Rick Rubin: Modern Master Of The Creative Act

The idea that one person says, my art is better than your art. It's an insane idea. It's like saying, my diary entry is better than your diary entry. It's insane. The things we make are a reflection of who we are in this moment. And that's all it is. It's not more than that. It can go on and mean more than that, but that's not in our

control. And it's something that cripples artists thinking, I have to make the greatest thing ever made to humankind. And then they basically psyched themselves out of being able to make something good. There's a great benefit in taking a risk, making the thing that's interesting to you, sharing it with the world. Because if you don't do it nobody else will. You're the only one who can make

the art that you can make. Everything that you make is a reflection of who you are. And how you live in the world will impact the things that you make. And I wish the best of luck on the journey in making beautiful things that we can all enjoy. The Rich Roll Podcast. Today I want to talk about magic. I want to talk about awe and wonder

and oneness. And I want to do that with a very special human. For most he needs no introduction. An absolute icon of modern music whose influence on culture has been nothing short of Titanic. Rick Rubin is one of the greatest producers of all time. Noted for his unique and some might say counterintuitive way in which he is able to manifest the absolute best in everyone he

works with. Rick is the founder of Deaf Jam Records who now runs his own label, America's American Recordings. And over the course of his storied career has worked with a litany of greats like the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Johnny Cash, the Beastie Boys, L.O. Cool J, Jay Z, Adele, the list goes on and on and on. And it's all coming right up, but first. Okay, Rick

Rubin. So the thrust of today's conversation surrounds the release of Rick's brand new and completely transformative book. The Creative Act, which is about cultivating the innate creativity that dwells within all of us. But more than that, it's about a way of being. It's about an openness to possibility, wonder, energy, and of course magic. And while this is a rare audio only episode recorded outside with Rick,

characteristically sitting across from me shirtless, I assure you that the contents that lay within this conversation are nothing short of profound and dare I say, perhaps even life changing. So let's just get after it. I mean, needless to say, I can't wait to share this conversation with you. So without further ado, please enjoy this illuminating discourse between me and the truly singular Rick Rubin. Yeah, I

started it coming up on 10. 10 years ago on the North Shore of Kauai. Beautiful. Yeah. Which is a place I know you've spent quite a bit of time. I love it. Yeah. In a warehouse up there. My second or third guest was Gabi Reese. Incredible. Because they were up there at the same time back in 2012. And it's just been creative Odyssey, you know, over

these many years. And I still love it just as much as I did on day one. It's a privilege. It's a gift. It's. It's just been such a fulfilling experience gives me the opportunity to sit down with people like yourself and then share that wisdom with so many people. It's been really cool. Cool. What I found interesting in doing a podcast with musicians is. One I

get to meet people I've never met before and it's interesting. The conversations are interesting. And. Also, I get to when I interview someone who I know for a long time, I've never interviewed them before. Like I interviewed people that I've never known for 30 years. And I learned a tremendous amount through the interview because you don't really ask your friends interview type question. Well, you don't.

By introducing a structure and formality, it kind of forces everybody into a presence of mind that ordinarily we wouldn't do on our own. Like I did one with my dad. And I was able to ask him questions that I had never asked him. What a great idea. I think everybody should do a podcast with their parents or their extended and not necessarily to share it. Yes.

But as a document. Yeah. Beautiful. And also, yeah, for future generation. Yeah. Cool. So we were introduced by our mutual friend, Steven Pressfield. We have lots of mutual friends, but it wasn't until the past couple days that we actually got a chance to meet. And we've been corresponding for, I don't know, it. Oh, wait, a year and a half, two years or something like that. I

think we're trying to make this happen. And you're. You know, always traveling in distant places. And at one point, you were like, look, I do tons of zooms happy to do it. Like, let's just do it digitally. I'm super comfortable with that. And I was like, no, I don't. That's not the experience that I'm looking for. I am willing to wait until everything. The universe sort

of conspires to bring us together. Beautiful. And in my experience, that like discipline to wait. I'll always prove to be the correct choice as opposed to like willing it into happening when it doesn't feel like the right moment. Like, there is something about timing. And I'm really grateful that we're doing this now and not, you know, when originally maybe we were going to do it. Yes.

And I think it'll be a richer experience as a result. Beautiful. I mean, yeah, man. So I guess we have to be cryptic about where we are and what's going on. But we're in undisclosed locations somewhere in the world. So it's a little bit of a problem. It's a weird fight club thing. But basically, we've been hanging out for the past couple of days, getting to

know each other a little bit. And I have so many questions for you. I'm fascinated by your life. But really the occasion for this conversation is this beautiful new book that you've written called the Creative Act, which I had the privilege of reading. It hasn't come out. It comes out in January. We're recording this in the middle of the summer. It's an early peak at it.

And it was great to read it with a beginner's mind, which is part of the message of the book, without having read any reviews or having had anyone tell me this is what it's about. And this is what it's not about. And among the many kind of fascinating, you know, sort of emotions that I had in the experience of reading the book was that, first off,

it defied my expectations of what it would be. And I had this assumption. You know, I went into it. But even with the beginner's mind idea, like I still formed an assumption of what this book was going to be, because there are certain conventions that kind of come along for the ride with people who write a book at a certain stage of their career. So I

was like, oh, this is going to be somewhat of a memoir. It's going to be all these crazy stories of the bands and the amazing artists that you've worked with over the years. And then, you know, through that, it will be interlaced with takeaways or some wisdom that you've accrued. And it very much was not that. It was heavy on the wisdom part, but it's not

a memoir at all. It's really a standalone work of art, a timeless meditation on the act of being a creative being. What is the experience of being an artist and how to, you know, sort of manifest the artist within all of us. So what was the kind of inception of the idea to write this book? When, um, when the thought of doing a book, I hadn't

experienced where I got to work on someone else's book about Johnny Cash and artist I worked with the, the, the Robert Hillburns book, which beautiful book. And the last few chapters are about Johnny Cash, um, the later period Johnny Cash. And that's when I got to work with him. So we spent some time together and he suggested we listen back to the records and talk about

different song choices. And I found through the process of helping Robert with his book, I learned a tremendous amount that I didn't know about my relationship with Johnny Cash. Just through, I tend not to look back. I'm, I'm always making something new, but tend not to listen back to any work I've made in the past. I'm just moving forward. I might come across hearing a song

in a coffee shop. It's like, Oh, wow. That's, I produce that. It's unbelievable. Um, but I don't choose to listen also because, uh, in the studio to get the things to sound like they do. We work on them for such a long time. That I'm good not hearing it again. You know, like we've done that day. I put in my thousands of hours. Yes. So I'm

good. Next. Um, so in that experience of working on the Johnny Cash book or participating in the Johnny Cash book, I understood what working on a book could be and how it could be about me learning something. And I thought about what could I possibly offer? I don't want to talk about my work. I'm not interested in myself, but I am interested in what happens in

the studio. And so much of what happens in the studio isn't about music. It's about, um, I guess we could say their principles, although at the time that I started, I didn't know what they were. I, I knew that I wanted, uh, to share what happens. The choices being made in studio, how that happens. Um, I think that's what I wanted to do. Um, in a

way that someone else could use it and apply it to their lives. And, um, so it took a very long time to figure out what those things were. Because at the time that they happened originally, in each case, it was an intuitive choice. So I spent seven years thinking back both for all the projects I've worked on in the last seven years in real time. If

something would happen, I would. One something good happened. I think that's what I wanted to do. I would try to understand, okay, is there a principle at play here that might be useful to someone else? And I would make notes. And then I tried to reverse engineer decisions that I could remember from my earliest works and all the way through. And again, it's not about those

works at all. Those were just a portal into what was the thought process to solve a problem at the time? And is there some tool there that can help someone else? And if so, I want to share that. Right. So in other words, it's a cannon. fest the formation of these instinctual tools that you didn't sort of conceptualize them and bring them into the studio, it's

just been a process of them emerging over time in the context of solving the typical type of problems that come up. Yes, and I would say they were all essentially reactions to. A problem, essentially problem, and a problem could be Neil Reiders block, or the problem could be. um a transition in a song doesn't work, or. A problem could be, um there's a story to tell

through a song that works in almost a coded way. Explain what that means. I'm not sure I get that last. Um I'll talk specifically. I don't speak specific in the book, but I can hear it speak specific. Um at the time that I was working with run DMC, it was in the early days of hip-hop and no. You have to understand what the world was like

at this point in time. Hip-hop was a tiny niche form of music. So tiny and so niche that most people not only did they not think it was good music, most people didn't think it was music. I can remember being courted by the head of a big record company because we were having some success and you wanted to you know work with us. And he said,

what do you attribute the success of rap? We all know it's not music. And he's being kind. You know like imagine what the more just confused. Yeah, or imagine what the people who there were some people who just hated it. Just were offended by it. Uh-huh. Um so we were finishing run DMC's album and the album was done and I listened to it and I felt

like there's some one it's missing something. I don't know what it is, but it's missing something. There's a piece missing. And I had just had these experiences. Of people telling me what I was working on wasn't music. And I was thinking about it as solving a problem. How do I demonstrate? This is not so foreign from what we're used to. And the thought was to find

a song that was an existing well-known song. Not change it really. And have run DMC do it true to what it was. Yeah. And let have it be a rap song. And the choice was Erasmus Walk this way. And I picked it because of the phrasing of the verses are a sentence and non-melotic verse. It's all about the phrasing. And it works like a rap song.

Same as a rap song. And another metal layer on top of that is that there's a breakbeat in hip-hop music. There are breakbeats which are a little instrumental snippets from longer works. Not indicative of the big work. Just a tiny snippet that if you loop it up, it's its own thing. And in hip-hop world, they called it the Toys in the Attic Break, which was Walk

this Way. But no one who heard that break knew who Erasmus was or ever heard the song. All they ever heard was that drumbeat. Right. So. And I'm trying to rack a lack because Erasmus has its own amazing history of being huge in the 70s and disappearing and then having personal issues. And then this incredible renaissance in their career was that song coming out in addition

to being the crossover event for hip-hop that introduced this new genre or medium. Of music to a much broader audience was that the kind of inception point for Erasmus resurgence on the timeline. Yes. In both directions. Yeah. It's unbelievable. So were you the one who chose that band and that song? And it was a conscious choice. The purpose being like we need that crossover. And this

will achieve that. Or was it just a crossover? Yeah. Crossover is not the right word because crossover makes it sound like it was a commercial decision. This was a commercial decision. This was a communication decision of people don't understand this. I want to explain it in a way that someone can understand it. That was the goal. I want to demonstrate it. Right. And I mean, I

had to have exceeded your expectations of what it achieved. Absolutely. Absolutely. It's crazy. What you're inside. I don't know. I'm not going to have it. It's a while ago. Yeah. A long time ago. Your story is well told. And well documented. But I think for people who aren't familiar with who you are or just kind of know some of the work that you've done, it would

be good to recap that a little bit. But just to introduce that idea. Most recently, I, not that recently, it was probably last year. I watched the Beastie Boys documentary. And you know, you recur in that story. A lot of which, you know, your role and all of that. I already knew. But one thing I didn't know. Was that you were actually a band member of

the Beastie Boys at the inception. We know about the NYU dorm room and how that was kind of a ground zero space. And how the hip hop community at that time was such a small, close Nick group of people. And there were only a couple venues. And it was the same people showing up at those venues that created this massive global movement. But, you know, maybe

talk a little bit about, you know, how you came into this space. And a little bit about, you know, how you've architected your career. Okay, we all, we were all punk rockers. We all love punk rock. And the hip hop wave happened. And for me, I experienced the hip hop wave as, as black punk rock. It was the same. It was, uh, it was a democratization

of music. It was taking music back to the streets. You didn't have to be a virtual, so player. You just had something to say and a point of view, a gripe and energy, something to brag about in the case of hip hop sometimes. Or a fantasy. And it appealed to me in the same way that punk rock did. And the Beastie Boys were already a band

that I was not a member of. And they were a punk rock band. And I met them through friends. And, um, like I name David Skilken, who is a really cool kid, who's no longer with us, but a good friend of all of ours. And, um, they had recorded a song before I was involved called Cookie Puss, which was a college radio hit. And it was,

um, a parody song, rap related parody song. And they wanted to play that live. And it wasn't a song that you play as a punk rock band. You needed DJ. And I was a DJ going to NYU. And I DJed it. And why you events. And sometimes the Dan satiria and clubs in New York, not much. More mainly in the dorm, but was a big fan

of music. Right. Dan satiria pre Madonna around the same time. Madonna will be around. And, um, that was part of the, that world. As a matter of fact, the first Beastie Boys tour. We went on tour with Madonna as her opening act for her, the Virgin tour, her first tour. Yeah. Yeah. So you hook up with these kids. High school kids. Yeah. Well, I'm one year

older. Mm-hmm. I'm in college there in high school. Adam Yalke was already in college. He was a bard. I was at NYU. We hook up. It starts with me DJing. And in the part of the set where they don't play their instruments. And as our appetite for rap music grew, it was, it ended up being all we listened to. That side of making music took over.

And I had already, uh, at this point in time, produced all the cool J's, not yet album. They were just singles at this time. And that were, and, uh, T. LaRoc record called it's yours. It's a very first rap record I ever made, which was like a cult hit. Using the techniques of that I used with T. LaRoc or L. Cool J, we tried making Beastie

Boys records in that format like real rap records. And that's, that's what we did. Right. And in that process, was there a sort of awakening like, oh, this is, this is what I love about music. It's being, you know, in the producer's seat trying to craft these things with great artists. Or was it just, oh, this came up and this seemed cool. And just I'm jumping

from one thing to another and one thing. You know, your, your universe just kind of slowly expanding. A series of events happened. I remember I had to leave the Madonna tour because I had an ear infection from flying. And while I was home recovering, I was continuing to make records. And based on that experience. And again, luckily the universe set up this system where, uh, it

basically told me home was the place for me. And, um, and I just realized I wasn't resilient enough to be an artist on the road. Didn't suit my, my lifestyle. And then in the earlier records that I worked on with LL or the beasties, or Rendy MC. I would, I would write a lot. I would write a lot of music. And sometimes in the case of

the beat, more in the case of the Beastie Boys right lyrics. The idea of how much work I could. Being involved in. If I was going to write everything, it would really limit how much I could do. So the idea. And I like to, I like to work on a lot of things. It's just, I've really eclectic tastes. I love music. And I like to be

busy. So, um, if I had to wait until every time I wrote something, it took. I remember the first Beastie Boys album took over two years from the time we started till we finished not of recording every day, but until the ideas came. It just took a long time. And you were heavily involved in the writing aspect of that first record. Yes. So that's it. Oh,

yeah. All of the music except for one or two songs. And, um, I don't know, 40% have to learn something like that. Right. I didn't know that. I didn't know that. But that changed after that album. It was, it was, it didn't. That life of writing. It's a very time consuming act. And it would just limit the output. And I don't know. It always seemed important

for me to make a lot of things. I like, I like being productive. And, um, so it just, again, it happened. If it not for the ear infection, it might not have happened that way. It's super interesting. Yeah. These little obstacles or I'm sure at the time you were disappointed. Yeah. Right. It was unbelievable. We were on Toru, Madonna. People, you know, it was wild. Yeah.

Um, and then with license to ill. I mean, that's just, I mean, I vividly remember when that record came out. And, you know, me and my friends had an obsessive relationship with every song on that record. Um, that had to be mind melting. The extent to which that became a cultural phenomenon. And another, you know, kind of real tipping point in terms of the broadening of

hip hop or certain kind of genre within hip hop. Yeah. I don't follow stats or, um, charts of any kind. But I read the other day that, like, license to ill was the first hip hop record to be a number one album. I didn't know that until the other day. Yeah. Um, but it's interesting. Well, I guess as a producer, you have to be a buffer

between the business side of music and protecting the artists. But at the same time to the extent that you're capable of, like, you try to stay out of numbers, results, externalities, award show. I don't know how many Grammys you've won, but like you've never shown up for an award ceremony. No. That's part of, um, the process of staying grounded in what's important about what you do.

Like, talk a little bit about that. Yes. For me, the, the success happens when we sign off on a finished thing and say, okay, send it out into the world. That's the moment of success. And once that happens, onto the next, yeah. Um, because that's the only part I have any participation in. That's the only part I can control. Everything else is based on, um, market

conditions on stars, aligning on one of the stories. Uh, one of the stories we heard today in what we were doing was, uh, many of the people whose music came out on 9 11, their music got lost. And their career is never recovered. Just because it happened to come out on 9 11. And it's fascinating. And that's out of everyone's control. That's again, it's a, it's

universal intervention. We don't know how it works. But these are all, um, one of the things we talk about in the book is watching these occurrences. Sometimes they're good. Sometimes they're bad. And thinking of it as riding a wave. And that the universe is pushing us in a direction. And we can ride with that energy. And like when you're surfing, if you really try to fight

the wave, it's probably not going to work. You know, we try to use the power of the wave. We're, we're almost dancing with the wave, not against the wave. And, um, that's, that's the work of creativity as well. Certain projects come together very easily. And they happen quickly. And they have a momentum to them. And others, others are a real fight. And sometimes we fight that

fight. And other times we decide, is there another path of less resistance around this? Is there a better way in? Let's rethink what, if it's so hard, something's up. And that's supposed to be so hard. Again, it's wildly time consuming. Takes a great deal of focus, takes patience. But if there are no signs that something's working at for a long time, that might be a time

to step back, step away. There's so much packed into what you just said. I mean, first off, it being very counterintuitive. Or, you know, opposite to this notion that if you want to be successful, you just, you push, you hustle, you force things into existence. And that is anathetical to the expression of great art. There is a surrender and an allowing and a shaping and a

sort of dispassionate relationship. You have to have a non-romantic, you know, connection to the result of the work. In the book, you have to be very careful. You say, the work is the work, right? What is the work? The work is lots of things. The work is hard, but it's play. It's about sharing and it's about passion. It's about structure, of course. Like, it's very elusive

and difficult to pin down. Like, when you said, like, oh, I just, you know, this book came about because I've been doing this thing for so long. But I never really had a formal sort of structure in my mind of what exactly, it's in the book. The process of creating this book, its own work of art, that you become more deeply connected to like who you

are and what it is exactly that you do. That makes you unique or, you know, allows you to bring a certain sensibility into the studio that can elevate the artist that you work with. But it is ephemeral. So it's understandable. You're like, I don't know what it is. Yeah. But I know what it's not. Yes. And I don't know how to do it. That's another thing.

Like, before you start any new project, I always have a lot of anxiety. Because I have no idea what's going to happen. Now I have a lot of experience that helps now. But that doesn't make it happen. It takes a tremendous amount of patience to wait for it to reveal itself. And I guess now I have the wisdom to know this that be patient. And I

have the discipline to stay with it for a long time. And I want to make that point because we were just talking about sometimes you have to do it. Well, no big deal between you and those of you who are silent Know, right. Now we live in a big circle. We live in the best way we want to be patient. We are like, Never mind, you're

like,rite, a boss. You guys are just running around without being afraid to think about what you're happy about. That's embarrassing. It'd be that. Let's say one of those people are animals, like a cat, and a groom, and some, like a gayer. They're crazy to get up to the fullest. create a climate science chair. It'd be like a damn type of a movies. They're forever. They're with

students, you know, how to feel. They've been wearing like,water and stuff like that these size of commas. And so they have to be coordinated or werezy big things like kicking high school guys out of here. That's really sustained such a feeling. But it make me feel too trivial. And it's a great way from that, even when you've invested, you know, some ungodly amount of time and

effort into that direction that's not functioning. It's something that we see often is the, the initial moment when an idea springs forth. That first sketch, the first demo, the first very first rough. Often has some energetic charge in it that's really compelling. And we hear many stories in music where records come out. People don't respond and then they go back, oh, well, but we missed it.

It was all in the demo. You know, we, the record screwed up. And being aware of that's helpful because you can, just because you put more time in, like from the time you make the demo, you may put in, let's say we'd work for a month after we've made a demo, we work on something for a month. Might work on a song for a month. We

might realize at the end of that month, if we listen back, which is a key, always checking back. See, I know we're putting time in, but are we progressing? Right. Is it different? Or is it better? Right. Just because you're working on it a lot doesn't mean that it's better. And after hearing it, you know, 10,000 times, you're so close to it. And you become, like,

sort of immune to its allure. Yes. There's something wrong with it. Yes. So you tinker. And then you actually end up dismantling the whole thing. It's true. Yeah. Many just get overdone. Um, so in the end, in the cases when the demo is the best version, luckily we recognize it and that ends up being the version. Now, but it takes discipline, confidence, and experience to recognize

that the original garage band version of it is actually better than the highly polished studio version. Yes. And even if it has mistakes, sometimes you fix, sometimes you hear mistakes, you fix the mistakes and it's not as good. Right. You, you wouldn't expect that. It's drained of its energy. It's drained of its humanity. And we don't know what this is the other part. We don't know

why it's good. You, you, you hear it. There's no, there are no metrics for this. The idea that one person says, my art is better than your art. It's an insane idea. It's like they're all, it's always apples and oranges. It's like saying, my diary entry is better than your diary entry. It's insane. It's the things we make are, are, uh, a reflection of who we

are in this moment. And that's all it is. It's not more than that. It can go on and mean more than that. But that's not in our control. And that's not the reason to do it. No. And it's something that cripples artists thinking, I have to make the greatest thing ever made to humankind. And then they basically psych themselves out of being able to make something

good. They give into the pressure of thinking it's more than it is. So one of the things we talk about in the book is lowering the stakes where we're not setting out to make the greatest album of all time. We're not setting out to make the greatest song of all time. We're there to have fun in the studio. We're going to entertain each other. We're going

to see if something happens that's interesting to us. And there's no better. I found, luckily, over the course of my life, that the things that I truly want to make, I think, I believe in that really feel like something to me other people resonate with. I don't know if that's the case for everybody, but I don't know of a better metric to use for anyone. Then

I really feel this. If I really feel it, it's much better than I think someone else might like this. It's not really from, you know, it's not really me, but I think someone else might like it. That's a dead. It's a losing game. Yeah. Yeah. You have to make it to please yourself. Absolutely. And one of the things I can say in the book is the

audience comes last. And the audience comes last in service to the audience. The audience wants the best thing. They don't get the best thing while you're trying to service them. They get the best thing when you're servicing yourself. When you're true to who you are. And the more you can trust yourself as an artist. In my case, I've been every decision I've made from working in

a different genre than I started in every time. Every time I do something different or new, I'm always told not to do it. I'm always told it's terrible idea. Every time you know you're on the right track, when you hear that. I just always be correct. I'm not, but I know it doesn't matter what anyone else thinks. I have to know what you know. I know

what I know. And my job is to share what I know. That's all I can do. I can't second guess myself. Well, the idea that the audience would dictate to the artist what to do because this is what we want is insanity. It's the artist's job to express themselves in a way that makes the audience think differently or feel something. Yes. And the audience doesn't necessarily

know that yet. Yes. Right. Yes. Steve Jobs said, you know, famously, the consumer doesn't know what they want until you make it. Yeah. Whatever it is that you created back in 2008. It's just not cutting it. You know who I'm talking about. I see you. So whether you're getting that side gig off the ground, importing handmade rugs or restoring antique motorcycles or whatever it is, you

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be some confusion about what it is that you exactly do. Like, oh, you're the producer. Well, what is a music producer? Oh, you go in. You have this amazing taste. And when the artist is going in a wrong direction, you say, no, it's better like this. And you kind of impose your opinion in a certain direction, like place a script or a format on top of

the whole thing. And like drive it to completion and ultimately commercial success. Yes, that is not it. That is not at all. That is not at all. What I do. There are many producers who work like that. I don't really know the details because I've not watched other producers work. But I know that everyone has their own style. Some producers today are people who make beats.

And they're producing a record. And then when you hear on the what you hear on the radio or streaming is something that they may be doing. They gave it to an artist. They never met the artist. Then the artist puts the words on top. And then that comes out and they're the producer of the song. Right. And there's nothing wrong with that. That had it all.

I know. I remember like that's how Madonna always continued to innovate and keep what she was doing fresh because she would work with these different producers who had a certain sound or a way of working with music that was different from what she had been doing historically. Yes. And when I first started, I had a sound. But very quickly, just my taste or two eclectics, like

I would never do the same thing for too long. I will say there tends to be a thread that runs through my work. Not always. But I like to think of it as getting to the essential heart of what's there. So it would be like the opposite. A lot of sounds are all put on top of each other to the point where you couldn't tell what

anything was. It was just the wall of sound. I'm the opposite in that. I want the least amount of information. The most space. Whatever you do here, I want you to be able to hear well and hear its personality. Almost like a conversation between two or three voices more than a wall of sound. You build the songs and then you have to strip them down to

see if it holds up. Right. It's about like the pairing down. Like what is the truest essence of this thing? And then we can add things if we think it's improving it. But like let's take it down to the studs and see what we're actually dealing with. Yeah. I like to get to like an architectural framework of something and experience it that way. And I will

say more often than not, although not always, it tends to stay very close to that the minimalist version. But I would imagine it brings clarity. Like now you know what you're dealing with. Right. Like we're all on the same page. When it's at its bare bones, this is what we have. Yeah. Then we can have a discussion about whether we need to add anything to it

or not. It also puts a tremendous amount of pressure on those individual elements when you can really hear. I can remember one successful record producer saying to me, very successful record producer saying like, I don't know how you have the patience to make music with so few elements. Because for that to work, everything has to be perfect. In his case, he would just layer things on

top until a big thing happened that he liked. And again, that's fine. There's no the beauty of all of this. There's no right way. We all find our own way. And if I worked with an artist where the best version of it was a heavily layered dense work, I'd be fine to do that. I'm I'm open to wherever it goes. I'm. When I say the minimalist

tends to happen often, that's probably where my taste lies. But my taste in relation to whatever the thing is that I'm dealing with. And sometimes the thing that we're dealing with. I think the most important thing to do is to get into it as it's density. So I may be right. Minimal would undermine what that is. In service of the highest expression of the artist that

it sells. Yes. That's the ultimate parameter. Right. Like that's what you're obviously always driving towards. But to just kind of extend that thought of minimalism a little bit. Like in reading the book. I mean, the books long. It's like 432 pages. I think at least the extra not right. And you know, it is like this. I Ching sort of devotional piece on a way of being.

Right. And even though it's long. And I read it in like one and a half sittings, which is not the way to. To consume this book. This is a book that should be consumed with patience and consideration. It's a book that you can put down and pick back up and reread, etc. It felt very minimal. It's the point that I'm trying to make. Like it didn't

feel like there was any extraneous sentences. Like it is distilled down to. You know, a very specific point that you're trying to make. Even the very few stories that you use to illustrate some of these points are like two sentences long. And like no names are used. And then you move on. Yeah. It's not about that. I was thinking about that early on. And I think

if the information had. The name of an artist attached to it, when you read it, you would visualize that artist. And it would be harder to put yourself in the place. Because your association with that artist would bring some baggage into your opinion on the point that you're trying to make. Yes, it couldn't help it. It would sensationalize it in a way that would undermine the

information. And this was about the information and the ability for the information to help someone else. It wasn't about to. Talk about it past glory in any way. There's a lot of shared DNA with this book and the way that you think about creativity and the expression of art with the work that Stephen Pressfield does in his marvelous books. Like this book that you've written is

very much a piece with the War of Art and Turning Pro. Like these things should be read in tandem or on the bookshelf together. Yes. But I think one distinction between these two things is you have a broader embrace of the mystical. Like the act of creation is an act of magic. It requires playing with energies and really considering the unseen as very real. These are

tangible forces that you have to channel and reckon with if you are going to be in this space of creation. Right. So talk a little bit about like how that came to be part of your sensibility. And so, you know, I think it's a very important thing to do. So important in the work that you do. I'll start by saying I'm a believer and I'm a

believer in everything. I start with the idea that I believe everything. And I'm going to try things. The in some cases, the more edgy, the more interesting they are to me. I'm less interested in what the orthodoxy thinks and more interested in what the fringes think. I live on the fringes. And, you know, I'll try. I won't take any pharmaceutical drugs, but I'll take all kinds

of crazy biohacking stuff. Yeah. That's me. That's my M.O. And I see, you know, and I've had mystical experiences in my life. Non-drug related mystical experiences in my life. So I can't discount these things that happen. Will you share one of those mystical experiences? You think of a good one. Okay. I've suffered with depression at different times in my life. Starting, it started when I was

33 years old, which was the year they got Jesus turns out. But before then, I was great. I'm in at 33. I got hit with this first panic attack, which I didn't know what I was doing. And then I had serious depression for probably two years. At which point, it was hard to get out of bed. If I even did get out of bed, I would

see a different therapist or healer every day. Sometimes two a day, at least five days a week, looking for healing. Just every day was just like this. Maybe this appointment. It's the one that's going to, you know, we're going to find out what's happening and would drag myself from healer to healer. And nothing worked. And then a friend of mine had taken Prozac and it changed

his life. And he said, not only do you say, you ought to try this, but he said, I will never not take this. Like this change, man, I do the greatest thing that ever happened. And while our personalities were very different. After two years of pain, it was a, it was at least something to consider. But it was a barrier that I wasn't comfortable crossing. I

was a vegan. I didn't use any medical. You know, I'm really a person who lives in a natural way. Yeah. Consciously with nature. Anything interference with that. Absolutely. Anything that undermines nature, I'm wary of. And I finally, there was a woman who wrote a book who was a, she was a psychic. And she was a psychopharmacologist. And I thought, okay, if I'm ever going to take

a substance, I'll take it from a psychic. That I'll do that. Okay. So I went to see her name was Judith Orlov. And I went to see Judith. Orlov told her what was going on. Told her the story about my friend and the prozac. And she said, it's certainly worth trying. And she prescribed it and told me what to do. Take it, take it right before

you go to sleep. And I took it that first night. And I woke up an hour later. Why do wake feeling energy racing through my body as if there was a race going on in my body. It was the worst feeling, the worst feeling. She also said, when you take this, you're not going to feel anything for six weeks, you know, it takes six weeks to

start working. I tied trade off forever. So I took it first night, hour later, wake up bad. And I'm just laying in bed scared until the morning. Why do wake terrified that I'm dying until I can call her and find out what to do. And finally, at the clock in the morning, I get through. And she says, okay, don't take that one again. So that was

it was a bad start. And then I ended up trying many different antidepressants. One after another, every one of them made me sick right away. The ones that didn't make me sick, I waited the six weeks taking them every day and didn't work. So no, nothing worked. And then finally, one drug. And it worked again, not like I was told it would work. I was told,

you know, well, wait, six weeks, see what happens with this drug. I took it the first evening. And it felt like within a half hour, all of the light in the room turned to candlelight. And I was being held and braced in a safe hug. And that night, I felt better for the first time in those two years. And a side effect of that particular drug

is that you gain weight. Nobody told me that. But I was on the drug for six months, eight months. And I gained something like 70 pounds. And I was already overweight. It's interesting also that the, I don't, I've never really researched this, but the fact that the one drug of all the drugs that I tried that worked for me, I already had a weight problem. Also

somehow side effect made me gain weight. It makes me think my weight and the depression somehow are related. I don't know, I don't know enough about science of that. But it seems clear there's some connection there. Too close. So I gained a lot of weight. I got better. I weaned off the drug. I was good again. And the mystical piece was in the throes of the

depression. One of the things that would help me, I would drive to Malibu. I lived in town at the time. I would drive to Malibu and we had a little house, a tiny little shack on the beach that I was renting. And I would sit in that house. And usually I would get some, some of the heaviness would lift. So one day I went to Malibu.

I got there around noon. Things that would like help get me out and nothing got me out. And I was devastated. And, and I was hopeless. And in that moment of hopelessness, I prayed. And I prayed for a sign. Please universe, please give me a sign. Please give me a sign to go on. Because I don't think I can go on. Please give me a sign.

And I walked out to the beach, which was something I never did or rarely did. I walked out to the beach. And I'm standing out on the beach. And in one minute, the entire sky turned into the most dramatic orange wild biblical painting. I have never been able to see it. I've never seen anything like it up till that moment. Never seen anything like it since

I walk out. I experience that. It blows my mind. I feel like my answer is I'm I'm I'm being spoken to. Uh-huh. And then within a minute gone back to normal blue sky. So that was. And for me, that was a mystical event. Right. So what do you make of that? Like how did that? Color your sort of sense of, you know, energy is unseen. It

felt like I'm not I felt less alone. I felt like I could, um, my cry for help was heard. And I felt connected. And that felt really good. In the book, you refer to you talk about the universe and you talk about source. Steven Pressfield calls it the muse. This is the, you know, place from which we can extract those those inspirations, those ideas and channel

them through the artist into creating something that lives in breeze in the world. But I guess I'm curious. As is Steven Pressfield, because he asked me to ask you this question. Like how do you differentiate how he thinks about it, EG, the muse versus like how you're thinking about it as source. Are those things synonymous? My sense is that you're, you have a more kind of

expansive spiritual version of the muse. Maybe. And I think it doesn't matter. It's helpful to know that the information we need. Doesn't all come from inside of us. Might not come. Maybe none of it comes from inside of us. Maybe it all comes from outside of us. And whether that be mystical or whether that be physical, whether that be practical. I've been trying to have that

experience is where I'm looking for an answer for something curious. And I'm holding it lightly in my consciousness, not working on it. Just I know there's this problem to be solved. And then I'll be out. And something will happen in the world directly related to answer the question. It happens all the time. It doesn't happen once in a while. It happens all the time. I believe

it happens all the time for everyone. If they're paying attention. If you're open to the communication, we're getting information all the time. There's so much more information coming at us than we can digest that we pick and choose unconsciously certain data points. And then based on those data points, we make up story about what happens. It's different for everybody. There's so much wisdom all around us

all of the time coming in the form of nature. Coming in the form of the culture, coming in the form of people speaking at a coffee shop. You know, over hearing a conversation. If you're open, and if you're paying attention, and I would even go further to say, I mean, it probably works either way, but I would say, and if you invite it, it might work

even better. I don't know if that's true, but why not? That's the thing. But if you're inviting it, then you're sort of injecting a level of intention into the practice of paying attention and being open. Yes. And because of the subtle nature of the information that we're looking for, it's not getting shouted at us. It's the thing that if you weren't really quiet and really paying

attention, you would likely miss. So we have to quiet ourselves. And we have to live in a way. That's why the subtitle of the book is a way of being to be able to live in the world. And we live in the world in this constant state of looking for clues, looking for information. What can I learn? What shapes align? Where are their connections? What's more

to be seen in the picture than just the face value? If I look deeper, what's happening? And that's the practice. And there are some suggestions of things that you can do to be able to see. You can get there. But meditation is a key. For me, meditation is a key. It may not be everyone's. That's the other point of this is we all function in different

ways. We can speak about diet. When I was vegan, I was wildly overweight and sick. And that was part of my depression. And when you became a vegan, you became a world class ultra runner. So it works different for different people. We each have to find what works for us and try things and see what works. Which is its own form of openness. Absolutely. Being able

to accept people in a non-judgmental way, leading with curiosity, with patience, all of these principles, which we'll get into that are kind of split out over the course of the many pages of your book. But on this idea of being open, I mean certainly in my own life, the best decisions that I've ever made, the most important decisions. And the reason that I've even sitting here

today is a result of a few brief sort of windows of opportunity where I was present enough to notice a whisper and respect it and take action on it. And I do believe like yourself that we're all visited with these moments. But we have to be in a place of receiving. Right? Like receiving is a huge theme of the work that you do and you know

it resonates throughout the book. Like how can we be better receivers? How can we attune our antennae to be in receipt of the messages that are available to us? And you talk in the book about the idea of it's sort of a hive mind collective consciousness notion that ideas are real things that exist among all of us. And when our antenna is properly attuned, we can

draw that down. And then the artist can translate that into something real. Yes. If the artist or anyone who's receiving that doesn't heed it, doesn't respect it, doesn't fertilize that seed, the seed being, you know, another big aspect of the book, it will ultimately be fertilized by somebody else, probably if not simultaneously in time proximity. That's an idea. Sorry. Let me just finish this one thought.

And we were talking about this the other day. That idea. You're talking about this idea. But I also read this same notion. And Elizabeth Gilbert's book, Big Magic, like she talks about it in a very similar way. Beautiful. I haven't read that. I love to read that. I think you've a like that book. I'll check it out. It's the idea of movements. When movements happen in

the art world, movements don't happen where one person discovers something and a bunch of people copy it. It's, there was a time for abstraction for abstract expressionism. In most art movements, it's difficult to pinpoint who was first because usually it springs up in groups and it might even spring up in different places in the world at the same time. punk rock happened all over the world

at the same time. Wasn't because one punk rock band influenced everyone else. It was a reaction to what had come before. It was time to take music out of the conservatory and bring it back to a street level. That's what that was about. And hip hop was the same. Out of the, the R&B suits and down to the beamoy mentality of people that you might recognize

on the street, how you friends might dress. Yeah. Pretty internet, by the way. Absolutely. Before ideas could spread instantaneously across the world. Absolutely. At the time that I went to high school, I was a punk rocker. There were no other punk rockers in my high school. I didn't know any punk rockers. So it was, I just think had the internet been around when I was a

kid. I would have had friends all over the world with similar interests. I had none. I had none. And you had to find your people. Yeah. Or I would go to a show and there were just a couple of clubs. Yeah. And once in a while, you know, there'd be a show once a month. And yeah, there'd be 20 people. And those would be and you

might meet, you know, you might meet two of them. Yeah. On that idea of being open, I think what's important about that is the notion of creativity itself and how we kind of culturally think about it. Like there is this idea that there are artists and there are normal people. I was talking to somebody the other day and he said, I don't have a creative bone

in my body. Very successful person, by the way. Of course, that's not true. Well, I don't know. But I think that's what we call a neatly creative. Now, most people, however, kind of you were talking about like the stories we tell, how we extract tiny little nuggets of the billions of pieces of information that we're being exposed to on a second by second basis. And we

create a narrative out of that. And I think we get calcified around what reality is and like who we are and what we're doing and what this means and what that doesn't mean. We walk around with blinders, right? We've made decisions about what's important. Pay attention to and what isn't. So we don't notice things that somebody who is natively more sensitive or somebody who is cultivated

the practice of being more open can see. Like we're sitting here. I have an idea of like where we are and all of that kind of thing. But a more sensitive person sitting here might be paying attention to something I don't even notice because they're attuned that way naturally or they have developed a process of being open. So we're talking about the practice of expanding their

awareness so they're allowing more in. So talk about this idea, like disabuse us of this idea that creativity is the genetic gift of the few and they walk the earth differently from the rest of us as somebody who's worked with so many brilliantly talented people. We may create a choice. All of us may create a choice is every day of our lives. The way when we

choose to take a new route on a that we've driven this idea of the same route every day and we try we decide to take the scenic route. That's a creative choice. And if we're paying attention and we decide today I'm going to take the scenic route and if you happen to notice something that day on the scenic route that you didn't notice before and that

ends up helping you and the thing that you're working on. Maybe it's a coincidence. But when you come to expect it to happen, it happens all the time, all the time, you know, be prepared to be awestruck and surprised on a regular basis by things that you would never imagine happening. It happens all the time. Isn't that a better, more fun way to live? It's incredible.

And you feel like also you feel like you're part of this bigger thing. You know, I can't remember exactly how I said it in the book, but we think of ourselves as the conductor, but we're not the conductor. We're an orchestra member being conducted and we're part of this bigger thing that's going on. And it works like clockwork and we all play a part. Every one

of us plays part and we all have a part to play. So when someone says, I'm not artistic or I'm not good at art, it'd be like saying, I'm not a good monk. There is no such thing as not a good monk. You're either living your life as a monk or you're not living your life as a monk. Monks aren't good or bad. You're either doing

a monk or you're not doing a monk. And, we all live as artists, but we don't know it. And there are things we can do to amplify the artistic side of ourselves that will make everything we do better. Everything. Any out your relationships, your ability to communicate, your ability to listen, your joy of life, your feeling of connection, your ability to communicate with nature will, it's

like taking off blinders. And a problem solve. We were talking the other day and you were like, I don't like softball questions. I don't know how to just talk about what it is that I do. Like I know how to solve problems, right? To bring an artistic sensibility into a problem solving context is a process of undoing everything you think you know, trying to, you know,

ditch whatever baggage and biases that you are loaded up with. And approach it with a beginner's mind so that you can see it more expansively. And I think obviously it's been very effective in how you extract the best out of the musicians that you work with. But I can't help but think about the applications in the real world to some of the biggest problems we have,

whether it's climate change or artificial intelligence or, you know, the things that that we're grappling with that very smart people are trying to come up with new ideas around like we need that sensibility as a major part of that conversation. We can't solve these massive problems on logic and reason alone. We need inspiration. We need kind of new orthogonal approaches that maybe we're not seeing. And

there's a really great story in the book about an AI that kind of illustrates that point. We do like until. Yeah. Yeah. Tell that story. I saw a video about seven years ago about AlphaGo, which was a AI system created to play the game Go. And they chose Go because up until this point, chess had been used computer chess. But Go is the most difficult or

it has the most potential combinations of any game. And it's the most difficult would be the most difficult game for a computer. To be able to play be good at. Yeah. There's like hundreds of billions of permutations. Yes. There are more permutations than there are grains of sand on the planet. That's how many permutations. So it's it's a very difficult computing problem. And humans have been

playing the game for 3000 years. It's a very old game. And there was there came a point in the movie where the computer is playing the world's grandmaster. And. Eventually, the computer makes a move that has never been made before. It's a funny thing to say because it's a game where you place a stone on a square. You can place it on any square you want.

You know, there's no rule where you can and can't place it if you place it on one of the one of the intersections of the squares. You can place a stone on any intersection that doesn't ever stone on it. And the computer made a move. And the first line was outside of the strategy understanding of human beings, it placed a stone in the as I remember

it, there were two choices based on the conditions for the computer to make a move. And to either make it was either going to place a stone on the first line or the second line. And if they placed the stone on the first line, it meant a defensive game. And if they placed it on the second line, it was a defensive game. But anyone with experience

who was playing the game ago would know it's one of those two moves. Right. And those are the only two moves that any rational person would make anyone. Yes. And the computer put the stone online three. Now there's no rule saying you can't put it online three. But it it was outside of the imagination of the culture of go for 3000 years. It made a move.

That was I'll say irrational to the human go world, right? The community of go wizards. Yes. And it was so inflammatory. That the grandmaster got up from the table and discussed. And there was some questions with the commentators. Because this was this was on on television. This is a like a computer versus man big story. People thought the computer made a mistake. It was like it

was such a wrong move. Couldn't be. And the computer ends up winning that game. The grandmaster eventually comes back after he composes himself. And the computer wins the game. And the grandmaster ends up retiring. Because his mind is so blown by what happened. Right. And when I'm watching the story, I realize there are tears running down my face. And I'm crying. And I wasn't sure why.

And I thought about it for a while. And it wasn't the most obvious answer was the computer beat the man. Oh no, it's the end of the world. Man loses to the computer. I'm crying because we're at but it wasn't that at all. What it was was the reason I realized the reason the computer won was because the computer didn't know more than the human. The

computer only knew the rules of the game. It didn't know the customs, the morals, the mores, the stories. What one grandmaster learns from another grandmaster. The cultural references over the years of the game didn't know the history. But etiquette didn't know any of that. All it knew was I could put it anywhere. But I didn't know what it was. By putting it here, it's getting increased

my chances of winning mathematically. So the computer solved a problem not by knowing more, but by knowing less. And that's a really beautiful idea for me. Because it gets back to the beginner's mind idea. It's not that we need to necessarily learn more. It's more like we need to think different. Like maybe if we can let go of some of our beliefs, if we can let

go of some of the stories. That we hold. If we watch an event happen instead of accepting the first version of the story that comes to us to help us survive in the world, that's what we do. We'll see a series of events. And we make up a story that explains what that is. And that way we can sleep at night. Right. Because really we don't

know anything. We don't know anything. That's the powerful epiphany and the whole thing. This. Humility to embrace the idea that we really don't know that much. And when you look at the web telescope images, it's so awe inspiring. And it's such a healthy dose of humility to that point. Right. We walk around. Rational beings. It's the age of reason and enlightenment. We have answered many questions.

And to the questions that we don't yet have answers to. We feel work. We're capable of answering those very soon. And yet that is still such an incredibly limited perspective on the totality of what we're actually fucking contending with, which is beyond our ability as these tiny organisms to comprehend. It's true. Yeah. It's sort of walk the earth with that sensibility of actually we don't really

know anything. We don't really know anything. And. And when something happens to say. Oh, that it might be that. Maybe it's that. Uh huh. Or let's see if we can come up with another reason. What else could it be? And like not assuming things are as they seem on their face. Sometimes they are. Sometimes they're not. Or thinking I can think of so many times over

the course of my life where. I thought that someone was mad at me or I thought that's like I thought I knew it was in someone else's head. And it. Never true. It was only just self negative self-hawk or some misunderstood or that causes our own suffering. Absolutely. So much of the difficulty is self-inflicted. And the more we can let go of all of our beliefs

and just experience what happens and see what works. Try things. It's like that works. And not too soon. Well, that works. That's the only way. No, that works. And maybe there's a hundred other ways. So what would be an example of taking that notion into the studio? Like is there a situation in which you consciously thought, you know, let's take a tip from AlphaGo and try

to unlearn what we think we know about what we're doing here and approach it from the other side. The first thing that comes to mind, and I don't even know if we've done this. But the first thing that comes to mind when you say that is. To ask a musician. A great musician, most of the people I get to work with are really talented. To try

playing on an instrument that they're not familiar with. That would be an example of like, let's let go of all of your practice and everything that we think of what makes you great at what you do. You're the wizard on this instrument. Let's play something else that you never played before and see what happens. And let's see where that goes. Let's see if we find something

new. Shake it up. Who knows? It's not a story is apocryphal, but isn't that what occurred with the talking heads with naive melody? Like every member of the band played an instrument that they didn't play. I didn't know that. That is how that song came together, which ends up being one of their, if not the best song they ever created. Beautiful. I didn't know this. It

might not be true, but I've heard that. I've heard that story. Yeah. A story on the other side. And that's why it's called naive melody. Yeah. Like the naive a day of it is what created the beauty. It's funny that Van Halen's biggest hit at the time and Eddie Van Halen's one of the greatest guitar players of all time. And song Jump was maybe the first

song he ever just played a keyboard on. And that was their biggest hit. And he was the greatest guitar player of the century for some. Yet the song that worked was the one where he played the keyboard. Yeah. So in this idea of the creation of art and creativity as a way of being, there's this quote. It's near the beginning of the story. The book, if

memory serves me, this quote by Robert Henry, who is a painter. And he says, the role of the artist isn't to make art, but to be in that wonderful state, which makes art inevitable. So it's about creating an environment, like a culturing a mindset, a way of walking the planet, such that you're conducive to the messages and the material execution of. The inspiration and the ideas.

And that's really kind of the role that you serve. Like how can you be a facilitator of enhancing the container of creation? Right. And it's, it's a guru role. It's a coach role. It's a teacher role. And it requires a certain delicate touch. Right. Like you have to be patient. Like when the, the other, the record producer or executive said to you, like, I don't know

how you could be so patient. Like you have to be patient. And you have to listen and marinate and all of this stuff and just gently guide the sensitive soul to that landing place. So the highest, you know, expression can emerge. And to do it with as little, I try to do it with as little of a footprint as possible. So in some cases, I'm more

involved in some cases, I'm less involved, but I'm only as involved as I need to be. If there was a way to do it, I'm not going to be involved. I'm not going to be to make it happen where I mean in a dream scenario, if I could produce an artist, support them in doing their best work without ever meeting or speaking to them, that would

be the highest form of it. I've not achieved that level. But that would be the ultimate version of it. Just the shadow. Just happen in the back or just happen. What happens though, I'm sure this happens. You're in the studio, you're working it out. Playback something that you're working it out. You just lay down and the artist says, well, what do you think, Rick? If your

job is not to inject your own sensibility into it, do you have to mirror that back to the artist or like, how do you kind of gracefully dance around that? My job is to mirror my true reflection as it's needed. So in that case, if I'm asked what I think, I will absolutely say what I think good or bad. I'll say it in a way where,

I'm not going to be able to do it. It's not confrontational or not unkind, but we're talking about something outside of ourselves. I would never say it about the person. It's never about the person. If someone takes criticism personally, the game is over. And it's helpful to remove whatever it is that we're making from the people making it. We're making this thing. It's a reflection of

us, but it's not us. It's this thing out here. And once we have this thing out here, we could talk about this thing. It's not dangerous to talk about this thing because I'm pointing at right now. I'm pointing at the table. I'm not pointing at Rich. So it's like, I'm not saying you're no good. I'm saying this aspect of this thing. Maybe there's a way to

do this part better. This parts good. This parts maybe can be better. Let's see. You have any ideas? How do I do this? We make this part better. I didn't be better. It's powerful to restrict that feedback to the work, taking the personality out of it so that it's purely focused on the common goal of making the thing great. It's not a commentary or a referendum

on the human being. It can't be dead in the water. Yes, it can't be. That's applicable in life. It's really interesting to be a fly on the wall for a note session with people who really know what it is. It's a very important thing to do with what they're doing. And you can see it's its own art form to do it properly. And it takes a

lot of, it's a soft touch, it takes grace, it takes experience to do it well. And it requires that the ego has to vanish. All egos have to be set aside. We're in unison as a team to create this great thing. Our only interest is in making the best thing possible. Credit, all of that, who cares about that. And there's a maturity that's required for that,

right? But it's cool. The comedian, Mike Berbiglia, he's a great stand-up comedian. He has a podcast called Working It Out. And what he does is he'll bring people on other comedians, writers, actors, people who are artistic in some way. And they each share what they're working on. And then they give each other feedback. On the podcast. Which I think is such a service to people to

hear people who are who really care about craft and know how to communicate, what's good, what isn't working, etc. In a really constructive, healthy way. Because it's so applicable to all other areas of our life. If you're having an argument with your spouse, your partner, if you're having a conflict at work, like all of these skills have high, high applicability in all areas. And so there's

a lot of areas of life. Absolutely. And taking the ego out of all of it is such a key component of allowing the thing to be the best thing it can be. If it's about you, it's about you. It's not about it. And it's not about it being its best. Whatever that is. Whatever that is. Or to, in any way, be defensive when someone's sharing information.

When someone gives criticism, that's how they see it. It's helpful. It's helpful to you to know you don't have to see what they see. But it's helpful to know that that's what they see. And the fact that it's different than what you see, that's good for you to know. That's not bad for you to know. That's helpful information. Right. But our insecurities end up hearing your

an untalented hack. You're a terrible person. You don't know what you're doing. You truly are the imposter that you believe yourself to be. And we create these narratives out of that in a way that ends up being destructive. And I would suspect, I'm interested in your thoughts on this, that the most generative artists are the ones who understand how to remove the ego and receive the

feedback for the best interest of the project. Absolutely. And it's something for someone who's never had helpful criticism before, it can be shocking. I don't remember. I'm a very successful artist. I was listening to some new songs that they were playing me. And I gave very analytical everything that I felt on every song. As they, you know, on this one, I felt this, this, this, this,

on this one, I felt this, this, this, this. And I finished completely analytical, talking about the craft, just the specifics of these things. And he said, have you ever talked to an artist like this before? I said, every day. It's my job. He's like, no one's ever talked to me like this before. I said, well, I'm here in service to you. I'm here to help. These

are the things that resonated with me. These are the things that didn't. This is information to help you. And we ended up working really well together after that. But there was this initial like, wow, no one's ever told me anything before. Right. No one's ever shared what they were, especially with people who are successful. People who are successful used to hearing yes, yes, yes, everything is

great. And it's not helpful. Right. It's not helpful. It's helpful to have yes, yes, yes. When it is, yes, yes, yes. And hmm. Is that as good as it could be when is that as good as it can be? Having some sense of reality. Otherwise, there's no grounding. They're operating in a vacuum. And they lose perspective with what's really happening. If they have no, no ability

to get feedback. Humbling yourself to be a craftsman among craftsmen. Right. Beautiful. In service. Well said to the higher purpose of the work. Absolutely. So in this idea of the stories we tell ourselves about who we are and what we're capable of. And how the means by which we communicate with others, the assumptions we make about how those communications are received. I think we need a

new perspective on how to shift how we think about that or to dislodge our entrenched thinking about how we see ourselves and how others see us. And this idea is illustrated beautifully by this psychological experiment that we were talking about the other day. So I think it would be cool to kind of end even though we are ending a little bit shorter than I wanted to.

Like it will give people something to ponder and consider until we meet again because we're going to have to do a part two. Great. Right. Let's close our eyes. If it's unless you're driving close your eyes and envision a desert. A desert. Once you have pictured the desert. In the desert, there is a cube. A cube. Visualize the cube in the desert. There's also a ladder.

See the ladder. There are flowers in the desert. Notice the flowers. There's a horse in the desert. Picture the horse. And finally, there is a storm. What's interesting about this experiment is if you were to, you might even want to write down the details of your, of what you're imagining. And the next time you're with a friend or loved one. Ask them to do the same.

You can either play this for them or read them the cues, the six cues. And then compare your cube image story. And they're a cube image story and see how similar or different they are. Try with your friends. Interesting. It's an old. It's an old. I first did this about 20 years ago. And I remember. The first time I did it, having a very clear vision

of what my, my story was when that, when I was given those cues, very simple cues. And I imagine that's what it looked like. And then I spoke to some other people around the table who took the same answer the same questions. And it was mind blowing how different our pictures were. And it's a great example of how, we all imagine such different worlds. And it's

why if we don't make the thing we want to make, if someone else is antennas more tuned to ours, and they pick up the same source material, the thing they make, it's not going to be the same thing we would make. No one can do our part. Our picture is our picture. So, there's a great, great view. It's a great benefit in taking a risk, making

the thing that's interesting to you, sharing it with the world. Because if you don't do it nobody else will. You're the only one who can make the art that you can make. And it's not in competition with anyone else. There is no competition. There's no competition who has a better picture in their head. It's a reflection of you. Everything that you make is a reflection of

who you are. And how you live in the world will impact the things that you make. And I wish the best of luck on the journey in making beautiful things that we can all enjoy. Yeah, it's beautifully put. I think a fantastic way to end this. This call to action that we all have something inside of us that is worthy of exploration and expression because there

is no other you. And that in and of itself makes you infinitely valuable. Absolutely. And you're depriving all of us of that. If you choose not to. Share true. And if you want to know the psychological meanings of your cube, you can Google cube psychology test. And I'm sure you'll find the. What everything means. Very interesting. Yeah. Cool. Do that. Then pick up the creative act.

It really is a beautiful expression. If you want to more finely attuned your radar to the subtle art of making things. And adopting a certain way of being, I can't think of any better way to start there. I mean, it's. It's really something special. So thank you for writing it. And I think people are going to. Really enjoy it. Beautiful. Thank you for speaking to me.

And thank you so much for reading it. Yeah. I hope that I can call you friend. And again, I would like to have you back. So if we ever find ourselves even though we kind of live close to each other, you're in parts unknown. So I had to grab this opportunity. We have background noise and all of that. But it's an organic living breathing thing. You

know, I love it. And when we hear it back, we'll remember where we are and what's happening. Yeah. It's beautiful for sure forever. Cool. Thank you, sir. Thank you. That's it for today. Thank you for listening. I truly hope you. I enjoyed the conversation to learn more about today's guest, including links and resources related to everything discussed today. Visit the episode page at ritual.com where you

can find the entire podcast archive as well as podcast merch. My books, finding ultra, voicing change and the plant power away as well as the plant power meal planner at meals.ritual.com. If you'd like to support the podcast, the easiest and most impactful thing you can do is to subscribe to the show on Apple podcasts, on Spotify, and on YouTube, and lever review and or comment. Supporting

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