Tim Ferriss: Creativity, Habits and Rigging the Game

If you’ve been following me for awhile, my guest today will be familiar to you — my good friend Tim Ferriss. He actually was a very early guest of cjLIVE, and now years later it’s good to have him back.

If you’re not familiar with Tim, he’s a 3x New York Times Best-Selling Author. He has a podcast that’s been downloaded over 70 MILLION times, a new TV show called the Tim Ferriss Experiment, an entrepreneur, an angel investor, and the list goes on and on…

In this episode, we discuss rigging the game so you can win it, why strengths shouldn’t feel like hard work, and celebrating the small wins. Plus, the tables are turned. After a few years of recording his own podcast, Tim has become quite the pro question asker. So I ask Tim some of his best interview questions and get some great tactical advice around habits, killer reads, and a story he hasn’t ever shared publicly.

Celebrate the small wins. If you’re not good at celebrating the small things, you won’t be good at celebrating the big things either.

FOLLOW TIM:
website | twitter | facebook

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Some Questions I Ask

Did you know that your podcast was going to be successful when you started? [3:20]
Is there a maxim that transcends just making your work feel easy? [9:40]
Is the amount of success that we’ve seen because we are hard charging type A personalities, or are those qualities anchors? [17:58]
How do you find the time to maintain your habits? [39:30]
What kind of sleep tweaks do you subscribe to? [42:10]
How do you deal with the voices in your head? [46:58]
What are some of your favorite guests and questions from your podcast? [58:10]
What’s a story that you haven’t told anywhere else about a struggle you’ve had with writing? [01:07:06]
How important is artistic freedom to you? [01:17:06]
If you put a billboard up anywhere, where would it be and what would it say? [01:25:00]
What’s the book you’ve gifted the most? [01:25:30]
What’s something that you like that people would be surprised by? [01:27:05]
Is there anything I should ask before we go? [01:29:40]

In This Episode, You Will Learn:

The question Tim asked himself to guide the structure of his successful podcast. [5:17]
Why what you’re best at shouldn’t always feel like hard work. [6:57]
How to set expectations for yourself to rig the game so you can win it. [10:39]
The importance of celebrating the small wins and a great technique for doing exactly that. [14:15]
Why if you’re not good at celebrating the small things, you won’t be very good at celebrating the big things either. [15:15]
Thich Nhat Hahn’s anecdote about how to stay mindful of your current circumstances. [16:20]
The positive effects meditation has had on Tim’s efficiency and effectiveness and why he wishes he started his mindfulness practice earlier in life.[21:40]
How to fight the kryptonite to creativity, taking yourself too seriously, by seeking the absurd.[25:30]
Why fiction, mythology and thousand year old stories can teach us more about the human condition than nonfiction. [29:25]
Why I make playing and making a habit every day and how it stimulates creativity. [30:30]
The rundown on the rest of my habit list. [32:15]
Tim’s morning routine. [37:07]
What you have to do when you can’t “find” the time. [39:32]
Tim’s noise machine, sleep mask and earplugs of choice [43:20]
How to turn off the voices in your head so you can finally get to sleep. [46:02]
Two of Tim’s blog posts on what a hard day looks like for him; “Productivity Hacks for the Neurotic” and “Practical Thoughts on Suicide.” [48:54]
What it means to retreat into your story and why you should knock it off. [51:38]
Why great content is the best SEO. [01:01:28]
Tim’s favorite questions to that he asks his podcast guests. [01:05:30]
The time that Tim wanted to dropkick a guy but instead blew him a kiss [01:12:17]
How Tim uses constraints to keep podcasting and other projects fun. [01:17:33]
Tim’s recommendation of a commencement speech you should be sure to check out; Make Good Art by Neil Gaiman. [01:30:00]

This podcast is brought to you by CreativeLive. CreativeLive is the world’s largest hub for online creative education in photo/video, art/design, music/audio, craft/maker, money/life and the ability to make a living in any of those disciplines. They are high quality, highly curated classes taught by the world’s top experts — Pulitzer, Oscar, Grammy Award winners, New York Times best selling authors and the best entrepreneurs of our times.