Louis Theroux: "The Thing That Makes Me Great At Work, Makes Me Bad At Life!" | E198

What makes me good at my job is also what makes me bad at life. This is maybe more than you bargained for. Our next guest has interviewed everyone. My money doesn't giggle jiggle. It's a cathedral of porn. That's a little offensive. You're a very fascinating person. How do you connect with people? I'm just so curious about what takes someone to that place. Why people do the things that they do. The question I get asked most often is How do you not get angry with some of these people, especially the ones who are sort of spewing hate? If if people see like you're attempting to wrestle intimacies from them, that's never going to go well. I think also there's some part of me that thinks maybe the person's got it figured out and I haven't. Your former wife said there's nothing real about you. Jimmy Savile, he also said something about insincerity being your specialty. That's good. Glad you brought that up. I remember it vividly. First of all, I neglected my personal life to focus on achieving professional success. The price was paid by those nearest and dearest to me. When did you get that feedback? So my relationships are sort of life support system for my kind of work self instead of the other way around. Saying to my wife, well, this is what I do. I did a lot of great segments just by being available at a moment's notice. I just think, oh, this isn't going well. So it became a bit of an impasse. Is it something that comes with a cost and is it something you want to change? Before this episode starts, I have a small favor to ask from you. 2 months ago, 74% of people that watch this channel didn't subscribe. We're now down to 69%. My goal is 50%. So if you've ever liked any of the videos we've posted, if you like this channel, can you do me a quick favor and hit the subscribe button. It helps this channel more than you know, and the bigger the channel gets, as you've seen, the bigger the guests get. Thank you and enjoy this episode. Louis. You're a very fascinating person. Thank you. And I've you know, I've as I've read through your story, I read your autobiography as well, I was trying to understand what I needed to understand about your earliest experiences to really understand the man that you are today. The the interesting personality you have and the trajectory you went and took in your life. So please enlighten me. What what what are the most pertinent things that I need to know about your earliest years to understand you? Oh my goodness. We could I I I could I spend 2 hours answering that question on its own. I don't know how interesting it would be. I'll try and give you a brief answer. I like the long answers. you? Yeah. Well, so first of all, my um parents are what my mom's British, my dad's American. They are both um in in different respects are free thinkers. So they they grew up in the '60s and they embraced aspects of the counterculture. They regarded their own parents as being in certain respects sort of limited and cloistered. And and and so my mom joined uh VSO, Volunteer Service Overseas, to get experience of life in Africa. My dad joined the Peace Corps. He would have been probably enlisted to serve in Vietnam and he didn't want to do that, so he went to teach in Africa as well, and that's where they met. So I was raised um I was born in Singapore where they were teaching. Uh my brother was born in in Uganda where um where they were teaching at that time, my older brother. But then we set they settled in London. And and so growing up, I was conscious of of them as people who who who really encouraged us to open our minds. And maybe you know, in in it was sort of 99% positive, like 1% I think like a lot of people you know, people use this term social justice warriors, right? Like as a talk form of judgment about overly do-gooding. Like there's an element of I don't tend to use that term cuz it's sort it's it's become it's but it's been weaponized. But I suppose in a sense my parents were kind of social justice warriors. Like they were very much encouraging me to challenge or us to challenge racism where we saw it, to challenge sexism, to be uh open to new experiences, not to fall into easy judgments about other cultures and other countries and other people. And and and and I only say the 1% it sometimes that could be inflected with a little bit of a sense of superiority. And I talk a bit about that in my book, a slight feeling that we weren't really like quite like other people. You know, other people were maybe not quite as smart or not quite as literary, you know. And I don't I don't you know, I strive not to endorse whatever is in me remains in me of that I try to unpack and eradicate, but nevertheless, that's the way looking back on it, that's something that I see and pick up on. My dad's a writer, novelist. My mom is a you know, after teaching uh my dad became a very successful literary novelist and travel writer. My mom went on to become a radio producer and worked for the BBC World Service, which is for those who don't know, that's the service that broadcasts all over the world and it's it's a bit like Radio 4, but broadcast you know, in this tiny language. It's extraordinary institution. It sort of represents in some ways the best of the BBC, but um so I was growing up sort of aware that we we you know, we were a family that loved books and and loved reading and you know, we watched TV and listened to pop music and did the normal things, but I think underneath it all was a feeling that to really count in life, um you should be a literary writer. Like that was that was without me fully maybe acknowledging it, that was underneath this thing that you should really I think still my dad probably feels that. Like he's very supportive of me and my TV making, but he's like, Louis, you thought Have you thought about writing another book? Louis, you're you're you know, you you you you've got time, you've got the talent, you can I I I don't want to push you into this, but Louis, you know, you should think about writing a book. That's a great idea for a book. You know, that kind of thing. Anyway, so that all of that was under underlying my attitude to life. Then they sent me off to um school, primary school. I'm going to have to I'm I mean, you wanted a long answer. This is maybe more than you bargained for. I suppose alongside that is the the influence of friends. And and and you know, I can stop the the and and the so the countervailing impulses of growing up in the '70s and '80s in South London and being exposed to funny creative people. And my friendship group which who who you know, met some of them have gone on to work into civilian quote unquote lives as you know, restaurateurs or or or you know, music other stuff. But but saliently were Adam Buxton, Joe Cornish and another friend Zack Sandler who were super creative. Adam and Joe went on to have their own TV show and I was conscious of falling in with a little group Amelia of of um like-minded kids who were very funny, really into movies, TV. And that was where I suppose I began to feel that there was well, you know, I don't want to owe in hindsight it's tempting to um sort of read back read back what I do now into that, but I just know that that that friendship group was very important to me and maybe counteracted some of the more cuz I was academic. I was I was I did really well at school. I feel like I could just go on and on. Should I go? Should I keep going? listen to you. Cuz the other part of it was that I was um I was quite an anxious child. So I I would I would I worried about everything. And uh I I would think about things that were on the horizon. Like when I was five or six years old, I remember fixating you know, there were various things that came and went that really worried me, but one was um the idea of maypole dancing, which was a big I don't know if it's still like in in state primaries um at that time every May holiday, like you would do maypole dancing. What is that, sir? It's It's it's a it's It's It's an old English or maybe British tradition where there's a big pole. I think it's like a fertility right. You know, it's a touch of wicker man about it. You know, it's an enormous kind of mast, a pole, like a maybe like like a totem pole almost like sort of 20 ft high. And then there's ribbons around it and as children you would skip round it and you would sort of braid the ribbons together to form nice patterns. And I remember seeing them doing it in primary school and thinking that looks really hard and I'm going to have to do that next year and I don't know how I'm going to do it. And just I remember being preoccupied with how am I going to learn how to do that? I only mention that as an example. Like there were other things like just reading. The Before I could read, I remember seeing my older brother reading and thinking like, I don't know how you do that. And and just getting very worried about it. So in general, my I'm someone who is pre I know everyone worries, but I just feel as though that feeling of worry and anxiety was quite a strong background note. And sometimes I would control my anxiety, not consciously, but again back by working hard. Like what by by by sort of just sort of becoming almost like super focused on academic work. And um and as a result, I did very well in school and um you know, like those people who look back and say like, well, I was a [ __ ] up in the school. I was the opposite. Like I didn't always you know, I would get in trouble. Like in sometimes I was regarded as especially when I was younger, 12, 13, as a disruptive element cuz I was also quite cheeky and sometimes tried to communicate and connect with people via teasing, right? Which is I don't know if that's a common it's quite a British thing in a way. It's certainly a big thing in my family was what's now called banter, right? And sometimes I'd try and do banter with my teacher and then it wouldn't go well. And so but but in general, which is confusing like regarding being regarded as a sort of black sheep in class or a disruptive person in class and then um but then also getting in trouble. They said like it's fine for you to mess about and get in trouble and then you do the homework and you're fine, but you're a bad influence on the other kids. I used to get told that. You're a bad influence on your I was like that's not true at all. Like if anything, my friends were just as naughty and were leading me astray, but nevertheless, because I could sort of go home and then become sort of organized and focus on my work. I got a I got for a brief period I got labeled as the troublemaker. Anyway, going through school I I sort of um the sort of the the loadstars for my um sort of sense of who I was and how I would progress in life such as it is. I mean, I was never that tactical, but as I went as I went through school, I thought, well, I'm I'm pretty good academically. I guess I'll just do well in exams and stuff and then see what happens. And meanwhile with my friends we'd be seeing movies. I got into rap music in the late '80s and so I would dress like a sort of hip-hop nerd. I was smoking quite a lot of weed, but still studying. This was sort of again, age 16, 17. But it never really interfered with my with my work. I went on to Oxford. And then having done well at Oxford um left university and and at that point it was like, well, what happens now? That was when it felt like okay, now I've no longer really got a clear path. Does that make sense? Yeah. You know, I think if you if you are if you're academic, if you find academic work not easy, but you find that you do well at it, cuz it's not easy, but you apply yourself and you do well at then sometimes life can be a weird um bump in the road. Like real life is only like, well, where are the exams? Cuz I know I can do those. You know, what do I do now? So for a while I thought maybe I would be like a professor or an academic or something. But then something in me told me that wasn't quite right. So then the rest of life is another story, but I hope that sort of answers your questions about or those different um those different uh sort of sources of of of of how I sort of you know, my whatever it is, personality and interests. One of the things that really stood out to me in that answer was your your early relationship with work. You said you used to work hard to kind of suppress or kind of distract yourself from the anxiety of life. Is that accurate? Well, what it is is um well, I I worried about things in general and um you know, one of those worries was homework or doing well in in in school. Like another worry was getting on with my peer group, but uh in so far as I can I could control those sources of anxiety. Like you know you uh work is actually relatively straightforward. Like if in terms of like, how do I get more you know, how do I attempt to relate to people better? Well, that's that's kind of hard and slightly mysterious, but how do I do well at these assignments I've been given? Um then you just sit down and do them um until you get it right. And and you know, a lot of these things are aren't uh are subconscious. Like I'm not thinking like, oh, how can I control my anxiety? But I would just find that I I I if if exams were coming up I'd get super anxious. And um and I don't mean to pathologize it. Like I've never been diagnosed with an anxiety disorder. I'm just slightly worry prone. And as it happens, I've become less worry prone as I've grown up. And it may be that there were other things going on, you know, in my family life, who knows? Um in in you know, my parents' marriage wasn't always happy. They subsequently divorced. There were other things that probably were going on that were stressful. But for whatever reason, I found that or without almost without meaning to I I would I took my studies uh very seriously. I have to sort of slightly check myself when I say this cuz I do I'm also aware that I've looked back at some of my reports having kind of got quite attached to this narrative of myself as sort of super swot, right? Super studious. And I've looked at some of my old report cards and some of them are are especially when I'm six or seven sort of say um you know, Louis is a pleasure to have in class, but I it sometimes it would be nice if you would let other pupils speak. He he he enjoys the sound of his own voice kind of thing, which is very apropos for this podcast probably. You know, and like so so I I I I had a sort of rambunctious side and it almost in social settings, my mom tells a story it's actually in my book, but of of how when I was about five or six, I would come home and I'd be really sad. I'd be like I don't know. I don't think I don't like school anymore. And she'd sort of think, well, Louis is obviously not getting on well at school. I need to talk to his teacher. And she went into to class and um and talked to the teachers and said, you understand Louis is very sensitive. He's a very sensitive young man. As I say, I would've been maybe five or six, seven years old. And the teachers were like, really? Yes, he's a very sensitive. Like you would just be mindful that, you know, things you can say might hurt his feelings, something like that. And they were like were struggling to recognize her description of me. And then on the way out of class, she passed the classroom and could see through one of the glass windows in the door and I was running along the desktops or doing a dance on top of a desk. In other words, like it was almost like in the setting itself I was a wild child. And and just sort of running amok, but also I had like this doubling. Like then I go home and be kind of be be worrying about small, which I think is probably still true of me in some ways that I have a I have that sort of disruptive trickster impulse alongside certain um a certain sensitivity. Is that a defense mechanism or a a a way to I don't know. Survive in a social setting or is that the true nature of you? I am and I think, you know, I could say, oh, well, I was a younger child and my parents found me funny and I I wanted to perform and I I wanted my dad to, you know, I wanted to get the approval of my parents by being silly, but the fact is is who knows? Like I just know that you know, things like your sense of humor or your inclination to to be cheeky that's just always been in me. You know? And you know, I'm slightly wary of attempting to to sort of um unpick where that comes from because I just know that's that's that's always been in me. The relationship with work I I think even for myself I I learned my relationship with work at a very young age and I I think I developed quite an unhealthy relationship with work at the expense of other things that matter in life. Yeah, me too. I think I can relate to that. And that's what I was trying to understand is like, when did you where did your relationship with work come from? On one hand I was guessing maybe it's from his father who was very, you know, insistent on being an intellectual is a is success, Louis. Or is it from the distraction of that from anxiety and from the social thing where you could be successful at exams cuz you were good at that, so you double down. I think it was all of the above. Like my dad's got both my parents have work ethics that border on the sort of being over the top. My dad uh would, you know, he's a he's a as I said, he's a writer and the weekends like he didn't really take weekends off. Like certainly Saturdays you would often be writing and Sunday mornings he was often writing and and he he's an extraor- I want to give both my parents a shout-out. See, um my parents were um were basically first generation university educated, came from very much not at the high table of life and and so for my dad to to sort of become a wealthy literary writer is kind of an amazing thing that he did. You know, in the world of you know, it's one thing to be a popular novelist. That's hard anyway. To be a novelist or travel writer who's extremely successful had a you know sold hundreds of thousands of millions of books just uh without any leg up in life is an amazing thing and um uh I wonder if I've ever told him that. I hope I have. Anyway, he'll listen to this probably cuz he he follows my he follows my uh career with interest. So some of that I would have taken on board just through osmosis of seeing that. Likewise, um my mom being super studious, going to Oxford. She grew up in Tooting. She you know, and and and her her sense of sort of self-belief or her sense of her own destiny, whatever it was and in her small, you know peer group of kids who were educated at a state school and then through her own hard work and the support of her teachers going to Oxford you know, in the '60s as a woman that was extremely unusual. So that was that was in the air, but in the end and and my older brother who was very studious. And the other thing just to reflect on is that I saw my brother as the more brilliant child. Like he was to to the way I saw it at the time was more effortlessly brilliant. Like sort of child prodigy material, you know? And I thought I was just kind of an sort of irrelevant bit of afterbirth you know, trailed around after him. And so when I noticed that I was getting fairly good results um when I was sort of 11, 12, it didn't feel particularly impressive. Like it felt like, well, I guess I could I can do well if I work hard. It's not like I'm kind of brilliant like my older brother. Um, but I think when I you know, again, in hindsight, I think mainly what I see is um, is a sense that I just felt like this was something I had to do. It wasn't a choice. And I even later on when I was at university, I sometimes used to worry that um, I wonder if I'm missing out. You know, people say it's the best years of your life and you should be hang you should be just going wild, having fun. I did a you know, some of that, but I was also conscious of like maybe I'm missing out by working by studying too hard. That's what I read into your story of of university was that I wrote I actually wrote in my notes, worked his ass off at Oxford. On the point of affection, this is also something I probably didn't learn from my parents if I'm honest. I could still call my parents by their first names. Um, Did they encourage you to do that? Yes. Yeah. Or I just didn't I didn't learn affection. And actually, you know, even growing up at 10 years old, when one of my friends turned to me and went, you're my best friend, my body like because the Yeah. The idea that's I was someone's best friend made me cringe. And I had this I think I had this like emotional intimacy affection issue growing up. Although, I think being a best friend is something you show but don't say. Yeah. It's a bit creepy. You're my best friend. I remember feeling stressed when a friend said that to me and and thinking, cuz you then you feel like if you say, oh, you're my best friend, and then it feels a bit inauthentic. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yes, you like do it, don't say it. Do you know what I mean? I love you. feel necessary to say. But but what what is what did you learn about affection at a young age? I I feel really lucky that my parents um, I feel as though they were, you know, they were they worked hard like my I had a working mom, my dad was as I say, had a huge work drive to be successful, but I I always felt like the love that they had for me was just taken as read. Like I I never questioned it. Do you know what I mean? In the way that felt positive. And even though, you know, I think there's a tendency or a temptation nowadays to look back and and be thinking about things that could have been otherwise. And I think, you know, parts of that therapy culture are really valid, but there's also a sense in which um, you can focus on negative stuff. And I'm not sure at a certain point how how healthy or helpful it is. And and and so for me, I I never kind of questioned like the love the love that they they had for me. And I it was it was never the case that I felt I was kind of um, seeking their approval. Like I remember friends at school saying, well, my my parents say if I do well in common entrance, they're going to get me a watch. And I remember thinking, that's quite weird, you know, or my my parents never I never felt like they needed to be I that I was in any sense doing like working hard for them. And if they took an interest, that was kind of a bonus, but I didn't rush to show them like I got all A's or, you know, I was I came first in all the exams or whatever. I wouldn't really talk to them about it. Like that was just something that I did for me. What about emotional expression? I think that's something that we learn how to say like I love you and to hug and to be to touch and Uh, cuz you said banter. You said Yeah, like I my Humor is really important I say such a kind of what they call that's so dead, it's cringe. I'm worried if my kids' voices in my head, but you know, humor is a very important way of communicating. You know, humor is a really I often think, you know, in terms of how I see life, that's why I'm worrying I sound a bit humorless. But anyway, how I see life is like humor is like the the missing dimension in terms of it's almost it can't really be expressed, but my we we shared a sense of humor as as a family. And so we would make each other laugh and so teasing was important like it'll um, just not taking yourself too seriously. My parents were I would say um, like I respected them. I would have I see how my kids behave towards me and I'm that classic thing of like, God, if I did that to my parents, that would not have gone well. It's not that I think of them being especially strict. I didn't feel they were at the time, but I wouldn't have dared to um, I don't know like I like there was there was a sense of of of them having boundaries that I would respect and observe. What about They they they slight also they slightly cheated because we went to boarding school, me and my brother age 13. So those difficult teenage years of sort of 13 to 18 or 13 to 17, they were part-timing it. And if mom and dad, if you're listening, I'm sorry about that. That's what it is. Right? They I mean, it was a weekly boarding and they got me in the holidays, but other than that, they were getting me half of Saturday and Sunday. So I've got kids who are teenagers and you know, that that's where like the a lot of the conflict kicks in. So when I look back at how I related to my parents, there were there were times when um, it felt like they didn't get me or they were being too hard on me or there were mixed messages because they were sort of on one hand being free-spirited and saying like, if you want to smoke some spliff, Louie, like that's fine. Just be careful you don't get caught like kind of thing. Or other times it would be like, how dare you? You're going out there. You know, what what are you doing? Like it was like, well, which part of the are we being are you being countercultural kind of dudes or you going to be like Victorian parents? Like which is it? But in general, um, I kind of I kind of got it. I kind of got I got I kind of got that um, you know, that it was about there was a foundation of love and approval that was you know, was unconditional. And and and I think if I had anything to sort of and I to sort of reflect reflect or reproach them for, not reproach, but sort of reflect on things that in hindsight could have been different, it's the feeling that because they were work-focused and also because their relationship was complicated, sometimes it felt like um, that me and my brother and I were slightly a side effect. Like we weren't And it was it should again I could spin that as a positive actually. Like there was a sort of a level of us being autonomous. You know, we had whatever the opposite of helicopter parents is, they we slightly had that. Like they were like, okay, cool, you know, you do you. And and and um, and I think again, that can be I I'm kind of quite grateful in some ways for that. But um, you know, they had their own thing going on. It reminds me of something Tim Grover said, which I've repeated a few times. He says he used to train Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant. And he was I spoke to him on this podcast when we did the LA run. And he said that sometimes an event that happens in our life or something that happens can create our brilliance. It can be responsible in the case of that kind of void of independence your parents create create someone that works and that goes and gets stuff and that's able to travel and be an island. Um, but it also can create our dark side. Like the same event creates our brilliance, but also our dark side. So my question to you is from that particular experience of having that independence and feeling a bit like you were a side thing in their lives, what was then the the dark side? I can see the upside. What's the upside? Uh, for me it it felt like the upside you were saying is the independence you had. Yeah, yeah, I think that's right. Yeah, yeah, the being in the space to grow and become your own person and not feel that you're especially kicking against anything, but license to follow your own interest. I think that's all positive. I think um, uh, what is the the Look, I think in general, what you know, I've said this and probably someone else said it as well, like that you you know, what you think maybe your disability is also your superpower. And I think um, uh, I think that I in I think I've struggled with intimacy sometimes. My you know, and and I think I I I you know, in terms of relationship building in in my private life, like it's it's a running joke between me and my wife like that she's extremely sort of emotionally acute and that I'm slightly the opposite, which is kind of weird when you think about my job which hinges on supposedly being sort of maybe emotionally or psychologically perceptive, but it's almost as though but I see it in my mom as well. Like my mom having worked at the BBC went into um, therapy and became a relationship counselor. And it's funny because um, my mom also finds it difficult sometimes to to fully inhabit her her emotions. I hope that doesn't sound an odd thing to say. I I and and I don't I'm going to probably regret saying that, but let's make it about me. And I think with me, I think um, yeah, I don't always find intimacy easy. Like it's it it it's so so so I sort of experience like a lot of the times my work is is a license to be intimate without consequences. Like to get to to a bit like what you're doing now. Like you talk to people someone in a prison, you know, who's been sentenced to 10 life sentences. He's like, "Okay, how does that feel? So what is what's life like?" And and then kind of get getting Whatever happens to me all the work I've done in some sense is about attempting to peel layers back and and and see inside someone's psyche and then get on a plane and fly off and go home and live my normal life almost at a a less intimate plane of existence. And um so clearly, you know, and the other joke I've made over the years is like what makes me good at my job is also what makes me bad at life. So I So if for me it's I think and I think you if you ask my friends, they might say you know, be like, "Oh yeah, you know, Louis is a good guy." I hope they would say that. But but they'd also might say like he's a little bit absent. Like he's a little bit um I don't feel I'm an especially attentive or present friend. And and and you know, I'm not You know, some people are really gifted at friendship. Like they they like really get they're there and they think about and they make arrangements and I don't make really I'm not very good at social arrangements. All these sort of boring things that are the qualities that are really the stuff of life. Like um just getting together, reaching out. Are you okay? How's It's been a while since I saw you. I wanted to let's meet up. Let's which in general This is a crash generalization, but I think women are slightly better at than men. And I think that's been one of the many gifts my wife has given me is actually involving me in life. Like in a just a normal sort of neurotypical way. Whereas I my tendency would be to sort of disappear into my slightly incel-like shell, you know, of of kind of in a metaphorical shed of kind of counting I The joke I'm making my book is like you know, separating my collection of screws and nails into their different jars. You know what I mean? Like that for me is like that You know, a lot of guys be like, "Yeah, that sounds like heaven to have 2 hours to organize my shed." You know, and not and not realize that you're missing out on the tapestry of life. So I plead guilty to whatever that is. Maybe that's just being a man. I can I can relate to It's funny. I was having this conversation yesterday with my friends where they were saying, "Yeah, Steve doesn't like to socialize." You know, I I would rather sit upstairs for 7 days on my own working than like It was someone said to me, they said, "You meet all these wonderful people on this podcast and you and it's such a wasted opportunity that you don't text them, 'Hey, let's go for a coffee.'" And it's just outside of my nature. My nature is to sit alone on my laptop and work. Yeah. And so again, my girlfriend, my partner is the opposite. Yeah. So she's dragging me in. So I really appreciate quite a common dynamic. You know, not bragging, two nights ago I was at GQ Man of the Year. I see. Thank you. Applause. Thank you. Um I was one of the honorees and um so there was a like there was a a banquet, like a a bit a posh dinner catered by Heston Blumenthal. And you know, Stormzy was going to be there, Mo Salah, Leah Williamson, the footballer. I think getting rid of all the men must have been quite men now, it turns out. Extraordinary list of like Andrew Garfield, an extraordinary list of incredible people. And it wasn't even an awards banquet. It wasn't even like the BAFTAs like where you sit and sit through the speeches and then at half past 10 when you're starving hungry and quite tired, you sit down and eat your food. This was like a banquet banquet where you just sit around and have a delicious meal and then a few people pop up and say a few words between starter and the main course. So it was And it wasn't even that. It was like maybe a couple hundred people, like quite small as these things go. But the point is is before on the evening of I was like, "I don't want to go." And I said to I knew I had to go, but I said to Nancy, my wife, I was like, "I am not feeling this." She's like, "What is it?" I said, "I just I can't you know, I don't know. I just feel really anxious." And she's like, "But you're not even giving a speech, are you?" You know, cuz sometimes it's that like what if we win and I have to give a speech or or you're worrying about whether you're going to win. It's like I knew I was an honoree and I knew I wasn't going to say any I wasn't going to have to give a speech. And it was just the idea of of having to talk to people. Like in a relatively high high wattage setting. So you think like I don't want to be wandering around like a blithering idiot. So there's a sort of little stress that sits alongside that, but there was no real reason on paper why I shouldn't have been thinking, "Well, this is going to be amazing. This is going to be a night I'll remember my whole life." You know, and I attempted to adjust my mindset, you know, using kind of Paul McKenna-like or Uri Geller-like, you know, just visualize Think about what this is. This is going to be No one's expecting anything of you. This is a chance to sit down with some amazing people and have fun. But nevertheless, for the first kind of hour I was there just thinking I kept just sighing. And Nancy would be like, "What's the matter?" So I think that's just for what I I think that's in me. It's probably in a lot of a lot of people. And um you just deal with it. But you know, why why should that be the case? I don't I don't really know why. Is it something that comes with a cost and is it something you want to change? Uh If you're being really honest If I could dial down I think sometimes I think I have changed it actually is the first thing to say. Because there were times in my life where I said no to things just because I thought that's going to be a bit like the You know, I did the maypole dancing in the end and it went fine. I did learn This will surprise you, but I did learn how to read. And you know, despite all the anxiety I had about doing that. And so and then as life went on I think there were times when I said no to things, opportunities which probably just because the idea I was asked to go on David Letterman's chat show um when it was on CBS. This would have been in around 2001 and I said no cuz I thought that's just going to make me anxious. And looking back on it, I probably wish I'd done that. It's not a huge Why would that make you anxious? I find the chat show experience not especially I mean, I've done it a few times in a in a as life goes on it seems. You know, the idea of public speaking or you know, when I first got into TV it it was like, "Why am I doing this? This is not me. Like this is not what I was cut out for. This is not something that I aspire to do and it sounds really you know, the whole notion of it feels um intimidating and and and just a bad fit. And and nevertheless, I knew that you know, just briefly like I was working magazines as a as a journalist in New York and um that's I aspired to be a a TV writer. Partly as a way of sort of avoiding comparison with my dad. Not directly, but I suppose that was in my mind. I was like, "I want to write and be creative, but I know I'll never write books." You know, I didn't feel like I wrote when I wrote it didn't feel especially as though it came as easily as I as it should. You know, it's hard when your dad Like I relate to people with famous parents. Like you know, people like you know, Jakob Dylan who's Bob Dylan's son. I don't know why I reached for that comparison, but Jakob Dylan that track One Headlight. Do you remember that one? No. Okay. For people who know, they know. You know, it's a great track. It was a huge international hit, but his dad's Bob Dylan. That's a painful maybe not painful, but that's an extraordinary legacy to be born into. And in a in a related way like I was conscious of my dad his name as a writer really meant something and that it was um that if I was to attempt to write something it was going to be a case of very likely kind of falling short, at least in my own mind. But the idea of writing in television was was less I felt that would set would would wouldn't invite the same comparisons. Plus I used to watch TV and I liked TV and there was something about the democratic kind of nature of television. The fact that everyone watches TV. I thought, "Well, that's a way of working in a medium that will connect with people." And so it was in the mid-90s TV was uh in a kind of a mini golden age. The Simpsons was on, Seinfeld was on, Friends was just about to come on. There there were all these amazing TV shows. Larry Sanders was another one. Did you want to connect with people? You studied history at Oxford. And as someone that is appears to be a bit of an introvert by nature from what you've said about your experience of double I I have a duality where I'm partly shy and introverted and then partly outgoing and an extrovert. So with your writing and with the TV writing, was your and with the magazine writing I know you you did some I used to do um Spy and was it Metro in Boston? Metro in San Jose. San Jose, California. Was your Was your objective and the thing that you found fulfilling in your work from was that connecting with people? Uh Or was it just I don't I think I connected with people not to sound um you know, oxymoronic or whatever it is, no tautologies by connecting with people. Like in other words like I always find I do my best connecting Sounds a bit weird. face to face. I mean, maybe on one level, but in the end I think I was just trying to do good work and get approval. Maybe more than connection like just trying to sort of get an A at work. Do you know what I mean? Like so I would feel good and think like oh I got 10 out of 10 on my article or on my piece of writing my film review and then if people said to me that was really good. That was like getting it you know like you got a good review or whatever. You know you people people say like you you did a good job then it it was maybe a way of um it's just a little it's just a little uh spurt of whatever that is like just kind of pleasure. You know you just worthiness a feeling worth. You know I don't want I I think I've got a healthy relatively healthy sense of self-esteem but nevertheless I I think I I I whether I require it I enjoy you know getting I got a I've got a series out at the moment. This isn't my attempt to segue into the promotional portion of this interview but nevertheless here we are. I got a I've got a series out at the moment on iPlayer called Louis Theroux Interviews and we had one that went out a few days ago where I interviewed Bear Grylls an alumnus of this very podcast. I listened to your interview with him by the way. Thank you. In preparation and um and when it went out for whatever reason I think because I thought it was a good show and I hoped it would I hoped it would get a good reception. I was on um I thought I'm going to go on Twitter and see what people were saying. And it was surprisingly quiet. And then I felt a bit like um okay now I'm going to I'll try at Louis Theroux. I'll try hashtag Bear Grylls. I tried a few different search terms. And then I suddenly I had a vision of my you know you get a vision of yourself like oh wow I've become that grubby guy kind of like it's sort of sad isn't it like trying to fish for fish for approval in the vast swamp of the Twitterverse right? Casting my line and nothing much is coming back and I thought well and then one that came back I looked at it and it said just watched Louis Theroux's interview with Bear Grylls wow it was hella boring. And I was like I just caught a boot. And then I was like well that's what you get. And by the way it isn't boring. It's a great show. And the point I was trying to get to was um then couple of days later I got a review great review in the times. Just sort of pointing out all the things about it that I knew to be really really good. It was sort of the perfect review. You know a rave saying like this is fresh it's new it's different it's fun it's entertaining it's revealing and I felt really good and at one level it's like cuz before that the first three episodes I hadn't really checked Twitter. I thought I don't I'm not that guy anymore. I don't really care like I make the shows and I know they're good and the ones that aren't so good I know none of these is is a clunker. They're all solid and and then here and then and then I suddenly thought like oh I went back to I regressed into being the needy sort of the needy insecure person which is you know and and that guy is always there by the way I think a lot of people could probably relate to that which doesn't it doesn't mean you know which which is which is fine by the way but I suppose to your point um or you know in all the kind of work in the work I do it's not like is it an urge to connect like it's an urge to do good work and then it's nice for that to be recognized and as much as I I could I'd like to pretend that I don't really care whether people like it or not I do care actually. Do you know what's funny is my team is very honest with me and we're in the car the other day and I believe it was Holly Holly in my team who might be upstairs now and I said we were talking about your Louis's coming on the podcast. I said I've also got the new series out where he interviews people. I turned to I think it was Holly it might be someone else so sorry if it's someone else um I turned to them and said how is it cuz they'd seen it before me and they went it's actually really good. Oh nice. That's what they said to me and they would be and they would be so honest with me. They went it's actually really good and then they explained why it was good. here's my thing it's like that actually like isn't it is it's actually They went it's actually really good. But you see when I because I'm a very glass half empty kind of guy it's with respect to praise. So what I'm hearing there is it's actually surprising Yeah I'm hearing like cuz I'm hearing it is that a surprisingly and which is why would that be surprising? I can I think I can assert why it would be surprising. I think that the generation Holly's in they don't watch um shows like that on BBC One typically BBC Two BBC Two sorry but on the BBC shall I say yeah. But that's what I got from it is her generation who are like 22 23 who spend a lot of time on like Tik Tok and Instagram and these other platforms. I think it was I was actually quite surprised. and I think that's probably true and also I think in my world if I'm going to talk about stuff you know we're there's a troll in all of us right? And and and in general it's more enjoyable to talk about stuff and dunk on stuff because it's [ __ ] right? Like and that sounds horrible and I'm slightly over simplifying. I think you're right. There's a little part of especially in the in the journalistic or the in the in sort of the media village it's like did you see it? Nah yeah that was rubbish wasn't it? And there's a sort of reassuring feeling of like yeah let's all let's all give it a kicking. So so when you acknowledge that something's good you're sort of saying like I'm going to grudgingly acknowledge that that was good. I think you're correct. You know there's a bit of that. Yeah I think pretty much everything especially when cuz we probably consider ourselves working in the media industry. Sure. So for the team to go it's actually really good and then she went on to explain aren't that good They're not. I mean most things are fine but most things are like only about as good as they need to be. Especially in the interview format like how many other ways can you create an interview format that is original and inspiring and that's also what I got from her was like she was talking to me about the way the format was constructed. Yeah I think we pushed things forward a little bit. Like it's not a paradigm shift like we haven't completely flipped the script as they used to say in hip hop circles but it is you know we we worked on the grammar. We tried to do things a little differently so we created a for want of a better term format you know that allowed for elements of actuality just being silly having fun or being in life settings where the unexpected could happen but also bits of um uh conversation that would be going to places that were quite deep. So yeah thank you for that and that that's that's thank you for passing that on. TV I I read when you were 18 I think maybe 16 um if someone had said to you that you would end up in TV you would have you would have been sort of perplexed at how that would have the steps that it would have taken to get you there. You're you're in San Jose I believe at the time. Is that where Spy was the magazine? No I just to rewind and I and I also want to mention one other thing which is cuz we talked a little bit about studying and and I feel as though whatever that is that work ethic has stood me in good stead but I don't feel that that's often think there's you know a very understandable sort of misconception about the level of importance of academic work you know that whole stay in school kids and you know we were talking I think off off mic about Mr. Beast the YouTuber and you know the media landscape we're in now it it would just it's just simply not correct to say that oh the path lies through academic work right? And I was talking to my cousin Justin Theroux oddly enough he says Theroux who's an actor he's a director a writer. He wrote Tropic Thunder Iron Man 2. He's been he's also like high profile Hollywood actor. I interviewed him for my podcast. I'm not trying to plug that would be weird to plug one podcast on another podcast but he and he he was like someone who struggled in the academic he um flunked out of a school he went to another school where they recognized his special needs but the point is that I sort of think so many I think we under we there's a tendency to undervalue those parts of of um of life that that lead to success that that exists. I mean maybe you maybe I'm sort of out of line here cuz it sounds like you are all over this but those parts of like the parts of life that help me become whoever I am part of it's academic part of it's was almost inimical to academic success. It was the part that was free spirited and naughty and that was bunking off school and seeing movies and and or or get getting me in trouble and and and and whatever that is and it's hard to really bottle it and know quite what it is. You know there there is something that I struggle sometimes with over discipline right? And and or a sense of like doing well in controlled settings but actually it's that you need the yin and the yang of both and and when I went out and did stuff that was successful on TV like working doing my first segments at a show called TV Nation having been hired by Michael Moore when I was 23 partly like a work ethic you know doing preparation and being you know turning up on time as they say is like 90% of the battle but actually then being just sort of allowing those creative juices sort of to you know whatever that mysterious quality of um humor and connectivity just being silly and disruptive like those are really valuable. They say don't they they say conformity is great to succeed in school but it's not great to succeed in life. Maybe that's what it is. You kind of need to be to unconform once you get out. You sort of do and I think and and I want to come back to your question but but I do think that that's also, you know, three, four years ago I started a company and there's a part of me that's overly um so overly conventional, you know, and and as a result seeks out unconvention in my work and that's positive. You know, it could it means that I love spending time with people who feel like they give free reign to the darkest weirdest impulses that I think to an extent we all share but keep repressed. You know, whatever those happen to be, people involved in sex work or people involved in religious cults or hate groups and and that's all my stock in trade is talking to those people cuz I feel as though I kind of get it. Like I I understand that those that that's part of the full complement as horrible as it might sound to say like we all have like unacknowledged and secret impulses that you know, we we have sort of civilized you know, and and kept and repressed into into you know, we've inhibited them into our souls so that we can function and and not go to be sent to prison or whatever or be canceled. But for me like I I I sort of I do it to a fault to the point where I worked at the BBC in house in BBC studios just cuz I sort of like the idea of the structure. Like I'm a company man going to the factory and you know, building my TV programs but not owning them and cuz I just thought you know, and I like going to the can I used to love working at TV center cuz it felt like going to the factory and then eating at the TV center canteen. You know, it just felt felt like comfortable. You know, my my granddad worked at the London water board his whole life. He had one job that he started when he was 18 and and finished when he was whatever 65. You know, to some extent those were the times but that temperament is slightly in me. The whole time when when when he left they gave him some box of cutlery. You know, that was the you know, you work here for 47 years. Here's your silver your silverware in a walnut case. It was on a it was in pride of place like not pride of place. It wasn't on the mantelpiece but you you used to we used to look at it that's what grandpa got when he worked at the London Metropolitan water board for 47 years. You know, you would sort of reverence it like and it was only used for special occasions and and there's a little bit of that in me and so when I finally went outside the BBC and set up a company three or four years ago. I'm sure most of your listeners probably have their own or many of them not most but many of them will have their own companies or will be fully cognizant of what it takes to make it in the sort of the world of of of free market and entrepreneurship but for me that was just absolutely not my lane and it was my wife who pushed me to do it and so that was a a case of me needing to break out of whatever I was doing and say, "Do you know what? Whatever you think that is risky or mysterious or you know, a bit spivvy. You know, like there's a little bit of judgment like oh, I don't want to be one of the yuppie guys like we just had an IPO. I'm I've just got my first Maserati." Like that kind of thing cuz I'm I'm antagoni- you know, I'm complete that that whole mindset. I feel like I'm alienating maybe some of your listeners. Like it's not my mindset. Like I'm just like I I almost valorize the opposite of that. You know, to an probably an extent that's sort of faintly unhealthy. Like like I don't want to be the guy I don't want to flash car. I don't want to flash clothes. I don't want anything. I want to be anti-flash, right? Like my watch, you can see this. My wife was saying to me last night, you know, maybe time for a new watch. This is a Casio whatever that one is. It's a F91W. These cost like 10 pounds, 15 pounds. You can get them at Argos. Do you have you ever seen that watch before? I have. I was listening to a program about Andrew Tate on the way here, a podcast. You know who Andrew Tate is? Yeah. What's your Anyway, Andrew Tate feels like he's that guy reduced to its quintessence where he's like one of his catchphrases was people say, "Why have you got a you know, green Bugatti?" Do you know this meme? And what does he say to them? He says he says what color is I say to them, "What color is your Bugatti?" Right? That's him in a nutshell. He's like unapologetically troll-like ostentatious displays of wealth and arrogance, right? So I'm the anti-Tate. You can put that on my you put that on my gravestone, the anti-Tate. So I'm like I don't give a [ __ ] about your Bugatti. I think it's embarrassing that you have one. But you know, fine. You know, and that's kind of a joke. Like that's I I want my point really is that that's something I need to keep an eye on. You know, cuz actually ostentatious almost like ostentatious humility is its own poison. Like like why are you so wedded to the idea of having a [ __ ] watch? By the way, it's not a [ __ ] watch. It's completely reliable and it's I've never had it. The only thing that goes on it is the strap. So you so I've got one that's got a you can replace the strap. After about five years the strap goes. I've got two of these. I'm not bragging. I've got one I've got my I've got my spare one in case I can't find this one. Anyway, last time my wife said it might be time for a new watch. I've got to embrace I'm trying to lean into being the guy that isn't showing off about what a lack of what a not show-off he is. I you think I've lost the thread. I haven't. The point I'm getting to is that so I needed to start a company and not cuz it's it's oddly infantilizing after a while. Like there's nothing there's nothing cool about making like hundreds of hours of TV and and not owning any of it, right? That's just me being a little bit of a chump and partly that's you know, there's a quid pro quo I suppose like well, you don't get stressed. You turn up. You're making things for a public broadcaster. You're getting a decent salary for sure. But people would say like what? You know, everyone else so who do you work for? I said well, I'm BBC. I'm on contract. I I work from contract to contract three years at a time. Like really you don't have your own company? Like no. Why not? Like you know, cuz everyone else does like Jamie Oliver or Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall or or you know, whoever you care to mention any presenter Bear Grylls with of any longevity would would be making their own shows. You know, it's it is a it's a no-brainer. And I was like I guess I'm fine doing my I'm a creature of habit. You know, that was sort of what I'm just sort of fine. I don't want to mess around with it. And then having done it three or four years ago like yeah, I probably should have should have done it a bit earlier. But it it's so so it's that thing of the point which now landing on the point sounds a bit banal was that you can sort of get in being a creature of habit being sort of embracing the whatever that you know, your own sense of self as risk-averse and conventional. Sometimes you know, I needed to challenge myself in order to discover that there was a you know, a world out there that was sort of more creative, more lucrative, more fun, more adventurous. That's happened a few times in your life where you've kind of taken a leap into the unknown which is actually quite surprising having you know, described yourself as a creature of comfort even habit. Have habit, sorry. Well, no, let me to habit. Like I'm trying to like tell you off. I didn't say habit. Maybe of comfort as well although but habit is really what I meant. Yeah. Creature of habit. Cuz I cuz I was reading about when you made the transition from being a writer to a TV presenter and I remember writing some quotes about how how there was one about feeling like an impostor a little bit to some degree and getting on that plane to go and interview these Christians when once Michael Moore had sort of put you at front and center in the documentary and thinking what the [ __ ] am I doing here? Yeah, that was I remember it vividly. It's extraordinary as you go through life so much disappears but there are times when you realize you're at this mo- momentous moment. I suppose often it's high stress moments which is really revealing, isn't it? Because actually risk avoidance, you know, that that almost like my mind's whizzing now but that bent the my idea like the greatest happiness, you know, in philosophy there's a utilitarian ideal that's supposed to be the the metric for how you judge whether an action is good or not and it's like the greatest will it cause the greatest happiness of the greatest number of people. But then if you unpack that like well, what is happiness? Like and what actually how do you measure it and how do you measure is it happiness in the moment? Is it happiness as it's recollected over time? Is it a happiness that you know, you can that will spread to other people or you know, it will exist for 100 years. And and so actually there's there's a sense of fear and discomfort that will subsequently lead to sense of of of of triumph or self-satisfaction. I know, is it happiness? Is it I don't know. Like that fear is such a such a blunt instrument for attempting to measure reality and and in general fear which you would equate with unhappiness can very often be what ends up creating the conditions for real achievement and I I I I remember sitting on this plane having been given a job by Michael Moore as a presenter on your TV nation. It was a network TV show on NBC one of the the then three networks in America. I was 23. I was as I say awkward in every apparent way disqualified for being correspondent on a network TV show. I was in the I was having to I was in the union like you know, as it I probably still the case but definitely then these TV shows were unionized to an extent in America further than they would be in the UK. So, I would be I was in the Writers Guild of America as a result of being hired. And so, they were required to fly me business class. Like, I don't think I'd ever been in business class. And somehow that contributed to my imposter syndrome, my sense like I shouldn't really be here. I remember sitting there thinking like, this is all kinds of wrong. Like, I don't know what I'm doing here. I don't know why they think I'm qualified to do this. And nevertheless, this is what's happening. And and I was there was a segment that was about, you know, TV Nation was a kind of satirical, fact-based comedy show where you went out and slightly made fun of people with to prove a political point or to sort of make some sort of social point. So, I was interviewing religious cults about when the end of the world was going to happen. So, it was sort of like slightly cheeky um irreverent take on religious fanaticism or religious weirdness. So, I was like, I wanted to know, so when will the world end? Is it on a Tuesday? How can I get prepared? And I was sort of wide in a wide-eyed way. Oh, no. Like, will there be, you know, I know the spaceships going to land. And what will the aliens look like? But I was just incredibly conscious of of thinking like, why have I been given this huge um it felt like a big slab of pressure. And and sort of license to fail very publicly and very embarrassingly. And and I also knew I wasn't you know, but I also wasn't so disconnect connected from reality that I didn't think like, well, it's a huge opportunity. Like, my and my my girlfriend at the time was very supportive. And she's like, you know, you you should you you can do this, Louis. Like, you're you're really good with people. And and um and and you know, don't don't don't worry. Like, you you can you've got this. You can handle it. Did you try to talk yourself out of it? I was It wasn't like I ever thought I um I I won't do it. Like, there was no question of like, I'm going to do it. Like, I have to do it. But I I I sort of didn't want to do it. Does that make sense? Has that been typical of your life where you know you've got to do it, but it feels kind of painful and anxious as you approach the challenge? Even like with starting your own company. Oh, yeah, I think so. Like, there's times when I you know, I suppose that's where the work ethic part fits in or whatever like that part of if if you commit to doing something, like, I'm very I I hate to let people down. Like, if I commit to doing something um or turning up on time or I still struggle with that part. Like, especially as you're in the when you're in the public eye or you're in demand and people writing ask for things. I still you know, will you come to our school and give a talk or I do I I I'm I'm a very I'm very agreeable in that sort of technical sense. I'm very inclined to agree to do things. And that can get you in trouble because you find you're over I I find I over agree and make unrealistic commitments. Like, oh, that'll be fine. And then I'll do that and then I'll do that. And then you look at it and you're like, there's just no way on earth I can do all of these things. So, I try and ring-fence my commitment levels. But that's not easy. So, but in in a positive way um that sense of like feeling like I need to show up having agreed to do it, having been offered an a an opportunity even though it might sound enormously stressful. Like, I would never I think there's maybe a world in which I never got into TV. I don't know quite what I did end up doing. The thing that it makes me reflect on is the extent to which we're conditioned and groomed into behaviors that can be healthy or unhealthy or positive or not positive. And I think that's the part of the libertarian ethos that I have a huge well, among others that I have a huge issue with. It's like, oh, just let people be themselves. People need help to fulfill their potential, right? That idea that oh, you know, you can pull yourself up by the bootstraps. Like, I with all the advantages I had of like a first-rate private education, supportive parents, you even I like didn't see myself as someone who would have various kinds of success. I didn't feel that that was in me for whatever reason. But other along the way, people among Michael Moore, um people at the BBC who then commissioned me to do my own series off the back of TV Nation when I got commissioned to do Weird Weekends, my wife Nancy, other people along the way have sort of seen things in me that I didn't see in myself. Even this interview series going out at the moment. I I never It sounds awful. I never aspired to have like a TV interview series. Like, it was something would be mentioned from time to time. And I would say like, that's not really me. You know, I like going out like my my comfort like my happy place really is in terms of TV like, oh, go and be in a prison for 2 weeks and film the inmates or go to a mental hospital or go to a um a brothel. Like, I made a film about a brothel. And just hang out there for 2 or 3 weeks and just be a That that to me is I sounds awful. But that's that's like pure bliss like work-wise. But the idea of oh, we'll have a formal sit-down interview and you'll talk to someone famous who probably only has a couple of hours for you. And then we'll piece it all together and do stuff. I I never thought like that's really something I want to do. But Patrick Holland, who was then in charge of BBC 2, had listened to my podcast and said like, I really think this would work. Some not this exactly, but there's a there's there's a TV show that takes aspects of this that could exist that would, you know, involve you talking to people. And I and I remember you would think like, oh, that would That must have been exciting. Like, someone saying like, I want to do it this TV format involves sort of partly chat show, partly documentary. I just thought I didn't think like, that's something I'll never do. I did think like, I just felt very blank about it. I know that's horrible. People are going to listen to this and throw up in their cars. But I just thought that sounds sort of stressful. I'm not sure if I really want to do that. What But I made myself The point is I made myself do it because I had a team around me who I knew expected me to do it. And at some level I had enough sense to recognize that it was an opportunity. These people that have seen things in you that you maybe couldn't at the time have seen in yourself or seen roles for you that you maybe at the time couldn't have seen for yourself. Michael Moore, Nancy, and then people at the BBC that you mentioned. Are you aware of what they're seeing in you? Now in hindsight, what they saw I think so. And I think in with with a bit of time I've been able to appreciate um that I know it sounds sort of glib and maybe even false modest. But to to appreciate that I have something to offer. um What is that? Well, um Makes you feel uncomfortable when you're asking these questions. No, no, I'm fine with it. Like, cuz I feel as I I can analyze it um with with the benefit of 25 years of doing it. I think it's something to do with like a little bit of intelligence, a little bit of humor, a little bit of un sort of unsought awkwardness. Like, I think that's part of it. Like, just being a little bit awkward. A little bit of um sort of authenticity. Or or whatever that is. Like, just sort of feeling like I think maybe that that same thing of not really fully chasing it or fully sort of needing it, oddly enough, is almost the You know, it's like, to go through the door, you have to not want to go through the door too much. I don't know if that's even That's definitely not a saying and it doesn't actually make any sense. But whatever sense you can make of that contradictory statement. If you want it too much, I think that there's there's then you need to step back and think about quite It's almost like then you're not ready um grasshopper. Is that the Did you grasshopper? Is that what they used to say in Karate Kid? I think if I can talk if I can call you a grasshopper, Steve. No. Um you know, it's like it's that feeling of you know, at the end of the day um there's more important things in life. And um I don't want to overdo I actually got lost in my metaphor a bit. But I think in the end it's like those different qualities of of of of it's it's that complement of qualities. And then just luck. But I don't think luck really is a quality. But alongside I'm now at the the position where having done my job for long enough, it's put me in a slight I think there's loads of people who could be uh whoever I am. Like, occupy that cultural place that I'm in. But you know, and and partly I've earned my place here and partly I've been really lucky. But I think you know, when you said something earlier, it also made me think of another quality which is to do with which isn't a negative thing, which is that you you know, that idea like you when you were told you know, when I was told that oh, you know, Patrick want you know, is quite keen to do some sort of talk format or some interview thing where you're on TV. And I and I just think like, well, I'm not really sure. I I I think one of my cuz it goes back to what you were asking earlier about uh what what is the downside of these various qualities? Like, I do think there's a term anhedonic. Have you ever heard that term? It just means I think it's a clinical term. But it sort of sort of means averse to pleasure or lacking in pleasure. Like, there's a part of me again that um I think my wife has helped me with is that I I kind of sense that I'm not always connected to pleasure. Does that sound weird? Like, I you know, sometimes I I sort of drift through life and and I have to sort of stop and remind myself. I think because I I sort of I I tend to see downsides and I'm I'm working on that and I I really do like I I sort of need to It's really odd like I've won three BAFTAs, not bragging. Uh it just came up and I and I mentioned it's a fact. And um and when you win a BAFTA you've got a lot of awards up there. I'm not seeing a BAFTA. Maybe those are just I presented a BAFTA to someone else. Some of them one's a camera. I'm not sure that camera is an award or You can do a cutaway of that later. You know, it's odd like I my main thing on winning each time I won a BAFTA my first always been oh [ __ ] now I have to give an acceptance speech, right? And I have to get up there. And um you know, in high like the pleasure you you get a little pleasure over the subsequent years when you can bring it up again and again as I like to do. But actually, it's really odd like I I most of the time when I get good news sometimes I don't even I can't notice the good news. Does that sound really weird? No, that makes sense. know if that makes Thank you for saying that. I think you're being polite. I'm not someone who I'm not someone who um is who who automatically feels connected to the good things that happen to them. How does one remain happy if they have that kind of default oh my god where am I going to put this third BAFTA that I've won or now I have to do a speech? but you just sort of follow your routine. You know, and actually I am a happy person and um I um I you know, I I I take pleasure in the simple things in life. You know, I I I like um doing stuff with a you know, stuff with the family or you know, really I really am against I'm terrible I've met a simple pleasure like I watch I like watching Match of the Day at the weekend. Like you say like yeah, okay, lots of people like doing that. What's that? But you know, like that that for me is one of the small things in the week where I'm like I know I'm going to be happy for the next 45 minutes or or hour. You know what I mean? Or on a on a Saturday night I listen to Loose Ends on Radio 4. And often I'll be cooking and and that's a small thing and I get a little a little tiny little boost out of I've known I'm going to enjoy it. I've usually I enjoy listening to it. There's little thing I I mean I'm not if someone says like you're going to go on holiday to the Bahamas you know, what I'm trying to imagine what a really big happy thing would be. I I would normally experience that as as stress and anxiety. I think that's quite normal though holidays are stressful, aren't they? Maybe you've got your priorities in order in fact because you don't seem to be compelled or um or derive your happiness from like the big wanky stuff from like the Lamborghini, the Bugatti, the BAFTA. Yeah, what color's your Bugatti? The GQ man of the year stuff. You seem seem to derive it from the the simple intrinsically fulfilling things like, you know, cooking, listening to a thing that's intellectually stimulating. So maybe you we're all like maybe everyone else is a weirdo and you're actually incredibly normal. I don't know. I I think there's more of us out there than you might think but maybe not. We're all trapped in our own brains. There's no way of measuring. I do think that you know, I mentioned that when I saw that I got a nice review in The Times that gave me like as I said, it gave me a buzz. You care about your work though. You really care about Well, that wasn't even about I mean I do care about the work. I mean work is a big source of pleasure like in the sense of either being on location and um being aware of it going well and getting into an almost like a mindset in an interview of feeling like yeah, this is all good. Like I feel connected. I feel uh cuz it's a high stress you know, I'm I'm sure you have a little bit if you have an interview with someone you feel like you've been trying to book it for a while. Uh the moment comes you're like the next 2 hours are really important. You want it to go smoothly. You want it to feel like a revealing encounter. You you want to be probing and insightful and attentive and immersed but not distracted but also thinking ahead and and all of that's going on and then it starts and then you feel like oh it's going okay and then afterwards you're like that was a good one. And then in the edit you're putting it together and you're piecing things in like that all of those the simple pleasures of of craft, you know, like it's really and it is simple like it's no great mystery but that that's that's a big part of um of how I connect with uh well, my own happiness. How do you connect with people? So actually I wanted to ask you this for my own sort of learning. You've done this for multiple decades. You've sat with people from every corner of the world who have all of these different experiences and some of them are a little bit, you know, in the nicest sense a little bit out there. Mhm. I'm glad I landed with a PC world. Yeah. out there. what the non-PC world But you have It was funny when I asked you about the qualities you have. I think you absolutely nailed it and all of those make you incredibly disarming. That almost like a lack of intense seriousness makes you a really disarming individual. Um how do you connect with people? How intentional is your approach to connecting with them? In your new interview series but also just generally. Some of it is stuff that you know, I didn't I just sort of came by by accident probably most of it which is a thing you know, natural curiosity which I think you have. A feeling of um of just just wanting to know what why people do the things that they do, right? And and and sort of getting out of your own way a bit, you know, in the sense cuz the question I get asked most often is like what how do you not get angry with some of these people especially the ones who are sort of spewing hate or coming out with stuff that's really objectionable. I find it slightly confusing question because I think that's so it's so far from what's in my head most of the time. I'm genuinely like why if it if it is someone like say a neo-Nazi or someone involved in religious intolerance I'm just so curious about what takes someone to that place. What what what's in their mind but to actually berate them to give them a hard time or even be particularly journalistically confrontational, that's not that's not my default mode. You know interesting cuz I just think in life generally those who like seek to even in our personal relationships and romantic relationships those that seek to understand tend to build bridges but if you seek to like as you say berate I get told off on this podcast a lot on like Twitter and in the press like because I don't berate people. Like when I had Matt Hancock here, I asked him the questions I really wanted to know but I didn't I didn't come to berate him. No. He would have gone shh. Yeah. The wall would have gone up had I done that. There's other ways of and some people use a confrontational approach and that's fine and then I think in general um you know, there's many ways of doing interviews and I think probably you know, I haven't interviewed many politicians and it's probably related to that. The feeling that they they they have their they tend to have their guard up. They tend to be uh follow a strategy of of attempting to be as as risk-averse headline-averse as as possible and it's like those aren't the people I'm I'm interested in people who are genuinely attempt who feel like they've got something figured out or or or are involved in a in a world or a lifestyle or just some situation that is is either self-sabotaging or or filled with angst. So in the end I see it as not I'm not trying to get one over on people. I'm not trying to I honestly most interviews I see as a as a potential win-win. You know what I mean? Like I I sort of think like well there's no there's no reason why you shouldn't tell me the truth and you're involved in something that you're relatively open about and and I'll I'll just assume that that's probably the case. Now obviously you're briefed. You've done as much research as you can. But um I think if you feel as though you're coming from a position of um sort of shared inquiry then that's contagious. Um I think also I sort of tend to think I think there's some part of me thinks that maybe the other person's got it figured out and I haven't, right? A level of humility. So that when they say stuff I'm genuinely thinking like well, I guess maybe or or they say something bonkers I'm like well that isn't right but I enjoy bumping up against that and I don't go in there thinking I'm going to I'm going to get this person. Like I'm going to get one over on them. I sort of feel as though you know, you come in and you just sort of try and just see what's going on, you know? If if people see like you're you're attempting to wrestle intimacies from them, that's never going to go well. You just create the space and the sense of of understanding and allow them to sort of walk through that. Everything you've just described there that creating the space to like understand them, the humility which is ultimately creates that safety which allows them to open up Mhm. are the exact things that I know my partner wants from me in all of our interactions. Mhm. So because you've got that skill in your work, I'm here assuming that you also have that at home. Mhm. Is that correct? Um I think I could work better on it. Like I'm very aware that the skill set I often think about the skills that I have in my work of being supposedly a good listener and an empathetic and present person I I slightly fail at in a kind of I think a very probably normal way in in my relationship. Like I I have a very happy marriage and probably you should check that with Nancy cuz I'm aware I'm slightly reviewing my own restaurant if I can use that metaphor. And but yeah, on Goodreads I gave my book a five out of five. And and you know, I'm giving my marriage five out of five. Uh so I think I think I could do I think I could I could improve. This episode is brought to you by Mercedes-Benz who recently got in touch to support the Diary of a CEO. Thank you. I'm a huge fan of their cars. In fact, I have one of my own which is like an office on wheels. And they have an exciting wide range of cars that I'd love to tell you about. The Mercedes EQ is the luxury electric range of Mercedes-Benz and it is available across many models from the SUVs to the saloons meaning they're ideal for all business needs. The innovative next generation technology found in all Mercedes EQ cars is really paving the way for the electric car industry. To make your electric car switch so much easier, Mercedes-Benz has a service called Mercedes me charge. It's a subscription which provides you with access to a wide network of charging stations across the entirety of the UK. 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Intel has spent over 15 years developing this technology with ecosystem partners and I truly think it has the potential to move businesses forward making your business journey far more productive and efficient. So I really encourage you to go and find out more at intel.co.uk/vpro and let me know what you think because for me, I know it's added no end of benefit to all of our systems and business continuity. In your autobiography on page 157 Are you serious? Yes. Got to get through this. My life in strange times in television. Do you know what I'm going to say? Get it on audiobook for an extra chapter about Jimmy Savile. That's true. Speaking of page 157 and Jimmy Jimmy Savile on that page your former wife, seeing as we're talking about relationships and reviewing them etc., she said there's nothing real about you. Yeah. And to the point of Jimmy Savile, he also said something which was to the same vein about insincerity being your specialty. Yeah. That's good. Glad you brought that up. It's quite a telling so ringing piece of self-exposure where where yeah, I my wife and Jimmy Savile both make the same critique of my interpersonal qualities finding me lacking in basically authenticity, lacking in sincerity. There's nothing real about Well, the first thing is when a relationship is ending um you seize whatever you can to hurt the other person. I think it's I think when someone you really love and you think really loves you. I mean I it was my girlfriend at the time although we were married and that's a whole other complicated but but yeah, when that relationship was ending I think there's a feeling of betrayal, isn't there? It's like I thought we were we were together forever and I trusted that that would be the case and and here we are clearly you don't feel the same way and and so I'm in the position of in her eyes being a kind of traitor, inauthentic, someone who didn't deliver on um on what was promised. Although it wasn't promised but what was what seemed to be implicit. Um I think uh yeah, insincere I mean I remember where we were like when the Jimmy Savile the first documentary I made about Jimmy Savile when he was alive, when Louis met Jimmy not available on the iPlayer um but it's on the internet. You can find it. And um I remember when we promoted it um before I think it was when we promoted it and he he agreed to do an interview to promote it and he part of that was a profile interview in the Guardian and he was interviewed at at King's Cross in one of the in the hotel there in one of the hotel rooms and the guy from the Guardian came down. I don't even know why I don't even know why it came up um but I made a joke and he said uh insincerity, your specialty. Gosh, you're asking me to get inside the mind of Jimmy Savile to think about what he meant when he criticized me? I think he thought that um I think that journalistic role where um Well, I think I think you know what it is is like the best constr- there's two constructions I can put on that. One is just that in journalism you're sort of required to inhabit this place of intimacy like I actually like, "Hey, let's do this and let's do that." And then afterwards you sort of disconnect and sometimes that can feel jarring. I don't think actually that's what he meant though. Like I think I think maybe in some cases there's a there's a part of journalism that can feel slightly instru- no, sort of transactional where you're like "Let's bro down on location and and have fun." And and yet if you looked at it dispassionately, it's slightly cynical and calculating. It's like, "Well, you're doing this for a TV program." And and so there's a part of that I slightly feel a little bit uncomfortable. I think really what he was talking about there was a sense of humor. Um he was he was calling out my sense of humor which is sometime an aspect of it which sometimes involves um almost self-parody like an element of where you say something uh almost as a way of par- sort of parodying or satirizing your own This isn't going to make any sense, Steve, but you satirize your own worst impulses. Like the best example I can give is when I said to um when I was with Neil and Christine Hamilton, right? I did a program and they were accused of sexual assault and and while I filmed with them and then I uh and then it became a media circus and I carried on filming and then they did a deal with the Mail on Sunday to sell their story and I was interviewing them during all of this and I said to Christine "How how much did the Mail on Sunday pay for you uh for the interview?" I was just curious cuz I knew probably they got 10 or 15 or 20,000 pounds and I was just curious. And Christine said, "I'm not going to tell you." And I said to Christine "Christine, this is me. I'm not a journalist. I'm a friend. Like you can tell me." And a lot of people gave me [ __ ] for it, right? Like that what I said. But in my mind like that was a funny thing to say because quite obviously um I am a journalist and whether I'm a friend or not is actually not established. I'm not clearly not a friend but I'm not also clearly a friend, right? So that was kind of a funny remark because I was being nakedly insincere. Hm. Which is fun like sometimes to me what's funny is saying like not like so saying the wrong thing, saying the thing that's sort of brazen as a way of of just sort of identifying the hypocrisy and having fun with it. So I I tend to think that I think that's what Jimmy Savile meant was that sometimes I would say things that would kind of definitively either untrue or quite clearly being said because they were not clearly true. Anyway, that's why you asked that question and when you ask a question about Jimmy Savile, I'm going to give you a long answer because it's easy to be misconstrued but I think that's what he meant. I think I'm in general like fairly um a fairly straight-up person. But I also think that the tendency to believe your own [ __ ] to drink your own Kool-Aid is is almost universal, almost a precondition of life, right? You know, Nietzsche, the German philosopher uh who I try not to quote too much cuz it makes me sound pretentious but he has he has a couple of really good quotes on this where one is um for the true deceiver, you know, for the most effective deceiver, first he must believe his own deceptions. I'm mangling that quotation but the idea that in order to con someone, you sort of have to believe the most effective con artist is the one who believes their own con, you know? You and you know like or a seducer. Like they say that about Casanova, you know, one of the most um notorious womanizers um in human history. And they say that he actually each time he seduced someone, he fell in love with them. Hm. You know, maybe it's true for sales in general like you really got to If you believe in that and and so I'm I'm fully aware that for me to say like I'm an authentic human being and that my journal- journalism relies on a kind of true connection. I'm I'm I you know there's there's a little part of me that thinks like I think I believe that. Um I'm pretty sure I I pretty I I know I do believe that, but I'm not my own best reference on whether or not that's really the case. I neglected my personal life to focus on achieving some sort of professional success. The price of my lack of emotional nous was paid by those nearest and dearest to me. When did you get that feedback? Cuz I remember the times in my life where I've got that feedback from friends, family, romantic partners. And at first sometimes we sometimes argue against it. We go [ __ ] off, and then we walk away and we go this is true. I think I've had that feedback in my relationships more or less um consistently. Uh and and and until maybe four or five six years ago. Like I think again I I feel like I'm reviewing my own book. Like and now folks I am happy and healthy and well-adjusted. And I've arrived at a spiritual place of tranquility. But I do I am conscious that I am all through my 20s and 30s I saw my relationships as a um Um I think I think the other phrase I use is is like I saw my relationships as a life support system for my kind of work self. Do you know what I mean? Amen. I can relate. Instead of the other way around, you know? And so I would say like well, I would take off when I went to work for Michael Moore it was even back in in the 90s it was a source of friction in the relationship that like without much warning cuz I became the fill-in guy who when other state people couldn't do segments or because they were they found it weren't available, weren't stressed about it. I I'd be like let's get Louis to do it. I I I did a lot of great segments just by being available at a moment's notice to fly somewhere and and never thought really which I don't know that that that it was the wrong thing to do at that time. Like we didn't have kids. Um And so I'd be like okay, I'm off for three or four days. And um but as it went on and then as I had kids um and I was still doing the same thing. Sort of saying to my wife well, this is what I do. There's a chapter in my book called This Is What I Do. You know, you knew when we married that we would be um that I was a sort of globetrotting TV documentary maker. And she um she said, yeah. What did I do when we when we met? I was a TV director as well. And I've changed what I do, and you need to change what you do. Like I don't mean to sound like she was being horrible about it, but her attitude was like people make a you need to make an adjustment to accommodate the fact that we now have two small children. And How did you receive that? Um At first. I think I received that as well, not not well. Like I it didn't make me angry, but it I I was somewhat inflexible. Because my attitude was look, I was because I went you know, my parents had it my dad traveled a lot for work. My mom was a full-time TV producer. And we had people at home au pairs who um who made sure that when we got home someone was there and would make us a meal. And so I was like well, we just need to get help. She said, I don't want I don't want us to get help. I said you she said what I said you I said you can do whatever you want to do. You you can carry on working five days a week, six days you can travel as well if you want. We just need to get help. And she's like I don't I want one of us to be here. And I want for some of that I want it to be you. I don't know, does that sound You sound like me. Really? Yeah. Yeah. And I was like well I said I I guess I don't see it that way. So it became a bit of an impasse for a while. And then? And then um well, then we had another child. And um and she said, well, now we've got a baby and two small children. And you've agreed to take to make sure you're only working in the UK. And I was like, did I agree to that? And she said, yes. And I couldn't remember it, but I was like well, she's probably right. And um Did you make rules? I read that you made some rules. I wouldn't go away for more than two weeks. And um and actually for most of the time it was between sort of a week and 10 or 12 days. Are you flexible now? I don't want to make my wife sound like I know there's some people out here that go like well you know, Louis was obviously bringing back the bigger wage and and so he should have been I I honestly think my wife was right about most of that. I feel the same way about my partner. And it's almost identical though. It it took me to find the right person to compromise my inflexibility where they they made the case to me that quality time and this relationship was actually an equal priority let's say to the work. And with the right person I was finally willing to bend. And I was finally willing to you know So but I think it takes the right person. To me it does anyway. Yeah, the right person, the right relationship, the right life stage. I also say that these interviews I'm doing part of that is an agreement that we made well, even an agreement a kind of agreement I made with myself in lockdown and being around my kids are now 16, 14, and 8. You know, it turns out older children in many respects need more management, need more sort of parental presence in their lives than younger children. And so I said, well, maybe a way for me to travel less and not be taking off for you know, two or three months a year cuz you aggregate those two-week trips or 10 and they add up to maybe a quarter or a third of the year. And now I I can I can my schedule is much more I said like if I do these interviews and we make TV shows in the UK and that this is a more controllable schedule and I can be around more. Nancy helped me set up the company. She's working more. I'm home more. And so it's actually like it turns out conforming to those expectations of family involvement it is really positive. Like it can actually be a creative boon, you know? It's not the enemy necessarily. It can be it can make you a more rounded person that ends up being beneficial. That's exactly what I used to think it was. I used to think it was the enemy of my professional success, but I've come to learn that it's actually the friend. It's the same yeah, serves it. Um you mentioned anxiety throughout this conversation. Now sometimes when people talk about anxiety they talk about it as in um like like an emotion. They kind of it's a flippant word to describe a situation where you're thinking a little bit much. But then there's what people would describe as sort of real anxiety. That kind of crippling like oh, you know, that we all felt that's like insane unshakable sort of deep nervousness about a situation and worry. Which one are you referring to? Uh I think the first one. Like I I don't think I've ever had a panic attack for example. Um I don't think I've ever had a feeling of um kind of in being incapacitated. I mean I've had moments where I've had stage fright or mo- you know, that that thing where due to you you just get I even recently like there's been moments where you just get this sort of tremulous feeling of nerves and your voice starts to shake. Have you ever had that? Where you've been in a situation where or sometimes it's just sometimes it's it's to do with your in you get into an argument with someone and you get really upset and your voice goes a bit like this. Like it doesn't you know, it was just kind of horrible. Uh or sometimes it's just where you feel like you're you I've been once or twice in in situations where um I just think oh, this isn't going well. And then your your confidence goes. I don't know if that's quite that's sort of nerves which is slightly different from anxiety. Anxiety like where but the anxiety I mainly mean is just a kind of sense of foreboding, a pervasive feeling of um of worry about something that's going to happen. Cuz one of the things we talk a lot about on this podcast is about mental health and about how that affects people that are in high-profile, high-stress positions. What's your you know, mental health is a topic that kind of emerged in cultural relevance about maybe a decade ago now. But when I was a kid I didn't understand it. I didn't know what that was. And I I'll be honest, I think the stigma was very much my belief. It was kind of like people are crazy some people are crazy. Yeah. Yeah. Um what's your journey been like with your own mental health? I feel really lucky to have um broadly speaking good mental health. I also think what you're saying is exactly right. And I think that there's a kind of there's a continuity a blurring that exists so that um you know, I think mental health as opposed to mental illness is a good way of thinking about it. Like that cuz actually um we should all be striving towards being our best selves. We should all be managing our anxiety. I think a lot of men especially fail even to recognize when their mental health may not be as good as it could be. And in the extreme end you've got incapacitating mental illness that requires sort of interventions, possibly medication even sort of residential rehab settings. But for for for the rest of us it's just it's keeping an eye on on how you're doing. And and know you know, sometimes I notice my emotions from the outside. Like I I notice that I my voice is raised. I'm like wow, I'm angry. You know, like or or and even when I'm sad I or grumpy or whatever it is, I'm not the first really to see it. Or my wife will say like, "Are you in a bad place?" I think we've been guilty of failing to see mental health as a holistic condition. Like in other words, that your support network needs to be in place. You need social inter- These are really basic, but you need social interaction. You need You need um exposure to things outside of work. You also need endorsement and approval in work. And all of these things need to be sort of pulling in the same direction. There may be people in your life who are undermining you. And you may need support from people to nudge you in the right direction. But, you know, not to sound really bland about it. I feel as though I've um you know, through sort of my wife's perceptiveness and her ability to sort of see how how She's so involved me in life a bit more. That that's um that's kept me in a good place. We have a closing tradition on this podcast, which um which is the previous guest writes a question for the next guest. Okay. And the previous guest, you don't get to know who the previous guest was, but the previous guest has written a question um for you, not knowing it was for you. And they said, "What is your opinion on hallucinogens?" Hallucinogens. Um I My opinion is I think um you know, if you're if if you feel like you're if you're of age, like 18 plus, I don't know how old your younger listeners are, you know, maybe even maybe slightly older, um and you feel like you've got solid mental health, I think it's a it's not a bad avenue to go down. It's not something I've massively dabbled in. Um I've noticed, I don't know about you, like in my social settings, um it seems to be mushroom oil is something that's increasingly being used. Uh and I think actually in you know, in a And I think we're all aware of the slight There's a dissonance between our levels of acceptance of alcohol and then the sort of relative unacceptance of things like, whether it's marijuana or mushrooms and mushroom oil. Like I'd like to see that leveled out. Like I'd like to see, as it is in California and elsewhere, I'd like to see cannabis legalized and um I think mushroom oil, without giving too much away, could be really positive. From what I understand. Louis, thank you so much for your time today. I've learned so much from you for for so many reasons. Um and your new documentary on the BBC BBC 2 and on iPlayer, Louis Theroux Interviews, is incredible. Yeah. So, there's six six six of them out there. They're right now. Um they're incredible. And you're interviewing some incredible people that are are being very vulnerable and open with you. But thank you for the inspiration as well. You're someone that I've watched for the for decades. Thanks, Steve. And that's given me a a life full of enjoyments. And thank you for coming and doing this. Pleasure. Quick one. Right now, one of my sponsors on this podcast, who I absolutely adore, Crafted, the men's jewelry brand, are having a sale right now. Up to 70% off. A brand that's already incredibly affordable. If you ever see me wearing jewelry on videos, in real life, it's Crafted jewelry. This particular piece, these pearls here, are one of my favorite pieces to wear when I'm trying to wear a fashionable item. All of their pieces, I wear all of their rings, I wear all of their jewelry, and I did before they sponsored this podcast. I actually asked them to sponsor this podcast because I'm such a big fan of the brand. I'm not somebody that rolls around in Rolexes and stuff like that, but I do want quality jewelry that isn't going to change color, that is going to be durable enough to keep up with me, um that looks fashionable, and that has a sense of meaning, and that's exactly what Crafted has in their rings, in their necklaces, in everything they produce. I know the founders, I know how much they care. And if you're a man that often struggles to find a good place to to buy good quality jewelry that's not going to change color, that's not going to break, um Crafted is the answer. And it's incredibly incredibly affordable. And they have a sale on right now, which they never ever do. 70% off. I implore you to go and check it out. For many years, people have been asking for a coffee flavored Huel. And quite recently, Huel released the iced coffee caramel flavor of their um ready-to-drink Huels. And I've just become hooked on it over the last couple of weeks. I've been on a really interesting journey with Huel, which I've described and talked about a little bit on this podcast. I started with the berry ready-to-drink, then I moved over to the protein salted caramel, because it's 100 calories and it gives you all of your essential vitamins and minerals, but also gives you the 20-odd grams of protein you need. And now, I'm balanced between them both. I drink mostly the banana flavored ready-to-drink. I've got really into the iced coffee caramel um flavor of of Huel's ready-to-drink. And now I'm drinking that as well as the protein. Make sure you try the new ready-to-drink flavors. The the caramel flavor is amazing. The um the new banana flavor as well is amazing. And obviously, as I said, the iced coffee caramel flavor has been a real smash hit. So, check it out. Let me know what you think on social media. I see all of your tags and Instagram posts and