I guess been a yeah it explaining third truth I think ultimately what matters most is just people is is is the connect the connections you make and how connected you feel with others and so any any sort of analysis you do in your head in terms like decision making I think people tend to underestimate human connection and overestimate material success and big numbers and stuff like that and so whenever you're doing that analysis you know pump pump inflate the human connection number a little bit and deflate the you know material a little bit so that's cool man I like it I'll go with that I like it man the new book you guys can get it now everything is a book about hope get one for yourself and a few friends come see me on tour come see you on tour mark Manson dotnet have all the events I'm assuming yep the books everything that you want to all the articles lots of amazing articles there your your more on social media now before you weren't really it was like once every three months from now you're more on social media which is great so people make sure you share out tagged him when you get the book let them know that you're getting the book when you're listening to this interview make sure you tag mark as well anything else we need to know I think that's it that's it okay final question what's your definition of greatness see has changed my definition of greatness I think it's just it's just showing up a hundred percent for whatever you value it whatever you mirror about like really just not leaving anything on the table you know whether whether you want to just be the best mom the world has ever seen or the best preschool teacher or lawn mower man whatever the hell you're doing you know it's like if that's what you're doing and your showing up fully putting everything into it and getting better at it consistently like that's what matters mmm my advances my man yeah appreciate you man

Channel: Lewis Howes

Views: 69,936

Rating: 4.8989472 out of 5

Keywords: lewishowes, the school of greatness, podcast, 2019, interview, tony robbins, sucess, money, business, millionaire, secrets, how to, lewis howes, relationship, your life it not over, friendship, know your worth, your heart will heal, are they really your friends, loyalty, mel robbins, oprah, ellen, motivation, success, mark manson, will smith

Id: xuUHBnTTqjo

Length: 64min 1sec (3841 seconds)

Published: Mon May 06 2019