Cortex

00:00:00 ◼   ► Do you have any intro ideas?

00:00:01 ◼   ► Like I have no intro ideas.

00:00:02 ◼   ► We've been talking as usual for three hours about everything in the world

00:00:06 ◼   ► and now we have to record a podcast and I have no idea what to do for the intro.

00:00:10 ◼   ► I feel like that's just gonna be what it is.

00:00:12 ◼   ► Okay. Go!

00:00:14 ◼   ► 3, 2, 1, podcast!

00:00:15 ◼   ► WWDC is approaching pretty quickly.

00:00:19 ◼   ► - Oh, it's... - I'm not far away.

00:00:21 ◼   ► It's coming up... coming up so fast.

00:00:23 ◼   ► I feel like we were just at WWDC and like it's gonna be tomorrow.

00:00:27 ◼   ► I mean for most of my shows it's an important part of the year right like it's as you say it's like the beginning and end of a year

00:00:34 ◼   ► I don't ever think that when we started this show I expected it to be that way for our show but it just is because we do something so strange every year right where we record in person we never ever do that except at WWDC

00:00:47 ◼   ► It has become, even for Cortex, a real calendar event. And it obviously makes sense as the start and end of the year, because summertime is the start and end of the year. January is a dumb time to do the start and end of the year.

00:01:00 ◼   ► But yeah, every time WWDC comes up and it's the summer, it's like, "Oh God, has a whole year gone by already? I can't believe it."

00:01:08 ◼   ► And so yeah, we were just doing our calendar planning and it is coming up fast, Myke. What's going on this year at WWDC?

00:01:16 ◼   ► I wanted to let the Cortex's know that I'm going to be doing a live show again.

00:01:20 ◼   ► Relay FM is going to be doing a live show on June the 5th at the Hammer Theatre,

00:01:24 ◼   ► which is where we were last year, which was amazing.

00:01:26 ◼   ► And I know that we had a lot of Cortex listeners that came out to that.

00:01:29 ◼   ► We have our tickets, it's on sale, but there's only about 50 or 60 seats left.

00:01:35 ◼   ► There are balcony seats, which is a great view.

00:01:37 ◼   ► We love this theatre. We were so impressed with it last year.

00:01:41 ◼   ► Like every single seat in the house is a fantastic seat.

00:01:45 ◼   ► It's laid out really really well.

00:01:48 ◼   ► So if you want to come out and see our Relay FM live show at WWDC, I'll put a link in the

00:01:52 ◼   ► show notes to the tickets, but it's at the Hammer Theatre, you can Google that and you

00:01:55 ◼   ► can buy our tickets there too.

00:01:57 ◼   ► But there'll be a link there so yeah, there's not many left and so if you want to come out

00:02:00 ◼   ► and see our show, which is a fun one, always at WWDC.

00:02:04 ◼   ► You put on a good show Myke.

00:02:05 ◼   ► People should go, people should buy some tickets if they're interested, if they're going to

00:02:07 ◼   ► be in WWDC.

00:02:08 ◼   ► Like it really, it's a great venue and it was really fun last year, so yeah, go get

00:02:13 ◼   ► some tickets.

00:02:14 ◼   ► Now, I had a great question come in from a listener recently that I wanted to talk about

00:02:18 ◼   ► on today's episode, and then I figured, why don't we just make this entire episode

00:02:23 ◼   ► and ask Cortex?

00:02:25 ◼   ► You want to roll into some and ask Cortex?

00:02:26 ◼   ► I do, but I have a CareTechs question that came in.

00:02:30 ◼   ► Oh, CareTech, it's been a long time.

00:02:31 ◼   ► Yeah, it's been a very long time since that segment.

00:02:35 ◼   ► And this comes from listener Myke.

00:02:37 ◼   ► Listener Myke says…

00:02:38 ◼   ► Wait a minute, wait a minute.

00:02:39 ◼   ► Is this great question actually just you, Myke?

00:02:42 ◼   ► Oh, I have an amazing question I want to start the show with.

00:02:45 ◼   ► It's from Myke.

00:02:47 ◼   ► I feel like I should have just said Michael, right?

00:02:49 ◼   ► Like, at least it would have maybe pushed it away

00:02:52 ◼   ► from your brain far enough.

00:02:53 ◼   ► But no, it's Myke with an I.

00:02:55 ◼   ► OK.

00:02:56 ◼   ► So it can't be me.

00:02:57 ◼   ► Can't be you, no.

00:02:58 ◼   ► Myke says, I find myself having trouble

00:03:00 ◼   ► putting my theme into action.

00:03:03 ◼   ► My yearly theme is sweating the small stuff,

00:03:05 ◼   ► because I constantly miss details or do things less well

00:03:08 ◼   ► than they could be done, because I'm not

00:03:11 ◼   ► thinking about those small details. The trouble is that my yearly theme doesn't pop into my

00:03:16 ◼   ► head until after I've already done something poorly. You and Grey talk about how a theme

00:03:20 ◼   ► is something in the back of your own minds that informs all of your actions for a year,

00:03:24 ◼   ► but it feels like there's maybe a habit building step that either I haven't caught or hasn't

00:03:29 ◼   ► been discussed that I want to get a hang of and I was wondering if you had any tips.

00:03:36 ◼   ► I tell you I can sympathize with this problem at times,

00:03:39 ◼   ► where I'll do a thing and be like,

00:03:42 ◼   ► wow, that wasn't about stabilizing at all, was it?

00:03:44 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:03:46 ◼   ► So again, just for a refresher,

00:03:48 ◼   ► my yearly themes this year are stabilization

00:03:50 ◼   ► and diversification.

00:03:51 ◼   ► So for me, I'm interested to know what you're doing,

00:03:56 ◼   ► or if you do something for this,

00:03:58 ◼   ► but I've spoken a bunch about my journaling over time.

00:04:03 ◼   ► That is what keeps me kind of on the straight and narrow

00:04:06 ◼   ► when it comes to my themes.

00:04:08 ◼   ► And that is in from basically taking the time every day

00:04:11 ◼   ► to think about what I'm doing

00:04:13 ◼   ► and to note kind of how I'm feeling

00:04:15 ◼   ► because how I'm feeling should match with those two things.

00:04:19 ◼   ► I shouldn't feel like my life is getting out of control

00:04:21 ◼   ► when it comes to work.

00:04:22 ◼   ► Because if it is, that means I'm not where I wanna be.

00:04:26 ◼   ► I wanna make sure like I'm in control of things.

00:04:28 ◼   ► But one of the big parts for me is my daily themes, right?

00:04:32 ◼   ► So that the questions that I ask myself every day,

00:04:35 ◼   ► And they got updated a little bit.

00:04:36 ◼   ► I was talking about that recently.

00:04:38 ◼   ► Just to be words rather than questions

00:04:40 ◼   ► and the way that I score them.

00:04:42 ◼   ► So my seven kind of daily themes

00:04:46 ◼   ► that I wanna try and attack in some way every day

00:04:49 ◼   ► are to create, to advance,

00:04:52 ◼   ► one word is just revenue,

00:04:54 ◼   ► teamwork, marriage, engage, and health.

00:04:58 ◼   ► So not everything in that list ladders up to my themes.

00:05:03 ◼   ► Some are just things that I wanna make sure

00:05:04 ◼   ► that I'm paying attention to.

00:05:06 ◼   ► But to me right now, the ones that I'm focusing on the most

00:05:11 ◼   ► are advance, create, and revenue.

00:05:15 ◼   ► Like those three things, if I make sure that every day

00:05:19 ◼   ► I am at least doing some work that I would count

00:05:23 ◼   ► in each of those buckets,

00:05:25 ◼   ► then I know that I'm moving towards my themes.

00:05:27 ◼   ► Right, so like it's, what I like about this kind of system

00:05:32 ◼   ► is every day I'm having to basically check something off,

00:05:37 ◼   ► to be like, did you move this forward?

00:05:41 ◼   ► And in theory, if I was right in the way

00:05:43 ◼   ► I've set it out for myself at the beginning of the year,

00:05:46 ◼   ► I should be able to stay on course

00:05:48 ◼   ► as long as I'm doing something towards those daily themes.

00:05:52 ◼   ► - So here's the thing,

00:05:53 ◼   ► I'm gonna totally back up journaling.

00:05:55 ◼   ► Although part of the problem

00:05:56 ◼   ► is if you're trying to establish habits,

00:05:59 ◼   ► is that journaling in and of itself is a kind of habit.

00:06:02 ◼   ► There's a little bit of a feedback loop that's going on here,

00:06:05 ◼   ► but whenever I do go through,

00:06:07 ◼   ► 'cause I don't journal consistently,

00:06:09 ◼   ► I always want to be journaling more,

00:06:13 ◼   ► and when I do do it,

00:06:14 ◼   ► the phrase that always leaps to my mind

00:06:16 ◼   ► is I am angry at how effective it is

00:06:19 ◼   ► because it is such a simple tool,

00:06:23 ◼   ► and so I tend to use it in bursts,

00:06:26 ◼   ► and then I sort of fall away from it for a little while.

00:06:30 ◼   ► So I'm not super consistent with it,

00:06:32 ◼   ► But yeah, if you're trying to keep an idea in your mind

00:06:37 ◼   ► and you want to try to trigger thoughts

00:06:39 ◼   ► before something happens,

00:06:41 ◼   ► if journaling is a kind of habit that you can maintain,

00:06:46 ◼   ► then I think there is perhaps nothing better

00:06:50 ◼   ► that you could possibly do to set it up

00:06:53 ◼   ► that like, I'm going to visit this every day

00:06:54 ◼   ► and I'm going to have a system of accountability

00:06:56 ◼   ► and I'm going to do all these things.

00:06:58 ◼   ► If like me, you're either inconsistent with the journaling

00:07:01 ◼   ► or you just feel like that's not a habit

00:07:03 ◼   ► that you could sustain

00:07:05 ◼   ► while you're trying to do something else,

00:07:07 ◼   ► I would suggest for this mic,

00:07:09 ◼   ► who's totally not at all my podcast cohost,

00:07:12 ◼   ► that I might just literally print out your theme

00:07:16 ◼   ► and put it somewhere

00:07:18 ◼   ► where you're gonna see it more obviously.

00:07:20 ◼   ► - There was a lot of listeners

00:07:22 ◼   ► around yearly theme time incorporate their theme

00:07:26 ◼   ► into their smartphone wallpaper.

00:07:29 ◼   ► - Oh, that's a great idea.

00:07:30 ◼   ► - That's a great idea, I like that.

00:07:32 ◼   ► The only thing I'm gonna say though is,

00:07:35 ◼   ► I do think if you're going to do this,

00:07:37 ◼   ► it's actually quite important to move or change it

00:07:41 ◼   ► on a somewhat regular basis,

00:07:43 ◼   ► because you can just become totally blind to it.

00:07:45 ◼   ► Like if you write out, like sweat the small stuff

00:07:48 ◼   ► and you stick it on the top of your computer monitor,

00:07:50 ◼   ► it becomes invisible after a little while.

00:07:54 ◼   ► You just, you don't really notice it.

00:07:56 ◼   ► 'Cause again, I always think of this as like,

00:07:58 ◼   ► productivity there's this thing about the Hawthorne effect which is simply changing almost anything

00:08:04 ◼   ► increases productivity but then there's a half-life to that and so if you're going to have

00:08:11 ◼   ► something that you can visually see I would move it around so that you don't become visually blind

00:08:19 ◼   ► to it. So for me one of the ways I don't print out what my theme is but one of the ways that I do

00:08:25 ◼   ► keep it in top of mind is that in OmniFocus, I do have folders that contain projects that are

00:08:31 ◼   ► related to the theme, like and have the year name, so it's like year of reorder. And it's like,

00:08:37 ◼   ► here are the things that are directly related to this. And because I'm going through OmniFocus a

00:08:42 ◼   ► bunch like that is one of the ways in which I help keep it top of mind. And that folder is also

00:08:49 ◼   ► at the top. So that hopefully, when I'm going through things, it's like I see that and that

00:08:53 ◼   ► and that just plants the idea in my head a little bit.

00:08:56 ◼   ► And then as I'm reviewing projects, I can see like,

00:08:58 ◼   ► does this work towards the overall goal

00:09:01 ◼   ► of what you're looking for this year or not?

00:09:04 ◼   ► So that's the place that it exists in my life.

00:09:08 ◼   ► But I do think you need to have some place

00:09:10 ◼   ► where you're revisiting or seeing it.

00:09:13 ◼   ► Otherwise, it's basically like a new year's resolution,

00:09:17 ◼   ► right, where you say like, oh, I'm gonna do this thing.

00:09:19 ◼   ► And then you never think about it again.

00:09:20 ◼   ► You have to have a loop, you have to have a feedback loop somewhere of revisiting and

00:09:26 ◼   ► adjusting.

00:09:27 ◼   ► Yeah, it's much more than just having the idea.

00:09:31 ◼   ► There has to be something, some kind of reinforcement mechanism for yourself.

00:09:36 ◼   ► Yeah, you've got to come back to it, and that's really the key.

00:09:41 ◼   ► And you can't just expect that you're going to think about it at the appropriate times.

00:09:47 ◼   ► And also, I always want to say this as well,

00:09:49 ◼   ► never expect perfection from yourself.

00:09:51 ◼   ► The whole reason that you probably set a theme

00:09:56 ◼   ► in terms of whatever it is,

00:09:57 ◼   ► is because this is an area that you have a hard time with.

00:10:00 ◼   ► So failure is always part of the process.

00:10:04 ◼   ► You're going to not sweat the small stuff

00:10:07 ◼   ► if the thing that you're concerned about

00:10:09 ◼   ► you don't do enough is sweating the small stuff.

00:10:11 ◼   ► So don't beat yourself up for small mistakes.

00:10:13 ◼   ► - Yeah, and also spend some time thinking about

00:10:15 ◼   ► what that actually means as well.

00:10:16 ◼   ► all you have is those words like just those four words that's not enough because otherwise that's

00:10:21 ◼   ► what you got to be like 100% hit rate on thinking about all the small things in a year like you need

00:10:26 ◼   ► to understand what does that look like for you like what actual outcomes do you want to see

00:10:32 ◼   ► and spend some time kind of like thinking those through writing them down what exact things do

00:10:38 ◼   ► you want to get better at that falls under this banner yeah like something actionable that i was

00:10:43 ◼   ► doing much more towards the start of the year.

00:10:46 ◼   ► But I think of it as a sub-theme for the year of reorder.

00:10:50 ◼   ► Was I was thinking about closing projects

00:10:54 ◼   ► that, my OmniFocus just has a lot of open projects,

00:10:58 ◼   ► and some of which have been open

00:10:59 ◼   ► for an embarrassingly long period of time.

00:11:02 ◼   ► And so the clear, actionable idea there is,

00:11:09 ◼   ► this list of projects that I have should shrink.

00:11:13 ◼   ► It shouldn't continue to grow over the course of the year.

00:11:16 ◼   ► By the end of the year,

00:11:17 ◼   ► the number of projects should be much smaller.

00:11:20 ◼   ► And so trying to say like, this is never gonna happen,

00:11:22 ◼   ► I'm just gonna close this project.

00:11:24 ◼   ► You know, like we all do,

00:11:25 ◼   ► to look at a little project that's been on the list

00:11:27 ◼   ► for six months and say, you know what,

00:11:29 ◼   ► I could knock this out in two hours

00:11:30 ◼   ► if I just sat down and did it.

00:11:32 ◼   ► And like, boom, get that thing done.

00:11:34 ◼   ► And that feeds into the feeling of the year of reorders.

00:11:38 ◼   ► like, oh, having a cleaner, smaller list of projects feels more orderly, and it feels

00:11:44 ◼   ► better.

00:11:45 ◼   ► And it's also a clearly actionable task.

00:11:50 ◼   ► Like there's a number of projects, it should be smaller.

00:11:54 ◼   ► It's not a goal, but it's like, it's a direction that you can clearly move in.

00:11:58 ◼   ► And it's it's become a bit of an articulation of what does the year of reorder mean in a

00:12:05 ◼   ► concrete way and that's one of the ways it has manifested over these months.

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00:13:55 ◼   ► So we have some Ask Gortex questions. The first comes from KJI. Does Myke still worry about career length in the entertainment field?

00:14:03 ◼   ► Still, did this come up on an old show?

00:14:06 ◼   ► I can only assume that it did. Maybe it's just a general, like, just aura I have about me.

00:14:12 ◼   ► Right, you've never said it, but you give off anxiety. It radiates out from your body.

00:14:18 ◼   ► Oh, Myke, he really radiates anxiety. It's probably an interesting way to describe me as a human.

00:14:23 ◼   ► as a human. Yeah, of course I do. I definitely worry about that because all things that are

00:14:32 ◼   ► entertaining are only entertaining for a period of time. I don't have any way of ensuring

00:14:39 ◼   ► it that I can be successful in this field. I guess really the thing that I consider my

00:14:47 ◼   ► the thing that helps me sleep at night when I think about what if everybody just got bored

00:14:51 ◼   ► of me is that I have built a company at this point which can support other creative people

00:14:59 ◼   ► and so that is always a skill that I will have and I will always have experience in

00:15:05 ◼   ► doing that. So I do genuinely expect that at some point in my life I don't create as

00:15:11 ◼   ► much and really I'm just assisting other people because I'm realistic in that, you know, I'm

00:15:19 ◼   ► trying to be realistic in that regard like I can't be relevant forever.

00:15:23 ◼   ► Yeah I was going to say to KJI who's asking this question you know Gray can worry too

00:15:29 ◼   ► about career length in the entertainment field. I happen to know I have a spreadsheet where I

00:15:34 ◼   ► track a bunch of my videos and I happen to notice that my UK explained video is coming up on eight

00:15:40 ◼   ► and a half years old now at this point which is just like inconceivable to me that it was

00:15:48 ◼   ► it was that long ago. My view of careers in entertainment is that they're like perfect storms.

00:15:58 ◼   ► We think of creators and people who entertain for a living, like comics and actors and authors.

00:16:08 ◼   ► What you have are people with particular skills, but you also have to have the weather of the

00:16:17 ◼   ► broader culture and the global audience has to match up with the thing that the person is producing.

00:16:26 ◼   ► And you don't have any control over that weather. So like, you know, if you're a comic, like,

00:16:37 ◼   ► you may be the world's number one comic for a period of years, but tastes and humor change.

00:16:46 ◼   ► and your very presence influences the change in taste of people.

00:16:53 ◼   ► So I really think it's crazy when I talk to people in entertainment who seem to just assume

00:16:58 ◼   ► that their careers will last forever and it's like no, no, no, like the very fact that you're here

00:17:04 ◼   ► changes this weather system and makes it more likely that some new hotness is going to appear

00:17:12 ◼   ► that people are going to then be interested in. So, you know, I don't know how long my

00:17:18 ◼   ► career in entertainment will last, but I've, I have never expected it to, to last my whole life.

00:17:24 ◼   ► I think that's, that's pure insanity. I don't think we have really good numbers on how long

00:17:30 ◼   ► YouTube careers can last because YouTube hasn't been around that long. But, you know, it is,

00:17:36 ◼   ► it is a thing that's on my mind sometimes is, you know, am I still going to be making YouTube

00:17:41 ◼   ► videos and podcasts when I'm in my 50s. And it's like, I don't know, that seems unlikely.

00:17:49 ◼   ► And so that's a thing that I will have to start planning for more and more as time goes on.

00:17:54 ◼   ► - There does exist people that have been podcasting for like 15 years successfully,

00:18:02 ◼   ► you know, at this point. - Yeah, the podcast world is longer,

00:18:05 ◼   ► but I think also just like you can find actors

00:18:09 ◼   ► who have been acting for 20 and 30 years,

00:18:13 ◼   ► you're talking about an outlier group

00:18:15 ◼   ► within an outlier group.

00:18:17 ◼   ► So it's just, I think it's insane to assume,

00:18:21 ◼   ► like if you're in a career in entertainment,

00:18:22 ◼   ► you're already in this outlier group.

00:18:24 ◼   ► And it's like, oh, not only am I lucky enough to be here,

00:18:27 ◼   ► I'm gonna be like the luckiest of the lucky group.

00:18:30 ◼   ► And that just, that seems like insanity thinking to me.

00:18:33 ◼   ► So yeah, like I know people do have these long careers, but I think they're very few.

00:18:38 ◼   ► You know, like actors seem to come and go in these seasons and it's like, oh, and you

00:18:42 ◼   ► never see this person ever again.

00:18:44 ◼   ► They were in a whole bunch of movies for, you know, a few years and then like, whoosh,

00:18:48 ◼   ► dust in the wind.

00:18:49 ◼   ► I've been holding on to this question for a while, but I am genuinely interested to

00:18:55 ◼   ► get your opinion on it.

00:18:57 ◼   ► Thimon asks, what are your opinions on the Mary Kondo hype?

00:19:03 ◼   ► Is Marie Kondo hyped?

00:19:06 ◼   ► Is this because of her Netflix show?

00:19:07 ◼   ► Yeah, yeah, the Netflix show.

00:19:10 ◼   ► It was a big deal, man, for like a little bit of time.

00:19:13 ◼   ► I was gonna say, I feel like there's something in the weather that I should be reacting to

00:19:16 ◼   ► here, but...

00:19:17 ◼   ► Well, but no, this is interesting to me on another level.

00:19:20 ◼   ► I'd never heard of Marie Kondo before the Netflix show.

00:19:23 ◼   ► You clearly have.

00:19:24 ◼   ► Oh really?

00:19:25 ◼   ► Okay.

00:19:26 ◼   ► Yeah, I was into Marie Kondo before she was cool.

00:19:29 ◼   ► You're a Marie Kondo hipster, is what you're saying.

00:19:31 ◼   ► Yeah, I suppose.

00:19:32 ◼   ► I read her book a long time ago.

00:19:34 ◼   ► - Interesting, why did you read that book?

00:19:36 ◼   ► - God, I can't remember.

00:19:37 ◼   ► Someone must have recommended it to me, I don't know.

00:19:40 ◼   ► Like it genuinely so long ago.

00:19:41 ◼   ► I think I must have read it in the initial wave

00:19:44 ◼   ► when it came out.

00:19:46 ◼   ► - What do you think of the book?

00:19:47 ◼   ► 'Cause I haven't read the book,

00:19:48 ◼   ► I've just watched a TV show.

00:19:49 ◼   ► My understanding is the book has more philosophy around it.

00:19:53 ◼   ► - Okay, yeah, so I watched the Netflix show with my wife

00:19:58 ◼   ► and we both loved it.

00:20:00 ◼   ► Like it's just fun.

00:20:01 ◼   ► - Oh, I'm pleased you loved it.

00:20:02 ◼   ► I loved it too.

00:20:03 ◼   ► - Okay, do people not?

00:20:05 ◼   ► Like how can you not love Marie Kondo?

00:20:06 ◼   ► She's adorable.

00:20:07 ◼   ► - I don't understand it either, but yes.

00:20:10 ◼   ► - It was like, this adorable woman is going to come

00:20:13 ◼   ► and talk in a soft Japanese voice

00:20:15 ◼   ► and your house is going to be clean.

00:20:16 ◼   ► - Some of the couples are troubling.

00:20:18 ◼   ► Like they're very frustrating.

00:20:20 ◼   ► And I think that's what helped a lot of people bounce off.

00:20:22 ◼   ► The first episode might actually be the worst episode,

00:20:26 ◼   ► which is like peculiar to me that they started that way.

00:20:29 ◼   ► But overall we really enjoyed it.

00:20:31 ◼   ► - Yeah, I don't remember the couples in particular,

00:20:33 ◼   ► but again, speaking of outlier groups,

00:20:35 ◼   ► you don't get a lot of normal regular people

00:20:37 ◼   ► who apply to be on TV shows, right?

00:20:39 ◼   ► Like, you know, couples on a semi-reality TV show,

00:20:44 ◼   ► they're not gonna be a normal couple.

00:20:47 ◼   ► You know, and it's often, you know,

00:20:49 ◼   ► you wonder this thing about like,

00:20:50 ◼   ► oh, these people know that someone's coming to their house

00:20:52 ◼   ► to clean up and this is what their house still looks like.

00:20:54 ◼   ► It's like, Jesus Christ, what must it look like normally?

00:20:56 ◼   ► But then part of me thinks,

00:20:58 ◼   ► maybe this is exactly what it looks like

00:20:59 ◼   ► because they're making poor judgment calls

00:21:01 ◼   ► being on TV in the first place, but whatever. No, I totally loved it. But here's an analogy.

00:21:08 ◼   ► It's a bit like watching the Lord of the Rings movies, which I really liked. But when I was

00:21:12 ◼   ► watching them, I couldn't help but think that your average moviegoer is missing a lot of

00:21:19 ◼   ► the experience here. And Marie Kondo's show sort of struck me in the same way that like,

00:21:26 ◼   ► oh, I really like this, but I don't know.

00:21:31 ◼   ► I was really glad that I had read the book

00:21:35 ◼   ► because I feel like I really understood

00:21:38 ◼   ► what she was going for in ways where she's just saying

00:21:41 ◼   ► a little sentence on the show.

00:21:44 ◼   ► And it's like, but there's so much more behind this.

00:21:48 ◼   ► But like, what did you take away from the show

00:21:50 ◼   ► with someone who hasn't read the book?

00:21:52 ◼   ► I mean, you say you liked it.

00:21:53 ◼   ► - A better way to store my T-shirts.

00:21:55 ◼   ► Yeah, are your t-shirts happy now, Myke?

00:21:58 ◼   ► They are happy. I did Marie Kondo my t-shirt collection. It's like it's much more neatly

00:22:05 ◼   ► folded now, like I have that great folding method that she does where you kind of stand

00:22:09 ◼   ► everything up so you can see everything, which is great. It helped me, it actually did really

00:22:15 ◼   ► help me getting rid of a lot of them, right? Where it was kind of just like, "All right,

00:22:19 ◼   ► let's be real about this. We don't need all of these forever." I just thank the t-shirts

00:22:24 ◼   ► that have been nice to me and they can be donated now.

00:22:27 ◼   ► And you know, in general, I took, I think,

00:22:29 ◼   ► a lot of practical tips from the show.

00:22:32 ◼   ► You know, stuff like the way that you organize your kitchen

00:22:35 ◼   ► and you know, it's not groundbreaking,

00:22:37 ◼   ► but like putting things inside of boxes

00:22:38 ◼   ► and putting them in drawers.

00:22:40 ◼   ► I'd never really seen someone do that before,

00:22:42 ◼   ► like nor had I really like considered it

00:22:44 ◼   ► as something to do for my own home.

00:22:46 ◼   ► So I enjoyed it for that.

00:22:48 ◼   ► And then of course it was just an entertaining show,

00:22:50 ◼   ► but I don't feel like I really understand her reasoning behind a lot of it, but I'm

00:22:56 ◼   ► very confident that it's there.

00:22:58 ◼   ► So, it's interesting that you asked this, because I actually think Marie Kondo is a,

00:23:06 ◼   ► maybe the most perfect example of an idea that some people really hate. And it's the

00:23:15 ◼   ► concept of the thing that isn't true but is still useful. So if you read Marie Kondo's book,

00:23:25 ◼   ► which I genuinely recommend to all the listeners, there is a thing about Japan which is useful to

00:23:33 ◼   ► know before you read it, which is Shintoism. I'll say it's a religion in Japan, but it's not a

00:23:42 ◼   ► a religion in the traditional way that people think of it. But one of the concepts of Shintoism

00:23:47 ◼   ► is that the inanimate world is alive with spirits. So the world is alive in this way. And I think

00:23:58 ◼   ► if you've ever watched movies like any of the Miyazaki films or a lot of Japanese movies,

00:24:04 ◼   ► you can kind of see this cultural influence in them. Like, boy, the world is alive, like

00:24:11 ◼   ► spirited away, everything is alive. And when you think about that, the book has this really

00:24:21 ◼   ► interesting concept of constantly relating to all of your objects. Like you said, she

00:24:27 ◼   ► has this idea of before you get rid of your clothes, you want to thank them for the service

00:24:32 ◼   ► they have provided you, even if you don't need them now. And she has the concept of

00:24:40 ◼   ► making sure that the things are happy.

00:24:42 ◼   ► That like, oh, all of your t-shirts are folded in a way

00:24:45 ◼   ► so that the t-shirts are happy.

00:24:48 ◼   ► Now, obviously, I don't think that there's a spirit

00:24:51 ◼   ► that lives in my t-shirt.

00:24:53 ◼   ► So that isn't literally true.

00:24:55 ◼   ► I don't think that I literally need to thank an object

00:24:58 ◼   ► before getting rid of it.

00:24:59 ◼   ► But it puts your brain in the right space.

00:25:04 ◼   ► - 100%.

00:25:05 ◼   ► - Yeah, and I have found myself constantly revisiting

00:25:08 ◼   ► the idea of are these objects happy?

00:25:12 ◼   ► Now, what's really occurring there is,

00:25:17 ◼   ► it's the question of are these things stored in a way

00:25:21 ◼   ► which I feel good about?

00:25:23 ◼   ► Like that's really what's occurring,

00:25:25 ◼   ► but thinking of it as like, oh, all of these wires,

00:25:28 ◼   ► they're unhappy in this box,

00:25:30 ◼   ► is just like conceptually a framework

00:25:32 ◼   ► that makes a lot more sense.

00:25:35 ◼   ► And so my wife and I, for years,

00:25:37 ◼   ► have used this phrasing of like,

00:25:39 ◼   ► oh, the cleaning products in that drawer are very unhappy.

00:25:42 ◼   ► Right, so they need to be rearranged

00:25:44 ◼   ► so that they can be happy.

00:25:45 ◼   ► It's like, it's not true, but it's so useful.

00:25:49 ◼   ► It's such a useful concept to think

00:25:52 ◼   ► of this little spirit world.

00:25:54 ◼   ► And I really think, like I have seen people I know

00:25:59 ◼   ► who have a hard time getting rid of things.

00:26:03 ◼   ► The idea of like thanking the object

00:26:07 ◼   ► gives them this kind of closure.

00:26:09 ◼   ► And it's like, it doesn't make any sense

00:26:13 ◼   ► on a logical level,

00:26:14 ◼   ► but it makes sense on this weird emotional level

00:26:17 ◼   ► that if you get people to thank their old pair of jeans

00:26:21 ◼   ► for all of the fun concerts they've been to

00:26:23 ◼   ► with those jeans,

00:26:24 ◼   ► somehow that mentally closes a door

00:26:28 ◼   ► that lets people let go of those objects.

00:26:32 ◼   ► So she has a ton of stuff in those books

00:26:36 ◼   ► That if you just read it in a literal way, she sounds like a crazy person.

00:26:41 ◼   ► Um, but I think if, if you read it in this metaphorical way and keeping in mind

00:26:47 ◼   ► this idea of like a very alive world, I think the book is incredibly useful,

00:26:54 ◼   ► even though it is not literally true for 90% of it, you know, and then, and then

00:27:02 ◼   ► And 10% of it is just greatly actionable tips.

00:27:07 ◼   ► And my personal favorite,

00:27:09 ◼   ► which I actually just did recently with my office,

00:27:11 ◼   ► so obvious but never really occurred to me,

00:27:15 ◼   ► is that when you want to clear out,

00:27:16 ◼   ► like you want to rearrange your closet

00:27:18 ◼   ► or you want to rearrange anything,

00:27:20 ◼   ► take everything out and then put it back.

00:27:25 ◼   ► And I just did this with all of the electronics

00:27:27 ◼   ► in my home office and man, it was a,

00:27:31 ◼   ► quite literally, three day long project of I dumped out all of the wires, like in all of the electronic gizmos and like all of these things that you just sort of accumulate over time.

00:27:41 ◼   ► And it's such a great tip because it then requires like more effort to put them back than to say, you know what, this thing doesn't really need to be here.

00:27:51 ◼   ► Well, also, you can't change your mind.

00:27:53 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:27:54 ◼   ► Kind of like, ah, this project sucks. I won't bother with it. Because it's all out now.

00:27:59 ◼   ► Yeah, it's like a commitment device.

00:28:00 ◼   ► And I remember the first time I ever did it

00:28:03 ◼   ► after I read her book was I did it with my closet,

00:28:05 ◼   ► like take out all of the clothes and then put them back.

00:28:08 ◼   ► And it was like, this is amazing.

00:28:10 ◼   ► Such a simple, obvious idea.

00:28:13 ◼   ► But previously, if I was going to quote,

00:28:15 ◼   ► organize my closet, you do it in this haphazard way.

00:28:18 ◼   ► You sort of like look through things

00:28:19 ◼   ► and you're trying to find stuff to take out.

00:28:21 ◼   ► And that's terrible.

00:28:22 ◼   ► And it's not clear, it doesn't work very well.

00:28:25 ◼   ► So I really like her.

00:28:28 ◼   ► I think people should read the book even though it does sound like Insanity Town at some points,

00:28:34 ◼   ► but I really think it is a great example of this concept.

00:28:36 ◼   ► It's not literally true, but it's useful.

00:28:39 ◼   ► I definitely wouldn't have thought you would say that.

00:28:41 ◼   ► I didn't think that you were gonna hate it, but I didn't know you'd read the books, so

00:28:46 ◼   ► it makes a lot more sense to me that maybe you've taken more from it than just the base

00:28:50 ◼   ► tips, right?

00:28:51 ◼   ► Because I had assumed that the books had more meat to them.

00:28:56 ◼   ► Yeah, there's a lot in there.

00:28:58 ◼   ► And again, I think it's really easy to dismiss,

00:29:01 ◼   ► and it is why I want, like, the very way this question

00:29:04 ◼   ► for "Ask Cortex" was phrased makes me feel like,

00:29:06 ◼   ► "Oh, I imagine people perceive the TV show

00:29:10 ◼   ► "in this very different way."

00:29:12 ◼   ► Like, I don't know, if I'm trying to imagine it,

00:29:14 ◼   ► like, I guess I could see how people would be annoyed,

00:29:16 ◼   ► but it's because it's missing a lot of the deepness of it.

00:29:19 ◼   ► Like, her whole concept about sparking joy,

00:29:22 ◼   ► it's just like a phrase that she talks about

00:29:24 ◼   ► on the TV show, but after reading the book,

00:29:27 ◼   ► I feel like it's something that I never really thought about before, but is a feeling you

00:29:31 ◼   ► can get attuned to.

00:29:32 ◼   ► It is a very evocative phrase.

00:29:35 ◼   ► Spark joy.

00:29:36 ◼   ► It's two words, but you can really pull from that.

00:29:39 ◼   ► I think that it is a very clever phrase.

00:29:41 ◼   ► I like it.

00:29:42 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:29:43 ◼   ► So go read a book, everyone.

00:29:46 ◼   ► Isaac asks, "What day of the week do your calendars start on?"

00:29:49 ◼   ► Well, Myke?

00:29:50 ◼   ► Well, I feel like there's only one option for this.

00:29:55 ◼   ► Okay.

00:29:56 ◼   ► I put it in there because I figured you would surprise me.

00:29:59 ◼   ► I just, you saw it on like Wednesday or something.

00:30:02 ◼   ► For me, it's Monday.

00:30:05 ◼   ► Like Monday is the logical day to have a calendar start.

00:30:08 ◼   ► - Yeah, I'm gonna agree with you there.

00:30:10 ◼   ► I've changed all of my calendars to start on Monday.

00:30:13 ◼   ► I never liked the US arrangement

00:30:15 ◼   ► of the week starts on Sunday.

00:30:18 ◼   ► - I can't get my head around that as a concept.

00:30:22 ◼   ► I don't understand why you would start calendars on a Sunday.

00:30:27 ◼   ► I don't get it.

00:30:30 ◼   ► Like Sunday is part of the week end, right?

00:30:33 ◼   ► We all call it the week end.

00:30:34 ◼   ► We don't call it the weekend slash week start.

00:30:37 ◼   ► Like it's called the weekend.

00:30:38 ◼   ► Why would you start your calendar

00:30:40 ◼   ► on the last day of the week end?

00:30:43 ◼   ► - Yeah, yeah. - Makes no sense.

00:30:45 ◼   ► - It doesn't make any sense to me.

00:30:48 ◼   ► I've heard a bunch of traditional reasons for it

00:30:50 ◼   ► that I also think don't make any sense

00:30:52 ◼   ► upon a moment's reflection.

00:30:54 ◼   ► Yeah, I'm not interested in hearing about the history behind that. That's not going

00:30:59 ◼   ► to help the case of why you would continue to do it today, right? Because in the Revolutionary

00:31:05 ◼   ► War it's just not important for today, for 2019, as to why your calendar app would still

00:31:13 ◼   ► start – your calendar app, right? Why would you set your calendar app to start on a Sunday?

00:31:19 ◼   ► I just can't get it.

00:31:20 ◼   ► If you're used to it, fine,

00:31:22 ◼   ► but I can't imagine what the utility would be.

00:31:25 ◼   ► - Yeah, I mean, this is one of those things,

00:31:26 ◼   ► growing up in America,

00:31:27 ◼   ► all the calendars start on Sunday.

00:31:29 ◼   ► But the reason why I've changed it in software,

00:31:33 ◼   ► and actually I haven't even thought about this

00:31:35 ◼   ► in years and years,

00:31:36 ◼   ► 'cause I just change it in all of my calendars immediately,

00:31:39 ◼   ► is because it just makes it easier scanning over the weeks.

00:31:43 ◼   ► Like it's having to know when the weekend occurs,

00:31:48 ◼   ► It's just easier to visually look at the calendar for me and be like,

00:31:51 ◼   ► "Okay, the first five days, those are all the work days,

00:31:53 ◼   ► and these two days are the days where people are around."

00:31:55 ◼   ► It's like, "Okay, I can see it much more clearly."

00:31:57 ◼   ► And it always bifurcated my brain,

00:32:00 ◼   ► trying to think like, "The center column is the work days,

00:32:03 ◼   ► and the edges are when people are around."

00:32:06 ◼   ► Like, you just don't think about it that way.

00:32:07 ◼   ► There's two groups, work days and weekends,

00:32:11 ◼   ► and splitting the weekend so that you have half on one side

00:32:13 ◼   ► of your calendar and half on the other always seemed dumb,

00:32:16 ◼   ► and I never liked it.

00:32:17 ◼   ► So Monday all the way.

00:32:19 ◼   ► While we're talking about calendars.

00:32:21 ◼   ► So when we did our state of the apps episode, I made a proclamation

00:32:25 ◼   ► that there are no good apps, no new good apps anymore.

00:32:29 ◼   ► Like that I kind of felt like it had been a long time since I'd

00:32:34 ◼   ► found something that was unique.

00:32:36 ◼   ► Like it felt like everything was just a remix when it came to apps.

00:32:39 ◼   ► Like there was just no new ideas.

00:32:40 ◼   ► A friend of the show, _DavidSmith, who is a wonderful developer, um, who's

00:32:46 ◼   ► I think probably these days best known for an app called Podometer++.

00:32:50 ◼   ► He has made an app called Calzones, which is also maybe the best name.

00:32:55 ◼   ► It is part time zone calculator, part calendar, and I adore this application.

00:33:01 ◼   ► One of the reasons I adore this application is I was really heavily involved in the development

00:33:06 ◼   ► of the application.

00:33:07 ◼   ► He originally asked me, "Tell me about how you use time zones."

00:33:13 ◼   ► he knows I'm somebody who is constantly keeping track of like five or six time zones

00:33:17 ◼   ► because of all the people that I work with all over the world. And I have, there are

00:33:21 ◼   ► just a few touches in this application. If you ever need to know what time it is somewhere

00:33:26 ◼   ► else in the world, you need this application. I can't believe I have never used an app

00:33:32 ◼   ► that integrates time zone conversion and a calendar because you always need the calendar

00:33:39 ◼   ► when you're doing a time zone conversion.

00:33:41 ◼   ► So when you're looking at the view to see what time it is in other places,

00:33:46 ◼   ► your calendar appointments appear at the bottom.

00:33:48 ◼   ► And then when you add calendar events,

00:33:50 ◼   ► it has a whole UI to add calendar events.

00:33:53 ◼   ► You know you have a time picker,

00:33:54 ◼   ► where you can choose the time that you want the event to be on?

00:33:57 ◼   ► David created a custom one that shows you all of your time zones.

00:34:01 ◼   ► So maybe you're tracking six time zones.

00:34:03 ◼   ► So when you're choosing the time in the event,

00:34:05 ◼   ► you see all the time zones at the same time.

00:34:07 ◼   ► It's brilliant and I absolutely love it and I wanted to talk about it so people could get it

00:34:14 ◼   ► because I think that a lot of our listeners could value it and it's one of those apps that's like,

00:34:19 ◼   ► oh, immediately on the home screen. And yeah, I just think it's fantastic.

00:34:25 ◼   ► It's really great to be able to see the way you can scroll left and right and sort of go past the

00:34:31 ◼   ► days and see your calendar move along the bottom and then you have time zones that you can lock in

00:34:35 ◼   ► on the top. Like it is, I don't use time zones nearly as much as you do.

00:34:39 ◼   ► I only really have to deal with one.

00:34:41 ◼   ► Oh, the widget's so good too. It's like the entire view of the application in the widget.

00:34:47 ◼   ► Like all of the like conversion stuff is in the widget.

00:34:51 ◼   ► And so like you're tapping through and you can see all of the times, right?

00:34:53 ◼   ► So you get like these columns of the, like, so you like, you see it's like, oh, it's

00:34:57 ◼   ► 10 a.m. Eastern, 3 p.m. in London, like 4 p.m. in Rome or whatever.

00:35:02 ◼   ► And when you've actually found the time that you want to do the event on in the widget,

00:35:06 ◼   ► you tap the number and it opens the app to create a new event at that exact time. It's like,

00:35:12 ◼   ► "Yeah, that's what I want it to do." It's brilliant.

00:35:14 ◼   ► Oh, you know what? I never looked at the widget, and this might replace the long-standing

00:35:19 ◼   ► clock K-L-O-K widget for me. This was it. So when me and Dave

00:35:23 ◼   ► were talking about this app very early on, I was like, "Dave, these are my bare minimum

00:35:27 ◼   ► requirements for a widget because I need to replace clock." Because at some point,

00:35:31 ◼   ► that thing's going away and if I'm going to use a timezone conversion app I only want to use one.

00:35:36 ◼   ► So like the widget was the thing that I cared the most about initially because it was like I want a

00:35:42 ◼   ► new widget and this one again it's like even better it shows your calendar events and then

00:35:46 ◼   ► when you tap on the times it just creates new events for you in the application. It's a great

00:35:50 ◼   ► app with a hilarious name. Yeah and also like you I was in the beta underscore invited me in

00:35:58 ◼   ► and I had one deal-breaking feature, and he's a fast developer, it's like, later that day, boom,

00:36:04 ◼   ► he's like, "Oh, I implemented that thing that you wanted. Amazing. Go check it out."

00:36:08 ◼   ► - So you talk about fast, right? So you look at this application. It came out on April 17th.

00:36:13 ◼   ► Dave showed me his, like, he asked me for my feedback for like a proof of concept on February

00:36:19 ◼   ► the 4th. And then he did it in like two months. Couldn't, cannot fathom that. I don't understand

00:36:27 ◼   ► development and I cannot understand how you could build an app in two months. He's very

00:36:32 ◼   ► experienced but still it just seems it's mind-boggling to me. Did you see there was a #MykeWasRight

00:36:38 ◼   ► theme in the, I think as he thanks to me. It's like themes. One of them, one of them

00:36:44 ◼   ► he said, "What are your two favorite colors?" I was like, "Green and orange." And then

00:36:47 ◼   ► there's a theme for me. I don't think people should encourage that Myke was right. You

00:36:51 ◼   ► just... There's one of them is 100% for you. The theme that's just called "Grays." It's

00:36:56 ◼   ► It's your theme, right?

00:36:58 ◼   ► It's gotta be, it's just all gray.

00:37:00 ◼   ► - Look, that's classy, that's subtle.

00:37:04 ◼   ► Myke was right, very brash, over the top, in your face.

00:37:08 ◼   ► - Yeah, just like me.

00:37:09 ◼   ► - Don't encourage him, people, don't encourage him.

00:37:13 ◼   ► - It's the color version representation

00:37:15 ◼   ► of just my personality.

00:37:16 ◼   ► - This episode of Cortex is brought to you by FreshBooks.

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00:39:02 ◼   ► Thanks to FreshBooks for their support of this show

00:39:04 ◼   ► and all of Relay FM.

00:39:06 ◼   ► - Camille wants to know,

00:39:08 ◼   ► what does your current watch face look like?

00:39:11 ◼   ► - You know what I just realized,

00:39:12 ◼   ► I was going to ask what your watch face looks like.

00:39:16 ◼   ► And then I was sad for a moment.

00:39:18 ◼   ► And I thought, oh, Myke doesn't have a watch face anymore.

00:39:22 ◼   ► - I do, it's really beautiful.

00:39:24 ◼   ► - Are you gonna put it in the show notes?

00:39:27 ◼   ► - No.

00:39:28 ◼   ► No, I have a different watch now.

00:39:37 ◼   ► - Oh, you have a new one now?

00:39:38 ◼   ► - You've seen it.

00:39:39 ◼   ► - Well, look, when you say a new one,

00:39:41 ◼   ► I don't know how new, new, like, you know,

00:39:42 ◼   ► you watch people, you're buying watches all the time.

00:39:45 ◼   ► So I don't know.

00:39:46 ◼   ► - I'm not buying watches all the time.

00:39:47 ◼   ► I have two watches.

00:39:48 ◼   ► I have two watches.

00:39:49 ◼   ► - Okay, all right.

00:39:50 ◼   ► Well, we'll skip right past that.

00:39:51 ◼   ► Here is my current watch face.

00:39:54 ◼   ► I'm sending it to you.

00:39:55 ◼   ► God, I don't even remember

00:39:56 ◼   ► what the heck they're called anymore.

00:39:57 ◼   ► After that time where I ragefully screenshot

00:40:00 ◼   ► all of the watch faces and arrange them

00:40:02 ◼   ► and tried to show the limit to,

00:40:04 ◼   ► like now I don't even remember the names

00:40:05 ◼   ► of any of these things, but I'm using the watch face

00:40:08 ◼   ► that has the four circular complications

00:40:11 ◼   ► that you can use on it, which as far as I'm concerned

00:40:15 ◼   ► is the literally only usable watch face

00:40:18 ◼   ► in this current generation.

00:40:20 ◼   ► - I think it's Infograph, right?

00:40:21 ◼   ► - Infograph analog, yeah, I think that's what it is.

00:40:24 ◼   ► WWDC is coming up.

00:40:27 ◼   ► I know I shouldn't say this, I know I shouldn't say it,

00:40:31 ◼   ► but I swear to God, if there isn't the ability

00:40:34 ◼   ► for developers to make watch faces,

00:40:36 ◼   ► or at the bare minimum, a doubling in the amount

00:40:41 ◼   ► of actual usable watch faces,

00:40:44 ◼   ► I'm gonna lose my (beep) mind.

00:40:46 ◼   ► I really am.

00:40:48 ◼   ► - I like that you're like, I'm not gonna say it.

00:40:49 ◼   ► There's no threat, nothing's gonna happen.

00:40:51 ◼   ► Like if they don't do it, then you're still stuck.

00:40:54 ◼   ► - Yeah, no, I am.

00:40:55 ◼   ► I'm totally stuck.

00:40:57 ◼   ► It has really been amazing that this year's watchOS

00:41:01 ◼   ► with the watch faces, I think,

00:41:02 ◼   ► was a tremendously weird step backwards

00:41:05 ◼   ► in terms of if you actually try

00:41:06 ◼   ► to want to use something usable.

00:41:08 ◼   ► But this is what I have.

00:41:11 ◼   ► Just to go through it really quickly, I have the very vital OmniFocus at the top, which I really like,

00:41:16 ◼   ► which shows what is the thing that I should theoretically be doing now.

00:41:20 ◼   ► I don't always perfectly follow it, but I do like to have it there on the watch.

00:41:23 ◼   ► So that's the text.

00:41:24 ◼   ► Yeah, the text at the top is pulled from OmniFocus.

00:41:27 ◼   ► So what that's doing is looking at current start date, current end date.

00:41:31 ◼   ► What is the thing that falls within that bracket?

00:41:34 ◼   ► Yeah, if you are a pro user of OmniFocus, you can set up a custom perspective

00:41:40 ◼   ► and say I want this custom perspective to show up on the watch.

00:41:44 ◼   ► Oh I know what you mean by pro user.

00:41:46 ◼   ► I thought you just meant like really talented.

00:41:48 ◼   ► Like you mean if you pay for it.

00:41:50 ◼   ► Yeah, no I mean if you pay for it.

00:41:52 ◼   ► If you're a elite omni focus user like I am.

00:41:55 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:41:57 ◼   ► If you're a noob, you're never gonna figure this out.

00:42:00 ◼   ► They don't let you.

00:42:01 ◼   ► You gotta be in the pro league

00:42:02 ◼   ► to get access to this feature.

00:42:04 ◼   ► To me that's a total deal breaking feature for a watch.

00:42:06 ◼   ► Like I have to be able to have omni focus on there

00:42:08 ◼   ► in the way that it can display some words.

00:42:10 ◼   ► which then immediately eliminates

00:42:11 ◼   ► like almost all of the watch faces.

00:42:13 ◼   ► I know I'm always putting in requests to Omni on the podcast,

00:42:17 ◼   ► but I'm gonna do it again.

00:42:18 ◼   ► - Just go to the forum, what's wrong with you?

00:42:20 ◼   ► - No, no listen, I'm just gonna,

00:42:22 ◼   ► this is clearly the most sensible way to do it.

00:42:25 ◼   ► It does drive me crazy though,

00:42:26 ◼   ► that it doesn't respect the order

00:42:30 ◼   ► in the customs perspective.

00:42:31 ◼   ► If you have an item that is due,

00:42:33 ◼   ► it always puts that at like the top on your watch,

00:42:37 ◼   ► which is a little frustrating because sometimes it's like,

00:42:38 ◼   ► yes, I know a thing is due in a week.

00:42:41 ◼   ► I don't need to see it now.

00:42:42 ◼   ► There's other stuff I would rather have at the top.

00:42:44 ◼   ► So I wish it would respect the sort order

00:42:47 ◼   ► on the phone and the perspective.

00:42:48 ◼   ► But anyway, OmniFocus bug filed.

00:42:52 ◼   ► Then we have Carrot, which is of course

00:42:55 ◼   ► the best weather app that exists.

00:42:57 ◼   ► The one on the bottom is timers,

00:43:01 ◼   ► so I can quickly tap and start a timer.

00:43:04 ◼   ► That one also sometimes rotates.

00:43:05 ◼   ► I sometimes change that one out.

00:43:07 ◼   ► And the one on the left I really want to recommend.

00:43:11 ◼   ► I absolutely love this.

00:43:12 ◼   ► It's the simplest thing.

00:43:14 ◼   ► It's called Better Day.

00:43:15 ◼   ► This is what so much of the Apple Watch should be,

00:43:18 ◼   ► but it's just a little app that allows you to customize

00:43:23 ◼   ► how do you want the day and date shown on your watch.

00:43:28 ◼   ► And it sounds like such a simple thing,

00:43:32 ◼   ► but there are very many things that you might want to have.

00:43:35 ◼   ► And I absolutely love this because it shows, you know, it says April 18th in words.

00:43:41 ◼   ► But what I really like is the visual indicator of how much of the month has passed.

00:43:49 ◼   ► I find that to just be really useful to see at a glance.

00:43:53 ◼   ► Like I know obviously the number should tell me, but it's, I just like to receive that information in just a more visual way.

00:44:01 ◼   ► So I love that there's a little progress slider

00:44:03 ◼   ► for how much of the month has gone by.

00:44:06 ◼   ► So that's my current watch face.

00:44:08 ◼   ► - Okay.

00:44:09 ◼   ► - I don't miss the Apple Watch.

00:44:10 ◼   ► - I don't blame you.

00:44:13 ◼   ► I don't blame you for not missing the Apple Watch.

00:44:16 ◼   ► I mean, I have many complaints about the notification system

00:44:19 ◼   ► that we can save for a later WWDC issue.

00:44:22 ◼   ► When you said that you gave it up, I wasn't appalled.

00:44:26 ◼   ► I can totally understand why someone would want to do that.

00:44:30 ◼   ► And I do think that the people I see who have the Apple Watch

00:44:34 ◼   ► with frequent notifications, I think,

00:44:36 ◼   ► are crazy people driving themselves crazy.

00:44:39 ◼   ► Like, don't do that.

00:44:42 ◼   ► Like, if you get an Apple Watch,

00:44:43 ◼   ► the very first thing you should do

00:44:44 ◼   ► is turn off all of the notifications

00:44:46 ◼   ► and then figure out what you actually want to turn on.

00:44:48 ◼   ► - Olivier asks, "I'm somehow really interested

00:44:51 ◼   ► in the Cortex discussion recently about Deliveroo,"

00:44:54 ◼   ► which is when you were all locked away for a while

00:44:57 ◼   ► and I was monitoring how many meals you were getting.

00:44:59 ◼   ► I would love it if you guys spoke a little bit.

00:45:02 ◼   ► Do you remember when you were in your fortress society?

00:45:04 ◼   ► No, no, I remember.

00:45:06 ◼   ► I'm just confused that someone has a deliveroo related question.

00:45:09 ◼   ► Well, it was more like...

00:45:11 ◼   ► Okay, so let me finish the question.

00:45:13 ◼   ► I think it makes more sense.

00:45:14 ◼   ► Would love if you guys spoke about food a little bit in general.

00:45:16 ◼   ► Like, lunch is a productivity killer for me, says Olivier.

00:45:20 ◼   ► So, you were talking about like,

00:45:24 ◼   ► you were getting just food deliveries

00:45:26 ◼   ► because then you didn't have to think about anything, right?

00:45:28 ◼   ► during that period of time.

00:45:29 ◼   ► I hate lunch time.

00:45:32 ◼   ► - Yeah, lunch is the worst.

00:45:33 ◼   ► - It's the worst thing.

00:45:35 ◼   ► - It's clearly the worst meal.

00:45:36 ◼   ► It's at the worst time.

00:45:37 ◼   ► - Especially--

00:45:38 ◼   ► - Fuck lunch.

00:45:39 ◼   ► - Try, exactly.

00:45:40 ◼   ► You know what?

00:45:41 ◼   ► Yeah, fuck you lunch.

00:45:41 ◼   ► All right?

00:45:42 ◼   ► Lunch at home.

00:45:44 ◼   ► If you've got a reason to be out of the house,

00:45:46 ◼   ► lunch is great.

00:45:47 ◼   ► Brunch is better, but lunch is good, right?

00:45:49 ◼   ► - Yeah.

00:45:50 ◼   ► - But at home, lunch is just a (beep)

00:45:52 ◼   ► and I hate it.

00:45:53 ◼   ► Because especially if you're trying to not eat carbs.

00:45:58 ◼   ► - Ah.

00:45:59 ◼   ► - Lunch can just go away, I hate you.

00:46:01 ◼   ► Most of the time I don't eat lunch,

00:46:03 ◼   ► or I try and combine breakfast and lunch into one meal.

00:46:08 ◼   ► I have kind of found that if I am gonna be at home all day,

00:46:13 ◼   ► I don't actually need a lot of food to keep me going

00:46:18 ◼   ► for the day without there being a detrimental hit

00:46:20 ◼   ► on my energy level, so I kind of just manage that way.

00:46:25 ◼   ► So I again, I don't know if I can recommend this to people specifically, but like the way that I

00:46:31 ◼   ► think we both deal with it is we just try and have lunch as little as possible because it just gets

00:46:35 ◼   ► in the way. My solution is a little different, which is just that I've mentioned this in in

00:46:41 ◼   ► videos, but I really like I can never express how much of a life changing thing it was for me to

00:46:47 ◼   ► realize that I don't need to eat breakfast. And it is a miserable change going through

00:46:56 ◼   ► that at first, but being on the other side of it, it really was life-changing.

00:47:03 ◼   ► "I think I'm in a similar boat to you. I have coffee in the morning and then I'll eat something

00:47:08 ◼   ► maybe around 11 or 12. So I don't really feel like I have either lunch or breakfast anymore.

00:47:13 ◼   ► I just have this like, and it's not brunch

00:47:16 ◼   ► 'cause I'm eating like not brunch food, right?

00:47:19 ◼   ► I'm not eating like a stack of pancakes,

00:47:21 ◼   ► but like just what I will have is like,

00:47:22 ◼   ► well, that's the one meal that I have

00:47:25 ◼   ► other than dinner that day.

00:47:26 ◼   ► - Yeah, so like not having breakfast

00:47:30 ◼   ► also sort of gets right around to the lunch problem

00:47:32 ◼   ► because like food in general

00:47:34 ◼   ► is this weird productivity killer.

00:47:36 ◼   ► I hate it in the morning because it's a real danger zone

00:47:39 ◼   ► of something went wrong, of like, oh, you know,

00:47:42 ◼   ► I don't have this ingredient

00:47:43 ◼   ► and then your mind starts going down like other tracks

00:47:45 ◼   ► are like, "Well, what else could I have for breakfast?"

00:47:47 ◼   ► Like, forget it.

00:47:48 ◼   ► Like all of that stuff is just totally gone.

00:47:50 ◼   ► It's an interruption and you can get sleepy after you eat.

00:47:54 ◼   ► So by not having breakfast,

00:47:56 ◼   ► on like perfect days when things are just going so great,

00:48:02 ◼   ► it's like I don't eat any kind of lunch until noon,

00:48:06 ◼   ► maybe even one or two o'clock if I'm like really on a roll

00:48:10 ◼   ► and I just don't wanna break the streak.

00:48:13 ◼   ► This way, for me, what happens is lunch happens,

00:48:17 ◼   ► ideally, after I have done all of the most important work

00:48:21 ◼   ► that I'm gonna do in the day,

00:48:22 ◼   ► which is mainly reading and research and writing stuff.

00:48:25 ◼   ► And then, because I hate lunch,

00:48:27 ◼   ► I have an extremely limited array of options,

00:48:31 ◼   ► which are always just available.

00:48:33 ◼   ► Just usually, I have two different ways to cook eggs,

00:48:36 ◼   ► and that is my lunch 80, 90% of the time.

00:48:40 ◼   ► and we always just make sure to have a gigantic stack of eggs available in the house.

00:48:45 ◼   ► So it's like work is done,

00:48:46 ◼   ► I can just scramble up some eggs, and I eat it,

00:48:49 ◼   ► and now we're done here.

00:48:51 ◼   ► The lunch isn't an interruption,

00:48:53 ◼   ► because I've front-loaded the workday,

00:48:54 ◼   ► I'm not having the terrible lunch food options,

00:48:57 ◼   ► I'm actually just having breakfast,

00:48:59 ◼   ► and then you just go on to dinner,

00:49:01 ◼   ► which is like the one real meal in the day.

00:49:03 ◼   ► So yeah.

00:49:04 ◼   ► Lunch is the worst, it's terrible.

00:49:07 ◼   ► Do everything you can to minimize its impact.

00:49:10 ◼   ► And for me personally, skipping breakfast and then moving breakfast to basically be lunch, huge, huge quality of life improvement.

00:49:18 ◼   ► Helps you lose weight too.

00:49:20 ◼   ► Yeah, depending on what you do for dinner though. You can really tip that scale if you want to.

00:49:26 ◼   ► It's not a be all, end all. You've got to be watching everything.

00:49:30 ◼   ► Yeah, you can still be net positive on calories very easily depending on what you're doing for dinner.

00:49:36 ◼   ► Oh, a big bowl of pasta.

00:49:37 ◼   ► Yeah, it's fine, I skipped breakfast. No, it's not.

00:49:41 ◼   ► I ate a whole pizza and pasta, I only had breakfast today, so I'm fine.

00:49:46 ◼   ► I'm still on that diet. Yeah, is it working out?

00:49:49 ◼   ► Yep, I'm 20 pounds now. Oh wow, holy cow.

00:49:53 ◼   ► Yeah, man. I don't know if I'm even going to recognize you the next time I see you in person.

00:49:57 ◼   ► I know, I'm working through, I'm very happy. It's going to be slim mic on stage.

00:50:01 ◼   ► Hopefully. I think I'm about halfway to where I want to be. But I'm currently the lightest

00:50:07 ◼   ► I've been in like six or seven years.

00:50:10 ◼   ► Oh, that's great. That's really good. Congratulations.

00:50:13 ◼   ► Thank you. Samuel says, "I recently got an iPhone XS Max and I'm considering getting

00:50:18 ◼   ► a popsocket, but I'm concerned about how well it will fit in my pockets and also affect

00:50:23 ◼   ► the wireless charging. What is your current deal with popsockets on your phones?"

00:50:28 ◼   ► It kills me, the wireless, the wireless really kills me.

00:50:32 ◼   ► I feel like I'm constantly trading off the wireless

00:50:36 ◼   ► and the PopSocket.

00:50:37 ◼   ► What I'm currently doing is I found a case for my iPhone

00:50:42 ◼   ► that I really like.

00:50:44 ◼   ► It's the Moment iPhone case.

00:50:46 ◼   ► - Oh, the camera people.

00:50:47 ◼   ► - The case is there because it's attachable for lenses

00:50:50 ◼   ► to your iPhone, which I got because I wanted to try it out,

00:50:53 ◼   ► like I thought it was just an interesting system.

00:50:55 ◼   ► But it turns out I actually really just like the case.

00:50:57 ◼   ► I think it's maybe one of the best iPhone cases

00:50:59 ◼   ► I've come across.

00:51:01 ◼   ► And currently I just have the popsocket

00:51:04 ◼   ► attached to that case.

00:51:06 ◼   ► But I do find myself constantly going back and forth

00:51:08 ◼   ► between liking the popsocket for being able to hold the phone

00:51:12 ◼   ► and then being annoyed that I can't use wireless charging.

00:51:16 ◼   ► Which is doubly annoyed now that I have the air-positive

00:51:19 ◼   ► wireless charging as well.

00:51:20 ◼   ► It's like I just don't want to have to deal

00:51:22 ◼   ► with plugging in the wires.

00:51:24 ◼   ► I find it a constant frustration between these two

00:51:27 ◼   ► feature sets and I just I always want both with none of the trade-offs and I

00:51:33 ◼   ► can't get that so I flip back and forth between them. They have an option but it

00:51:37 ◼   ► doesn't it's not good like they have this this new pop socket where you can

00:51:41 ◼   ► take a piece of it off and it will work. No but that defeats the whole purpose

00:51:45 ◼   ► I might as well just plug in a wire. Exactly. Forget it. My thing is I'm just not a

00:51:49 ◼   ► wireless charging person. Mm-hmm. I don't so it doesn't bother me because I care

00:51:54 ◼   ► more about the popsocket than wireless charging and I'm just not, you know, I have a couple

00:51:58 ◼   ► of docks that I use already that just have iPhone cables and I've been using it for years,

00:52:02 ◼   ► one on my desk, one on my bedside and that works great for me. I use the popsocket all

00:52:06 ◼   ► the time. I have no problem with like putting it in pockets and stuff because you kind of

00:52:11 ◼   ► just get used to the way that you put your phone in your pocket and the way that I put

00:52:15 ◼   ► my phone in my pocket is like I basically put my hand over the popsocket and put it

00:52:18 ◼   ► in.

00:52:19 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:52:20 ◼   ► Like that did not take me very long to adjust to at all.

00:52:22 ◼   ► - Yeah, that's the move.

00:52:24 ◼   ► That's the move when you have the popsocket on there.

00:52:26 ◼   ► - Yep, I actually have a couple more popsocket questions.

00:52:29 ◼   ► One kind of showing Yakko,

00:52:30 ◼   ► do you put your popsocket in the middle of your phone

00:52:33 ◼   ► or do you have it to the side?

00:52:34 ◼   ► Where do you place it?

00:52:35 ◼   ► - I place it kind of near the top.

00:52:37 ◼   ► - Interesting.

00:52:38 ◼   ► - Because I like it to be able to,

00:52:41 ◼   ► if I have the phone in portrait mode

00:52:44 ◼   ► and I put it down on the table

00:52:45 ◼   ► so that it's lifted up a little bit

00:52:47 ◼   ► like it's facing me on the table.

00:52:49 ◼   ► Every time I have to put a popsocket on,

00:52:50 ◼   ► I very carefully am trying to find the balance spot

00:52:54 ◼   ► where I can put it far enough up the phone

00:52:57 ◼   ► so that the phone will face me in portrait

00:53:00 ◼   ► when it's on the table,

00:53:01 ◼   ► but not so far up that I can't in landscape mode

00:53:05 ◼   ► also have the pop socket support the phone.

00:53:07 ◼   ► It's like there's maybe a three millimeter worth

00:53:12 ◼   ► of tolerance for finding that sweet spot.

00:53:14 ◼   ► And so I'm always very carefully like,

00:53:16 ◼   ► I want it to be in both of these positions.

00:53:20 ◼   ► So that's where I go for it.

00:53:21 ◼   ► But what do you do, Myke?

00:53:22 ◼   ► Mine's in the middle.

00:53:23 ◼   ► Like on an iPhone, it goes directly

00:53:25 ◼   ► under the Apple logo on my case.

00:53:27 ◼   ► Right.

00:53:28 ◼   ► Because that way I think it's

00:53:30 ◼   ► aesthetically pleasing because it

00:53:31 ◼   ► doesn't cover up the Apple logo.

00:53:32 ◼   ► That would drive me mad.

00:53:33 ◼   ► But also it's in a place

00:53:36 ◼   ► where I can hold it and still with my

00:53:37 ◼   ► thumb reach the whole screen.

00:53:38 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:53:39 ◼   ► Because like with your system, I don't

00:53:41 ◼   ► know if you could use it one handed.

00:53:43 ◼   ► Yeah, no, you can't.

00:53:44 ◼   ► I can totally use it one handed.

00:53:45 ◼   ► It's funny.

00:53:47 ◼   ► It's a little bit like the opposite of

00:53:49 ◼   ► having the phone rest on your pinky and you use your pinky to move the phone up and down.

00:53:54 ◼   ► Having the popsocket high, you can raise the popsocket with your middle and index finger

00:53:59 ◼   ► holding it.

00:54:00 ◼   ► So it's very one-handable.

00:54:02 ◼   ► Oh, I see what you mean.

00:54:04 ◼   ► Like you're pulling the phone up instead of dropping it down.

00:54:06 ◼   ► Yeah, okay.

00:54:07 ◼   ► That's interesting.

00:54:08 ◼   ► Huh, that's interesting.

00:54:10 ◼   ► And PSI Monkey asks, "Have you ever tried a popsocket on an iPad?"

00:54:15 ◼   ► No, Sigh Monkey.

00:54:16 ◼   ► I have not because that's dumb.

00:54:17 ◼   ► No, I haven't done it either.

00:54:18 ◼   ► That's ridiculous.

00:54:19 ◼   ► - None either.

00:54:20 ◼   ► Kindle though, that's a life hack.

00:54:22 ◼   ► - Kindle great, 12.9 inch iPad, no.

00:54:25 ◼   ► - No, you'd need like a bunch of 'em.

00:54:28 ◼   ► I just don't think one would be enough.

00:54:29 ◼   ► I feel like that'd be more of a problem.

00:54:31 ◼   ► - Yeah.

00:54:32 ◼   ► - Andrew asks, "When you transitioned from employee

00:54:36 ◼   ► to business owner, did you hire an accountant

00:54:38 ◼   ► and if so, at what point?"

00:54:40 ◼   ► Andrew, this shouldn't be a question.

00:54:42 ◼   ► This is a definite.

00:54:45 ◼   ► You gotta have 'em, you gotta have one,

00:54:47 ◼   ► in my opinion, like immediately,

00:54:50 ◼   ► as soon as I wanted to set up my company,

00:54:53 ◼   ► I hired a professional.

00:54:54 ◼   ► Because I don't know anything about taxes,

00:54:57 ◼   ► and it's really freaking confusing,

00:54:59 ◼   ► and it only gets more confusing as time goes on.

00:55:02 ◼   ► So hire an accountant as soon as you feasibly can,

00:55:07 ◼   ► would be my recommendation.

00:55:08 ◼   ► - Yeah, I didn't hire an accountant at first,

00:55:12 ◼   ► and that was just partly because my father

00:55:14 ◼   ► is a tax attorney, and so he was handling

00:55:16 ◼   ► a bunch of the finance stuff at the start.

00:55:18 ◼   ► But very quickly, like you said,

00:55:21 ◼   ► you get into complicated situations

00:55:23 ◼   ► and it's like, "Nah, no, we need to hire someone."

00:55:26 ◼   ► - Right, but even then, you weren't doing it on your own.

00:55:29 ◼   ► - Yeah, but that's what I mean.

00:55:30 ◼   ► I didn't hire someone because I had someone in the family

00:55:33 ◼   ► who was an expert in this area.

00:55:36 ◼   ► But even then, it's like,

00:55:37 ◼   ► well, my father doesn't know all the tax laws

00:55:41 ◼   ► for two countries.

00:55:42 ◼   ► So I eventually transitioned to an actual accountant

00:55:44 ◼   ► and then what is now a team of accountants and--

00:55:47 ◼   ► - Squad of accountants.

00:55:49 ◼   ► What is a group of accountants called?

00:55:51 ◼   ► - I don't know.

00:55:53 ◼   ► - A murder.

00:55:54 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:55:56 ◼   ► - I feel like, I don't know, I feel like it needs to be

00:55:58 ◼   ► some coin related thing, like a change of accountants.

00:56:01 ◼   ► - A change of accountants, I like that.

00:56:02 ◼   ► A bill of accountants.

00:56:04 ◼   ► - Yeah, something like that.

00:56:05 ◼   ► But I am in a very particular situation,

00:56:07 ◼   ► but without a doubt, I think it sounds like an exaggeration,

00:56:11 ◼   ► But the accountancy and tax stuff is by far and away

00:56:15 ◼   ► the biggest source of stress in running your own business.

00:56:20 ◼   ► And it's like, I can't even conceive

00:56:25 ◼   ► of trying to do it on my own.

00:56:28 ◼   ► Being in a dual citizen brings up a whole bunch

00:56:31 ◼   ► of particular problems that most people

00:56:32 ◼   ► don't have to deal with, but it's like,

00:56:34 ◼   ► if you're trying to run your own business,

00:56:35 ◼   ► you should not be dealing with the total spaghetti nightmare

00:56:39 ◼   ► of accounting and taxes.

00:56:41 ◼   ► Like you just don't even try.

00:56:44 ◼   ► Immediately hire an accountant.

00:56:47 ◼   ► - Yeah, and if you, again, if you can

00:56:49 ◼   ► or if you think it might be helpful,

00:56:50 ◼   ► speak to a attorney, a lawyer or something too,

00:56:53 ◼   ► just to make sure you've got all of that sort of stuff

00:56:55 ◼   ► squared away.

00:56:56 ◼   ► Depending on where you're starting of your business,

00:56:58 ◼   ► sometimes there's like additional legal paperwork

00:57:00 ◼   ► that you might need.

00:57:02 ◼   ► - Yeah.

00:57:02 ◼   ► - It's difficult.

00:57:04 ◼   ► I have this theory,

00:57:05 ◼   ► which I think I've shared on the show before.

00:57:08 ◼   ► Accountants and lawyers exist,

00:57:10 ◼   ► so accountants and lawyers can exist.

00:57:11 ◼   ► - Oh, 100%, yeah.

00:57:13 ◼   ► - And this isn't something that accountants

00:57:16 ◼   ► and lawyers are doing, but the systems that surround them,

00:57:19 ◼   ► I genuinely believe are created to be so complicated

00:57:22 ◼   ► that it supports the industries.

00:57:24 ◼   ► This stuff doesn't have to be the way that it is,

00:57:27 ◼   ► but it is that way, so yeah.

00:57:29 ◼   ► - Yeah, this is one of those things in life

00:57:33 ◼   ► where I've sort of changed because I remember

00:57:37 ◼   ► when I was younger listening to people complaining

00:57:40 ◼   ► about the complication of the tax code

00:57:42 ◼   ► and feeling like it was a sort of fake complaint

00:57:46 ◼   ► that people were using because they just didn't like taxes.

00:57:50 ◼   ► And now having had direct experience with it,

00:57:54 ◼   ► there are times when you can just see

00:57:58 ◼   ► the intentional complexity in rules.

00:58:02 ◼   ► And it's like, this system is not designed

00:58:06 ◼   ► for its stated purpose, which is how do we fund a country

00:58:10 ◼   ► in a reasonable way?

00:58:11 ◼   ► It's like, no, no, no, no, no.

00:58:13 ◼   ► This system is just a quagmire of competing interests.

00:58:18 ◼   ► And it's really unbelievable when you see it up close.

00:58:24 ◼   ► Like it's a very simple system if you're just an employee,

00:58:26 ◼   ► but the moment you're not an employee,

00:58:28 ◼   ► it's a freaking nightmare.

00:58:30 ◼   ► And I completely understand why now

00:58:33 ◼   ► people who own businesses,

00:58:35 ◼   ► you'll often hear complaining about the complexity of all of these systems, because

00:58:40 ◼   ► it is legitimately a problem at a whole bunch of levels, and it just doesn't feel like

00:58:45 ◼   ► it needs to be that way. But it's an expression of all of these competing interests.

00:58:50 ◼   ► But then it all comes down to the hilarious part where you're still signing it and saying

00:58:57 ◼   ► you understand it and that everything's correct, even though you definitely do not.

00:59:03 ◼   ► - Yeah, I know.

00:59:04 ◼   ► I always really resent that part.

00:59:07 ◼   ► - It annoys me every single time.

00:59:08 ◼   ► Like, why do I pay anyone if it doesn't matter ultimately?

00:59:13 ◼   ► - But yeah, so, pro tip, hire an accountant.

00:59:17 ◼   ► - Yeah, really do.

00:59:18 ◼   ► Like genuinely really, really do.

00:59:20 ◼   ► We don't spend a ton of time talking about

00:59:22 ◼   ► how you should set up your business,

00:59:25 ◼   ► 'cause I just don't know how much advice

00:59:28 ◼   ► we really have to give,

00:59:29 ◼   ► 'cause both of us have only really done it once or twice,

00:59:32 ◼   ► But yeah, and it's always it's always so particular.

00:59:36 ◼   ► Yeah, the reasons for setting up a company in a particular way just matter so much on the individual circumstances that talking about it feels

00:59:45 ◼   ► feels pointless. It's not generally applicable knowledge.

00:59:50 ◼   ► So like I wouldn't.

00:59:50 ◼   ► Yeah, especially as we're in the UK and the majority of our audience is in the US and the systems are completely different.

00:59:56 ◼   ► Like even just the nomenclature of what a company is, right?

00:59:59 ◼   ► Like what it's called is like a completely different thing.

01:00:01 ◼   ► Yeah, I had a lot of vocabulary to get my head around it.

01:00:04 ◼   ► Yeah.

01:00:04 ◼   ► Where I was like, what are these words?

01:00:07 ◼   ► Why do you say things like, oh, we're trading now.

01:00:09 ◼   ► Like, does that mean I have a company?

01:00:11 ◼   ► Like, I don't understand.

01:00:13 ◼   ► We're still trading goods.

01:00:14 ◼   ► But yeah, get an accountant.

01:00:15 ◼   ► Speak to an accountant, get an accountant.

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01:02:36 ◼   ► Brandon asks Why don't either of you post content as text?

01:02:40 ◼   ► Grey, given that your videos are scripted anyways, why do you prefer communicating via

01:02:45 ◼   ► video? Is someone starting out wanting to have a creative outlet? What medium should

01:02:49 ◼   ► Should I focus on text, video or audio?

01:02:51 ◼   ► Have you ever really written articles, Myke?

01:02:53 ◼   ► No, I've tried, man.

01:02:55 ◼   ► I tried.

01:02:56 ◼   ► Oh, have you?

01:02:57 ◼   ► Did you try to have a blog?

01:02:58 ◼   ► Oh, yeah.

01:02:59 ◼   ► Oh, God, yeah, did I?

01:03:00 ◼   ► Oof, so many.

01:03:01 ◼   ► So many.

01:03:02 ◼   ► Really?

01:03:03 ◼   ► Oh, my God.

01:03:04 ◼   ► So many failed blogs in my lifetime.

01:03:06 ◼   ► I tried being like Apple news reporter.

01:03:10 ◼   ► I tried reviewing apps.

01:03:13 ◼   ► I tried a million different personal blogs, you know, my own personal musings about things

01:03:18 ◼   ► It's just a disaster back there in the annals of web history.

01:03:25 ◼   ► Luckily, nothing ever got big enough that it would be stored anywhere and I took a lot

01:03:30 ◼   ► of time to delete the rest.

01:03:32 ◼   ► It's just like I'm not good enough at it.

01:03:36 ◼   ► You know what, I want to rephrase that.

01:03:37 ◼   ► If I ever come across something that I've written, by and large I'm really happy with

01:03:41 ◼   ► it.

01:03:42 ◼   ► Because I don't think that I'm a bad communicator.

01:03:44 ◼   ► I can communicate things.

01:03:46 ◼   ► I just really do not enjoy writing. It's just not a thing that I enjoy. I don't like grammar

01:03:55 ◼   ► because I'm not good at it. I don't like having to remember all the different rules and the style

01:04:04 ◼   ► guides, right, that people seem to really love. I'm not interested in any of that and I don't like

01:04:11 ◼   ► the process of immediate editing.

01:04:15 ◼   ► I get too stuck in that.

01:04:16 ◼   ► So like writing something, seeing what it said,

01:04:19 ◼   ► and then be like, "Oh, fix that, fix that,"

01:04:21 ◼   ► because it stops the flow.

01:04:22 ◼   ► The editing that I do now happens afterwards.

01:04:26 ◼   ► I've said all the stuff already.

01:04:27 ◼   ► I can't like actually change what I just said,

01:04:30 ◼   ► so I'll just change it later if I need to.

01:04:32 ◼   ► And I really like that method of communicating.

01:04:35 ◼   ► Like I just like talking extemporaneously

01:04:37 ◼   ► because it matches more with the way

01:04:40 ◼   ► that my brain works I think and that's why I've always preferred audio. I don't think

01:04:47 ◼   ► that there is a specific medium worth focusing on like out of text video or audio it's about what

01:04:54 ◼   ► you prefer. Try them all if you really are not sure and see which one fits for you but they're

01:05:01 ◼   ► very different. Yeah they're very different mediums. I'm sure, I don't know if I've mentioned it before

01:05:07 ◼   ► but one of my goals for doing podcasting was actually to get better at extemporaneous speaking

01:05:14 ◼   ► because like that never felt like a core skill of mine.

01:05:18 ◼   ► - I want to conversation.

01:05:19 ◼   ► - Yeah, yeah, and I do think I've gotten better over the years of doing podcasts,

01:05:26 ◼   ► but that was specifically something in mind that I had of like,

01:05:30 ◼   ► this is a way to try to exercise a skill talking to people.

01:05:35 ◼   ► And like any of these skills, it's something that you can develop over time. But yeah, like,

01:05:42 ◼   ► what medium should you focus on? Text, video, or audio? I feel like that's a strange question

01:05:47 ◼   ► because it feels like you should be thinking in terms of what is it that you want to make. And

01:05:54 ◼   ► I mean, like, I would say of those three, text is the total loser medium. But if you really love

01:06:04 ◼   ► love the written word, then you should still focus on text and maybe you will be successful

01:06:08 ◼   ► at it.

01:06:09 ◼   ► The total loser medium.

01:06:15 ◼   ► You can quote me on that.

01:06:18 ◼   ► I'm not going to ask you to clarify what the loser is in that sentence.

01:06:22 ◼   ► I don't want you to do it either.

01:06:25 ◼   ► Okay, well, let me then just say why I don't really write articles.

01:06:31 ◼   ► I mean, if you like go through my blog, you'll find there's a few, but they all have something

01:06:37 ◼   ► in common, which is like, I was kind of like annoyed about something and wrote it out or

01:06:42 ◼   ► they tended to be produced in relatively short periods of time.

01:06:46 ◼   ► But like you, I don't really like writing either.

01:06:49 ◼   ► And so for me to write an article for my blog is, it's like an insanely poor use of my time,

01:06:59 ◼   ► Because it's all of the frustration that comes with writing something with just no upside

01:07:06 ◼   ► whatsoever because the number of views, the number of people who are going to read it

01:07:10 ◼   ► on my website is dramatically smaller than if I'm uploading a video to YouTube.

01:07:15 ◼   ► And I don't earn any money from it.

01:07:17 ◼   ► I didn't want to have ads on my blog.

01:07:21 ◼   ► So like, spending time to write an article is just crazy.

01:07:26 ◼   ► It's like self-mutilation.

01:07:27 ◼   ► I'll go through all the agony of writing

01:07:29 ◼   ► and get nothing in return.

01:07:31 ◼   ► Plus, there is a thing which is,

01:07:34 ◼   ► talking about thinking about the thing

01:07:35 ◼   ► that you want to create,

01:07:37 ◼   ► I have definitely noticed over time

01:07:39 ◼   ► and developed my writing skill in a particular way,

01:07:43 ◼   ► where I started out thinking like,

01:07:46 ◼   ► oh, I want to try my hand at writing

01:07:48 ◼   ► and writing a whole bunch of stuff.

01:07:49 ◼   ► And then I realized very quickly like,

01:07:50 ◼   ► oh, I'm better at nonfiction than I am at fiction.

01:07:54 ◼   ► And then within that genre is like,

01:07:58 ◼   ► "Oh, I'm actually better at writing things

01:08:01 ◼   ► that are explanatory."

01:08:03 ◼   ► And then realizing,

01:08:04 ◼   ► "Oh, I'm good at writing things

01:08:06 ◼   ► that are meant to be spoken,

01:08:08 ◼   ► and then writing things that I am intending to speak."

01:08:12 ◼   ► And so over time, I've ended up just

01:08:15 ◼   ► developing a writing style that really doesn't make sense

01:08:20 ◼   ► in the actual written form.

01:08:22 ◼   ► - Yes, 100%.

01:08:24 ◼   ► I write like I speak now, and I get this a lot from friends and stuff that in text messages

01:08:30 ◼   ► and stuff they can really hear my voice because it's very similar. I don't know what the chicken

01:08:36 ◼   ► or the egg is in that scenario, but that's kind of where I am.

01:08:40 ◼   ► Yeah, it's interesting. I've gone so far down this road of developing a writing style that

01:08:45 ◼   ► is intended for me to speak that I've had to change something recently about reaching

01:08:50 ◼   ► out to experts, where I used to send experts a copy of the script to say like, Oh, hey,

01:08:56 ◼   ► can you take a look at this?

01:08:57 ◼   ► This is something that I'm working on.

01:09:00 ◼   ► And over the years, I've noticed that more and more of the feedback people were getting

01:09:04 ◼   ► distracted by all of the stuff that wasn't the reason why I'm contacting an expert about

01:09:10 ◼   ► when they're like, what the hell is this paragraph like this paragraph doesn't make any sense

01:09:14 ◼   ► as like, oh, right, of course, because I'm going to be speaking it.

01:09:17 ◼   ► It's not written to be understood on the page.

01:09:19 ◼   ► So I've actually just started to send out modified versions of the script where I strip

01:09:25 ◼   ► out everything except the paragraphs or the little sentences that I care for the expert

01:09:30 ◼   ► to look at.

01:09:31 ◼   ► That part's for me only, it's not for you, right?

01:09:35 ◼   ► That's tailored to the way I speak, not the way that anybody else would read.

01:09:39 ◼   ► Yeah.

01:09:40 ◼   ► And it's also why, if you go through my blog and look at some of the older videos,

01:09:43 ◼   ► I used to post the script as a transcript along with the videos, and I eventually stopped

01:09:47 ◼   ► doing that for the same reason.

01:09:48 ◼   ► Like this actually doesn't add anything.

01:09:51 ◼   ► It's not intended to be written this way.

01:09:52 ◼   ► So I think my ability even to write an article

01:09:57 ◼   ► that is intended to be read and understood

01:10:01 ◼   ► in the pure written form, like I think that has atrophied

01:10:05 ◼   ► as I've strengthened my skill of writing a thing

01:10:08 ◼   ► that I intend to speak.

01:10:10 ◼   ► So writing for me in text anyway, total loser move.

01:10:15 ◼   ► - Dean asks, "With time tracking,

01:10:17 ◼   ► How granular is too granular?

01:10:19 ◼   ► I started tracking my time this year

01:10:21 ◼   ► and I'm still trying to find the right level of depth

01:10:23 ◼   ► without having to switch timers every five minutes.

01:10:26 ◼   ► - Okay, five minutes, way too granular.

01:10:29 ◼   ► Way too granular. - Six minutes.

01:10:31 ◼   ► That's fine, five if you've really pushed it.

01:10:34 ◼   ► - Oh man, that's crazy.

01:10:35 ◼   ► What do you think is the minimum unit of time to track?

01:10:38 ◼   ► Like what do you think is the smallest unit

01:10:40 ◼   ► that you tend to track, Myke?

01:10:42 ◼   ► - 20 to 30 minutes.

01:10:43 ◼   ► - Yeah, okay, that is exactly my,

01:10:45 ◼   ► I think less than 20 minutes,

01:10:48 ◼   ► it becomes a bit of an exercise in futility.

01:10:52 ◼   ► - I think what might be a better thing to say is,

01:10:55 ◼   ► whenever I'm tracking time,

01:10:57 ◼   ► I'm expecting at least that amount of time.

01:10:59 ◼   ► Sometimes it's 10, but that's because I finished

01:11:03 ◼   ► what I wanted to do faster

01:11:04 ◼   ► than I thought it was gonna take me to do it.

01:11:07 ◼   ► - Yeah, that's a really good way to put it, yeah.

01:11:09 ◼   ► - 'Cause I only track intentional work time.

01:11:12 ◼   ► So if I sit down to do a thing,

01:11:15 ◼   ► start the timer and I could be there for two hours or I could be there for 11

01:11:20 ◼   ► minutes right but but when I'm sitting down to do it I'm expecting it's probably

01:11:24 ◼   ► take me about half an hour yeah which is why also time tracking so important

01:11:28 ◼   ► because otherwise I would think everything took me exactly 30 minutes to

01:11:31 ◼   ► complete when it really does not. You know I had a funny day yesterday I had

01:11:36 ◼   ► like a just a crazy day bit like busy wise and I want to just send you a

01:11:42 ◼   ► a screenshot because it just looks so funny and the toggle Mac app, the piece of junk that that is.

01:11:48 ◼   ► I just want to show you what my kind of like my projects just look like on a daily basis.

01:11:53 ◼   ► I just think it's funny. So this is on like a day of editing three shows and recording two shows.

01:12:00 ◼   ► And it just starts from the morning show prep, show prep, editing, recording, editing, sponsors,

01:12:06 ◼   ► recording editing. And it's just this like, well, I look at this list and I'm just like,

01:12:13 ◼   ► oh boy, that was a difficult day.

01:12:19 ◼   ► The thing that I like about, you know, you say you're aiming for 20 minutes. The thing

01:12:24 ◼   ► I like about time tracking is sort of the reverse about that, which is the like, okay,

01:12:31 ◼   ► I'm going to sit down, I'm going to edit this podcast. Let me start the podcast editing

01:12:35 ◼   ► And then somehow 30 minutes later, it's like,

01:12:37 ◼   ► "Wait a minute, why am I watching YouTube videos?

01:12:39 ◼   ► "Like, how did I, right, like, oh, I thought I was

01:12:44 ◼   ► "gonna sit down and do this thing, and then I just didn't."

01:12:47 ◼   ► And that ability to take the timer and go like,

01:12:52 ◼   ► "No, no, no, no, no, this wasn't podcast time at all."

01:12:55 ◼   ► And see the horror, like, what is the unit of time

01:12:58 ◼   ► that you actually spent not doing the thing

01:13:00 ◼   ► that you intended to is great.

01:13:02 ◼   ► - So here's an interesting philosophical question.

01:13:04 ◼   ► philosophical question for you then mm-hmm

01:13:07 ◼   ► Do you keep that time? Oh for sure? Yeah, okay good good. I specifically keep that time so like with my editing

01:13:15 ◼   ► Right I might be like of that say an hour two hours or whatever

01:13:19 ◼   ► There might be like half an hour where I was just like walking around the house like

01:13:24 ◼   ► Checking Instagram, but like that is in my mind. That's the work time

01:13:29 ◼   ► right because it's like I think about it like

01:13:33 ◼   ► this idea of solo work and typical team-based work,

01:13:38 ◼   ► like you work for yourself or you work as part of a company

01:13:41 ◼   ► in a team, you don't sit and just work constantly

01:13:45 ◼   ► for a period of time.

01:13:46 ◼   ► You do get distracted, you do go to the coffee machine,

01:13:49 ◼   ► you do go talk to somebody, right?

01:13:51 ◼   ► But you're still working, you are at work

01:13:54 ◼   ► and being paid for that time.

01:13:56 ◼   ► So I think that it is unfair to be like,

01:13:58 ◼   ► right, I'm gonna stand up now and go into the kitchen,

01:14:01 ◼   ► Stop the timer.

01:14:02 ◼   ► Like it just seems wild to me.

01:14:04 ◼   ► - This is also in my,

01:14:05 ◼   ► like when I'm in a good working groove,

01:14:07 ◼   ► is I'm intentionally taking breaks

01:14:09 ◼   ► that are around 20 minutes long anyway.

01:14:12 ◼   ► This is why I think like 20 minutes

01:14:13 ◼   ► is the sort of minimum viable time tracking thing.

01:14:16 ◼   ► - 20 minute break after how much work?

01:14:18 ◼   ► - I would say like an hour and 20 minutes of work,

01:14:21 ◼   ► hour and 40 minutes of work.

01:14:22 ◼   ► - Right.

01:14:23 ◼   ► - Somewhere in that ballpark.

01:14:24 ◼   ► - You're taking typically like 20 minutes of break

01:14:28 ◼   ► for every two hours of work.

01:14:29 ◼   ► - Yeah.

01:14:30 ◼   ► hour window of time, 20 minutes of that was a break.

01:14:33 ◼   ► Yeah, that's a good way to put it because it's like, I'm so aware that there is this

01:14:38 ◼   ► like mental clock in my head that I can just, I feel like no matter what I'm working on,

01:14:43 ◼   ► I start to feel getting antsy after the hour and 20 minute mark and it's like if I'm really into

01:14:50 ◼   ► something I can push it for a while but then I need to take a break and then come back.

01:14:55 ◼   ► So I do track that break time as a separate break.

01:15:00 ◼   ► I don't track that as part of the working time,

01:15:02 ◼   ► but it's just, it's useful to me

01:15:04 ◼   ► 'cause I wanna see the pattern

01:15:05 ◼   ► of what is my work date look like.

01:15:07 ◼   ► - Interesting.

01:15:08 ◼   ► Okay, yeah, see, I just leave it all in one,

01:15:10 ◼   ► but I'm way less granular than you, right?

01:15:12 ◼   ► - Yeah, I think that's, like, again,

01:15:14 ◼   ► if you consider that part of the work,

01:15:15 ◼   ► I think that's totally fine.

01:15:17 ◼   ► To talk about, like, the question behind this question

01:15:20 ◼   ► is that the time tracking should serve you,

01:15:25 ◼   ► you are not a slave to the time tracking.

01:15:28 ◼   ► And if you're constantly flipping switches

01:15:32 ◼   ► to track your time,

01:15:33 ◼   ► that doesn't sound like it's actually helpful to you.

01:15:36 ◼   ► But it's the same way, like this thing that I find is,

01:15:41 ◼   ► you know, one of the great frustrations of my work

01:15:43 ◼   ► is I always think of this as,

01:15:44 ◼   ► particularly when it comes to the writing,

01:15:46 ◼   ► of bouncing off the work.

01:15:48 ◼   ► I was like, I sat down to do the thing

01:15:50 ◼   ► and I sort of bounced right off it.

01:15:52 ◼   ► And I do like to keep a record of that,

01:15:55 ◼   ► just to have that in the system.

01:15:57 ◼   ► And it's very useful 'cause like,

01:15:59 ◼   ► oh, I started a timer saying I was going to do this thing,

01:16:02 ◼   ► and then somehow I just didn't.

01:16:04 ◼   ► And now I'm gonna flip all of this time from,

01:16:06 ◼   ► oh, I was writing into, this was unintentional time.

01:16:09 ◼   ► And this is like the worst kind of time

01:16:11 ◼   ► that I can possibly have.

01:16:13 ◼   ► But I would say as a general rule,

01:16:17 ◼   ► bigger, broader things are much better to track

01:16:21 ◼   ► than small granular pieces. Like, when in doubt, combine categories into bigger, broader categories.

01:16:29 ◼   ► You almost certainly start out by thinking you need to track things much more granularly than

01:16:33 ◼   ► you do, and you really probably only just need to see the bigger, broader trends.