The Power of Obsession

[00:00:07] Jay tricked me. So as you know, Jay Yow is the producer of this podcast and we were just talking casually and he asked me about all the different things.

[00:00:21] I've been obsessed with a lot of different things ever since I was a little kid and kind of this power of obsession has driven my entire life for better or for worse sometimes for better sometimes for worse and

[00:00:33] we're just casually talking about it and then I realized he's recording and so we made an episode about the power of obsession and you kind of hear in the beginning

[00:00:45] I didn't really want to do an episode on it, but then I realized oh this has been an interesting thing for me And this aspect this power of obsession is overall very positively affected my life. So Here we go the power of obsession

[00:00:59] This isn't your average business podcast and he's not your average host This is the James Altucher Show You know what's really interesting is that when you go on that that guy's David Shanshow Yeah, I never really thought about is that the power of obsessions

[00:01:29] Right the power of obsession because you were so obsessed with so many different things one at a time Yeah, I have all this interesting It makes me kick you into a quest. Yeah, like like for instance I

[00:01:41] Mentioned how when I was six years old I was obsessed with Greek mythology I've never read a book on Greek mythology since I was six years old But I remember everything because obsession helps the memory too

[00:01:53] Yeah, wait. So so I'm just curious six years old. Yeah, when do you start reading? I don't know. No, it's three or four as you can remember. Yeah, or oh my god And then you already start reading like Greek mythology and stuff like that

[00:02:06] Yeah, I had to get a special library card to take books out of the adult section How like okay? I'm just curious I'm this is I'm just totally curious right like I don't know if this gonna make into the podcast or whatever

[00:02:17] I'm just curious how the how the six years old you look at something and you're like I'm gonna obsess with this Greek mythology like what like do you remember? the start of it Well, I didn't decide to be obsessed. I just I

[00:02:32] Don't know it seemed like comic books but better because these were stories of That had lasted for hundreds or even thousands of years about these gods So it was almost like they were real. They you know, I didn't know I was six years old

[00:02:48] I didn't really understand what religion was at a deeper level You know how you know religion is designed to basically control the population in various ways and You know, I'm not I'm not saying I'm not saying faith is bad

[00:03:04] Like faith could be a good thing and about religion and religion can be very powerful in a positive way but often in many historical periods Religion was used to control the masses. I'm essentially quoting Karl Marx here, but

[00:03:19] The stories are beautiful like it's like Joseph Campbell's, you know The hero's journey like every one of these mythologies all have a creation story They have like a god that rules all the other gods Sometimes they get angry sometimes they fall in love sometimes they

[00:03:38] And they all have like superpowers because they're better than mortals and there's and there's amazing stories that are supposed to You know teach people truths of life and that's kind of how You know

[00:03:52] Information would get transmitted from one generation to the next like oh, why does the Sun? Go down at night and come up in the morning. Well There's a god named Apollo who rides a chariot who? You know brings the Sun around the world every day single day

[00:04:10] So and so that's how this that was like science then and so that's how this science gets passed down from one generation to the next and You know their battles for instance again in Greek mythology Aphrodite who was supposedly the most beautiful goddess

[00:04:28] You know Zeus the king of the gods wanted her to be married. So he He wanted to award Hephaestus so Hephaestus was was a god who basically made all the weapons of the other gods

[00:04:42] So he was like a he was like the god of blacksmiths and weapon and weaponry But he was very ugly. He was hideous and Zeus wanted to award Or reward Hephaestus for all the good he had done all the other gods were making all their weapons

[00:04:59] like he made Zeus's lightning bolts for instance and So he married Aphrodite to Hephaestus, but meanwhile Aphrodite was attracted to Ares the god of war right and Hephaestus found out and if that's this was a big guy in Ares the god of war was ironically

[00:05:22] Coward and so the so just a little lesson there is that's often the most warmongering People are cowardly at heart. So it's kind of a moral lesson there But anyway, Aphrodite and Ares started having this affair Hephaestus found out Beat the living crap out of Ares

[00:05:40] Ares complained to Zeus and Zeus had to punish Hephaestus so he threw Hephaestus down to earth for a year and he had to live like a human for a year and

[00:05:53] Imagine then that leads to many stories. I can imagine you could write a novel now. What happened to Hephaestus the the year he was Was a normal human So right so like there's all sorts of stories and that's why you have all these stories even now written

[00:06:10] Like like all these young adult novels are about the Greek gods on like the children of the Greek gods that are on earth right now and You know, what's they called the Percy? Percy Jackson. Yeah, Percy Jackson

[00:06:24] Right is like some it sure child of act of Poseidon the god of the ocean or something like that Right. So he essentially he's a titans, right? That's what they call the titans or demi-god Oh, yeah, so the Titans and again all of this is from

[00:06:40] Books I read when I was six years old. I haven't read a single book about Greek mythology since I was six years old But I was obsessed so I read everything I could find so the Titans are kind of like the the ants uncles and parents of

[00:06:57] the gods that Ended up being the real Greek gods so There was a god Cronus that they had Titan the oldest Titan was named Cronus and He was the ruler of all the gods and there was a prophecy Told to him that one of his children was gonna

[00:07:17] Kill him and become the king of the gods. So every time his wife had a child he ate the baby and and One time the mother I forgot what her name was his wife or whatever she got sick of you're eating all my babies so she

[00:07:37] Took when when she was giving birth this one time the last time she Quickly the midwife She she gave the baby to the midwife the midwife, you know hid the baby. This was the baby called Zeus and

[00:07:53] Instead she made like a fake baby like out of rock and Cronus ate that baby instead of Zeus so Zeus grows up and The mom's like hey get your brothers and sisters back and so Zeus kills Cronus his father and You know gets his brothers

[00:08:17] Their brothers and sisters are still alive. They're just in Cronus' stomach. So he gets All his brothers and sisters back and then Zeus becomes the king of the gods and all his brothers and sisters like Poseidon and

[00:08:30] Her fastest I didn't know I didn't know he has a sister. Oh Yeah Zeus yeah, I think Demeter is his sister. I mean, I think he married his sister Forgot what her name is see I don't know that's going on

[00:08:46] Yeah exactly says going on and and then he had children too. So like Hermes is his child Athena So Athena was a child she was born from his brain. That's why she's like the wisest of the gods

[00:09:02] Yeah, she's supposed to be the goddess of wisdom, right? Yeah, and Apollo and Artemis are his children And they're like twins so Artemis is the moon Apollo's the Sun his son and Artemis is sort of the first example of lesbians in kind of biological history

[00:09:25] And she was also the goddess of the hunt and No, I didn't know that so a lot of these gods also are similar in other countries so like you know the equivalent of Zeus in Norway is sort of like a combination between Odin and Thor and

[00:09:43] the equivalent of her me Hermes and Norse mythology would be Loki and so there's kind of like little comparisons and and Throughout all these different religions, but I was obsessed so I would read all about Greek mythology Egyptian mythology Norse mythology

[00:10:00] Hindu mythology so I would and then again this is all when I was six. I would trade my Superman comic books with my friends who were from India who had like these comic books called armor Chitra Kata

[00:10:14] And so it'd be like all the Hindu gods so the Mahabharata would be in there the Baba Gaggita But just in comic book form and so I would read about all the Hindu gods in this these very popular comic books in India

[00:10:27] And so six years old. That's crazy Also, I mean I don't mean to like break the flow, but I have one conspiracy theory about all this mythology tell me I Think great mythology essentially it's alien Well, yeah, why do you think about it right?

[00:10:44] So you're saying you're saying Greek mythology and probably all these mythologies are Asian So, why do you think that no Asian not Asian alien alien? Oh because of the idea that the aliens possibly cloned an alien and Left a human here on earth, but they're like the gods

[00:11:03] Right there what we think of as the gods like like who built the pyramids? Well, there were a bunch of gods around, you know It's an interesting fact that we're closer in time to Cleopatra than clear Patra is to the making of the pyramids

[00:11:16] So yep, the pyramids are so far back. We just really have no idea how they were made who made them I mean what what we discover that like each block in the pyramid is two tons and comes from

[00:11:26] You know a hundred miles away from where the pyramids are like how do they carry them there? Yeah, and also the That's the Sphinx right? I don't know if you heard about this the Sphinx if you look at it the humans had It's on an in

[00:11:41] How do you call it? It's not proportionate So what happened is maybe before it was actually way larger and then they They cut it down and become and make it into like a human head, you know But but yeah, so and also

[00:11:56] Like if you think about the Greek mythology and stuff like that You have a blacksmith that make Zeus weapon like a thunder weapon thunder like magic Sort of sort of sci-fi if you thought about it everything about it. Yeah

[00:12:09] Yeah, well mythology was kind of like the science fiction of those times And by the way some of these religions still exists like Hinduism still exists and you could argue the Bible is a form of mythology You know for instance, why does Christianity have? Angels and saints well

[00:12:27] It's because Roman mythology had all these gods and they wanted to commence The Roman Empire to not persecute Christians. So they kind of said oh we're similar It's to Roman gods It's just like you know

[00:12:41] Here's the angel Michael and the angel Gabriel and they have different powers and there was a war between the good gods and the bad gods, you know just like in Roman mythology and You know it's it's all

[00:12:56] It's unrelated. Yeah, it's all related because you know and really probably the source of a lot of religions like the reason why why is it? Why is Hinduism there's a God of the Sun. There's a God of

[00:13:08] Wisdom, there's a God of this they got it and they're all kind of represented in Greek mythology speak a lot of theory Is that Alexander the Great when he was invading all these different area countries all the way down to India? He kind of brought

[00:13:21] Greek mythology with him so You know there in India kind of the Regular gods sort of were more northern India where Alexander the Great was conquering and More southern India at least at that time. This is like in 400 BC

[00:13:37] Southern India was more like Brahma Shiva Vishnu. It's almost like two different mythologies But they they work together with Brahma Vishnu Shiva were were much more powerful than like the regular God so Indra who was the king of the gods and

[00:13:53] In Hinduism is more like Zeus and Brahma Vishnu Shiva are more like this trinity of gods that are much more powerful Right. That's like was it isn't Shiva is like the God of destruction or something like that. Yeah, so so

[00:14:08] Brahma basically created the universe so Brahma is almost like this Equal to God in some sense really God is like all three combined but Vishnu preserves the universe he keeps it going and Shiva is going to destroy the universe eventually and Shiva is all about change

[00:14:27] And so then it gets very deep like Shiva is about change and creativity and and so on and Vishnu was about is very very wise and and Vishnu would Much like the story of Jesus Vishnu would would go in human form occasionally these were called avatars. So like

[00:14:48] Krishna is an example of an avatar of Vishnu and like when the world needs some big thing to happen to change it Vishnu turns into a human and and and goes down to earth

[00:14:59] Gotcha, so so so it's a lot more philosophical that way. Yeah, but but just like Christianity just a Greek mythology is also very Very philosophical like the story of You know Prometheus so The story of Prometheus is so Prometheus was He could see the future

[00:15:21] He was a Titan and he could see the future and he told his brother listen So his brother's name was Epimetheus and again I'm just remembering this from when I was six years old six years old But Epimetheus had a special power. He could see the past

[00:15:36] He could know he knows everything about the past but Prometheus had a better power Which he knows everything about the future So Prometheus said to Epimetheus listen this Titan thing seems like a great deal right now

[00:15:49] But it's not gonna work out for the Titans. So just let's hide for a little bit so when Zeus killed all the Titans Prometheus and Epimetheus kind of took off and did their own thing, but Prometheus eventually

[00:16:02] You know he was very sympathetic to humans. He liked humans. He thought humans would eventually rule the earth You know instead of just being like another animal and so he wanted to

[00:16:14] He wanted to give them a special present and so he gave him fire. He taught them how to use fire and when Zeus and he also Taught them what it was like to eat food from that the gods would eat

[00:16:28] So the humans wanted to show their new special talents to the gods And so they cooked a meal Using you know using fire and using food from Mount Olympus where the gods live

[00:16:42] They cooked a meal for Zeus and the other main gods and Zeus was like what the hell Where did you learn about this fire stuff? We didn't teach you this and they were like well Prometheus taught us so Zeus punished Prometheus he tied Prometheus to a mountain and

[00:17:02] All all day long a vulture Comes to Prometheus and eats his heart out and then at night the heart because Prometheus immortal at night the heart regrows and

[00:17:15] Then in the morning the vulture comes again and eats his heart out and that's for for the rest of Prometheus's days so basically The gods want to oppress human and

[00:17:28] But there's a deeper point too, which is that you know there's that saying don't play with fire like God You know it's too powerful. Don't forget humans are the first species There's like a mil millions of species on earth, right?

[00:17:42] But humans are the first and only species that can With a single stick Can destroy an entire forest so they they made techno That's like the fire is like the first scalable technology in that you know If an elephant can't burn down the whole fire

[00:18:02] Forest like an elephant has to kind of like knock down one tree at a time and kill one animal at a time They just have to they have to go find something to stop on and they stop on it and then it's kind

[00:18:12] It's not scalable, but humans made the first Scalable tool which is basically a stick of fire because with that you could you could burn down a whole forest and kill everything And it was just like a single stick of fire so it was very dangerous and

[00:18:29] So you have to be very careful how you use fire both symbolically, you know what fire You know dangerous things and fire itself so it's really kind of like a moral lesson that you know Zeus is basically saying don't try to get too powerful

[00:18:44] Which is why like even you know even Oppenheimer when he when he made in the nuclear bomb Which is much more scalable than fire. What was that expression? He said I Said about the chain reactions, right? No now I become death the destroyer of worlds

[00:19:01] That's what he said the first time they exploded an atomic bomb as an experiment to see if it would work He said now I'm become death this destroyer worlds And I believe he's quoting Krishna from the Baba Gita

[00:19:14] And Krishna of course is Vishnu so again these there's all sorts of like deeper moral lessons But anyway, that was you're talking about the power of obsession. Yeah, what obsession does is is it makes you

[00:19:29] Over and over and over again think about the same thing and so when we're growing Basically most of this happens from the ages of six to like 25, which is why they theorize maybe memory starts to decline after You know starting from your early to mid 30s

[00:19:46] What did I say? I'm memory starts to decline And it's because when you think about something over and over again Okay, you you have these connections between neurons. I think they're really called synapses or whatever but What this this other substance called myelin?

[00:20:05] Forms around the connections that you form between the neurons So it may it turns like a road into a superhighway So that information can go back and forth much faster and so the things that you really remember well

[00:20:18] when you obsess on something you build more and more myelin around these synapses and And so that's why obsession greatly greatly Increases your memory now when you get older, you know

[00:20:33] People used to think you had no more myelin left to build these strong connections after the age of 25 That's not true anymore that neuroplasticity the ability to kind of grow your brain still continues It's just not as powerful. So when you're obsessed with something now

[00:20:48] It's harder to form memories around it But when you're a kid and you don't have a lot of memories yet you have all this myelin that Kind of that's why you're you know what you're exposed to when you're young is very important so I'll tell you like

[00:21:03] When I was six I was obsessed with mythology and also obsessed with the New Testament which as Jewish person didn't make me the Parents didn't want their kids to hang out with me because I was talking about Jesus all the time to my Jewish friends

[00:21:22] So I literally like parents would call my mom and say get your dirty son away from my kid and You know You know everybody dislikes everyone else. That's what we that's what you realize but isn't

[00:21:39] New Testament is sort of mythology as well, right? So that's what so it's all Yeah, so it's still four under the the whole mythology like group mythology in type of like the category, right? Yeah, because if you think about it. Yes one thing about Judeo-Christian

[00:21:57] Islam religions is there's only one God, right? It's a supposedly a monotheistic religion But if you look at the personality of God between the Old Testament and the New Testament It's very different. I mean God in the Old Testament

[00:22:12] punishes people and gets angry at people, right? So so Moses allowed for You know idols to be created when he didn't allow this but it happened He didn't man. He didn't manage his team well and when he was off getting the 10 commandments they they built

[00:22:33] What was it the golden? Calf or something Golden plate But from what I know from Monty Python It was supposed to be 15 commandments, right? And then he dropped one plate and became 10 of commandment. Yeah, right? so yeah, so he comes down from Mount Sinai and

[00:22:51] All the Hebrews had created this golden calf like to worship and so mode that Moses did drop The first version of the Ten Commandments He had to go back up the mountain and get second version

[00:23:03] but as his punishment God was really pissed off and God said, you know, you're never gonna you're gonna get to Israel You'll see it, but you're never gonna enter it and That was his punishment and God also, you know was a little

[00:23:19] Upset at humans during the time of Noah's we said to Noah listen I'm gonna keep you in your family alive and all the animals But the rest of these humans can go to hell for all I care

[00:23:30] So and that's when he flooded the world and there was Noah's Ark by the way There's similar floods in other religions like Hinduism and Greek mythology and so on and so and also didn't he kill like someone's son? Was it Aaron or Isaac's son? Yeah, so

[00:23:48] Abraham had a nephew lot and He didn't he didn't kill lot but he killed lots wife because they were hanging out in Sodom and Gomorrah and So and when he told Abraham look at them out of there because I'm gonna burn those places to the ground

[00:24:05] They're so disgusting. I'm gonna burn them down and lots wife and and God said specifically when you're leaving Sodom and Gomorrah do not look back and Lots wife was curious what was happening and maybe she missed a little bit of that Sodom and Gomorrah

[00:24:23] Partying that she was doing she looks back and she instantly Turned into a pillar of salt and died and so So so so in the Old Testament not always but some of it He was maybe a little bit of an angrier God and in the New Testament I

[00:24:41] Jesus has more of a message of love and God sort of changes so it's there's not God doesn't have like one personality like you know Adam and Eve story of Adam and Eve Yes, God created these great things and gave him great things in the Garden of Eden

[00:24:56] But when they broke the rules he punished them when Cain and Abel when Cain killed Abel he punished Cain now I'm not saying he doesn't punish in the New Testament. There's Christianity believes in the notion of sin, but you know it's

[00:25:13] God has different personalities in the Bible depending on where you're reading And so anyway, but it's just like how all these gods around that time, you know The new the Old Testament is based on stories that happen in 2000 BC 1500 BC and Like you know from

[00:25:34] from a thousand BC like 400 BC there's like these different sections and so it's written over a long period of time and there are different writers for different sections that you know, we don't know for sure, but that's the likely theory and So God's personality changes throughout

[00:25:52] And it's interesting studying these things almost from a literary perspective Whether you believe in religion or not it doesn't matter even if you believe in it It's interesting to study these the different parts of the Bible from a literary point of view

[00:26:06] Like how people wrote the way they wrote back there and how they told stories and so on but anyway So the power of we're talking about power of options, right? So you remember all this because of your obsessions with the mythology and and the Old Testament New Testament

[00:26:34] I'm just talking about one part of your obsessions, right because you have a tons of other Yeah, that was just one year and other stuff if you need me any year between the age of six

[00:26:44] And the age of 55 I could tell you my obsession and sometimes they last at a year Sometimes they lasted more than one year. It just depends All right, uh age 12 Age 12. I was obsessed obsessed with politics

[00:27:00] So here's and and I didn't know the issues like you're only 12 years old I don't I don't know so I was 12 in 1980. So in the 1980 Uh, uh in 1980 it was Jimmy Carter who was the president at that time versus Ronald Reagan

[00:27:15] And uh, of course Ronald Reagan won and Jimmy Carter was a one-term president And I didn't know anything about the issues. I didn't know what Reagan stood for. I didn't know what Jimmy Carter stood for I didn't care

[00:27:27] I was I was just interested in the game like aspects of politics like what is an election? What do people have to do to win an election? What are all these personalities like, you know, it was just fascinating to me

[00:27:39] Oh, John F. Kennedy was assassinated robbery of Kennedy was assassinated like all these conspiracies but when I say I was obsessed like I got the list of so I called up the federal elections commission and they I I got the list there was a printout of

[00:27:57] All the people who are running for president and that's when I realized There's more than just the people you see in debates Running for president There are hundreds of people running for president like if you go to ballotpedia.com right now

[00:28:09] You can see all the people who are running for president for for 20 james out 24 Including my name on there because it only takes a few minutes to start running But so then what I would do is I would call

[00:28:20] I would I would skip school like I would basically Um, I would leave for the school. Okay, and then I would go Into my backyard and hide Like basically next to the chimney or whatever and I would wait until I heard the garage door open twice

[00:28:37] So both my parents went off to work and then I'd go back into the house And I would spend the whole day Calling up presidential candidates and interviewing them And if you said I should pick up, huh? Did they actually pick up? Well, I would call their office

[00:28:55] and I would say Oh, I'm writing for This local newspaper Can I interview you and I will and this local newspaper did pay me At one point to publish the interviews if you search south brunswick central post

[00:29:11] And james out the chair you'll see me as a 12 year old and all my interviews. So I interviewed all these presidential candidates I interviewed The minority leader of the house who later became the speaker of the house

[00:29:25] I interviewed. Oh, I interviewed the chief usher of the white house He's like the chief butler of the right house names was rex scouting and on my birthday Rex scouting who later became the official historian of the white house rex scouting

[00:29:41] Invited me and my dad on my birthday to come have like a private tour of the white house that he gave us And so we went like to all the private areas of the white house on this on this tour and

[00:29:52] I went to the democratic national convention that year Uh And hung out on the convention floor Uh, it was in new york city. So it was easy for me to get to and I I flew to mississippi because

[00:30:06] You jimmy jimmy carter even though he was present there. Well, he had one Well, he had two people who were trying to fight him in the primaries Joe biden has nobody fighting him in the primaries really because rfk jr became an independent

[00:30:18] But teddy kennedy was fighting jimmy carter in the primaries and also this one unknown guy cliford finch Who was the governor of mississippi was up against jimmy carter and of course he lost disastrously But I flew to mississippi Clifford finch's

[00:30:34] Campaign paid for it and I stayed with his campaign manager I flew to mississippi for a week to interview him. I was 12 years old and he made me an honorary colonel in mississippi And they all got a kick out of this 12 year old

[00:30:47] Like being obsessed with I was giving him advice on how he should campaign and how he should make speeches and everything and I was trying to like come up with speech ideas for him and uh

[00:30:58] Did they actually take some of the idea or they're just like, oh, this is good. And then they're just like yeah, I think they just said, oh, this is good. Uh, and You know he was He was nice for for doing that

[00:31:11] I don't I think maybe he thought my dad was rich or something which my dad most certainly was not And I think they thought they were just going to raise money from my dad if they treated me nice and so right but uh Uh, you know all

[00:31:26] You know it was it was I had a lot of adventures put it that way like you you always want to have obsessions that lead to Adventures and so when I was 12

[00:31:34] I was a little more mobile than when I was six not that much more but a little more and But I was just obsessed With politics. It's what I would do all day long

[00:31:44] Like I would think about it in school or I would skip school and I was Constantly calling up like I interviewed senator bill Bradley. I interviewed tons of senators congressmen Mayors, you know all sorts of politicians and I would tell my parents

[00:31:58] I wasn't doing any of this stuff and then they get the phone bill and people who are old enough will remember Phone bills were it was really expensive to call outside of your town

[00:32:08] Like if you made a long distance call which was anywhere like could be just a few miles away You start getting charged and just think inflation is up about five times since then so like a dollar then

[00:32:21] Would is like five dollars now. So my parents would get these phone bills of six hundred dollars a month So that's like three thousand dollars a month in today's dollars, but like salaries

[00:32:33] Were like, I don't know my parents made like 40,000, you know, they've made like nothing and and I was costing $3,000 a month just on my phone bills So they would just be screaming me all the time and I said I promise I'll stop

[00:32:46] I promise I'll stop and I was just not able to stop That's crazy Yeah, and then and again like anything I know about politics and presidential history Most of it comes from that year. Like I read every biography of every president

[00:33:02] I read about all the big elections, you know that were infamous like 1876 or 1824 with john quincy adams or of course george washington and john adams and erin verre And then all the way up to like rosevelt versus hoover and just I was you know, there was this guy

[00:33:21] Theodore white who wrote really great election books. They're not really popular now, but they were the election books about 1960 1964 1968 and then huntress thompson. It's the first time I was told you the first time

[00:33:33] I read hunter s thompson. He wrote a book fear and loathing on the campaign trail in 1972 Really crazy book. So I just read tons of stuff about politics But more from like an election and and personality point of view. I didn't know anything about issues at all

[00:33:49] You know what amazed me the most is like you're a child yourself and your your parents like yeah Just go to missus to be by yourself

[00:33:55] That was the first time I ever flew on a plane and I was and I couldn't believe it like I get out of the plane And I'm like wow, this is a Different it looks the same but it's different. It's like Mississippi

[00:34:07] Which is you alone right now your parents with you right and then I was hanging out in the campaign headquarters every day and You know everything's different now everything's more blended, but I remember one guy said to me I never met a jew before

[00:34:22] And this is no offense to anybody. This doesn't happen in missus to be anymore I've been to missus to be since and it's you know Like every other state and then another guy said oh, what's your initials? And I said j a and he's like jackass and

[00:34:35] Like they were just they were just different So but I didn't mind and then I would hang out with the governor all day Uh talking about his campaign All right. What about okay, what about okay, so what about 18 years old? We jumped six years ahead Uh 18 years old

[00:34:54] chess You started chess. It's 18. Yeah. Well, I started at 17 and but it continued 18 18 I was new jersey junior chess champion And I mean I was obsessed with it. It's that what I did all day again

[00:35:09] I would skip class and skip school and I'd go into the Manhattan chess club and uh But every day like 10 hours a day. I was that's how I got good at chess It was just A lot of kids start young so I had to catch up

[00:35:25] And I started basically when I was 17 and by the time I was 18. I was the strongest You know junior or kid in in the state and Uh, you know, I wish I had either started younger or kept going like my problem is

[00:35:39] I would just get obsessed with something for a year or two and then I'd move on and and do something else but but Chess was a good obsession for me. My parents were really worried because before that

[00:35:51] I was obsessed with break dancing like all I was interested in Was being a good break dancer. Wait, how low were you? I was like 15 and I had gone to This exchange program is where I you know, I I got to go to london for summer and I

[00:36:12] Completely skipped all the activities Of the program that I was in and I hung out and I guess what would be considered kind of like a ghetto and I paid this other kid like 20 dollars or showed me how to break dance and like so for the whole summer

[00:36:27] I hung out with these kids who were just break dancing all the time And so I got obsessed even when I got back to the us And that's all I would do was practice and I'd watch there were just a couple of movies

[00:36:39] one was called break it another was called beat street and You know, occasionally there was some break dancing on MTV but uh I was just obsessed with it and that's all I would do

[00:36:52] Well, let me but my parents did not like this obsession. They thought it was not a good obsession for me I mean, you're Jewish so Yeah, they just didn't know they just didn't know they were thinking like like many parents everything

[00:37:05] Well, what's going to get this guy into college? It's probably not break dancing So they were much happy with chess if you if you're good at break dancing right now. I'm pretty sure you can get into any college That's probably true

[00:37:18] See it's unique enough and it's also it wasn't really considered like an art form then and now it's right It really is a beautiful style of dance which combines so many other styles You know, this is why hip-hop and break dancing is really flourished. I mean

[00:37:32] These guys, you know a lot of musicians in that space make hundreds of millions of dollars Probably the only Area of music as popular as hip-hop is, you know, like country western Okay, so let me ask this power of obsessions

[00:38:03] But by the way, this is why when I was older and starting my first business I did all the websites of all the rap labels and I did the website for the source magazine

[00:38:12] Which is like the premier magazine in the space because I knew all this stuff. I knew everything See that I was about to ask you that did any of the obsessions lead into anything later in life

[00:38:22] Like let's say the first one the mythologists, right? I assume I assume it will lead into your writing Yeah, like when you when you are Essentially when you're interested in mythology you become a student of storytelling

[00:38:36] Because you notice how all the stories are the same with little twists And you know, like I I read the bible like front to back just to Just because I loved it not because I was A religious or had a faith or anything. I just love the stories

[00:38:53] I read all about Greek mythology because I love the stories and you know I think I got interested in it because I remember one time there was a Superboy comic book that had Apollo in it

[00:39:04] And then there were comic books like Thor and there were comic books like Shazam which referenced the Greek gods and Thor was the Norse god and And then of course I got those

[00:39:17] Indian comics and so it was all like linked to me like I loved comic books too So and that's kind of like an American mythology in some sense and Uh So but but yeah the the art of storytelling is all intertwined with mythology myth as a story and

[00:39:39] You know and my in politics There was just one year where I was really obsessed with it But ever after I know a lot about how what happens in elections in the us and So each time there's an election. I kind of have a running start

[00:39:56] Knowing what is going on behind the scenes like right but at the same time you also like Interview so you interview people you interview the politician before so like that's also sort of just start of sort of interviewing

[00:40:09] Podcasting type of thing, right? Oh, yeah, absolutely. I mean I would all day long be calling people and interviewing But my interview, you know, I had the interview style of a 12 year old. Oh, do you like being a senator? You know

[00:40:22] You know for bill Bradley. Did you also like what do you like more being a senator or basketball player? And you know, I didn't ask anything about issues. I had no concept of issues. That was above my head so

[00:40:33] Uh and even now but I guess I guess what it gave me was is that I still don't really believe in issues I got such a sense back then that it was a game And you won by playing the game with a good strategy

[00:40:49] So I never trust any politician on what they claim are their issues now. That's unfair to politicians I think some politicians really do care about their issues, but I think most Are are ruled more by ambition than a care of issues

[00:41:04] Uh and by that I mean they're they'll they'll Not always but in part Take on an issue if it polls well and the one time so in 20 I think was 2014

[00:41:16] I wanted to run for congress and there was a major presidential candidate who wanted to support me and uh I remember him saying though that I had to Hire his pollster so I could see what issues I should talk about that are popular in the district

[00:41:35] And I said I had my own issues already. I don't need a pollster, but that Really underlined The thing that I kind of intuitively grasped when I was 12 years old It turned out to be really true that

[00:41:50] The pollsters are the ones who tell you what issues, you know a pollster is someone who takes polls They're the ones who tell you what issues to talk about and uh

[00:41:59] Uh and look it's it's it's part of the game. So I still think of politics is all a giant game I mean it is right because like how often the policy actually change Yeah, like it it doesn't change that all often and not only that

[00:42:15] Look, they all know what to say in their speeches and then they then they make these promises and they rarely follow up on their promises So like for instance, I'll just take a quick example because on a another meeting I was on today. We were talking about

[00:42:29] Uh marijuana stocks and Joe Biden said he was going to make marijuana legal as the first thing He did as president. Of course, he never talked about it again. So um Nor has he really changed immigration policy or anything

[00:42:43] So very few things get changed from president to president. That's another thing I realized But it was fascinating like, you know, again back when I was 12 we we had You know, 19 set just six years earlier Richard Nixon had resigned in like the biggest scandal and presidential

[00:42:58] history, you know, except for maybe Warren g. Harding and the teapot dorm scandal that we all know about and uh Again, all this stuff is I only remember these things from when I was 12 But that's when you're building memories so I was I

[00:43:16] And you build memories the best as a young person by being obsessed with something It's very hard to be great at something You're not obsessed with and the reason is obsession is not about Love it's not about passion. It's about You'll you're so interested in something

[00:43:33] You'll do it even if you're not passionate about it even if you're not motivated That is the thing about obsession obsession is mostly unhealthy. It's like addiction You you don't want to do heroin every day if you're a heroin addict because eventually, you know

[00:43:50] The road of a heroin addict is not a pleasant road in the long run and everyone knows that But you do it anyway because you're addicted and so with me I added this weirdly addictive personality not to drugs or anything but to these

[00:44:06] ideas and and aspects of life like You know mythology or politics or You know when I was 13 14, I got obsessed with Like the occult So I was I wanted to get I wanted to get psychic powers because then maybe I could use my mental powers to get

[00:44:26] You know as a Entering puberty. I wanted to have girls like me and so maybe my psychic powers could make me more attractive and But then that led to an obsession with meditation And so like by the time I was 15 or 14

[00:44:42] I was really into meditation and got obsessed with it and would meditate like for hours a day And I knew all the different styles of meditation from Vipassana to Zen to You know compassion style Tibetan meditation to More American style, you know mindfulness and so on

[00:45:01] So I I learned every style of meditation And that helped that helped me in later in life because then when I you know, I kind of have this You know back, you know this way of

[00:45:14] Meditating that I developed myself along the years and it's very useful for me So let me ask you this. I don't know if you can answer it or not because I felt like it's in your bone It's in your DNA. How do be obsessed with anything?

[00:45:28] How to be I don't know. Yeah Yeah, see that's why I don't know if you can answer it Yeah, because I felt you have to switch in your brain

[00:45:35] That it just switch on and off automatically. You can't even control it. I felt like I think mostly it's an escape so for instance Why did I start playing chess again? well In august 2020 as all my listeners by this point. No, I wrote this article

[00:45:52] I had like a lot millions of people loved it, but My friends and family Basically dropped me half to this article and then all the people I knew in new york city

[00:46:02] You know hated me and I got a little depressed after sign felled wrote his full page op-ed against me And it kind of I don't know subconsciously it did something like I stopped writing for a while well

[00:46:16] Whenever I had a period like that in my life before I would just start playing chess until The writing came back and I just And then the tv show the queens gambit came out and suddenly everybody was interested in chess

[00:46:28] And I was already a chess master. So I became obsessed again with it and When one obsession begins another obsession ends. So I stopped doing stand-up comedy Which I was was obsessed with for years before that Well, yeah, so like what what makes you obsessed?

[00:46:46] Were you escaping something that that you obsessed with stand-up comedy? No, I think that was okay escape. I think happens about half the time and Aspirational happens the other time meaning I always really admired people who went up on stage

[00:47:01] And told jokes like I thought it was an incredibly brave thing to do And I enjoyed public speaking And and I was very funny all the time whenever when I gave a talk

[00:47:10] So people would always tell me oh, you should be a comedian. And so I tried it once this one Comedy club owner said hey Do you want to just try going up once? And I said yes, and I was scared to death and I was horrible horrible horrible

[00:47:26] But I became so obsessed with getting good. Hey, I bought half that comedy club from that guy And and I've since resold it back to him. I just I started performing every single night and for hours every day

[00:47:38] I would watch comedy specials to learn. Oh, what makes Dave Chappelle great? What makes chris rock great? What makes louis ck great? And I would watch I've watched the specials of hundreds of comedians And because I owned a comedy club I watched

[00:47:52] thousands of comedians over the years and You know most of them very bad So I think that helped me get pretty good pretty quickly. I'm not going to say I was Great because I think it takes a really long time to be great at it

[00:48:06] But I was good enough that I can you know, I would travel around other cities even other countries Uh, I was touring with tony woods who was dave chappelle's mentor So he was a good mentor to me as well in comedy, but I was obsessed

[00:48:18] I mean, that's why for a period of my podcast was like all comedians And we had a dip in audience because of that now I'm not making the same same mistake now We've hardly had any chess players on Yeah, well, so so

[00:48:34] Comedy that obsession helped me in many ways like It helped me first off my public speaking which was already pretty good got 10 times better And and there are so many skills in comedy that are useful for public speaking

[00:48:48] But pop the regular public speaker does not have these skills So you have to be a comedian to kind of acquire the skills But it became so useful for my public speaking it like 10xed my public speaking and um

[00:49:01] Also was the first time I owned a physical location like a bar a bar slash stage when I owned the comedy club And so that is useful for to expand my understanding of business something. I never was obsessed

[00:49:13] I never was obsessed with business, but I'm good at it But you know, you could be good at things you're not obsessed with But You know, I'm not the greatest

[00:49:23] I'm not like the you know war and buffet of business like I'm not anywhere close because I never was truly obsessed with business I just know a lot about business because of you know, 25 years experience running businesses

[00:49:36] but uh, right so all all these things do contribute to to my life Yeah, so this is interesting. So your your your obsessions became in the quest and the quest that leads to adventures

[00:49:47] Yeah, like that led to like interesting stories. Yeah the first time I went up on stage Uh at a comedy club who would know that just a few years later for instance as an example

[00:49:56] I would be traveled to every major city in the Netherlands performing comedy like actually right before the week before covid Or that uh, or that would have all these experiences with all these comedians like I would know all these like well-known famous comedians who are my heroes

[00:50:12] and ultimately culminating in Jerry Seinfeld trashing me and uh And so I think that was part of the reason why I dropped comedy also is like I felt like that world Betrayed me a little bit

[00:50:24] Oh, man. You get you got you got betrayed. Yeah your heart got betrayed. Yeah, my heart was Yeah, your your heart was broken by the the things that you left and then when you 12 years old you got crowned as the

[00:50:37] Honorary I can't say the words the colonel. Yeah, an honorary colonel in uh, Mississippi, yeah, and also I became an honorary lieutenant colonel in Alabama and that's a different story But many years later in like 2006 I the I wrote about in the financial times I wrote about

[00:50:55] Becoming a colonel in all these states honorary colonel in all these states But I said the one state that would not give me an honorary colonel ship was Kentucky So like Kentucky fried chicken

[00:51:05] Is colonel sanders. He's not he never was in the army. He was an honorary colonel of Kentucky Colonel Muhammad Ali an honorary colonel of Kentucky Elvis Presley an honorary colonel of Kentucky It's really hard to be an honorary colonel of Kentucky

[00:51:18] So the governor of Kentucky in 2005 read my article and made me an honorary colonel of Kentucky So now I'm an honorary colonel of Kentucky. So basically I'm working for a colonel

[00:51:29] Do I get a title myself if I work for a colonel? Maybe I can make you a lieutenant colonel What can I can I well we got to start you off at private Private private jl. Then then you got to get well, okay

[00:51:42] You you've you've you've done well. Maybe you're up to like lieutenant now not lieutenant colonel So lieutenant By the way, there was one point I was obsessed with the military Uh, like maybe when I was

[00:51:56] Like seven or eight because I was watching like if you don't if you for for listeners who lived in the us in the 70s all the shows were like military shows like there was um You know I dream of genie was

[00:52:10] basically about an astronaut slash major in the air force and f troop was Uh, about a bunch of people in a four in the 1800s and they were all military And there was a whole bunch of like shows that were

[00:52:23] That had a kind of like a military aspect to it So I got obsessed with like the military for a short period right But uh, I mean no matter what rank you give me I have no idea because I have no idea the rank of military

[00:52:35] I don't know if lieutenant is It's higher than captain or or now it goes. Um, well it goes second lieutenant lieutenant captain major lieutenant colonel colonel brigadier general lieutenant general major general and

[00:52:52] Four star general and then a five star general someone like eisenhower who like commands all the generals When he was in the military Why can't I just consolidate them a little bit like there's too many titles to have any rank

[00:53:04] Uh, I think there's the they have a you know, they have a system to it I mean they've been doing this for a long time and you know, the navy has similar titles

[00:53:12] But instead of generals there are admirals and um, so there's there's a method to the madness Right So this is all to say like the power of obsession is actually very powerful that leads you to like adventures

[00:53:26] Leads you to like skills that you probably will will lead you need Yeah, every obsession I've had has led to some benefits in my life now What some regrets though of that Is I wish maybe I had stuck with some of the obsessions for longer than I did

[00:53:44] um But the good thing about obsession is you could do something for a very short amount of time and if you're obsessed You'll quickly be among the best. You might not be the best, but you'll be in the top 1% of what you're

[00:53:59] obsessed with so like I got obsessed with computer programming when I was in college, but I it was I was already Three fourths of the way through college or two thirds of the way through college And I had never taken a computer science class in my life

[00:54:15] But I got obsessed with programming so I switched my major in the last year To computer science. I'd never taken a course in it And I took six courses a semester and also over the summer

[00:54:27] Computer science just to catch up and then I and I graduated a year early major in computer science That went to grad school for computer science because I was so obsessed

[00:54:35] I got I was able to catch up you're able to catch up much faster with the power of obsession Which happened to me in chest too. I didn't start till I was 17 So other kids would start when they're four years old or whatever. So uh

[00:54:49] But now you ask an important question, which I've been thinking about a little more as we're talking Which is how do you get obsessed with something?

[00:54:55] And I think the key is you got to try you got to read a lot and you got to try a lot of things So reading gives you ideas of what else is out there but doing Makes you get that dopamine and You know, I would get dopamine

[00:55:11] You know an explosion of dopamine for instance if I was if I was interviewing a presidential candidate or a senator or whatever or You know, I would get dopamine when I'd win a game of chess But like an enormous like an an an outlier amount like too much

[00:55:28] So that would give me this obsession But you have to you have to actually do things to see how your body feels about it And that's how you get obsessed if the body feels good, you'll do it more and more So that's why some people get

[00:55:41] Obsessed slash addicted to drugs Some people get obsessed slash like I loved the flow state. I would get into when I was programming a computer and I Essentially put in my 10,000 hours very quickly. I would love the flow state I would get into when writing

[00:55:57] So when I got obsessed with writing and usually there's some reason like this girl I had a crush on like the guy who was a writer And so I said to myself I'm gonna be a writer and then I started writing

[00:56:08] And but then I got obsessed and I would read all I mean instead of going to classes I would go to the library and just read like literary criticism and read books and

[00:56:19] And then I would go home and write it right three or four thousand words a day for Years and years and years like for 20 years basically I mean the obsessive part probably lasted five years, but then I was simply

[00:56:30] Good at it and still getting better because I was writing for money then and uh And I kept doing it So I would say the way you get obsessed is leave yourself open to it like

[00:56:42] Expose yourself to a lot of different things and that could be through reading or watching or Or whatever and then and then actually doing those things. So like having an expo like Like it's one thing to watch a lot of comedy

[00:56:55] It's another thing to go up on stage and do comedy Now it's fine if you're obsessed with watching comedy and being like a critic say or Reviewer of comedians or an interviewer of comedians. That's fine, too. It's a different kind of obsession

[00:57:07] I was obsessed with doing it. I was obsessed with Doing meditation or interviewing politicians or You know, I didn't I didn't really do anything with greek mythology Like I wasn't I didn't learn greek or anything but I was six years old

[00:57:22] So all I could do was read and talk about it And I would I would drive my parents crazy because here I was a six-year-old kid We'd go to like visit other families, you know, like families do we'd get together with

[00:57:34] My parents friends and they would have kids and my parents would always have to warn me I got in the car right over don't talk about Zeus To the other six-year-olds there

[00:57:47] I mean, I wish you were talking. I mean, I love mythology stuff. I wish you have talks I wish I would have known you since then but then that will be too old right now

[00:57:55] So well, we could talk about Zeus now, but it's not it's not as interesting Um But yeah, so I think I think obsession is important And no matter what it is you're obsessed with unless it's like a drug like heroin

[00:58:09] It will it will benefit your life in some way Like you you will learn things that will be so deeply ingrained in you You won't even know like just because I don't do comedy now doesn't mean

[00:58:21] Like every single time I give a public talk or or in many other cases There are skills you learn from that that you're able to apply that you don't even realize you're applying Or even the stuff I learned when I was six or 12 or 15 or 17 or You know

[00:58:37] Even i'm sure there's things even from break dancing that I still apply today in life So that's the episodes for today. I think this is a great episode good good A good interview j you you were a good interviewer. Thank you the power of obsession

[00:58:54] The only okay, we'll keep this in the recording because I'm gonna analyze this podcast I didn't realize we were kind of getting into a podcast. So I feel like my voice was low energy in the very beginning but

[00:59:08] In the intro I'll I'll that we'll do it after we finish this episode I'll explain that But that's more real though Like we want the real James you want real like look at the The reality tv everyone just wants something real right?

[00:59:22] Yeah, but reality tv is so there was a period where I was obsessed with pitching a reality tv show Uh Reality tv is scripted people don't some people know that but many people don't know that Yeah, I just like wwe right or wwf the wrestling

[00:59:38] It well, it's like okay, you know, we were on a meeting earlier for talking to a potential avid the big advertiser for the podcast And I mentioned The tv show house hunters. So if you don't know what house hunters is i'll just describe real quickly

[00:59:54] It's the most popular tv show in the world 25 million people a month watch it and it's syndicated in like 50 different countries It's it's on ht tv. It's basically a couple. Here's the format A couple looks at an expensive house a cheap house

[01:00:10] And a house in the middle and they decide what house to buy so That's the whole format. That's the whole description. It's this and My tv agent like six years ago explained to me this show and

[01:00:25] And he was trying to convince me that to do simple formats and I I got the point but But the whole thing is is that The way I describe it. It makes it seem like oh first they're going to look at

[01:00:38] This expensive house that they never saw before then they're going to look at this cheap house that they never saw before Then this middle Cost house that they've never seen before and then they're going to make a decision all within the chronology of the show

[01:00:50] But even a show like that is scripted because it is a real couple But the house that they choose at the end they had already bought that house When they or they were in escrow. They were already an escrow on the house

[01:01:05] When the the producers of the show picked them to be on the show So they had already decided but they hadn't yet closed the acquisition yet So the old people were still living in the old in the house So but they were in escrow to buy the house

[01:01:17] So they had already decided but then it made the show makes it seems like they decided later And by the way, the expensive house they had already looked at it and rejected it The cheap house they had already looked at it and rejected it

[01:01:28] And the producers would would take a look at all the houses they bought and figure out All the houses they looked at and figure out which one should be the expensive one and the cheap one So even such a simple format like that Is somewhat scripted

[01:01:40] So basically all the house hunter uh actor In their real people who are buying a house in fact, they already bought the house that they supposedly decided to buy on the show But there's an and they're not really they're not actors like they don't know how to act

[01:01:55] But there's an element of Storytelling it's not it's not reality. Let's put it that way. It is definitely not there are no reality shows that are actually about reality God All right, so that's the power of obsessions. Yes And look I got obsessed with investing and

[01:02:16] Uh that changed my life forever because I got obsessed with You know, you see a lot of people work in the investing industry They know about trading stocks or trading metals or real estate investing But because I was obsessed I had to read I and do

[01:02:32] Almost every style investing day trading arbitrage value investing growth investing real estate uh private investing venture capital investing quantitative investing everything and uh I was just obsessed. That's what I did for years and years. So that obsession of course has changed my life completely

[01:02:52] Yeah, but anyway, all right j you're doing a good job of trying to wind down this podcast I just keep going because i'm obsessed with All the things i've been obsessed with and I have so many stories, but we could

[01:03:05] Do this again another time, you know pick different years and I'll have different obsessions And I think that should be the series Yeah, but we're just like we're just like 1988 was your obsessions and then just tell the tell tell You know the whole story about

[01:03:20] 1988 was uh entrepreneurship and I first got interested in being an entrepreneur in 1988 and uh, I started a Like a weird kind of food delivery company kind of like uber eats. Actually, I started we we had 10 restaurants

[01:03:33] No, no we had like 20 restaurants and if somebody ordered through our business, they would get a big disc count We I arranged that without each restaurant and then I would take all the orders And there was a guy on the football team at cornell fred

[01:03:47] And he was like an 1800 rated chess player I was you know close to 2200 and we would play chess In between orders and then we were we were the delivery people as well But I had to program. I didn't know anything about programming

[01:04:00] I had to program the software for all this and so I went from being obsessed with entrepreneurship for the first time And that's how my computer science obsession started

[01:04:10] James is supposed to wind down the I know but you said a year. I had to tell you the obsession That was supposed to be the series don't say any years anymore Well, I mentioned the year because that was the year that was born

[01:04:22] So oh well that was a defining year in my life was the year you were born because you were born not because of entrepreneurship stuff So the power of obsession

[01:04:31] Thank you very much jay for getting me going. I didn't even think we were doing a podcast and you were secretly recording which is nasty and uh in a drastic invasion of my privacy, but this is the episode