3 Minute Monday

Hi friend,

Ok so last week was wild.

I recorded episodes in Austin Monday, Tuesday, Vegas Thursday, LA Friday Friday, Saturday Saturday and Sunday, plus a live event Sunday evening.

Those episodes were so much fun it’s insane and I absolutely cannot wait to release them.

Up first is an episode with the third-highest played Modern Wisdom guest ever on audio…

Alex Hormozi.

This time it was 3 hours long with the full Modern Wisdom Cinema production as we go through a mountain of life advice, controversial opinions, mindset reframes and more in a huge, gorgeous Vegas location.

I loved this episode so so much. It’s going to blow you away.

Live one week today.

In anticipation, here’s a lesson I learned from Alex.

One of his most inspiring, and most controversial takes:

“If you had disadvantages – I agree with you.

You are right.

It’s harder to be successful if X happened to you.

Replace “X” with:

Gender, race, birth deformity, different language, different country, abuse, etc.

The main point of the longer conversation is that despite the disadvantage you only have one choice:

What are you gonna do about it?

1) Take action anyway and become proof to other people – like you – your people – also born into or abused into this tragedy that you were that they too can overcome it.

2) Blame and complain.

And to be clear – do whatever you want.

I support your choice.

But only one of those decisions will make you better.

And I wish I could say this without getting attacked.

But you know who wins by you not being successful?

Whoever or whatever you blame.

And fuck them or fuck that.

You can lead a rebellion of one.

And blame the one thing you can control – which is YOU.

In your mind redefine the word “blame” as “give power to”.

And when you do that, there’s only one person you’re gonna wanna give more power to – and that’s you.

For everyone who had shitty circumstances – I’m on your side.

Your long term side.

The side that wants you to win.

So do it anyways.

With all the disadvantages.

And still tell them to shove it.

And win.

I wanna be clear (again).

If you had tough shit happen to you.

It sucks.

And it’s not your fault.

But now what? Where do we go?

My 2 cents – win anyways and prove that you can win even when the chips are stacked against you and your dealt a lousy hand.

Because we can’t get dealt a new hand.

We gotta play the cards we got rather than hoping the dealer rules in our favour.

So again – what do you do with your shit hand?

The only thing possible – you play it the best you can.” — Alex Hormozi

MODERN WISDOM

I do a podcast which has had 250 million+ downloads. You should subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
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This week’s upcoming episodes:

Monday.
Nancy Segal – one of the world’s most prominent Twin Researchers on the biggest lessons from decades of studying twins, nature vs nurture, behavioural genetics and more.

Thursday.
David Pinsof – a masterclass on counterintuitive lessons about psychology, power, happiness, groupthink and status. Really fun.

Saturday.
Scott Walker – one of the UK’s top hostage negotiators on how to communicate effectively, his advice for staying calm during heated discussions and wild stories from his career.

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THINGS I’VE LEARNED

1.
​It’s not all men. Not even all criminal men.

“Despite encompassing only 3-4% of the male population and about 1% of the female population, psychopaths are responsible for over 50% of all crimes in the U.S.” — Rob Henderson

“Atlanta police estimate that 1,000 individuals are responsible for 40% of the crime.

In one four week period, they charged 75 people with more than 1,800 combined arrests.

Crime is a matter of allowing ourselves to be hostage to an antisocial minority.” — Richard Hanania

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2.
​Build an undeniable stack of proof.

“Belief in yourself is overrated. Generate evidence.” — Ryan Holiday

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3.
​A list of problems with the idea that humans are primarily interested in useful truth.

“Most of the stuff that interests us is false and useless. And we know it. We freely admit it. We call this stuff “fiction.”

We’re not only interested in fiction; we’re more interested in fiction than reality. Novels sell better than textbooks. Movies sell better than documentaries. Tabloids are about a thousand times more interesting than scholarly journals.

We’re interested in celebrities, even though we we’ll never meet them. Useless.

We’re interested in sports, even though we can’t control the athletes. Useless.

We’re interested in sweeping generalizations, even though reality is complicated.

We’re interested in eloquence—enthralling speakers and stylish prose. But eloquence has nothing to do with truth or usefulness. Ditto for charisma, humor, whimsy, wit, passion, irony, and quirkiness.

We’re interested in new information (i.e. the “news”), even though the vast majority of useful truths are old.

We’re interested in spiritual flimflam about the “meaning of life”, even though it’s too vague to be useful.

We’re interested in self-help gurus who confidently tell us all that we can be the best, even though that is logically impossible.

We’re interested in contrarian hot takes, even though the conventional wisdom is usually truer and more useful.

We’re interested in simplistic partisan rants, and we’re bored by nuanced policy analysis. Shouldn’t it be the other way around?

We’re interested in stuff that confirms our preconceptions. But that is the least useful information to focus on, because it just results in us doing what we were going to do anyways.

You know what’s actually useful? The tax code. Home repair. How cars work. Retirement planning. Noncollateralized loans. The actual policies going through Congress. The actual words in the contracts we DocuSign. Booooooooring!

Here’s a weird fact: modern humans have been around for roughly two hundred thousand years.

Yet we only discovered how to find useful truths (i.e. science and free inquiry) a few hundred years ago—about 1% of our history.

And plenty of countries still haven’t gotten the memo: heretics and dissidents are getting killed all the time.

Humans really suck at seeking useful truth.” — David Pinsof

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LIFE HACK

The Weirdo Role Model.

Spend time with people who give sufficiently few f*cks to do whatever strange thing they want to.

So that you finally have the excuse to do it too.
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Big love,
Chris x

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PS
I’m doing some exclusive, intimate warmup shows at a 40-person venue in Austin this September. Sign up for first access to tickets