Have you ever pondered the puzzles life throws at you, or how a simple dish like 'egg rice' could spark a philosophical debate? Well, buckle up, because our latest episode traverses the culinary landscape of leftovers, touches on the sweet allure of Starbucks treats, and dives headfirst into the paradoxes that keep our minds spinning. From my kitchen to yours, I reveal the secret spices that transform yesterday's rice into today's breakfast champion, and we explore whether this comfort food has the chops to become a restaurant's crowning glory.
With a sprinkle of humor and a dash of self-reflection, we unwrap the enigmas of everyday life that often wear the mask of common sense. As we dissect modern paradoxes, from the impact of reading on personal identity to the intricacies of skill and luck in our endeavors, the conversation is peppered with real-world anecdotes that'll have you nodding along or scratching your head in wonder. Even our podcast transitions, a source of comedic pain, get a moment in the spotlight, as we acknowledge the beauty in the struggle to find the perfect ending to our rambling beginnings.
As we reach the apex of our chat, decision-making takes center stage—will it be the egg bites or the shaken espresso? Just kidding. It's about tackling the real-life conundrum of overthinking and the strategies to overcome it. Wrapping up, we tease your appetite for intellectual debate with a hint at the paradox of originality, ensuring the conversation continues beyond today. So, join us as we laugh, ponder, and maybe even change the way you see the world with each episode. No cliffhangers here—just the promise of more enthralling talks to come.
Infographic Used in Episode
Have you ever pondered the puzzles life throws at you, or how a simple dish like 'egg rice' could spark a philosophical debate? Well, buckle up, because our latest episode traverses the culinary landscape of leftovers, touches on the sweet allure of Starbucks treats, and dives headfirst into the paradoxes that keep our minds spinning. From my kitchen to yours, I reveal the secret spices that transform yesterday's rice into today's breakfast champion, and we explore whether this comfort food has the chops to become a restaurant's crowning glory.
With a sprinkle of humor and a dash of self-reflection, we unwrap the enigmas of everyday life that often wear the mask of common sense. As we dissect modern paradoxes, from the impact of reading on personal identity to the intricacies of skill and luck in our endeavors, the conversation is peppered with real-world anecdotes that'll have you nodding along or scratching your head in wonder. Even our podcast transitions, a source of comedic pain, get a moment in the spotlight, as we acknowledge the beauty in the struggle to find the perfect ending to our rambling beginnings.
As we reach the apex of our chat, decision-making takes center stage—will it be the egg bites or the shaken espresso? Just kidding. It's about tackling the real-life conundrum of overthinking and the strategies to overcome it. Wrapping up, we tease your appetite for intellectual debate with a hint at the paradox of originality, ensuring the conversation continues beyond today. So, join us as we laugh, ponder, and maybe even change the way you see the world with each episode. No cliffhangers here—just the promise of more enthralling talks to come.
Infographic Used in Episode
Welcome to Help Yourself. Food and Philosophy with Brian and Nick. I'm Nick and I'm Brian. Brian, what do you call it when a medical doctor and a PhD coexist, yet also disagree? Don't know what. A paradox which you can Brian.
Speaker 2:All right, I get it. I think I got it. I feel like a little split second there, but that's okay. A pair of docs, I got it, which is what I just got rid of. I got rid of a pair of Doc Martens, so I got rid of a pair of docs. Anyway, good riddance, I say I did, I did. I just got rid of some Doc Martens. I wore forever and they're dead. So anyway, just.
Speaker 1:They weren't loafing around with your pinnies, weren't they?
Speaker 2:Right, exactly what am I eating? Well, for breakfast this morning I had egg rice. You ever have egg rice? Have I talked about egg?
Speaker 1:rice no.
Speaker 2:Oh man.
Speaker 1:I've had egg noodles. Is that anywhere close to the same?
Speaker 2:Well, egg noodles is just like the actual noodle, Like that's. There's little curly short ones right the Like.
Speaker 1:They're not made with egg.
Speaker 2:They're just made for egg. They're made with egg, I think. Aren't they Okay With the yolks, or I don't know?
Speaker 1:Anyway, we'll have to get that one man. We're so ignorant.
Speaker 2:I know we're only going to be in 10 minutes and 26 seconds and we're already showing.
Speaker 1:So tell me more about this other thing. I don't know anything about egg rice.
Speaker 2:Okay, so I had egg rice, which is something that I've had my whole life. Like I just it was just something. You know how there are certain things that maybe in your household growing up, your family did, and you get the sense that as you go out into the world that nobody else did that. No, I don't know. I haven't met another person that's like oh yeah, I do egg rice all the time.
Speaker 2:So it's pretty much just when we have leftover rice like either from a Chinese food restaurant, like you go out and you get extra, all you have a bunch of white rice leftover or we usually once a week we'll cook rice, just so we have rice in the fridge that we can throw together with something else, right?
Speaker 2:And so today there was just a little bit of leftover, and so what you typically do is you just take that leftover rice, you throw it in a pan with some butter, heat it up so it gets back to not the crunchy refrigerated rice anymore, and then you just take a couple scrambled eggs, put it in there with it and you scramble it up into like a big mixture. That's in essence, you know, and they do this a little bit with fried rice, like if you get fried rice at a Chinese restaurant. They do put egg in it, but this is more like more egg. So it's you know, it's not just like a little like they put. They'll put like one egg in like a big batch of fried rice, whereas this is like a couple of eggs in a smaller amount of rice. So it's almost like the egg is binding together the rice and usually it's just.
Speaker 1:Why don't they just call it egg rice then, since eggs take such a dominant part of the dish?
Speaker 2:What egg rice?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I do call it egg rice.
Speaker 2:Good job, anyway. So I usually just salt and pepper, but you can do whatever you want. You can add a little cheese to it if you want. So you have like you know, cheesy egg rice. You can also add meats if you want. Put some sausage and some other stuff in there Sausage- bacon.
Speaker 1:Now it's like a breakfast burrito power bowl.
Speaker 2:Yeah, basically yeah, it's, and instead of using a tortilla and wrapping it up, you're getting your sarch or your carbs from the rice that's in there. But really, I think in our family it just turned. It was just one of those. Hey, let's try to use this thing that we have in the fridge and not let it go to waste and so just sort of throw it in there. You can also put veggies in there too, if you want, like I've put, like spinach and other things, if you want to, or peppers, bell peppers and make it like a breakfast scramble, but it's pretty hearty. My secret ingredient, though, is the Cajun seasoning. I put a little bit of Cajun seasoning in it, so it'll be like Tony Keshares, or like Conrico Chash, chash, chash, chasherees, chasherees, chasherees. Yeah, all of the people that are in Louisiana and listening to this and are French like me are really mad at me right now.
Speaker 1:You got corrected so they're happy.
Speaker 2:So I put a little bit of that seasoning in there salt and pepper and gives it, and obviously you can control the spiciness. If you put a lot in you're going to get a little bit of spice there. And then today I had the couple of pieces of bacon with it, where I just sort of ate the pieces of bacon. Along with it I added a little bit of cheese and I had it in a bowl and it was really really good Bacon and eggs rice.
Speaker 1:Yeah, bacon and eggs rice.
Speaker 2:Yeah, bacon and eggs rice. Bacon and eggs rice, exactly, yeah, yeah, which again is another idea, copyrighted, so no one could take it, since I just said it's copyrighted. And if that's another idea for my breakfast restaurant, when I went, and if I ever opened a breakfast restaurant, there'll be egg rice on the menu and everyone will come in and be like what the heck is egg rice? And then I'll be known as the egg rice king of the Southeast. So do you see how far my delusions go?
Speaker 1:Well, no, I think I stopped paying attention halfway through, so I only saw most of how far your delusions can go.
Speaker 2:So I had that this morning I also had some iced coffee. I just had some of the cold brew iced coffee that's just was in my fridge and like store bought and I also am and this is another thing, if I can't remember if I talked about this or not, but I'm hooked on there's a coconut cream creamer that is put out by like the basic, like the most prominent, you know, if you go into your refrigerated section at your supermarket.
Speaker 1:I think it's I want to say it's like it's always Nestle Cafe, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Like it's like the most prominent one in there, like the oldest one that you probably have known since you were a kid, and they have this one that's coconut cream, and originally I thought how that sounds horrible, right, coconut in coffee sounds really not like. If you just in my head, that doesn't seem like it should taste. It's, paradoxically, it seems like that should be a bad combination, right, and it is awesome.
Speaker 1:So it's like a paradox, it's like a paradox of flavor.
Speaker 2:That's what the catchphrase for my breakfast restaurant is going to be. I don't know if you knew that or not, but that's crazy that you guessed it. So I'm hooked on this. So I don't know if I'm drinking more coffee because I actually like to drink more coffee or it's just because I'm trying to have like a delivery mechanism for this coconut creamer.
Speaker 2:It doesn't really matter which I guess, but anyway I had that along with it, and then I also have my hydration is important flask my iron flask, iron degree flask, whatever, and then I haven't had these for a long time, but there's sort of a off brand soda that's in the market called Dr Browns, and it's been around forever, like since I was a kid. I remember drinking it. They actually I haven't been able to find it, but I'm pretty sure they make a chocolate soda, which is the only chocolate soda that I've ever. That I've ever. And it's not chocolate like creamy chocolate, like chocolate milk, it's like it would be like cola flavored like a carbonated beverage that tastes like chocolate. So, anyway, I got a craving as I was walking by and so I got the diet cream soda that they have and this says since 1869, it's also kosher, so, and it's also caffeine free. So after I had a big cup of coffee, I'm going less caffeine on this, but every once in a while I like a cream, a good cream soda. It just is, I don't know.
Speaker 2:I think that some I don't know, I feel like some people, I feel like cream soda is a divider among people. That I don't think. I think people either love it or hate it. So, but this one is particularly good. I also like that. It's diet, which is hard to find it's hard to find cream soda in and of itself, but then to find, to be able to find, one that's a diet cream soda that I don't have to worry about, like, oh, this is like another 150 calories I'm taking and I shouldn't be taking in. Um, that's, it's good so and that, and it has a good flavor to it, not like no aftertaste or anything like that. I wonder what the sweetener is in this Hold on a second.
Speaker 2:What is the sweetener? Hold on, let's see.
Speaker 1:Rithritol sorbitol.
Speaker 2:It is aspartame.
Speaker 1:Aspartame.
Speaker 2:Which is which used to be the one that they said everything was bad and then they moved on to their Rithritol. So I guess they're all bad right.
Speaker 1:Rithritol sweeteners are probably all sort of bad in some way, but my personal take is yeah, but you know I don't have any science to prove all of it.
Speaker 2:Sure, so that's that's what I was eating right before I came on, and that's Brian's beverage corner in a nutshell Not really in a nutshell, but you know. So what are you eating?
Speaker 1:Unless your stomach's a nutshell Right, let's see. I went to Starbucks with my sweetheart and got the white.
Speaker 2:Dory. Oh okay, I just wanted for clarification. Just wanted to make sure if Dory's listening to this.
Speaker 1:Yes, I suppose that is important, that they're. Yeah, see it. Just there's no other person on mind who would qualify, so it goes without saying that I get. Why it for?
Speaker 2:others does matter.
Speaker 1:So egg white, roasted red pepper, egg bites.
Speaker 2:Oh nice.
Speaker 1:I get it because they're roasted red pepper, that egg whites are just okay. That's how they make it, so that's how I get it. You know a lot of their. I think all of Starbucks food is prepared outside the store and they just reheat it.
Speaker 1:So there's not any customization options. But it was a good snacky kind of breakfast and to drink I got the iced brown sugar, milk shaken espresso, Of course decaf roast because of my my thing, I did have a caffeinated drink Back Wednesday, which that's not much of a frame of reference for our audience, but let's say about what half a week ago, a week and a half ago, yeah. And anyway, today I had this, so it was good Still sipping on the remaining ice cubes.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I like the oat milk. The oat milk out of all of the fake milks I think has all has the most or the best feel of actual milk, like it has that sort of thickness to it where you know, where the you know, it sort of rolls over your tongue.
Speaker 2:The same way, because, unlike like soy milk or something else, I feel like the oat milk is the best in terms of making like for something like that, like putting it in coffee and stuff. I think it gives you the same feeling as having a sweet cream or something else in there, because it is a little bit sweet in my opinion.
Speaker 1:And the milk? Yeah, it's really sweet. Like it helped kind of in between that and then the brown sugar. Yeah. It was pretty, pretty sweet, I do. I do like coconut milk and I think, there is sort of a you know as it comes option of the shake and espresso with coconut milk. The only reason I chose oat milk is because that's how it comes Like. I was pretty lazy. Yeah. I was not sure what I wanted, so I ordered by picture. I just said I want that, except decaf.
Speaker 2:Sir, what do you mean by that? Well, I read it off right. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Like you know, because I can't remember what the coconut milk was or didn't think about it, but I have noticed that I like coconut quite a bit.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I would say that's number two for me, after if I'm going to get a fake milk.
Speaker 1:Doesn't just that make it this shit? Yeah, absolutely. I'll have to put a language advisory on this episode, sorry.
Speaker 2:No, it was a reference.
Speaker 1:That was a reference to an actual thing, so yeah, yeah, a phrase that's common in the colloquial parlance of this day and age.
Speaker 2:Well, that's good, that, like I said, that's to me, that's a I think I want to say. I've tried that one before, the brown sugar oatmeal one, I think I did it one.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think I've done it one before Shaking that stirred.
Speaker 2:And every once in a while I do like ice, because I know the nitrocobrus. They don't come with ice, but every once in a while I like it. I like a drink with ice, like an iced coffee with ice in it. It just keeps it cold and it's. Every sip is going to be like that and it does get watered down a little bit, but I don't. I drink it quick enough that it's not going to, you know, not going to be that big of a deal. So yeah.
Speaker 1:And then, as a kind of a snack before lunch, I had an ice cream sandwich.
Speaker 2:Nice, yeah, I just. I just small the, so just just the original basic, like one with two chocolate and vanilla ice cream.
Speaker 1:Nice, yep, I am basic AF.
Speaker 2:I, just I enjoy those. They take me back to childhood. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:Yes, and I wanted. I wanted a little bit of ice cream, but I didn't want the pint, because the pint usually lasts like one serving. Yes In practice, you know. Yeah. So it's like I want. I want individually wrapped serving sizes to help with my portion control.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, cause then you know what you're getting. I can't say I'm not doing the same thing, so it's a double negative.
Speaker 1:So you are implying that?
Speaker 2:I am saying that I'm doing the same thing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I have to count the negatives. So, this is the transition into our subject.
Speaker 2:We're transitioning now. Look at this segue. It's working really well, you would think. You would think, nick, you would think it's so smooth. You would think that, after us doing almost what three and a half years of podcasting, that we would know how to transition from one subject to another. You would think that, right, like logically, you would think it would have made us better at that. But it hasn't. That's the paradox.
Speaker 1:No, because I think. I think the two hardest things with anything you do in the first and second place can vary between the task, but it's going to be finishing and starting.
Speaker 2:Right, yeah, we also have a problem.
Speaker 1:We have a big problem with how we end it. I was going to say if anyone listens to the end of these podcasts.
Speaker 2:They know absolutely that we still have no idea how to end the podcast. It's sort of ridiculous. All this is being said to get us into our subject, which is paradoxes.
Speaker 2:Paradoxes of modern life, of modern life Right, and so, as is our usual custom, first of all, what the heck is a paradox? We can usually go about saying, defining that for the audience, so that we're all sort of at least hopefully, on the same page. So I pulled up the definition says a seemingly absurd or self-contradictory statement or proposition that, when investigated or explained, may prove to be well-founded or true. So then. And it also says a statement or proposition that, despite sound or apparent sound reasoning from acceptable premises, leads to a conclusion that seems senseless, logical, logically unacceptable or self-contradictory.
Speaker 2:And if you guys have been listening for a while, we did do another episode on this a while back back in I think it's August of 2022. It's titled Doing the Illogical is Logical, and it was about counterintuitive truths, which is basically what we're talking about here with paradoxes is these things are. They don't make sense. They, it may like, when you start to think about it, you're like that doesn't make any sense at all. It's like it should be the opposite of that. But from studies and people, you know the actual, you know reality of the matter is that they do make sense, and that's exactly what a paradox is is like, which is also, I think, a little tie-in we didn't even talk about this before we started recording but I think a little also tie-in to our cognitive biases, because I think cognitive biases really play into the fact that you believe that the paradox shouldn't be the way that it is, because your brain is trying to tell you that doesn't make any sense. It can't be that way, you know.
Speaker 2:And if you stop right there and just say it doesn't make any sense, then you're saying yeah, you reject it, and then you're actually rejecting the truth, which is counterintuitive what you think, so okay, I think it also reminds me of co-ans.
Speaker 1:I forget we've talked about those. Maybe it was in that episode. Doing the illogical is logical, but where they're like zen mental puzzles, the classic, the one that probably everyone's heard of, is what is the sound of one hand clapping? Yeah. Right, it's like they sort of break your brain a little bit yeah.
Speaker 2:Well, and then the other one that's similar to that is tree falls in the forest and no one's there to hear it. Does it make a sound?
Speaker 1:Right, we can probably think I think we can think the Simpsons for both of those. Yeah. They had episodes that covered that and the peak of their attention capture. But yeah, so one thing, and you found this, brian, on Reddit like an infographic the paradoxes of modern life. And. I thought this is fascinating. We could definitely get a lot of mileage and banter back and forth on it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it was really interesting to me when I was reading it, because each one of them and there's nine of them on this infographic and we'll post it in the notes, but each one of them is it really is like you read it and you're like, yeah, it really doesn't make sense. And I can say that some of them in my head, I've experienced them in my own life, where I'll say, oh, yeah, that makes sense to me, because I actually have sort of gone through the process of trying to do something and then I go, oh, it sort of doesn't make sense how I got to where I got to. But now it does, because this is almost confirmation bias a little bit, because I'm like, ah, okay, now the missing piece of the puzzle sort of clicked in there where I'm like it didn't make sense, why what happened to me happened to me. And now it does. So, yeah, that's the basics of it. So do you want to just dive into the first one?
Speaker 1:Yeah. So, the paradox of reading yeah, Go ahead.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So it says, in essence, the books you read, or yeah, the books you read will profoundly change you, even though you'll forget the vast majority of what you read, which to me is makes sense, because I can barely remember what I read yesterday, like I mean, I guess that sort of I mean what's interesting to me. I'll say, let me start out here. The whole educational system is based upon you reading material and then remembering what that material is and regurgitating it back to some extent, at least lower levels of education. When you get higher, obviously you're trying to get into original thought and other things like that, which again we'll get into that in another paradox.
Speaker 2:But I can say that I've read a lot of books in my life just through education. Not necessarily I'm not saying I'm like some smart reader or something. I'm just saying that through education you end up reading quite a bit of source material and you know primary and secondary sources and a lot of those. I don't remember the exact part of it. I could review it and it would refresh my memory, but I can say that it has All of those things have a, you know, a role in who I am today and also sort of why we started this podcast even because you and I are self-help junkies. Well, self-help, you know? Like, how many self-help books have you read? I mean, like if you had to guess, like Whatever to cover or just like yeah.
Speaker 2:That is a good qualification, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:There's definitely ones that have, you know, bailed on, either because of attention span or it just works like it did. Yeah, but yeah, it'd definitely be in the triple digits, I mean certainly over 100, probably less than 999.
Speaker 2:So you probably could give like a brief summary of like sort of the premise of that book, like sort of the crux of okay, what is this book getting at in terms of self-help, or like what is it trying to get you to do in your life, to do something right? But you might not be able to tell us in detail, like well, chapter one was this and chapter two, but those books all obviously have, you know, pieced you together to who you are right now.
Speaker 1:right, Well, I think, yeah, I think some of that has to do with a social and neurological component, Like what we read and why has a lot to do with how we'll store it in our memory. Yeah. If I'm reading something because I want to use it like the way I like, just biologically speaking, like I store that differently in my head. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Then if I read something because I know I'm going to report on it, if I'm going to tell someone else about it. I might reread it multiple times. I might, you know, write down a summary or key points and reread those and you know, reread the book and like, reading to report is very different than you know, reading to embody, and I think that's where, like was it, plagiarism and copyright law get kind of on. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Because there's been several examples of people who absorb content subconsciously and they reproduce it almost perfectly unconsciously, not realizing where it came from, where they got it. Yeah, that they're even stealing like, and yeah. So there's lots of times where I'm just regurgitating the culmination and synthesis of tons of self-help stuff that I've read and unconsciously combining it into something that's cohesive for me.
Speaker 2:Well, and that even makes sense with it. We aren't going to talk about it this episode, but there's another paradox that talks about exactly what you're talking about, and so I don't want to spoil it, because you know.
Speaker 1:I want to be a spoiler alert, but well, you're not spoiling, but you're definitely teasing Geez.
Speaker 2:I know I'm trying to Come listen to the next episode. Can we get there now? Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1:Like wait a minute.
Speaker 2:This is not fair. Yeah, no, I was just going to say what you were talking about is that there's the old saying of, like, if you really want to learn material, then you teach it Right, or what's that. There's like if you I forget what the exact saying is or if there's an actual quote that goes with that or not, but you know, basically they're saying that, hey, the way to really learn materials to teach in exactly what you just said.
Speaker 1:Did you just read the? Did you read the quote? And you're having trouble retrieving it.
Speaker 2:No, I did not read the quote.
Speaker 1:It's changed the quote. The quote has changed you, but it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, exactly, but I can't remember it, I can't recall it exactly.
Speaker 1:You'll forget the vast majority of the quote.
Speaker 2:I'm just trying to demonstrate the paradox for the audience right now in real time. So so, anyway, so yeah, but what you're saying is, hey, if I have to report on this, then I'm going to take notes, I'm going to make bullet points, I'm going to, I'm going to digest that material in a different way, as other than you know, or you know, instead of just saying, hey, I'm just going to read this to try to get some information out of it, and but then also again, once you give that report, I think that that still has changed you but you're not going to remember, three years from now, the report you gave, unless you go and look at that report and look at your PowerPoint or whatever you did. You're not going to remember exactly what you said or how you did it Right. You just are going to say like.
Speaker 2:Hey, I remember we discussed this and it was something about this, so anyway, very interesting.
Speaker 1:I think we see it a lot too. There's a difference between yeah, under understanding something and remembering something. Right. And we see it a lot with speeches and trying to memorize speeches, and that's just a parallel to so many other activities. But like you can, you could write your speech and and then try to give your speech without any rehearsal and you can't remember your speech. Yeah. Right Cause cause like writing it down, storing it isn't the same as retrieving it. Yeah.
Speaker 1:And we're just understanding, isn't the same as between kids studying for school. Dole of time to they'll read the material. It's like oh, okay, I get it. You know these, these chemicals interact this way and and these, yeah, since I see the consistency and they stop reading and when they get to the test, it's not there. Right. You know, because comprehension is not the same as retention.
Speaker 2:Right. Well, that's interesting that you are talking about that, Because the next paradox is the paradox of writing, which is great. Writing looks effortless, but because the ideas are so clear, casual readers don't appreciate how much time it took to refine them. So Dory's going through this right now and has gone through this, you know, having books that she's written our our friend Ed, who's been on the podcast before he's gone through this, and a couple other people we know that have have read or, excuse me, have written books or other things.
Speaker 2:Anybody who's a writer really, you know you're reading speeches, yeah exactly, and that's what exactly what you're just saying is, and I think both of those. You can expand it a little bit. Obviously, writing the speech is one thing, but then delivering it is another thing, and then you know each one of those things. I think I feel like this plays into just almost the 10,000 hour kind of thing like the, the, not necessarily that you spend 10,000 hours writing a book, but you, you know, a lot of work goes into from the, the beginning product, to what the end user, if it's, unless it's this podcast, then if it's this podcast, very little work goes in and then the audience understands that we're. We're here conversing, conversating about it, you know.
Speaker 1:And one of the things that shows up there, too, is writing, especially fiction writing is hyper real. They don't have the characters, don't struggle to find their words. Right. Always a lot more self aware than anybody in real life. Yeah.
Speaker 1:They don't. They don't open up dialogue with hi, how are you? Oh, I'm good. How are you? Oh, that's not like, there's none of that. That's just straight into the meat and the heart of their souls. Are seeking you know like and there's no problem. Or points to the story that are disconnected from the main story. Right. Unless it's a mystery which case. That's part of the point is. There's some red herrings thrown in facts that are missing information yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Things that are not revealed.
Speaker 1:Access unnecessary information right.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:Throw the reader off. But but by and large it's. It's been honed down. You know, the author has killed their darlings, as the phrase goes. It's been edited and trimmed and that's partly why I think some people are drawn to reading such things. Is it's hyper real?
Speaker 2:a lot of the yeah distraction and unnecessary bits of life aren't present mm-hmm, but it also can be to some people, depending on personality type, can be distracting, and the reason why is because they're like they. It's that suspension of disc, the suspension of reality, a suspension of disbelief, where they're like. This is not how people talk, like I don't, I can't read this, because this is not how a regular person or any regular people would act, and so I know we're sort of off the topic of the paradox, but but the idea is exactly what you said is there. There, they have taken a, they've taken a bunch of material, they've written it down and then they've removed anything that is superfluous and and Doesn't move the story ahead and does not, you know, doesn't get to the point that they need to get to and so Then it comes to the mean polished.
Speaker 2:Yeah, exactly Thing that is almost sometimes sterile if you aren't too careful, right?
Speaker 1:So yeah, yeah, and that's that polish that gives people that illusion of almost have been so smooth and easy for the writer To use this yeah thing was like no, no, the writer had to do a lot of work to make this thing so smooth. Right and start with a smooth thing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, and I think I Think, just like anything else, it. I don't think this is one of the paradoxes, but I Don't looking at them in general, I don't think there is, but this almost plays into the overall. So, like, if you're a writer and you've been writing, like Stephen King, as an example, I've read that Stephen King has Three times the amount of I don't say three times, he has much more the amount of unpublished material than he has published. And if you know how much Published material Stephen King has, which is a lot over the last 30 to 40 years, if he has that much more unpublished material, then you know. The thing is he is, he's constantly writing, he's he probably is at a different starting point than somebody who's starting their first book, right, like when he sits down to write he's like, oh, I know how to trigger my brain to do whatever and get into that creative mindset right and Go down the path of. And he knows all, obviously knows all the the ways to build a good story and all the things.
Speaker 1:I think. I think this might what your timeout plays into the next two Paradoxes a little bit. So yeah, there's, you know, the paradox of skill. Yes that's the more. The more evenly matched opponents are in skill, the more of a role luck plays in the two final outcome.
Speaker 2:Yeah, this one makes me mad.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, it reminds me of, I think we all, not we all. There's a phrase that makes me think that Someone knew this somewhat intuitively. You know it's, you know, made the best team win. Yes, like it is sort of going into it. You know that, like the whole point of a tournament is to find the best team, but by the time you get to the, the Super Bowl or the final round or whatever it is.
Speaker 1:Yep, they're gonna be the two best, so they're gonna be ostensibly very evenly matched and At that point it's like all things being equal, right, yeah, skill and and jersey material and the brand of cleats they use, and the average height of the players and the average weight of the players.
Speaker 1:Yeah average stats of the players like bright. All things being equal, it comes down to maybe home team advantage, right, or it comes down to well, players, knees done the other five minutes before, you know, five weeks before, and and there's this thing that's culminated and it's just bad luck well, and I was bring.
Speaker 2:I was bringing this up to my daughter because I was talking. She was asking what we were recording about this morning and and, and one of the ones that I was talking about was this and it's it could be that the, the, the person that's officiating that game, the referee and or umpire or whatever they're called in that particular sport Just doesn't happen to be looking at the place where a penalty is occurring, so that penalty doesn't get called. So, literally, it's just a matter of, yeah, that person's eyes were not at the place they needed to be at, or they were at the place and that person got called for a penalty when they could have easily just eat, just as easily not have been called for that penalty. So it's, the luck of the draw is is that? Is that a fishy, you know? Is that a person officiating the game, looking in the right place, you know? Um? And so.
Speaker 1:I'm sort of human element, but I Will say that like okay, no, I have something to say before we move on to the next one. But go ahead.
Speaker 2:Oh no, I'm not moving on to the next one. I was just gonna say the reason that this one almost makes me feel like All hope is lost, because you're like, you spend so much time building a skill right and whether that's something else, whether that's, uh, you know, in sport or in business or anything else, you spend all this time like building and like trying to be the best that you can and then to find out that if you're Around other people that are a relatively equal skill and that, whatever that is, that it's just a luck of the draw like that. That is so frustrating, you know.
Speaker 1:Well, it's it's only true evenly matched. Right now this comes to my next point and how it plays into Stephen King. Yeah, he's. He's I think he's even said that he doesn't see himself as a great writer in terms of skill and like quality, right, but he is prolific right if, if, if there's a scarce market for eyeballs on book pages and Even if he's evenly matched with everyone in the market, he's out working them, that he's applying his skill to more iterations with more effort more often. Yeah.
Speaker 1:To then come out ahead. So he's he's turning luck in his favor. You know, if you go to the casino or play poker or whatever like, yeah. In aggregate, you have the same odds as anybody else in terms of getting a good hand or whatever else, and the people who think themselves more lucky like if you take a survey of people and set aside those who think they're lucky versus yeah, they're unlucky those who think they're lucky Roll the dice more often, figuratively speaking right, yeah and therefore have more, more chances to win.
Speaker 1:And they have this bias that they think they're lucky, so they're willing to roll the dice more often. Yeah, they put more attention to when they win and less attention when they lose, partly because of the confirmation bias. Yeah, so they have no better skill at rolling dice than anybody else, but because they do it more often, they win more often right Right right, the, the numerator. The ratio doesn't change, but because their denominator is so much larger, their numerator is so much larger than most other people. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, I mean, and that's an interesting point, and I guess that's that's an interesting you know way to look at Anything you're doing in life is like, hey, you know, because I'm looking at it in the pessimistic way of you know, like why should I even try? If it's just luck, right. But Again, what you said is true, which is okay, and I mean I think most self-help things will Align with this, which is just keep going, you just keep trying, you got to do.
Speaker 1:80% of life is just showing up like you got to just keep going and and the the the closer to your best that you do, the better your best gets right, like with each iteration, your skill improves and therefore now you're out skilling people. Right said because of more effort and more attention. Yeah, yeah more learning and more improvement. Yeah, sorry. Let's go on to the next one. You ready for the next one? Yeah. The paradox of creativity. Right.
Speaker 1:This is the other one I thought applied to Stephen King. So your work is done when it looks so simple that the consumer thinks they could have done it, which means they won't appreciate how hard you work. Yeah. This is sort of the abstraction of the writing, one that they gave.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, it's almost like a broader concept of the better that you get, the more you know, the more easy you make it look. It's the I mean you can. We always do the sports references because they're just the easiest, most compacted way to look at something. But you know the poetry and motion and sports kind of thing where you're like man, that guy running down the field looks like it's so easy for him, it looks like he's just not even trying and everybody else on the field is like how is he doing that? Right, and you know that's somebody that's reaching a high level of being an expert. You know they're again going back to the Malcolm Gladwell 10,000 hours. That's somebody who has put the time in. And then also I can say that we are I'll say that we're a society of I think we're rapidly approaching a society of people who think that they can do anything.
Speaker 2:People are like I can do that. Yeah, I can do that, I can do that job, I can do that. And you know, and it's based on you know it's based on them thinking this. It's just like you're seeing people that are. You know they're like what's so hard about that? I could, just I could step in and do that.
Speaker 1:Well, and that's? I'm seeing that too, and I think the wake up call comes when they hopefully realize, sooner than later, that the world does not reward someone for what they can do. The world rewards them for what they actually do. Right. Right, it's like you know I can learn to do that or I could. I could do that. It's like, yeah, but when you're going to do it, why haven't you done it yet? Yeah, so you too. So focus on your potential that you're not turning anything into the actual. Yeah.
Speaker 1:And and I guess the way I see this applying to Stephen King is, like you mentioned, his he's got more writings that's unpublished, that were unacceptable. That didn't make the editors cut. Right.
Speaker 1:But then he does that it's been published and again the ratio is the same. It's just he's out done. Most people who you know have to contend with the ratio of, you know, works written versus works published. Right, and maybe, maybe it's 10 to one. You have to write 10, 10 out of 10 of the things you write only want to get published. Well, he just wrote a thousand things, so he has a hundred things published. Yeah.
Speaker 1:You know like yeah, I mean, of course everybody's results vary. There's the skill, there is luck. Even if you've got a lot of skill, there's always luck and such. But sure by and large, it's a hundred to one. Well, and I think the last two.
Speaker 2:So this one, the paradox of skill and the paradox of creativity, those two, like combined to me, are make me think of TikTok right now. So we have I know it sounds weird.
Speaker 1:No, you've captured my attention like a TikTok video.
Speaker 2:So I'm going to give you seven seconds of wisdom right now. But you've got this activity that pretty much anyone can. I can go start a TikTok account right now and have a TikTok channel. The level of skill that you need in order to do that, or to do anything right to create the content meaning creativity, right, paradox of creativity is very little, and there's a lot of luck involved as to whether or not your channel is going to go viral, even though we see the ones that are.
Speaker 2:Have you know this?
Speaker 2:This TikTok had 15 million views, but the overwhelming majority of TikToks out there or podcasts out there or anything else, the overwhelming majority are not getting 15 million views. Right, you're seeing the one that has 15 million views because of algorithms and all these other things. But the interesting thing is that, as somebody does and I can say this with YouTube channels that I watch and other things like that the more that you do it, the better that it gets, and so that goes into that paradox of creativity is that somebody will see that and say, oh, I can, I can make a video like that. It's like, yeah, but you didn't see the 10 years before that of them making really bad videos, yeah, only I think that it's compressed with TikTok, though, because you could make your first. Your first video on TikTok could go viral. I mean, it's very unlikely, but it could right, which plays into the luck, right? You know, theoretically, anybody. Since it's such a low level of skill that is required to produce a TikTok video, you're pretty much evenly matched with the same Technical skill.
Speaker 2:Well, technical skill yeah, yeah, I mean yeah, that's what I'm saying is, you're at that, everybody sort of starts at that. And then, granted, the people that sort of rise to the top are potentially, potentially, they have some kind of talent that they're sharing with the world, whether that's like singing or dancing or being funny or something else. Right, but even that it still is a matter of luck. And then, as they, you know the person that does get the viral video if you go and look at their channel, their videos get better and better and better, because, ostensibly I guess probably because now that it's their full time job and they're getting paid and they're being able to, they're, they're the technical, you know, technical merit that is required is there because they've been doing it for a long time. So, like, now I know how to do this, like use this tool or whatever.
Speaker 1:So interesting, Well, I'm reminded of Aristotle saying you know, we are what we repeatedly do. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Excellence, therefore, is not an act but a habit, and these, these people in TikTok, they made a habit of making videos and responding to feedback, and so that was a, was it a? I can't, I'm trying to avoid positive feedback. Another feedback loop, another's a virtuous cycle. That's what I was thinking. Yeah, it's, it's a same thing, but virtuous cycle, such that they're going to get better and better. Maybe one day they only get like 0.01% better, but then three days later they get 4% better.
Speaker 1:You know, they, they learn something, they have an epiphany, and so it's, yeah, I think the lesson there is, you know, abc always be creating or always be crafting or whatever. The C is the operative verb of whatever craft you want to perfect and hone and get paid for or be famous for, or whatever.
Speaker 2:And it's. I think that it's a. I think it's the usual thing on this podcast, like I bring up TikTok and you bring up Aristotle. You know it's.
Speaker 1:Oh, that's what ABC is. Is Aristotle be correct? That's right.
Speaker 2:Aristotle be correct. Oh man yeah. So so yeah, I know I next one is this might be the last one that we do in this episode, but paradox of decision making and this is for all the over thinkers out there, I think says it's better to choose commit, who has two thumbs and is an over thinker, this guy anyway. It's better to choose commit and get started instead of waiting for the best possible option. So the correct decisions are actually suboptimal because who?
Speaker 1:yeah, I feel seen.
Speaker 2:You were like oh no, oh no, I've been exposed.
Speaker 1:I feel like let this one linger and lead right into the next episode.
Speaker 2:Well, honestly, that one is, that one is. I won't say it's frustrating, but like I struggle with it because I do want to wait for the optimal, like I do want to wait, I want to evaluate everything, which is again just overthinking really yeah. I call it evaluating, but it's actually just overthinking, Isn't it?
Speaker 2:isn't it crazy the amount of justification that we do to ourselves. So, you know, think about like yeah, but is that the best? Should I go that direction? Should I go this? How should I say that, how should I do this? And, honestly, like I will say that actually very recently I've been trying to work on things that are you know the dude, do you know the? Do one thing that scares you every day, or start your day with the thing that scares you the most, or that type of a mentality.
Speaker 2:I've been really yeah, I've been forcing myself to do that and I've been less stressed because I've actually, in the first thing in the morning, when my mind is fresh, I'm like you know what? This is the thing that I the first thing I thought of when I woke up in the morning, and it's stressing me out and I'm going to take it, I'm going to do something, I'm going to have some action associated with that that I just go and do. And I've been less stressed because of it, because I'm sort of like taking the thing, I'm disarming it and and so that sort of plays into this a little bit, but it's it's also just talking about overthinking in general.
Speaker 1:Yeah Well, I think one thing that can help with this and helps me when I have this, you know, sober perspective is being afraid of failure is really stupid when the cost of failure is negligible. Right, or overthinking and trying to evaluate what the best choice is is really dumb when the difference between the or among the three options is negligible. Right. Like when I go to a restaurant, I try to stop as soon as I see something I like, I try to stop looking at the menu. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Because once I have three or four choices, now that all sound really good. How am I supposed to pick? Yeah, yeah. Or I'll get frustrated because other people will be making that same mistake. Who I'm dining with, and it's like the waiter's been by three times and we haven't ordered yet.
Speaker 2:Yeah, can you just give me another minute?
Speaker 1:Between pancakes or blueberry pancakes.
Speaker 2:Right, right.
Speaker 1:Or strawberry french toast is like you're going to enjoy all three. Just promise yourself that if you can't pick between two, next time you come you get the other one Right. If you remember, you'll remember and you can do it the second time. But then, like if you're going to buy a car, like okay, so some research and due diligence is in order.
Speaker 1:If you're going to buy a company, okay yeah, spend a few months doing what you can to make sure you're not making a life changing careers portal, ruining the stake, right, because you've got employees who are counting on you, so it's like. And then I guess the other thing that come into mind with what I was hearing you say there's a this guy sometimes I watch on YouTube, tom Billio Bill you. His channel is called Impact Theory and he talked about how some people just need to be chased by a lion. Yeah.
Speaker 1:To get perspective, to realize that like to re-center, re-align their stress center. Right Because of the modern society where the worst thing we ever have to face is you know, am I late on my taxes, right, something like that, and the stresses are sort of weak. You know, we end up having panic attacks over first world problems. Yeah. When we're thinking it's a life or death situation, when we're at the fifth or sixth level of the Maslow's hierarchy of needs.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:And we need to kind of be reminded that there's all these other needs that are filled, that are much more important, that we need to have perspective on. And have a bit of gratitude and again, perspective. You know, it's interesting you say that you can be homeless and be okay. You know, yeah, and that's what.
Speaker 2:I was just going to say is it's funny that you said that right before I was because, like, I volunteered recently for a local organization that works with local churches to give homeless people at least one night and some meals, some place dry and warm to sleep, especially in the winter when it's cold, here in Middle Tennessee, and you know so I spent the night at the church with like half a dozen homeless men and with a friend of mine, and so that was my part of my volunteering, my time, and so you get to talk with them and you get to, you know, see what they are, you know their circumstances and all of them have a story, everyone's got a story, and so very interesting, great, very rewarding on my side, I mean, but it doesn't really even matter.
Speaker 2:What I realized, based on what you were just saying, is, you know, five o'clock in the morning, when we were getting them up and we were cleaning the church up and they got taken out to breakfast and me and my friend were just cleaning up the beds, stripping the, stripping the cots and everything, getting all that cleaned up for the church, I had this realization like I'm going to go home. I had, like I had sort of a bad night's sleep because I slept on a cot and it was in the middle of a church room and I was like man, I was sort of in my head almost complaining like man, I'm just so tired and all this stuff. And I had this realization, like they had one night where they got to sleep on, they got to sleep on a cot, and the next night they had to figure out where they were sleeping again.
Speaker 2:So, immediately I was like, okay, stop complaining, I'm going to go home to a nice warm house. My kids are there, my wife is there, I've got food in the refrigerator, I've got. You know, like you said, first world problems here, of like I had a sort of a bad night's sleep. You know what I mean One night out of my life, you know it's like anyway. So, yeah, I mean, I feel like I feel like there's a lot of self-help that talks about that decision-making thing, and just don't overthink that. I mean the just do it thing. And when you were talking about the, what were you talking about?
Speaker 1:You were talking about something that all failures created equal, like not all failures are the same, no, it's it reminded me of the burn all the boats, because you were, oh, chased by a line.
Speaker 2:You were saying. Somebody said, hey, some people just need to be chased by a line, and that reminded me of the burn all the boats principle of when you commit Raising necessity.
Speaker 2:Yeah, basically, you commit to something. You say, no, I'm committed to this. In fact, I'm going to eliminate all possible ways for me to escape this, like I'm going. The only way out is through, and so you know, I think that that sometimes, that you know is valuable, just like you were saying is not having a I get. It triggers every single fear factor in my head. When I when I say that, though, when I say like, yeah, I'm going to commit to this and I'm not going back, all of a sudden everything in my being is like ah, you know just what are you doing.
Speaker 1:That is literally. That's the anxiety you have when you're facing a decision. That's the same anxiety. Yeah, if you look at the etymology of, decision means like to cut off. Right, you're cutting off all other options. You're saying no to every. All your opportunity, all your opportunity. Costs are now being incurred because you're choosing this over everything else Everything else you could be doing with your time. Right. Um, yeah, that's, I guess, the point. It's the same as incision. Right, you're cutting in decisions, cutting off.
Speaker 2:Oh, that is that is. Is that really the? Is that really?
Speaker 1:Look it up after we stop recording.
Speaker 2:If it's not, that's pretty cool. Well, uh, well, so yeah. So there's a few more, obviously, that we have to go over, but I think we're going to save those till the next episode. And, uh, they're good ones. I already teased one of them that you guys are going to have to listen to the next episode.
Speaker 1:At least give us the title.
Speaker 2:Like paradox of originality.
Speaker 1:Oh, thank you.
Speaker 2:Which is something that you talked about and if you go, if you roll the tape back, you'll see why I said that is one that we talked about, because you sort of mentioned exactly what the paradox of originality is, and um so so yeah yeah, I'll see you then. Yeah, as we don't finish this podcast, normally we say goodbye, bye, bye.