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Why You Feel Like a Failure (Even When You're Not) — Transcript

by Mark Manson · 10,765 words · 1,683 segments · language en · Watch on YouTube

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0:00So we have now managed to get 2 hours
0:02into a podcast about failure without
0:05actually defining failure. And there
0:07there is actually a very good reason for
0:09this, which is that failure is
0:10completely relative. It's failure
0:12compared to what, right? What is the
0:15standard or expectation that you're
0:17setting that is defining your failure.
0:19So it it is actually difficult to define
0:22failure without first looking at the
0:25standards and expectations we set for
0:27ourselves. And it turns out that those
0:29standards and expectations
0:31are very deeply linked with
0:33how we see who we are. And the best
0:35vehicle to explain this phenomenon and
0:39this experience that we all have, I
0:41actually think is
0:42one of the most popular religions in the
0:45world, which is Buddhism. I'm going to
0:46tell briefly the the story of the Buddha
0:49again. I'm going to tell it with a
0:51little bit of a twist, in a way that I
0:53think will help us understand failure
0:55and loss on on a a deeper, more profound
0:58level. So for people who don't know,
1:01the Buddha was born a prince to a very
1:04wealthy family. And the Buddha's father
1:07was apparently a very bold and ambitious
1:10man, and when his son was born, he
1:12decided that he wanted to create an
1:14environment that his son would never
1:16know lack, would never know pain, would
1:19never know loss, would never know
1:20failure. And so he contrived everything
1:23in his son's environment to fulfill
1:26every wish, every desire. So supposedly
1:29as the myth goes, as the Buddha grew up,
1:32he never wanted for anything. Anything
1:34he wanted at any time it was immediately
1:36given to him, and he never had to deal
1:38with any problem, he never had to take
1:40responsibility for any struggle, any
1:43outcome. Everything was just
1:45easy peasy
1:47lemon breezy. Now interestingly, this
1:49became very dissatisfying for him. I
1:51think he probably intuited once he
1:53became an adult that this was kind of an
1:55empty life. Like it was just this
1:57hedonic treadmill of indulgences and and
2:00ever-escalating novelty. And at a
2:03certain point, he decided that he wanted
2:06to actually experience the world. And so
2:08late one night, he snuck out of the
2:09palace and he encounters four different
2:11people that all all of them shock him.
2:14So the first one is is an aging and
2:16withered old man. He had never seen
2:18somebody old before and this kind of
2:21freaked him out. The second thing he saw
2:22was a deeply sick person, someone
2:25riddled with disease and deeply
2:27suffering because of it. The third thing
2:29he saw was a corpse on the side of the
2:31road. He had never seen anybody who was
2:33dead before.
2:34And then the last thing he saw was a
2:36wandering ascetic,
2:37which was at the time it was a monk that
2:40gave away all possessions and just kind
2:41of wandered around, took took a vow of
2:44poverty, I suppose. Now all these things
2:46completely shocked him. Like he had
2:47never been exposed to anything like this
2:50in his life and it kind of gave him a
2:52wake-up call and he realized, "You know
2:53what? I got to get out and the world. I
2:56need to learn and understand everything
2:58that's going on that I I haven't been
3:00exposed to before." So soon after, he
3:02planned to exit the palace for good. He
3:04had a wife and a child. He left them in
3:07the middle of the night without saying
3:08goodbye to them. And he decided to
3:11wander
3:13the wilderness as an ascetic himself. He
3:15gave up all possessions. He took a vow
3:18of poverty. He supposedly lived on like
3:21a single peanut each day. He basically
3:25intensely suffered intentionally for
3:29an extended period of time.
3:30Intentionally suffering isn't really
3:32satisfying either. It's just kind of
3:34another form of indulgence, just you
3:37know, with a different flavor, I
3:38suppose.
3:40And so eventually he came to the
3:41conclusion that like this wasn't really
3:43leading anywhere either. And so that's
3:45when he went and sat underneath the
3:46Bodhi tree and he decided that he was
3:48not going to get up until he had a
3:50better idea.
3:51And that's when he became enlightened. I
3:53find this story interesting because
3:55earlier we were talking about kind of
3:56the Hegelian dialectic, this the thesis,
3:59the antithesis, the synthesis. I think
4:01we could look at the Buddhist story of
4:03kind of a an example of that dialectic
4:05at work, right? So, you have this this
4:08prince who's born into a life of luxury.
4:10He has zero problems, zero failures,
4:13right? That's kind of our our natural
4:15instinct is to avoid any loss or
4:17failure.
4:18That is not satisfying because you don't
4:20grow, you don't have accountability for
4:22anything, you don't have any
4:23repercussions for anything, you never
4:25have to change. And that's not living.
4:27That's not a life, right? So, he becomes
4:29dissatisfied with that and then he goes
4:31to the other extreme, which is he seeks
4:32out failure. He seeks out pain. He seeks
4:34out loss. And he tries to indulge and
4:38optimize that suffering
4:41to to achieve some some degree of
4:43enlightenment or or self-empowerment.
4:46And he realizes that too is a dead end.
4:48That is just another form of
4:50self-indulgence and it is also an
4:53unhealthy relationship with failure and
4:55loss. And so the synthesis that he
4:57arrives at, I guess you could say under
4:58the Bodhi tree, is that
5:01everything
5:03is a sense of loss. Everything is an
5:06eventual failure. Because the moment you
5:09attach yourself to any thought, any
5:11desire,
5:13any identification,
5:15you are defining the terms of your
5:17future failure. Because nothing lasts
5:20and because nothing lasts, anything that
5:22you attach yourself to is destined to
5:25fail you at some point. From a Buddhist
5:27perspective, every time you say I am and
5:30then finish the sentence,
5:31you are committing a a very subtle act
5:34of self-harm because you are setting the
5:35standards and expectations by which
5:37you're going to measure yourself. And by
5:38definition, every measurement and
5:40standard you set for yourself is one day
5:41going to fail you. So, as soon as you
5:44define yourself in any way, shape, or
5:46form, you are also defining the terms of
5:48your future failures. So, in this sense,
5:50failure is not only
5:52inevitable, it is
5:54a fundamental part of
5:57our consciousness and the way we
5:59experience the world.
6:01Now, the Buddhist response to this is
6:04that you just shouldn't define yourself
6:05at all. That you should let go of all
6:07attachments, all standards, all
6:09expectations.
6:11And this is a pretty radical idea. I
6:13mean, this is this ultimately is the
6:15realization that the Buddha came to
6:17sitting underneath the Bodhi tree and
6:18became the kind of the foundational
6:20premise of
6:22the philosophy of Buddhism. But, I do
6:24think there is a lot of wisdom in that
6:25of
6:26at least defining yourself extremely
6:28loosely and not being too invested or
6:31too attached to any single definition of
6:34self because the more invested you are
6:36in any definition of self, the more you
6:38bank your self-esteem or how you feel
6:40about yourself on any single narrow
6:42definition, the more vulnerable you're
6:44making yourself
6:45for when the eventual failures do occur.
6:48I'm not really going to recommend that
6:50everybody goes full Buddhist
6:52>> [laughter]
6:53>> and just like sits in a corner and
6:55stares at a wall and tries to let go
6:57relinquish every single form of
6:59identification and attachment in their
7:00lives.
7:01I don't think that's necessarily
7:04practical in 2026.
7:06But, I do think it's an incredibly
7:08important principle to understand
7:11and I think as a a mental exercise, it
7:15is useful for people to kind of explore
7:18this idea that a lot of their
7:20self-definition and a lot of the
7:23standards and expectations that they've
7:24invited into their lives are completely
7:26arbitrary, are completely self-defined,
7:29and don't necessarily need to exist.
7:31Like, you can kind of just stop
7:33measuring yourself in certain ways
7:35technically whenever you want.
7:37>> Right. Okay, so you're advocating for
7:39Buddhism light?
7:40>> Yes.
7:40>> It kind of sounds like a diet
7:41>> A diet Buddhism.
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8:54All right, we're back. Where were we?
8:56>> This kind of leads to the four noble
8:58truths of Buddhism, right? Like the
8:59first noble truth being life is
9:01suffering or some sort of
9:02dissatisfaction that's just inherent in
9:04life. The second noble truth I think was
9:06that we create a lot of that suffering
9:09though, too. And this is kind of what
9:10you're getting at, is that these
9:11attachments that we have or these
9:13identities that we identify with or
9:15these these things that we call
9:16ourselves, that creates some sort of
9:19inevitable future failure that you're
9:21talking about that will generate more
9:23suffering for us if we hold on to them
9:26so tightly. So, you're not advocating
9:28necessarily going and sitting under the
9:30Bodhi tree and and reaching full
9:31enlightenment, although if you can,
9:33great, right? But, just being aware of
9:36that, being aware of those attachments
9:38and the the failures they're setting you
9:40up for is something that can be useful
9:43for us because we can not attach to them
9:46so tightly if we're more aware of them.
9:48Is that what you're saying?
9:49>> Whenever we pursue something or we're
9:50interested in something, I think we're
9:52psychologically predisposed to only see
9:54the upside of the success of that thing.
9:57While we tend to ignore the inevitable
10:00failure of that thing.
10:00>> The inherent inevitable failure. Okay,
10:02yeah.
10:03>> And and what's funny, too, is like I
10:05think it's really important for the
10:06listener to to get this, too. Like this
10:08isn't just about trying to achieve
10:10something and failing. Like it's not
10:11like
10:12like trying to lose some weight and not
10:14quite losing it. Like
10:16sometimes the failure is precipitated by
10:19succeeding at the thing, right? So like
10:21let's say I want to become a parent and
10:24I want to I want to parent a child.
10:26Well, if I parent successfully, I'm
10:28going to raise this a healthy,
10:30independent adult who's no longer going
10:32to need me around anymore, which it
10:33means like being a successful parent
10:35means you no longer have to parent
10:37somebody.
10:37>> So so even success can hold the seeds of
10:39failure.
10:40>> Correct.
10:40>> And you're just kind of screwed either
10:41way.
10:42>> Correct. [laughter]
10:43>> Yeah, okay.
10:43>> this is like and I mean this is what is
10:45so powerful about the first noble truth
10:47is like everything is impermanent.
10:49>> Every single thing, right?
10:50>> Nothing lasts.
10:50>> Yeah, yeah.
10:51>> Everything goes away at some point. And
10:54it goes away whether you succeed at it,
10:57it goes away whether you fail at it, it
10:58goes away no matter what. So anything
11:00you attach yourself to, anything you
11:03define yourself by,
11:05you are tacitly signing up for the thing
11:07that is going to eventually disappoint
11:09you or or the thing that you're
11:11eventually going to grieve. I mean, that
11:12sounds kind of dark and
11:14sad, but like
11:16it's inevitable.
11:17>> Right.
11:18>> Right? So it it it's it's not
11:20necessarily a sad thing. So it the the
11:22question then becomes what is worth
11:23doing even though you know you will
11:25probably lose it one day.
11:26>> Mhm.
11:27>> Right? It is for I think for many people
11:29it's like
11:30being a parent is worth it even though
11:33they understand that one day they're not
11:34going to be a parent anymore. I think
11:36about this, you know, with marriage,
11:37right? There is going to come a day
11:39where
11:40either my wife or I die before the other
11:42one, right? And it's
11:44it's still worth doing though
11:47even though you know that that is going
11:48to eventually happen. It becomes a very
11:50useful compass for people to think about
11:53what they invest themselves into because
11:55that, you know, last chapter we both
11:57gave some examples of like very
11:58superficial things that we pursued
12:00really just to kind of like win a little
12:02bit of status and approval from others
12:04and how empty that is. I think this is
12:06kind of the the rubric for how do you
12:09pursue something that is really
12:11worthwhile.
12:12>> Mhm. Mhm. [clears throat]
12:13>> over the long run.
12:13>> You know, the third noble truth is that
12:16it is possible to escape suffering,
12:18right? Even if you lose something, even
12:20if you fail at it. Uh and then the
12:22fourth noble truth is how you do that
12:24that that the eightfold path what they
12:25call this is how you live to in order to
12:27do that.
12:28>> Again, what you're saying is you don't
12:28have to sit under the Bodhi tree
12:30>> Yes.
12:30>> and become enlightened to do that. Is
12:32this what they mean by I'm kind of
12:33becoming an amateur Buddhist? Okay,
12:35there this is I've been looking into it
12:36before this episode even started.
12:37>> Yeah.
12:38>> Is this what they mean by the middle
12:39way? Is this what I I not I don't know
12:41if I completely understand the middle
12:42way in Buddhism. Is that what they Do
12:44you know about this at all?
12:45>> It's very similar it's very
12:46Aristotelian. Like it's like any pursuit
12:49there is
12:50you will kind of naturally be there's a
12:52magnetic pull towards either extreme,
12:55right? There's there's always a tendency
12:57of like you should try to go out and
12:58make all the money or you should just
13:00never not care about money at all,
13:02right? Where it's like actually the way
13:05of non-attachment is
13:06understanding that money matters, but
13:08it's also not everything, right? So,
13:09there's always kind of this
13:11>> Okay. Like the virtue is found in the
13:13balance. That's the Aristotelian view,
13:15but in the in the Buddhist view it's the
13:16middle way, which is
13:17>> Yes.
13:17>> how you become non-attached to seeing
13:19both of those simultaneously.
13:21>> Yeah, and we talked about this a little
13:22bit in the values episode where it is
13:26actually a a highly functional person
13:29you have a almost like a balance of
13:31power of values within you. Like you
13:33have this tension between all the
13:34different things that you value in your
13:36life and you're you often have to make
13:38compromises between them.
13:40Whereas like an unhealthy individual is
13:42when one value kind of takes over and
13:44becomes a tyrant and and every other
13:47value or or thing of importance has to
13:49be sacrificed to that single value. Like
13:51that's that's where dysfunction comes
13:53from. That's where imbalance comes from
13:55and and Aristotle would say that would
13:57that would mean living unvirtuously and
13:59then a Buddhist would say that you have
14:01become attached to to something and and
14:04and that is the root of your suffering
14:06as a result.
14:06>> Right. Okay.
14:07>> There's kind of two other principles
14:08that I think are worth touching on that
14:10kind of flow out of this idea that that
14:12failure is an inevitable side effect of
14:15just setting standards or expectations
14:17for yourself. So, the first one is is
14:19that failure is relative and it's
14:20relational. There's never just failure
14:23in a vacuum. It's always failure
14:25compared to what?
14:26Right? What is the expectation or
14:28standard that you have set and then it
14:31what is the gap between what happened
14:33and that outcome? I think everybody has
14:35had a series of these experiences
14:37throughout their lives where like
14:39something has happened to you and it
14:41initially felt like a failure because it
14:43didn't meet the expectation you had in
14:45that moment but then as you kind of
14:48processed it and thought about it, you
14:49suddenly realized like wait, this is
14:51actually a really good thing. Oh, I'm
14:53actually glad this happened. This isn't
14:55a failure at all, right? Like we've all
14:56had that experience before. I think one
14:58of the most profound and world-changing
15:01versions of this was a Alexander
15:03Fleming. So, Fleming was a a biologist
15:06and he was he was studying bacterial
15:08cultures and he went on vacation. He
15:10accidentally forgot to seal some of the
15:14the bacteria that he was studying and so
15:16I guess the Petri dishes like became
15:18overgrown with mold while he was gone.
15:21So, when he came back the specimens that
15:22he was studying had like
15:24were ruined by a bunch of mold. And so,
15:26by the standard of a biologist studying
15:28bacteria, he had actually failed
15:29spectacularly. He had like destroyed
15:32dozens of samples by leaving them out
15:34and not protecting them appropriately.
15:36But what he noticed after he kind of
15:38cleaned everything up is he noticed that
15:39where the mold was, bacteria wouldn't
15:42grow in its place. And this eventually
15:45led to the discovery of penicillin,
15:46which is
15:47derived from a form of mold. And
15:49penicillin has arguably gone on and
15:51saved probably more lives than maybe
15:53almost anything.
15:54>> The first antibiotic, yeah.
15:55>> It's the the first anti- antibiotic. I
15:57mean, it's like saved hundreds of
15:59millions of lives, maybe even a billion
16:01lives, who knows. And this was
16:02discovered as a failure. It was a form
16:04of failure. But if you move the goal
16:06posts, it's actually one of the greatest
16:08successes in human history. This sort of
16:10stuff happens everywhere. I mean, I see
16:12it like in our business, this industry,
16:15podcasting, online content, media,
16:17everything. It is changing so fast. I
16:19mean, how many times do I change our
16:23business strategy?
16:24>> Yeah,
16:24>> [laughter]
16:25>> by the end of the month I'm not even
16:26sure what we're measuring anymore, yeah.
16:27>> Sometimes, yeah.
16:29>> [laughter]
16:29>> Because we have to, I yeah.
16:30>> Yeah, sometimes I feel bad for the team
16:32I feel like the team gets whiplash cuz
16:33it's like every other quarter I'm like,
16:34"Okay guys, we're changing everything."
16:36[laughter]
16:37>> We're going to look at something
16:37completely different now, yeah.
16:38>> But it what what happens so often is
16:41that it's like you define standards and
16:43expectations for the quarter or for the
16:45year, and then you get to June and
16:46you're like, "Oh, this actually isn't
16:49what we should be optimizing for
16:50anymore. We need to change our
16:52definition of success, and that means we
16:54need to change our downstream strategy."
16:55And you run into this in romantic
16:57relationships as well. I would say the
16:59majority of fights within a romantic
17:01relationship is the downstream result of
17:04either two people having different
17:06expectations about certain things or one
17:10person failing to shift their
17:12expectations about something based on
17:14new evidence or or a new experience. So,
17:17failure is inevitable, failure is
17:19relative and relational, and the last
17:21one is that failures therefore
17:23arbitrary. It is a made-up concept. The
17:26idea that Alexander Fleming failed as a
17:29biologist is a completely made-up
17:30definition. The idea that a golfer
17:33failed because he missed a putt
17:36is completely made up. Putting a ball in
17:38a hole 400 yards away, like this is a
17:40completely arbitrary construct that a
17:43bunch of people came together and just
17:44agreed was important. And
17:47it's not real. Back to the Buddhist
17:49view,
17:50it is illusory. Everything is illusory,
17:53right? It's like
17:54this podcast success is illusory, right?
17:57They Whether we get a quarter of a
17:59million downloads or half a million
18:00downloads or a million downloads,
18:02whether that is success or failure,
18:04it's an arbitrary number that we we make
18:06up. And we make it up so that we can
18:08either feel good or bad about
18:10what we did and what happened.
18:12At any moment we can decide to measure
18:14success in a in a different way and then
18:16feel differently about ourselves. Yeah.
18:18And so, this raises the question of
18:19like, if you are feeling like a failure
18:22in your life, if you are feeling like
18:24you are consistently failing to measure
18:27up to some standard or expectation,
18:29where did that standard or expectation
18:31come from?
18:34When did you adopt it?
18:35Like, who says that you have to have it?
18:38You don't.
18:39Right? Like, I think we adopt so many of
18:41our standards without realizing that we
18:44adopted them. And then we have them for
18:45so long, we assume that they are
18:48like capital T true,
18:51when really it's just
18:53another arbitrary narrative that we
18:55decided to identify with.
18:57>> Yeah, yeah. You see this all the time,
18:58right? Like, people are Oh my god, I'm
19:00like
19:0135 and I haven't bought a home yet. Or
19:03And it's like, okay, what what standard
19:04are you Or Or you should have a home by
19:0635 or whatever it is, you know?
19:08>> Like, measuring yourself by like the
19:09boomers who could just Houses were
19:12practically handed out
19:13on a street corner or are you measuring
19:15yourself by
19:1721st century standards where there's not
19:18enough homes anywhere, right? So it's
19:20like what are you measuring by?
19:22>> It's just kind of like the water we swim
19:23in though a lot of times, right? We're
19:24just like this is what people do and so
19:26we do it. Not realizing that just that's
19:28setting us up for a lot of that
19:29suffering and anguish that the Buddhist
19:30talk about. Like you're attaching to
19:32something and you don't even know what
19:33you're attaching to. If you choose
19:34something and you fail by it, that's one
19:36thing, but when it's just kind of handed
19:37to you and you're just doing it blindly,
19:39that's kind of another level of
19:40suffering too, I think.
19:41>> I do want to note one thing though
19:42because what we are talking about right
19:44now, I think is
19:47a very profound realization for people
19:49when they first have it, you know,
19:50whether it's when they go to therapy or,
19:53you know, when they meditate for the
19:55first time or whatever. Like the first
19:56time you kind of realize this of like,
19:57oh my god, I bought into all these
19:59scripts without really realizing I
20:01bought into them and then they are
20:02arbitrary and I don't have to accept
20:03them.
20:05It is a very, very powerful personal
20:07experience that I think most people go
20:09through. There's a little bit of
20:11pushback I'll I'll I I want to put out
20:13there, which is that once people realize
20:15this is is there's a tendency to think,
20:17well, we can just define anything
20:20however we want, right? Like we can
20:22don't tell me what tall means or what
20:25rich means or what poor means. Like I
20:27can just decide what anything means
20:29myself and then you can't tell me
20:31whether I'm right or wrong. So while
20:33that is philosophically true, I think
20:35for a society to function well and a
20:38culture to be beneficial for the
20:41majority of people within it,
20:43people do have to come together and
20:44agree on some terms and definitions. If
20:47everybody has a different definition of
20:49everything, then you can't coordinate.
20:51And if you can't coordinate, then you
20:54don't get the benefits of
20:57being a social species, right? You don't
20:58get all the all the good things that
21:01that come with being part of a larger
21:02social group.
21:03>> So again, from my amateurish Buddhist
21:06understanding, I think they address this
21:07as well. They distinguish between the
21:09relative and the and the ultimate, I
21:11think is what they call it. They're just
21:12different names for it, but the relative
21:14is like the world that we have to
21:15navigate and live within and try to be
21:18in harmony with one another. And that's
21:19kind of what you're talking about.
21:20There's actually, hold on, you know, you
21:22can't just be making up all the rules
21:23all the time. We all have to agree on a
21:25few things. That's what they call the
21:26relative, kind of this human world that
21:28we have to interact with each other.
21:30Whereas the ultimate, like you're
21:31saying, the philosophical truth is
21:32actually no, these are all arbitrary and
21:35made up and there's a recognition of
21:36that. I think again, that kind of comes
21:37back to that middle way though,
21:38recognizing both.
21:40>> Again, this is my amateur Buddhist
21:41understanding.
21:42>> Yeah, no, I I I think that's accurate.
21:43And and I think a a good example of this
21:46is imagine there's a a golf tournament
21:48with a bunch of PGA pros. And all the
21:50PGA pros come together and they're like,
21:51"You know what? This whole golf thing,
21:53it's totally made up. I'm going to
21:54change the definition of a birdie. I'm
21:56going to change the definition of a
21:57driver. I'm going to change the
21:58definition of a sand trap." Right? It's
21:59like every individual golfer is like,
22:00"Well, you can't tell me what a birdie
22:01is. I I have my own definition. You
22:01can't invalidate my truth." It's like,
22:02"Okay, well, now the golf game means
22:03nothing." Right? You you completely have
22:03you've like destroyed the entire
22:04activity because there is no
22:04definitional agreement across like what
22:05certain terms are. You don't want to be
22:06so attached that you forget that this is
22:07all just a bunch of made up stuff and
22:08you don't necessarily have to buy into
22:08everything, but at the same time, you
22:10can't just tell the world to [ __ ] off
22:13and
22:14imagine anything that's true for
22:16yourself, anything you feel like is true
22:18for yourself is true.
22:20That's not really going to be helpful
22:21either. That's a form of attachment
22:23itself, right? It's attachment to your
22:25self in a way. Attachment to your own
22:27definitions, yeah. To kind of wrap this
22:29all up, if I had to define what failure
22:32is, I would say really what we do is we
22:34define success as an arbitrary and
22:37temporary arrangement of
22:40certain standards and circumstances.
22:42And then failure is just the moment that
22:45reality fails to live up.
23:00>> And then failure is just the moment that
23:03reality fails to live up
23:06to that circumstantial arrangement.
23:08And on a long enough timeline, the
23:10failure rate of everything is 100%. So
23:13there is no arrangement of circumstances
23:16that you or I could imagine
23:19that will
23:21always exist.
23:22>> Western psychology, too, has also kind
23:24of come to the same conclusion around
23:25this whole attaching to identity thing
23:27and all that. But when it comes to like
23:29well- being. For instance, Jennifer
23:31Crocker back in the 2000s, she
23:34came up with this idea of like
23:36self-worth and identity. The moment that
23:39you decide your worth depends on any
23:41domain in your life. Again, it's kind of
23:43like that attachment. That is just
23:45setting you up for where the failure is
23:47going to be the most destructive in your
23:48life, right? So if you say my job is the
23:52thing that you know that defines my
23:54self-worth the most or my relationship
23:56or whatever it is, you know, my whatever
23:58hobby you have or or talent like that,
24:01that's going to be kind of the ground
24:04zero for any sort of like damage or any
24:06sort of threat to that is going to hurt
24:09the most. And the more you
24:12you double down on one or you single out
24:14one area of your life or anything like
24:15that, the more risk you're setting
24:17yourself up for. You actually wrote an
24:19article about this a long time ago,
24:20right? The um
24:21>> Diversify your identity.
24:22>> Diversify your identity, right. Right.
24:24The identity side, too, there's other
24:26researchers who clear back in the '80s
24:28like they they were thinking about this,
24:30too. Like if you define yourself through
24:32fewer and more concentrated roles, the
24:34blast zone for any of those when it does
24:37get inevitably does get blown up, these
24:40people they they suffer more from like
24:41anxiety, depression, all the well-being
24:43metrics you can think of, basically.
24:47Concentrating your identity or your
24:48self-worth in any one of these areas
24:52is going to lead to catastrophe 100% of
24:54the time at some point. There's a
24:55tendency to for people to be like,
24:58"Well, just succeed at it all the time
24:59then." Well, again, there's an
25:01inevitability
25:02of the impermanence of it at some point.
25:05These like fixed labels even too. Maybe
25:07it's not a domain in your life, but it's
25:08just a trait that you have. Like, "I'm
25:09talented. I'm smart. I'm beautiful."
25:11Whatever it is, right? Any one of those
25:13is going to fail you at some point. And
25:15attaching too hard to them the Western
25:18psychology bears this out too. Took them
25:20a couple thousand years to catch up to
25:21the Buddhist, but they figured it out
25:22too. So, if we haven't lost all the
25:24people yet who got turned off by the
25:26religion, just know that there's
25:27actually some science behind it, too.
25:28>> We still have a chance to lose them
25:29here.
25:30>> Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, no, no. Yeah.
25:31Oh, for [laughter] sure.
25:32>> Cuz we're not done with the religion
25:33yet.
25:34>> But if But yeah, but if you think about
25:35this though, like you you could even put
25:37all three of these together. Like, think
25:38of somebody who is like nothing but
25:40their job title, right? And so, they
25:43stick their self-worth on that domain,
25:44whatever they're in finance or they're
25:46in, you know, whatever. They identify
25:48with that so much, too. Like, that's
25:50their identity. And they believe that
25:52their talent or their intelligence or
25:53whatever is what makes all of that
25:55possible for them.
25:57What happens when they get fired or
25:58there's a market crash? You remember
25:59seeing this back in like 2008, right?
26:01The the financial crash? Like, people
26:03committed suicide
26:04>> Right. Every Yeah, every massive market
26:06crash, there's a bunch of Wall Street
26:08guys that off themselves.
26:10>> Yeah, yeah. That's their sole identity.
26:12They based it on their intelligence that
26:13I'm a really smart person, so I'm going
26:15to go into finance, and I'm going to
26:16stick my whole identity. I'm a finance
26:18guy, and I make a lot of money. That's
26:20who I am, right? That's a that's a an
26:22obvious example, but it happens all the
26:23time.
26:23>> Yeah, there was there was an interesting
26:24news story about a guy who killed
26:27himself in New York a number of years
26:29ago, and I I remember reading about it.
26:30And I think this is like, you know, cuz
26:32everybody hears that there's always a
26:34bunch of Wall Street people that end up
26:36committing suicide after a financial
26:37crash. And I think that's what they
26:39don't realize is that
26:40people in finance, it's not just it's
26:43not just the money. In a lot of cases,
26:44it's their sense of competence. It's
26:47it's their sense of self-worth. But
26:49people don't understand that if you're a
26:51really successful guy in in finance,
26:53you're not just investing your own
26:54money, you're not just investing in your
26:56company's money, you're investing your
26:58family's money, you're investing your
27:00friends' money, you're investing your
27:01neighbors' money. That literally is your
27:03identity. It is your identity.
27:04>> So, all those people you those people
27:06that's what they see me as.
27:07>> Right. And it's And it's like if the
27:09market starts crashing, it's like the
27:10guy across the street's like banging on
27:12your door being like, "Did you get out
27:13in time? Did you get out in time?" And
27:15if you lost everything, right? Now you
27:16have to go to all those people you love
27:18and care about in your life and tell
27:19them that you lost all of their savings.
27:21>> Yeah. So, for us to sit here and say,
27:22"Well, well, I would never do that."
27:23Well,
27:24>> Yeah.
27:24>> you don't have your identity wrapped up
27:26like [laughter] they did.
27:27>> Okay. But, have you ever done this? Have
27:29you ever stick your identity on too
27:30much? I feel like you're you kind of
27:32spread out quite a bit.
27:33>> Uh Are there certain things?
27:36I don't know. I don't think I'm very
27:37diversified.
27:38>> Oh, you don't? Okay.
27:39>> I don't.
27:39>> Okay.
27:40>> I don't. Yeah, I'm definitely more
27:41focused these days. I think when I was
27:43younger, maybe it was a little more
27:44diversified, but yeah, these days I'm
27:47doing I'm becoming so boring and
27:49repetitive. Like I just I work, I hang
27:51out with like the same five people,
27:55I hang out with my wife,
27:57I play some video games. Like that's
27:58kind of it.
27:59>> Yeah.
27:59>> Yeah. That's kind of That's kind of all
28:00I've got going on.
28:01>> So, if one of those legs got knocked
28:02out,
28:03>> Oh, yeah. I mean,
28:04>> you would be devastated, you think?
28:06>> I know I haven't done anything and I
28:08don't think I will do anything that
28:09could potentially get me canceled, but
28:11like
28:12>> Oh, yeah.
28:13>> You know, if if I got canceled, if my
28:15career got massively jeopardized, yeah,
28:18it would be it would be a deep deep cut.
28:20Yeah, for sure. Like there's a lot of my
28:23identity
28:24>> I bet. Well, and there's a lot a lot of
28:25people depend on you, too. Like yeah,
28:27yeah, yeah.
28:28>> I can sympathize with that. I could
28:30definitely see that.
28:30>> Yeah, I don't know. I feel like what as
28:32I get older, I've I've loosened a lot of
28:33those. I've talked about this before.
28:34Like I've always I had that identity as
28:36like, "Oh, I wanted to be the smart
28:37guy." That was kind of like me getting
28:39out of certain situations. Like being
28:40smart is going to get me out of these
28:42situations and it'll get me things that
28:43I need and
28:44you know, satisfy some of those basic
28:46needs that I had. And it that worked for
28:48a long time, but then I started to see
28:50it fail.
28:51Um and I think luckily I kind of like
28:53have
28:54slowly loosened my grip on that. It used
28:56to be like any slight to my
28:57intelligence, I took it very, very
28:59personally, right? And that's another
29:00thing you'll see with somebody who
29:01over-identifies with something is that
29:03they take it everything very personally
29:04around that domain. I still have plenty
29:06of attachments, sure. We're going to
29:07talk later about what are good things to
29:10identify with. Like what are good
29:12failures to sign up for? And I think
29:13that's an example of a bad failure to
29:16sign up for because it is based on
29:18metrics outside of yourself, right? Like
29:20you're you're you're essentially basing
29:21your
29:22how you view yourself
29:24on
29:25the perceptions of others or or or the
29:28ability of others. It it it came into
29:29stark contrast too, like when I'd go to
29:31grad school and everybody's smart around
29:33you. That doesn't mean anything anymore
29:35at that point. So, you're like, well, I
29:36got to find something else, I guess, or
29:38>> I had the same experience in music
29:39school.
29:39>> Yeah, all right. Right.
29:41>> my whole identity when I was a teenager
29:43and then I went to music school and I
29:44was just
29:46Yeah, everybody's talented. Everybody It
29:48like and and half the guys in my class
29:50were so much better than I was and it
29:51just man, it was a
29:53brutal hit to the ego.
29:55>> Like I said, I feel like I have fewer
29:56and fewer identities as a Maybe it's
29:58because I'm amateur Buddhist, too,
29:59though.
29:59>> Yeah, there you go. You you are you are
30:01getting pretty deep down down the
30:03meditation rabbit hole.
30:04>> Oh man, we'll we'll get into that.
30:05>> [laughter]
30:06>> A quick pause. We'll be right back after
30:08this.
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31:31Okay, we're back. Let's keep going. So,
31:34if we haven't lost
31:36everybody with the religious talk yet,
31:38there's still time, Drew. There's still
31:39time to fail. In this chapter, I want to
31:41pivot to Christianity because I think
31:44there are some really interesting
31:46concepts in Christianity that
31:48have a lot to say about failure and the
31:50management of failure and atoning for
31:53failures. As an atheist, I personally
31:55would characterize Christianity as a
31:57very
31:59efficient atonement technology or or set
32:03of practices. The same way I think
32:05Buddhism is a set of practices to like
32:07loosen the
32:09the ties of identity and like loosen
32:12that identification with things, I've
32:13come to appreciate Christianity as as a
32:16set of practices to help one manage the
32:19inevitable fallout of our failures and
32:21and
32:22disappointments.
32:24>> Okay.
32:24>> [laughter]
32:25>> I'm interested to see where you're going
32:26with this.
32:27>> So, I actually want to start with the
32:28definition of sin. So, I I mean, as you
32:30we've talked on this podcast before, I
32:31grew up in the church. I grew up going
32:33to church all the time. I'm
32:35very, very familiar with the Bible. One
32:36of the concepts I always hated when I
32:39was younger was this concept of original
32:41sin, which is this idea in Christianity
32:44that
32:45people are born sinful
32:48and you can only be redeemed by coming
32:50to to Jesus and asking for forgiveness.
32:52As a teenager, I thought this was the
32:53most [ __ ] up thing that you could tell
32:55people that like you're essentially
32:57telling people that there's something
32:59inherently wrong with them and there's
33:00nothing you can do to fix it other than
33:03pray to God and pray to Jesus.
33:05>> And yeah, I think on one level that is
33:07probably not the best message to be
33:09disseminating. Like it it is
33:12well, let's just say it's a little
33:13culty. But
33:15>> [laughter]
33:16>> but as I've gotten older and I've I've
33:18done a little bit of a
33:20deeper research into some of these
33:22things and especially prepping for this
33:23episode, I I came across some things
33:25that made me think about original sin in
33:27a little bit of a different way. So, the
33:29first thing is that I think the popular
33:32contemporary idea of sin is that you did
33:34something wrong.
33:35That you are a bad person, right? Like
33:38we think of sin. Like if I say the word
33:39sin,
33:41what do you think of?
33:42>> I've like, you know, fornication
33:43[clears throat]
33:44>> and stealing something. Yeah, yeah. Hit
33:47it like violence, hitting somebody.
33:48>> Mhm. Murder. Like yeah, all the horrible
33:50things that that people do, yeah.
33:52>> Like I I I almost equate it. It's like
33:54it's like crime essentially, right?
33:56What's interesting is that sin, if you
33:59look at the the origins of the word sin,
34:01it actually it comes from an ancient
34:02Greek word that was used in archery. And
34:06the word sin was was the word that that
34:09described an arrow that that missed the
34:13bull's-eye. So, like the gap, I guess
34:15the that that gap in which you missed,
34:18that was the sin, right? So, it
34:19>> Didn't hit where you were aiming.
34:21>> Exactly. So, it is
34:23interestingly the origination of the
34:25word sin is much more attuned and and
34:28aligned with the idea of failure or
34:31missing expectations, of trying to live
34:34up to some sort of standard or outcome,
34:37and just falling short. And so, the idea
34:38of original sin, if you take all the
34:42things we just discussed about Buddhism,
34:44that no matter how you define yourself,
34:46you are also defining your future
34:48failures, you're defining all of the
34:50standards and outcomes that you're going
34:51to fail to live up to,
34:54and how that's inevitable and
34:55unavoidable, and there's nothing you can
34:56do about it because it is just a a a
34:58ingrained piece of your psychology,
35:03you could call that original sin. Right?
35:05It's like we are all born with this
35:07sense of self that we can never fully
35:09live up to. The only way to atone for
35:11that is through some radical form of
35:13self-forgiveness. That understanding
35:17of of Christianity, I was like, "Oh,
35:20>> It's a little more palatable.
35:21>> Tell me more."
35:22>> Okay. Okay.
35:23>> This is way more interesting. I think
35:25the backbone of Christian theology,
35:27there is a very manipulative culty way
35:29of looking at it, which is kind of what
35:31I described earlier, but I I do I also
35:32think there is kind of a profound
35:34psychological way of looking at it as
35:35well. Um which is that
35:38we are all
35:40hampered with this kind of inherent
35:42sense of guilt and shame of the fact
35:45that we
35:47will never be able to fully live up to
35:49the standards we set for ourselves, that
35:51no matter what we pursue in our lives,
35:54it is going to slip through our fingers
35:55at some point, that the failure rate of
35:57everything is 100%. It is always going
35:59to be difficult to to deal with that and
36:02wrestle with that. Whether or not
36:03anything is our fault, we are always
36:05going to wrestle with certain feelings
36:07of of guilt and shame around that.
36:09And what what is the cleanser of guilt
36:11and shame? It is a a radical form of of
36:15compassion and forgiveness uh for
36:17ourselves. If Buddhism nailed the
36:19psychological explanation of
36:22uh why we struggle so much with feelings
36:25of inadequacy and and anxiety and
36:27failure and doubt and all these things.
36:29I think Christianity nailed the the
36:31solution, right? Which is kind of this
36:33radical self-compassion, this radical
36:36self-forgiveness. What's also super
36:38interesting about Christianity is that
36:39it has this
36:41baked-in mechanism of confession.
36:44Which I I guess in some ways you could
36:46say it was like the predecessor of
36:48therapy, of talk therapy.
36:49>> Yeah. Yeah.
36:50>> Um which I never really thought about
36:52before until we worked on this episode.
36:54I was like, "Huh.
36:55Interesting. We didn't just invent
36:56therapy out of nowhere. Like we've
36:58actually the church has been doing this
37:00for like 2,000 years." There's a funny
37:02story um around confession, which is
37:04that Martin Luther, the
37:07the guy who kicked off the Reformation,
37:10apparently he was such a neurotic mess.
37:13He was a monk in a monastery in uh
37:15Erfurt in in the early 1500s when he was
37:18younger. And apparently he was such a
37:20neurotic, self-loathing mess that he
37:23would catalog and document all of his
37:26failings with such minute detail that
37:29his confessions would often last up to
37:31six
37:32five, six, seven hours at a time. And it
37:35got to the point where like every
37:37thought that he had that was wrong,
37:38every like minute tiny mistake that like
37:42eventually one of the confessors, one of
37:44the priests like pulled him aside and
37:45was like, "Look, man.
37:47You don't really have any problems.
37:50>> [laughter]
37:51>> He's like, "I'm talking to people who
37:52like [ __ ] killed somebody, like
37:55cheated on their wives. You're coming in
37:57and telling me that you feel bad because
37:58like the rice was undercooked last
38:00night. You know, like it it's they had a
38:02little bit of a uh
38:04a come-to-Jesus moment, no pun intended,
38:06of like of like, "Dude, you don't really
38:09have any problems. You're kind of just
38:11making this [ __ ] up and and you're
38:13abusing yourself." I don't remember
38:15exactly what the confessor told him, but
38:16it was there is a great line in there
38:18about how forgiveness is not merely this
38:21external thing that happens to you. It
38:23is part of it is learning to develop a
38:26tolerance and an understanding of your
38:29own shortcomings. So, if you think of
38:31confession in terms of
38:33being a technique or even a technology,
38:35right? For
38:37alleviating the guilt and shame of of
38:39failure. I I I think there's actually a
38:41really interesting kind of scientific
38:42explanation for this and I'd put therapy
38:44in the same category. Which if you go
38:46back to the sociometer theory that we
38:48talked about last chapter, right? That
38:50we are there's like something innate
38:51within each of us that we are always
38:53subconsciously measuring ourselves
38:56and how much value we have relative to
38:59the tribe. And that a lot of our what we
39:01experience is our self-esteem is a
39:03reflection of that sociometer, right? If
39:05you fail at something
39:07and then you go talk to somebody else
39:09about it, one of two things is going to
39:12happen and maybe both.
39:14First thing that's going to happen is if
39:16that person listens to you,
39:19empathizes with you and accepts you
39:21despite your failure,
39:23that probably repairs your sociometer.
39:26It reassures you of like, "Okay, I've
39:28not lost status with the tribe. I'm not
39:30a total loser. I'm not going to get
39:31kicked out tomorrow.
39:34Thank God. I'm okay." The second thing
39:36it can do is that it can alert you
39:39to whether you had an an unhealthy or or
39:43an inaccurate expectation or outcome
39:45that you are working towards, right? Cuz
39:47if you think about like part of the
39:49value of therapy or or just talking to
39:51anybody is is the empathy that you get,
39:53right? That that there is a certain
39:54amount of healing in that.
39:56But another aspect of it is like beating
39:58yourself up over something and then you
40:00go talk to somebody and they're like,
40:02"Well,
40:03why
40:04why are you beating yourself up over
40:05that? Like why is that success to you?
40:07That doesn't make sense. My definition
40:09is completely different."
40:10>> have different definitions, yeah.
40:11>> Right. And then you hear their
40:12definition and you're like, "Oh,
40:14I was being crazy. I this is like that's
40:16completely off base. I should have seen
40:18it this way that the entire time. So, I
40:20think the
40:21the magic of uh what Freud called the
40:24talking cure, I think is largely
40:27it's a combination of both of those
40:29things. It is seeing that you are you
40:31are not going to be socially punished,
40:32that you're not being ostracized, and
40:34then also having the ability to
40:36recalibrate your expectations in such a
40:39way that the failure
40:40maybe doesn't look like such a failure
40:42anymore.
40:42>> Again, if we haven't lost the people
40:44[laughter] who are are turned off by the
40:46religion,
40:47that bears out in like the psychological
40:49research as well. And then you're right,
40:50you made the parallel with therapy,
40:52that's exactly what it does. And then
40:54it's it's it's not only that, but just
40:55like disclosure in general, any
40:57distressful event, not it maybe it's not
40:59a failure, just anything that's
41:01bothering you and getting it out there,
41:03it seems to have some sort of beneficial
41:05effect all across the board. And it's
41:07not just catharsis, it's not just
41:09getting it off your chest, too. There is
41:11some form of processing, which is
41:13exactly what you're talking about. Like
41:14there has to You can't just vent to
41:16somebody, like venting is fine, sure,
41:18but there there has to be some sort of
41:19like processing that happens with it.
41:21Pennybaker back in the '90s, he he did
41:23all this research on this and did this
41:25whole meta-analysis around it, and kind
41:27of like basically the form of the
41:29confessional,
41:30where you have an audience, and it's not
41:32you're not just doing it to yourself.
41:34Journaling's good, processing on your
41:36own's good, but actually putting it out
41:37there, precisely because of what you're
41:39talking about. Like that sociometer
41:41theory that we have. It's like we we
41:43have to in our minds put ourselves back
41:45into the group and be okay and and
41:47accepted in some way. When you think
41:48about this, a friend comes to you and
41:49they they're like, "Oh man, I feel awful
41:51about this." Usually what you're like to
41:53say is like, "Dude, like
41:54take it easy on yourself." And that has
41:56a lot of reparative effects um that that
41:59we've seen. There's also the the cost of
42:01like not disclosing things, too. Like if
42:04we keep all of that in,
42:06you end up doing it That's where the
42:07rumination often comes in, right? That's
42:09where the open loops stay open and you
42:11can't quite close them, and so there's
42:12always that going on in your back in the
42:14background, you know, of your mind.
42:16There's a physical aspect to it, too.
42:17Body keeps the score. Bessel van der
42:20Kolk, a lot of that is real. There's
42:21also effects of effects of not
42:23disclosing versus disclosing.
42:26Again, though, it's not just the
42:26catharsis. There's a There's got to be a
42:28processing element to it.
42:30>> From what I recall, um a lot of
42:32Pennebaker's research on journaling in
42:34in particular found that it was
42:37journaling was was most beneficial when
42:40you specifically journaled about
42:42something that bothered you. Like you
42:44couldn't just sit down and just dump all
42:46your thoughts and ideas. I mean, I'm
42:47sure there's some value in that, but
42:48like it was specifically when you
42:51journaled about some issue in your life
42:53that was really eating at you, that is
42:55when you saw
42:57the benefits of it.
42:58>> And it wasn't just the facts of what's
42:59eating you, too, but the emotions and
43:00the integration between the facts and
43:02the emotions. This is what happened.
43:03That's a very important part of it. This
43:05is how I felt about it. And then it um
43:07there were continued if you did it over
43:08several sessions, too. And and the story
43:11developed over time and you were able to
43:12integrate it and tell a more coherent
43:14story over time about that. That helped
43:15a lot, too. You can do that a lot better
43:17with someone else and I think that's why
43:18therapy works for some people for a lot
43:21of people. Around something that you can
43:23you can tell a coherent story about and
43:24eventually make sense of both the
43:26factual and the emotional side of it.
43:28So, yeah.
43:29>> In the case of confession in the church,
43:31the the power is that radical
43:34forgiveness, right? It's like you go you
43:36go sit with the priest or whatever. You
43:38tell the priest all the awful things
43:39that you've done.
43:41The priest, you know,
43:43consoles you, reassures you, and says,
43:45"You're forgiven. God still loves you.
43:47Jesus loves you." Whatever, right?
43:48There's probably some sort of like
43:51cleansing effect that comes with that.
43:52>> There's closure to it, yeah.
43:53>> The other thing that I thought about
43:55while you were talking is when we hold
43:57things in, those standards and metrics
44:00by which we measure ourselves,
44:02they seem to kind of drift. And they
44:04drift into like irrational areas. And
44:07it's only by like saying it out loud I
44:10mean I I I'm sure you've had this
44:12experience a million times, right? Where
44:13it's like you've thought you've like
44:14thought something, you're really anxious
44:15about something, and then you like just
44:18go to say it out loud, and as soon as
44:20the words come out of your mouth, you're
44:22like, "Wow, I'm being ridiculous."
44:23>> Yeah. Yeah.
44:24>> [laughter]
44:24>> Yeah. What What's What's really
44:26interesting about that, too, is that
44:28they they they do find that the the
44:30listener in that situation, if they have
44:32two qualities, it it tends to do the
44:34best as well. One of them is compassion,
44:36which you've already said. The other one
44:37is being assertive, though, too. So,
44:40this I have a I have a friend in
44:41particular when I am thinking those
44:42kinds of like crazy thoughts or
44:43whatever, I'll call her up, and she's
44:45she'll sit and listen, and then she'll
44:47immediately come back to me and be like,
44:48"What are you like This is why this is
44:50crazy." So, there's a confessional And
44:52this is the confessional is set up like
44:53this, like priests were They're They
44:55were trained to be like this. Be
44:56compassionate.
44:58Know that we're all sinners, {quote}
44:59{unquote} sinners, right? But then also,
45:01they have a code by which they live, and
45:03they say, "This is This is how you
45:04should go about it." So, there's an
45:06assertiveness to it as well. They are
45:07You're absolutely right. Like it's like,
45:09yeah, getting out loud, you might hear
45:10it yourself, but someone else could
45:12reflect back to you how crazy it is,
45:13too, and be assertive enough where they
45:15can be like, "Look, I get where you're
45:16coming from, but at the same time, too,
45:18you're being [ __ ] stupid."
45:20>> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
45:21>> Like that's actually very, very
45:22valuable. So, it's not again, it's not
45:24just catharsis and getting it out there.
45:26It's There's some sort of reflection and
45:28and processing that has to happen around
45:29it.
45:30>> Yeah. I remember I met a woman years
45:32ago, and
45:35I remember she came up to me after an
45:36event once. This was like a kind of a
45:38business event.
45:40And she told me that she really wanted
45:41to start a family, but she felt like she
45:43couldn't until she was
45:45professionally and financially secure.
45:47And she was just afraid that she was
45:48going to run out of time.
45:50And this It was a conference with like a
45:51lot of successful people. So, I was just
45:53And I kind of looked at it. I'm like,
45:55"You're probably fine." Like in my head,
45:57I'm like, "She's probably fine." So, I
45:59was like, "Okay, when would you be
46:00financially and professionally
46:01successful enough to to be able to
46:03comfortably have a child?
46:04>> your standard? Where's your definition
46:06here?
46:06>> And her definition was a million dollars
46:07a year.
46:08>> Okay.
46:09>> She thought that was bare minimum
46:10>> Okay.
46:11>> to like raise a kid.
46:12>> a kid, okay.
46:12>> And it's always tough cuz you like you
46:14don't want to like laugh in people's
46:16faces, but you know, I remember I was
46:17like, "Okay, that's interesting. Why why
46:20a million?" And then she started going
46:22through all the reasons. She was like,
46:23"Well, you know, either my husband and I
46:24would we'd want to quit working. We'd
46:26want to have a nanny. We'd want to like
46:27go to a private school." Like blah blah
46:28blah blah blah. And I was like, "Okay,
46:30everything you just described like like
46:32that you're maybe at like 300k, maybe at
46:36most, like if you're in a really
46:38expensive neighborhood. Where's the this
46:40other 700k coming for?" Like I actually
46:41tried to do the math with her and it
46:43just kept coming up so short. I told her
46:45I was like, "It's it's clear that this
46:47is there's a lot of fear here and you
46:51are overcompensating with an extremely
46:54large number in your head and you were
46:56defining success as this absurdly large
46:58number to compensate for that that
47:00irrational fear that's going on." I was
47:02like, "Where do you think that fear is
47:03coming from?" And and sure enough it
47:04turned out she grew up very poor and and
47:07was like, you know, father went broke
47:09when she was young and the family, you
47:11know, like lived in a car for a couple
47:13months and had this like torrid story
47:16from her past. I was like,
47:18"Got it. Okay. That's So it's the
47:21extremity of the number is is it's
47:24proportional to your internal
47:26emotions. It's not It has nothing to do
47:28with the spreadsheet." I was like,
47:29"First Well, that's completely
47:31understandable given where you come
47:32from,
47:34but you should listen to the
47:35spreadsheet."
47:36>> [laughter]
47:37>> It's an arbitrary standard she she
47:39adopted without knowing
47:40>> Yeah.
47:41>> without knowing it.
47:41>> Yeah. Yeah, that's crazy. And so yeah,
47:43reflecting it back to somebody and
47:45hopefully seeing it right in front of
47:46your face.
47:47>> It was funny too cuz I remember I
47:48remember asking her. I was like I was
47:50like, "How many people do you know who
47:51have had kids and don't make a million
47:52dollars a year?" And she was like she
47:53was like, "Oh, everybody."
47:54>> Yeah, 100% of the people I know, yeah.
47:56>> I was like, "How many of those kids are
47:57fine?
47:58And she was just kind of like,
48:00oh yeah, good point.
48:01>> Right. [laughter] Right. Yeah. [gasps]
48:03>> But it's funny. I mean, your your your
48:05brain plays tricks with you, right? It's
48:07and it's it's coming back to that
48:08Buddhist point of the attachments,
48:10right? You know, it's like that
48:11attachment is probably deep-seated in
48:13her from a very young age of like this
48:15intense anxiety around money
48:17and an overcompensation around money.
48:21And it's probably been there for so long
48:22that she like forgets that it's there.
48:24She doesn't realize, you know, people
48:26don't really talk about money a whole
48:27lot. So, like she doesn't have people to
48:30measure herself against or maybe she
48:32only hangs around people who are super
48:33rich. And so, her measurement of what's
48:35acceptable is like gotten completely out
48:37of whack.
48:39And she doesn't realize it cuz she's not
48:41confessing.
48:42>> You can get attached to independence.
48:44You can get attached to non-attachment
48:45even too, right? Like that's that's
48:47always one of my favorite ones that I
48:48point out in myself sometimes. Like I
48:50and goes kind of similar to that story.
48:52Like when I was growing up, I just
48:53realized so many different situations
48:55where it's like, oh, I'm on my own. And
48:57so, like independence became a value of
48:58mine or like a standard by which I I
49:00measured a lot of my life. And then I
49:03see it start failing as I get older,
49:04too. That's another one. Like with the
49:05being smart thing, the independence
49:06thing, then it starts failing you, too,
49:08at some at some point.
49:10>> When I was younger and I was really in
49:11into Buddhism and meditation, I started
49:13to notice that to some of some of the
49:15retreat centers and stuff that I used to
49:17go to, like the the hardcore regulars,
49:20there was a little bit of a status game
49:22among them, right? You know, so you you
49:23kind of hang out with these people after
49:25a retreat and you know, they they'd be
49:27like bragging about the month of silence
49:29that they did or how they were
49:30meditating 3 hours a day or whatever.
49:32And there, you know, it just kind of
49:33became another dick measuring contest to
49:35see who was going to get enlightened
49:36first. And I'm like, this is just the
49:39same thing. Like this is
49:41another version of attachment.
49:42>> I I just heard this I think this is the
49:44term used for that is Zen stink. Isn't
49:46that what they call it? Zen stink? I I
49:48think that's the word for it. Like, oh,
49:49look how look at how quickly I'm
49:51becoming
49:52enlightened or on my on the path to
49:54enlightenment or whatever it is. Yeah,
49:55they call it Zen stink.
49:56>> But it it's a real problem.
49:58>> Yeah, for sure.
49:58>> It's I mean it and it it goes back to
50:00like the sociometer follows you
50:02everywhere. It it is human nature to
50:05what no matter what environment you put
50:07yourself in
50:08you will start measuring yourself
50:10against the people in your environment
50:12and
50:13>> Your brain is a big comparison machine.
50:15>> Basically, it's what it is. Yeah. Yeah,
50:16no matter what it is. No matter what the
50:18comparison is.
50:19>> So at the end of the last chapter I I
50:20asked the listener to think about a
50:22major recent failure
50:24and kind of consider where they got the
50:26definition of that being a failure. I
50:29think with this chapter
50:31really what to think is first, where did
50:33that definition of failure come from?
50:34Did it come from themselves? Did it come
50:36from somebody outside of them? Were they
50:37aware that they were accepting that
50:39definition, that expectation? And then I
50:41think the second piece would be what is
50:43their mechanism for
50:46finding atonement or finding finding
50:48compassion or forgiveness for that
50:50failure? Who have they shared their
50:51feelings with? And if they have shared
50:53the failure with somebody, I'm curious
50:55if they ended up finding out that their
50:57their expectation or their metric was
51:00maybe a little bit out of whack,
51:01little little bit irrational. But the
51:03point of all of this is that failure is
51:06inevitable,
51:07failure is relative and relational,
51:11and failure is arbitrary. It's
51:13self-defined.
51:15But it's also guaranteed. It's it's it's
51:17a structural fundamental part of our
51:21psychological machinery. It is the
51:23inherent price that we pay for
51:25caring about anything,
51:27for pursuing anything, which I think
51:29makes us land with a much better
51:31question than we probably started this
51:33episode with, which is
51:34that it's not about how to fail less,
51:37it's about figuring out
51:39what is worth failing for.
51:42What is worth doing despite the
51:44inevitability of failure happening?
51:47And that is what we're going to get into
51:49in next chapter.
51:53All right, we made it through chapter 3
51:56and chapter 4 might be the wildest one
51:58yet. Be sure you're subscribed to this
52:00channel to make sure that you get it
52:01when it drops in a couple days and if
52:03you want to watch the whole episode
52:05right now, you can go to the link in the
52:06description below and check it out
52:08today. As always, there's a free PDF
52:10guide. It has all of the citations,
52:12information, and exercises. Go to
52:14solvepodcast.com/failure
52:17if you want to work through this stuff
52:18on your own time and stop being such a
52:20failure.
52:21It's okay though.
52:22I still love you.
52:24See you next time.

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