[00:00:00] DANIEL: Hey there Spacemakers, this is Daniel Sih and welcome to this bonus episode of The Spacemakers. We are here in Sydney to interview Nir Eyal. Nir is an international best selling author, he's a global speaker, he's an expert in behavioural engineering, in attention design, in focus and concentration. We are going to have the most fascinating interview about how to get unstuck and how to get unhooked if you find yourself constantly distracted and need more space.

[00:00:30] NIR: Distraction is nothing more than an impulse control problem. That's all it is. So if you're struggling with drinking too much or smoking too much or scrolling too much or emailing too much or YouTubing too much, whatever it might be, it's not a moral failing. There's nothing wrong with you. You're not a bad person.

[00:00:45] NIR: It's simply that you haven't learned how to control your emotional impulses. It's just a feeling. So, what do we do about that? The antidote to impulsiveness is forethought. That if you wait to the last minute, if the cigarette is lit and it's on the way to your mouth, you're going to smoke it. If you're on a diet but the [00:01:00] chocolate cake is on the fork, you're going to eat it.

[00:01:01] NIR: If you sleep next to your cell phone every night on your nightstand, it's the first thing you're going to reach for in the morning. It's too late. You already lost. But, if you plan ahead, if you take steps today, there is no distraction you can't overcome tomorrow.

[00:01:14] VOICEOVER: This is The Spacemakers.

[00:01:16] DANIEL: I'm super excited because I'm here with our friend Nir Eyal, and he has come all the way from America, well via Singapore.

[00:01:24] DANIEL: I'm so grateful for this opportunity to talk about technology, about overuse, about focus and distraction, and a whole lot of other things related to our Season 1 of the podcast, and we're going to also talk a bit about midlife. So welcome, Nir. Thanks so much, Daniel. Great to be here.

[00:01:39] NIR: Thanks so much, Daniel. Great to be here.

[00:01:42] DANIEL: Yeah, great. Thank you so much. Uh, so look, you're in Sydney. Tell me why you're here. You're writing a book.

[00:01:46] NIR: I am writing a book, but that's not why I came to Sydney. I came, I came just for, for some R and R and, uh, really enjoying it. We've been here for about two weeks and we're going to stay for one more week. I'm with my, my 16 year old daughter, my wife as well, and we're having a blast. It's fantastic.

[00:01:58] DANIEL: Sounds good. Sounds good. Yeah. [00:02:00] Have you spent much time in Australia?

[00:02:01] NIR: No, this is my first, I was here for a speaking engagement, but I never actually got to enjoy the city.

[00:02:05] DANIEL: Oh, look, that's, I mean, it's, it's a beautiful place to hang out. And I know you came to my hometown of Hobart. I loved it.

[00:02:12] NIR: Yeah. And, uh, ran around and did other things. It was amazing, amazing place.

[00:02:16] DANIEL: Oh, sounds good. Hey, um, you've been here long enough to kind of pick Australianisms. Is there something weird or unusual or interesting about Australia?

[00:02:25] NIR: Okay. So, uh, uh, Waitstaff is unbelievably friendly. Uh, that's been amazing. Like I, I can't tell you how many times Waitstaff has asked us, where are you from?

[00:02:34] NIR: And where are you doing? Where are you going? And then they lit, it's happened three times now that the Waitstaff will go behind the counter and come back with a written list of all the things they think we should do while we're in town. It's amazing. That would never happen in America. I've never, at least I've never had that happen to me in America.

[00:02:49] DANIEL: Yeah. Yeah. That sounds good. Yeah. No, I can, I can vouch for hospitality in Australia. I think it's something we can be super grateful for. And the coffee. Uh, the coffee, unbelievable. The coffee is good. The coffee is [00:03:00] good. Um, Hey, look, so you've written two bestselling books, uh, and, uh, one on, you know, technologies design called Hooked, uh, and the other, uh, Indistractable about how to improve our focus and, and shape our attention in this kind of digitally soaked age.

[00:03:16] DANIEL: Both have been very popular, sold, you know, half a million copies and more from my understanding. And so when I heard that you are in Australia, I was like, Oh, if I can connect with you and have a conversation, my pleasure, I would be super excited. So thank you for saying yes. Thank you. But, um, I'd love to talk on this special episode, which is a bit outside of our normal season about your books and particularly around focus and attention.

[00:03:37] DANIEL: So, um, but maybe, would you mind telling us a bit about yourself and in particular how you got into this space of, you know, talking and writing about tech and design?

[00:03:45] NIR: Yeah. So I'm a behavioural designer. So I help companies build the kind of products and services that people use because they want to, not because they have to.

[00:03:52] NIR: Uh, and I previously, uh, taught at the graduate school of business at Stanford and later at the Hassett Platter Institute of Design at Stanford. And, [00:04:00] uh, today I work with all kinds of companies and all sorts of industries to make products, products that people get hooked to, to build healthy habits. So, uh, Fitbot is a former client that uses the hook model, uh, to, uh, uh, build these habit forming products around exercise.

[00:04:14] NIR: Duolingo uses the hook model to get people hooked to learning a new language. There's all kinds of ways in all sorts of industries that you can build healthy habits in people's lives. And so that that was the goal of my first book Hooked: How to Build Habit Forming Products. And my second book, Indistractable, was about the other side of the coin that if Hooked is about how do you build good habits, Indistractable is about how do you break bad habits to different products, not to the same product, right?

[00:04:35] NIR: So you want to build healthy habits with the fitness app and the language learning app and the personal finance app that helps you do the things that you yourself want to do. Meanwhile, you want to disconnect, you want to break those bad habits there. To those distractions, many of them tech distractions, like too much news, too much social media, too much email, but also it can be things that are not tech related, right?

[00:04:56] NIR: Whether it's drinking too much, smoking too much, [00:05:00] whatever it might be too much. That's taking you away from your values in life.

[00:05:04] DANIEL: Yeah, what fascinated me reading both of your books is, you know, on the one hand, you're teaching people how tech works and how to actually design tech for behavioural design and habit change.

[00:05:13] DANIEL: And then the other. Yeah. Like you said, on the other side of the coin, you're teaching individuals and leaders, professionals, how to shape their attention and live an intentional life. And it reminded me a bit of my book, Spacemaker, where I talk about technology and productivity. It's also my TED Talk. And I talk about it as an upside down curve in the sense of you need to use technology to be productive and to use tech tools and to use tech design in order to build healthy habits in line with your values, in line with your values,

[00:05:38] DANIEL: with what you want to achieve, then you hit a productive middle where more technology doesn't lead to better outcomes, but then you slide down the right side of the curve into what I call digital overuse, which is what I'm seeing a lot of in workplaces where actually we need less tech or different ways of engaging technology in order to shape our life around a broader depth and breadth of activities.

[00:05:58] DANIEL: So there's a nuance in the [00:06:00] conversation, which is why I'd like to have a conversation with you.

[00:06:02] NIR: I think that's exactly the right word is, is the lack of nuance. Uh, I think we love to have simple stories. We like the good guys and the bad guys. So just tell me who to hate and that's who I'll blame for everything.

[00:06:14] NIR: And right now it's very much anti tech, right? Uh, so, so we, we love making the tech companies into the punching bags and some of that deservedly. So I'm not a tech apologist. There's a lot of things that they could do better. And, you know, I think the trend is generally moving for them doing, doing a better job.

[00:06:29] NIR: But also we kind of forget to talk about our personal responsibility, that there's so much we can do, uh, to reassert our agency that I think that the worst thing that we can do. And I think it's, it's interesting because a lot of the criticism that tech companies get these days, it's almost like, you know, they want you to believe this.

[00:06:47] NIR: They want you to believe that you're addicted. They want you to believe that there's nothing you can do, that you're a puppet on a string. And this is how a lot of tech critics talk about these products. And I think it's completely counterproductive because when you [00:07:00] tell people there's nothing you can do about it, you're addicted, right?

[00:07:02] NIR: The word addiction comes from the Latin addictio, which means slave. And so when you tell people you're a slave, there's nothing you can do about it. The technology is hijacking your brain. Guess what people do? Nothing. Right. It's called learned helplessness. And so that is really what I'm fighting against.

[00:07:17] NIR: I want people to know that they do have control. They do have agency as long as they believe they do. The worst thing you can do is to say, Oh, my, my kids are addicted. There's nothing I can do about it. The tech is controlling our brains. And meanwhile, there's some very simple things that all of us can do to make sure that we can get the best out of the technology without getting it, letting it get the best of us.

[00:07:34] DANIEL: It's very interesting. I mean, I, I've written a book in this tech space and I wrestled long and hard with the term addiction and I chose not to use that term in my book. Bravo. So I used the term digital overuse to express some of the, uh, what happens on the right side of that curve. And I, but, but addiction is a, you know, a specific narrower form of addiction.

[00:07:53] DANIEL: Tech and, you know, substance abuse, et cetera. So, I was trying to wrestle with how to do that, and it sounds like we've done similar type of things.

[00:07:58] NIR: And I think anyone who seriously [00:08:00] looks at the scientific literature and understands what a terrible pathology addiction is, it's not a word to be tossed around.

[00:08:06] NIR: I mean, you see it in marketing, right, like, uh, you know, this, this brand of crisps is addictive. Like, it's almost insulting. I mean, we don't talk about other diseases this way and somehow anything that's good is somehow addictive. No, it's not. That's ridiculous, right? There's all kinds of things that people do.

[00:08:21] NIR: You know, we have a glass of wine. We're not all alcoholics. We have sex. We're not all sex addicts. So why do we think somehow technology? Oh, it's addictive. Well, for some people, absolutely, about one to three percent of the population does have a predilection towards addiction, of course, but that means that ninety nine to ninety seven percent of the population, it's not an addiction, it's a distraction, but when we talk about it as overuse or distraction, oh, no, now I have to do something about it.

[00:08:44] NIR: That's not fun. Can't I just blame Zuckerberg for my problems?

[00:08:47] DANIEL: Yeah. That's, that's very, very interesting. Yeah, I like it. It's interesting. I like, um, Greg Lukianoff talks about, uh, uh, word creep in, um, I think the coddling of the American mind, and I like that idea, similar idea that everything is [00:09:00] traumatic and everything is, you know, addictive.

[00:09:02] DANIEL: And so I think we need to be careful of the words we use because labelling ourselves as particular things when it's not that, or making, let's say, something like trauma everything. So true. You know, every word I use can give me triggers and trauma. Like, then it can start to shape our own identity.

[00:09:18] DANIEL: Absolutely. And we've got to be careful of that. So I think we're talking the same language there.

[00:09:20] NIR: Absolutely. We see that now with ADHD. Yeah, everybody thinks they have ADHD and, and, and what results, you know, if you take your kid into to see a psychiatrist and you say, Hey, my kid has ADHD. Guess what?

[00:09:30] NIR: There's a 99 percent chance you will walk out with a diagnosis. Uh, and it's very dangerous in the, I don't know what's going on in Australia, but in America, 25 percent of American boys are diagnosed with ADHD. 25%. I mean, it's off the charts. It's crazy. It can't be that everybody, boy, has this, uh, has this, uh, uh, disorder.

[00:09:49] NIR: So we need to be very careful about these labels because they really do affect our perception. We conform to our perceptions of self. So that's actually why my book is [00:10:00] titled, Indistractable, which is actually used by many people with ADHD. I think the pendulum is starting to swing the other way. For a while, a few years ago, uh, uh, there was this kind of rush to get diagnoses, and now we're starting to see that actually there's some real cost, not only the, the, the, uh, the cost of labelling yourself as something, uh, which you may or may not have, but also that there's tremendous, uh, costs to the, the, the pharmaceutical interventions as well, that they have side effects, there's real trauma to that, there's real harm to that potentially.

[00:10:29] NIR: So what I advocate for, whether you have ADHD or not, is to first start with non pharmaceutical interventions, right? As opposed to jumping to, to pharmaceutical interventions, you know, pills don't teach skills. That the first thing we need to do is to start with these non pharmaceutical interventions to see, can they work?

[00:10:44] NIR: Are they effective? And it turns out many people, many ADHD coaches utilise my book, even though it wasn't specifically written for people with ADHD, they use that book to help people, uh, first as the first line of defence to see, hey, if this solves your problem. Great. We don't need to go further. That makes sense.

[00:10:59] NIR: And [00:11:00] so the book is titled Indistractable to give people a new moniker, right? That I want, this is who I am, it's my identity. And this actually comes out of the psychology of religion, that we know that when people label themselves, when they have a certain identity, uh, it, it changes their behaviour. So, uh, a devout Muslim doesn't say to themselves, Ooh, I wonder if I'll have a bacon sandwich for breakfast.

[00:11:18] NIR: No, a devout Muslim does not eat pork. It's who they are. Uh, it's part of their identity. So when you call yourself indistractable. The word is, the word is meant to sound like indestructible. It's who you are, which means that there's some things I don't do. I won't use my cell phone while we're having a conversation over lunch.

[00:11:34] NIR: I won't check my email every 30 seconds. It's about defining who you are as a person in order to help you reach those goals.

[00:11:41] DANIEL: That makes sense. That does make sense. I know you're, you're a friend of Greg McEwen. He uses essentialism as an identity from what I see. And an essentialist. I mean, I, I wrote Spacemaker 'cause I want people to have making space as their core identity and, and part of their identity.

[00:11:54] DANIEL: So I think there's a similarity, which makes sense to me. Now, I should actually move to question one in my, uh, [00:12:00] plan, which I love. So I want, now we're gonna get started. Now. We're getting started now. The hard stuff. No, I wanted to get started by talking about, that book fascinated me, partly because I've done, I've done years and years of reading and research and kind of focus and attention.

[00:12:15] DANIEL: And I did like your second book, but Hooked kind of, well, hooked me in. And I know it's an older book and I know it's not for professionals and busy leaders necessarily. It's more for product designers. But what I found is by understanding more about how the products that we use hook us into particular behaviours for good or bad, uh, it helps me then.

[00:12:34] DANIEL: Yeah. And have that autonomy and self efficacy to then make decisions within that space, which is what your second book was about. So I would love, you know, I suppose the question has is, uh, if you were designing an app today to get people hooked, how would you do it? Uh, essentially, I'd love to know. You to overview your model, if that's okay.

[00:12:52] NIR: Yeah, I'll give you a very quick high level overview.

[00:12:54] NIR: That would be fantastic. And it applies to all sorts of products. It's not just tech products, not just for product designers. Anybody who's building the kind [00:13:00] of product service that needs repeat use. Now, some products don't need repeat use. But if you want users to get habituated to your product, you want them to use it because they want to not because they have to the way they would use, um, you know, check, Instagram or Slack or Snapchat or any of these other, you know, uh, products.

[00:13:16] NIR: What I wanted to do was to steal these tech company secrets to democratise these patterns so the rest of us could build products and services to build healthy habits in users lives. So a hook model is a design pattern to connect the user's problem with your product with enough frequency to form a habit.

[00:13:32] NIR: And so there are four steps to the hook model starts with a trigger, two kinds of triggers. We have the external triggers, which are all the pings, dings and rings, anything in your outside environment that tells you what to do next. That's an external trigger. We'll get back to the other type of trigger in a minute.

[00:13:46] NIR: The next step of the hook model is the action phase, which is the simplest behaviour done, anticipation of reward. So opening the app, scrolling a feed, pushing a play button, a very, very simple action done, anticipation of reward. Then comes the third step of the hook [00:14:00] model. The engine of the hook model is called the variable reward phase.

[00:14:04] NIR: Variable rewards are about this, this, this concept that comes from, uh, B.F. Skinner, the father of operative conditioning, this psychologist back in the 1950s who studied these pigeons, he gave these, these pigeons a treat every time they pecked at a disc, today we call it the Skinner box, and he found that he could train the pigeons to peck at the disc every time they receive this reward, this little food treat.

[00:14:25] NIR: Uh, no big deal, it's called operant conditioning, we've all done it, if you have pets at home, you've probably done this, if you have kids at home, you've probably trained their behaviour, if you do this, you get that, that's operant conditioning. One day he comes into the lab and he realises, hey, I don't have enough of these food pellets on me, I can't afford to give it to the Pigeon.

[00:14:41] NIR: Every time they peck at the disc, I can only afford to give it to them once in a while. So sometimes pigeon pecks at the disc no food pellet. Nothing comes out. Next time the pigeon pecks at the disc. They do receive a reward and what Skinner observed is that the rate of response the number of times these pigeons peck at the disc

[00:14:56] NIR: Increases when the reward is given on a variable [00:15:00] schedule of reinforcement. So when we have some kind of mystery, some kind of uncertainty, some kind of intermittent reward, we engage more, we focus, we concentrate, and it's highly habit forming.

[00:15:11] DANIEL: So there's novelty, there's discontinuous rewards, it happens sometimes, it doesn't happen all the time.

[00:15:16] NIR: And we see it everywhere. So we said everywhere we, uh, the reason we watch a movie and find it engaging is because we want to know what's going to happen at the end, when we read a great book, when we watch sports. Why do we like watching spectator sports? Some stupid ball bouncing around some grass or pitch or who cares?

[00:15:31] NIR: We like watching because it's uncertain, right? There's variability to it slot machines. Why do we like gambling? Because there's uncertainty about what you might win. Social media.

[00:15:39] DANIEL: Even a decade ago, when I was talking about email ninja, which is where I started, you know, I'm an inbox zero guy originally.

[00:15:45] DANIEL: And again, we talked about operant conditioning and the fact that you get a light, you get a, um, you get a, a desktop alert, you get a sound, uh, you always get an email. You don't know if it's that like Jetstar two for one special to Phuket or if it's some boring email from your boss. Uh, and it's discontinuous, [00:16:00] so it has all the markers of variable rewards.

[00:16:02] NIR: That's exactly right. So email is kind of the mother of habit forming technology. It exhibits a perfect hook model and all three types of variable rewards, which we didn't get into, but we can definitely go deeper. But the final step, so, so far, uh, you have a classic loop, right? And many people have written about how to change your own habits with, you know, some kind of, uh, cue, an action, a reward.

[00:16:21] NIR: That's pretty commonplace. What I added to the equation is not only the variability, right? The Scenarion type intermittent rewards. And again, I'm standing on the shoulders of giants, right? I didn't do the original research. I just put it into a model that product makers can explain to their team so they could build something useful.

[00:16:35] NIR: But the part that has never been put in place before is what I call the investment phase. The investment phase comes after the reward, and this is where most products and services fail. They just give people what they want, which is fine for a one time use product. But if you want people to keep coming back, you have to get them to invest, and I'm not talking about investing with money.

[00:16:54] NIR: I'm talking about something that is, it improves the product with use that makes it valuable. So most products and [00:17:00] services, my clothing, your car, your couch, they depreciate. They lose value with wear and tear habit forming products because of this principle that I call stored value. They should appreciate, they should get better and better, more and more valuable the more you interact with them.

[00:17:14] NIR: So the more data, the more content, the more, uh, skill acquisition, the more followers. The more valuable product becomes over time. So what, what the, the social media companies and the gaming companies showed us is that by using this investment phase of the hook, you can build a very habit forming product.

[00:17:30] NIR: And today what's happening with the explosion of LLMs and uh, AI, every product and service will have this expectation that it should get better with use. And frankly, if you don't do it, your competition is going to do it. Customers are not going to wait around to put their information into your product for the hundredth time.

[00:17:48] NIR: They're going to expect you to remember I did business with you last time and you damn well better remember what I did so that you make the product or service better next time. That is very quickly going to become unacceptable not to do. And your competition will eat your lunch [00:18:00] unless you start doing it in the next few years.

[00:18:01] NIR: So it's through successive cycles through these hooks trigger action, reward investment, that eventually what happens, the ultimate goal of a habit forming product is to no longer need those external triggers, your internal trigger thing, which I found fascinating. So this is, this is also very different from any other model out there is that the external triggers for a habit forming product become unnecessary.

[00:18:21] NIR: So imagine what would happen if you no longer needed advertising, spammy, annoying messages that your, your customers hated receiving, what would happen if people used your product the same way they check their phones? Right? Even, it turns out that we only check our phone because of a notification, an external trigger, one of those ping, ding, and rings, 10 percent of the time.

[00:18:41] NIR: 90 percent of the time that we check our phone, it's not because of a ping, ding, or ring, it's because of an internal trigger. Yeah. What is an internal trigger? And that,

[00:18:48] DANIEL: I didn't read that stat in Hooked. That, that's new, isn't it?

[00:18:53] NIR: That's new, actually. That's a new statement.

[00:18:54] DANIEL: Yeah, that's interesting. It doesn't surprise me. Yeah. But that that's fascinating. So keep going.

[00:18:57] NIR: Yeah. So what is an internal trigger? It's an [00:19:00] uncomfortable emotional state that we seek to escape. The most common ones, boredom, loneliness, fatigue, uncertainty, anxiety. If you can attach your product's use to an emotion that is frequently experienced by the user and every time they feel a certain way, boom, you're the answer to their problem.

[00:19:16] NIR: You built that habit. Now you don't need advertising. You don't need spam and messaging. You're triggering the user to use your product in their own heads. So every time I feel this way, your product is a solution to my problem. And what's, and what's so powerful about that, the reason that's such a, uh, a competitive moat as Warren Buffett likes to say, is that when you have a, a product habit, the consumer doesn't even consider the competition.

[00:19:41] NIR: Yes. They don't even think about alternatives because that's my go to.

[00:19:44] DANIEL: And it's almost like their identity is part of the product though, isn't it? Or at least, at least, at least in the habit loop, I suppose.

[00:19:49] NIR: So identity is a bit tricky one because that's the old way of doing things, the old way of doing things when it comes to big brands, right?

[00:19:56] NIR: Why does Coca Cola spend so much money on advertising? Because they want to [00:20:00] brand you, right? When you see an ad for Coca Cola or Pepsi or whatever, it's not about the people who haven't decided what they should drink. People think advertising like that is about, well, I could choose between Coke or Pepsi, which one am I going to choose?

[00:20:12] NIR: And they're trying to influence you to drink their drink. No, that's completely incorrect. What they are doing is reinforcing the identity of people who already know what they want to drink, those products. Yes.

[00:20:21] DANIEL: And they're keeping them hooked. Okay, so I, I drink coke because it makes me feel like I have a community.

[00:20:26] DANIEL: And because that's my community, I'm just thinking, I'm just thinking about the, you know, ads as in the identity is based on either the community. They're trying to get the small.

[00:20:34] NIR: So that's what's called a fathead industry. So if you look at, uh, uh, uh, fast food, for example, if you look at food and beverage, if you look at the alcohol industry, Okay.

[00:20:42] NIR: The distribution of where the income comes from, it's, it's a fat head. So it's a very small percentage of people that make up almost all the revenue.

[00:20:50] DANIEL: And that's the gambling industry as well, right? Gambling industry as well. The whole industry is based on that fat head.

[00:20:52] NIR: Absolutely. So they're trying to get people who already are brand affiliated to consume more.

[00:20:57] NIR: It's not for the average person who's choosing what they should drink. [00:21:00]

[00:21:00] DANIEL: But you're saying that the design of tech and new media is different. Slightly different. It's not about identity.

[00:21:06] NIR: Exactly. So those companies like Coca Cola had to spend billions upon billions of dollars over, over 100 years to create that impression in your mind.

[00:21:15] NIR: It's called the mere exposure effect. The more you're exposed to a logo, the greater affinity you have for that brand, for that, for that identity. What took billions upon billions of dollars and 100 years to do, these tech companies are doing with no advertising budgets. Why? I mean, if you look at the P& L of these tech companies, Google, Amazon, Meta, uh, you know, they spend almost no money on advertising.

[00:21:38] NIR: Why is it that Coca Cola spends billions and these tech companies spend almost zero? Because in their case, it is the product itself that creates the habit. It's not the mere exposure effect. It's the usage of the product itself that gets you hooked.

[00:21:51] DANIEL: That makes a lot of sense. And yeah, so when I read your model, it's different than Charles Duhigg, which I read in the sense of it just, he particularly doesn't have that [00:22:00] internal trade.

[00:22:00] DANIEL: And then he doesn't have the investment in the product. Exactly. So I can, you know, I liked how you described the IKE effect as one simple example that when you, you know, buy IKEA and then create your piece of furniture, it actually has more meaning to you because you have participated in the creation of it.

[00:22:14] DANIEL: So, so that last bit where you actually put in some effort, or I think you've said here where you put a bit of work in, uh, that reinforces the, the loop between I have a desire to escape a pain or a fear or something like that. I know that the, you know, swiping this app or pressing this product will reinforce that positive loop and give me that

[00:22:36] DANIEL: Uh, variable reward, but then I add something of myself through maybe sharing comments, putting in photos. You know, in my email example, I've been using Gmail for over a decade and the idea of moving would be so complex because I've got like 10 years of data, right, and I need to search for it. So I can't move because I've inputted so much into Google and to Gmail that now I'm kind of hooked.

[00:22:57] NIR: You got it. Exactly.

[00:22:58] DANIEL: And so that's a very [00:23:00] powerful end. Yeah. Part of that, um, hooked process. Have I understood?

[00:23:04] NIR: Yeah, you nailed it.

[00:23:05] DANIEL: And so essentially, it's almost like you need external triggers and you need simple actions, the ability to quickly act without any thinking, uh, and the experience of variable rewards to get to that kind of, I don't know what you call it, the, the gold coin of what you're trying to do.

[00:23:20] DANIEL: Where you have an internal thought, an internal desire, a feeling, a sense of boredom, wanting to escape fear or something that makes you feel uncomfortable, and then you automatically associate opening the product as your way of escaping that pain or experiencing that pleasure. So there's no advertising.

[00:23:37] DANIEL: It's all internally based. Well, a lot of it's internal based.

[00:23:39] NIR: That's right. So, yes, the only small correction is that it's not about pursuing pleasure. Okay. It's only about escaping pain.

[00:23:47] DANIEL: So, so is that a change in your Hooked book versus

[00:23:50] NIR: Nope. It's always been the case with Hooked. Okay. Yeah. So, so Okay.

[00:23:52] NIR: What I think it's kind of, um, we have this paradigm in our, in our minds that, uh, human motivation is about carrots and [00:24:00] sticks, right? Pursuing pleasure, avoiding pain, and in actuality, it's, uh, that's not neurologically true. It's a good metaphor, but it's actually not what happens in the brain. The way the reward system works is in fact by making the carrot the stick.

[00:24:14] NIR: Okay? The carrot is the stick. How is that so? Wanting, pleasure, pursuing a good feeling, right, hunger, lusting, desire for something good to happen, is itself psychologically destabilizing. So the only thing that causes you to do anything and everything you do. Everything you do, every product you buy, every action, everything you do is about the desire to escape discomfort.

[00:24:42] DANIEL: Alright, so I reckon this might be a good time where you can give me some counselling and coaching and help me with my own problems. No, but I was reading your book and look, I don't have any problems with social media because I've basically eliminated it, except for from a desktop and I post on LinkedIn once a week.

[00:24:58] DANIEL: But it's for business. You know, I don't get [00:25:00] hooked on it. Uh, but I must admit I'm not that good at email. And the irony is I teach people how to not get hooked on email and yet I still look at it way too much. More than I'd like to. I don't use it on the weekend. I've got a habit of that where I have no tech on a Saturday.

[00:25:12] DANIEL: It's my digital Sabbath, but in the week, I do it. I'm definitely pulling out my phone, and I know I'm pressing that Gmail button, and I know I don't need to because it's useless, but I do it anyway. I was on the train, you know, reading a book, thinking about, well, what is my pain, or what am I trying to avoid by being on the train

[00:25:31] DANIEL: pressing that Gmail button? I mean, because essentially this moves into your indestructible model where we actually need to understand our internal motivations and triggers ourselves. If we are to then shape our behaviour differently than the design of the tech we're using.

[00:25:42] NIR: Right.

[00:25:42] DANIEL: And so I was like, well, uh, should I do five wires on why do I put my hand on that Gmail button?

[00:25:48] NIR: And is that how you would, you know, kind of start to building a habit from your product.

[00:25:53] DANIEL: No, no, no, for me, for me, identifying why I do this personally.

[00:25:53] NIR: Okay. So let's go into the realm of Indistractable. Yes. Um, so the same internal [00:26:00] triggers, external triggers, uh, that go into making a habit forming product.

[00:26:03] NIR: This is the same insight that we want to use in terms of breaking bad habits. And so the most important first step, if 90 percent of our distractions begin from within, if they come from internal triggers, we need to recognise that distraction. It's not a moral failing. It's not a character flaw. Okay.

[00:26:18] NIR: You're not broken in any way. It's simply that we haven't learned techniques that help us deal with discomfort. That distraction is a desire to escape discomfort. That's all it is. Because all behaviour is about the desire to escape discomfort. So time management is pain management. Money management is pain management.

[00:26:37] NIR: Weight management is pain management. It's all pain management. Yeah. So when we start from, from, so this is the most important step to becoming indistractible. The very first step. If you don't do this step, none of the rest will work. No technique will work out there. Uh, that's ever been invented unless you first and foremost understand what is the issue,

[00:26:55] NIR: internal trigger that you are trying to escape.

[00:26:57] DANIEL: And that's what I was trying to explore with my email [00:27:00] habit. Yeah. So you tell me.

[00:27:00] NIR: First of all, nothing to feel ashamed of. Research is me search. It took me five years to write Indistractable because I kept getting distracted while I was writing it. Yes. So complete, you know, we, we, we do these things to help ourselves.

[00:27:13] DANIEL: You've redeemed my email sins. Thank you for that. I appreciate that Nir.

[00:27:16] NIR: We're both part of an illustrious club, I wrote the book for me, really.

[00:27:19] DANIEL: And now I started my book saying I struggle with space and overwork and therefore, I mean, I like, um, uh, who wrote, uh, you know, the quote, I teach best what I most need to learn.

[00:27:29] NIR: Exactly. Exactly. I mean, that's why I do what I do. I only write books about problems that I have so I can solve them. Yeah. But when it comes to this problem, I have to tell you, I've, I've, I've, I've solved it. I'm super. My life is better in so many ways. I, I exercise it when I say I will. So I'm in the best shape of my life.

[00:27:43] NIR: I have better relation with my daughter, my wife than ever before. I'm more productive at work, not because I have some super skills. I just do what I know I'm supposed to do. That's it. Like that's the secret.

[00:27:52] DANIEL: So how do you help me work out what to do? Pain or uncomfortable feeling I'm trying to avoid by clicking that email.

[00:27:59] DANIEL: [00:28:00] Is that five? Why do it?

[00:28:01] NIR: No, but we'll do something else. That's, that's building product. Okay, so counselling. Yeah, so take me back makers. Exactly. Exactly. So take me back to the last time that you remember getting distracted. You want to do a, and yet you're checking email instead. When was the last time that happened?

[00:28:16] NIR: If you can remember.

[00:28:17] DANIEL: Half an hour ago.

[00:28:18] NIR: Okay. Well, what did you want to do? What did you plan to do?

[00:28:21] DANIEL: Ah, look, I would probably rather simply sit and look out of the window and think okay and reflect. Okay, because I checked my inbox 15 minutes before

[00:28:32] NIR: mm hmm,

[00:28:32] DANIEL: and I don't really need to check it every 15 minutes Okay, I pull out my phone and check it again, and maybe there's one or two emails, but I don't need to check it every 15 minutes because I only have to respond every 24 hours.

[00:28:42] DANIEL: So why do I do that?

[00:28:44] NIR: Fantastic. So let's, let's, okay. So let's take step one for a second and put it on the side. And let's actually, I want to jump ahead to step two, which is making time for traction, which is about turning your values into time. So had you ever said to yourself, you know what I want, uh, from this time to this time, I want to stare [00:29:00] out the window or, uh, every time I'm on the train, I want to, enjoy the scenery and not check my phone.

[00:29:05] NIR: Like, had you said to yourself that that was your intention?

[00:29:09] DANIEL: Yeah. Uh, had I said it as in, as I got onto the train?

[00:29:13] NIR: No, no, no. So, uh, you can't call something a distraction if you don't know what the traction is. If you don't know what it distracted you from.

[00:29:20] DANIEL: Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. I do have an identity as someone who values deep thought.

[00:29:24] DANIEL: Okay. Who values not being one of the people who sit on the train and only scan their phone to, I'd like to pay attention to my surroundings and not allow myself to get into that overwork habit loop. Right. Which, which I don't have, but I mean, I'm talking about a small distraction. Right. But I still check email more than I'd like to.

[00:29:41] NIR: So the point is, it can't be spontaneous. Yes. It has to be planned ahead of time. So you have to turn your values, there's two ways you know what someone's values really are. Because people talk a good game. They say, oh my values are to be, you know, to be a good father and to take care of my body and to be devoted to God and all this stuff.

[00:29:56] NIR: They say, they talk a good game, but there's only two ways to see what someone's real values are. [00:30:00] How they spend their money, you look at their cheque book. And how they spend their time, you look at their calendar. That's it. That's how we manifest our values. So your job is to turn your values. So if it's not on your calendar, you can't say you got distracted from it because what did you get distracted from?

[00:30:16] DANIEL: So I very much like your time blocking or time boxing focus and I time box so much of my life. Time boxing meaning when you have, you plan your week, you plan your day, you have a sense of scheduling the things that matter. So in a work sense, I time box deep work, I time box meetings, I time box thinking time, I time box inbox.

[00:30:33] NIR: So did you time box time to work? Watch the, look out the window.

[00:30:37] DANIEL: No, I timeboxed getting from A to B to this interview, right?

[00:30:41] NIR: So be easy on yourself.

[00:30:42] NIR: So if you said, look, my time is B on the train and get from point A to point B, that's what you timeboxed.

[00:30:48] DANIEL: That is true.

[00:30:49] NIR: Right. And you did that.

[00:30:50] DANIEL: I made it. I'm here.

[00:30:51] NIR: And so if you want it to, so we don't need to think that we, that somehow checking our phone is evil. There's nothing wrong with it per se. If you're on the train and your only job is to get from point A to point [00:31:00] B. Listen to a podcast, watch a video, read a book, it doesn't really matter as long as whatever you said you were going to do is what you do.

[00:31:07] NIR: Now if you said to yourself, I'm going to be on the train and I need to do something else like I'm going to look out the window, now you've stated an intention. And that's the big idea here. The difference between traction and distraction, right, those are opposites. The opposite of distraction is not focus, the opposite of distraction is traction.

[00:31:24] NIR: The difference is one word. And that one word is intent because remember what Dorothy Parker said, the time you plan to waste is not wasted time. So if you say, I'm going to be on the train and my miscellaneous thing to do is check email, there's nothing wrong with that. For example, for me, when I'm walking from, I love to walk.

[00:31:40] NIR: I walk at least 20,000 steps. I love walking, especially in Sydney. It's such a great city to walk in. And so I really enjoy, as I'm exercising, I like listening to podcasts. Sometimes I'll check an email. That's fine because that's what I said I was going to do in advance. So it's not the evil technology.

[00:31:54] NIR: It's whether you are not doing what you said you were going to do.

[00:31:57] DANIEL: Yeah, that makes sense. Look, there's very few [00:32:00] situations in life where I don't do the things I was planning. Well, let's go back to email because we're doing a therapy session.

[00:32:04] NIR: Yeah, yeah. So take me to a time when you said you were going to do something and then now instead you're checking email.

[00:32:09] DANIEL: Uh. Uh, possibly when I'm doing a deep work time block or I'm doing concentrated work, it happens less and less because I have little time and I have a lot of content creation. But, you know, that would be a situation where I just don't feel like doing that hard concentrated task that I said I'll do, uh, and therefore I might decide to chip away at email and do small things.

[00:32:29] DANIEL: Uh, but I, I'm pretty good at, even if I do that for, let's say, 10, 15 minutes, once I finished an email, I'm pretty good at stopping and asking what's best next and actually taking that, yeah, breath and having that space and then realising, okay, let's close down email and do the thing I said I'd do. So, I'm not bad at that when I've actually time boxed, I'm pretty good actually.

[00:32:47] DANIEL: Okay. Um, it's probably more just recognising this is a bit dumb. Why am I checking 15 minutes at a time when I'm on the train when it doesn't really do anything and I don't need to.

[00:32:55] NIR: But you, you said something really interesting. So, so you, you book the time, uh, to work on this big project [00:33:00] and then you said something, you kind of glanced over very quickly.

[00:33:02] NIR: You said, it's these things that I just don't feel like doing at the time. And now I check email. Yes. So you've, you've actually sparked on something that I think we, we need to talk about. We don't spend enough time thinking about, which is the real reason back to what we were saying earlier, is always about escaping a feeling.

[00:33:17] NIR: So you will never break this problem. You'll never get it under control unless you have tools in your toolkit, unless you know what to do, because we justify ourselves. I just did it for 15 minutes and then I got back to the task at hand, but we know 15 minutes and 15 minutes and 15 minutes. Like one of the things that I really disagree with David Allen are on with the getting things done methodology is the two minute rule.

[00:33:36] NIR: Two minute rule is awful. He, when David Allen wrote the two minute rule, which says whatever takes less than two minutes, just do it. He was thinking before email, but now every email takes less than two minutes.

[00:33:44] DANIEL: Exactly. And, and you can always spend less than two minutes and never actually do any important stuff.

[00:33:48] DANIEL: I recognise that. Your whole day is two minutes. Yeah. So, I mean, I, I look at both methodologies and I've done a lot of work with people looking at time blocking as opposed to doing the thing that matters. Exactly. Yeah. Okay. That makes sense. So what you're saying is I'm essentially avoiding [00:34:00] the uncomfortable feeling of doing the work that I want to do.

[00:34:02] DANIEL: And therefore I'm, I'm well, I I'm entering a distracted state in order, but which is the opposite of traction, right?

[00:34:08] NIR: So the idea is, so, so step, you've already done step number two, which is planning the activity you want to do. So where we need to start is with step number one of what is that feeling you're trying to escape?

[00:34:19] NIR: So you need tools and it's not going to happen by itself because you're, every time you checked email in the past when you were supposed to do be doing that difficult task your brain is now

[00:34:31] NIR: And you're going to keep doing it again and again and again, unless you put a practice in place that says, ah, whenever I feel that discomfort, I have a different action that I will take. That makes sense. That will, that will satisfy that discomfort in some way. And so there's a dozen different techniques you can use that talk about in the book.

[00:34:45] NIR: There's a 10 minute rule. There's surfing the urge. There's re imagining the trigger, re imagining the, the temperament. There's all kinds of things that you can do, but you want to have those tools ready to go. So that when you feel that, Oh, I really want to check email for a second. And you, your brain immediately will start justifying and say, Oh, well, there might [00:35:00] be something important there, or, you know, my team might need me or whatever justification, which is all just an excuse.

[00:35:05] NIR: You have a practice in place that says, Nope, I'm not going to do that. I have this practice.

[00:35:09] DANIEL: That makes a lot of sense. And so you have a clear sense of what you would do, um, as you experience that internal trigger, uh, in order to act more in line with the behaviours you're hoping to achieve. That's right.

[00:35:21] NIR: That's right. So to, to, to satisfy that sensation with an alternative that leads you towards traction rather than trying to escape it with distraction. Great.

[00:35:29] DANIEL: Thank you. You've solved my problem. We can go now. Um, Hey, look, let me, let me shift gears if that's all right. And, uh, and look, I hope this is okay. I want to talk about something.

[00:35:40] DANIEL: It might be a bit more personal, I don't know. But, um, I read a book a while ago, Stolen Focus, by Johan Hari, and I know you've heard of him, and I'm sure you've heard of his book. Uh, and there was, you know, he sold a million copies. Uh, it was a popular book. It is a popular book. And, uh, it really tried to, I think, frame at a broad sociological level

[00:35:59] DANIEL: the [00:36:00] factors that lead to, uh, what he sees as a loss of focus across society, from like diet to, you know, a loss of play based exercise to, you know, lack of sleep. Uh, and, and obviously he spends a lot of time focusing on technology. Uh, now the reason I'm asking, and it might be personal as he does, he does, he does have a chapter in the book.

[00:36:19] DANIEL: It's in the public domain. It's in the public, there's a chapter in the book. Uh, and, you know, in all honesty, he probably painted you as the tech villain or the anti hero of the book. Uh, and, and really, um, I went back and listened to the original interview between you and Hari. It is on the public domain.

[00:36:34] DANIEL: And it was fascinating having compared his chapter on cruel optimism, the idea that sometimes we're promised that we can improve our behaviours and fix our own distraction, uh, with the, what he says, the reality that tech companies are designed in such a way that, uh, it's, they're rewarded for distracting us and therefore the majority of people don't have a hope in actually improving their focus and distraction.

[00:36:56] DANIEL: So really what I heard is he was critiquing [00:37:00] the idea that you were suggesting that individuals have a positive expression of how they can focus, uh, and really individual autonomy versus environmental factors shaping us. When I heard the interview, I don't think you got a fair rap because I don't, I don't think, I don't believe you're actually saying, well, you're, you clearly didn't say that environment and legislation and the designer tech isn't a factor in, in our focus.

[00:37:26] DANIEL: What I understood you were saying was that we should start with self. We should start with what we can do, uh, and do the things first that are in our control and agency, even as we're doing other stuff, but I would be very interested to hear your perspectives on both his perception of what your message is and where you might agree or differ with Hari's book, Soul and Focus.

[00:37:49] NIR: Yeah, I think the, the word of the day is going to be irony. Because when you look at a book like that, where an author says we are so distracted today [00:38:00] and we can't get anything done. And meanwhile he cranks out, I don't know how many, 500 page book that he sat and somehow found in a focus that apparently was stolen by somebody for him to finish.

[00:38:10] NIR: Irony number one. Irony number two, the fact that he uses, you know, he, he berates that these tech companies are using psychological manipulation against us, that we're powerless to resist. And funny enough, he uses psychological manipulation in his writing, right? It's called the plot line. When you have mystery, when you have uncertainty, when you have a storyline, right?

[00:38:31] NIR: That is using psychological manipulation. In fact, he's going even a layer, a layer deeper because he's using what's called negativity bias. Right. The oldest, most engaging stories are the scary ones, right? We love these chicken little stories about why the sky is falling. And every other day there's some kind of disaster that we need to be aware of because it sells a lot of books.

[00:38:50] NIR: Very ironic, right? There was a similar, um, uh, critique that you could level with the film, The Social Dilemma, right? That told everybody about how terrible tech was and how [00:39:00] awful social media was. And where did you watch this? on Netflix. Yeah, and look, there's the irony there.

[00:39:05] DANIEL: I mean, I must admit there is an irony.

[00:39:08] DANIEL: I agree with that.

[00:39:08] NIR: So, and another, so I think, uh, we need to take a step back and, uh, ask ourselves some deeper questions, which is what exactly are we supposed to do? Should we tell these tech companies, Hey, you know what, uh, your tech products are too good. Please stop. Netflix, your shows are very engaging.

[00:39:27] NIR: Please stop making your shows so good to watch. Uh, Apple, stop making your phone so user friendly. I want to engage with them all the time. What the hell are we complaining about? If you told our grandparents who were dying and starving in World Wars, etc. that our big struggle today was that products are so good that we want to use them a lot, they would laugh in our face.

[00:39:48] NIR: This is the first time in human history that more people die of diseases of excess like diabetes and, uh, obesity than die of starvation. That's never happened in history. Mankind. So we have abundance and part of our [00:40:00] problem is that we don't know exactly how to deal with abundance. You know how you deal with abundance?

[00:40:04] NIR: You take responsibility for it. You realise that this is a blessing. This isn't a problem. This is what we call progress. We want products to be better than us. So we're going to sit here and say, Zuckerberg, stop doing that. And Tim Cook, stop doing that. You're, you know, if you, if you hold your breath, you're going to suffocate.

[00:40:20] NIR: They're not going to change. In fact, the world is only going to become God willing, more engaging products are only going to become better and better. That's what technology does. That's the role of progress. And so instead of bemoaning these tools for being so good, by the way, I'm not talking about all the other problems they create.

[00:40:35] NIR: That's not what his book is about. I agree we need better privacy controls. I agree we need special regulation for children, but he's specifically saying that our focus was stolen. That's the title of his book. Excuse me, sir, your focus was not stolen. You gave it away. Did it, did it hurt when he wrote that?

[00:40:53] NIR: You know, it's such a, um, people love easy arguments, right? People love, [00:41:00] um, simple solutions and there's nothing, there's nothing new to this. We all like stories that make us feel better about ourselves, and telling someone that you're the victim, it's not your fault, is the easy way to make friends and influence people.

[00:41:15] DANIEL: I imagine, I mean, you entered the interview in good faith, and obviously I heard that, you know, you were trying to share your perspectives and have a mature conversation, then a book comes out, and you're the anti villain of the book. Okay. Was it okay?

[00:41:26] NIR: I mean, it's, uh, thankfully I have a thick skin, and, you know, I think where it would hurt, uh, is if I, if I screwed up, like if he brought it, it would be, it'd be for the better.

[00:41:40] NIR: Like the best thing, the best gift someone can give me is to change my mind. I love that. And I've changed my mind many, many times in my life, right? I've gone through different ideological phases and I've changed many, many opinions. Uh, in fact, this, like when I started, uh, the writing Indistractible, I too believe the knee jerk solution, you know, I wrote Hooked [00:42:00] and then I thought the book was going to be called unhooked the next book because, Oh my God, what did.

[00:42:04] NIR: You know, what's going on? It's gone too far. Like, we need a book to help us get unhooked. And then when I started digging into the research, like what you were talking about, actually, it's not addiction, guys. Like, it's not, it's not the same thing. We're talking about something else. I just saw that it was such a low road.

[00:42:17] NIR: It was just such a beer and circus type of, of argument that, yeah, it gets people riled up, but it's the uneducated. When you actually think about it, I think people who really look at the research and think carefully about this and critically about this, they say, look, it's not black and white. It's nuanced.

[00:42:32] NIR: It's how much you're using these devices. It's what you're doing with these devices. And most importantly, what would you be doing instead of using these devices? Do we really think, Johan, do you really think that if you got rid of social media, people would, uh, read Chaucer and Shakespeare in their spare time?

[00:42:49] NIR: Of course not. We would go back to some other distraction because we need distraction. It's part of, or I wish to say we need diversion. And so it's not a new problem. Right. It's, [00:43:00] it's something that's been part of our species forever.

[00:43:01] DANIEL: Can I ask one last question about, uh, what we call the Roadrunner effect?

[00:43:05] DANIEL: Mm. And, uh, one of the concepts we've talked about in our last season of the, the Spacemakers, uh, is about the idea that actually a lot of us spend our life a bit like the Roadrunner. We're trying to chase Wile E. Coyote, and get some type of external measure of success, you know, money, power. Uh, kind of fame, fortune, maybe great relationships, maybe health.

[00:43:26] DANIEL: Uh, some of us, you know, are more successful at catching the Roadrunner than others. And, uh, I have heard a number of people suggest that once they actually catch the Roadrunner, it's like, well, what do I do now? You know, and I know that you're someone who has, you certainly had a certain level of success, you know, so a lot of books you've spoken on the biggest stages around the world.

[00:43:46] DANIEL: I know you're still healthy and like your relationship is still healthy, you know, like, so you've had a lot of wins and you're only like you said, 46, uh, is there any roadrunner effect in your life and how do you, how do you manage [00:44:00] success?

[00:44:01] NIR: I mean, I, I think, um, there's been things that I haven't succeeded in that, uh, uh, I stopped chasing, uh, like I thought it was going to be a startup founder.

[00:44:12] NIR: And I, I did, I did that twice. Uh, and once I succeeded, I sold my company and, and had a nice payday. And then the second time I tried it, I didn't succeed. And we kind of had a, an aqua hire. Um, and so I think part of me, uh, went through the experience and had the emotional wherewithal to adjust my, my self image, uh, to say, you know what, like, maybe that's not for me, and I'm going to try something else, which is actually why I started writing.

[00:44:39] NIR: I had a friend who said, you know what you need to do? Just do whatever you would do if money was no object, like, just do that for a little bit. And I, I just started writing and I, I, I, I really enjoyed writing. Uh, and so that's what, and then it turns out that actually I could make more money being a writer and be much happier as a writer than trying to chase this dream that turned out wasn't really for me.

[00:44:59] NIR: [00:45:00] Um, so being able to like, to be flexible in your beliefs of, okay, this is the path I have to take, I think has, has really served me well. Um, but in terms of, of, you know, I, I remember, you know, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I don't, I don't pray, uh, but I have a couple times in my life and when I was really, um, struggling, uh, with what I should do next, I remember praying to whatever higher power at the time, but I remember asking, like, I just want to figure out what I'm supposed to be doing.

[00:45:26] NIR: Like what, what, what, what, what? You know, for me, it was professionally, uh, and of course, I have family, I don't want to disregard those. Of course, I have familial obligations to my parents, to my wife's parents, to my family, to my nuclear family. But I really professionally, I want to know, like, what am I supposed to be doing with my time?

[00:45:40] NIR: And, uh, that, that prayer was answered, uh, in that today, if you ask me, what is my purpose? What's my mission? And I repeat it every day to myself. I have like a little mantra that I say to myself, my purpose in life is to explain the world so that it can be made better. Like, that is why I'm. I'm not saying that's because of some kind of supernatural force, [00:46:00] but to me, that brings me meaning.

[00:46:01] NIR: That serves me.

[00:46:02] DANIEL: And you do the work in that time of struggle or not knowing by the sound of it to reflect a bit more deeply about what your next purpose is since the last shift didn't work the way you expected. And that makes sense. And you remind yourself of that regularly.

[00:46:16] NIR: Yeah. I say it every day. My purpose in life is to explain the world so they can be made better.

[00:46:19] NIR: Uh, and yeah, I think, I think that's something that I can't ever catch, right? There's no roadrunner effect there. There's no, oh, when I get to this amount of money.

[00:46:31] DANIEL: Because you're not trying to chase like external, you're actually chasing, how would you describe, a value? A mission. A mission.

[00:46:36] NIR: Yeah, I want to explain the world so that it can be made better.

[00:46:38] NIR: That's never going to be done. I will die with that mission not accomplished, not finished. Yeah. And so that's, that to me is, is, that's something that kind of can't be taken away, right? And can't be accomplished.

[00:46:50] DANIEL: So if someone felt stuck and they needed to get unstuck, which is, you know, the focus of this season, how would they go about that?

[00:46:59] NIR: Well, [00:47:00] that's a great question. I mean, maybe I'd love to hear your answer on that. I, so something that I've recently found researching my next book, uh, again, I, you know, I was kind of raised in a secular family and I, I, I haven't really believed in anything supernatural growing up, but something that I've really come to respect is, is the power of prayer.

[00:47:16] NIR: Um, and I actually think it's something that you should do, whether you, believe in the supernatural or not. I think prayer is far too powerful to not utilise. And you look at the studies around how people who pray do better in so many facets of life. Uh, and so I've been exploring actually how we can use a secular prayer.

[00:47:37] NIR: Uh, because I was always stuck on, well, I can't pray because I can't, I don't believe it, right? Like, I don't believe all the stories actually happen that way. And so. I'm just going to toss out everything and, um, I don't think that served me. And I think in my life, when I have stopped, and it didn't make sense to me because I always thought prayer was about asking God for something.

[00:47:58] NIR: And then, uh, [00:48:00] I, I, in researching this book, I talked to many people, I said, you know, can I ask you a very personal question? What do you pray for? Like not, not like the text that you read or, you know, the hail Marys or whatever you say, uh, that needs to be said this way from a book, no, no, no. When you are talking to God, what are you?

[00:48:16] NIR: What are you saying? And boiled down over hundreds of interviews, I kind of learned that that my favourite type of prayer is the prayer that doesn't ask for things. It's not, you know, give me this or give me that or heal this or help that. It's show me how. Yeah, I think that's just that's so powerful because it brings focus to what you really are looking for.

[00:48:39] NIR: Because at the end of the day, Uh, it's not going to be a book, it's not going to be a guru, it's not going to be a YouTube video. The answer's not going to be in any of that stuff, it's going to be in you.

[00:48:48] DANIEL: There's a beautiful, um, interview with Mother Teresa, and she was asked, I can't remember the interviewer, you know, what do you pray for, which is a similar question that you're asking.

[00:48:58] DANIEL: And, uh, you know, she's this little lady, [00:49:00] very quietly spoken, and she took a while to pause, and she then looked at the interviewer, and she said, I don't ask for anything, I listen. And then he was a bit stumped and he said, well, what do you hear? And she says, God is listening to, I think she said, he was completely perplexed.

[00:49:19] DANIEL: But I've certainly experienced that. I, you know, you've heard my, um, episode about first, second and third born faith. And I think the first born faith, the Santa Claus faith, the faith where, you know, everything's black and white and easy. And that is the, that's the faith where you ask for stuff all the time.

[00:49:37] DANIEL: Religion is about what you get out of it in that true kind of consumptive sense, uh, whereas what I'm hearing from a person like Mother Teresa who prays to listen, it's more of a relationship. There's a sense of being, there's a stillness that occurs and a sense that prayer is not so much about what you achieve or what you get, but it's about who you are.

[00:49:57] DANIEL: It's about who you are as a friend. [00:50:00]

[00:50:00] NIR: Yeah.

[00:50:01] DANIEL: I think with, I mean, and I didn't expect that obviously as an answer from, from you, but it's a fascinating idea that prayer might be linked to your, to getting unstuck and prayer might be linked to actually discovering the mission that you have, which has certainly been my experience.

[00:50:15] NIR: Absolutely. Absolutely. Or, or asking, asking for that strength. Like we talked about how do you, um, you know, this practice of, you know, something pedantic like, you know, not checking email too much. How do you, what do you do about that? Well, part of it is asking for, for strength, like praying for strength is a great strength.

[00:50:30] NIR: Yours is a great prayer because you're, you're, you're asking for, um, the fortitude to avoid not doing the wrong thing, right? We, we, so often we think about how I have to do the right thing all the time. We don't think about actually, if you can just not do the bad stuff that you yourself know you don't want to do.

[00:50:46] NIR: You're pretty good, right? So asking for strength, focusing on like that, that's a, a virtue you're looking for, uh, is, is beautiful because you're essentially strengthening your personal agency. I mean, I think that is such a powerful force of prayer that it's something that [00:51:00] you can do that makes you feel stronger, that gives you agency, that gives you a sense of control so that you stop constantly feeling like you are being controlled by forces you don't have.

[00:51:09] NIR: You don't want to be controlled by, you're asking for that strength.

[00:51:12] DANIEL: And so if you're not, you're not praying to a God or the universe, you're praying in a broader sense. Is that what I'm understanding to, to motivate yourself? I'm still figuring out. Okay, that was meant to be a question as a statement. I'm sorry.

[00:51:25] NIR: I don't, I don't have a, I don't have a practice yet. I'm hoping that by the end of this book, I figure out what the practice should be. I'm curious. Maybe I can ask you, like, what, what, what do you say? What do I say? What do you say? Like when you're

[00:51:36] DANIEL: Well, look, I, I, I pray like a conversation. Yeah. So, I mean, look, I have the faith in Jesus.

[00:51:43] DANIEL: Most of the listeners to this show won't, but I, um, yeah, I, I, Jesus like a friend like I would my spouse, but, but he's not a mate. You know, I like, I like the, uh, portrayal of Aslan in the Narnia series where I [00:52:00] think C. S. Lewis, you know, shapes the story around, uh, someone saying is Aslan, um, is he safe? And the expression is no, Aslan is not safe, but he is good.

[00:52:11] DANIEL: So there's a sense where, you know, I like the Italian word, um, Papa. It kind of denotes respect, but also, you know, respect. As opposed to, hey, my mate, who I go and have a beer with. And so that's the kind of relationship I have. And so I just talk. Um, but, you know, I would ask for things. I am often thankful.

[00:52:29] DANIEL: I say, I really practice thankfulness because I'm not naturally a thankful, glass as half full person. So I really practice saying thanks for the things in my life. Uh, I'll talk about my day and the things that are coming up. Uh, and., yeah, and sometimes I just say I'm really stuck. I need help. Can you help me with my calendar?

[00:52:50] DANIEL: Can you help me with this meeting? You know, oh, oh shit. I'm in trouble.

[00:52:52] NIR: Do you ever, um, do you ever write down what comes out of those conversations [00:53:00] or how do you remember what? What insights might come to you?

[00:53:03] DANIEL: Yeah, it looks like I don't necessarily see prayer as something I'm trying to progress. I write a little prayer every day.

[00:53:09] NIR: Oh, you write a prayer?

[00:53:10] DANIEL: I write a prayer every day and I write three things I'm thankful for. Okay. But I also follow, and I've done a lot of speaking on this, Kairos moments, these aha moments where time stands still. Kairos is a Greek term as opposed to Kronos. Uh, and I spend a lot of time perceiving those Kairos moments, whether it be a conversation, some scripture, a song, an event, a feeling, where I reflect on what the meaning of that moment is, uh, how it impacts me.

[00:53:40] DANIEL: I talk about it with others because I believe that discernment and discernment direction needs to be in community, not just by yourself. And I always commit to a plan of action, which I'm accountable to. So it's almost like there's a chorus, which is a moment in time where I discern or recognise this was important and it was different or [00:54:00] it woke me up or it was uncomfortable or it was joyful, but it's a spiritual moment if I want to make it that way.

[00:54:07] DANIEL: And then I walk that circle of what does it say? What's it mean? Who will I talk to? And what will I do?

[00:54:11] DANIEL: Before the prayer or after the prayer?

[00:54:12] DANIEL: Oh, uh, after. After, yeah. But I, I suppose I consider life a prayer. So even when I'm going through that process, it's just an expression of who I am. And, and that has led to starting businesses, writing books, doing podcasts, meeting my wife, raising my kids, living in community.

[00:54:28] DANIEL: That can't be a coincidence. There is a direct line between that, right? So, so listening to those moments has given me that mission and that guidance. So that's, that's probably my process, but.

[00:54:36] NIR: Do you do in the morning, evening? Is there a particular?

[00:54:39] DANIEL: Oh, I do my journaling in the morning. In the morning, but as, as you said, just, you know, I was walking upstairs today and I'm just like, Hey, God, let's not stuff up this interview.

[00:54:52] DANIEL: That worked and hopefully it worked. Great. Um, look, I, I'm very aware of your time and I'm sorry if we've gone over, but, um, no, not at all. [00:55:00] This has been a fascinating, uh, interview. I really enjoyed it. It's not where I expected to go. I, I might ask one last question. Sure. If you have, if you had any advice, particularly for people who are feeling stuck in life, and maybe they've had some knocks, or maybe they're just distracted, is there any advice that you'd give them to guide or encourage people in a general sense, recognising that that's all it can be?

[00:55:24] NIR: Yeah, okay, so I think if you're, that's a kind of two part question, so if you're feeling stuck, I think the thing that has served me, your mileage might vary, but the thing that has served me is writing. So I think for many people, I'm starting to appreciate it. It's, it's prayer. It's a very similar process of just making time to think, to ask what are, what's in your way and giving yourself time to answer that question.

[00:55:45] NIR: So as opposed to, uh, you know, jumping for looking for someone else to give you the answer, I would say nine times out of 10, if you just sit down in a quiet room with a piece of paper and a pen, and write out that problem. And a good technique that I've used [00:56:00] is to, uh, talk about your, talk to yourself the way you would talk to a good friend.

[00:56:05] NIR: So it's not your problem. Think about your friend comes to you and tells you your problem and you’re writing to your friend. Here's what I think you might want to try. Right? Incredibly effective. Like just that process of writing. Very, very effective. And then in terms of struggling with distraction, I think if I could summarise, uh, my over a decade now in this space, uh, it would come down to this, this mantra that the antidote to impulsiveness is forethought, the antidote to impulsiveness is forethought, meaning that distraction is nothing more than an impulse control problem.

[00:56:36] NIR: That's all it is. So if you're struggling with drinking too much or smoking too much or scrolling too much or emailing too much or YouTubing too much, whatever it might be, you're going to, it's not a moral failing. There's nothing wrong with you. You're not a bad person. It's simply that you haven't learned how to control your emotional impulses.

[00:56:51] NIR: It's just a feeling, just a feeling. So how do, what do we do about that? The antidote to impulsiveness is forethought that if you wait to the [00:57:00] last minute, if the cigarette is lit and it's on the way to your mouth, you're going to smoke it. If you're, uh, if you're on a diet, but the chocolate cake is on the fork, you're going to eat it.

[00:57:07] NIR: If you sleep next to your cell phone every night on your nightstand, it's the first thing you're going to reach for in the morning. It's too late. You already lost, right? They're going to get you, but if you plan ahead, if you take steps today, there is no distraction you can't overcome tomorrow.

[00:57:22] DANIEL: That is fantastic.

[00:57:22] DANIEL: And what I love about that is it fits very much the theme of our podcast, which is to make space for an intentional, meaningful life. Uh, and look, thank you so much for being on this show. It's, it's a true gift. I'm so glad I came to Sydney to meet you. Thank you. Uh, and look, you're an inspiration and thank you so much for the wisdom and guidance you've given my listeners.

[00:57:41] DANIEL: Thank you. Appreciate it. Make space. Thanks so much.

[00:57:44] VOICEOVER: If you like this podcast, you'll love our Spacemakers YouTube channel, full of content on productivity, life wisdom, and everyday spirituality. It's practical, interesting, and a little playful. Until next time, make [00:58:00] space.