Scott Perry on the Catching the Next Wave Podcast

Let's do it.

Okay, Scott Perry, a guitar player and a man who loves to empower others. We met as a consequence of the altMBA workshop and stayed in touch. Scott has wrote his first book, The Stoic Creative, bringing Stoic philosophy to guide creative life. His next writing was a pamphlet about creative approach to professional fears, Isn't it interesting? He tackled there the topics of failure, inadequacy, irrelevance, obscurity, poverty, and others. Recently, very recently, he has published his first work, Endeavor, to empower people who want to empower others. How awesome is that? Scott Perry says about himself: a husband, father, teacher, and a musician. BeCreativeOnPurpose.com is the home of his weekly blog and broadcast, sharing lessons for flying higher in endeavors that make a difference. So awesome to have you here, Scott, with us.

Thank you so much, Aga. Really, really appreciate the opportunity to speak with you again.

In all your work, you talk about empowerment to be creative, right?

Mm-hmm.

Is everybody creative?

I believe that creativity is one of the most important impulses of being a human being. That yes, we are all creative beings. And the, I mean, this is born out, but so creativity is, I define it as simply the, the ability and the impulse to bring forth things into the world that didn't previously exist. So for instance, this conversation is an act of creativity because until we got on this Zoom call, we, had not created it, so now here it is. And it's also the way that we solve interesting problems. So when we are young and fearless and uninhibited creators, we see that there's this thing that happening around us where people are walking and we are not yet walkers. So we employ our creative instinct and our creative impulse to try out this walking thing. And it turns out that we're pretty lousy walkers for a long time. There's a lot of, uh, a lot of false starts, a lot of falling down, a lot of failure. But because we're unselfconscious and because we have our aspiration firmly in mind, we eventually turn our bad walking into really good walking. And we do the same thing with talking and writing and reading and everything else that we value as young people. And I think it's— what is sad is that as adults, the polling shows that less than 50% of people worldwide feel that they are creative. And that's just really sad, but it's also a little bit delusional because we all maintain our creative instinct and impulse. We have just talked ourselves out of employing it as frequently and as often as we need to.

So actually what you're saying is that as much as we do learn how to walk and talk and write and do all the stuff, we sort of unlearn how to be creative over the course of years.

I think it's just a failure to keep embracing and engaging that impulse. I mean, when you when you make a sandwich, you're creating a sandwich. When you write an email, you're creating an email. One of the things that I said in the Still Creative Handbook was that since we, we are all creatives and we're all creatives in various domains and spheres of our life, we— what's important is to choose some areas where you want to rise to artistry. And the difference between being merely creative and becoming an artist in an, in an endeavor that matters to you is that art is made for the purpose of transforming, and art has to happen out loud and in public. It has to collide with an audience somehow because that's how you make change happen. So the artist is somebody that is willing to put forth their creations to others. And as Seth says, Here, I made this, and then watch what happens next. And it's through the process of creating and engaging with an audience that you're able to refine your craft, you're able to define your audience, and you're able to continue to level up as an artist through work that's intended to make a difference.

So how come that so many people have this creativity so deeply buried in their, you know, the darkest corner of their lives?

Yeah, well, I think it's something that happens through— I mean, it's institutional, it's cultural. I mean, our schools are trying to cookie-cutter young people into fitting into a system that doesn't really exist or work anymore. And so the emphasis by many educational institutions, by many corporate institutions, by many cultural, social, political, and economic institutions is conformity. And conformity is not the absolute enemy of creativity, but it's certainly doing a lot to get in the way of encouraging us to become, to employ and develop our creative capacity. And there's also, I would say, there's a lot of things happening on kind of a, that lizard brain tribal belonging level. Like we don't, We're culturally, historically programmed by evolution to not stand out too much because people that stand out oftentimes get cut down, you know, when we were more tribal and relied on, you know, being part of a tribe to survive in a world that was reasonably hostile. And that instinct is not going anywhere. Anytime soon, what we need to do is reframe our relationship with the things that are getting in the way of our creativity, like anxiety and attachment and fear, and, you know, fear of being noticed, fear of failure, and all those things. And I think that the easiest way to do that is to just instead of looking at fear and all of those things as the enemy, as, as things to hide from, we welcome them as friends and say, oh, fear showed up. Clearly I'm doing something that, that is important, important to me, important that I pursue and worth paying a little bit more attention to, possibly worth investing myself in and developing and delivering. And so thank you, fear, for showing up. Now I know which direction I need to head, and now I'm going to step in that direction. You're welcome to come along. I know you will, but you've got to shut up and sit in the back and be quiet.

Yeah, you tackled something that I haven't thought about that much, that indeed through evolution we were like— the most reasonable behavior was to to kind of be like the others, not to stand out. And we are living in times right now when creativity and being different are the sole advantages, like, you know, competitive advantages to survival of companies, of businesses, of pretty much any, anything that is happening. How do you see this standing out versus compliance as a conflict for people, for businesses?

I have been doing a lot of listening to very smart people talking about what's coming in terms of the future of work, the role that artificial intelligence will play, and One of the things that I address in both The Stoic Creative and my, my new book Endeavor is there, there's 3 things that are not going anywhere in terms of humanity. As long as humans continue to exist, we are born with a social instinct because it, going back to that evolutionary imperative, It's our social instinct that enabled us to survive. Our social interests— we lived in a hostile world where we were neither the strongest nor the fastest. And so it was by banding together that we were able to maintain, keep ourselves protected and prevent ourselves from becoming somebody else's lunch. That social imperative required us to communicate and collaborate which is how we developed language, which is how we grew our brains, which is how we developed our creative capacity and how we went from being at the bottom of the food chain to being at the top of the food chain. Now we're not hiding in caves hoping that nobody eats us. We're at— we actually are dominating the planet for better or for worse. So the social instinct is, is always going to remain. The other thing that we're, we have is this capacity for reason, for rationality. Doesn't mean that we're always behaving like reasonable and rational creatures. Too frequently we're not, but we have that capacity. And when we employ our creative capacity, our social instinct, and our capacity for reason, and do, do all of that in service to others, for others, with others, we have the ability to enhance our own lives while we are helping improve the lives of others. So as we think about what's happening as we move forward, I tend to think that anything that can be done better by a machine or an algorithm probably should be done by a machine or an algorithm. There's, you know, I'm not saddened by the fact that I don't have to dig ditches for a living. You know, there are machines that do that much more efficiently than I ever could. Um, The things that will never be able to— well, the things that are not currently able to be done by anybody other than human beings are the things that involve creativity, because we have not yet developed machines that are capable of becoming conscious and thinking for themselves. So our creative capacity is, is I think the thing that we want to put all the chips on right now, and we want to leverage that capacity in order to, you know, move, move ourselves forward and continue, um, not only continue to, to thrive, but continue to just simply exist. So the first step is we have to disabuse ourselves of this notion that that, you know, some of us are creative and some of us are not, and that creativity comes from somewhere, is only reserved for an elite few, and that the rest of us are destined for lives of quiet desperation. It's just simply not true. We have to change the stories that we're telling ourselves so that we can improve the stories that we're telling each other.

So you write that this creativity is something that that is, okay, I agree with what you're saying, that creativity is this thing that remains as this one thing that cannot be taken by the machines. I see it very, very similarly. Yet when I'm looking at the leaders of today, the leaders who are in high positions, who are in the, you know, in management positions, they are not very skilled to lead for creativity. They are not very skilled to lead creative people. Um, very often their way of leading is by, you know, command and control, by sometimes by bullying, sometimes by pressuring people to do what they want to be done rather than to let them do what they think is the best. And there is this other thing, which is nourishing, which is a big challenge today. How do you see this and what would you recommend to the leaders, how they should change their way of acting?

So our institutions, political and academic and commercial, have a vested interest in the way things have always— the way things are right now. They have a vested interest in the status quo. The status quo rewards confidence and certainty. And the people— I'm gonna— I'm hesitating to use the word the term leaders because those— the people that are at the top of our institutions, the people that are our instructors and administrators and so forth, they have done a masterful job of mastering what already is. But what already is, is not really serving us right now, and it's not going to serve us for much longer. And what we need now, instead of certainty and confidence and the status quo, is more people like you and your husband and all of our friends in the MBA, people that are, instead of chasing the status quo, mastering the status quo, and seeking certainty and confidence in things as they are, are instead willing to approach interesting problems with greater curiosity and courage. People who are willing to take chances, people who are willing to be deliberate and intentional and with integrity try to make change happen and bring us— help us step forward into a better way. Now, that's going to take a lot of time. And so, yes, in the United States, I could take a look at my political institutions and just say, this is hopeless. Everybody— the system's bought and paid for by corporations and special interests, and we have completely selfish terrible human beings, you know, at the, at the very top positions in our country. Um, but the fact of the matter is those people don't, they don't really have a huge impact on my life. Uh, the people that have an impact on my life are, are people like Aga and people like Seth and people like Maria and people like Patrick and people, all the people that I've met through the Alt MBA. Who instead of saying, well, I guess this is just the way it is. Guess I'll just have to gut it out until they plant me in the ground. Instead, they're saying, hey, I think we could do things differently. I'm going to give this a try. Would you like to come? Now that's leadership. And that's something that I'm much more interested in paying attention to now. I'm grateful for people that try to work within the systems that already exist and try to make change happen. I'm not sure that that's how change happens. The status quo is really good at winning because it's the status quo, and the status quo rarely changes until a better idea comes along that is undeniably preferred by people that are making a difference. And so I think, you know, you can look at things and be fairly pessimistic about it, or you can look— there's a great documentary about Fred Rogers, who was the star of Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, the show that I watched growing up, that I made my boys watch as they grew up. And He remembered something after the 9/11 attacks here in the States that his mother used to say. And because whenever Fred was scared as a child, whenever— I think it was in reaction to Bobby Kennedy's assassination and being really frightened about that as a child— and his mother said, "There's always helpers. Look for the helpers." And that's the way I feel about the place we are right now globally. Let's look to, instead of looking to the quote unquote leaders, the people that are at the heads of corporations and governments and financial institutions, let's instead look to the true helpers, the people like you and I and all of our friends in the altMBA and all the generous people that are out there doing great work, whether it's through social justice movements or through education or just as thought leaders, people sharing big ideas that are going to change the way things— let's look to those people instead.

So actually you're saying that the current status quo is what it is, but I sort of believe that status quo is always there, it's just it can be different. So what would be your future status quo? How would you like the status quo to be?

I would— I just, I'm not a fan of the status quo. I mean, whatever, however things are, it doesn't mean that that's— because I don't believe that— so I'll take a different angle on this. I have a great admiration for the work of Simon Sinek, and I think that he is, um, he's certainly been an inspiration to me. He has a thing that he says about your purpose. He calls it your why that I strongly disagree with. He says your why is fixed by the time you're 20 years old, that your purpose in life is fixed when you're 20. And now When I heard him say that, I just, I couldn't, I just couldn't swallow it. I couldn't accept it because when I think about my journey and my purpose, it has changed over time. I'm not, I didn't, I don't have the same values, talents, motivations, intentions, and aspirations now that I had when I was 16 or 30 or even 40. I mean, I, I have— I am a work in progress. And as I go through seasons of life, as I find myself in different situations and circumstances and surroundings, as I find myself surrounded by different people, I have found that going, doing, going back and I call it sweeping the floor. You know, what, what, what's important? What are my guiding principles now? What are my talents now? Where are the people that share my values and need my talents now? That's where I want to be. And that helps me define the work that I'm meant to do now in this moment. And I could say, yeah, in a way my purpose has always been to teach or to encourage. It's just a little bit too light for me. I feel like your purpose should be stated very specifically and it should be for a very specific collection, a very specific group of people. And that you should be seeking a very specific result or very specific transformation. And, uh, so there is no status quo because as soon as I've achieved excellence in this endeavor that I'm doing now, I'm going to have my sights on what's next for me. And I want to continue to step into that what's next with integrity and and intention. And so the thing about that, I believe, the thing that I assert about that, that, that perspective is that there's room for everybody. We can all do better. We can all improve our lives as we enhance the lives of others. That's how we improve our lives. In a status quo kind of mindset, there's people that are at the top and then there's everybody else, and there's not that much room at the top. And if you're at the top, you're not going anywhere unless somebody takes you out, because that's the way the status quo works. It protects the people at the top. And so the change agents and the transformers and the And the people that aspire to fly higher, um, you know, they, they've got to, they've got to create an alternative again, that's just so undeniably more attractive and beneficial to more and will help make, do better for more that the either the status quo can ignore it or the status quo gets left behind because the new idea becomes the what's now as it seeks to continue to evolve into the what's next.

You had a quite interesting personal path to developing yourself and changing yourself and empowering yourself. Would you share some of it with us?

Uh, are we talking— are we going to talk about Stoicism now?

We can.

Oh, I was, um, so, well, I'll begin there. I'm not sure where your question was intended to lead me. Um, so, little disclaimer: Stoicism is not spelled with a capital F or with a, with a small s when we're talking about Stoic philosophy. Stoicism with a small s means grim endurance and keeping a stiff upper lip as you grind your way through misfortune and struggle. Stoic philosophy as it is, as it developed as an ancient Hellenistic philosophy of life and continues to be a work in progress and evolve and change through the modern Stoicism movement, is a philosophy that states that all that is required for you to be a happy and healthy human being is to cultivate and maintain and act upon your virtue, is what the Stoics would call it. I would just I would say that the excellence of character would be a better way of phrasing it. All that's required to be happy and healthy as a human being is to have and cultivate and develop excellence of character. Beyond that, the Stoics say that we have the capacity for reason and that we are inherently social creatures and that our lives are improved most when we are working to enhance the lives those around us, and that we can employ our capacity for reason and rationality to choose how we want to see things and, and what we decide to do next. Now, Stoic philosophy was presented, came across my radar at a very young age. I was in the 7th grade when my Latin teacher gave me his copy of Marcus Aurelius' Meditations, and and that I've connected with daily since then. And I've very intentionally applied those ideas, those basic ideas of Stoicism to everything I've done. I've done— I've applied it to my life as a husband, my life as a father, my life as a musician, my life as a teacher, and my life now as an author, and it has never let me down. I haven't always been the model Stoic that I would love to be, but I'm not looking to become a Stoic sage. I'm just, I'm just an aspiring student, aspiring and advancing student of Stoicism, and So I would say that for anyone that wants to live a life with greater intention and greater integrity and engage in work that makes a difference and experience greater sense of flourishing and less frustration through the inevitable struggles that come with that journey, you could do a lot worse than checking out a little bit of Stoic philosophy. It's not a life hack. It's not simply a philosophy of life. It's a way of being in the world that is entirely about promoting human flourishing within yourself and within everybody that you come into contact with.

Your first book was The Stoic Creative, right? How, how does this approach to life and your own path into Stoicism converted into this book? Like, what was the connection there?

So basically, the Stoic— so I came up with the idea to write The Stoic Creative in the marketing seminar in the very first session. And, um, it just was a flash of inspiration. And I had been writing a lot on the topic of Stoicism and creativity in my blog, uh, as I was trying to figure out what I was going to do next. Because when I graduated from Alt MBA 6 in August of 2016, I kind of just, I had this, uh, transformative experience where I realized I didn't really necessarily want to continue to be a musician. And a guitar instructor for the rest of my life that I had, you know, I was allowing myself to dream a little bit bigger and to, um, pursue other interests, but I didn't really know what it was going to be. I just had this idea that I was going to somehow help other people by sharing my, my love of Stoic philosophy and my, my, the belief I had that creativity is, is the way that we get out of the predicament that we find ourselves in. And so The Stoic Creative was my first project to really marry those two ideas. So I'll share a little story, uh, about our mutual friend and mentor Seth Godin, who was present in the marketing seminar. And when I presented this idea and put myself on the hook to write this book, The Stoic Creative, he said, putting Stoic in the title is a bad idea. And I thought, wow, Seth Godin says it's a bad idea. It's probably a bad idea, but I think it's a good idea. I can't let go of this. You know, I'm, I'm gonna, I'm gonna go for it. Well, The Stoic Creative has done well enough for sure. And it has made a, made a difference in the lives of a lot of people. I get continued to sell copies of that book every day, and the people that engage with it continue to write me every week and to tell me how much they enjoy that work. But I will have to say that the book did not do nearly as well as I think it could have. And I think that Seth was— is right, that there is a— that Globally, the word stoicism does not have a very positive feel to it, very positive connotation. So when I wrote Endeavor, the stoicism is all still there. I open up with talking about how we are inherently social and rational and creative creatures. I ask my readers to engage with life's big questions as they get ready to step into what's next with an endeavor that's going to make a difference, that they're going to engage in, that's going to make a difference in the world. Um, but I, I think the word stoic appears like 2 or 3 times in the entire book. And I just, I don't want, I don't want my love and affection and use of stoic philosophy to get in the way of somebody else's journey. I think the, The principles and the practices that I'm sharing in Endeavor, just like the principles and practices in the Soul Creative, can be immensely helpful for doing work with greater intention and integrity, especially work that, that is intended to make a difference with and for others. So by kind of removing that obstacle or having to explain fully what Stoicism is. It just felt like it was a good idea to kind of take that out of the equation. And then I share resources at the end. Hey, if you want to learn more about the Stoic philosophy thing, here's some resources that will help you get there. I'm certainly not evangelizing Stoic philosophy. I'm evangelizing this idea that we enhance our lives most when we are engaged in enhancing the lives of others.

Yeah, it sounds like— I don't remember who said it, but someone said that if you put an equation into your book, you lose half the audience. So it seems that if you put a philosophy into your book, you lose half the audience too. Your next thing was this pamphlet about Fear. And fear is something that we keep on talking about whenever we meet with the ALTA MBA crowd. This is something that the ALTA MBA workshop made us all aware and that we realize how much it's running our lives and how much we need to face it. What was the goal behind this pamphlet for you?

One of the things that I wrestled with a lot when I was— because I felt like even with The Stoic Creative, I wasn't being absolutely clear about who my audience was. And as I continued to do workshops and to speak and to do coaching, uh, with, you know, my, my own personal clients, but also coaching through the marketing seminar, the Bootstrappers Workshop, I realized that I didn't— I was less interested in helping people get unstuck than I was— I mean, that, that are just totally stuck and totally hiding and totally in fear and just unwilling to move. I was more interested and people that were actively engaged in some sort of enterprise, but struggling because things, you know, they were in a way getting in their own way. So I didn't want to write, you know, I didn't want to write a book that was intended, say, for like Brené Brown's audience, or, you know, I didn't want to cheerlead people out of hiding and, and throw them into the arena where they maybe don't really yet have the, the soft skills and the, and the toolkit to, to survive and thrive with, you know, it. Because I think, you know, the— especially if you're doing work on the internet or using the internet to promote your work, you're going to be subject to a lot of criticism, ridicule, or simply being ignored, right? Um, so as I was moving toward this other audience, which I would call an audience that was already going but needing assistance, uh, in continuing their journey, I wanted to not abandon people that just needed to hear that there is a way through the fear, that there is a way, or there is a way to position fear so that you can move forward. So the pamphlet that I wrote, Isn't This, Isn't That Interesting, is literally an exercise I've been using since I was a kid. Because whenever, you know, I was kind of, uh, my family moved around a lot. I was constantly having to like make new friends. I was really, I was just a fat kid and, um, had very low self, you know, self-image, self-esteem, was picked on and bullied and, you know, teased, uh, just like many of us were back in those days. Um, but I always at the same time felt I had a pretty good sense of who I was and I liked myself. I never allowed other people's opinion of me to color the fact that even though I realized I wasn't perfect, that I was okay. I was, you know, I wasn't lacking. I just had potential that I hadn't yet realized. So I developed this phrase that I use. I would say it out loud whenever something was happening. If I was getting teased or or if I had just had a disastrous failure, if I didn't make the team I was trying out for, if the girl didn't say yes, you know, when I asked her to the dance, I would just say, instead of like saying, oh, I'm terrible, I'm an awful person, I'm a loser, I'm never going to amount to anything. I would say, huh, isn't that interesting? Because what it— the thing about fear is that it meant— it, it, it, there's a couple things. The first thing is that fear is again, one of those evolutionary imperatives, right? It exists so that when we hear something go bump in the night, that we go run inside and lock all the doors. But there's not that much out there right now that's going to actually kill us or even cause us true harm.

Harm.

It's just this evolutionary impulse that we have that whenever we feel a little anxious, that we shut down or that we run back into our hole and hide. And so what we need, basically, it's the pamphlet I wrote as my way of saying the Viktor Frankl quote, between stimulus and response, there is a pause. Because what we need to do is insert that pause. Because instead of the knee-jerk reaction to fear, what we want to do is take a second— actually, 5 seconds is what the science says we need— take 5 seconds to hold the situation out away from ourselves and look at it with a little bit more of a discerning and a little bit more objective eye and say, well, let's look at what's really going on here. So that this, when you say to yourself or out loud preferably, "Isn't that interesting?" You insert the pause because you're saying "isn't," which means you're in the here and now, we're in the present tense. "That," we're identifying what the problem is or what the situation is.

Away from you.

Right. And then we're saying "interesting," which is saying that now we're saying I'm curious about this as opposed to I'm scared out of my mind about this. So we say, isn't that interesting? And now we have this created this moment where we can take a different look. And the pamphlet goes on to explain, as I shared earlier in our talk, that, you know, now we can take that and say, well, maybe there's, maybe the reason why I'm having this reaction is because it's actually something that's important to me. Maybe it's because I should actually be heading in this direction. And this is fear's way of trying to protect me. And that's the thing is fear is not trying to do you harm. Fear is trying to keep you humble and hiding and safe. The problem is we don't need humble and hiding and safe right now. We need curious and courageous and stepping into what's next. So just one, one more thing about fear. Fear and excitement manifest physiologically exactly the same. Your pupils dilate, you start to sweat, your heartbeat picks up, and you have the same exact feeling in your body with either of those. And so, you know, one of the things I do as a musician when I'm getting ready to do something, you know, where I'm really like, for instance, this past summer I was teaching at a guitar camp, um, that, that's led by my friend Martin Taylor, one of the greatest jazz guitar players on the planet. And the other, uh, one of the other featured guest instructors was Frank Vignolo, who is my former teacher and again, one of the best guitar players on the planet in my humble estimation. Um, And I— it was my turn to perform with two of my heroes. And I, you know, I don't historically do really great in these situations. I've been in them before because I, I'm in my head and I'm attaching myself to the outcomes that I hope happen, but I'm also wrestling with all of my past failures and all my lack. Um, and so I stood at the back of the room as, as I was watching them perform the song right before I was to go on. And I just kept repeating to myself, really excited about this. I'm super excited about this. I can't wait to go on stage and be with Frank and Martin. I can't wait for this. This is going to be so much fun because it enabled me to completely reframe fear into excitement. And I actually performed. I was very, very happy with the way I performed. And I don't think I would have had that experience if I had sat in the back going, oh my God, oh my God, I'm so scared. Oh, what's Frank thinking about me now? What's Martin gonna do? Oh, you know, it's all about the— again, we choose Your, your, your project here is all about empowerment. And I would say that empowerment for me is all about agency. Who's in charge and what are you in charge of? And as every human being on the planet, I believe, is only in charge of two things. You're in charge of how you choose to see yourself and your situation and others, and you're in charge and have the ability to choose what you do next. And both of those things that you control, your perception and, and your actions, are all right here in this present moment. So any time you spend getting anxious about outcomes that you're attaching yourself to in the future, or any time you spend attached to preconceived notions about your past self is taking you out of your current experience and only doing you harm and causing you suffering. And so when I say you're only in charge of two things, that's because that's all you need are those two things. If you make better choices about how you choose to see yourself in your situation and other people, and you make better choices about what you decide to do next with integrity and intention, you'll be okay. Things will be all right. Things will work out. This is not guaranteeing fame and fortune because those things don't really matter. What matters is— what matters to me, and I think what leads to a greater sense of flourishing and happiness and health and well-being is being prosperous enough that you get to get up tomorrow morning and do the same thing that you were doing today, only do it a little better and with a little bit more integrity and intention.

There is this book that we both read, and because this is the reading from the Altenbier And I absolutely love this book. This is my, you know, like whenever I feel down, I read it and I feel good again. And this is The Art of Possibility. And in this book, Ben Sanders and his wife, I don't remember her name. Oh my goodness. Yeah, Joe, Josephine. I don't know. Like, okay, whatever. It doesn't matter. But basically what What they say, they talk about something that I absolutely adore, which is rule number 6, not taking yourself so damn seriously. How does that feel into empowerment? How does this feel into finding your true self?

That's a great question. And I think a lot about this because again, just to give a nod to my, my my friends Marcus Aurelius and Epictetus and Seneca, my Stoic teachers from antiquity, they talk a lot about this idea of contextualizing yourself. And I don't think that there's— I don't have any issue with the cognitive dissonance of holding two ideas in my head at the same time. On the one hand, I am a speck of dust on a rock hurtling through space and the cosmos, and when I'm gone, I will not be missed. That's— I have no problem accepting that, you know, I don't matter much in the grand scheme of things. Things. At the same time, my duty, my role, is to do the most I can with what I have in service to my own character, my own virtue, through the work that I do with and for others. And so on the one hand, I'm all I need. And on the other hand, I, I really don't matter at all. And I think that the Stoics have just a bunch of exercises for helping you with this. For instance, one of, one of the things that I practice every day is I go for my daily run at the cemetery and it's, I call it my, momento mori exercise. It's when I go to the cemetery and I run 6 laps and it's 3 miles. And I have a couple of walks in there too. So I do about 4 miles a day at the cemetery. And so as I'm jogging around the cemetery, number one, it's at the highest point of town and I see all the mountains and all the beauty all around me. And then I see all the headstones. And I am reminded simultaneously that I am part of this whole, this whole that is nature, not just my human nature, uh, and not just the nature of the land and the earth that surrounds me, but the nature of all things, the sky and the cosmos and everything else. I'm a part of all of that. And I'm going to end up underground with the rest of my friends. And so it's a gentle reminder of my place and that my time is finite, and therefore I should make sure that when I get home and showered and move on to what's next for me in my day, that I do that to the utmost of my ability, and that I continued this, you know, path of developing my potential and delivering on my promise. And so empowerment is not power. Empowerment is the ability to recognize both your limitations and, and your abilities, and to cultivate your abilities. And, um, you know, you can work on your limitations, but, you know, there's the idea of empowerment is you are— you have some, some agency in building yourself from the ground up. And that what you can't do is wait for somebody else to pick you, or for the world, the planets to align, and the ducks to get in a row. You need to— you need to be an active agent in your own life's journey, and that journey is going to be best served by you recognizing and assisting those around you.

Okay, let's talk a little bit about your new book. What is Endeavor about?

So Endeavor is subtitled Cultivate Excellence While Making a Difference. And it's— I also have said that it's not a self-help book, it's a help others book. Unfortunately, there's not a help others section at the bookstore, or there's not a help others category on Amazon, so I'm kind of stuck in the self-help section at the moment. But Endeavor is again intended for people that are either actively engaged in doing work that's intended to make a difference or are ready to get going in some sort of enterprise that tends to improve the lives of others and along the way improve their own lives. So it's a book that kind of puts the reader in the position of being the the hero of their own hero's journey. And so the first part of the book talks about agency and assets. It talks about, uh, all the things that I've shared here about who's in charge and what are they in charge of. And, uh, it shares a lot more about the assets that we all have access to right here and now. And the second part talks a little bit more about the, the challenges and, um, and at the same time presents an approach through those challenges or a way of reframing challenges so that you can continue to make progress. And then the book kind of ends with, uh, with some, some concepts and tools and some principles for continuing beyond the book. So one of the things that the book does at the very beginning is it provides some tools and res— uh, it supplies an approach, a process for dialing in who you are, what you're good at, and where you belong. And who you are is what your core values are, your guiding principles. What you're good at are your core talents, the things, the soft skills, the interpersonal skills, the things that you've been employing and, and, and developing since you were a young child. And then where you belong is with your tribe. And your tribe is made up of people that share your values and need your talents to either enhance their lives, solve a problem, or to, to serve as collaborators in, in other work. And then again, just the book is sharing all these ideas in a very— I made it purposefully short. Each chapter is a page. And what I am trying— I'm not trying— I didn't want to create a fluffy book that I could charge a lot of money for. I wanted to chart— I wanted to create a very I wanted to take all the things that have worked for me and have worked for all the people that I've engaged with through my life's journey as, you know, a family, a person with a family, as a person that's had a successful music career, a person that has a thriving entrepreneurial enterprise. And I wanted to share them in a way that you could easily digest and then go and employ them and apply them to your life right away. Because that's what I find is the part that's missing so often. People that buy self-help books are always looking for the next self-help book, just like people that will frequently take online courses and then just look for the next course. And I call it just-in-case learning as opposed to just-in-time learning. And just-in-case learning is great if, you know, but if Seneca has a saying, an aphorism that he shares in his letters that says, learning that does not lead to action is useless. So all that just-in-case learning that you end up doing, just none of it matters a lick if it never gets employed in the world. Whereas if you are out in the world doing work, especially in the day and age that we live in, You have access right now, just in time, to whatever knowledge you're missing or to whatever skills, help you need to develop skills and talents that you need for the endeavor that you're engaged in. So it's a, it's a book for doers and people that are ready to be doers and that are ready to do work that matters with and for people that they care about.

That leads me to my question that sort of got into my head when I was looking through the book, which is like, is it really possible to empower others, or do we have to first empower ourselves?

No, it's not, because you, you the reader, are beyond my control. I cannot incept myself in your brain and start activating neurons and gets you moving, right? So you have to have, you have to have engagement. You have to have— and I believe it's not just engagement, but you have to, you have to be invested in your own life's journey, and you have to be willing to engage in that journey. And that means that you're going to have to come to terms with all the things that we've talked about that can sometimes hold us back. You know, we're going to have to decide how we're going to deal with failure and frustration and criticism and, and people that, you know, don't find any significance in what we're doing. I mean, those are all things that we're going to have to contend with. But it means that you have to— you're the one with the agency. You're the one that must empower yourself before anybody else can help empower you further.

Actually, recently Seth wrote that 90% of the change is in us, but there is this 10% that we need in order to progress. And sometimes we don't need it, but sometimes we do. You mentioned coaching, you're a coach yourself. How do you see coaching playing? What sort of role does coaching play in empowering others? And do you need coach? Do you need coaching? Do you think people need coaching?

I think that yes. I mean, We are not always our own best guides. Doesn't mean that we don't— shouldn't— there are times when we should be, you know, self-learners and that we should be trusting our instincts and our intuition. I think there's a case to be made at various times and places for that, but There— it is undeniable that we are social creatures and that our work is improved by coming into contact with others and by paying attention to the way that others are engaging with it. And having a trusted guide, coach, fellow traveler, mastermind member, accountability buddy, whatever you want to call it. Having some— somebody or somebody else to, um, provide you with the real love, right? Because it's not— we don't need tough love. Tough love is, is what, uh, what, what all those, um, people that are married to the status quo want to give us. But real love means that We, we are, if we surround ourselves with people that truly respect and care for us and our journey, and those are people that, um, have earned our trust and who we admire, then we are positioned to make progress. Much more fast than if we try to slog through, uh, the jungle of, um, challenge ahead on our own. So I, I'm a firm believer that work done by teams is, is better than work done by individuals, and that there's not a single person on the planet that I can think of who who doesn't have somebody else out there in the world that could be of real service and value to them in helping them enhance themselves so that they can in turn enhance the lives of others. So one of the things that I do as a, as a guitar teacher and as a coach is ultimately I do want to teach myself or coach myself out of that job. My job is not to keep, keep you on the hook and collect your money every week. My job is to give you the encouragement and the concepts and insights and resources for you to be able to continue on. You know, as a guitar instructor, when I get students to a certain point and I see that their interests are taking them in a direction where I'm not really qualified to provide instruction, or where I feel that maybe the best service I can provide is to encourage them to leave the nest and go put their work out in the world. That's, that's what I do. Because I'm not worried about— this community is making new guitar potential guitar players every single day. Every single day people are being born, and those people, some of them are going to become guitar players. And sooner or later, if they're going to become guitar players, they're going to have to come through me. So I'm not concerned about, um, you know, hanging on or clinging to my students any more than I want them clinging to me. So yes, guides and coaches and teachers are important. Mentors and role models and heroes are important. Um, but at the same time, it's important that you become the hero of your own journey and use those trusted guides, for what they are, which is facilitators of your journey.

And not the leaders of your journey or the writers of your journey.

Or the managers.

Or the managers of your journey. Yes. Do you think everyone can be empowered?

Everybody is empowered. I mean, I don't know anybody that's just sitting in the dark, um, getting fed by a machine or by a tube. I mean, so I think it's, it's more a matter of degree, right? So we all have the path. I opened up Endeavor with this idea that you and I and everybody else, we are sufficient as we are. But at the same time, we have this unrealized promise, and that's— therefore, that's the job, is to go on this, you know. And the promise never gets fully realized. You're never fully self-actualized. It's— but you, you can improve by working on yourself daily. And that's what, to me, what empowerment is, is the posture of somebody that is willing to put themselves on the hook and put them and, and, and step forward, uh, with integrity and intention today, and then do it again tomorrow and the next day and the next day and the next day. And so, um, you can, again, you can spend, you You can spend your days getting ready to be empowered, or you can begin right now by taking a step and checking out what happens next.

How do you, how can design or designers help in making people empowered? Like, do you think that there's space for design and designers to help with it?

Oh yeah. I think design is the thing right now. I mean, now what we used to call self-help is called life design. Now, you know, what we think of as employment services or, you know, job counseling is career design. And that's— we're kind of circling all the way back to at the beginning of our discussion. We have this moment in time when what's required is for us not to look to what's available now, but to start imagining what's possible next. And design thinking is the way that we're going to get there in a way that is deliberate and perceivable purposeful and is done in alignment with our values and helps us continue to experience greater, a greater sense of fulfillment and satisfaction. So I think design is an essential component. Design is really just another way of saying creativity, but Maybe even more design as a way of talking about artistry. It's creativity done with intention and with specific aspirations in mind and with, you know, and stepping into that strategically.

If you were to recommend a book, we are recommending yours, of course, but—

I wasn't going to recommend mine.

No, but it's like you You guys, you should certainly look at Scott's new book Endeavor and check it out. It's super awesome. But if you were to recommend a book to our listeners, what would it be?

I have to say Marcus Aurelius' Meditations just because it's had such a profound impact on my life and whether it's that Or I just think when I read Meditations as a 7th grader, I remember what struck me. And at the time, I didn't even know that he was necessarily a student of Stoicism. There's no real mention of— or if it is meant— if Stoicism is mentioned, it's not to the degree that you would remember if you were unfamiliar with it. I just remember thinking to myself as a, whatever I was, 14-year-old boy, that Marcus was talking to himself in the very same way that I talked to myself. And I just, that blew my mind that somebody from millennia ago, from eons ago, was, you know, was having an experience that was so dramatically similar to mine. So if you are a person that is thoughtful but also deliberate in the way that they approach life and approach the work that they do and approach approach the relationships that they're in. That book is just a treasure trove of advice and reminders, and loaded with aphorisms and maxims and quotes that you can keep close at hand, you know, when you need to, when you need to gently remind yourself, you know, what's the next thing here, what's the next step. But whether it's that, or I, I just think that engaging with any of the ancient texts from the Hellenistic or even pre-Socratic philosophers, um, is, is worthwhile because what they are all wrestling with are the three most important questions that we need to contend with, which is What does it mean to be human? What does it mean to be happy? And how can I be more of both?

Thank you so very much. It was a fantastic conversation.

Oh, always, always a pleasure. That was a— you're doing great work, Aga. And I didn't ever really get your husband's name.

Lukasz. Lukasz. Yeah, that's that.

Lukasz. So Aga and Lukasz, you're doing fantastic work with this podcast. And I really meant it when I said it earlier that, you know, you and me and all of the people like us that are putting forth work into the world with the impulse to make the world a better place and doing it with generosity and with real integrity and intent, it— you're making a humongous difference. And I have a deep respect for the work that you're both doing, and I'm deeply honored that you would have me on your broadcast.

Thank you.