Episode w Khe Hy (Founder & CEO of RadReads)

Everybody, welcome to yet another episode of Building Public Podcast. Today I am— I have to really, really, really get this intro right because this is a guy, this is an entrepreneur, this is a founder, creator that I admired from afar for a long time and read all the stuff, read all the newsletters, you know, I mean, was really an influential person, both from an energy and the vibe. But also from the wisdom and a lot of like wholesome content he puts out there about his family and about his daughters and about productivity and the 10K work. You know, I think these are the hints you may, you may have already pictured who this person is with the hat backwards. It is Kei Hee. Welcome to the podcast, Kei.

What's up, KP? Thank you so much. You know, thank you for that intro. What I want to tell you though, it's like, I'm the one like all this time I've been watching you talk and build and I'm like, I'm like, yo, am I gonna get on this podcast someday? I'm like the one wondering. So it's always, it's so funny how it all works, but it's a pleasure.

I appreciate it. And look, I think this is something that I've seen as a pattern among some of the greatest people that I've interviewed. I think if there's one thing I could tell myself from 10, 15 years ago is that the game recognizes game. And there was a lot of self-doubt. And that's actually one of my opening prompts for our convo here is that a lot of self-doubt that I had as an immigrant in the US, kind of finding my identity and like trying to fit in. And I know you talked about this in many interviews, was around like, am I enough? Right? And like, what part of me do I need to refine, work on, get better at so that I can be much more accepted? And I really, really thought it was money and like public accomplishments and, you know, things of that nature, like, you know, status and accomplishments. And what I've learned after 10, 15 years now, I'm 33, is actually, you know, like, the greats, the game, the people who you look up to, the people who inspire you, who you admire, they don't really care about those things. They don't really care about the bank numbers in your bank account, nor do they care about the number of followers you have. I think ultimately there's a sense of mutual recognition. They see a little bit of you in them, but them in you and vice versa. And more importantly, it's really about your ambitious proof of work. And that's what came out to me, like, came out, like, stood out for me, is that they know that it's really a matter matter of time and matter of volume of work and proof of work. And you're on the other side, on the other side, doesn't matter wherever you are. It's just really putting in those reps and sets. And for me, I wish I knew this so I could have really enjoyed my ride here to this place where I am in my career. But I feel like it's been a pattern, like, you know, interviewing Gary Vee and Alexis, all of these, like, insanely humble and they completely recognize, you know, this truth. That is, you're not any different. We're all doing the same. We're all, you know, trying to help people and add value. Okay, let's talk about this. You've touched on identity crisis. Give me a sense of like the younger version of Kei who was battling and wrestling with, am I enough?

Wow, that sweet young boy. So, I'll paint a picture because—

Give me a picture. Tell me about the walk you took from the coffee shop. Like literally walk us through what block, block around your home.

Yeah. So, we grew up in the East Village of New York City, Stuyvesant Town, 14th Street, if those of you are familiar, brick, you know, big apartment complex, like I think 60,000 people live in that complex. And, you know, New York— so I'm born in '79, so I'm almost 43. New York— people forget that New York in the '80s and New York in the '90s was very different than the New York that it is today. And I think one of the big things is it's just way less safe.

Hmm.

So way less gentrified, way less safe. And so, you know, I was, I was, I guess I was average height. I'm 5'10.5 now. So I guess that makes me average height. But I was a skinny, skinny freaking kid, like, So skinny that like, you know, you just like, you couldn't see my shoulder line. Like it was just like, I was like neck and torso sans shoulder.

I'm imagining a young KD right now.

Yeah, except that, yeah, except for the average height part. Right. But, um, but yeah, it's just like super, super skinny. Like I kind of like walk a little bit funny, like, like I'm bowlegged. So like my, my feet like kind of splay out to the side when I walk. So just like kind of awkward, kind of uncomfortable, kind of And then you got my parents. Like, I love my parents, incredible parents, the tiger parents. And so there's like, Dad, can I get a new, you know, what was the brand? Like a Ralph Lauren polo shirt, right? Like, is it on sale at Marshalls? Like, no, it's not. It's like $65 for a polo shirt? No way. Like—

Go back and finish your test prep, right?

Exactly, exactly. And so, you know, like, I just, I wanted to belong. And I think now that I'm older, I think that my parents wanted to belong too. Like, they came to New York in the early '70s. They didn't have any family or any friends, and they barely spoke English. So like, I think, like, I think we all want to belong, right?

Yeah.

We all want to belong. And I think everyone was having their journey of belonging. And for me, it was belonging socially, belonging in high school, belonging in junior high. But being like, like a physically awkward kid, and that physical awkwardness Translated into social awkwardness,

right?

And I didn't have these like cool, hip American parents that were like teaching me how to navigate the culture of like East Village New York City culture,

right?

Right. So I just kind of felt out of place. I just wanted to belong. And let's, let's cut to the chase. Like, I wanted to have a girlfriend. And that was not really in the cards for me in junior high and in high school. So, you know, There was like a lot of dis-ease in that version of Kei, right? Just like didn't really— like, you see me now, I'm like always smiling and energetic. And

so if I met you on the subway, would you be like— would you have been just shy?

Like, so shy. I would not like talk to strangers. Like, I would not strike up conversation. I would not pursue, like, ask a lot of questions. Just like keep to myself, right? I think like many of the traits that I have now is like very curious, like Yeah, charismatic.

That's been fantastic to hear about that is that you're insanely charismatic today and like, you know, with the surfing and all the things you just talked about. I mean, we all outside in feel about you feels almost unbelievable given that background, right? Given that childhood.

Well, I think that says a few things. One is like people can change. I'll tell you one thing that like I'm on camera Either doing interviews or presenting, like on average 90 minutes a day for multiple days a week. When I was in finance, I was like, I always got straight A's, like in my performance reviews. But one criticism always, you suck at public speaking.

Ah, that's the— oh my God.

I swear to God.

I swear to God. Oh my God.

They were scared to put me in front of clients. I still actually say—

That is the funniest. It's like saying David Perel sucks at writing. That's the funniest thing.

I still say like a lot. I still use um, but You know, I've gotten better at that, but that wasn't my thing. So I say that so that your listeners can be like, yo, you could change.

Yeah,

right. The narrative could not even— it's not even the narrative, it's the actual lived experience can change. Yeah. So, uh, was there a—

I can actually— let's double-click on that. Was there a point, like, do you remember inflection point in terms of somebody making a comment or some self-discovery element where you, you went from, you know what, I could be a much better public speaker. And I think I have that in me. And I know I'm set. Like, for me, it happened, and I'll tell you where, but I'm curious about like what set you on the path of improvement and where you are now.

I think that there's 2 things that come to mind. The first was, I remember very specifically, it's actually a theme of Rad Reads, is self-awareness. And so I didn't even, you know, using crutch words like like and um and so on, I didn't even know that I was doing that. And so, I would— when I would present in Wall Street, I would have one of my colleagues, I'd say, hey, can you just count how many times I said like when it's my turn to speak? And he'd just count them and then he'd tell me at the end. So, bringing that self-awareness, I would also practice speaking to like a recorded iPhone just to rewatch. It's so awkward when you're not used to public speaking. It's so awkward.

It is. I hate that, by the way. Yeah.

Yeah, I can't. And so, getting that, it's a little bit like exposure therapy.

What was your north star there? What was driving you to get better at public speaking? I just knew it was important.

I mean, it's that straightforward. I mean, I didn't like having a ding on my resume, right? Or in my— I wanted all straight A's. I didn't want like one B. Yeah, I wanted that. But I think also as you get older—

Your parents are smiling somewhere right now. They're like, so proud of my boy.

Exactly. And as I get older, you realize that it's such a superpower, just a professional superpower, that you're just at a disadvantage if you don't have it. So it was those 2 things. But honestly, KP, now with Rad Reads, Almost anything with Rad Reads, writing, tweeting, like just overnight, I got 4,000 new Twitter followers overnight.

Yeah.

And writing, tweeting, public speaking, it's just the reps. I've just been doing it for so long. It's just the reps.

There's no secret sauce. I mean, people have these very complex, you know, like sophisticated answers to it. I'm like, 90% of it is just reps, showing up, doing it for long, too long, right? Like, more along like the Kobe style, just like, yeah. And the 10% of it is like some tactics and techniques and like learning from others. Like that's really why part of my reason of this podcast is an excuse to kind of learn from other smart people. And it's the way, same way, like, you know, I'm sure you do a lot of like peer-to-peer learning. Like you ask other people some of the dumb questions you've been holding for a while. And then once that's taken care of, you're good to go. You can go back to the reps, right? Yep. So for me, what I wanna share, like another interesting anecdote, and the reason I asked you about like what drove you in public speaking was somebody like, told me, and this is like a shocking thing, like somebody told me, Kippy, you're gonna be— you're a terrific community person. You're gonna be a great community leader. And this is so funny because I am like similar to you. I had a background where I was very shy and English is my second language. I speak Telugu at home even now with my parents, you know, when we FaceTime. English is like a learned skill, like where I had to practice a lot. So I was like you, like a straight-A student, academically really bright. I always had like, you know, great like rankings and everything, but I never really wanted to be in the spotlight. I was so afraid of it. And I also had a lot of self-doubt around like, am I good enough physically? You know, all this, like similar traits. Like if I have a— I'll flash a picture maybe to the audience after this episode in the show notes. Like it's unbelievable. Like I can't believe, like I know why I didn't have a girlfriend then, right? 'Cause I was like, unbelievable.

I would not date myself. I'll find you one pic. We could put both of our pics.

We should do that. Like I can't, like I would not date myself. Like, so I, and so, you know, with all those, I guess, baggage and limiting beliefs, everything, as I got into adulthood or as I got into 20s, never thought myself— like, I wanted to be the invisible fly in the community. So when I would go to networking events, I would be like, like, leave me alone. But at the same time, I recognized the value of connecting and like knowing people and getting to know. But I, once 2018 or '19, I think I kept doing— out of nowhere, I started doing these monthly dinners/meetups for indie hackers in Atlanta. Okay. And because the main host ghosted on us, I became sort of the default host. And I just really enjoyed it. I enjoyed getting a pizza sponsor. I enjoyed giving an intro to everybody. I enjoyed like getting everybody to pitch or share what they're working on. And that's when the guy who said this, Drew Riley, you know, if you know him from Trends VC, he came to one of my meetups and he said, KP, you're going to do great. You're going to be an amazing community leader. And I was like, what is he talking about? Or is he— what is the community even? Right? But then like I learned to hone into it, kind of like you with public speaking. I realized the value of it. and then leaned in and went full all in, you know? So, there's so many times in life you're just one conversation away or one inflection point away.

And I think I'm glad you shared that story because it's a reminder to me and to our listeners too that if you see someone with a talent, they may not see it in themselves.

Yes.

So, just tell them.

Yes.

Just be like, you're an amazing X.

Right.

And that one comment can change the trajectory of their lives.

And you're

not even blowing smoke up their ass.

Yeah, I mean, also, like, I think being authentic is important there, right? Like, not just— to your point, not just complimenting for the heck of it. But I think, Kay, I wonder if you felt some— something similar, where I've noticed one of my favorite things to observe in high achievers is that, especially high achievers who are likable or charismatic, is that they compliment others way more than they receive compliments.

Yeah.

They sometimes go out of their way and actually come— I've received that so many times as one of my traits, which I— by the way, I don't even think about it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But I think there's a sense of maybe that's another, another secret sauce of being a community person is that you are not afraid to acknowledge and compliment someone's uniqueness. And I do this all the time. If I like your hat, I'll tell you. If I like your beard, I'll tell you. And I've said this to people at every level. I've said this to Eric Thornberg, founders. I've said this to billionaires. I've said this to someone who just joined Twitter Spaces, right? If I hear their voice, I'm like, oh my God, you have the podcast.

Yeah.

I think there's something about— there's a correlation between how much you compliment others through the day. I wonder, I don't know if I'm true or I mean this right or wrong, and how blissful you feel through the day.

Yeah.

There's a sense of like other-orientedness in genuinely complimenting, not bullshitting.

Yeah.

Genuinely complimenting. Yeah.

And I think humans— I think you're totally right. Humans crave these like micro acts of connection. And I think I'd take it a lens further. It's even rarer amongst men.

Yes.

Because you just said, like, I compliment someone on their nice beard. You didn't say, like, their nice shirt, whether they're a man or a woman.

Yeah.

Like, men are not used to— it's like the way men are not used to, like, touching each other, like hugging and so on. And so when you break that wall with a compliment or something nice, then it changes the whole dynamic. And we crave that, right? It's like, I think, like, you know, we may talk about it. It's like, well, one of the big observations that I've had about happiness or joy. Yeah, it's just, it's just an accumulation of little moments.

Wow.

Right. And you see that with, with one, especially when you become a father.

Yeah.

It's like, you know, the first couple, it's not like my kid's not, you know, hitting home runs, walk-off home runs at T-ball or winning medals and, you know, in dance contests. Like, no, it's just like, hey, Dad, today was the best day of my life, you know, or that, that was so funny. When you tripped, right?

Yeah.

And that's it. And it's just, you string, you string a bunch of those together for a lifetime. And that is like, that's— and so when these little micro acts of connection with others, with your kids, with your spouse, with you, with people on Twitter, like, that's life. That's

right.

That's the beauty of life. Not this like, oh, like, I got a retweet that I want. I got a tweet that went viral today, right? Like, oh, that makes me so happy,

right? It's almost the— to your point, like, it's always the little things and the ones that you don't expect. Because I think there's a sense of novelty, like the fact that you didn't expect that coming in. You were like, wow, I can't believe like KP complimented me on like something, right?

Yeah.

And if you keep going, if you go around doing this daily, you're not doing it out of pressure. I'm just doing it because I notice it. And also it makes you a better noticer of things too, which is helpful because I'm actually a I'm someone with a very poor, shitty memory. So unless I remember that you wore a pink hat on my podcast interview, like, Kay is forever recognized, like, stored in my database forever. Like this picture right here.

Pink hat.

As opposed to, like, if I remembered you from Brooklyn, was this whatever, right? So I think there's something about that too. So, okay, another— again, I love the riff nature of this conversation, and I know this is what you said that you wouldn't mind getting into. So I'm blaming you for the lack of structure here. One of my favorite things that I've seen you execute so well, and I'm low-key jealous, but in a positive way, is you're insanely consistent with the newsletter, with the writing game. And I know some part of it is reps and sets. It's just about showing up. Just break it down for us, for the audience, for the listeners.

Okay.

What does your writing routine look like on your ideal state? And tell me, what is your— what is the least acceptable floor? Like, what was your, like, okay, this is the bare minimum I'm gonna do and that's acceptable.

Got it. Okay. So let's give a— let's step back and look at the full picture. We are— we're hitting send on Rad Reads 335 on Saturday. 335. I think I started writing an essay around Rad Reads 100, a weekly essay.

Right.

So that's like 225 essays. Wow. I think, um, in the 225, there's probably been maybe— I took one summer off, one summer I alternated, and then maybe like 4 breaks per year. So there might have been— there's not that many breaks in that,

right?

So here's a little secret. You ask this question, people ask me this question often, you're expecting to hear that there's this like crazy editorial calendar and there's like a Zettelkasten in Rome that is hooked up to Zapier to a Notion Kanban calendar. And then there's a VA somewhere that's like line editing it. And, you know, to this day, you want to hear the writing process?

I don't know if I'm ready for it, but lay it on me.

To this day, on Monday, I start thinking, what am I going to write about this week? And then throughout the week, I'm just, I'm observing. And one of the things I really like to do in my writing is to write about what's trending in that week. Because I think that that just increases the likelihood that people will want to read it. Right.

What resonates, right? What resonates most.

So I'm kind of observing. I'll tell you, like, so this week I know that I have— we're promoting our course, so we're kind of in like the warm-up period. So I want to do something related to the course. And just the other day, an idea hit me. And the idea hit me is that there's 2 types of productivity. Fear-based productivity,

right?

Like hustle culture, there's never enough, gotta compete to beat others, more, more, more, bigger, faster, break things stuff. And then there's joy-based productivity, which is like zone of genius.

Right.

In your flow, you smile a lot. It's effortless. Wu Wei, if you're familiar with the Eastern philosophy, the Zen term. So, It kind of hit me and I was just sitting in my car as I thought about this. And so this is one of the—

Gonna be the theme, I guess, right?

This is the beauty of the newsletter is that it's basically where I experiment. So I'm gonna write this post and then on Monday, you know, 2 days, we'll let people read it over the weekend. We're gonna see if people think it's as interesting as I think it is. And it's probably not gonna be black and white.

But how would you assess it? Like what's the feedback loop for you?

So there's a few feedback loops. One would be just people replying. Yeah. So the first one will be like, you know, there's— you're a writer, like you have an idea in your head, it sounds great in your head. Once you write it, you're like, ah, that was kind of a shitty idea.

Yeah, that I was gonna say.

So that's the first step. Like once it comes out, there might be some lost in translation and you're like, oh, this wasn't as good. But let's assume it comes out good. Then there'll be a few things. Oh, I'll also tweet about it throughout the week. 'Cause I start, I incubate the idea on Twitter with like a tweet thread. So I kind of see the flow there. And then on Saturday morning, I'll write it. So I try to hit send by 9 Pacific so I can go surfing. And so I'll wake up at about 6. So I have about 3 hours.

3 hours to finish the draft. Wait, is the draft— did the draft already start maybe a day? Oh, wow.

I just took notes.

It's a cold start, right?

Okay. It's one sitting. That's why there's so many typos.

Dude, you're like dispelling so many myths. Like you're just like destroying so many books and productivity systems as you say.

Exactly. So then I sit down. I know the only one is that like I need— I actually, you would think that 335 weeks later, I don't need a deadline. No, I need the deadline.

The positive constraint.

I need the constraint. I can't start it on Monday. I've tried for so many. I've been doing this for 5— 2015. I've been doing this for 7 years. I still need the constraint.

I think you probably will be the most relatable guest on the pod. I feel like that's so many people though. There's so many people, they know they have to ship something on Saturday, but they can't start No, you can't.

No way. So I sit down and then I write it for 3 hours. I edit it. I have a hard stop because I gotta surf. Like, I'm not leaving an essay to dwindling, dawdling on an essay to avoid surfing. So I go and then the week goes by, we'll get like, people will reply and then I'll look at the click-through rate. So last week I did a massive piece on GTD and I actually, I thought it was like really good, but it was very nerdy inside baseball GTD stuff. So I'm like, yeah, it'll do average. It was like gangbusters. So like, people were relating to it. So I'm like, oh, okay. And you would think that like, I take note in my head. I'm like, I'm kind of like, it's like you noticing someone's beard is slightly different. I'm like, oh yeah, like the GTD thing, that was an outlier. Like, you know, whenever the expected result is different than the actual result, little light bulb goes off. Like, make a mental note, okay? Like, People like the GTD thing more, like recalibrate the algo,

right?

And then see the observations. And then, you know, then we might go back and if it's really good, we might like make a YouTube video out of it. We might incorporate it as a module into the course. We might use it as a launching pad for a free event. So we try to reuse the content like 3 or 4 times— Twitter, YouTube, event, Notion template, tweetstorm.

That's the name of the game, repurposing.

Yeah, so repurposing, that's pretty new though. Like I only figured that out like

I think, no, underrated, super underrated. I think, you know, it's kind of like what they say about sales follow-ups. Everybody thinks that it's the first sales email that's going to win the contract. It's actually the 8 follow-ups that happen after. Totally. Same way everybody thinks the net new content is winning.

Totally.

Is the thing that wins to kind of gain audience is actually the repurposing, you know? Totally. And we're seeing like Dickie Bush does a great job. Like Danny Miranda, this guy, I don't know if you know him, but he's been crushing it with repurposing.

Yeah. So good. So yeah, so that's— I wish there was a, like, some, like, crazy elaborate process, but it's like the processes, there's a constraint. And I think the thing that I really want to reiterate is that a lot of them are average.

Yeah.

A lot of them are average. And, but I use this, it's my lab, it's my way of showing up for my community. And the thing is that the community, then it's a part of their habit.

Yeah. Right?

Like reading an essay from Kay and it doesn't have to be the world's greatest essay.

Right.

It's just an essay from Kay. It's almost like a podcast in that regard.

Right.

Where there's like a scheduled connection between reader and creator.

Right.

Dude, you do that for 7 years, man. Fuck, man.

Yeah.

Some crazy shit will happen.

Yeah. And they'll like, they'll really get a hang of your worldview, you know, and they'll try to like chime in and add and expand that as they can, right? And so, I think that's another like A surprising discovery for me has been like in the last 2 years where I really like 10x'd my community outreach and my Twitter game is I didn't realize how big of a role they want to play in your content creation, right? And I now, I like, I don't even think of myself as a creator. I think of myself as a co-creator.

Yeah.

Right? Like the difference between a founder and a co-founder, I think as a content creator, I think I'm a content co-creator. The other part is the audience.

I love it.

And that's why it's important to do it in public. And, you know, my whole myth is building in public, learning in public, asking in public. And so it's been fascinating how much they want to chime in, you know. So let's do a jump cut into a whole different part of your life. I think you talked about parents and the fact that they were Cambodian immigrants, you know, who moved to the US without many friends and not much of a social life here. Reminds me of my early days in the US as an Indian immigrant, 21-year-old. It was really hard. And, you know, I think I finally, after 10 years, I feel like I'm slowly getting used to this.

You came to the US at 21?

Yes, for my master's.

Yeah, I was born here.

Yeah, and so I think I relate more to your parents, you know, than you perhaps. But I wanna know, what does it feel like to be a kid? 'Cause I wanna know what does it feel like to be Neil, my son, who's born to an Indian immigrant? And for you, like in terms of what were some aspirations you had as a kid? You know, like does the dreams change? Does the things you aspire for, like I know if we like pulled an average American kid to born to, and like maybe non-immigrant parents, ask them like, hey, what do you wanna become? They'll be like astronauts or, You know, YouTube creator, right? TikTok dancer, whatever. What were yours? And

yeah, yeah, that's a good— um, my daughter asked me this question the other day. So I was— I had a— I've always had a lot of hobbies and things. So if you ask me what are some of the things that I wanted to do, be when I grew up, I mean, one was definitely like a magician. I, I loved—

Every kid's dream, right?

I loved card tricks. That was one of them. I also know how to juggle.

When did you give up or are you still kind of pursuing?

No, I lost interest in card tricks. I still— I'm always down for a good juggle. I love juggling. And since I drink a lot of margaritas, like I'm always juggling limes.

Right.

There's always limes in my house, so I'm always juggling limes. So, juggling. I really, really, really wanted to be a professional skateboarder.

Interesting.

Yeah. Wow. I skateboarded a lot as a kid. I was decent as a skateboarder. Skateboarding, side note, is a very like 10,000 hours sport where it takes you like a year to learn one trick, like an ollie jump. And then another year to learn another trick, like a kickflip where the board flips horizontally, then another year to learn like something else. And so it really like lent itself to my personality of just, right, think about that.

Right.

A year to learn one trick.

One trick.

Like a 12-year-old.

Yeah.

Right. There's no instant gratification there. So those were— so I think I had the standard like scientist You know, physicist, scientist, chemist, STEM,

right?

Yeah. At some point, I'm trying to think other strange stuff. You know what though, KP? Part of it was I wanted to make money.

Yeah. So I think that's a great point. Actually, I think that's where I kind of got that point from one of the videos you made and you talked about how money was an aspiration growing up because that was a way to kind of feel belonged.

Yeah.

Fully, fully. I could not agree more. And again, I guess part of the reason why like, you know, immigrants move to America is to have a better life, one, you know, so many other things. But it's this, you know, feeling like this societal success can maybe replace the void that you feel. And I've had the same chase. And I know you shared this. So let's start to talk about how money was almost the—

yeah,

you know, the thing that— so for a long time, and then when you changed your way.

Yeah, well, I wanted to belong, right? And so I think that when you're trying— I think that society culture tells you, and it may or may not be wrong, I'd have to think about this more. But culture tells you that What— that there's a few ways that you can belong, and the key ones are status and a derivative of status, power, influence, right? And how do you usually— what's like the easiest way to get status, power, and influence? It's through money.

Money.

And so I, I've always been really good at like distilling things into playbooks. Like right now I'm distilling— like I know very little about SEO, but I just immersed myself in SEO conversations, and I think that I've distilled it into like a playbook that's going to work for our business. And so, I love immersing myself in all this, what seems like a very noisy thing, and distilling it into a playbook. And so, when I was a kid, I realized very quickly that if I wanted to get status, power, and influence, then the fastest way to do that was to get money.

Right.

And then, so then once I figured out that I wanted to make money, then it's like, okay, go to Yale, major in computer science, learn entrepreneurship. I'll tell you some crazy fun little facts about me. I was really good. Oh, I like role-playing games, like fantasy games and Final Fantasy and Warcraft and all that stuff. I was very good at Magic: The Gathering. And I sold my collection in 1998, I think, or '96. I had all the most valuable cards. And I sold the collection for, I think, $4,000.

Wow.

And I bought shares of the S&P 500 in 1996 with the $4,000. And I still haven't sold them. Whoa, that's 17-year-old Kay.

Wow.

Gifted 42.5-year-old Kay like $27,000 worth of stocks that I still haven't sold. I'll probably give them to my kids like right at this point. So like to go back to your question, I could see around the edges of like how the games, and I think that's what I really enjoy about entrepreneurship is that it's like I know how to play the game. I opt out of a lot of the games, like, so I choose not to play them. But I'm like, it actually makes sense how to get there, right? And so as a, so as a kid, it was like, okay, like, play the game. And like, dude, I loaded up on the game. I taught myself how to invest. I learned HTML in 1995. I was making, I was coding HTML websites, like local florists for $20 an hour. As a 16-year-old in 1995.

Wow.

That's like $40 an hour today.

Right.

Right. And so I was doing that and then I was investing the money in the S&P 500 and then learning, like taking SAT prep so I could get into like the best school and then reading books on C and C++ and ColdFusion and PHP to like broaden my like non-academic skill set. This was all as like a 16-year-old.

Right.

But it was very motivated by that one thing, right?

Yeah.

Money will lead to power, status, and influence.

Right.

So that

was like the video game you chose.

It was the game. And it was, maybe I'm gonna sound arrogant saying this, but it was so obvious to me.

Right.

And the game on Wall Street was actually once, you know, I went to Yale, majored, I actually was a very mediocre student at Yale, only because the competition was so

high.

And I went to Wall Street, I was like, you know, like a mediocre, I went and started a very like second-tier bank. But I'm like, I can only look around. I'm like, I see how this game is played. Gotta learn this kind of certain skills, one of which is public speaking. You gotta grow this kind of network, these kind of relationships. You gotta work this amount of hard. You need to be this organized. And then you need to be methodical about how you save and invest and like manage your money. And I was like, okay. And I did that. I did that for, for 15 years. And so this is probably where your original question got to, like somewhere, you know, I had a great career success in my—

And you quit the radio game, right? And that's the, that's the, that's where— I opted out of the

Right.

I'm gonna just switch up the cassette if you think about it. Yeah.

But I think the interesting thing that your reader, your listeners will want to hear is that like, what was the catalyst? Like, why did you give it up, right?

Right.

And I'll tell them a very simple example, quite recent. Ask anyone, ask it on Twitter, what was something you wanted so badly and you thought it would make you happy and you got it? How did you feel 1 year later about that?

Right.

And people will be like, making 6 figures, making 7 figures, making 8 figures, buying a home, paying down my loans, you know, buying a second home, traveling, whatever. Every single dream that you have will be answered by that one question.

Yeah.

And I can't say that I figured that out, but I was starting to get a sneaking suspicion That's where self-awareness

kicks in. You kind of could read what's going on.

I could kind of— I was like, okay, I got a great bonus, very lucky. I bought a studio apartment in my late 20s.

Right.

Cool. Doesn't— like, if you think, like, say there's like a line chart of happiness, like you think like you're cruising, let's say you're like at a 4 out of 10. You buy an apartment, you're like, I'm gonna be a 10, a 9. You buy the apartment, you spike to a 9, and then—

4 months later.

A quarter later, exactly, you mean revert.

You're back to the baseline.

0.1.

0.1, yep, exactly.

You're like slightly higher.

Yeah.

And then you're like, okay.

And you're feeling guilty too that you're not being 9. Sometimes I notice myself that I'm, man, like I'm not being that stoked about the life that I made for myself. Should I be more stoked? But I return to my baseline, you know? And I'm like, ugh.

Totally. And then it's like an addict's behavior.

Yeah.

Because if the apartment only brought you a 0.1, you're like, well, I need 2 apartments.

Yeah.

But the 2 apartments don't even bring you 0.2.

Yeah.

They bring you like 1.6.

Yes.

It's like logarithmic decay.

It's crazy. Yeah. And then, yeah, you're right. And then towards the end, you're like, okay, you have 18 cars and then you got like 4 homes and you got, I don't know, 7,000 sneakers.

You're like 4.42.

Yeah. You're still at 4. Sometimes you may like look at— I think the guilt compounds. That's what I'm saying. I think the guilt of feeling like maybe this is not the path compounds. Also the guilt of feeling like I should be more happy. Why am I not happy? The frustration of not going to 9. Because you've seen 9, so you know what 9 feels like. Why am I not returning to that every day?

And then, this is what you— I've seen this with very wealthy people. Then, every time you add like a new big thing, the complexity of your life increases. So then, you spend all this mind space managing this new complexity. Like people that have 2 homes, I'm like, I don't even have— I mean, I rent my house because I don't want the complexity of being a homeowner.

Right.

I want to call someone.

Property taxes, everything 2x, right? Like, can you imagine?

Broken, fix it yesterday. Boom. And so, I felt really— to go back to your question and all of those feelings, like I met my wife, we had our kid, I had an amazing group of friends and all that. But it turns out that that belonging was not— even having an amazing wife and kids, like, didn't make that feeling of wanting to feel seen Go away fully.

Right.

So, I think what I realized, there's this quote that I found on Twitter once that said, where all good quotes live.

Exactly.

Is that there's no external solutions to internal problems.

Exactly.

And so, anything, whatever word you want to use, happiness, contentment, joy, peace, serenity, it will not come from acquiring something.

Yeah.

something material. I think like this is what happened. People like, they achieve something material like Wall Street. So then it's like something else. It's like, I must make an impact. And like, even then you got to be careful.

Yeah.

Because you can't— whatever pain you hold, whatever sense of lack that you have, and we all have that. Right. That's part of being human. Whatever sense of lack that you have will not be healed by achieving something new.

Yeah.

And I think again, with my intuition on playbooks, I had an intuition that that playbook was was faulty.

Yeah,

and I did. I still don't know the answer to that playbook, but I know that like pursuing things, even when I made the decision to grow Rad Reads, I'm like, "Hey, you have certain things that you feel, certain insecurities, certain fears, certain things that you don't like about yourself." Just it's like my inner monologue. Just a reminder, you know that like hiring three people not going to fix those things.

Right? Already. So are you still—

yeah, are you still— you still want to do it, right? Do you still want to do it more for the intrinsic, like, joy or whatever that that brings? And so I am constantly having that conversation with myself.

So it feels like a red pill moment, you know, to me, what you went through. And of course, you shared about this in many interviews. Like, given that now you kind of taken up a new video game, right? Kind of like writing your own rules and kind of creating your own— like, solopreneur is kind of designing your own game, you know?

Yeah.

Even like designing your own levels of the game, like, right? So what does growth mean to you now? Like what lens do you view growth and growing and acquisitions? You know, like how do you view them now?

Yeah, I think about this all the time because I think it really exploded when we have a team of 5 other 6. So it really exploded once we added 5 other people. Because when you're a solopreneur, like you're still, the degrees of freedom are still limited, right? It's like, oh, I should do this. I want to do this. But there's like a very tight constraint on your time. But when there's 5 people on your team, you can have, they're like, oh, I want the marketing person to do this. And I want the product person to do this. And I want the ops person to do this. And, and, and there's a lot of that happening now. And I have to like ground myself. Like one of the phrases that I always come back to is genuine care.

Mm-hmm.

Like I want to only partake in activities where there's a genuine care. And I always say, like, you know, if, you know, we schedule this interview and let's say, you know, yesterday someone was like, hey, Kate, you won the lottery, you're a billionaire, right? I still want to do this interview, right? And I want to bring the same level of attentiveness and genuine care to this interview.

Hmm.

When I have a one-on-one with my direct report, I want to genuinely care about their well-being, their craft, the thing that we're working on together, not in the what is in it for me, but just because the concept of genuine care. Like, when I surf, like, I want to just know that I'm trying my best in that moment, right?

Mm-hmm.

And so, I've tried to find like what is an overarching theme of my life that can kind of bring everything together. And guess what? Like, if you genuinely care, you're probably going to be successful by you know, traditional definitions of success, right? You're probably gonna make good money. You're probably a good manager. You'll probably be a good employee, right?

Right.

So that's kind of like, that's one lens. The other though is it's peace, I guess. Like, am I at peace?

Yeah.

I'll say that I, you know, I go through waves, but like, I think because of 5 employees and like each one of them could be doing like 50 different things. So I'm like thinking about 250 things that like I have every point in time that hasn't brought me a lot of peace. Because I'm thinking about that. I'm thinking about SEO keyword research. Like, I had a dream about keyword research last night. That's fucked up. Oh, that's not peace, dude. So I'm kind of like, well, why do you care? Because like, I hand on my heart, I'm not doing it for the money,

right?

Like, I need to work, but like,

right,

we'll be fine. Like, right, 5 people, 3 people, 1 person, like, right, doesn't fucking matter, right? For what I want out of life.

Yeah.

So then like, why are you dreaming about keyword research? And I think it is because of that game, right? And I think that's when I need to remind myself, like, look, that is a game,

right?

And it's cool. Like, it's a cool puzzle. Like, keyword research is kind of like investing in stocks. Like,

right,

it's kind of a little bit of a black box, and you try some shit out and you, like, see if it works. And then, like, you make a little money if it works, and if it doesn't, you lose a little, you know? Like, but, like, that's not life, right?

Right.

Like, it doesn't mean I shouldn't do it, And there's this phenomenal quote from the Bhagavad Gita that goes, you have the right to your work.

Actions.

You have the right to your actions, but you don't have the right to the results of your actions.

Correct.

Right? I might be paraphrasing it, but—

No, I mean, no, you got it directionally right. Yeah.

So, I'm like, okay. And that's a beautiful, powerful message. And I keep thinking about like, and the consequences of your actions, that's your ego.

Yeah,

right. That's this— that's all the other stuff, the status, the validation, the Twitter likes, the followers. And like, and, and I keep trying to reground myself to be like, are you doing it? That's why like genuine care has been a helpful reminder. It's just like,

right,

like when you're writing the— I spent 40 minutes writing a tweet storm this morning. I'm like, yeah, are you doing this because you want more followers, or are you doing this because you actually are proud of the thing that you're gonna—

You want to share? Yeah.

It's a creative expression and if no one liked it, would you still feel good that you spent 40 minutes doing it?

Yeah. I think that's the metric, right? If no external metric, no positive external metric comes out of this, would I still do it? And if you can maximize those moments through your week, I think you won. And that's where, I mean, kind of similar to zone of genius but still zone of genius still has an implication that there is a consequence, there is an output you're measuring. I think the true freedom, okay, I feel to your point, the first red pill is the freedom from money, right? Like freedom from that game. Like everyone's playing the game. I grew up in the game. I love that game. I respect it now. But I think I know where it leads. The second game is a lot of people in tech, you know, around me in startups, they love to play this, which is the game of impact.

Yeah.

Which is still similar, definitely more, I think, has a higher moral ground in my view. Because, you know, like if you see Elon Musk, why he doesn't need money, me, right? But he's truly pushing the boundaries of what humans can do. Massive respect.

Yeah.

Still, that is still a game that is designed for this up-down, up-down baseline happiness thing. The only game I feel like— I mean, there's other things, all these other games, but I feel like the only game seems to me, and it's something that I wish I remember more actively through the week, is the game, the freedom from your mind, freedom from your mind telling you Here's what you should be doing. It's like what Naval talks about, right? Not freedom of mind, freedom from mind. And our mind is constantly telling us, here's what you should be doing. I'm sure your mind was telling you, okay, here's what you should be doing. Assign 500 tasks on a Trello board to these 4 or 5 employees. Make sure they're feeling productive. Make sure you're feeling—

Do your keyword research.

Yeah. Or put this tweetstorm out there. Same thing with me. And I think when you catch yourself not giving in to the grip, the tight grip of your mind's ego's wants and needs is when you get like tiny, precious little jewels of, you know, precious little pockets of peace.

Totally.

And I've gotten many of those through this interview. And

I

mean it, you know, and that's why I think, that's why I think I do this.

Yeah,

really, there's no ROI. Like, literally, like, this podcast has the shittiest ROI in my life. Like, right now, I'm sure you feel the same way about some of the work you do. Like, it's the— but there's a sense of intangible joy that I get, right? I know you mentioned joy. In one of your interviews, it doesn't feel like hustle; it feels like joy.

Yeah, yeah. And then take it a step further. I challenge all of your listeners to this.

Yeah.

What if ROI is actually the wrong thing?

Yeah. Right.

We've been.

What if JOY was the main thing?

Yeah. We've been conditioned to believe.

Right.

That if you're not maximizing ROI, you're fucking up.

Yeah.

What if that's? First of all, we could think of the absurdity of that claim.

Yeah.

Right. Like it. It's actually not that hard to dispel the absurdity. Yeah. But if you were to not see the absurdity of it, you're like, really? Like the ROI? I mean, I would say like, if you, if you're listening to this and you're like, no, ROI is the thing to maximize. I was like, okay, look around in your life and think, show, think of 5 important things where ROI don't mean shit.

Yeah.

Right. Yeah. And think about that. Now, do you still feel the same way about it? Yeah. And it's like, I think it's that red pill moment. It's kind of like opting— like, I've had it in many things, like growth. Like, what? I don't— why is growth important?

Right?

Right. Even like personal growth, like, and that's a controversial one for some people. But if your personal growth brings you agitation, if your personal growth is motivated by agitation, yeah, and then brings you agitation, you need to take a deeper look at your desire for personal growth.

If you're striving for personal growth is sabotaging your inner peace, you're playing the wrong game with the wrong controls, right? Exactly. And there's another thing too that I think about a lot of smart people, a lot of high achievers really struggle with this. And this is a question that I ask myself when I'm driving and I'm like, I have a spare moment to think is, okay, I keep asking like, KP, if you're so smart, why are you not happy right now? And I'm like, I like to think that I'm actually have gotten like personal growth-wise, I've gotten smarter and smarter and I understand the mechanics. The goals and all this. And then I pause and I have to like look at the red light sometimes. I'm like, you know what? If I'm so smart, then why am I not happy right now in this right moment? I don't care. The justification doesn't matter. I should be happy right now.

Or at least— Let's take it a step further. What is happiness?

Yeah.

Right. Is it pleasure?

No. Right.

Definitely not. Is it like smiling? No. Is it experiences? No. Is it impact? Maybe. Right. It's like, yeah, it's like that's an even— that's a more meta question, which I think about all the time. And I don't have the answer to it.

Yeah. It's hard to— I mean, to your point, it's a very strange emotion.

Yeah.

And the closest I've gotten to is when I do like 15, 20 minutes of meditation and close my eyes over 30 minutes sometimes, and then you feel that inner peace. That's the closest I've gotten to. Everything else feels like externally driven. Like something else happened, hence I'm happy.

Yeah.

Only thing I could see that was genuinely internally driven was I didn't do anything, sat there on a couch. Close my eyes, internally driven.

Yeah. And so, yeah, it's that— I mean, you and I have both like regrounded or anchored ourselves around that word peace, which I think is a very— and again, you could use agitation or calmness or serenity or contentment, right? Yeah. I think— I suspect— I don't want to go— I'm not a philosopher. Like, I don't want to go out and say like everyone wants peace. Like, no, that's not my job to decide that, and you shouldn't listen to me. But like, I think for me, Personally, especially with age, you just kind of like, especially when you like achieve things and you buy stuff and you're like, it's not it.

Yeah.

It's not it, dude. It's not it. What is? I don't know, but that's not it.

Right. I love that. I think that's a great note to wrap this up. It's Not It should be the title of this podcast. I'm just kidding. The Inner World of Kay, and then the headline is It's Not It. That's not it. I love it, man. I appreciate it so much. Thanks for coming by. And look, I mean, I know you've done tens of maybe even hundreds of interviews on GTD, on Notion, on, you know, 10x— sorry, 10K work. And so I wanted to kind of go into a different, slightly unbeaten, you know, non-traditional path with you and kind of get like this, the man behind K, right? Yes. The mind behind K. So

I appreciate you joining. Thank you for that,

right? That's the 10K work right there. I take it from some of your reactions to the questions that you actually— some of them were like truly novel to you and you were, you know, you had to pause and think. And I love— those are the kind of things I love.

Exactly.

Yeah. And when you make you pause and think, I'm like, shit, I didn't come prepared for that. Just like how I didn't come prepared to define what happiness was, man.

Come on. Yeah. There you go. You got your homework for tonight.

Right. I know. I got to go read that Bhagavad Gita again.

Exactly.

I appreciate it. This was fun. And let's keep in touch. All right?

Thank you, KP.

See ya.