The Tim Ferriss Show

Howard Marks (@howardmarksbook) is co-chairman and co-founder of Oaktree Capital Management, a leading investment firm with more than $120 billion in assets. He is the author of the new book Mastering the Market Cycle: Getting the Odds on Your Side, and his previous book on investing, The Most Important Thing: Uncommon Sense for the Thoughtful Investor, was a critically acclaimed bestseller. Warren Buffett has written of Howard Marks: "When I see memos from Howard Marks in my mail, they're the first thing I open and read. I always learn something." Marks holds a B.S.Ec. degree from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania with a major in finance and an M.B.A. in accounting and marketing from the University of Chicago.In this conversation, we discuss:How his firm was poised to capitalize on the bubble in 2008 and put massive amounts of capital to work.His thoughts on understanding market cycles for making better decisions.The three stages of a bull market.Newsletters he reads.Thoughts on Bitcoin an

Hamilton Morris (TW: @hamiltonmorris, IG: @hamiltonmorris) is a writer, documentarian, and scientific researcher who currently studies the chemistry and pharmacology of tryptamines at the University of the Sciences in Philadelphia.His writing has been featured in Harper’s Magazine, Playboy, and Vice, and he is the creator of the television series Hamilton’s Pharmacopeia, which recently completed its second season, and it is absolutely one of my favorite series of the last five years.Hamilton is exceptionally good at explaining complex subjects simply and making science sexy, as you’ll discover in this episode.Enjoy!This episode is brought to you by Inktel. Ever since I wrote The 4-Hour Workweek, I’ve been frequently asked about how I choose to delegate tasks. At the root of many of my decisions is a simple question: “How can I invest money to improve my quality of life?” Or “how can I spend moderate money to save significant time?”Inktel is one of those i

Scott Belsky (@scottbelsky) is an entrepreneur, author, investor, Chief Product Officer of Adobe, and venture partner with venture capital firm Benchmark. Scott co-founded Behance in 2006 and served as CEO until Adobe acquired the company in 2012. Millions of people use Behance to display their portfolios, as well as track and find top talent across the creative industries.Scott is an early investor and advisor in Pinterest, Uber, and Periscope among many other fast-growing startups, and his new book, The Messy Middle: Finding Your Way Through the Hardest and Most Crucial Part of Any Bold Venture, hits the shelves October 2nd.I urge you to check it out, but until then, please enjoy this interview in the meantime!This podcast is brought to you by FreshBooks. FreshBooks is the #1 cloud bookkeeping software, which is used by a ton of the start-ups I advise and many of the contractors I work with. It is the easiest way to send invoices, get paid, track your time, and track your clients.FreshBooks t

Doris Kearns Goodwin (@DorisKGoodwin) is a biographer, historian, and political commentator who found her curiosity about leadership sparked more than half century ago as a professor at Harvard. Her experiences working for LBJ in the White House and later assisting him on his memoirs led to her first book, Lyndon Johnson and the American Dream. She followed up with the Pulitzer Prize-winning No Ordinary Time: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt: The Home Front in World War II. She earned the Lincoln Prize for the runaway bestseller Team of Rivals, the basis for Steven Spielberg's award-winning film Lincoln, and the Carnegie Medal for The Bully Pulpit, the chronicle of the friendship between Theodore Roosevelt and William Howard Taft.Her newest book, Leadership: In Turbulent Times, examines how the four presidents she's studied most closely — Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, FDR, and LBJ — found their footing. It goes all the way back to when they first entered public life and takes a look at the daily habits, tricks,

"Write an interesting story, not a perfect story." — Drew HoustonDrew Houston (@DrewHouston) is co-founder and CEO of Dropbox. Since founding the company in 2007 with Arash Ferdowsi, Drew has led the company's growth from a simple idea to a service used by 500 million people around the world.Drew received his bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from MIT in 2006. After graduating, he turned his frustration with carrying USB drives and emailing files to himself into a demo for what became Dropbox. Today Dropbox is one of the world's leading business collaboration platforms, with 11 million paying subscribers and 1,800 employees across 12 global offices.Enjoy!This podcast is brought to you by 99designs, the global creative platform that makes it easy for designers and clients to work together to create designs they love. Its creative process has become the go-to solution for businesses, agencies, and individuals, and I have used it for years to help with display advertising and illus

Serial entrepreneur, world-class investor, eagle scout, and all around wild and crazy guy Kevin Rose (@KevinRose), rejoins me for another episode of The Random Show. We discuss Kevin’s new diet obsession that may just save his life for many decades to come, fatherhood, minimalism, lifetime learning, ways to dial back alcohol consumption, lessons learned from Tony Robbins, most recommended books, and much more.Enjoy!This episode is brought to you by LinkedIn and its job recruitment platform, which offers a smarter system for the hiring process. If you’ve ever hired anyone (or attempted to), you know finding the right people can be difficult. If you don’t have a direct referral from someone you trust, you’re left to use job boards that don’t offer any real-world networking approach.LinkedIn, as the world’s largest professional network — used by more than 70 percent of the US workforce — has a built-in ecosystem that allows you to not only search for employees, but also interact with them, their connec

Coach George Raveling (@GeorgeRaveling) is an 80-year-old living legend and Nike's former Director of International Basketball. Coach Raveling was the first African American head basketball coach in the PAC-8 (now PAC-12), and he is often referred to as the "Human Google."Coach Raveling has held head coaching jobs at Washington State, The University of Iowa, and USC. Following a prolific basketball coaching career, he joined Nike at the request of Phil Knight, where he played an integral role in signing a reluctant Michael Jordan. He's also been inducted in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame as well as the National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame.In this episode we cover a lot of things including how he came to possess the original copy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech, how his practice team ended up beating the 1984 US Olympic Dream Team in basketball, and much, much more! I hope you'll emerge from this conversation walking on air as I did!Enjoy!This podcast is broug

Ann Miura-Ko (@annimaniac) has been called "the most powerful woman in startups" by Forbes and is a lecturer in entrepreneurship at Stanford. The child of a rocket scientist at NASA, Ann is a Palo Alto native and has been steeped in technology startups from when she was a teenager. Prior to co-founding Floodgate, she worked at Charles River Ventures and McKinsey and Company. Some of Ann's investments include Lyft, Ayasdi, Xamarin, Refinery29, JoyRun, TaskRabbit, and Modcloth.Given the success of her investments she was on the 2017 Midas List of top 100 venture capitalists. Ann is known for her debate skills (she placed first in the National Tournament of Champions and second in the State of California in high school) and was part of a five-person team at Yale that competed in the Robocup Competition in Paris, France. She has a BSEE from Yale and a PhD from Stanford in math modeling of computer security. She lives with her husband, three kids, and one spoiled dog. Her interests are piano, robots, and gastronom

This episode is a rare exception to the rule — unlike my usual long-form interviews, this is a drunk-dialing Q&A with you guys, which I’ve done a few times in the last few years, including for the celebration of the 100th episode of this podcast. In preparation for this episode, I solicited phone numbers from listeners who wanted to receive a call from me, and then I started drinking and dialing, answering questions and getting a little frisky along the way.This time, I came in hot, starting after a few preliminary drinks with friends on a weekend — so it's double trouble.I ended up covering topics including:How to reassess existing projects, specifically ones which you've put a lot of capital and time into, using 80/20 analysis and other tools.How to learn to care less about what people think, social perception, and how to minimize herd mentality.A framework for thinking about entrepreneurship, risk-taking, and how to cut your teeth as a business builder or creator.How to learn to ask better qu

Jason Fried (@jasonfried) is the co-founder and CEO at Basecamp, and the co-author of Rework, Remote: Office Not Required, and Getting Real: The Smarter, Faster, Easier Way to Build a Successful Web Application. The upcoming It Doesn't Have to Be Crazy at Work will be out later this year.Jason writes a regular column for Inc. magazine and is a frequent contributor to Basecamp's popular blog Signal v. Noise, which offers "strong opinions and shared thoughts on design, business, and tech."Enjoy!This podcast is brought to you by Peloton, which has become a staple of my daily routine. I picked up this bike after seeing the success of my friend Kevin Rose, and I've been enjoying it more than I ever imagined. Peloton is an indoor cycling bike that brings live studio classes right to your home. No worrying about fitting classes into your busy schedule or making it to a studio with a crazy commute.New classes are added every day, and this includes options led by elite NYC instructors in your own living room. You can

This episode of The Tim Ferriss Show showcases two chapters from Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown (@GregoryMcKeown), one of my favorite books of the past few years.The first chapter explains how to say "no" gracefully (and why most of us have trouble doing this in the first place), and the second one gives us ways to cut our losses and uncommit in the aftermath of a premature "yes."This should help you shorten your to-do list and lengthen your not-to-do list.Enjoy!This podcast is brought to you by Four Sigmatic. While I often praise this company's lion's mane mushroom coffee for a minimal caffeine wakeup call that lasts, I asked the founders if they could help me—someone who's struggled with insomnia for decades—sleep. Their answer: Reishi Mushroom Elixir. They made a special batch for me and my listeners that comes without sweetener; you can try it at bedtime with a little honey or nut milk, or you can just add hot water to your single-serving packet and embrace its bitterness li

Aisha Tyler (@aishatyler on Twitter, Instagram, and Vimeo) is an award-winning director, actor, comedian, bestselling author, podcaster, and activist. She’s amazing. If you enjoyed my episodes with Brandon Stanton, Debbie Millman, or Adam Robinson, among others, you will love this one.Whether you do any type of creative work, want to be too complex to categorize, or want to overcome rejection and beat the odds, this one has something for you.Aisha voices superspy Lana Kane on F/X's Emmy award-winning animated comedy series Archer, which won four back-to-back Television Critics' Choice Awards. She is a regular on the hit CBS show Criminal Minds, now in its 13th season, for which she has also directed. Aisha continues to host the CW's hit improv show, Whose Line Is It Anyway, and she is launching a line of bottled cocktails she created, Courage + Stone, in Summer of 2018.Aisha was a co-host for seven seasons of CBS's Emmy-winning daytime show The Talk, which she departed in September 2017 to focus more on

"In order to scale, you have to do things that don't scale." — Reid HoffmanThis episode is a showcase from Masters of Scale, one of the few podcasts I recommend repeatedly to entrepreneurs. It's a conversation between LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman (@reidhoffman) and Airbnb co-founder Brian Chesky (@bchesky), and it focuses on how you can scale your company by, paradoxically, doing things that don't scale.This is, in some ways, part two of my conversation with Airbnb's co-founder Joe Gebbia (which you can check out here). I also highly recommend subscribing to Masters of Scale, which just began its third season and features interviews with the founders of Spotify, Instagram, TaskRabbit, Shake Shack, and Glossier, among many others.And if you're looking for a companion piece to read with this episode, I can recommend none better than 1,000 True Fans by Kevin Kelly (@kevin2kelly).Please enjoy this short conversation between Reid Hoffman and Brian Chesky, with a few cameo appearances in the mix.This

This particular episode of The Tim Ferriss Radio Hour explores success, a slippery and dangerous term if ever there was one. The particular guests selected for this episode represent not only achievement, but also appreciation and a well-rounded version of what I consider to be a successful human being.This episode features:CDBaby founder Derek Sivers on the importance of challenging your own definitions of success.Performance coach Tony Robbins on best lessons learned from working with legendary investors.Venture capitalist Chris Sacca on missed opportunities and the commonalities of successful people.Legendary investor Ray Dalio on the three things that make up a successful life.Virgin Group founder Sir Richard Branson on the best thing his parents taught him.I hope you enjoy this episode of The Tim Ferriss Radio Hour!This podcast is brought to you by 99designs, the world's largest marketplace of graphic designers. I have used them for years to create some amazing designs. When your business needs a logo, w

I’ve interviewed legendary storyteller Cal Fussman (@calfussman) on this show before (here and here), but this time, the roles are reversed, and he interviews me!If you are not yet familiar with him, Cal is a New York Times bestselling author and a writer-at-large for Esquire magazine, where he is best known for being a primary writer of the “What I Learned” feature. And this interview originally aired on Cal’s podcast, “Big Questions with Cal Fussman.”Cal has transformed oral history into an art form, conducting probing interviews with the icons who’ve shaped the last 50 years of world history: Mikhail Gorbachev, Jimmy Carter, Ted Kennedy, Jeff Bezos, Richard Branson, Jack Welch, Robert DeNiro, Clint Eastwood, Bruce Springsteen, Dr. Dre, Quincy Jones, Woody Allen, Barbara Walters, Pelé, Yao Ming, Serena Williams, John Wooden, Muhammad Ali, and countless others.Enjoy!This podcast is brought to you by Four Sigmatic. While I often praise this company’s lion’s ma

In this podcast, I had the rare opportunity to interview three men in Level 4 maximum security at Kern Valley State Prison. There was no time to do homework on any of them, so I crossed my fingers and jumped in. It was incredibly nerve-wracking and, ultimately, incredibly rewarding and fun. Any expectations I might have had going in were exceeded.I owe special thanks to Cat Hoke, all the men who participate in Defy (the program Cat started), and all the staff and officers at Kern, including Chief Deputy Warden Goss who made it possible for me to bring recording equipment. Thank you for the help, sir!If you're interested in a similar prison visit after listening to this episode, Cat now has five more trips lined up. Simply email admin@cathoke.com for more details. If this episode moves you in any way, make sure to check out Defy and other groups doing this work and making an impact, like the Anti-Recidivism Coalition (ARC).Enjoy!This podcast is brought to you by Helix Sleep. I recently moved into a new home an

Welcome to another episode of The Tim Ferriss Show, where I share the habits, tools and patterns of world-class performers. This special short episode features insights from Adam Robinson (@IAmAdamRobinson). His answers to my questions were highlighted in my most recent book, Tribe of Mentors.For those of you not familiar with Adam, he has made a lifelong study of outflanking and outsmarting the competition. He is a rated chess master who was awarded a Life Title by the United States Chess Federation. As a teenager, he was personally mentored by Bobby Fischer in the 18 months leading up to his winning the world championship.Then, in his first career, he developed a revolutionary approach to taking standardized tests as one of the two original co-founders of The Princeton Review. His paradigm-breaking — or “category killing,” as they say in publishing — test-prep book, The SAT: Cracking the System, is the only test-prep book ever to have become a New York Times bestseller. After selling his interest in The Pri

Brandon Stanton (@humansofny) is the photographer behind Humans of New York. He attended the University of Georgia and worked as a bond trader in Chicago before moving to New York to pursue photography. Followed by over 25 million people on social media, Humans of New York features daily glimpses into the lives of strangers on the streets of New York City. It has been turned into two #1 New York Times bestselling books: Humans of New York and Humans of New York: Stories. In recent years, Brandon has expanded the blog to include stories from over thirty different countries, and was invited in 2015 to interview Barack Obama in the oval office. In 2017, Humans of New York was turned into a television series that is now available on Facebook Watch.Enjoy!This podcast is brought to you by WordPress, my go-to platform for 24/7-supported, zero downtime blogging, writing online, creating websites — everything! I love it to bits, and the lead developer, Matt Mullenweg, has appeared on this

Liz Lambert (@thelizlambert) first purchased a seedy motel on South Congress Avenue 23 years ago, and she transformed it into Hotel San José, which has become known today as the quintessential "Austin" hotel. The success of Hotel San José, which sparked a revitalization in the city's now thriving South Congress district, led her to launch Bunkhouse Group, a hospitality company founded on the pillars of design, music, and community-driven experiences.In the course of chronicling her experiences with the residents of Hotel San José on video camera, she ended up making the Last Days of the San José, a documentary that casts a fascinating light on human relationships in gentrification and urban renewal. You can check out the trailer here, click here to be notified when streaming becomes available, or get a copy of the DVD here.Enjoy!This podcast is brought to you by Soothe.com, the world's largest on-demand massage service. Because I've been broken so many times, I have body work done at least twice a week, and I

“A good person dyes events with his own color…and turns whatever happens to his own benefit.” - SenecaFrom the outside looking in, the last several weeks have been disaster after disaster for me:Death in the familySeveral deals that have been worked on for 6+ months fell apart at the last minuteI might need to sue someone for egregious breach of contract and unexpected damagesOn and on and on...I've thought of several books over and over again during this period to cope. One of them was The Obstacle Is the Way: The Timeless Art of Turning Trials into Triumph by Ryan Holiday (@ryanholiday). It has helped me to turn problems upside-down, look at them through a different lens, and even uncover unique opportunities.The Obstacle Is The Way is a collection of stories and principles about Stoicism, which I consider to be the ultimate personal "operating system" for anyone who wants to thrive in high-stress environments and situations.If you want to be antifragile like Thomas Jefferson, Marcus Aurelius, Bill Belichic