289. Dr. JC Doornick | Makes Sense: Rewire Your Mind and Transform Your Life.

Hello, Book Thinkers family, and welcome to our personal development podcast, Book Thinkers Life-Changing Books. During each episode, we interview one of the world's top authors, and as a listener, you can expect to discover new books, new mentors, and new resources that you can use to achieve more and live better.

Hello, Book Thinkers family. In today's episode, we have the pleasure to interview Dr. J.C. Dornick, author of Makes Sense: Rewire Your Mind and Transform Your Life. Dr. J.C. Dornick, also known as the Dragon, is a former chiropractor turned health transformation coach, author, and host of the Makes Sense podcast where I have been a guest. He focuses on understanding the human response system and helping people overcome life's challenges through mindset shifts, resilience, and practical strategies that turn obstacles into catalysts for growth. I actually met JC at Limitless Live, where we both shared the stage with Jim Kwik, and that's where we really got to know each other and discovered just how aligned we are In the way that we think about growth and transformation. In this episode, you'll learn why moving from certainty to uncertainty can actually become one of your greatest superpowers.

Power moves.

How movies like The Matrix and Limitless capture powerful truths about the way we program our minds and why your entire life can change in a single snap instant once you start consciously rewiring the way you respond to challenges. Now, get ready to learn and enjoy this incredible conversation with Dr. J.C. Dornick. Dr. J.C., aka the Dragon, I'm excited for our conversation today. Welcome to the Book Thinkers Life-Changing Books Podcast. We're here today to talk about your brand new book, Makes Sense. And I'd like to kick off and talk a little bit about your acknowledgments. section. I'm one of the few people that reads every single word of a book.

You know, I'm sitting here saying I'm sure that he's going to explain some sort of strange way that he reads books again, because I remember our episode.

Yes, and I am strange in that way. And the first thing that caught my attention that I wanted to ask you about is, how did your wife get the nickname the Chicken?

That's great. Everybody always asks me just about the Dragon, but they forget about the Chicken. Well, first of all, when you get the chance to meet my wife, you'll just probably not say anything with because you don't want to insult her. But she kind of feels like a chicken. You know, she's kind of chickenish. But when she met me, you know, I was kind of this dragon. And when we were in the beginning phases of our puppy love, you know, we used to use those little emojis. You know that. that, you know, the AI emojis, and I was the dragon. And somehow I had like an Asian accent when I spoke like the dragon. And she just came back at me one day with a chicken, like with the big clucks on her and stuff. And she's got a South African accent, and she's just the chicken. So what's funny about it, though, is that my first stab at podcasting was a show that I did with her about relationships called Rise Up with Chicken and Dragon. And, uh, because my wife's a sex therapist, so that was a pretty racy show. Um, but yeah, people, people that know me from my podcast or that see us in the streets, they always say Chicken Dragon, you know. They don't even know our names. Oh, that's funny.

Well, maybe after we jump off, you could send me a link to one of the sauciest episodes of The Rise of the Chicken Dragon.

We've taken that one down.

Well, we could get one of those.

It doesn't really suit the brand these days, you know.

Yeah, fair enough, fair enough. No, that's good to know, and I think that gives the audience a little backstory that maybe they wouldn't have learned otherwise. That's pretty cool. The other thing that I loved about your acknowledgments section, and we are so similar in this way, is that you thanked your board of directors in the sky.

Yeah.

Which had a good combination of, you know, real-world relationships that you had, right? Family members and friends, but also people that we both look up to, like Marcus Aurelius and Nelson Mandela. So, How often do you access that board of directors in the sky when making decisions?

Well, for one thing, they're on the wall all over my office. So, so that's, that's a cool concept that anybody could initiate in their life, um, is to just first of all decide who would be on your board of directors. And there's always a slot open for somebody that's had a big impact on my life recently, and they could be live, but, uh, You know, there's certain figures that I've come across that have taught me such amazing lessons, and they just have so much wisdom, like Marcus Aurelius, like Nelson Mandela, like Gandhi, like Martin Luther King. Um, and I just love the idea of saying, well, what would you do? What would you have me do? Because I, I know so much about them, and it kind of like from all of my reading, because you and I are book people. But I kind of like figure out what their answer would be. So I just like to take some of life's challenges, or maybe a big strategic move that I'm about to make, and go to them. And, you know, sometimes they all have something to say. But sometimes I'll go, you know, like, if I'm afraid of a next step, even though I understand that that's a big part of steps is being afraid. And I asked Martin Luther King, you know, Dr. King, you know, what are your thoughts on this? And then I just recall all of this stuff that he spoke about, you know, the fierce urgency of now. I speak about that in my book. And how this guy was so committed to his cause that he knew he wouldn't even be alive for the result of it. And it just gives me strength, you know. So then you have Jean-Claude Kili, the greatest, the Michael Jordan of skiing. That's what— that's where I got my name. JC stands for Jean-Claude. And, you know, he's just a guy that moved through the slopes with style and grace. So, that's what it is. And I think a lot of people, when they hear that concept, they go, oh, man, what a cool idea. So, I would always, you know, pose that question, who would be on your board of directors?

I'm curious, who was on your board of directors or who gave their advice most often inside of your head? As you started out on the journey of writing this book, are there specific people that helped guide the decisions that went in here?

Well, that's an interesting question. The answer to that question would be time sensitive, right? It would be it would be very hard for me to answer that question because if you go through the book and you look at all these pivotal moments that transpired where I picked up these little. Winks from God, or these little crumbs, these little clues. At that time, those are my 3 favorite words. I love to make things that seem permanent temporary. So I would say at that time, you know, it would have been the mentor in chapter 7, or, you know, my daughter and my wife in that moment. So I would just say that if you read my book, you you'll get a timeline, or I like to call it my lifeline, of, of who were the most influential people at that time. And one of the cool lessons in that is part of arming and equipping people with the weapon of awareness, which is what I like to say. Um, a big part of that identifies one of the biggest struggles that human beings have. And that's why you get strange answers when you say, who was the most impactful person ever? Human beings struggle to unwrap the present moment, to live in the present moment. And if I reflect back on my lifeline, and I really can sit in those present moments, it would have been potentially God. It could have been a person, it could have been a figure, or it could have been a conversation with Martin Luther King. So I guess my answer would just have to be all of them. Right now, I'm sitting here in the present moment with You. So, you know, if somebody asked me a question 3 hours from now about my day, I might say it was you.

Imagine that. Nick Hutchison is the most influential person in your life.

Right now you are.

Yeah. No, I think that's a beautiful way to open up a bigger discussion, which is really getting to the heart of who JC is. And I'll read something from the beginning of your book to kind of tee this up. Now we're, uh, now we're getting into it, right? So to kick off the book, you talk about waking up and venturing down the mysterious rabbit hole of consciousness.

Right.

And I can tell you when I think I woke up, but I'd like you to tell me, when did you really wake up for the first time and see the programming on the walls like we're in The Matrix? And when did that happen for you?

That's such a good question. Um, and it really is, once again, it's always time sensitive. Um, if you, if you're referring to the book, It would have been this moment where I went from what I say messed up to blessed up, and and I'll share that story. But what's interesting is once you start to become more conscious and more aware, you know, and start wearing glasses without lenses, you and you start looking at things through your lens versus the lens that we've acquired along the way. You start to realize that you've actually had those awakenings your whole life. You just didn't notice them at the time.

Mm-hmm.

But the one that, you know, the book refers to, and that you're referring to is, you know, I had this moment. And that's how the book opens up with this very dramatic scene where I was sitting, I found myself sitting in front of the last person that I'd ever want to be sitting in front of. And that would have been this psychologist that was asking me why I wanted to kill myself. But to put a little bit of context about the waking up, because, you know, waking up, it reminds me of the movie Inception, where they call it a kick, you know, like when, when you're in deep, deep sleep, and you're sleepwalking through life, sometimes you need some sort of a stimulant to kick you. So I was brought up, you know, or I grew up in a very, very peculiar way. And the book Highlights a lot of that. But, um, leading up to that moment, I was probably a very unlikable person by most, and that was because I was extremely confident, overconfident, borderline cocky. You know, I, I like to introduce myself in talks by saying, hi, my name is Dr. JC Dornick. I go by the Dragon. I'm a recovering bullshit artist. I've been clean for 20 years. You know, I'm So, what happened was I was moving through life indestructible. And I remember one time a mentor of mine noticed that in me. And he didn't— it wasn't like a warning, but he just said, hey, man, at some point, you're going to hit a wall. Of course, I said, screw you. I'm never going to hit a wall. I'm indestructible. And there's nothing wrong with having Confidence, but there's different types of confidence. Like, you're, you're probably the kind of father that talks to your son at night and builds him up with confidence and things like that. That's, that's very healthy.

Yes, yes.

The kind of confidence that I had was to protect my insecurity. That's a different type. So I was moving through life, and then all of a sudden, I just experienced something that I never had experienced before. And without getting too in-depth, I was just traveling in into the city on a train. And this is what led to me seeing this therapist. And I had the greatest job setup. I mean, I was being mentored by my mentor, and I was going to have the opportunity to take over his practice. I was, you know, a new fledgling chiropractor. And, you know, just piss and vinegar, shoot, you know, on my way into the office. And then all of a sudden, I just— some sort of a weird sensation took over where I had started having trouble breathing. I had a knot in my stomach. I started sweating. And I, I thought I was sick. I thought I was having a heart attack or something like that. Well, it turns out that I was having a panic attack. And as a super confident, borderline cocky guy, you know, it's very hard to acknowledge that's what that is. So, you know, but I— but it was powerful enough that I turned around. And this is what's really important, because it took Over. I turned around and I made up a story about why I couldn't come into work that day, which was something I'd never done. You know, I was like the, the, the Dark Knight from Excalibur. If you cut my leg off, I would hop and say, that's just a flesh wound, you know. So I turned around and I, and I retreated for the first time in my life. And that started a 3-month process of me just falling deep and deep and deep into the darkness of despair, where I just, for whatever reason, had thoughts and feelings about wanting to die as if it was the only solution. And I believed them. I believed them as fact, you know, and they took hold of me. So naturally, my parents were very, very worried about me. And, you know, it's really interesting because I had a friend commit suicide when I was younger, and that's in the book as well. And I remember feeling so bad, but saying to myself, how the hell could anybody ever? I mean, like I can understand suicidal thoughts, but anybody actually considering that or even taking action, you know. So here I am saying makes sense, right? And I and I bought into it. So that's why my mother, as in desperation, you know, took me to this woman. And what's funny is I don't even remember this woman's name, but. What transpired in there, I was completely hopeless knowing, and I thought therapists were full of it. And, you know, now I've married one, which is funny. But this woman took me down this, you know, rabbit hole, as you said, and asked me certain questions that led me to this place where, you know, she was basically asking me what happened that day, you know, and I didn't even want to talk about it. But I just remember she was asking me these questions and something just felt like it was unraveling. I can't say that I was feeling better or more optimistic, but something was happening that I'd never felt before because I was gone. I was gone. I hadn't shaved. I was wearing shirts with holes. I wasn't showering. I was a mess. I, I was even supposed to get married, and I was backing out of that too, which made it worse and worse and worse. But this woman, um, led me down this rabbit hole of questions, and, and I remember she asked me She said, well, what about your parents? Because we identified that this day on the train happened in July. And my birthday's in July. And she— I, I'm just not a fan of my birthday. I never have been. And she was like, okay, she says, what about your parents? And I said, well, they're divorced. And she goes, oh, okay. And she said, you know, where do they live and all that stuff? And then she asked me a question. She said, When did they get divorced? And you know, it's interesting because I— when I remember, the way I remember is when she asked that question, it sounded like this. It was like, when did they get divorced? And something in that moment— I call it a snap moment, that's the first chapter— something happened in that moment where I made the connection in my head, which I couldn't make before, that when I was 11 years old It just like it was like a folder that got pulled out of my, you know, it was like ChatGPT. It popped right up. And I remember when I was 11 years old, it was my birthday. And you know, we were going to have a bowling party. And you know, everything that 11-year-olds—I mean, had a wonderful life as far as I knew. When I walked in the door, excited to have the whole birthday thing transpire, and I remember seeing my mom very, very unusually at the base of the stairs in her underwear crying. And that was just not normal. And I remember when I was very, very nervous as a kid, I used to take my tongue and, and go like that. You know, kids do that sometimes. So I said, what's wrong, Mom? And she just looks at me and she says, your father's leaving us. So in that moment, I didn't— I was 11. I didn't really know what that meant, but I knew it wasn't good. And my grandmother was upstairs talking to my dad. My dad was always away, you know, so that's Another part of my book. My dad was always traveling, so I just kind of maybe tucked that under the carpet that way. But I also recognized that my birthday got bumped, right? So I had to go out and explain to my friends and lie, you know. But what happened that day, Nick, is, you know, my natural defense systems tucked that all under the carpet, and I went through the process of my father leaving and all of that stuff that happened. And it didn't come out until that train ride that day. And I think a lot of people will resonate with some version of their story, which is what the book intended to do. But that woman helped me make that connection somehow. And I made 2 decisions that day with that awakening, because I was, I was back online. I went from Darkness to the light, extreme doom to ex— back to extreme confidence, laser-focused with clarity. And I made 2 decisions that day. One was that I was never going to allow myself to go back there. I was going to figure out how to make sure that never happened again, because now I knew about it. Can't unsee that. And then the second was that I was going to spend the rest of my life figuring out what happened in that with that woman that day and pay it forward and teach other people how to do it. So that was the massive shift in my life and was probably the beginning of this book.

So many things to unpack there. And you did a great job telling the story. I have one thing that I'd like to highlight in case my audience goes to call me out on it, which is that JC, just like you, when I was younger, I had a form of confidence that was arrogance, and I did develop it to protect a lot of insecurities.

I knew I loved something about you.

Yeah. So, we have that in common. And the version of confidence I have today is much more of a stoic confidence. Yes. It's rooted in nothing but positivity, empathy, and love for the world and myself. And so, very different than I was back then. And just like you, I've used these personal development tools and our understanding of how the brain works To rewire how I view the world, right? Just like with the the glasses you have on today, I've taken mine off and I've put other lenses on, and I love to see the world through a very different lens. Okay, we also have a very similar taste in movies. I mean, everything from Inception to Limitless to The Matrix. And it it did sound like when I was reading this initially that you had used NZT to access. Oh. Something in the back of your brain or something like that.

I could watch, I could watch that movie 6,000 times, you know. Um, and so I don't want to dip into too many aspects of my interesting life, but, you know, I've worked a lot with plant medicine. And the reason why I was curious about that is I knew a bunch of very, very extraordinarily successful people that I really respected that had a massive breakthrough. So I started going down that rabbit hole, and that was part of my personal growth journey. But what I discovered there in connection the NZT is what's interesting about plant medicine is it's not like a drug that does something to you. Like, you don't get high and, you know, it's, it's, it's not doing something to you. What it does is it unlocks something in you. And what that taught me is that we all have NZT in us. It's just laying dormant. You know, I believe that one of the sayings that I very often use in our ecosystem, in our masterminds, Is that I believe that all humans are extremely capable, but they're just scattered and they're just unaware because they're of the nature of our conditioned mind and our programming, our mother, father, teacher, preacher. And then look at society, whatever it is that we consume, we end up assuming, right? So there's all these wonderful things that we can unlock, which I know that you've unlocked in yourself. that can tap us into our great potential. And that's probably what was happening that day and many other days where I was confused and scattered, is I just bought into this idea that my success, my happiness, and my, and my abilities are an outside job. So what I've learned, and that's what I love about that movie, is not this idea of taking this little pill, although it sounds great. I probably wouldn't say no to that if I was offered it. Neither would I, yeah. But what I've learned is that we have that capability on our own and we just have to learn how to unlock it. And that's kind of what the Interface Response System is about.

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There's a quote that I love from a book called Be Here Now by Ram Dass, and he says something related to plant medicines or psychedelics in general. He says, for those that haven't experienced them, no explanation is possible.

Right.

For those that have, no explanation is necessary. You get it, right? There's kind of life before and life after. And I think you could also say the same about This awakening moment for you.

Yeah.

The snap moment. Now, I, I get your point about there are earlier snap moments, you were just less conscious of them.

Sure, sure.

Happening throughout life. But everybody in this audience, JC, has that moment where they go, okay, I get what everybody's talking about. And I see the, I see the programming on the wall. I see all the numbers flashing by. And the most optimistic part of the kickoff to your book is when you say it is programmable. If you realize it's a program, then you also realize that it's programmable.

Right.

Which means that we have the tools at our disposal. Now, they're not always easy to implement. There's a lot of tough work that goes into this, but we get to choose how we want to live. And then the decisions that we make moving forward determine the reality that we see. So, for somebody in the audience, it's like, all right, I'm picking up what this guy JC is putting down. I get it, life is programmable. I wish I could also take NZT, but there are ways to do it internally. What's the next step other than somebody buying the book? What do people do after they come to this realization?

So, um, first of all, just recognize you don't need to do plant medicine. That's what I've learned. Medicine's already in you. And that, that's what I would say is the most important and valuable next step. Um, one of the things I love about Joe Dispenza is that he'll have this like crazy seminar where you'll learn so many things, but then at the end, same thing, people will be like, what, what should I start doing now? And what Joe says is the same thing that I would recommend is Allow yourself, permit yourself. And that's a big step for people. He uses the word awareness. He says, allow yourself to just start becoming more aware. The way I interpret it is, is that give yourself permission. And you'd have to give yourself permission because the outside world is not giving you permission to be open and curious. Now, a good way that I could, you know, educate somebody, that would be like your brain is an SD card that for the most part has the write protect switch on. So you would have to allow yourself to take that write protect switch and put it back open, which means that you're open to looking at things with a different vantage point. You're open to new information. You start using words like Maybe, or I don't know, I'm not sure, or as my hat says, hmm. And a lot of people don't know this, but I've got all these gimmicks. And by the way, whenever you see a guy that's wearing glasses with no lenses and a hat that says hmm, those are anchors. You know, this is not me projecting my brand. It's turned into that. But what hmm stands for is Haven't made up my mind. And what's interesting about that is I challenge everybody to just become self-aware right now and just recognize that we live in a world that requires us to make up our mind pretty fast about a lot of things, about core values and morals and what we should and shouldn't do, what's right and what's wrong. Um, there's that famous video, Nick, called Here's to the Crazy Ones. The writing's on the wall. The most successful, happy, content, fulfilled people don't follow the herd. And in order to do that, you'd have to be open and curious to what else is out there. So, that's what I would say is the number one, even if you just did it for an hour, allow yourself to question yourself by saying, hey, JC, what else might be true?

Hmm.

It's just such a— there you go. He just said it. Hmm. And that's the whole premise of my ecosystem is I help people make sense of things. But that's a power move when you allow yourself to entertain alternative perspectives.

Yes, it is. It is a power move. I don't think you framed it that way in here. If you did, I missed it. But I agree, it is a power move.

Yeah.

Uh, there's a quote that's often attributed to Einstein, and maybe it's actually a JC quote, I'm not sure, but it says, the true measure of intelligence is the ability to change.

Yeah.

Change your mind. And that's why, you know, when we think about politics, for instance, it's this camp or that camp. How about neither camp? How about you get to choose a little bit of what you like on both sides and Make up your own mind. It's hard to put a label on something like that other than I'm just a human being with my own free will and, and I'm open to change.

Yeah. I mean, and maybe just allow yourself to take a little bit of a pause and not feel compelled to react so fast. I mean, the difference between a reaction and a response is a response is thought about first. A reaction is something that your conditioned mind, your programming, you know, spits out. And there is something to say about being able to think on your feet, you know, and multitask and everything. We live in a society that's all about efficiency now with AI and everything. If you're slow moving, the perception is that you're weak. I think that that's the complete opposite of power and wisdom. You know, if you look at Eckhart Tolle, if you ask Eckhart Tolle a question, guy takes like 30 seconds before answers. And everybody's like uncomfortable. I mean, I was actually thinking like, if Nick asked me a question, I'm just going to pause for 30 seconds and he's probably going to be prompted to say, are you okay? Or— right? So take note of that, that you for some reason feel compelled to trust, hand over the keys of trust to your reaction and your, your program, your knee-jerk reflex. And there is a time for that. If a car's coming at you, jump out of the way. But allow yourself to think about things and question what you think about it as well.

Beautiful advice. I have not done ayahuasca, although I've experimented with some other plant medicines. But I'm curious, have you ever been in a sensory deprivation float tank?

There's very few things I haven't done. And also, remember, my neighbor is Jim Quick and he has everything. I mean, you go into Jim's basement and he's like, just got everything that's ever been invented.

Yeah. I'm excited to go visit Jim's lab. Before the event that we were both at in November, we were both speaking at Jim's event or December, whenever it was. I was on a FaceTime with Jim. He was showing me around his house and I was like, that's amazing. But what I was going to say to the audience is like, you know, a great way to improve self-awareness is to go into a sensory deprivation float tank for half an hour or maybe an hour if you can, and just see what happens when you're forced to sit with your own thoughts.

See what happens.

See what happens.

See what happens.

Yeah. And I also love— and I'd be curious for your commentary on this. You know, I've— you know me, I love the art and science of learning, and I invest a lot of my time understanding how the brain develops.

Hmm.

And what one of the interesting tracks that I've been down recently is that oftentimes a child's prefrontal cortex, development of that prefrontal cortex gets delayed by devices, or there are a number of other reasons. And one of the ways to accelerate the development of your prefrontal cortex, which is responsible for executive functions like self-awareness, is to sit with your own mind and be bored. And that forces you to create versus consume. And you said earlier in the conversation that when you assume— or sorry, when you consume, you assume.

Yeah.

And Isn't that right? And do we want to be like the people we're consuming information from on social media? No. So, the alternative is to be a little bored every once in a while. What do you think about that?

You know, I had a really cool conversation about this topic with just a really interesting character to talk about parenting, and that's Gary Vee. You know, he's got— I mean, he's got— he's, you know, this— a lot of people don't know that, like, he's a dad as well. And it begins with the perception from— and we always have to kind of, as parents— I'm 54, right? We're all— we have our generational things. We always make this assumption that the way that kids are acting right now is not good if it's different than us. So I always have to say, hmm, on that and say, what else might be true? Say maybe they're preparing for a different reality. But The observation that I have, because you were talking about the float tank, and you could, you could get that by doing Transcendental Meditation. I meditate every day, and that's, that's plant medicine of a different sort.

But I got certified in TM as well, by the way.

Oh, awesome. All right, so we can have a side talk about that. And, you know, I mean, that I, I never not do that. But to your point, I have practiced for many, many years because I'm— I have a workaholic in me. So I always, always struggled to like not take action. I'm like different than most people. But I've learned how to allow myself to wander, to be bored. You know, there's a great— I've introduced you to Chris Bailey. He talks a lot about this in his books. about how some of the greatest breakthroughs that we ever have happen when we're wandering and when we're bored. But this new generation right now, and you know, you've got a little one coming up in it, and I'm sure you're doing a great job parenting, but they're still going to be exposed to things. They don't know how to be bored. They have to be stimulated. And that's one of my biggest fears. of the fast-moving, you know, AI and all of that stuff. I love all that stuff. But human beings don't know how to be bored anymore. So I actually like to talk about, like, voluntarily doing what I call boring reps. You know, I like to actually, like, like you'd go to the gym, force myself to do my new favorite thing, which is no thing. And, uh, I think there's a lot of value in there. And, you know, our friend, uh, Lee Zlotoff, I had him on the show. And, you know, this is the guy that created the genius behind MacGyver and everything. And, you know, his story is so cool. As he said, whenever he had to, like, come up with a new idea, what he would do to come up with that idea is step away from everything. And he used to take a shower. And in the showers where— so he would do nothing, right? And so yeah, I think that this NZT stuff we're talking about can be tapped in if you would just allow yourself to not be busy-minded.

Yeah, we live in such a funny world now. And you're totally right. I mean, are we preparing kids for a reality where they're going to be better suited because of some of these things? I do agree with you, though, that boredom is essential. Doing nothing is so important for Big fan. Increasing awareness, which is a really big message inside of this book. Yeah, that's right. And you know why I said we live in a funny world? That was my immediate reaction because I thought about the speaker that I have in my shower and the fact that oftentimes I put a podcast on or I listen to music. Sure. And you know what I'm going to do? I'm going to throw it out today once we jump off the podcast because Can we get a—

can we get an Instagram video of that throwout?

Yes, we can, and I'll tag you in it because I'm, I'm becoming aware of the fact that I need more silence. Yeah, and you can achieve more silence in the shower by simply throwing your speaker out, and that's what I'm going to do.

Well, you know, it's very, very difficult if, if you were a friend of mine and you were distracting yourself all the time with scrolling or substance abuse or something like that, it would be logical and rational for me to say, you should put an end to that. But what you're about to do is actually the most difficult because the idea of constantly learning— you and I love to constantly learn. I mean, look at what's behind us. I always get intimidated when I'm talking to Nick because I know he's read more books than me, and I like to read a lot of books. So, in any case, for you to say, I'm going to stop listening to an educational podcast that enriches my mind and it unlocks my creative process, that's difficult. But you're tapping into something where you're just recognizing that you're not allowing yourself to be bored. And I think that what you might find is that your creativity, your NZT will really explode In those moments. And then, when you come out of those boredom reps, you'll probably pick up a pen or start typing and just be like, wow.

I think so. Yeah, I think you're right. Well, look, you're creating change in my life.

Awesome. Well, you've already created change in my life.

We're getting towards the end of the podcast. So, I have— time flies when you're having fun. So, I have a couple of kind of rapid-fire questions for you. When you think about the target reader for this book, who did you write it for?

It's really, I would say it's written for anybody because somebody that knows a lot of this stuff would benefit from it. But I would say that it's really targeted for that person that on any level has bought into their thoughts and feelings And allowed them to become their identity. You know, it's that person that makes statements with exclamation points at the end. You know, I'm not good at that. I'm, I'm not disciplined. No, I'm good at this, but I'm not good at that. And then there's a lot of permanence in their words. And I like to think that my book helps people shift from permanence to temporary. Just by allowing them to go through the book and, and start saying, well, what else might be true? So I would say somebody that's not necessarily stuck, but stuck in their ways. And like I said, their identity has been shaped by their, their beliefs. And I like to look at thoughts and beliefs as clouds in the sky that just pass on by. You know, um, I mean, God, we have 40,000 to 70,000 thoughts come through our brain in a day, and we just somehow miraculously choose 4 and shape our identity. It's really silly.

It is really silly. And listen, I read a lot of books, you could say, like this, but every one of them is unique, and yours is very unique from your level of transparency with things like Suicide, right? To your kind of like fun metaphors with the Matrix and Limitless and NCT and everything like that, um, to just the different ways that you live life and how far you go down the rabbit hole. So, uh, and walking away from today's conversation, I'm going to go film a video of throwing out my speaker, and that's, that's a change that I made after talking with you and reading your book. And then also, I think a big part of my personality— I think, I don't know, but I think a big part of my personality for a little bit of time, because it's all temporary, to your point, it's going to be this idea that a response is better than a reaction, and that response is not fixed. It has the ability to change, and the ability to change is a power move. It's the new cool thing not to say, I am 100% certain of this belief. No, you're not. And it's kind of cool to say, you know, if somebody gives you a different opinion, somebody— if somebody says nicotine is good and you go nicotine is bad automatically, and they go, well, maybe it's not. Why do you think that way? Display a little bit of curiosity. Have the power move. Ask the question. Don't just state your opinions outright like they're fact. Just such a cool vibe. I think that's the new thing.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah. To reframe, you know, allow, allow yourself to know, like you said before, that our brains are programmable, but they're also reprogrammable. And all the science and all the people that you and I know, and all the books that we read, tell us that, you know, but you have to allow that. And you just used, you know, the concept of nicotine. And I just want to say the only Nick anything that I like is Nick Hutchinson.

Yeah, he's, he's cool. He's cool. I've heard he's a cool guy. Uh, a couple more questions for you. You told me, uh, via text message that the early reader responses are coming in. The book is changing people's lives. You're addicted to that feeling and you want more of it. So rumor is you've already started working on your next book.

Oof.

But what is the concept that you're playing with today? And I know it's subject to change.

You know, it's— well, God, I've become so obsessed with it. I'm now at the point where I was going to call you and say, when should I put my next book out? Like, what's the normal way to wait? You know, because I'm so excited about it. So let's put it this way. Very often I wear a lot of funny shirts. And one of the shirts that I wear, one of my favorites, says, breaking news, I don't care. And when people see that, they kind of laugh and they probably think it has to do with politics and all that stuff. And I always joke sometimes and say, hey, before we talk, I just wanted to make sure you know. But what it really means is that human beings are very often very careless about what they care about. And that's what my next book is about, is in tune with my flagship Interface Response System, which is the 4-step system in the book that teaches you how to actually practice this stuff. There's this exercise called the sorting filter where you start allowing yourself to run things through a quality control system. Is this something I control or is it not? Is it something that serves me and the things that matter most? You know, you've got a sorting filter that's very healthy. And I watch the way you operate as a family man and in work and things like that. That's one of the things I admire about you. But a lot of people's sorting filters have been designed by others. So one of the aspects, and a powerful one, is allowing yourself to identify what you care about and what you don't care about, what you need to care about and what you don't need to care about. So that's all I can say about that.

Well, I'm excited to dive into that. I love that.

And the COVID name is really funny. Of course.

I love the idea. You know, one of the things that I took from Stoicism, which is a very actionable philosophy, and you, you start off the book, the first couple of chapters had quotes from ancient Stoics and philosophers. It's the idea of being able to differentiate between what you have control over and what you don't, and then releasing expectations over the things that you cannot control. That's right. But then also that second filter layer that you just mentioned— does it serve you? Does it not serve you? So I'm interested to see what models your brain plays with and, and how you think about things like that. That, that's going to be fun. Uh, next question related to the book: now that it's out and people are reading it, is there anything you wish you put in here that you didn't?

Of course. I, I was talking to Jim about this the other day, and He actually warned me. He's like, you're you're gonna want to rewrite that book, you know, and because I mean that's what the second edition is always about. So I don't know if I'll write a second edition, but writing a book is very interesting, Nick, you know, and I don't know if there's any way of like being done with it. So rather than saying that I wish that I put some things in it. Because I mean, I've met people and I've interviewed people on my show post-publishing the book. And I was like, oh my God, I wish I met you like a month ago, you know, before the book came out, because I would have changed something. But back to that concept of at this time, what I love about my book is that I wrote it and I published it at that time. And I wouldn't want to change anything in that sense. So, anything that's new that I might have like said, hey, I wish I was in that book, is for the next book or for whatever's to come.

Yeah. And with these first editions, when I put my book out, Rise of the Reader, there were 8 different errors that I had in the book.

Oh, the errors. Yeah.

And what I tell people all the time, they would send them to me and I would say, you better keep that copy. It's going to be worth a lot of money someday.

Yeah.

You know, the next million copies won't have that missing period.

So the excuse that when somebody tells me that they found an error, my, my favorite excuse is, I was wondering if anyone would find that.

Yeah, true.

Like, it's like an Easter egg or something.

Yeah, no, that's good. Yeah, I was wondering if anyone would find that. I love that. Uh, where can people go to learn more about you and grab a copy of the book?

So obviously the book is available on, on Amazon and all that jazz. But I have a website, makesensebook.com. And what's interesting about the book— so I speak in the book about the difference between a jacuzzi experience and a pivotal one. And what that means is a lot of people will read books, and you and I know that not everybody finishes books. And, you know, I have my own opinion about that. But learning is not nothing but another form of distraction in the absence of action. So my biggest hope is that even if somebody just reads a little bit of my book, that it translates into action. So one of the things that I'm offering with the book at no cost is when people buy the book, they automatically will gain access to a mastermind that I run every month. And knowing me, it'll probably go on for a couple of years where I'm going to actually go through the book and interact live with people And to the best that I can, and help them lock it in. You know, because remember, habits, both good and bad, are hard to break. So if you've got some bad habits, chances are they're going to override even the biggest breakthroughs that you have unless you put those things into play. So that's another thing I want to remind people. You know, obviously there's my podcast, Make Sense with Dr. JC, which is number 5 in the world right now. Which is crazy. Um, and that's from applying a lot of this stuff. Um, so that's what I'd say is welcome to the Make Cents ecosystem.

Yeah. And I, I also think a big reason your podcast is doing so well is you are a great interviewer. You ask great questions, you make your guests feel great, you pull great lessons out of them, you summarize them for the audience. So, uh, we'll put a link to my interview on your show in the show notes below as well.

I will, I will tell you that you're, I track these things. This might shock you, but your episode that we had, and this is just in podcast land, has almost 30,000 listens. Oh, amazing. That pretty cool?

Yeah, people must like you a lot.

No, it was a great, it was a great interview. You, you taught me some very valuable things that I'm speaking about on a regular basis.

Oh, good. Well, here's my last question for you before we hit the The end button. If your book Makes Sense was deleted, but you could leave the world with just one simple message from it, what would that be?

One of, one of my favorite lessons that kind of sets up everything that I speak about is just a reminder that it's who you are that determines how well what you do works. So If you're dissatisfied or you're the kind of person that thinks that there's more out there, there is. I promise you there is. And the problem doesn't lie with you and the idea that you're not good enough, not capable enough. You're just not the version of yourself that can get the results in life that you know you're not the right person for the job yet. So it's who you are. That determines how well what you do works. So if you're out there oscillating, you know, you're focusing too much on the do and not enough on the who.

That is a wrap. Thank you so much for listening to today's episode of Book Thinkers, Life-Changing Books. It would mean the world to us if you could write a review and share this episode with a few of your friends. I mean, these books truly have the power to change people's lives, and by reviewing or sharing our podcast, you're helping us make an impact. If you have any recommendations for future guests or any constructive feedback for us on how we can improve our show, please feel free to submit a form on our website, www.bookthinkers.com, or send us a direct message on Instagram @bookthinkers. With that, I am signing off, and I hope you have a wonderful day. Don't forget, Go read something.