(rhythmic music) – Welcome to “Ear Biscuits,” the lifelong podcast where (laughs). – The lifelong podcast? I mean, that’s quite a commitment. I mean, do you wanna do this – What else are we gonna do? until we die? – Welcome to “Ear Biscuits,” the podcast where two lifelong friends talk about life for their entire lives. I’m Link. – And I’m Rhett. This week at the Round Table of Dim Lighting, we are talking about some of the habits of successful people. Now, and I’m not talking about like that book, – [Together] “The Seven Habits of Successful People.” – We’re talking about things that you may or may not have ever thought about. We’re kind of talking about the weird secret habits of successful people. – Yeah, because just the normal habits of successful people, that’s boring. I mean, we wanna go strange, but I do think that there’s gonna be some takeaways from this. They may not be direct to what we’re talking about, they may be the opposite of what we’re talking about, or maybe you do wanna jump into a pool and almost drown yourself, I don’t know, we’ll have to find out. But sometimes it’s just helpful to take a step back and evaluate is there any new practice that I can incorporate into my life? Some new helpful habit that might become the key to accomplishing something, you know, like. – We’re kind of over promising at this point. I don’t think anybody, does anybody listened to our podcast so that they can become successful or do they listen, I kind of feel like people listen to our podcast to escape from thinking about success and things like that. – This was your idea. – (laughs) Yeah, just, only because I thought it would be interesting to talk about. So you can do something like sweep up your child’s art project that they just dropped on the ground. And guess what, people do- – That’s not a habit. – No, people, I’m saying people listen to “Ear Biscuits” while doing other things. And so for the person who’s sweeping up your child’s art project that you accidentally broke. First of all, don’t tell them, they’re gonna forget about it. – Did this happen to you today? – No. Maybe you’ll wanna become more successful from listening to this, but that’s not the intention. The intention is to have an interesting conversation. – But listen, maybe we’ll discover something that is the exact opposite. Maybe you need to practice to help you accomplish less and enjoy life more. Yeah, I’m promising big on this, man. This is big. – Well then you better deliver. – I’m not backing down at all. Today, we’re gonna look at habits of successful people that are strange and may or may not have contributed to their success or their wellbeing or their genius or their fame. But maybe there’s something in it for us. I’m just saying, let’s approach it with an open mind. Maybe there is some things- – Oh, I approach all things with an open mind. – Maybe there’s something that can revolution- – My middle name is Open Mind. – Well, that would be two names. Revolutionize our experience. You know, I, listen. – Well, and I gotta say, I gotta go ahead and say preemptively that at least three of these are things that I was already zeroing in on. But I think maybe this is gonna take me to the next level. Again, I’m not saying it so that you’ll do it. – I picked all of these because they sounded crazy, not knowing that you did any of them. – Well, I’m doing three of them. – So that kind of adds up. For what, I don’t know exactly why you’re listening. I think Rhett and I have different ideas today of what will keep you listening, but as long as you keep listening and as long as you buy stuff from our sponsors, just kidding, not kidding, but we’re happy. Just hang out. – We’re gonna get to that in a second though, but you know what, something pretty monumental is happening. There was, we have a four-way group text with the two of us and our wives. And in that group text this morning, I think, well, I think maybe it was a text from your wife to my wife who was like, “Hey, you know, today is our 10-year anniversary of being in Los Angeles?” And I was like, “No, it’s not.” (laughs) It’s not today, it’s two days from now. And I was like- – So you knew the actual date? – Well, because- – The reason why she said that is because something popped up on her, you know, it was either Facebook or one of those Google Photos or something where it’s like, “10 years ago today, this was happening.” – Well, here’s how I know, because- – And she ended up being two days early. – Me and you, of course, drove across the entire country. We got to Los Angeles one day before our wives and children showed up on a plane. And I have a picture that I took from the balcony of the apartment that we rented. And there’s a date on that. March 11th, 2011. And then Jessie was like, “Well, did we come the next day?” And then she brings up her phone, and she finds the video that she took in the RDU airport when they were all getting ready to get on the plane, and she goes around with a phone and she asks all five kids. – [Jessie] All right, guys, tell me what we’re doing. – Oh, a plane just took off! – “What do you guys think, where are we going?” And she starts with Lily. So this is 10 years ago, so Lily was seven years old. – Almost eight. – Almost eight. And it was just, it’s so crazy. – Four weeks away from being eight. Like, when I think about how long we’ve been in Los Angeles. – Oh, I know. – I’m just like, it doesn’t feel like we’ve been here that long. – But then when you see our children. – I watched the video, and yeah, I was thinking the same thing. I was like, “When we moved here.” First of all, you know, we rented furnished apartments. We didn’t move everything, We kind of did this like staggered approach to kind of ease into it, and that way, when we left, we could tell our family and friends that, you know what? – This might not be permanent. Just six months. – Our furniture’s still in our homes. Of course, we were thinking, “We gotta make this happen.” We, you know, in success, we’re gonna stay out there. – Or not success. (laughs) That was. – Yeah. – That’s what you thought, and I was too scared to think that at that point, but, yeah, I really didn’t think of it as like, “We’re doing that thing where you move to a new city.” It was like, “We’re going, and we’re doing this. We’re making this show. And we just happen to have to be in this city to do it. And this is, this is. It does feel like some dreams coming true type of thing.” – And that kind of makes- – But there was so much going on that it wasn’t just about relocation. – Well, that’s why the kids didn’t say we’re moving to California, that’s why Lily was like, “We’re gonna California.” And okay, now, did you notice that. So it’s so amazing how indicative of their personalities all of them are in this video. So you got Lily. – [Jessie] Lily, what are we doing? – We’re about to get on a plane to go to Atlanta, and after that, we’re gonna get on a plane to California. – [Jessie] How do you feel about it? – Okay. – It was like, kind of like, she’s gonna answer the questions, she’s gonna engage, she’s gonna be like, we’re going so and so and so. And then they go to Lincoln, and he’s got this funny look on his face. And Jessie’s like, “How do you feel about traveling today?” And he was like, “I don’t know what that means.” – [Jessie] Hey, Lincoln. – Oh, here comes my mom with the Cinnabon cinnamon rolls. – [Jessie] Tell me what your thoughts are on this move. – I don’t know what that means? (laughing together) – Yeah. And then she goes to Locke, and Locke is standing up, turned away from the camera. And you know why he’s doing that? ‘Cause he was, first of all, he’s a challenger, but he was very upset about moving. He did not want to leave North Carolina. And in fact, in the first couple of weeks that we were in Los Angeles, he said, “I would rather be a door knob.” That’s why one of his famous quotes is I would rather be a doorknob than be in California. I don’t know how, why he thought. But did you know, and so do you notice in the video where Jessie’s, he’s facing away, and then he says something like we’re gonna go, and Jessie’s like, “We’re gonna go see your dad in California. And he says something like, “I’m gonna insult my dad.” – I’m gonna insult you guys in the camera. – [Jessie] No, no, no, no, no, no. We’re gonna be respectful. Are you excited about this trip? – No. Actually, I’m not. – [Jessie] And why is that? – Oh, it’s pretty normal. – [Jessie] Pretty normal. Okay. – (laughs) Or he said something like that, and then she turns around, he turns around, and he’s just so upset about it. And of course, Shepherd and, I mean, Lando was like fresh from the womb. It seemed like. – [Jessie] Lando, how do you feel about us moving to Los Angeles? – [Member] Lando, do this. Can you show your trick? – [Jessie] Let me see your trick, Lando. – [Rhett] He was so little. – Yeah, he was one. – He’s one. That’s fresh from the womb in my book. – Ah. – [Jessie] That is very impressive. – [Member] That’s kind of how I feel too. – But she panned to Shepherd, and he was, she would tell him what to say, and then he would say it. – [Jessie] Shepherd, where are we going? – And then visiting my daddy. – [Jessie] Okay, and where is your daddy? What state is he in? – California. – California. – [Jessie] Yes, California. – California. – He was super cute. (Rhett laughs) Is that all the kids? Do we? That’s it. That’s all the kids. Yeah. That’s all the ones we brought with us. We don’t talk about the ones we left in North Carolina. They’re currently being raised by another family. – I mean, their lives are defined by here. You know? Their whole experience has been defined by. – How does that make you feel? – I feel good about it. – Well, the answer to that question is – [Together] I don’t know what that means. (Rhett laughs) I don’t know. What are you, what do you want me to do? Like develop thoughts and responses to questions. – I don’t know what that means. – I don’t (laughs). – Yeah, but 10 years, man. 10-year anniversary in Los Angeles. Like I said, it just went by so fast. But I do think about it from the perspective of the kids. It’s like, “Yeah, we made this choice because of what we were doing and what we wanted to do.” And the effect was our kids are from California. I mean, that’s how they think about it. – And they’re doing just fine. You’re doing great. – Yeah. I think they are. I mean, they’re doing great. They’re doing great. They’re doing great. No, they are doing great. It’s just, when I think about how they’re doing right now, I still think about the fact that they’re not yet back in school. – Yeah. They’ve got their challenge. – I want them to be back in school as soon as possible. Not because I’m tired of dealing with them at home, online school. I’m just saying they’re tired of online school. They’re the ones who are tired of it. – 10 years, man. Congratulations. Let’s celebrate. Let’s celebrate by reassessing our lives and seeing if there’s something else we can incorporate into it. Some new practice that’s gonna change everything or nothing because that’s not why you’re listening. – Right. But first let’s see if we can get people to buy that hoodie you’re wearing. – Okay, let me give it a shot. I’m wearing this hoodie. It’s, it’s got that tie-dye think going on. It’s a, it’s a cool color. It says, it has Mythical logo right there. You want to rep your boys. You want to be warm. – So this is a subtle promo. – You want to put your hoodie on. – I get it. You’re kind of trying to get them to make a decision. You’re not making the decision for them. – Mythical.com. Just comes in this teal color, and it comes in a purplish hue. – We call it crystal wash. We had one that was like gray and black. And now we’ve got these pastel colors. – Put the hood on. Hood goes all the way over the head and the ears. – You can wear while Easter egg hunting. Or you can just wear it by just while hunting. – Now I’m wearing this in order to promote it. And I might, I don’t know what we’re gonna talk about. I might sweat. I’m actually sweating a little bit. I’m just go ahead and tell you, but I might do, it might turn into one of those stink sweats, depending on what we talk about, where it’s like, “Wow, we’re really processing something, and.” – That makes you smell? – I don’t know. It makes more stink come out. I feel like when you really are having a stress sweat, and if that happens, then this hoodie is gonna stink. And then if you pick it up off the rack and decide to put it on, it might stink like that last hoodie that we were modeling for mythical.com and it stunk so bad. – I’m not gonna throw anybody under the bus. – That wasn’t me. – Oh, I know. – It was an extra large, I wouldn’t have put that on. – There wasn’t an actual large, it was a large. – Oh, maybe it was me. – Here, no, it wasn’t you. – You know what my stink smells like? – Unless you forget to wear a deodorant for a full day and wore that with no undershirt. – This is a long ad. I think we should start just doing it. A podcast is just an ad. We can talk for an hour. – Just an ad. It’s a whole new podcast. It’s just a side podcast. – Do you think, would anybody listen to that? – Yeah. If it was good enough. – Rhett and Link, add-cast. – Just an ad. – It’s just, but it’s not ad-reads. It’s just where we’re talking about it. We’re talking about stuff. ‘Cause I know you don’t want to listen to us read more ads as a whole podcast, but promoting stuff. – I think that Malcolm Gladwell podcast that we had as a sponsor was just an ad. You know the one that was sponsored by Lexus? – Yeah, but it was, and it wasn’t. We weren’t selling something the entire time directly. And that’s what my idea is. – No, I’m saying that podcast wasn’t just an ad. Not us selling, the podcasts. It was a branded podcast. – Oh, their podcast. – It was just an ad. – We did an ad for a podcast that just ads. – That was just an ad. But I mean, it’s Malcolm Gladwell. It was interesting. Anyway, rep your boys, mythical.com. – Mythical.com. – All right. Let’s just get started with Ben Franklin. Why not? Let’s go there. – Take a naked air bath is something you might want to consider doing on a daily basis because Ben Franklin did that. He would sit naked in the cold air for half hour to an hour each morning because he believed that cold water was too much of a shock to the system. – Whoa, hold on. The way you put because in there is misleading. As opposed to doing it. He believed that being in the cold was gonna be helpful, but he thought that the air would be better than the alternative which would be cold water. – I stand by what I said. – I’ve talked about it before on this podcast. I told you that I was just assembling the different parts to make my own ice bath. So the ice bath thing, especially since Wim Hof, the Iceman, kind of made this concept popular is something that’s in the popular culture. It’s in the vernacular now. Where people are doing the. Athletes taking ice baths, whatever. And so there’s all these, there’s all this research that suggests that first of all saunas have all these health benefits. So I’ll go, let me go to the hot side first, right? – I’ll go with you to the hot side now. – All kinds of evidence is piling up that people who spend like four to seven days, four to seven times a week, and they studied all these guys. And you know, it’s very popular in the culture of the men in the like, you know, Sweden, Norway, Scandinavian dudes, very big for them to take, you know, to go into saunas all the time. A lot of times like public saunas, and they followed, there’s multiple studies, but one of the most famous studies shows that people, and again, this is kind of a cultural thing. So you know, more men were doing it. So men are the ones that have been studied, but it probably affects everybody in a positive way. If you take a sauna, if you take a sauna bath of like 20 minutes or so at 175 degrees four to seven times a week, it has all these incredible health effects, like basically reduces your all-cause mortality. That’s like dying of anything by a large percentage. Now you can go look up the study to get the specifics. I don’t, I’m not, I don’t have it in front of me, so I’m not gonna give you the specifics, but it’s also shown to have effects on like mood, and you know all kinds of things, it makes you feel good. So because of that, when we redid, I’ve always loved being hot in general, but when we redid the outdoor area, I got a sauna installed. ‘Cause I was like, “I’m gonna do this.” And I am basically doing it every night. – Every night? – If I’m at home, I’m doing it definitely six times out of- – 20 minutes? – So first of all, I go for, I have a, like a manual. I have a timer, that’s an hourglass for 15 minutes, and what I do is I go 15 minutes, and I get out, and I’ll talk about that, ’cause I’m coming back to Ben Franklin, cool off, and then I go back in for another 15 minutes. So it ends up being about a half hour. And currently I’m oscillating between 195 and 205 degrees is where I’ve gotten to you. – Good gosh. – Your tolerance builds up pretty fast. So it’s, when I first got the thing, it was like 140. I was like, “It’s hot in here.” And then over the course of a few months, I’m already over 200 degrees, so you can do it. And you can feel, and you’d begin to crave it. But what I do is I go into the sauna, then I get out of the sauna, and I get into the pool, which like last night it was 46 degrees outside. – 46 degrees. Okay. So it might be 55 degrees? – Low 50s. I think it was 52 degrees. – In the pool, yes. – Get the pool. And I hang in the pool for about five minutes. – Good gosh, that’s hard to do the first time. – You begin to crave it. Like when we watched the octopus. – My octopus teacher. – He talked about how he began to crave the cold. I was like, “This dude’s nuts.” – He said it took him a year, but that water was frigid. – He was way colder than I am. And then I get out, and you get back into the sauna, and you get back into the sauna, and it’s like 205 degrees, and it takes you about five minutes to realize that it’s hot because you were just so cold. And then I go for 15 minutes, and then I get out, and I get back in the pool. And then Ben Franklin, coming back to the Ben Franklin, I get out of the pool, and I stand outside for at least 10 minutes. Last night, and I was wet, out of the pool, in a wet bathing suits, 46 degrees. – But it’s colder outside of the pool than in the pool. – But something about coming out of the cold water because of the heat transfer, the water feels colder. So I came out, and I just stood next to the pool and was like continuing to listen to the podcast that I had going. And I just stood there for 10 minutes before I began to feel uncomfortable. It’s revolution. Have you noticed how I haven’t been wearing a jacket? Like it’ll be cold in our office, and like me and you used to be like, “Man, it’s cold in here.” And we put on a layer. We put on another jacket. I’ve been thinking, “I’m hot.” Like I don’t, I haven’t worn a jacket. I haven’t worn a jacket except maybe one time when we went over to your house to hang out in the backyard the other night. I wore a jacket. I was like, “This is the first time I’ve worn a jacket in a while.” Because my body has adjusted. – Do you notice any other changes? – I mean, I feel good, but I don’t know if that has anything to do with it. – You’re not dead. You didn’t die of any cause. – I feel good. I haven’t liked tested. It’s supposed to like lower your blood pressure, which I kind of had like borderline blood pressure, but I haven’t tested that in a couple of months. I probably should test that. – Well, you know, I’d be interested to try that. – I highly recommend this. – I’m not coming over to your house every day to get your sauna. – You should get one of those infrared saunas, man. You can. – I would have to try it before I go all in. – Well, you could just come over. – But like being really cold is something that I don’t like. That’s why I’m liking this Ben Franklin thing because it’s not a cold shower or a cold pool plunge. It’s just cold air. He’s like, “You know what, I’m gonna do something.” So he’s sitting outside just naked – Naked. – in the cold for an hour every morning. – Well, and there are two things. – He was onto something. I mean, science has proven him correct. And said, “You need to go further, Ben.” – Yeah, I wonder if he understood what was happening. If he just had a sense for it. Because the science of this is that what’s happening with, when you. So there’s this stuff called brown fat, right? Which is like it’s fat that I guess under a microscope looks darker. – It’s kind of already gravy. – It’s got more mitochondrial elements to it or something. And it isn’t like, you can’t see this fat. It isn’t like, “Oh, I got a lot of brown fat, and you can see that I’m overweight,” or whatever. No, this is like fat that kind of concentrates in your neck and your shoulders. And if you go back to like pre-climate-controlled times, so we’re talking like thousands of years ago, everybody had way more brown fat, and they were able to regulate their temperature and be cold and not really have a big deal with it. But now we’ve lost all our brown fat because we’ve got hoodies and jackets and climate control. And so you don’t need it. And so you quickly lose it, but there’s all these studies that show. In fact, there was one study I was looking at. There was these guys who they slept, I think, uncovered, out of a blanket, and it’s 68 degrees. So like 68 degrees without a blanket, you’d be like, “Mm, this is a little uncomfortable, a little too cold, right, just a little bit too cold.” And these men did this for like six weeks, and they all had some very noticeable increase in the amount of brown fat. And what that ends up doing is you become way more tolerant of cold very quickly. And then the moment they went back to sleeping regular, like within a few weeks they lost the brown fat. So you got to keep doing it. But Ben Franklin had a bunch of brown fat because he was doing this, I’m telling you. And he, you know, I mean, he was way ahead of his time. – Brown Fat Franklin. – Yeah. That’s his nickname. – Brown Fat Ben Franklin, BF. – Telling you, man, it’s a light. Just come over to my house, get in there. My wife got in there for like the first time last night as a matter of fact, ’cause she was like, “I just don’t want to get in there. I feel like I’m gonna faint or whatever.” I was like, “Let’s just do 175.” Put her on 175. She was in there for 15 minutes, sweating like crazy. It’s kind of sexy. And then she came out, and she was like, “I feel good.” I was like, “All right, we’ll do it again tomorrow night.” I’m gonna live forever. – I’m not. – (laughs) But. Well, one of us is gonna live longer than the other, and they’re gonna have to keep doing this podcast. ‘Cause you’re committed to doing it for our entire lives. – All right, this is one that came to mind immediately when we started tossing around this topic. And it’s one that we keep coming back to because we’re fascinated about it. Wear the same outfit every single day. Of course, Steve Jobs, the most famous example of this, wore the same black. Well, I don’t think it was the same black turtleneck. He wore the same outfit, but it was probably different. – I think he had a closet full of black turtlenecks. – He probably had a closet full of black turtlenecks, blue jeans and New Balance sneakers, okay? – Very particular choice. – Of course it became his signature look and a part of like the Apple aesthetic, and his rationale when asked about it was that he had a finite capacity of brainpower to make well-thought-out decisions. And he wanted to minimize his decision fatigue. A minute more a day using his brainpower to decide which t-shirt to wear is less brainpower he would have to think about his company. – Many people have fallen into this, because this has been out. You know, everybody’s known this for the past 20 years or so. – Obama did it. You know, he only wore gray or black suits except for that one time that he wore the brown suit, and everybody wanted, – The tan suite. – the tan suite, wanted to talk about it. And yeah, he told Vanity Fair that he wants to, he’s trying to pare down decisions. He said, “I don’t want to make decisions about what I’m eating or wearing because I have too many other decisions to make.” And just as a side note, I totally relate to that. We’ve asked Jenna just to, if the crew is ordering food for us, just get whatever we’ve gotten before or whatever you know we’ll like because stopping and making a decision – Stopping and making the decision about what to eat. – in the middle of making a bunch of decisions. So I do think this. – It’s demoralizing. – Maybe this is like, if your job is defined by making constant decisions would lead you to consider something like this. – Yeah, and the whole idea of a president. I mean, first of all, the president is gonna wear a suit every day. So that feels like, if you have a closet full. – Not after the pandemic, man. He’s gonna be wearing sweats just like everybody else. Biden gonna be wearing them sweats like all the college basketball coaches like we talked about. They ain’t going back to suits either. – But the idea that the president, that doesn’t really track for me because they’re already just, they’re just wearing a suit. Like, it’s not like, it’s like, “Yeah, I have a closet full of suits and shirts and ties. – Does Jimmy Fallon? – And just put it on.” – All the late night show hosts. I mean, they’re just given a suit to wear. I mean, if they don’t like it, I’m sure they won’t wear it, but they’re not going through and picking it out every day. When you have to wear one every day. – But this, but so. – But I’m surprised that it’s not someone’s job to pick out the president’s suit every day. I had to believe it was, but the way that Obama talked about it, it seemed like he wanted to simplify it. ‘Cause I guess if you’re wearing like, “Oh, this is a tan suit. Oh, you got me in this thing now.” Then even though you’re not making the decision on what to wear, you’re you have veto power over it, and you’re still assessing it. You’re giving attention to it. So it does make sense to me, I guess that a president would be tempted to allocate mental resources to that. – Okay. – But you like the idea of publicity jobs. – I’ve been, okay. – I do not. – I’ve been trying to land this for myself for the past couple of months, okay? And now when I say land this, I don’t mean get as specific as same exact shirt. He had multiple black turtle necks, but they were all black turtlenecks, and all blue jeans are the same color. – Dennis The Menace. – And all new Balance Sneakers that look the same. But I had been thinking about creating like a couple of options. Like if it is between X and Y degrees in a certain day, then I know what I’m gonna wear is these jeans, this shirt, and maybe just a couple of choices of shoes, right? And then if it’s a little bit warmer, okay, I’m gonna wear this t-shirt. – Why? – So for. Now, for me, it has less to do with decision fatigue. The lunch decision is very much about decision fatigue because me and you will be in a conversation about something. We’re making decisions. Our job has largely become making decisions, right? We’ve got a little bit better at kind of making it where we’re actually doing creative things, but we’re managing a lot of things. So, – but for clothes. – When Jenna comes into, Jenna comes in and does that it throws us off. But in the morning, it’s kind of like, all right, it’s not. It’s almost like a buffet. Like I’ve got all the clothes there, but for me, my body type, it’s my height. And so it’s very difficult, 90% of the clothes that I own, once you wash them once, I have to be really careful about how I wash them because shirts get too short or shirts get, you know, shirts that are long enough for two big, shirts that are the right, are tight enough or too short. Pants, you can, it’s just being an unusual body type. And so I’ve been on a hunt for just a t-shirt that I can reliably wear every single day. Now you see, I wear the t-shirts that we sell at the Mythical store all the time, right? Here’s the issue with those shirts. An extra large, it’s a little bit bigger than a shirt that I want to wear. And a large looks perfect. – Until you wash it. – Until I wash it. And our shirts don’t even shrink that much, but I’m dealing with such a small margin of error here. – Tall man problems. – And so like I’ve tried multiple, like tall-fitting t-shirts, and this is like, I can’t quite, because again, I just want to have like a closet, not the same color, just like, okay, here’s 10 different colors of t-shirts, just blank t-shirts with nothing on them. – To me, it’s not about, yeah. So it’s not about, it’s about fit. It’s about, you know have something. – No, no, but it is, it’s about the time, because when you have an issue with things fitting, you know what’s gonna happen is you go in your closet, and you know you’re gonna put something on, and there’s a 75% chance you’re gonna put it on and be like, “I’m not really comfortable in this because it’s not fitting in this way.” And so you’ve added time to your day. And so it is about time for me. And so I’ve got these. – And then if you run out of time, then you might, you lack confidence. See, that’s the thing like, because you know I’m not trying to rub your nose in this, but for me going into my closet is like, “All right, I’m getting dressed for the day. This is my opportunity to express myself and to embody what I’m anticipating or what I’m feeling or the mode I’m going into.” And if I have some new clothes, then there’s also something to get excited about. “Ooh, I can’t wait to get out of my pajamas today.” It’s like, sometimes you need that motivation. So for me, it’s like the self-expression, excitement, variety of it, but there are times when I’ll put something on, and I’ll go in front of the mirror, and I just won’t be happy and I’ll start over. Or I realize that that doesn’t match or whatever. And then, and then I do get frustrated. And if that happened to me every day or multiple times a week, I could start going the way of Jobs. – Well, and I think that it coincides with, there’s two things, there’s two sort of prevailing things that are happening that have led to this decision. The first is that, the body shape thing that I’ve just dealt with my entire life, just not being a normal size. But then the second thing is the age that I’m at. Right? You know? Okay. 43, even though I said I was 42 in that sketch, we did on Instagram because I forgot how old I was. I’m 43. And, you know, this latest iteration of like things going back to the ’90s. And we talked about this, I think maybe on an episode, where I quit caring so much about the trends when I started realizing that I was dressing like my children. So I was like, okay, oh, now I’ve got this like man in my house, this teenage man, basically, you know, in my son Locke. And if like we’re wearing the same clothes, it’s like something just feels off. And, and then I’m like, “I just kinda don’t want to keep trying that.” Like I might, like there comes a time, I think, in most people’s lives where you just say, “Okay, I’m checking out of remaining with the trends.” Now, if we had stayed in North Carolina and worked as engineers, we would have checked out at like 24. (laughs) You know what I’m saying? And then you like kind of just keep dressing the same way for the rest of your life, and the 25 year old engineer and the 55 year old engineer could trade clothes and nobody would know. And that’s a phenomenon that happens in a lot of workplaces. But because, “Hey, we moved to Los Angeles, and, oh, and we’re also on the internet, and we’re trying to like be relevant and cool.” You end up kind of wearing things that represent like, “Oh, these guys understand fashion and what’s in style.” And I just think my appetite for being on that edge is just waned over the past. Like since I hit 40, really. And so now I’m just like, I’m not saying I want to look like I don’t, I’m out of touch. I’m just saying, find something that fits your body that you feel comfortable in, that makes it look. I mean, it looks cool, whatever, doesn’t, but it doesn’t look like you’re trying to be cool. Just looks like you are cool. – 10 of them. – And wear it every single day. So I’m zeroing in on that. Haven’t figured it out yet. – Especially if, I mean, if it’s about fit, and then there’s a number, you can get a couple of different colors. Like I can feel that. All right. I’ve been waiting to talk about this one. All right, something else that we could consider doing to improve our lives is to drown yourself, almost. Could lead to lots of success at least if you’re an inventor. Prolific inventor, Dr. Yoshiro Nakamatsu, he patented the floppy disc in 1952, but I didn’t have to tell you that. He’s also patented over 3,300 inventions in his 74 years on this planet. And here’s what he would do. According to his own accounts, many of his ideas hit him while he was close to drowning. Now you might think, “Well, he just needs to be more careful around bodies of water,” or, you know, it’s like, “Why’s this dude drowning so much?” But he would do it intentionally to quote, “Starve the brain of oxygen, you must dive deep and allow the water pressure to deprive the brain of blood. 0.5 seconds before death. – How do you time that? I visualize an invention.” So he may be dramatizing this thing. – Hold on, it says then he jots his idea down on an underwater notepad? – Yes. – And swims back to the surface. – He stays, yeah. He’s almost dying. He has the idea. He doesn’t come up (gasping), gasps for air and say, “Oh my God, but I’ve got this invention! Give me a sheet of paper!” No, he does that while he’s still dying. – Let me just, I mean, listen, I don’t want to. – Underwater notepad. – I don’t want to be the skeptic here, but if you almost die, okay. I’m just gonna do some math here. If you’re half a second. – 0.5. – If you’re literally half a second from death, and then you’re still underwater, how do you then write it down? Doesn’t the death part come? – Doesn’t really add up. – Something about this doesn’t add up, but 3,300 inventions adds up. – Yeah, I mean. – The notepad part had to be made up. This is, I don’t know where you got. I see you got the source linked there. – That’s right. ‘Cause I knew that you would be like this. – I’m just saying that that last part reeks of like internet creative liberties. – Well, Rhett, it comes from the website taogroupinc.wordpress.com 2015/06/11. – And it’s got Martha Stewart on the website. Okay, I take it all back. It must be true. – Yeah. – No, but I, okay. But the idea of- – Taogroup.net, cultivating growth. – But the idea of almost dying, I mean, I didn’t. There he is, is that him writing on his underwater notebook? – There’s a picture of him right there. See, he’s writing. – Everything other than the 0.5 seconds from death. Maybe that was just a tidbit that he threw in. – Maybe that’s just what he feels. Don’t do this, by the way. – Oh yeah. Please. We’d have to tell you that. Right? I mean, okay, so this, I mean this. – Underwater notepad, man. – I haven’t tried this. But there is something to the whole idea that in fact I started watching, there’s a Netflix show that I didn’t really commit to it, but I watch like an episode where it’s sort of that, it’s the whole, the moment of death and all the research and ideas that come, that moment of almost dying and that release of DMT into the brain, and all this stuff, and the experiences that people have. And I don’t know what the world view of this particular show is, but they spend a lot of time like talking to, there’s like a research institute that basically just believes that, yes, there’s, your soul survives. There’s definitely life after death. And they have all these, they have like a compendium of all these testimonies of people who’ve experienced these things. – “Flatliners.” – Yeah, but it made me think about the movie “Flatliners” for certain, but it isn’t people getting ideas, but this made me think, I’ve heard Einstein did this thing where he would, he said that he came up with a lot of his sort of breakthrough ideas in the liminal space between sleeping, between being awakened and being asleep. And that moment, I get, what, I don’t, there’s a technical term for it. It’s like hypnagogia or hypnagote. You know, it’s, you know the hypnagogic jerk. I’m gonna probably say that word wrong, but it’s that I’m falling asleep, and then you catch yourself, and people are like it’s because we used to be in trees. They don’t really know exactly why is happens, but. – And if you have an underwater notepad, and when you do that jerk, you’ll write down like an equation. – Right. But he. – Or if you’re Keith Richards like the riff to start me up. – Right, yeah. So he did the same thing. So because Einstein – For satisfaction. – had this happened to him so often that he started doing this thing where he would sit in a chair, and he, I can’t remember. He had like a pencil that he held above a plate. Basically, he had this built in alarm so that he was starting to fall asleep, and then when he did fall asleep, he would immediately wake himself up. It sounds kind of like it would drive you crazy. But he did this multiple times during the day for two reasons. Number one, he said that these many naps, like falling asleep and then waking up immediately, happening over and over again in the day was something that he needed. He also slept like 10 hours a night. So Einstein got a lot of sleep, but it was also because in that moment of falling asleep, he was getting these insights that he would then write down. I mean, I haven’t tried, this is. I mean, I’m interested in it, but. – Well, if you’re, you know, if you’re doing something so heady as like trying to solve equations or have some sort of breakthrough with a problem, or yeah, it does apply to songwriting. You know, if your entire existence is really bent towards solving a problem or creating something in a very focused way, I, you know, we do so many different things, but we do have problems we’re trying to solve. And some things that are kind of like nagging and kinda give me anxiety. And I wonder if there’s a way to, you know, take a dive in my pool and think about it. Or as I’m falling asleep, you know, do something that’s gonna wake me up and just have an intention of trying to solve these things. – Well, you know what’s interesting? – Solve the problem. – Now that we’re talking about this, I do, it has hit me that while in the sauna at these really high temperatures, I’ll be listening. I usually put on a podcast or a book or something like that. And I feel like I’m having some higher level of insight into something, and I’ll come up with an idea, and I’ll get out and I’ll, I need to, like a sweat-proof notebook. Because I mean like going out, ’cause I can’t bring my phone in there ’cause it’s too hot. – Sweat-proof notebook. – And then I like wipe my hands off and type something. – You need a Yoshiro Nakamatsu. – He’s probably, probably that one would probably work. The underwater pad would also work as a sweat pad, but there’s this other book I was reading. I can’t remember what it was, but the guy was talking about how there’s a bunch of thinkers in history who have insisted that walking is how you come up with ideas, that you’ve got to be in motion in order to like, a bunch of people. It was like, he quotes all these people. I was like I’ve never thought about this. I mean, I’ve had ideas while walking and sometimes you’re like, “I need to, let me take a walk on this.” Well, I don’t know the science behind it, but the idea that you’re in motion, you kind of get your body and your mind kind of doing something, and then something cracks open. – Well, I mean, my theory is, yeah, I like to do a lot of thinking when I’m like riding my mountain bike. I’ve started doing that more often, just kind of taking, found this one trail I can do in less than an hour, and I know the trail, and I know it increasingly better. So I can devote more of my active attention to just not die, not to dying or falling off the cliff, or you know, where my tire is, but on other things. But the way that I think about those things is it’s a little bit different than I would think about them if I was just sitting down at my desk trying to solve the problem or trying to work something out. You know, it’s, it ruminates. And I think, you know, when you’re in your body, I do think that you think differently. – Oh, yeah. – And so you can approach problems differently, or a creative exercise differently. So it, but, ’cause for me, a lot of times, I’ve noticed, you know, you get so much in your head about, well, I need to accomplish this, or I gotta solve this problem, or I really want to create this thing right now. And then it’s kind of self-defeating when you’re just 100% focused on it, there’s a, because then you have all this self-awareness of like the pressure you put on yourself, but if you’re doing something else, or it kind of relieves that pressure, at least for me, to say, “You know, I don’t have to solve this right now.” So I can kind of play with the idea. It’s the difference between working with an idea and playing with an idea. And so I don’t know any of the science really behind it, but I’ve observed that the best solutions or ideas come from left field when you when you least expect it, or when you give room and remove the pressure of having to show improve. – I kind of experienced it as a balance between, like if I sit down, and I’m like, okay, I need to write this thing. And like, okay, this, you know, I need to write 20 pages. I like, and you kind of have to, there is sort of a work sort of focus that happens. And I tend to be like, all right. I, you know, there’s certain problems that I’m gonna come to in this process. There are certain holes, and there certain unanswered questions. But when I come to those unanswered questions, I’m not going to spend a lot of time just sitting there thinking about the solution. I’m going to arrive at a solution, put it as a placeholder. Maybe it ends up being the final decision, and then I’m gonna keep moving. And that way I’ll be able to say, hey, you sat down for two hours, and you wrote this much, but then what I’ll find is if I’ve done that, if I’ve laid the track, and that track has some problems in it, right? Then when I’m doing something completely unrelated like sitting in the sauna, thinking about something else, listening to something else, all of a sudden the solution to that problem, that I created a hole. And then all of a sudden, the solution to the problem pops in in those other spaces. And then I go back into that. Now I’m back into work mode. And I take that solution that came to me in a different phase, in sort of the play phase. So that, I mean, I have never thought about that being, I don’t do that intentionally. It’s just as you talk about it, I realize that’s what I do naturally is just to kind of be like, all right, I could sit here for the next 30 minutes thinking about this one problem, but I’m a little bit ADHD, so I’m gonna end up getting on the internet or doing something else. But if I just be like, nope, just move past that. Get to the next thing, the solution to that will come later while you’re doing something else, like walking, riding the bike, in the sauna, whatever. – As long as you don’t start breathing before you come up for air. – That’s the key. – Yeah. I didn’t say that. That is how your Yoshiro Nakamatsu died. He drowned. – Oh, he really? – Yeah. He drowned. I wonder what he was coming up with. It must’ve been so good, he couldn’t come up. I’m lying about that. No source. Link is the source. – Hold on, so you’re saying he might still be alive. – Yeah. – Well, okay. – ‘Cause you can black out pretty easily, and you definitely shouldn’t do anything like that. First of all, just don’t do it. But if you are gonna try to do like holding your breath, don’t do it by yourself. Do it in the presence of someone else who can pull you out of the water. – I got another one for you. This is especially for you. Pythagoras, you know, with his theorem and all that stuff. I dunno from like 500 BC, give or take. Greek mathematician. He, I didn’t know this about him, but he’s credited with popularizing a meatless lifestyle, dubbed the father of vegetarianism. So, you know, he was this, you know, he was a mathematician, but it was, there was so much philosophy and politics, and, you know, all of these thinkers, Greek thinkers and philosophers and mathematicians and astronomers. You know, we’re figuring all this stuff out and thinking about all of these things. But a lot of it was very contentious, as I’ll get to in a second. But even though he did not eat meat, he just ate veggies, he hated beans. He hated lagoons. And he had, you know, he had followers. He had people that he was teaching and that were like learning from him. And I guess being allegiant to his beliefs. He even forbade them from eating or touching beans. – What’s wrong with this guy? – We don’t know if it was for health or religious reasons, but here’s what happened. That he did die. He is no longer alive, Pythagoras. – Yep. I guess that. – And there’s all these different accounts of how he died. One of them, which I’ll call a legend is that there were these attackers who attacked a house that he and some of his followers were in for, I mean, again for that political contention, and it got to the point where they were killing people. And as he fled his, this house, he was getting away. But then he encountered a bean field, and he refused to run through the bean field. And then, so he was caught by the attackers and killed. – He got what he deserved. (Link laughs) This is ridiculous. – So if you want to be a successful mathematician, you should avoid beans. – I never liked the Pythagorean theorem. I always questioned it. A squared plus B squared equals C squared? – I did hear the question mark as you said it. – I mean, it’s like really? – Yeah, really. – Really? – Yes. Yes. – I don’t know. – Yes. – I honestly don’t know. – It is a theorem. – This is strange. This is a strange, this is a strange position. I understand the not eating meat. Okay. But most people who don’t eat meat. – It’s weird that they. – Who sell the idea to me are like, well, you can eat beans all the time kinda as a substitute. – Yeah, mental flaws could not tell me why he hated beans, but there is this whole health meets religion meets. You know, all of these ideas are floating around. All of these ideas are floating around. Yeah. I mean, – Fava beans. – I could see, what about them? – I think that was the field. – Oh. (Link laughs) I got this. – You want to know how to do triangle math, avoid the beans. We don’t need to talk about it anymore. We can move on. – I just wanted you to know, Rhett. – Well, no, but I feel like I got this. I’m not gonna say what brand it is because I don’t know what I think about them yet, but they’ve got a bunch of fake meat. And again, the principle of eating less meat, I’m all on board. I get it. I understand the impact on the environment. And so, and also just the impact on lifestyle. So the idea of minimizing meat intake is something that I’m personally interested in. The fact that I like beans makes that somewhat easier. – The idea is something you’re personally interested. The practice is a little more difficult. – The practice is more difficult because. – Because of the whole meat part of it. Yeah. I’m with you, man. – Well, here, okay. I’ll be honest with you. I’m kind of holding out for fake meat, like real fake meat, like lab-grown meat, like meat that’s actually meat, but that was grown in a lab. Because they’re gonna be able to do that with so much less environmental impact. And obviously it’s gonna be considerably more humane because it won’t require slaughtering any animals. – And by not becoming a vegetarian or vegan, we both. – I can make it to that, can cross that bridge. – Well, we’re actually creating an environment where that can succeed. We’re making an incentive. We’re incentivizing them. – ‘Cause you’re not gonna get the world to just decide to stop eating meat. You might be able to get the lab-grown meat. – Right. That’s why I keep eating meat to demonstrate the demand for meatless meat. – This is quite a theory. – That’s what I’m doing. I’m doing, I’m long. This is a long play for the environment. – Okay. Well, I appreciate that. But I got this meat that’s made from beans. And this doesn’t happen when I do like an Impossible Burger or like Beyond Meat. I don’t think it happens, but I got this. – Are you gonna talk about poo-poo? – This meat that had been made with beans and other things, and they send you like a pack of it and it’s, there’s taco meat, there’s sausages, there’s hamburgers, all these different fake meats. And you know I like to do the scramble thing on the weekend. I’ll make a scramble for my wife and I. That’s not correct grammar by the way. Be my wife and me. – I’m losing you. I’m losing you, man. – But I made this taco scramble with this fake taco meat. – Didn’t work. – And the whole weekend, it was just this past weekend, Saturday and, I came over to your house on Saturday night, I didn’t want to talk about it. You know, but I was in like bloat pain the whole time I was there. – You were grimacing. – It was just like very bloated, very like not. And I guess maybe you would adjust over time, but I eat a fair amount of beans. It’s just, it’s like why is it the human body? If the human body is supposed to only eat vegetables, then why is it so difficult for me to digest the vegetables? – Well, it’s because you wear hoodies, man. It’s the same thing. It’s like the brown fat’s gonna go away. You gotta get used to it. – You’re saying I’m maladjusted. – You’re soft. – I’m maladjusted. – You’re soft. But what’s your point? – Just I’m saying, I want to not make a full switch, but I want to minimize meat. – I want to eat some – But the fake meat, – of that meat on the GMM. – the lab grown meat, the lab grown meat is where, and I know it’s gonna be difficult to convince people ’cause they’re all scared of things from a lab, but we’ll get there, we’ll get there. – I wanted to put one in here that wasn’t so strange, but I just thought it was so personally impactful. – Speaking of impactful, that’s a Sunday afternoon, man. All those beans came out. – One of the things, One of the habits that you can incorporate into your life that I have incorporated, this made a difference that’s popped up on these lists that we looked at, was me-time or according to one Ted speaker named Steven Kotler, he calls it non-time. I did not watch the Ted talk because I read this sentence, and that’s all I needed to know. He discusses the importance of downtime that is just for you, and here’s the key. It doesn’t require you to think about anything at all. Einstein did this, Steve jobs did this. Dwayne The Rock Johnson wakes up early for a quiet time. Now we woke up early for quiet times, or at least that’s what we. – But it meant something very specific. – Yeah, that was like a. – Bible study and prayer time. – Yeah, it was a Christian spiritual exercise. Now. – And we also weren’t very good at it. – Not very consistent. Now, that sometime, I have me-time. I aim to have me-time every morning. I’m such a, you know, I have this sense of what I ought to be doing. And I certainly have this sense of like if I’m not meeting my own expectations as a perfectionist. And so I always have this, you know, that voice in my head that’s like should I be doing something different? Should I be doing, should I be doing better than this? Am I meeting my standard? You know? Am I contributing? Or am I being lazy or whatever the case may be? You know? So it’s actually scheduling time where the goal and the task is to do nothing, have no obligations. So, you know, I set my alarm 30 minutes earlier, and then I’ll go down, I’ll drink my coffee. And I’ll just sit on the couch. Now when I’m done with my coffee or done with enough of my coffee that like I’m ready to move on to the next thing, that’s when I like actually do a meditation. And I do consider meditation as part of this me-time, because, I mean, the practice of mindfulness meditation is to. – To not think. – To not think or to acknowledge the thoughts that you’re having, but not to obligate yourself to engage in those thoughts. So it gives you space. It gives you head space. Now actually it’s, HeadSpace is gonna be a sponsor on “Good Mythical Morning.” It’s not as sponsor here, but, I mean, I’ve tried lots of different meditation apps, and they’re all good for different reasons, but Headspace is a great introductory one. And I’m glad that they’re a sponsor. Again, they’re not a sponsor right now, but since I’m talking about it, and if you are interested, you can use our code EAR. You gotta, it’s headspace.com/ear. And then you got to put in the coupon code EAR to get, I can’t remember what it is right now. – It’s a good deal. – It’s a deal. – It’s a good deal. And it helps us, and, anyway. I’m not great at it. And we’ve talked about it in the past, and how we’ve, you know, you get into it. You have seasons of being in and out of it, but whether you’re actually learning and practicing mindfulness meditation, or if you’re just taking time to where it’s like, you know what, I’m drinking my tea, I’m drinking my coffee. I’m just gonna sit here. And I’m just going to notice myself. I’m gonna notice what it feels like. I’m gonna notice if I’m, you know, am I experiencing anxiety or what, you know, whatever the case may be, and just give yourself freedom to just not have to engage. With the way my brain works, I really do think it’s making a huge difference in my capacity to then go on with my life for the rest of the day. – Yeah, it’s really tough for me to do it in the morning. I think I’ve replaced it. And I know most of the time I am listening to something, but like I’m getting that like half hour every, pretty much every day in the sauna. And I’ve thought about making that into meditation, but it’s almost the heat is so intense that- – You need a distraction. – I need something to kind of focus on. But it is a very meditative time. And when I get out of the thing kind of in between them and the pool, whatever, but I’ve been working out in the morning, and there was a time when I was meditating and then working out, and it’s just like, I have to get up so early in order to come to, my workout is like an hour. And so it’s so tough, but. – But that’s what it is for me. Are you saying, ’cause I was, I did want to just flat out ask, you know, what is the one practice that you would point to for you personally that is the key to your either success or personal wellbeing, if you were to nail it down to one thing? I think for me, it is that me-time. And then I think a corollary is beginning to see exercise as something that allows me to, to get out of my head and get into my body. And so it’s not just about all the other things you associate with working out, but it’s just about, it gives my brain a break to actually engage in rigorous physical activity. So I think that’s my answer. – Well, I mean, one thing before I give you my answer is, you know, Eckhart Tolle talks about how mindfulness is kind of a misnomer, that it’s actually a mistranslation, because his whole deal is about how the mind is the problem. You know what I’m saying? Like, thoughts and your mind feeling like it has to be active and it has to be doing something and identifying yourself with your mind is like the key to all suffering essentially. Him does a much better way of talking about it. He’s also, his voice is very intoxicating, but so mindfulness is actually about not thinking. Like, yeah, the reason that you focus on your breath or you observe a thought is actually so you won’t think about those things and you won’t go down a rabbit trail. And that’s why you keep bringing your thoughts back to your breath, so you don’t think. And I, and so, I mean, I find meditation to be very helpful in that even though it’s so difficult for me to stop thinking. Because even when I do meditation I keep reframing it according to how well I’m meditating, or, you know, it’s like, this is a very common problem for anybody trying to gets into meditation. – If that makes you feel better. – And so, but what I found is that I have to because I’m forced to because of my back. I have to every single morning, I have to get up, and now I go down to, ’cause we’ve kind of redone the garage area, and it’s kind of like a gym, and I’ve got like a yoga mat down there, I play some like peaceful music, some like Spotify meditation playlist. You know, I’ve got so many, and I know I keep promising putting this on the site, and I will someday, but my stretching sort of yoga sort of back essential routine every single day is about 20 minutes every single day. And so, and I’m not thinking about anything at that point, other than what I’m doing to my body, you know what I’m saying? It’s just like I’m stretching in this way. I’m stretching in this way. I’m doing this move. I’m doing that move. And I’m playing this music or whatever. So I think that’s kind of become my meditation time. And I have to do that in order to stay healthy, but I also have to do that in order to then work out without hurting myself. So it ends up being about an hour and a half total time every day pretty much of doing the, you know, half, 20 minutes or so of the stretching and then like a workout that’s about an hour long. I think that that’s become pretty essential, and it’s become so, so much of a rhythm in quarantine, that I’m kind of nervous about life going back to the way that it was. I mean, a lot of people have been talking about this lately. They’re like, oh, now that life seems like it’s about to return to normal, and, you know, everybody’s gonna be vaccinated. And then we’re gonna start doing all the things that we were doing before, there’s this anxiety that a lot of people are having about, some people is a social anxiety. Like I haven’t been in a crowd. I’m kinda nervous about that. I don’t, that’s not me. That’s not how I think about it. I think I have an anxiety about being pulled out of these rhythms that I’ve been able to establish, that like, yeah, okay, if we go to New York City, I can do the back routine on the hotel floor, right? But if you want to work out, you’re like, well, I’m gonna go to the hotel gym and what are they gonna have, and, oh, what am I gonna do at night? I can’t go, I can’t go get my sauna. You know what I’m saying? It’s like, these are privileged problems, but I just have this anxiety about not, this has become such a part of my existence at this point. I haven’t thought about it in these terms, in this non-time. But I think it’s probably one of the reasons that I feel good right now. I feel kind of healthy because I’ve got these things that I’m doing almost every single day that are pretty consistent and not focused on doing, doing, doing, doing. – I think that’s why now is a good time to have this conversation because as things start to change, it’s like, okay, is there something new to incorporate or something that you started to incorporate that you want, that there’s a new priority associated with it, that you’re gonna protect that, you know? I hope that’s true of me, that I’ll keep getting up and taking that time. – Well, I mean, the good news for me is the fact that I have, like, if I don’t do the stretching, I literally can’t go on about my day. Like I will, I’ll be in pain for the rest of the day. So that’s kind of the blessing of a lower back injury or chronic pain or whatever it is. Is that, okay, like if we’re traveling, and we’re like, okay, we gotta be at this interview at seven o’clock, or something like that, I’m like, okay, well, I’ve got to get up. I’ve got to have at least 20 minutes to sit there and do these stretches, and you can’t go faster than the stretches allow. And so I guess that’s a good thing. Sometimes there’s, you know, pain can be, an inconvenience can be a blessing if you turn it into something that ends up being sort of meditative. – #EarBiscuits, let us know if any of that resonates with you. You got a rec for us? – I do. – Sweet. – This is gonna be in the category of things that are old or least not current that most of you probably didn’t watch when it was around, and so maybe like me and you, you can discover it for the first time, the HBO show “The Watchman,” based on the graphic novel, which was probably the only graphic novel I’ve ever read. And I really liked it. This is, I mean, what? It’s been like four years or so that this? Three years? – I don’t think it’s that old. Of course we’ve been in LA for 10 years. I wouldn’t have believed that either. – But, hold on. There’s only, is it, there was only, there was only one season. It was like a limited series, right? Or is it, or is there gonna be a second season? – I haven’t heard about a second season. No. – Okay, well maybe it’s not as old as I thought it was, and maybe there isn’t gonna be a second season, but anyway, excellent television show. And the same thing that happened to me happened to you when you were watching it which is halfway through the season, you began to think is this? It started really good. And then halfway through the season, you’re kind of like is this getting to be too complex? How are they gonna bring this all together? And I don’t like super complex shows. And so I’ll end up, I started to almost kind of lose interest, and then the way it all came together in the last two episodes was just some of the best television that I’ve ever seen. – I would say that the penultimate episode was one of my favorite episodes of a show. It’s the first episode of a show that I’ve watched, and then I sat down the next night and I watched that same episode again, before, even though I could go to the finale. – And the way that it weaves- – And that redeemed the whole thing for me. Because the season as a whole, – Well, I thought that. – I’m like it’s really good, but that was just mind blowing. – The second to last episode was so good that I thought that the season was over, and I told Jessie, I was like, “That was incredible!” She was like, “What about that storyline and that storyline and that storyline? Isn’t there gonna be?” I was like, “Oh yeah, there’s probably,” and then we were like, “Oh yeah, there is another episode.” But the way that they kind of explore these science fiction concepts in a fresh way, but then also weave in the issues of racial justice in a way that doesn’t feel reaching or forced. You know, a lot of times people might be like, well, I’m gonna do this thing, and it’s gonna have this social justice issue in it. And I’m gonna do it in a way that feels preachy or whatever. They do it in a way that is very compelling and very relevant to the story and very effective and just makes it that much better of a story. So “The Watchman” on HBO. HBO just, I mean, they’ve been a sponsor before. They do so many things right. – I like HBO, man. – Just do it right. – All right, y’all. We’ll keep talking. Every day is this another day of your life. Thanks for making us a part of some of those. – That’s true. And once a week, let us be a part of your life. Well, on this show, and there’s another show pretty much every day. You know, there’s a lot of stuff, a lot of content. – Let us just take over your life. (rhythmic music) To watch more “Ear Biscuits,” click on the playlist on the right. – [Rhett] To watch the previous episode of “Ear Biscuits,” click on the playlist to the left. – [Link] And don’t forget to click on the circular icon to subscribe. – [Rhett] If you prefer to listen to this podcast, it’s available on all your favorite podcast platforms. Thanks for being your Mythical best. (rhythmic music)