Video summary
The podcast explores a compelling analogy between gastric band surgery and chronic busyness, drawing on an idea from Joe Hudson regarding the shift from being merely an operator to becoming an innovator or "idea guy." The speaker argues that just as gastric bands physically restrict eating capacity but leave underlying emotional issues unresolved—leading to increased suicide risk by removing food's role as a coping mechanism for loneliness and anxiety—a reliance on chaotic busyness serves a similar psychological function. In this dynamic, individuals use constant work and movement as an "anesthetic" or release valve to avoid confronting uncomfortable emotions, reflecting on decisions, or connecting with their existence. When one eventually realizes that busy-ness is not the highest calling in life but rather a detachment strategy, removing it forces them to face these suppressed issues without their usual distractions. This realization presents two distinct paths: either revert to the old habits of force-feeding oneself through work and chaos, or learn to handle emotional discomfort directly. The speaker emphasizes that if busyness is viewed as an archaic technology used to hide deeper levels of connection with the world, slowing down allows buried issues to surface rather than being swept away by momentum. This concept aligns with Ryan Holiday's assertion that sanity, not just ambition or skill, sets a person apart; working hard often compromises mental peace and creativity because unregulated states prevent access to one highest lever: creative thought. Consequently, motivation naturally declines over time if the work is net negative for well-being, as illustrated by the speaker's calculation of losing even 0.1% of motivation per episode would result in zero motivation after a thousand episodes. The discussion highlights that while intense effort and burning out—sleeping less and working on multiple fronts—is expected during the first five years or until reaching "escape velocity," it becomes detrimental later when the initial drive transforms from a helpful dog on a leash into an internal parasite staring out of one's eyes. At this stage, the distinction between the individual and their work blurs, making it difficult to separate self-worth from productivity. The speaker questions who they are if not defined by constant busyness, noting that most people will ask why someone works hard before a win but only remind them of luck after success; however, true growth requires letting go of this grandiosity and assessing what calmness feels like. To support the physical toll of such high-output lifestyles, the transcript includes an aside on mitochondrial health, explaining how aging causes these cellular engines to break down, leading to fatigue and poor recovery regardless of sleep duration. The speaker promotes Timeline, a supplement containing MitoPure designed to clear damaged mitochondria and replace them with new ones, backed by over 15 years of research and numerous clinical trials. This product endorsement underscores the broader theme that maintaining sanity requires not just mental shifts but also biological support, as peace acts as a performance enhancer essential for long-term sustainability in any endeavor, whether it is producing content or building a career. Ultimately, the message encourages listeners to consider if their current workload is merely an obesity of effort used to cope with problems and invites them to experiment with dialing back intensity to reconnect fully with life.
Read the full video transcript
I talked about this idea from Joe Hudson
that uh operator guy to idea guy which
is you need to
think about where productivity comes
from a little bit more carefully and I
also realized that there is surprisingly
an analogy between gastric band surgery
and being busy. So the gastric band
surgery of being busy is after
undergoing gastric band surgery,
people's risk of suicide tends to go up.
And that's perhaps unsurprising because
gastric band surgery is a big deal and
can sometimes have complications,
infections, painful outcomes. You're
you're literally like putting a belt
around your stomach to make it smaller
so that you can't eat as much. It's like
the old school version of ampic like you
know you're physically getting in there
and and having to uh limit the space but
one of the unseen reasons for this
increased suicide risk is actually due
to the surgery going right not it going
wrong. So you understand gastric band
surgery lots of complications infections
painful outcomes but it going right can
have as bad of an impact on people as it
going wrong. Many patients used food as
a way to deal with issues in their
lives. Emotional challenges, loneliness,
anxiety, and after having their stomach
shrunk, the ability to use food as a
comforting crutch has been taken away.
But the emotional challenges that they
were using food to deal with still
remain. So the coping mechanism has been
taken away and it forces patients now to
face their issues without a release
valve. And I think that there is an
equivalent dynamic happening when you
try to elevate your life to take your
sense of selfworth from things other
than your work and your level of
busyness. So, let's say that in the past
you used busyiness and chaos as a way to
distract yourself from feeling unwanted
emotions. It meant that you didn't need
to reflect on your decisions or sit in
discomfort. That you're moving so
quickly that you never fully connect
with the things that are happening in
your life. Lost relationships,
disconnected friends, poor decisions,
accumulated negative character traits,
they're all swept away. so quickly that
you don't even have time to consider
them by manic work, right? So eventually
you realize that chaotic busyness is not
your highest calling in life and maybe
you value different things now or maybe
you've outgrown that phase of your life
or maybe you realize that busyiness for
busyness's sake is detaching you from
connecting to your existence.
So the question here is what happens
when this coping mechanism gets taken
away.
You are forced to face your issues
without the highly distracting release
valve that you're used to. The busyiness
anesthetic that you used to previously
rely on has now been removed, leaving
you with two choices.
One, ignore the lesson that chaos is not
fulfillment and go back down the road
you just escaped from by force-feeding
your way through this figurative gastric
band. Number two, actually learn to
handle emotional discomfort without
distracting yourself with work. And
gastric bands, I guess, in the world of
Ompic are kind of it's like an old
archaic technology. But I do think that
the analogy works that uh you have this
realization that comes in with regards
to your busyiness. Hey, maybe this isn't
where I should take most of my selfworth
from. Maybe I am hiding the uh deeper
levels of connection between me and the
world in my uh chaos and this uh heavily
uh built out calendar. Uh what is it? A
busy calendar is a hedge against
existential loneliness. Uh okay. So
that's kind of the what do you call like
the cognitive uh gastric band. You've
had this thing wrapped around you. Okay.
I've really limited my capacity to do
that old workload and not feel sick by
it.
Why were you working that hard? Maybe
because you just have raw ambition and I
I want to make the most of my life. I'm
going to make a dent in the world. I'm
going to do all of these things. Yeah,
and that will be some of it.
But that's not all of it, man. Like,
it's a coping mechanism. Like, what are
you hiding from? You're hiding from
something. And even if you're not hiding
from something, you will have hidden
things
by being that busy. Or maybe more
accurately, you will have been a been
unable to notice things by being that
busy. So it's either notice,
hide, or from being so busy have hidden
and then when the busyiness goes away,
start to notice. So either way, if the
busyiness begins to slow down, stuff
tends to burble to the surface. And
look, like I'm [ __ ] speaking to
myself here, okay? All of these are
thinly veiled autobiographical notes to
self. Uh, but it's a challenge. Where do
I take my sense of selfworth from now?
How am I going to deal with not being
able to hide emotions in
sweeping them under the rug of bravado
and momentum is a good way to think
about it. And there's this idea from
Ryan Holiday that says, "Be quiet, work
hard, and stay healthy. It's not
ambition or skill that is going to set
you apart, but sanity."
and
sounds fantastic. Uh apart from the fact
that working hard often stops you from
being able to remain sane, especially if
you push it. I if we accept, and I think
this is true, that peace is a
performance-enhancer. That if you are
unpaceful, if you are in uh disregulated
states all of the time, you don't get to
access creativity, which is the highest
lever that you've got. You're not
enjoying the work. So, your motivation
is going to decrease every single day.
Even if even if each time that you do a
thing, it only saps 0.1%
of your motivation.
I'm about to hit episode 1,000. I would
be at 0% motivation. And there have been
times when the way that I have done work
has been net negative to my motivation.
So if you want to do a thing for a very
long time, like over 7 and 1/2 years,
which is I guess how long I've been
doing the show, I've done it a pretty
quick clip, right? like a thousand
episodes in seven and a half years is
pretty quick. Like even if I'd only lost
0.1% of my motivation each episode, I
would I would be in the red, right? I
would be overdrawn by now. It is not
ambition or skill that is going to set
you apart, but sanity. And I think that
that's because so many people make
trades that they in the moment seem it
seems smart, but in retrospect you
realize was actually the thing that was
supposed to keep you going. So given
that we know that dialing back a little
bit of the workload, having a little bit
of balance once you've reached escape
velocity, this is not for you in the
first 5 years of doing whatever you're
doing. Like end yourself. That's the
job. The job is nose goes against
grindstone, sleep is out of the window,
the candle gets burned on three ends.
That's what you're supposed to do. Okay,
let's assume you've got to a little bit
of escape velocity. There's some
momentum.
Now you need to ask yourself some deeper
questions because the monster that you
created inside of yourself to deal with
the challenges at the start of your
journey is very difficult to handle
becomes super unwieldy and undisiplined
later in your journey. And if you don't
step in soon enough,
it's no longer like a a a dog on a leash
pulling you forward. It's more like a
parasite that's grown inside of you and
is staring out of your eyes. Like the
difference between you and the drive is
very hard to uh pull apart. And I think
that's why I've been talking about this
so much recently that this last 12
months I've really tried sort of asking
myself the question, who am I if I'm not
busy all the time? Um or who am I if
busyness isn't my primary contribution
to the stuff that I do. Uh
[ __ ] hard question. It's really hard
question to answer. But uh Mark Manson
as well just had this banger from the
start of the year which was before you
win everyone will ask you why you're
working so hard and after you win
everyone will remind you how lucky you
got.
Horoszi twisted that into before you win
everyone will ask you why you're working
so hard and after you win everyone will
ask you why you're working so hard.
If that doesn't just go to show that
most people are not worth listening to,
like myself included, right? But I I do
think that this is true, like the the uh
like self-grandiosity
uh of every person that's just come upon
a an idea that they can't stop talking
about. I I think this one's got some
legs to it. All right, most people are
not worth listening to, me included, but
this one's got some legs. So, do your
own assessment. Uh your results may
vary, but it's tough letting go of
busyness, leaning into
What what would a little bit of calm be
like for a while and then turning that
up and turning that up and turning that
up? Because why did you work so hard if
it was just to allow yourself to work
harder in the future?
That's not to say that working hard
isn't enjoyable, but that by working
hard you don't fully get to connect with
life because it sweeps lots of things
under the rug and it is a coping
mechanism. It is an obese person using
food as a crutch. You are obese with
your workload. You are a workload fatty
and you are continuing to eat and that
is how you deal with your problems.
So think about what it would be like to
go on a diet. A quick aside. Do you
remember learning about the mighty
mitochondria back in grade school?
Here's a quick refresher. It's the tiny
engine inside of your cells that powers
everything you do. But here's what they
didn't teach you. As you age, your
mitochondria break down. That's what can
cause you to feel tired more often, take
longer to recover, and wake up feeling
like you're never fully recharged, no
matter how long you sleep. I started
taking Timeline nearly 2 years ago
because it is the best product on the
market for mitochondrial health and that
is why I partnered with them. Timeline
is the number one doctor recommended
uriththin A supplement with a compound
called Mtopure. Basically, it helps your
body clear out damaged mitochondria and
replace them with new ones. Mitoure is
backed by over 15 years of research,
over 50 patents, and nearly a dozen
human clinical trials. It was
recommended to me by my doctor, and that
is why I've used it for so long, since
way before I knew who even made the
product. And best of all, there's a
30-day money back guarantee, plus free
shipping in the US. And they ship
internationally until the end of
January. You can get 30% off a 1 month
supply by going to the link in the
description below or heading to
timeline.com/modernwisdom30.
That's timeline.com/modernwisdom3030.
Congratulations for making it to the end
of a clip. Your brain has not been fried
by Tik Tok. Uh, watch the full episode
here.