AJ Jacobs

AJ: Hey. My name is AJ Jacobs and I’m an editor at large at Esquire magazine and author of four
New York Times Best Sellers, including The Year of Living Biblically and The Know-It-All.

Ramit: Thanks for being here.

AJ: Oh. Thanks for having me.

Ramit: Well, you may be the one person I know who tests things in their lives more than I do. So I
can’t wait to talk about all these things today. Let’s first start at how we got acquainted, how
we met. Do you remember?

AJ: Yeah. We met at a conference. 99U I believe it was. I was struck by what a sharp-dressed
man you were and I immediately enjoy and I loved watching your presentation. What do you
remember?

Ramit: I remember. Well, I already knew about you, and I know we have some friends in common, so
when I saw your name, I was like, “I can’t wait.” Can’t wait to see the talk, can’t wait to meet.
And your speech was better than I would have imagined. I mean, it was better than even the
speeches I’d seen on Youtube and things like that. It was awesome and the crowd loved it. And
then we became friends, going out, you showed me your Google Glass.

AJ: Exactly.

Ramit: Which I struggled with using. Every time we hang out, I have a great time.

AJ: Me too.

Ramit: So thank you for being here and I’m very excited to talk about your background and your
attitude towards experimentation. So let’s just get started at the beginning. You’re the author
of four best-selling books, and I wanted start there because many people think that in order to
write a book or to create a product, you have to be an expert at something. And I started my
blog when I wasn’t an credentialed expert, and I wonder how did you go about writing a book
when in some of these cases you weren’t an expert?

AJ: Yeah, I was not an expert at all. And I think that’s part of the appeal, is you can either go in as
an expert, as, you know, the voice of God. Or you can go in as an every-guy, and that’s what
I did. I think what I say to the readers is, “You’re going to come along on this journey with me.
We’re going to learn it together, and we’ll see what works and we’ll see what doesn’t.” And I
think that’s appealing.

Ramit: Very appealing. It’s the difference between decreeing from on high what you need to do,
which in a way is kind of “I Will Teach You To Be Rich.” I mean, I have to admit it. But on the
other hand, it’s very relatable to say, “I don’t know what I’m doing at all. Let’s do this together.”
And that relates.

1 [Link] - RAMIT’S BRAIN TRUST: A J JACOBS TRANSCRIPT - CONFIDENTIAL

AJ: And we become an expert. I mean, eventually you become an expert. That’s how you do it, is
go through it. You can’t do it just by reading.

Ramit: Exactly. One of my friends had this idea of starting a website called The Clueless Chef. And
they start it and they don’t know what they’re doing, and as they go through it together, they
get better together.

AJ: I love it.

Ramit: It’s a very endearing, relatable concept. Right?

AJ: I have an idea, how about The Clueless Surgeon. So it would be like brain surgery. You don’t
know what you’re doing, you’re going to learn along.

Ramit: Perfect. We can get some volunteers from this group watching right now.

AJ: So it doesn’t always work. But I think in many cases, it’s an excellent approach.

Ramit: So you wrote these books and you are also the editor-at-large of Esquire Magazine. Now, there
are thousand people who would kill to have your job. Why did you stand out? How did you get
this job?

AJ: Well, first of all, I do want to say that luck plays a big part in it and we sometimes forget that.
And people who, maybe, aren’t successful, you can’t always blame them. It’s not because they
didn’t work hard, it’s just they didn’t get a big break, you know.

Ramit: Yeah.

AJ: Brad Pitt could be a waiter in Hollywood if things didn’t break one way. That said, I think
I worked really hard, I did everything. When I first graduated college, I had a degree in
Philosophy, which there were not a lot of Fortune 500 companies hiring philosophers. So I just
decided the only thing I could do was write a sentence or two, so I started to be a freelance
writer, and I wrote for anyone. I wrote for newspapers with fourteen readers, or I wrote for a
magazine called Dental Economics, about the economics of dentistry.

Ramit: Oh yeah. I subscribe to that.

AJ: Yeah.

Ramit: It’s great bedtime reading.

AJ: So you’ve seen my work?

Ramit: Oh yeah.

AJ: Yeah. So basically just hustling. Doing everything. Getting out there and not saying no to
anything.

Ramit: Now, did you have the same writing style that you have now when you first started?

AJ: Well I think, of course, you get better. The only way to get better writing is just write, write,
write. I do think that I’ve always had a conversational style of writing because some people
are great at writing these paragraphs with literary, beautiful, flowery words. That’s not my
strength. So I basically try to write the way I would talk. And often, I’ll just read my articles or
books out loud to myself, and it’s like, does this sound like a person? Does it sound like me?
And if not, then I’ll rewrite it.

Ramit: I think one of the key takeaways that I’ve learned from you, and I think we’re going to discover
this more and more today, is you took some time for deep introspection, and you’re like, this is
who I am. Like, I’m a conversational writer, or I’m not an expert and I don’t want to be the voice
of God, and I’m just going to accept that. And I’m going to maximize and optimize for who I
am.

2 [Link] - RAMIT’S BRAIN TRUST: A J JACOBS TRANSCRIPT - CONFIDENTIAL

AJ: True.

Ramit: I can’t try to be. I’m not a literary, highbrow writer. I’m not going to try to do it. But I know
what kind of writing I do love, what kind I’m good at, and I can try to be the best at that, too.

AJ: Exactly.

Ramit: Okay. So how did you develop your style? Like, just telling people to write more is one thing,
but how do you get better at your craft?

AJ: Well, one thing is, you know, I get writers’ block all the time, and what I do is, I just start typing
with my fingers. It doesn’t matter what I’m typing. I could be typing about, you know, the color
of the cup I’m drinking from, the pigeons on the windowsill outside.

Just the idea of moving your fingers, and then you get into the rhythm. And after a while, you
actually start to make sentences that are semi-coherent. And I believe that about everything.
We’ve talked about this before, but just the idea of doing it until you become comfortable.
There’s a great quote from the guy who founded Habitat for Humanity which is “It’s easier to
act your way into a new way of thinking than to think your way into a new way of acting.” So I
love it. “Fake it until you make it” is an easier way to say it.

Ramit: Absolutely. We all totally believe that. And sometimes it’s just doing the most basic of actions.
Like you said, you just start typing. One of our other RBT interviewees BJ Fogg, he was talking
about flossing, and he said don’t try to floss all your teeth. Just go there and say “I’m going to
floss one tooth.”

AJ: That’s good. Yeah.

Ramit: That’s it. And of course, when you floss one, you’re going to be like, of course I’m going to floss
the rest of my mouth. I’m already doing this. But whatever it takes to do that first action, and
then the thought will follow. Do you have any other examples of that?

AJ: Well, one other thing I was just thinking about when you were talking about that is when I have
an e-mail that I’m sort of intimidated to write, what I do is I just think about what is going to
be the first line, in my brain, like while I’m walking to the grocery. And once you get that first
line, even if it’s hey, how are you doing, it’s AJ, or something. Once you get that first line, then
everything flows a little more easily. We often get stuck on that very first step.

Ramit: Do you still get intimidated writing certain emails?

AJ: Oh sure I get intimidated all the time. I mean, I get rejected all the time. I mean, that’s just part
of it. We were discussing this earlier. You’ve just got to embrace rejection, you know.

Ramit: Let’s talk about it. What kind of rejection, because from the outside, you’re the editor-at-large,
bestselling author, who speaks on all these stages. But you just said, you get rejected all the
time. What kind of rejections? And who would dare to reject AJ Jacobs?

AJ: Thank you. Thank you, sir. I get rejected by editors all the time. You know, when you
pitch articles. I think nowadays, in everything, not just in writing, you have to be more
entrepreneurial. There’s not a lot of chances where editors come and say, would you write
this article? You have to be out there generating ideas, saying, “What about this? What about
that?” And you have to be aware. You know, in the beginning, my rejection rate was 99%. Now
maybe it’s 50%.

Ramit: 50?

AJ: Maybe. I don’t know. Could be higher. Could be higher.

Ramit: Wow.

3 [Link] - RAMIT’S BRAIN TRUST: A J JACOBS TRANSCRIPT - CONFIDENTIAL

AJ: I come up with book ideas that don’t work, they fail all the time. I’ll tell you, this was the most
humiliating rejection I ever got, was my very first book. I sent it out to agents, and one of the
agents got a publisher interested. The publisher said, you know, we like it, but can we see a
photo?

We just want to make sure you don’t have two heads, so that you can go on talk shows, like
this one, and I said great. So I went to Walmart, I was twenty-three years old, I took a photo,
and I sent it in, and two days later, the agent called and he’s like, well, they’ve decided to pass.
And I’m like, what? I’m not good looking enough to be an author? Like, I thought authors…

Ramit: That’s right. It’s like, a face made for radio.

AJ: Exactly. I thought this was the perfect job for an unattractive person. So, you know, I just had
to keep plowing through, and just realize that’s just the business. You know? You’re going to
get rejected.

Ramit: I mean, after a certain point. Like, the first time I failed or got rejected, it was the most
crippling thing. I thought my life was over. And, frankly, it didn’t get easier the second, third,
fifth time. But I think what I can see in you is once you make rejection a part of your lifestyle,
you can actually have a sense of humor about it. Like, yeah, they rejected me because they
wouldn’t put my face on the back cover. It’s crazy. And you just have a sense of humor about it.

I’ll tell you a rejection that happened to me recently. So I got an introduction to the person
who chooses the TED talk speaker, and I was like, yes. This is huge. Like, I’d rather do this than
any other TV, blah, blah, blah.

So I was reading, and she really sold me because she’s a good friend of mine and she went in
there and said, “He’s the next big thing.” So I was like, “Oh yeah. It’s my time now.” And I go
in there and, I have to admit, I didn’t do the usual level of preparation. Usually when I go in
for a really important meeting, I like to plan. So I plan out every possible scenario. And I did,
honestly, about ten minutes of planning. That’s not enough.

And I walk in, we shake hands and we have instant report. We’re friendly. So then she goes,
“Alright, what do you have for me?” So I give her my idea, and as I’m saying it, I can see her
face. It’s just I know it’s not going well.

So I have another pitch. I pitch something, and I can just tell. And she asks me a couple
questions that make it very clear she thinks my idea is stupid. And at the end, she doesn’t
even say come back to me with more questions. She says, “Well, thank you for coming in,” and
shakes. And I was like, “Oh shit.” So I walk out and I feel horrible, that feeling right here.

I email my friend, you know, it didn’t go well. Thank you, though. I really appreciate it. And,
whenever this happens to me, I always take a couple days just to sulk. I just accept it. I’m going
to feel horrible. But after that, I said to myself, “First of all, Ramit, you’re an idiot because you
didn’t prepare, so you can’t blame anyone but yourself.”

And then, “Ok, so you’re still alive. You’re still… you know, everything is ok. You didn’t get this
big thing. Wait two years, go back again and do it. And maybe things will change.” I think in
the past, I would have been crippled. I would have been, like, “Oh, my life is over. I can’t go on.”
And it still feels horrible but I think you get a sense of perspective, and even a sense of humor
when you look back after failure after failure.

AJ: Exactly. And you can use that. I mean, right now, you’re using it in your business to teach
other people. So when I was writing, one of my books was about where I tried to be as smart
as possible and I read the encyclopedia from A to Z. And during the middle of it I would
interview all these people. I called this professor from Yale who was the ultimate, the authority
on intellect and smartness. And he said, “This is a really stupid idea what you’re doing.” And
I was, you know, momentarily crushed. But then I wrote about it and it was a wonderfully
entertaining part of the book. So yeah. Use your failures.

4 [Link] - RAMIT’S BRAIN TRUST: A J JACOBS TRANSCRIPT - CONFIDENTIAL

Ramit: Absolutely. People relate to them, especially if you have a certain insight about failure. One
nuance I’ve learned is if you just write about how you got brutally rejected over and over. I
mean, it’s kind of entertaining in a “watching a horrible reality show” way. But if you can say, I
failed and here’s what I learned, or I failed and this is how I felt and this is what I’m going to
do next time, that actually becomes a great lesson. And so much of great literature is about
failures and then what they did afterwards.

AJ: Totally. And I also think, what I try to do is say, “Here’s what didn’t work, be very honest about
that. But here’s what did work.” Because if you do enough things, some are going to work. I
saw a talk by some creativity expert who said, “Picasso painted a lot of crappy paintings… And
Mozart wrote some horrible, horrible sonatas.” It’s a quantity thing. You’ve got to generate a
lot of ideas, because some are going to be gems, and some are going to suck.

Ramit: So I want to talk about a couple of things. I want to talk about experimentation in a minute
because we have so much to talk about, but you have interviewed a lot of these amazing,
interesting people. You mentioned the Yale professor, and I know you’ve interviewed a ton of
people. What are some of the patterns you learned about people who are at the top of their
field? Like, one is, you just said, they paint a lot of crap before they make it to the top. What
else?

AJ: Well, another one is just the idea of, I like to call it, delusional optimism, and I am a fan of it.
Because you have to be a little bit delusional in any business when you get in there, because
you’ve got to convince yourself, this is a really good idea. Because if you don’t, then no one’s
going to pay attention to you.

And I interviewed George Clooney once for Esquire, and he said his philosophy in life is the
same he had when he was playing baseball, I think in college, maybe high school, where he
wouldn’t think about whether he was going to hit a home run, he was thinking about is the
home run going to be to left field or to right field. And I love that. I love having this delusional
optimism. You know, sometimes you’re going to fail, but you have to have that idea. And if you
don’t have it, this is the one key I have learned from all of my experiments, is that you pretend
to have it.

Again the idea of sort of faking it until you make it. Like when I was writing a book about
health, I was totally overwhelmed. First of all, I’m not very healthy. You know, you can see my
abs, I’m not an exercise guy. I’m not like Tim Ferriss, our friend.

And so I was like, “Oh what have I gotten myself into? This topic is too big. No one’s going to
listen to me. No one cares.” But I would convince myself, you know what? I would say, “What
would a confident person do?”

What would an optimistic person do? And I would do that. So I would call and set up
interviews with doctors. I would call my publisher and say, “Alright, here’s for the launch party,
what if we had kale martinis?” You know, just acting as if this is going to be a huge hit.

And after a couple of hours, I convinced myself. You know, you were able to get into that
mindset. The momentum, you trick your mind, and you become more optimistic and confident.

Ramit: Why do you think more people don’t do this? Because it sounds like a very simple, powerful
way to go about life. Act as if… you might not always get there, but some of the time you will.
Why do you think people don’t?

AJ: Well, partly because you got to feel a little silly. You got to be a little vulnerable. I mean, you’re
acting. I do this, I think we’ve talked about this before. There’s a great TED talk by Amy Cuddy
who talks all about the importance of posture, and being in a standing in a power position, and
this will actually raise your testosterone, lower your cortisol if you stand as if you’re a confident
person.

5 [Link] - RAMIT’S BRAIN TRUST: A J JACOBS TRANSCRIPT - CONFIDENTIAL

 And I do that, and you feel ridiculous. You feel like an idiot when you’re first doing it, because
I my usual posture, I think I told you, it’s sort of the humanoid number two on those evolution
charts. So I’m not used to that, but I do it, and you feel better after a while.

Ramit: Yeah. That’s true.

AJ: You feel like an idiot for the first fifteen minutes, and then you feel better.

Ramit: They did a great study in psychology, where they had people, in one condition, they held
a pencil in their mouth, and they would go like this, and they would, like, read a joke or
something. And then the other condition, they were just like this, and then the third condition,
they were frowning. And the people who had a pencil, which, AKA a smile, found the joke
funnier.

So behavior first, then attitude. And we know this from so much research. So OK. I also know
that acting as if can feel foolish, and it can feel as if you’re an imposter. Like, why am I acting
so big? I’m not ready to do that yet. And the truth is, yeah, you’re probably not ready, but the
only way you get ready is to take the baby steps you need in order to get there, whether it’s
dressing better, doing the health stuff, I mean, the little things… flossing one tooth. All those
things take you one step closer to what you want to do.

AJ: It’s true. And you do feel a little foolish, but really that is the key. And I talk in my books a little
bit about, you know, there are vicious cycles, and then there are virtuous cycles. And the key is
to just get that first step. So like with exercise, you know, if you don’t exercise, you’re like, you
get more depressed, and then you get more depressed, you don’t want to exercise, but if you
take that first step and force yourself to exercise for just like five minutes a day.

Ramit: Five minutes.

AJ: Then that’s going to make you in a better mood. You’re going to be more optimistic, and
you’re going to want to exercise more. So it’s sort of a virtuous cycle.

Ramit: Love that.

AJ: Positive feedback.

Ramit: One thing I also noticed in speaking to really successful people is at a certain point, they don’t
feel the need to prove themselves, so they can actually be really honest about what they’re
good at and what they’re not good at. So when I go into a room with, you know, some really
young gung-ho people who feel they have to prove, they’re always trying to answer the
question the smartest way.

And I know because I was that guy. And then you go into a room with experienced
entrepreneurs or actors or whatever it may be, and a lot of them will say, “I don’t know. What
do you think about that, Mike?” And you look at them because they’re actually more successful
than the younger people, but they’re the ones saying I don’t know, or I’ve never experienced
that… Or can you tell me what you think? Have you had that experience?

AJ: I love that idea. Absolutely. I think the more honest you are about your… you know, you don’t
want to say, like, Homer Simpson, they had that episode where he was in a job interview, and
they said, you know, what do you think your weaknesses are? Oh, I’m lazy, I’m an idiot, I’m
irresponsible. You don’t want to say that.

But you do, if you are open about your flaws, and I think that allows people to become closer
to you, and to trust you. And so, you know, in all my books, I’m very open about it. When I
wrote a book about the Bible, I was like, I don’t know anything about religion. You know, I
said I’m Jewish, but I’m Jewish in the same way the Olive Garden is Italian. So no offense to
the Olive Garden. And I actually did an experiment once on being totally vulnerable, totally,
radically honest. It’s a movement called radical honesty.

6 [Link] - RAMIT’S BRAIN TRUST: A J JACOBS TRANSCRIPT - CONFIDENTIAL

Ramit: So let’s talk about this. What was that? And what is radical honesty?

AJ: Well, it’s a movement started by this guy in Virginia. He’s a psychologist, licensed, actually.
And he believes that we should never lie, but then he goes further. He says, whatever’s on your
brain should come out of your mouth, no filter.

Ramit: So for example, what might someone say who’s in radical honesty?

AJ: Well this, you know, it’s crazy way to live. Because it’s like, you know, you’re supposed to say
things like, yes you look fat in that dress. You know, I don’t like you. You’re my boss, but I think
you’re an idiot. You know, so it’s a crazy, dangerous way to live.

I did one where we were at a restaurant and we ran into some friends of my wife from college,
and they said, oh, we should all get together and hang out. And I had to say what was on my
mind, which was, you seem like nice people, but I kind of don’t want to see you again because
I don’t see my friends enough. You know, my friends from college I never get to see, so I don’t
have time. And that was horrible I felt like crap, she was furious. On the upside, we didn’t ever
see them again. It was effective.

Ramit: Does that count as a win, then?

AJ: No, I don’t think so, because I don’t believe in radical honesty as the way he practices it but I
do believe in a certain type of radical honesty. Which I call radical positive honesty, because,
being open and vulnerable and saying, you know, I don’t know, that’s helpful. Also being, you
know, a lot of times, men, we don’t like to express our emotions, but when I was doing this
experiment, I would be thinking, well you know, that first boss of mine was such a great mentor.
I really should tell him.

So I call him up out of the blue and tell him, you know, he’s a newspaper editor at a tiny
newspaper, I said, you were such a big influence on me. Thank you. And I think he felt weird, I
felt weird but it was also, at least for me, and I think for him very helpful, because, you know,
you’re telling him, you’re giving appreciation. And that, I think, is key, and I mean, it’s key in
business. If you give people appreciation, they’re going to remember you, and they’re going to
come back and be your client.

Ramit: So this movement, I love it because it’s a great metaphor for what a lot of Brain Trust students
want to do. The idea is to try something different. Maybe it’s radical honesty, maybe it’s radical
positive honesty, but when you try some of these new things, the world around you doesn’t
really know how to react. I want to talk about the social consequences of what happened
when you did this. What did your wife say? What did your friends say? How did you feel as you
were trying on this whole new set of clothing for yourself?

AJ: Well sometimes, it was completely liberating. Like, my mother-in-law gave me a gift certificate
for my birthday to, like, a store, you know, Barney’s, I don’t remember what it was, and was,
like, how do you like it? And I was like, you know, gift certificate, it’s like you’re giving me an
errand to run. I don’t like gift certificates.

Ramit: Wait. What? What do you like? I love them because I’m like, “You’re not going to buy me
something I like. Just give me a gift certificate.”

AJ: Well, if it’s online, that’s fine. But this is like…

Ramit: You have to take it to the store.

AJ: This was way back when. So yeah. That I didn’t like. I will tell you, I got a lot of feedback from
that article, people who had adopted some sort of radical honesty. So I hope didn’t, like, open
Pandora’s box.

Ramit: You probably caused, like, two thousand divorces. How do you feel? Do you sleep well at
night?

7 [Link] - RAMIT’S BRAIN TRUST: A J JACOBS TRANSCRIPT - CONFIDENTIAL

AJ: Well hopefully I caused more good than harm. I really wish, but I will tell you, a lot of single
guys, like, especially bankers. They came up to me and told me that they use radical honesty.

Ramit: Oh I bet they did.

AJ: Yeah. They would go up to a woman and say, listen, I’m doing something called radical
honesty. I find you very attractive, and I’d like to go home with you at the end of the night. And
95% of the time, they’d get drinks thrown at their face. But 5%, the woman was like, oh, that’s
interesting. Thanks for being so honest.

Ramit: You’ve got to have the best inbox in the world. Like, the stories you must get are unbelievable.
So OK. So you take this and the social consequences. Sounds like they could be dire, but,
again, going back to the AJ Jacobs model of failure, yeah, you’re going to fail, but it’s not
going to be the end of the world. You’re going to get a drink thrown in your face, or your wife
might be mad at you. I assume you told your wife before what you were doing?

AJ: I did. I did. And she likes some of it, you know, and the radical positive honesty. Yeah. I say be
willing to do anything, as long as it doesn’t hurt other people. Like, that’s why I didn’t, that’s
why I’ll never do that, you know, I never want to be friends with you thing again.

But if you try anything, as long as it’s you that’s being humiliated, I think there’s nothing wrong
with that. And that’s really the only way to do it, is to just put yourself out there and I did have
one story that I was reminded of. Just this idea of being vulnerable, putting yourself out there,
having chutzpa. When I was writing a book about the Bible, I was writing a book where I had
to live by all the rules of the Bible. So not just the ten commandments, but the Bible says you
can’t shave the corners of your beard. I didn’t know where the corners were, so I just let the
whole thing grow.

I looked like a crazy person. And during this year, a freshman at my college, Brown, sent me
an email, very funny, very well-written, saying he wanted to be a writer, could he come be my…
work for me for free? He’d work in a Starbucks and he would do [anything] and I was like, at
first, I was like this is a terrible idea. You know, writing is on the way down. Go do something
else. But I said, “Listen. If you really want to do it, the Bible does say, in the Old Testament, that
it’s OK to have slaves.”

And I had been struggling with how to do this, because, you know, morally, slavery not so
great. So I decided. Ok. Listen, if you come be my intern, and you will let me call you my
biblical slave, then lets do it. So he did, he was great, he came up with ideas, he was proactive,
he baked me bread, Ezekiel bread, Biblical bread. And as a thank you, I took him on a trip
to Jerry Falwell’s church, because that was part of my book, is to explore, sort of, how other
people interpret the Bible. And he was fascinated. And when he was down there, on the way
back, he said to me, “What if I spent a semester… I transferred from Brown, this ultra-liberal
college, to Liberty University, the most conservative in America, and then wrote a book about
that, like, my semester in, you know, evangelical Christianity?”

I was like, “That’s a really interesting idea,” and I helped him. I hooked him up with my agent,
helped him write the proposal, and he did it. And he wrote a great book. It came out, it got
great reviews, a lot because it was not judgmental. It wasn’t, like, black and white. It was all
about here are the good parts of this lifestyle, here are the bad parts. He had an open mind.

But I just love that idea, that he had the chutzpah to just e-mail me directly. If he had gone
through Brown alumni relations, it would never have happened. He just went, he focused,
he said, “Ok. Here’s the guy I want to target.” Although I was probably one of fifty guys he
targeted, but he said he read my books, he was very specific, here’s what I like, so he appealed
to my, you know, my insecure writer self.

And he said, can I do this? And I just thought that was so bold. And that’s, I think, the best way
to get a job, to get ahead, is to do that.

8 [Link] - RAMIT’S BRAIN TRUST: A J JACOBS TRANSCRIPT - CONFIDENTIAL

Ramit: And you still do that. I mean, you’re pitching editors, you’re pitching all kinds of stuff, and you
mentioned that you’re failure rate might be 50%, which shocked me, because from the outside,
the idea is once you make it, it’s just coasting along. And I think what you’re sharing with us is
that it never stops.

AJ: Oh yeah.

Ramit: You always continue having to grow, to pitch, to sell yourself and your ideas. Maybe you get a
little bit more comfortable with failure, but it never stops.

AJ: No. I mean, 50%, that’s probably far too kind. I would figure now it’s, like, probably 25%. And
yeah. You just have to be ok with that. And I have lots of book ideas that will never happen,
that just, you know, sort of die and undignified death.

Ramit: Well, I think also, another thing that makes it acceptable is you don’t have a scarcity mentality.
Like, this is my one big idea. I need to have it happen. I know that you put aside time to think of
ideas. To you, ideas are, like, ideas are a dime a dozen. You probably come up with an idea on
the way here, ten on the way home, and so, if one doesn’t work out, you have a huge vault of a
million other ideas. I wonder if we can talk about that.

AJ: Well that is… I do love that. Because some ideas, you know, you get while you’re in the
shower, but I actually like to, it sounds paradoxical, but structured creativity. So I will make an
appointment. I’ll say from 3:00 to 3:30, I’m going to sit down, turn off all distractions, and just
come up with ideas. And, you know, 95% of them are going to suck. As we discussed, but there
are a few.

And so I really do think that, you know, I surround myself with, like, maybe magazines, books,
and then just riff. And even if none of them turn out, I still think it’s a good use of time. And
I talked to my friend James Altucher about this. You know, he says that if you’re doing this,
your brain is like a muscle, and if you are constantly keeping that creativity muscle going, then
you’re going to, in life, just be better, you know. You’re going to figure out how to fix a flat tire
if you don’t have a tire iron. So I do believe I try to carve that, I don’t always succeed but I do
try to carve out fifteen-twenty minutes a day to just brainstorming.

Ramit: Interesting. Ok. So I want to talk about experimentation, because this is, like, one of the core
tenants that you have, and I have it too. I love experimenting with everything from how do I get
myself to go to the gym more, how do I become better socially, I mean, everything. Business,
everything. So you’ve taken experimentation to a whole new level. Everything… like, you’ve
written books about experimentation with health and all kinds of other things, can you just
give us a basic primer for those who don’t know, how do you think about the experiments you
run?

AJ: Well, I take in, something I’m interested in and then I say, let’s try it and see what works. And I
try to push it to the limit. So when I wanted to get healthy, I said, alright, let’s write down every
piece of health advice ever, and I had a list, like, seventy-two pages long… And some of them
were, you know, seemed ridiculous, some didn’t, and then I just did them all. So I did the, you
know, paleo, I did, you know, raw food, and see what worked for me. And it may not work for
everything.

What worked for me may not work for everybody, but you’ve got to try it. So take it to the
limit, and then at the end, draw back, and you’ll have what works for you.

Ramit: So let’s get specific with the health example. You tried all these different things, what were
your takeaways from specifically for the health book?

AJ: Well, one big takeaway was just the importance of movement, which I, you know, we’re sitting
here. I feel a little weird.

Ramit: Our specialty is sitting. And not moving at all.

9 [Link] - RAMIT’S BRAIN TRUST: A J JACOBS TRANSCRIPT - CONFIDENTIAL

AJ: But you’ve read the stories, you know, the newspaper stories that say, you know, if you don’t
get up by the end of this story, you’ll be dead.

Ramit: Yeah.

AJ: You know, which is an exaggeration, but its… there’s part truth to it. You really do have to
keep moving. And what struck me, what really surprised me was how much this affected my
brain. Because… and there are lots of studies. There’s a great book by John Ratey, a Harvard
professor called Spark about how important physical movement is to your thought process,
and that if you move around, you’re more creative, and it keeps your attention, it keeps your
serotonin level higher. So I actually, you know, I was an early adopter on this whole treadmill
desk movement, so I put my computer on top of a treadmill, and I wrote the book while
walking.

Ramit: Interesting.

AJ: And I love it. I’m also, you should know, you know, I’m totally uncoordinated. Not an athlete, so
if I can do it, I really believe anyone can.

Ramit: Ok. Interesting. And then, what other major experiments have you run, let’s say, in the last one
to two years?

AJ: Well, let’s see. I did one where I recorded everything in my life for three months. And I had
a little camera. It was sort of pre-Google Glass… The idea was that every moment would
be recorded. And I do think it’s a little taste of the future. Because I do think the more and
more… it’s like Facebook and Twitter taken to the extreme. We are going to have a completely
recorded life. And there are some great parts about that and some totally scary parts.

Ramit: Did you notice yourself acting differently when you did that?

AJ: A little bit. I started to… this you probably want to edit out, but like, would, you know,
sometimes I’m so lazy that I’ll go and I’ll just… I don’t want to lift up the toilet lid, so I’ll pee in
the sink. And so but when I was wearing my little camera, I was like, oh, I can’t have this on
tape, so.

Ramit: Amazing.

AJ: And I will tell you, there are some interesting studies that show that the more your watched
the better you act. And that even… I don’t know if you saw this study, that they put up pictures
of eyes. You know that one?

Ramit: Yeah.

AJ: And, you know, they had an honor system. You get a donut, you’re supposed to leave 50 cents.
If there were pictures of eyes there, then more people left their 50 cents. Because they felt like
they were being watched.

Ramit: Those are amazing studies. There’s one with children and they leave a big bag of candy
outside for Halloween, and in some conditions, it just says, please take one, on your honor, and
then, in the other condition, it says, please take one on your honor, but there’s a huge mirror so
you can see yourself. And, of course, the one with the mirror, they’re more honest…

AJ: Interesting.

Ramit: Because it’s… These ideas of being watched can really affect our own behavior.

AJ: And I actually have used those. Sometimes I’m… there’s studies that show if you eat in front of
the mirror, then you’re going to eat less. And so I did. I went on the mirror diet. For a while, and
it actually, it worked, you know? And, you know, it was good company.

10 [Link] - RAMIT’S BRAIN TRUST: A J JACOBS TRANSCRIPT - CONFIDENTIAL

Ramit: Yeah. You practice jokes.

AJ: And also I actually cut out eyes from magazines and put them on the walls so that I would stop
myself from looking at, like, TMZ and these horrible websites. And that worked a little.

Ramit: So the thing that I keep hearing over and over is just this idea of being playful with these ideas.
Like, life isn’t that serious, and whether it is in your social life, your personal life, even your
spiritual life or business, you can have fun with this stuff, and you can different things. And
when I first started, like, learning about business and psychology and stuff, it was all tactics.

AJ, what tactics should I use? Which tools should I use to split-test this? And tools are
important and whatever. But I think as you become better at something, you become more
playful with it. So I could take away all your tools. I could take away your computer, you’re still
going to come up with ideas.

And you’re still going to be playful and, like, hanging up… I mean, cutting out pictures of eyes,
that’s like what a child would do.

Ramit: But the idea behind it is really powerful. Let me play around, let me see what works, and if it
does work, that just changed something for the rest of my life.

AJ: Well I do think that’s one of the keys to creativity, is to really be playful keep your mind as
loose as possible. And there are lots of studies that when you’re in a good mood, you’re more
creative. You know, after you watch a funny movie, you’re more creative than after you watch,
like, a depressing movie that… you know, because you need… to me, the key to creativity is
taking two things that are completely different… And melding them together. James Altucher
calls it idea sex. And I think the only way to do that is to keep your mind in a loose, like, a
loosey-goosey state so that you can make these weird connections.

Ramit: Yes. I do the same thing in my own business. I, like, I read enough people like me who are
doing business, and it’s fine, it’s interesting, I like to stay up-to-date on the industry, but I
want to read other industries. Fashion, creativity, all… fiction. I have to force myself to read it
because it doesn’t come naturally… To me. But when I do, I always find myself coming up with
these crazy, off-the-wall ideas, as opposed to incremental ideas that I would normally get.

AJ: And I think that’s very… you know, this I learned from the Encyclopedia Britannica. There was…
Isaac Newton… it wasn’t the apple. The apple is a myth. That… he didn’t get the idea of gravity
from that. He got it from reading really weird alchemy books… Because these guys, these
alchemists, were talking about the secret forces that would act on something from afar. And all
the scientists thought, you know, these guys are nuts…

Which they were. But that weird idea gave him, like… you know what? Maybe there is
something that acts from afar like a gravity. And it was only through reading this very bizarre,
something from totally outside his field, was he able to make this breakthrough.

Ramit: That’s very interesting. Also because I’ve been reading books on magic… So like magicians and
how they go about crafting the experience, and also by people who run hotels. It’s all about
the experience, right? The Restaurant, Danny Meyer, et cetera. And that… most of my students
don’t know, but there’s a lot of what I’ve been learning in… from those industries that affects
the experience they get today.

AJ: That’s so interesting.

Ramit: You would never know.

AJ: Right. Yeah.

Ramit: But being able to expose yourself to that, so critical. So alright. In terms of experimentation, it
sounds like you go into it with a pretty open mind. Do you ever go into it and say, here’s my
thesis. I want to prove this or that? Or do you just say, let me just see what happens?

11 [Link] - RAMIT’S BRAIN TRUST: A J JACOBS TRANSCRIPT - CONFIDENTIAL

AJ: Ideally, you just want to say what… let… what happens. I mean, I do sometimes have an
endpoint, like when I did The Year of Living Biblically, I wanted to experience it. What am I
missing? Is there something that religion offers that I don’t know about?

That I’m missing out on? But I also wanted to show that if you take the Bible completely
literally and believe the earth is six thousand years old, then you’re going to… you’re a crazy
person.

So for me, creativity is sort of a dance between knowing generally where you want to end up,
but taking these weird by-ways and side-ways to get there.

Ramit: Got it. What are some experiments that we can try on our own?

AJ: Well I love… that’s one of my big… yeah… big themes, that everyone should try experimenting,
and you don’t have to do a big one. You don’t have to grow a beard and look like a terrorist.
You know, you can… it can be tiny things. It can be brushing your teeth with a new type of
toothpaste…

It could be doing fifteen minutes of brainstorming, it could be… when I did The Year of Living
Biblically, I stopped… I tried to stop gossiping, which is incredibly difficult. And I still gossip,
you know, a huge amount.

But it actually made my life a little better, because when you stop gossiping, you start… stop
having as few negative thoughts.

When you say fewer negative things, your mind generates fewer negative things. And so I
actually became happier not gossiping. I mean, gossiping, I don’t want to totally diss it…

Ramit: Yeah, there’s a reason.

AJ: There’s a reason.

Ramit: Yeah. OK.

AJ: There’s some good things about it.

Ramit: But I like that you created your own virtuous cycle. Did you know that that was going to
happen?

AJ: No, that was totally surprising. I mean, because I thought, who gives a… you know, who cares
about gossiping? But, it actually changed my life.

Ramit: Interesting. So let’s talk about vulnerability for a second. I think you do an amazing job of
being vulnerable at what you struggle with and also… when you’re good at something… it’s
clear you’re good at writing, it’s clear you’re great at speaking. It’s clear, all these things, like,
but you don’t come across as arrogant, you don’t come across as a know-it-all at all. And it’s…
and I think one of the keys to that has been your vulnerability. And you just accept it. I mean, in
this session today, you’ve talked about all the horrible things that happened… You know? And
most people would not have the courage. I know that it doesn’t come naturally to me and yet I
fail at stuff all the time. So were you always vulnerable, or is this something that you worked on
as a skill?

AJ: That’s a great question. I do think I’ve become much more vulnerable. I mean, as you become,
you know, as you get older. I’m an old man. So as you get older, it becomes less important for
you to impress others with exactly what… but as you say it’s a skill, and like any skill, you have…
kind of have to force yourself to do it sometimes. So you have to say, you know, this is an
embarrassing… should I say this… But then you force yourself to do it and be like, hope people
understand, I hope they see that my good outweighs my flaws, and it happened that the same
thing happened… you’re very kind to say I’m a good speaker, but I was not always. You know, I
hated speaking. That’s part of the reason I became a writer…

12 [Link] - RAMIT’S BRAIN TRUST: A J JACOBS TRANSCRIPT - CONFIDENTIAL

 Is I thought I wouldn’t have to speak. But I forced myself to speak in front of audiences, like,
any chance I would get. Like, any tiny radio show, any, like, you know, the opening of an
envelope, I would go and I would force myself to speak, and I would pretend I was having a
good time.

Ramit: How did you do that?

AJ: Well, I would, you know, I would smile and laugh, like I’m pretending now. I’m actually having a
horrible time. This is the hurt.

Ramit: Heard this before many times around me.

AJ: But yeah. No. And then I… now it’s one of my favorite parts of my job. So it really is… you know,
there’s a sense, we talked earlier of that, how you have to accept who you are… And that is
true, I believe, but then there’s also… the flip side is you can sort of force yourself to be an
extrovert. I think I’m naturally an introvert.

But I am able to sometimes, not always, force myself out to be an extrovert, and when I’m
doing it, I’m actually having a great time, and I’m like, you know, this… being an extrovert, you
get more ideas from people, the studies say you’re happier when you’re around people…

And then I go, and then in the morning, I forget, and I’m like, oh, I don’t want to go out and see
people… But I force myself to do it.

Ramit: Why though? Like, how do you get the energy, the motivation, to do that? Because if you truly
are an introvert, or if you just, like, you hate speaking, then almost by default, it is so easy to
say no. So where do you get that push to say, yeah, I’ll accept this speaking gig even though I
hate it, I’m terrified, and I don’t think it’s going to go well?

AJ: Well partly, I like to… you know, there’s method actors… I, you know, you can sort of live a
method life. You can… I consider myself a method writer sometimes. So I’ll say, you know, I’m
doing this character. I’m doing a character who loves speaking and getting out there. And then
once you start doing that character, you get into that character.

Ramit: That’s very interesting. Hm. So alright. So you weren’t always vulnerable. Did you get, like, the
first time you were vulnerable, whether it was on, you know, on paper or with your friends, or
speaking, did you notice the response of people?

AJ: That’s a good question. I mean, I certainly… I have… when you’re vulnerable, you’re definitely
taking a risk, because then people can focus on your flaws. Instead of your good parts, but
you just have to, I find, hope that people realize that the good outweighs the flaws… And, you
know, and you also have to train your mind to accept the negative feedback. Because, I do
think, you know, we have… I love this whole behavioral economics about the flaws in our brain…
And we do have a bias where if you get ninety-nine compliments and one insult, what’s the one
you’re going to remember?

Ramit: You’re going to dwell on that negative one.

AJ: Exactly. So you have to really force yourself and take a step back and say, alright. I’m going
to read through those compliments again. I’m going to focus on those compliments. And our
brains are very tricky because I think they’re like… almost like a ski slope, one psychologist
described it. So when you ski down a ski slope, you create a rut. And the more times you
ski… The deeper that rut gets. So even just thinking about that negative feedback, then it
sort of programs your brain to think about it more and more. So just, like, stopping yourself
and saying, alright I’m focusing on this. Let’s step back. Let’s make a… I’m going to make a
concerted effort to think about this good stuff. I’m… and almost seeing yourself as a curator of
good experiences.

13 [Link] - RAMIT’S BRAIN TRUST: A J JACOBS TRANSCRIPT - CONFIDENTIAL

Ramit: Ah OK. Let’s talk about this. So first of all, how do you distinguish between being vulnerable
and being overly self-critical. Because this vulnerable is one thing, like, oh yeah, I fail 50%,
90% of the time, and the way you deliver it, and in the context of what you said, it was funny,
and it was illuminating. But imagine I had… imagine my body language was like this, I was like,
yeah, I just failed again, like, no one’s going to ever hire me as a writer and I hate working at
McDonald’s.

AJ: Right.

Ramit: It’s a very different experience. So, how do you distinguish between vulnerability and being
too overly self-critical?

AJ: Well I do think the… that being… you know, having humor about it is very crucial.

Ramit: What if you’re not funny? I mean, most people are not funny.

AJ: Well I… you know, I’m not so sure about that, like…

Ramit: You don’t think so? Alright.

AJ: I think that some… I think that, you know, you are born with a certain amount of humor… Maybe.
But I do think, like many things, it’s a skill that you can learn.

Ramit: Ok. I totally agree with that. I didn’t develop a sense of humor until seventh grade, and it was
all because I got around funny friends.

AJ: Yes. So true.

Ramit: Now you’re making me think about that. And then over time, I started working at a pizza place
where we had the world’s biggest degenerates working there. They were hilarious, and then
in college, I wrote a comedy column where I had to work to be funny. So OK. So you’re saying
humor is one of the… you actively work on developing your humor.

AJ: Yeah. I think you can. I think, as you say, hanging out with funny people… That is incredibly
important. Reading funny books, like mine perhaps… And watching funny shows. I mean, that, I
think, is… and learning to think in a funny way. And there are, you know, there are some hacks,
as our friend Tim Ferriss would say. You know, you can’t be completely, robotically funny. But
there are some tips. Some ways to think. Like the idea of taking two completely disparate
things and putting them together.

Ramit: A lot of people I know, they recommend starting with improv as a way to just rewire the brain
and get yourself on to that stage in the most uncomfortable situation of all. Some of my
friends have done stand-up comedy and they were like, this is the scariest thing I’ve ever done,
but they love it. So I’m glad you brought up the idea of you can get funnier, it’s a skill you can
develop.

AJ: Right.

Ramit: Because until this point, I had not connected the dots and made the point to my readers as
well.

AJ: And use a lot of K words. That’s always the secret.

Ramit: K words?

AJ: K words are funny.

Ramit: Like?

AJ: Like, you know, ketchup, kumquat… That’s funny. That’s well known.

Ramit: Humor 101 here from AJ Jacobs. Oh, I love it.

14 [Link] - RAMIT’S BRAIN TRUST: A J JACOBS TRANSCRIPT - CONFIDENTIAL

AJ: And then odd numbers are funnier than even numbers. That’s another important one.

Ramit: I like these.

AJ: Thirty-seven is funnier than thirty-six.

Ramit: Is this a new book? That’d be funny. From the funniest man alive, AJ Jacobs. Your mentor.

AJ: Another one is, oh, when you’re talking about something specific is funnier than general. Like,
weasel is funnier than animal. But also, more general is funnier than… you either want to go
very general or very specific. So you either want to say, like, you know, I’ll have a Fresca, or I’ll
have a tasty beverage. You don’t want to say, I’ll have a drink. So you either go very specific or
very general.

Ramit: Nice. Alright. These are interesting, by the way.

AJ: These are very important.

Ramit: I would love to read. To me, this is a fascinating article. Like, whoever thought of things like
this? Only this guy. OK. So on the topic of vulnerability and being overly self-deprecating
or critical, I’ve also seen it go the other way, where I meet someone and, you know, they’re
bragging about the brand of clothes they just bought or the brand of car they bought or
something, and it’s almost this visceral feeling I have inside where I’m totally turned off.

How do you handle that? I mean, how do you go from… sometimes you want to brag about
stuff, right? We do something amazing and we want to brag about it. But you’ve also told us
be vulnerable. How do you combine those two, or do you break them apart? How do you do
that?

AJ: Well I think just saying, you know, here’s where I failed, but here’s where I succeeded, you
know, if you’re honest, you are going to succeed in some areas. And so, you know, with my
books, for instance, I’ll talk about how hard… like with the health book, you know, I’m… I have
no coordination, I’m terrible athlete, whatever, but I did lose twenty pounds, and I did… I got
stronger and my stress level really decreased. So things worked. Some things worked.

And you got to be honest about those. So I guess, just not being so self-deprecating that you
say nothing works, you know, I’m a complete failure. That’s not going to get you anywhere.

Ramit: Yeah. One thing I notice that you do really well, and I think it’s so intuitive to you, is you frame
things very clearly. So you’ll say, look I’m not a coordinated guy. I’m not the most healthy guy.
And then you go into all the things you’re not healthy about, but I know that right now we’re
talking about this sort of self-deprecating area. And then you say, but things worked out. I lost
twenty pounds, I lost my stress. So you’re kind of framing it whereas, I’ve seen people who are
not a socially skilled and they deliver it… first of all, they deliver it like this, and they’re… just
look clinically depressed, but also they’re… they intermix things all the time. They’re like, it
didn’t go well. I sucked. My friends hate me, my wife divorced me.

And they just go on and on and on and on. Whereas when you are doing self-deprecating
things, it’s like, one-two-three, now let’s get to the point. And I think that the way you deliver
your vulnerability, your self-deprecating joke or comment, it’s as important as what you’re
actually saying.

AJ: Well that’s nice to hear. I mean, I think, yeah. You’ve got to be… whenever I give a talk… I have
a friend who’s had an interesting idea. He says when he gives a talk, he actually likes it when
something goes wrong with the AV and that it’s not perfect talk. I’m not sure I agree with that,
but I think it’s an interesting idea because it allows him to bond with the audience.

Ramit: You know those rugs you see… you buy those… they’re in glass cases as you’re walking by
stores in these furniture departments? Like, buy these rugs, they’re like five grand or ten grand
or whatever. Turkish rugs, et cetera. They always have one flaw in them. Because they said we
never want to be as perfect as God. So they always have one intentional flaw in them.

15 [Link] - RAMIT’S BRAIN TRUST: A J JACOBS TRANSCRIPT - CONFIDENTIAL

AJ: I like that.

Ramit: Let’s talk about quitting. So do you ever give up on idea, or do you give… do you just give up
on something entirely?

AJ: Well, you know, sometimes you do want to cut it off because otherwise you’ll just be investing…
but I try to go farther than I think I should, because you never know what’s going to turn up.
And again, it’s that idea of forcing myself to keep going… Where I, you know, I say, Oh, this is
never going to work out, but let’s pretend it will. But yeah, you know, sometimes you’ve got to
realize this is not going to happen, and you only have so much time.

And let’s ditch it and I, you know, as I say, I have tons of book ideas that I start but never work
out, tons that I pitch but are reje-, and my wife has control over some of them. So, like, I get
a lot of emails from people saying that I should try to be the best lover in the world and try
all the positions in the Kama Sutra. And my wife is like, that is not going to happen. I got to
say I agree with her. I have no interest in… I’m not… I’m too old. I… my back doesn’t bend in
those ways. It does sound exhausting. So yeah. You know, you’ve got to realize… you’ve got to
prioritize.

Ramit: What do you do when you have and idea, maybe it’s for an article or a book, and you pitch it,
and you get rejected the first time and you’re like, I really think this is a good idea? What do
you do then?

AJ: Well, you just start doing it. I mean, I really think that you can dive in and start doing it, and
then you might be able to convince people. And that happens a lot. I will tell you, since I wrote
a book about the Bible, I’ll tell you a very quick biblical story…

That a rabbi told me. Because when I was starting that book about the Bible, I was terrified,
and I thought, you know, people are going to be so offended, I’m going to be, you know,
laughed out of New York City, but I also thought it was kind of a good idea. So this rabbi told
me this story from the Bible about… it’s not actually in the Bible, but it’s a legend about the
Bible.

And it was when Moses was leaving Egypt, and he got to the Red Sea. And he raised his
arms to part the Red Sea and nothing happened. It wasn’t like in the Ten Commandments
movie. The sea just stayed what… where it was. And his followers were freaking out because
the Egyptian soldiers were coming to slay them. And one of his followers named Nochsana
decided, you know what? I’m just going to walk right in. So he walked in. The water got up
to his ankles, got up to his knees, got up to his waist, chest. Right before it got to his nostrils,
the seas parted. And the idea is sometimes you just have to wade in to… you have to dive
in to make miracles happen. And, you know, I don’t believe it actually happened, but it’s a
wonderful metaphoric story.

Ramit: Yeah. And you don’t have to wait for permission. You know? If your editor rejects it, I’m going
to do it anyway.

AJ: Exactly.

Ramit: And it’s very hard for people to deny the energy of someone who’s like, I don’t care if you are
going to support this or not because I’m doing it. And, paradoxically, that’s what gets people
more interested in something. Your example is a great story.

OK, as we wrap, I want to ask just a couple of questions. My readers are fascinated with the
kind of stuff you read. So you have these crazy ideas… just today you’ve quoted Moses, The
Simpsons, I mean, all these totally disparate ideas. What do you read… websites, courses,
books, magazines… what do you read on a regular basis that gets your mind going?

AJ: Well one thing I sometimes do is I actually go into an old style bookstore While they still exist.

Ramit: What?

16 [Link] - RAMIT’S BRAIN TRUST: A J JACOBS TRANSCRIPT - CONFIDENTIAL

AJ: I know. It’s crazy. But that’s where… this happened, you know, like eight years ago, where I
went in and I saw what was on the bestseller list, and it was Tom Friedman’s book The World is
Flat.

And it was all about outsourcing. And I thought, that is so interesting. All these companies are
outsourcing to India, what if I did that for my life? And so that’s when I did this book… article
called My Outsourced Life, where I hired a team of people in Bangalore, India to do everything
for me. They answered my phone and answered my emails, and read bedtime stories to my
son and argued with my wife.

So it was fantastic. But taking an idea, just, that’s out there, and pushing it to the limit. So
going to bookstores. Another one, I am a huge fan of, as I mentioned, this genre of behavioral
economics, how… what the flaws are in our minds.

Because I do think, you know, our brains do some great things, but they’re also incredibly
flawed instruments and the more you’re aware of them, the better you’re going to be at
everything. At business, at social skills. So I love reading, you know, Daniel Kahneman has a
book, there’s Daniel Ariely is a great writer.

Cass Sunstein wrote a book called Nudge, which is sort of how to trick your mind into doing
things like, you know, putting the healthy stuff at eye level, the healthy food at eye level
instead of… because we’re so lazy, we just eat what’s at eye level. So just little tips like that.

Ramit: Awesome. And you can always apply those things. Behavioral economics and behavioral
psychology, if you want to get better at your health, at your dating life, at your social skills,
there is something to be found in those books for you.

AJ: Totally.

Ramit: So great recommendations. And then, one thing… our last… my last question for you is we love
to issue a challenge for Brain Trust viewers. And the good news is they’re going to do it. We
make sure they do it. So they’re going to follow up. And in the past, we’ve had people offer
challenges like get seven hours of sleep, change one thing about the routine you do every day,
like drive a different way to work… something to inspire and get them to change based on
what we talked about today. Do you have a challenge that you can issue them?

AJ: I actually thought of two.

Ramit: Our first ever double challenge!

AJ: So you can do either or, you can do both. But one would be to try for fifteen minutes every
day to sit down and just brainstorm ideas and just push on through even though the first five
minutes are going to be terrible.

Push on through. Keep on generating, you know, a hundred ideas and then assess. Like, later,
you say, oh, these ones might work, and then follow up on them, or don’t. But just try. Fifteen
minutes a day.

Ramit: So fifteen minutes a day for how long? For one week?

AJ: Yes.

Ramit: Ok. One week, and the ideas can be… what kind of ideas are we talking here?

AJ: You can do it totally directed, like you say, you know, I’m a writer, here’s… I’m going to come
up with a hundred book ideas. Or sometimes I just like to totally un-direct it. So it’s like, you
know, might have a book idea. I might have an idea for a cartoon or an invention, or, you know,
whatever, a new type of watch.

Ramit: Perfect. Or even what is the experience I want my friends to have when we go out to coffee
next time? Just brainstorm anything.

17 [Link] - RAMIT’S BRAIN TRUST: A J JACOBS TRANSCRIPT - CONFIDENTIAL

AJ: Right.

Ramit: Ok. Perfect. So that’s challenge number one.

AJ: And challenge number two is that try to go out to lunch with someone who has a completely
different point of view, from the polar opposite side of the spectrum. Because that’s what I
did with my book about the Bible. I grew up totally agnostic, atheist, no religion. I was like,
how can people believe in this, you know, tooth fairy, so I forced myself to go out with these
people… And have a conversation instead of yelling at each other.

Like actually try to see the world from their point of view. And it was so interesting, and it
really helped me understand it, and I think it made me a better person. So I would recommend
trying that.

Ramit: So let’s say in the next two weeks, find one person with polar opposite views as you, take him
out to lunch, coffee, drink, whatever, and just listen. Is that it?

AJ: Well you can talk to him about your point of view. I mean, either way. But I think having a
discussion as opposed to an argument.

Ramit: Love it. Love it. AJ, thank you for being here.

AJ: Thank you. Loved it.

18 [Link] - RAMIT’S BRAIN TRUST: A J JACOBS TRANSCRIPT - CONFIDENTIAL