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Episode 347 Derek Sivers – Creating a Life You Love, Useful Beliefs & Why Mastery is the Ultimate Status

01:11 Mastery is the Best Goal

Section Overview: In this section, Sean Delaney and Derek Sivers discuss the concept of mastery and how it relates to personal development.

The Quote on Mastery

• Sean Delaney quotes one of his favorite quotes from Derek Sivers about mastery: “Mastery is the best goal because the rich can’t buy it, the impatient can’t rush it, the privileged can’t inherit it, and nobody can steal it. You can only earn it through hard work. Mastery is the ultimate status.”
• The quote highlights that mastery cannot be bought or rushed, inherited or stolen. It can only be earned through hard work.
• Both Sean and Derek express their love for the quote and its meaning.

Gauging Your Work

• Sean asks Derek how he gauges his work and knows when he has created something remarkable.
• Derek compares it to listening to a song you love – there’s just something in your values or preferences that resonates with it.
• As a musician, he would create songs that he wished existed but didn’t yet. When he made those songs, he knew they were great because they were what he wanted to exist.
• For his book “How to Live“, he tried to put everything he had ever learned into one book. He edited 1300 pages down to 112 pages by compressing each sentence with a trash compactor.

04:47 Writing Process

Section Overview: In this section, Sean DeLaney and Derek Sivers discuss his writing process for “How to Live“.

Editing Process

• After creating a rough draft of 1300 pages, Derek spent two years editing it down to 112 pages.
• He replaced entire pages with a single sentence that represented everything he was trying to say on that page.
• Every sentence in the existing book represents what used to be a page.

Culmination of Everything Learned

• “How to Live” is the culmination of everything Derek has ever learned.
• It’s the densest book he’s ever written, and every word needs to be there.
• Derek is extremely happy with how the book turned out.

05:35 The Benefits of Mastery

Mastery Helps Filter Out Noise

• 05:39 Mastery helps to Slough off the noise.
• 05:48 When you get on that path to Mastery, all the other noise that comes at your eyeballs and ears through the media or even just chatter from Friends is just noise because you know what you want.
• 06:24 It really helps you filter the world and shut out the noise since you know what your big yes is then you know that everything else is a no.

Deep Happiness from Achieving What You Set Out To Do

• 06:32 The primary benefit of mastery is the deep happiness you get from making yourself proud by achieving what you set out to do.
• 06:56 Success is just achieving what you set out to do. To me, success is just achieving what you set out to do so that’s the main benefit of Mastery.

07:36 Pursuing Your Passion

Pursuing Music as a Passion

• 08:07 At 16 years old, he knew he wanted to be a successful musician.
• 08:33 He became very mono maniacal on music for 15 years from age 14 till 29.
• 10:45 Cal Newport has a brilliant book called “So Good They Can’t Ignore You” where he makes a wonderful point that passion is an emotion that comes later after getting good and rewarded at something.

11:34 Passion and Entrepreneurship

Section Overview: Derek discusses how passion can develop over time and how entrepreneurs can create their own utopia by starting a business.

Passion Develops Over Time

• 11:34 Steve Jobs was not initially passionate about computers but became passionate after seeing an opportunity to sell them.
• 12:13 If you’re not feeling passionate about something, pick something and start. The feeling of passion comes later.

Creating Your Own Utopia

• 12:50 Entrepreneurs can create their own universe by making a business. They create the laws and make it a little universe.
• 13:19 Negative motivation of witnessing something you dislike gives creative spark to go right that wrong in your company.

 

16:46 Useful but Not True Beliefs 

Section Overview: Derek talks about how useful beliefs can be more important than true beliefs. He gives examples of how believing in something that is not necessarily true can help us take action and achieve our goals.

Useful Beliefs

• 16:46 Derek deliberately chooses a belief like “men and women are exactly the same” and shares it with someone. Even if it’s not true, it’s useful because it counterbalances something else he thinks.
• 17:08 When starting a new venture, believing that it will be great and successful helps to give courage to take the first step.
• 17:33 If you believe that nobody at a social event will like you, you’ll sit in the corner and not talk to anyone. But if you believe that everyone there is fascinating and could be your future friend, you’ll go out and make friends.
• 17:58 It’s okay for beliefs to not be true as long as they are useful.

Discovering Your Beliefs

• 20:37 Discovering your own beliefs is a constant process of self-discovery. When you notice that a belief isn’t working for you, question it and see if you can change or counteract it.
• 21:25 The speaker caught himself saying that the city he lives in is bad for certain things. He realized this wasn’t true and was able to change his perspective on his city.

Overall, this section discusses how useful beliefs can be more important than true beliefs. By choosing to believe something that may not necessarily be true but is helpful in achieving our goals or changing our perspective, we can create positive outcomes for ourselves. Additionally, discovering our own limiting beliefs allows us to question them and change them to better serve us.

22:22 Foundational Beliefs

Section Overview: In this section, Derek talks about how having a foundational belief that everything will be great can be useful at times, but it’s also important to have a realistic perspective and prepare for potential challenges. Derek also discusses the harmful effects of subscribing to a single monist belief system.

Need for One Truth

• 23:18 Many people have an internal pull towards believing in one truth or correct way of doing things.
• This can lead to harmful effects such as delegating our thinking to someone else and following beliefs that may not work for us.
• It’s important to realize that all beliefs are just useful beliefs for now and we should feel free to expire them if they’re no longer working for us.

Harmful Effects of Monism

• 25:01 Subscribing to a single monist belief system can be harmful because it leads to tribalism and closed-mindedness.
• It’s important to choose our beliefs piecemeal from different sources instead of blindly following one doctrine.
• Getting out of tribalism and opening our minds can be emancipating.

27:46 Choosing Your Beliefs

Section Overview: In this section, Derek emphasizes the importance of choosing our beliefs based on what works for us rather than blindly following what others tell us. The harmful effects of isms such as racism and tribalism are also discussed.

Choosing Beliefs Piecemeal

• 28:19 We should choose our beliefs piecemeal from different sources based on what works for us now.
• Blindly following what others tell us can lead to harmful effects such as closed-mindedness and limiting ourselves.
• It’s important to get out of tribalism and stop all isms such as racism in order to open our minds and choose beliefs that work for us.

Harmful Effects of Isms

• 27:01 Isms such as racism and tribalism can be harmful because they limit our thinking and lead to closed-mindedness.
• It’s important to recognize where our beliefs come from and expire them if they’re working against us.
• Choosing beliefs based on what works for us rather than blindly following what others tell us can be emancipating.

29:09 Reflecting on Foundational Beliefs

Section Overview: In this section, Derek reflects on his foundational belief that he does not believe anyone or anything. He talks about how he doubts himself and his answers to questions.

Doubting Answers

• 29:47 Derek doubts himself first, suspecting that he might be saying something for reasons unknown to him.
• 30:12 He starts from a place of doubt when reflecting and learning.
• 30:32 Derek asks himself questions every day and dives into the answers while doubting them.

 

33:12 Sticking to Habits

Section Overview: In this section, the conversation shifts towards habits. Sean asks Derek if he followed any specific framework when creating habits that have stuck for years.

Creating Habits

• 33:32 Derek cannot remember following any specific framework described in Atomic Habits by James Clear.
• Instead, he reflects on how pain or inner compulsion can drive habit change.
• Sean brings up breaking down habits into simple steps and rewarding oneself as a common framework but notes that he can’t remember ever creating lasting habit changes doing this. 

34:20 The Importance of Values and Beliefs

Section Overview: In this section, Derek talks about the importance of values and beliefs in shaping our habits. He shares his personal experience of answering every email he receives and how it is driven by his deeply held belief that people deserve to be respected and honored.

The Power of Internalized Values

• 34:29 Our values are often internalized, making them difficult to identify.
• 34:49 Answering every email is a habit for Derek because it aligns with his value that people deserve to be respected and honored.
• 35:12 Meeting new people from different parts of the world through emails reinforces the speaker’s belief that answering every email is a good thing to do.

Supporting Reasons for Our Beliefs

• 36:37 Having multiple supporting reasons for our beliefs makes them more powerful.
• 36:57 Derek has many reasons why answering every email is important, including building long-term connections and having a network of support.

38:45 Keeping Track of Ideas from Books

• 39:08 Derek keeps a list of every non-fiction book he has read since 2007 on his website.
• 39:25 He underlines and highlights his favorite ideas from each book and puts them into a text file for future reference.
• 39:42 Derek’s list of favorite ideas is available for free on his website https://sive.rs/book

39:51 The Power of Rituals and Overcoming Fears

Section Overview: In this section, Derek Sivers talks about the power of rituals and how they can help us internalize our beliefs. He also shares his approach to overcoming fears by facing them head-on.

The Book that Shaped His Beliefs

• Derek re-read “Awaken the Giant Within” by Tony Robbins, which he read at 19 years old.
• He realized that many of his beliefs came from this book and had internalized them over time.

Rituals vs Habits

• Derek explains that a ritual implies regularity, while a habit does not necessarily have a set schedule.
• He shares his morning ritual of making breakfast with baby spinach, black beans, and cheddar cheese, as well as brewing a cup of black tea.
• Derek compares taking book notes to flushing the toilet – it’s something he always does after finishing a book to prevent having to read it again.

Facing Fears

• Derek shares his rule of thumb: “Whatever scares you, go do it.”
• He explains that every time we face our fears, we realize it wasn’t so bad and come away not scared anymore.
• Derek turned this rule into a lullaby for his son when he was three years old.
• He still follows this rule today and steers towards things that scare him or feel intimidating or unknown.

45:49 Taking Action and Internal Awareness

• 45:49 Derek says he takes action immediately when he notices something is scaring him. This has developed his ability to overcome his fears and get comfortable with the uncomfortable. 
• 46:13 Many people use fear to stay safe by rationalizing or justifying it.
• 49:40 Choosing a belief is as simple as deciding to believe it and stacking up reasons why you need to believe it.

Internal Awareness

• 46:38 Derek has deep internal awareness in the present moment, which allows them to expand the time between stimulus and response.
• 47:01 Derek can process his motions and feelings internally through the moment because he’s willing to explore them as opposed to turning away from his emotions.
• 48:58 Journaling has helped develop Sean and Derek’s skill of questioning their beliefs and stepping outside of what society or their parents have told them.

47:51 Journaling and Remembering Conversational Threads

Section Overview: In this section, Derek discusses how podcasting has helped Tim Ferriss develop a skill for remembering conversational threads. They also talk about how journaling has helped them develop similar skills.

Remembering Conversational Threads

• 47:51 Tim Ferriss developed a skill for remembering conversational threads through podcasting.
• 48:10 Journaling has helped Derek and Sean develop a similar skill for questioning their beliefs and processing their thoughts.

51:23 Pursuit of Emotions

Practicing Feeling Emotions Intentionally

• Most actions are a pursuit of emotions.
• Practice feeling emotions intentionally instead of using actions to create them.
• Ask yourself why you want to take action or own a thing and what emotion you think it will bring.
• Keep pushing yourself for more answers until you find the best solution.

Example: Feeling Claustrophobic in Singapore

• Derek felt claustrophobic in Singapore due to urban claustrophobia.
• To feel better, he would vividly imagine himself in a field of tall grass blowing in the wind.
• This helped him make life decisions, such as moving to New Zealand where there is lots of tall grass blowing in the wind.
• You can put yourself directly into feeling the emotion you want by vividly imagining it.

56:39 Visualization Practice + Mastery

• Visualization practice involves tapping into a total sensory experience.
• It is a strategy that elite performers use to achieve their goals.
• The practice can be used to go straight for the feeling of importance without having to go through the steps of achieving success.

Conscious Development of Skills

• Derek Sivers has developed a deep self-awareness journaling practice over time.
• He asks himself good questions and goes 10 layers deeper by asking harder questions and going towards his fears in the moment.
• Derek consciously develops skills by visualizing if he needs to.

Long-Term Thinking

• Derek wanted more friends, so he decided to think long-term about where he would likely be in the future.
• He had always wanted to live in India, so he started going there more often and meeting interesting people face-to-face.
• Consciously developing friendships requires action rather than just laying down and closing your eyes.

Path to Mastery

• Facing fears and challenging beliefs is only necessary on the path to mastery.
• Cultivating skills every year is hard work but necessary for growth.
• Sharing experiences publicly helps others learn how to do similar things.

01:01:45 The Most Meaningful Person to Spend Time With

• 01:01:45 Derek Sivers reveals that if he could interview any person in the world dead or alive the person he would most like to interview is his 11-year-old son.
• 01:02:11 He explains that spending time with his son is the most meaningful, rewarding, and future-focused experience for him.
• 01:02:27 Derek mentions that having a son has changed him as a person.

01:02:34 Contacting Derek Sivers

• https://sivers.org/