From Inside Your Gut To Outer Space Moonshots with Naveen Jain | 541

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You're listening to Bulletproof radio with Tav Asprey. Today's cool fact of the day is that two US economists who received the 2018 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences were awarded that for their efforts this month to untangle the economics of climate change and technological innovations. These guys are William Nordhaus and Paul Romer, and they significantly broaden the scope of economic analysis by constructing models to explain how the market economy interacts with nature and knowledge. According to the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, their work was based on two computer simulations that weigh the costs and benefits of taking various steps to slow global warming. The EPA has used their work, among others, to estimate the economic impacts of climate change. And the reason this is really important is that I don't fundamentally believe that people are evil or bad. I think that what happens is we set up systems and we make trillions of micro decisions. We do this inside companies, even companies who spray poison all over our soil and things like that. No one stood up and said, I am the dark emperor and I will destroy the world. What happened is hundreds of thousands of people made tiny decisions that resulted in an unexpected outcome. And, and these guys are untangling the math behind that. And I think that's really important because this happens in healthcare. This happens in what the government tells us we're supposed to eat versus what we should actually eat. And this whole school of research about how regulatory and policy based things lead or inhibit new ideas and economic growth is something that we must understand to continue our evolution as a species. This is a special episode of Bulletproof Radio recorded live at the XPRIZE Visioneering event with my dear friend and advisor Naveen Jain, who's been on the show before. Naveen is a amazing guy who has this long string of companies that have solved substantial problems in the world, the newest one of which is a company called viome, which I'm an advisor to. Viome, as you know, if you're a longtime listener, has cracked the code on understanding exactly what's happening inside your gut. I've actually learned things about what's going on in my gut. And if you've read my books, you know I spent a lot of time looking at the microbiome. I have a lot less guesswork in my life than I used to because I know what's growing and I know how what I eat, what supplements I take can make changes to what's going on in my gut. And the changes happen very quickly over the course of a couple days. And Naveen's on the show today because he has a new book out called Creating a World of a Abundance. And he and I have spent a lot of time with Peter Diamandis, the guy behind the X Prize. And this idea of solving global problems is really important. And Naveen wrote a book about the mindset it takes to think bigger. My problems in business have always been from thinking too small. And I like to think I'm a big thinker, and Naveen's always pushing me to do more. Naveen, welcome back to Bulletproof Radio.

First of all, Dave, it's just an honor and a pleasure to be here. And it's so hard to record a podcast because we just end up talking about so many different things. To keep the podcast at a certain time, it's always so difficult.

It's funny because we want to only go for an hour and you've been on a couple times, but we always talk about incredibly different things. And this time this is about mindset, not necessarily the human gut, which we've gone into great detail on. And I think I described you on stage at the Bulletproof conference as at least part alien, part.

I'm not quite sure what that means. If you simply meant because I look brown and you have never seen a brown guy. I get you.

I grew up in New Mexico. That's not a problem. But your way of thinking is 8 standard deviations away from normal. I've seen you walk into rooms and just light up the crowd. But also just over dinner, someone puts a problem in front of you and the experts will say, well, let me tell you all the reasons that can't happen. And you just kind of laugh in their face. Not in a degrading, rude way, but just say, are you kidding? And then you just come up with all these crazy ideas. Why does your brain do that?

Well, I think that first of all, every one of us can do that. So there is nothing unique about what I do. And the trick really is never to look at the world as is, but really what the world can be. And anytime you look at that problem that don't think about how you're going to solve this problem today. Instead, take the different set of thought process and you see what needs to happen, what kind of technologies will have to be developed if that were to happen. And let me give you a more specific example. So let's assume you say we want to settle on the moon, and the person who is thinking about how to do it, they can come up with all the reasons why it can't happen and why it will not happen. If you simply were to ask them, okay, I don't want to know how, just tell me what needs to happen. What technologies needs to come come true, needs to be developed to make that happen. And the first thing they'll say, well how do we, how are we going to solve the problem of humans DNA not being destroyed by high radiation? Because there is going to be tremendous amount of radiation and there is no way the humans can live there great problem. And then you say okay, if I could tell you that that problem can be solved. For example, we find the bacteria growing in a radioactive nuclear waste. Now think about it for a second. Extremely high radiation. Nature has figured out how to protect its DNA from very high radiation. And it has also figured out how to use the radiation as a source of energy. Now imagine if you can take a genetic material from these bacteria, use the CRISPR to modify our own genes in vivo and suddenly you could become radiation resistant. And nothing that I've said is beyond possibilities. I'm not saying can we do that today, but that could happen. And you say that were to happen, let's assume that problem will get solved. And you say yep, that could possibly work. What is the next problem? Well, how are we going to feed them? How are we going to grow food on the moon? Well that's really not the problem. That's a solution you're looking for. What you're really asking me is how are we going to provide the nutrients? How are we going to provide the energy to the human beings on the moon? Because food is simply there to provide the energy and the nutrients. So really the question you need to know is now can we get energy in the nutrients? And we just talked about that. What if the radiation was the only source of energy you need? You can say honey, do you want to go out for a walk and get some radiation? And, and that was energy you needed. Now plants can do photosynthesis. There is no reason we could not do the radiation synthesis.

Believe it or not Naveen, this was in either head strong or the bulletproof diet. Up to 5% of your energy as a human being already can come from photosynthesis if you eat enough green stuff. And it's actually in a scientific study, but no one talks about that. That's why sun exposure can be important. So we already know we even have a little bit of that. But back to the original question. So you ask a typical planetary scientist and they say, well we're going to have to have 100ft of water to shield you from some of the forms of radiation. And that weighs too much, so we can't go to Mars. And your perspective is, well, what if we just modify the humans who are going to be going to Mars so that they can survive the trip? There's some kind of a mental switch that you're throwing there. And I want you to teach listeners how you either learned or how you actively throw that mental switch to take the way you solve problems to the next level. Do you know how you do that?

Yeah. And that's what I was describing was really start to imagine if that word is possible, what needs to happen. And as opposed to saying how I do it, you say what needs to be done. And once you start thinking of every problem and someone say, here's a problem, you say, okay, what? How do you break it down into smaller pieces and say these small pieces have to be solved for this big global grand challenges that can be solved. And then you take each piece and you say, what is the underlying core issue that needs to be done? Does the technology exist or what technology exists in the next three, five, ten years because you can see the own exponential curve where we are and where we need to be.

That kind of thinking is why you are one of the game changers in my new book. And this is an obvious plug. If you're listening and you haven't already ordered Game Changers, go to your favorite online bookseller and order a copy today. I'd appreciate it. In Law 12, which is titled don't lead a horse to water, make it thirsty. I actually, based on our previous interviews, based on additional conversations with you, boiled down my best ability to figure out how you do your moonshot level of thinking so it can be teachable. And the idea behind this is that game changers don't get bored and they seek out the things that fascinate them and that make them want to leap out of bed in the morning. And that was actually a quote from you. And the idea is if you want to do something big, you want to be a game changer yourself, you've got to find your passion and purpose because without those, you're not happy. And what stands out, knowing you really well, is that you actually do leap out of bed. Actually, I wouldn't say in the morning, you get up in the middle of the night, you're one of those extreme early morning people, and I won't judge you for that. But you come out and you're just bouncing with energy. And I have one time seen you A little bit tired and the rest of the time you are just vibrating with this passion for what you do. And I want people who are listening to the show, people who read Game Changers to understand that if they don't learn how to turn that on, everything they do is going to be harder and it should be easier. Now this is a long queue up into my question for you. How hard for you personally is what you do?

So first of all I just want to state saying I've read the book Game Changers and if any one of you who have not ordered it is missing out on something. Dave gets to meet with amazing people and this is really his distilled down for everything that every single person who you hear about and who are successful about what makes them successful. And so as you and I talked about, it's not about their habits, it is about how they think. And to me there is no better book you could buy in your life to improve yourself than to buy Game Changers.

Wow, that's a serious plug. Thank you.

Now having said that to me it is about finding your true passion. And the way you find true passion is not somehow go on a self discovery. You don't need to go out to a mountain and spend three years searching and finding your soul. And true to who you are. There is a very easy way of finding what you actually care about. Ask yourself that. If you had everything in your life, you had billion dollars, you had amazing family, you had wonderful kids. What is it that you would do? And if you do that today, you will get everything that you want in life. The money and the family. Because people are attracted to people who are driven by to what they care about. Find what you're willing to die for and then live for it. And that's the kind of things even you do. And one way you know you're not doing what you're truly passionate about is when you get up in the morning, in my case at 4am and a Dave guest at 7am but if you are not jumping out of the bed the day the minute you wake up, you're doing something wrong with your life. If you say let me just snooze button, let me lie down for another five minutes, you're not doing things that.

Are worthwhile doing now Naveen, you're on the Forbes list, okay? You're a successful guy who can really do whatever you want to do and you built that. You came here to the US with nothing and your story is incredible. There are people listening to the show though who are on their way to $15 an hour job, or maybe they're pushing a cart in a warehouse right now. I did that for five years, by the way. Put parts in boxes. So it wasn't very fun, but they're probably not jumping out of bed in the morning.

Dave, that advice exactly wrong. I tell you, I worked for $3 an hour when I came to this country. To me, you take pride in what you do. I don't care what I did. I wanted to be the best at it. If I am going to clean that floor, I want to be the best damn janitor ever done. I want to take pride in what we do and everyone who sees that and say, that man loves his work. And then take the time you have left to improve the skills, to learn something. Every day when you go to bed, you have to ask yourself, am I intellectually better today than I was yesterday? Am I emotionally better than I was yesterday? Am I spiritually better than today than I was yesterday? And if you're not making progress, you are actually dying. The day you stop becoming intellectually curious is the day you die.

That is very much the path that I followed. I would get so bored putting parts in boxes that I realized there was an award, a financial award for everyone at my warehouse if we could come up with process improvements. So I said, I'll just do two a week because it's not that hard. We're putting parts in boxes. Couldn't you do it better? And I ended up raising what everyone at the warehouse got paid by about 5% for a couple months before they changed the program because they realized it was increasing costs because I was bored. And that staying intellectually stimulated, it does take time. It certainly took me time. It took you time as well. I started out at $425 an hour, not $3 an hour, but pretty similar. And I mean, look where you've ended up today. And so this is a process. So for younger people who are just getting going on that, your advice is, do what you're doing with excellence and be really curious.

And never, ever think that what you're doing doesn't matter the fact someone paying you to do that, because it matters. And if you are good at it, then they want to give you something even more. If you suck at your job and you tell them, because I want to do something more meaningful, they say, you can't even do this job and you're asking me to give you a different job. The reason people give you a different job and more meaningful job because they See, you do so good at what you do and say, I want that dedication, that passion applied to this.

Did you ever read the Fountainhead?

No, I did not.

You did not? It reminds me a little bit that there's sort of the heroic people in Ayn Rand's famous book that has really influenced Silicon Valley. I read it when I was 16, and it probably helped me and probably made me more angry than I should have been at the time, but more angry at injustice. The characters who are the very successful people, when they're making a hamburger, they make it perfectly. When they're rolling a cigarette, they roll it perfectly. And it's this idea that whatever you're doing can be done with excellence. And you've built that into your life.

And our culture of our company. Every person I hire, and I tell them the same thing. This is what you're hired to do. I call that a cake. Everything else you do outside, that's your true passion, and you want to do that. That's an icing. It doesn't matter how much icing you put in. If there is no cake, people don't want just icing. Do a wonderful cake. Do so good a job. That cake is amazing. And any icing you put on top of that is just what people love.

That is fantastic advice. And I think it's important as people are starting their careers to understand that if you're not doing what you're hired to do, or you're doing it with resistance and anger, or undermining others at your company, or starting internal wars and building your own little fiefdom inside a company, people will notice. And when they notice, they're not going to promote you. And it's going to create discomfort for you and for others. Instead, you just come in, you kick ass, and help everyone else, of course, and help others.

And that's how they say, well, oh, my God, not only he does a great job, he's such a good person that whenever he finds time, he helps someone else do their job. And that's how you get promotion. That's how you get more responsibility. You don't get responsibility by bitching about how shitty your job is and why you don't like it, and then expect someone to promote you.

Yeah. Or bitching about other people at your company, too.

Yeah.

So the complainers typically don't get promoted. What would your advice be? Or what experiences have you had in your. In your evolution to become this big moonshots thinker for people who are at a job where they actually do that?