December 1, 2020 • 39 mins
After graduating from UNC-Chapel Hill in the late 90s, Ravi Patel was an investment banker before a chance opportunity to do stand-up in Los Angeles left him fielding calls from agents. He went on to act in over 70 national commercials and land roles in films and TV, most notably Scrubs, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, and Master of None, before co-writing, directing, and starring in Meet the Patels, alongside his sister, Geeta.
In 2013 he helped to co-found This Saves Lives, a snack bar company whose mission is to end childhood malnutrition worldwide with fellow actors Kristen Bell, Todd Grinnell, and Ryan Devlin.
And most recently, his four-part original series, The Pursuit of Happiness, premiered on HBO Max.
Ravi joins us to talk about how his penchant for mischief has helped him succeed, why he had to travel around the world to discover values that Americans hold dear, and how creating safe spaces can help overcome our most deep-seated differences.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Art of the Hustle is a production of I Heart Radio.
You're listening to the Art of the Hustle, the show
that breaks down how some of the world's most fascinating
people have hustled and learned their way into achieving great things.
I'm your host Jeff Rosenthal, co founder of Summit, and
(00:23):
today on the show, I had the pleasure of chatting
with Robbie Patel. Robbie is a actor, slash model, slash producer,
slash entrepreneur. All these things are true, except the model part.
After graduating from u n C. Chapel Hill in the
late nineties, Robbie was an investment banker before a chance
opportunity to host a stand up show in Los Angeles
left him fielding calls from agents and managers. He went
(00:45):
on to act and over seventy national commercials and land
roles and films and television, most notably Scrubs, It's Always
Sunny in Philadelphia and Master of None, before co writing, directing,
and starring and Meet the patel Is. Alongside his sister
Get That and Tony thirteen, he helped co found This
Bar Saves Lives, a snap company whose mission is too
in childhood malnutrition worldwide with fellow actors Kristen Bell, Todd Grinnelle,
(01:09):
and Ryan Delvin, and most recently, his four part original
series The Pursuit of Happiness, premiered on HBO. Max Robbie
joins us to talk about how his penchant for mischief
has helped him succeed where he had to travel all
around the world to rediscover the values that Americans hold dear,
and how creating safe spaces can help overcome our most
deep seated differences. So please enjoy my conversation with Robbie Patel. Robbie,
(01:35):
thank you for being on the podcast. Good to chat
with you, buddy. What a time to be alive. Yep,
I believe the first time we came across one another
was maybe around a decade ago when you started this
bar Saves Lives. Yeah, I think our buddies Sundepa Hoojia
(01:56):
first connected us is my guest, another act your slash model,
slash VC slash founder. He is good looking um and
also just an incredible connector. Wow. It's it's probably been
like nine or ten years ago now when I lived
in Venice. One of the reason I mentioned that it's
just like you have such an interesting background, you know.
I I've been enjoying you in films for a very
(02:19):
long time. Um, you know, from from Meet the Patels,
which you made of course and Master of None, to
the stuff that you've been doing recently like Come as
You Are and Long Shot, um and of course your
new show proceed of Happiness on HBO. What always fascinated
me is like you had a poker magazine and you
founded this bar Saves Lives, and I'm sure you had
(02:40):
a bunch of other careers that I don't know about,
but like you know, this is you know, the art
of the hustle. Tell us, give us, give us some background. Yeah,
I mean, I think I'm probably much like all your
listeners and a lot of the people that you bring
together at summit, which is just a real passion for
ideas and finding new ways to connect. One of the
(03:04):
most calming pieces of wisdom I ever read was that
it was about the entrepreneur mindset, and our personality is
such that we have to have ideas and that's just
a part of our day. And I used to actually
carry shame about needing to wake up in the middle
(03:25):
of the night with I haven't I've always slept with
a notepad next to me since I was a little kid,
because I'd have all these ideas and I'd have to
write them down, whether it's like some weird idea for
a company, or a weird idea for a joke, uh,
just anything at all. I needed to write it down.
And I realized now in adulthood that that's part of
(03:45):
who I am, and people like us just need an
outlet to have those ideas, even if we don't act
on them. But what happens eventually is some of those
ideas you keep thinking about, you keep in thinking about,
and you eventually act on them. Know my career, I
I've never had a particularly mindful approach to my career,
(04:06):
increasingly so now in adulthood, now that I'm a father
and I have to be really intentional and thoughtful about
how I spent my time. But you know, like most people,
I grew up, you know, as kids were completely in
flow state of just doing whatever the hell we want,
and and we're doing it whenever we want. I grew
up just wanting to have fun. That's all I cared about.
(04:29):
I wasn't a good student, I didn't care for school.
It wasn't something that was tangible to me, you know,
like like any Indian, I could study the night before
and get like a B. Plus, I was basically like
a Ferris Bueller in high school, so I cheated on everything.
I had a copy of every exam. I look back
on that now and I realized that was my training.
(04:49):
Like I had such a passion for figuring out creative
approaches to problems. The problem then being getting by without
having to do the work. You know, I had a
copy of every exam. I was I like really reveled
in figuring out fun scams where I would get everyone involved.
(05:11):
And I had early dismissal passes in the back of
my car. And our school was like this giant public
school that was gated, and I was friends with all
the security guards and they were on the take anytime
I wanted to come and go, and I parked wherever
I wanted to. You know, it was such a fun
time and it's it's interesting because if I had to
(05:32):
reflect on it at that time, I would have thought
that I was just delaying growing up. But now I
look at that as you know, really my training for
what I do now, except I use it for more
kind of positive purposes, I guess, and so I was
just kind of going with emotions. I went to Chapel Hill,
a group in Charlotte, and then went to Chapel Hill
just because all my friends went there. I hadn't thought
(05:52):
one second about what I want to do with my
life or who I am or what I need. Then
staying with the motions, you know, I just parted through college,
played basketball. That's pretty much it. And then I cheated
my way into a banking job, like literally changed my
transcript to get that what do you talk? Wait, you
are you serious? Yeah? How how did you what do
(06:14):
you mean? How did you do that? I don't entirely
remember how I did it, but it was like, literally
my g p A that I was being interviewed with
was not the one I actually had, and you're trying
to protect some co conspirator or like you truly don't
remember how you change I vaguely remember. I vaguely remember
like printing out transcript and like changing things on it.
(06:36):
I don't remember exactly how I did it, but the
old school, very old school mom. Yeah, yeah, I finished
college in nineties seven, so this is when you could
do this kind of thing, and I was, look, I
was smart enough where I was able to still do
really well, Like I was interviewed for trading jobs and
they'd have you do all those kind of combinatorics using
(06:59):
case studies. I was able to do all that kind
of stuff. Like it's probably like this kid definitely faked
his g p A, but we like him. I don't
think they knew. But you know, I'll tell you what
my first investigating job, you know, the proof was in
the pudding. I was not built to do that. I
was a horrible employee. I spent all my vacation days
(07:19):
in the first like two months because the Bears were
really good for the first time in like a decade,
so I was like flying around to go watch and play.
I had never made that kind of money before. And
then nine not long after nine eleven, found out that
our group was bought and dissolved and I got a severance,
and I couldn't believe it. I was like, oh my god,
I was either gonna get fired or leave anyway, and
(07:41):
now I get free money. A few weeks later, I
got a one way ticket to Chicago because they had
made the playoffs. They lost the day after I got
there and I lost all my severance on a riverboat
that night. Are you serious? How much is a severance
that you lost in the river? But remember, I'm sure,
but you said you sounded like a real loose candid.
(08:01):
I still it's adorable and like an awesome friend to have.
I'd be like, you know, who's fucking amazing is Rubby.
He's so much fun. I love kicking out with the guy.
But you definitely sound like you had a really high
tolerance for risk. Oh yeah, Oh I'm obsessed with risk.
I mean, I still I'm I'm I'm an adrenaline junkie.
It's one of the things that I probably deal with
(08:25):
most in therapy, like, you know, trying to figure out ways. Look,
I recently, two months ago, I've got diagnosed with a
d h D and I'm like, Okay, that's like the
least surprising thing in the history of medicine. Welcome to
the club, bro, You have a too. Yeah. In fact,
I'm on the drugs right now that I'm on this
thing called cholesterol, which I'm thinking about getting off of
because it actually makes me really hyper and kind of anxious,
(08:49):
and I don't think it's improving my focus or anything
at all. Well, there's some there's some interesting theories on
what a d h D truly is. And like certain
jobs that you know you'll you'll a lot of, like
like air force pilots for instance, it's there's this ability
to hyper focus um that you know comes with a
d h D. And I'm obviously a d h D
(09:10):
for those and spend time with me. But you know,
I have like a quasi photographic memory for the things
that I find interesting. So like, you know, the if
it's something that I can't like deal with, my wife
thinks it's hysterical because it's literally like Charlie Brown listening
to the adults, like I am retaining nothing and I'm
very uncomfortable and I don't have great poker face for it.
(09:31):
But if it's like something that I find and that
and it's almost like category in specific to a problem point.
Now because of Summit, we're all like go and be like, oh,
I learned about you know, this completely random thing and
there's no bearing on any of the other stuff I'm
working on for the last like minutes and forgot time existed. Well,
I actually i I've I've read everything that you just said,
and you know, it's not just that, but it's also creativity.
(09:53):
I mean, I would imagine that the vast majority of
entrepreneurs have some version of a d h D. And
it's actually, you know, our strength. For me, I think
the older I've gotten, the more I've become wise to
my own limitations. And that's a strength of mine because
I'm able to make sure that I partner with people
(10:16):
who can first of all, people who are Type A,
people who are super organized and know how to be
focused on tasks and stuff, and that way, I'm able
to actually do the thing that I'm good at. And
that's actually the reason why I guess a d h
D is one of the most underdiagnosed disabilities amongst adults,
because the older we get, the more that we learned
(10:37):
to operate with our operating system. I just I'm not
certain I would call it a disability, you know, I
think that it's a learning difference certainly. And to your point,
you know, like guys like us are and you know,
people like us are more dependent on partners, which you know,
it seems like filmmaking an entrepreneurship in the way that
you've done it and I've done it certainly suits us.
(10:59):
We finitely have friends who like you know, the CEO
and founder and they own the whole company and they
sign every check and like typically not you know, the
person with d h D in the business. Um. But
you know, the truth is is that some of the
most visionary founders certainly have like you know, those types
of learning differences. Where are you at with your journey
with the disorder? Where when did you find out you
(11:21):
had it? Like are you is this something you struggle
with now? No? No, no, no, no, I've I've accepted
it as just like part of my standard operating you
know system. I just think that you know, normal is
the home of the stasis is not a real thing
in my opinion, you know, like there's no such thing.
It's like just balance, Like we all have strengths, weaknesses, differences.
You know, I've been able to build around my personality,
(11:44):
I guess um as a he. I mean the reason
I the reason, you know, my question around this for
you is like you did something that's very very rare
for anybody. You broke out. You clearly like weren't taking
all this stuff as seriously as the rest of us were,
you know, coming out of school, taking getting these jobs,
and then you then you were like, I'm going to
do something, you know, especially crazy trying to be an actor.
(12:05):
You know, like how did you how did you make
that jump? How did you make that transition? You know.
Most of my kind of big moments of my career
have been not surprisingly spontaneous, um and unintended. I was
in l A after that, you know, I was. I
took a year of just screwed around doing fun things
after the investment banking thing. And I was in l
(12:26):
A and my sister was here pursuing entertainment. While I
was staying with her. I got asked to fill in.
She was producing this big arts festival here in l A.
And every night there was an event that you know,
had musicians and comedians and various performers. The MC for
this guy, Assuf Monvi, who used us spend the daily show.
(12:47):
He had to leave at the last second to go
do some movie. They needed someone to fill in, and
my sister was like, you know, you can, you you
should do this, and I was like, okay, great, and
I did it. I did like thirty forty minutes of
improvised stand up throughout the course of this evening. To
this day, It's probably one of the you know, better
(13:09):
things I've ever done. And I ended up being kind
of the the big hit of the whole show. And
I got like fifteen calls in the next week, and
I don't know, like two or three months later, I
was I was a full time actor. You know, one
thing that I've always been comfortable with is being myself,
(13:30):
Like I'm not I'm not particularly um shy about, you know,
being myself in front of a large group of people
or even on camera for that matter, and so being
uninhibited in that way I think really helped me at
the top of my career because I think most of
the training that people do for acting is trying to
(13:52):
figure out a way to be uninhibited, to be yourself,
to not let desperations heepen. Now that said, you know,
like my whole first year as an actor, I probably
booked twenty or thirty things, and I didn't even have
a head shot, and so I didn't care. And as
a result of not caring, I was having so much
fun that I think, you know, people can sense that
confidence and it affected, you know, positively impacted my performance.
(14:15):
But then a couple of years in and I kept
I had have been deferring going to law school at
the time when I really figured out, oh, this is
like a career. Now I need to get better at this.
I need to figure out a work ethic around it.
It was a hard transition because once it started mattering
all that natural like the desperation that need to get
(14:35):
better at it, the self awareness. Um, I took a
small step backwards, and then, you know, my work from
then on has been about getting back to that place
I originally started, while also knowing how to move forward,
and then even more as I got older, um, and
meet the Patels was a big point of inference for this.
I realized that I was only like, I wasn't motivated
(14:59):
just by acting being successful. So I had to figure
out a way for that whole thing to actually be
substantive to me. And that was really hard. Like I
quit acting twice despite becoming increasingly successful because it felt
so vapid to me. Well, you it sounds like you
truly were fairest fueller, you know, and like I can
imagine like that archetype or you as a kid, like
(15:21):
going through what you just described. You know, I think
that there's a parallel in you know, the my and
my experience as an entrepreneur where like and I would
a dear friend who's a who's an artist, who's a
contemporary artist, and he put it really beautifully. He's like, looking,
you know, the tools that you have is like a
as you at your best, you know, in the flow
that you're in, you you're signing it. You're gonna build
(15:43):
you know, stone houses, you know, like you can do it,
and it's like it's artisanal and you're in the flow.
But the reality is that like they're not. Skyscrapers are like,
you know, cities like you just can't do things at
scale in the same like what got you here won't
get you there. In a sense, there's a great expression
that I love. It's it's that your twenties are about
becoming the person you want to be, and your thirties
(16:04):
are about becoming the person you are. And I think,
you know, especially when you have an a D D mind,
you you can't help but kind of be yourself. You're
not we're not as good at lying, like you said,
you can't. You don't have a poker face. And I
think people like us are just so driven by whatever
(16:25):
the thing is that we really want to do, and
so we were going to confront our real ones at
some point or another. We'll be back with more out
of the hustle after the break. Speaking of you know,
(16:47):
stuff that's happening right now. I recently saw your new show,
Pursuit of Happiness, and I really enjoyed it. Thanks, man,
I appreciate you watching it. Will you tell the listeners
a little more about the show. Yeah, So Pursuit of
Happiness is on HBO Max and we have four episodes
in this first season. The premise of the shows, every episode,
(17:09):
I travel with someone I love and admire and we
have some big question about life that we share and
that's what takes us to some international destination. And so
it's kind of a buddy comedy. I would say we're
basically comparing the way other cultures do things versus the
(17:31):
way that we in America do things as a way
of answering big questions about ourselves that we kind of
urgently want to answer. So we have an episode in Mexico,
um in one of the hottest retirement destination for ex pats,
and I went there with my parents to talk about
retirement and aging. And really, you know, how can my
(17:55):
parents and I make the best of the time that
we have left together? And that question was really urgent
to me because, you know, having like yourself, I'm you know,
a young father, and that has given me such incredible
empathy for my parents, and you know, realizing that the
way that I obsess over my daughter is how my
(18:17):
parents have probably obsessed over me their entire lives. And
I kind of want to reward that, and I want
to ask the questions today that I might otherwise be
asking in retrospect and therapy. So that's where that episode
came out of. And then I did another episode in
Japan with my wife, Ma Haley, and that was about
(18:40):
parenting in a place that's known for being the most
innovative and pretty much everything um and obviously there's nothing
more urgent than me trying to figure out the most
important startup in my life, which is my family. And ultimately,
as you know, parenting, you think it's about the kid,
but what it ends up really being about is the marriage.
(19:01):
And so that that's what that episode is about, is
a beautiful journey. Well, the episode that the episode that
I watched was your third episode where you went to
South Korea with our mutual dear friend Matt, who we
actually also had on the podcast recently. You went and
learned about work life balance. Yeah. Yeah, And and you know,
I think Matt and I story is probably something that
(19:21):
anyone who's listening to this will really relate to, which is,
you know, we're you know, pretty much everyone I know
these days is overscheduled, overwhelmed, and as a result, under satisfied.
You know, we optimize every minute of our day, whether
it's work or play, and then in order to distress,
(19:41):
we're scheduling even more things, whether it's yoga or meditation
or uh ted talks or going to summit series, you know,
and all these things cost more money, which in turn
makes you want to work more. It's about this kind
of obsession that our generation has with a achievement and
how you reconcile that with the thing that becomes increasingly
(20:05):
apparent the older you get. Which is the most important
thing in your life is the day you have today,
And all those other things tend to be forward looking,
and so you're so focused on climbing up the mountain
that you spend your whole life climbing up the mountain.
You realize there's no actual top to that mountain. All
you have is that climb the journeys. You have to
figure out a way to enjoy that every day. So
(20:27):
that's what that episode is about. You know. One of
my favorite scenes in the whole series is when we
visit that um what's called a death cafe, in which
we simulate you know, we literally laid in coffins for
ten minutes and wrote our own eulogies. I mean, I
don't know that there's a better way to figure out
what's important in life than to go through an exercise
(20:48):
like that and tell us more like, what are some
of the other wild things that you learned from this
new show. Yeah, so let's see. We went through three
of the episodes, and the fourth one was in Denmark,
and that was a question that was more urgently about
being American. You know, Denmark is generally known as being
one of the happiest places in the world. Um, but
that's really on the case if you're only the case
(21:09):
if you're white, it turns out for immigrants and refugees, Um,
it's not so great. And I realized that story was
emblematic of, you know, an issue that's happening worldwide, but
most prominently here in the US. We shot that before. Uh,
you know, the Black Lives Matter in a movement that
we're going through right now the last five six months.
(21:30):
But you know, I'm not sure that there's a more
urgent issue in this country right now than our inability
to reconcile you know, specifically racial differences, but intersectionality in general.
Just I mean, people are just so fucking dumb when
it comes to all that stuff, and the way that
(21:51):
we have conversations about it is you know, divisive rather
than you know, approaching them in a way that's familiy'll.
I think, like the reason we're going through all these
issues in this country right now is because we don't
feel like one we don't feel like we're part of
the same family. Rather, we feel like, you know, enemies
(22:14):
with each other. And all of that, I think is
all what we're experiencing right now is that big fight
that hopefully ultimately results in you know, everyone getting closer
and you know, being racially different from the South right
from what's you know, considered normal. Like you grew up
in North Carolina, you know, Indian America. I grew up
(22:35):
in Dallas, Texas, Jewish um. You know, I think that
there's a level of like. First it's like you know,
otherism that you experienced to a certain degree. But then
then you know, as an adult, I find a lot
of empathy. I try to find like with people that
I disagree with and don't share my politics, Like where
are the areas in which we, you know, do want
to see a similar future? And how do we move?
(22:56):
How do we just move the chains? You know, like
how do we like inch by inch you know, arc
towards progress? And I'm curious, you know, I imagine that,
you know, to be as good as you are, you know,
as an actor, you must have a lot of empathy,
um and sympathy for for people's perspectives and experiences. And
so what what you talk about, you know, us being
on the same team again, how do you think we
(23:18):
cross that bridge? I don't think it comes from I
don't think any my empathy comes from being an actor.
I would say rather it comes from having grown up
in North Carolina alongside a ton of Republicans in a
culture that is rooted in many ways in the major
(23:39):
tenets of conservatism, Southern culture, Southern tradition, you know, it's
it's all about tradition. It's all about you know, loving
the past and and kind of keeping it going. Family
is the number one priority in the South. These are
actually some of the most loving, boiled people that you
will ever meet. And if you know that then and
(24:02):
your friends with these people, then the conversation you have
with them is more familiar and with love as opposed
to antagonistic. Because I don't think that those people are
bad people. I think they I disagree with the values
that they're prioritizing. And for them, they prioritize loyalty. Their
(24:23):
number one thing is loyalty at all costs, which is
obviously what we're seeing even with Donald Trump right like
there's literally nothing he can say or do that will
get many Republicans to not vote for him, Like there's
nothing more important than just supporting your guy. If you
even look at like, I don't know if you follow
college football, like SEC fans are the biggest psychos because
(24:46):
it's all about rooting for your tribe. And so if
you know that, then it's not a matter of hey,
you're bad people, it's hey, you're prioritizing the wrong things.
Let's talk about out it. But underneath all of that,
we can't we can't doubt that the love is there,
(25:07):
because that's actually their number one thing. It's like, you know,
when you get in a fight with your wife, you know,
there's that first part of it where you're just trying
really hard to get the other person to understand your
point of view, and in the process everyone gets offended,
you say the wrong things, you get busy trying to win,
and all of that part of the conversation. It's like
(25:27):
you needed to do it because everyone had to get
their thoughts out. But the real conversation happens when you
decide to let your guard down, say you're sorry, even
if you don't mean it, start listening, try to habit
the other person's point of view, and next thing, you know,
surprisingly you actually finish it in a loving way. Pretty
(25:48):
Much all of my fights with my wife have gone
in that progression, and I think, you know, being from
North Carolina has you know, kind of kind of kind
of allowed me to know that, you know, these aren't
bad people. We just we're just disagreeing on, you know,
how to approach something. Yeah, you're totally I fucking hard though, dude,
(26:09):
it's hard. It's hard not to get really really angry
anytime someone dies from a gunshot. Certainly anytime you know
a cop you know, beats an African American. I mean,
these are all things where you're like, Okay, your support
is making all these things happen, and it's hard not
to get angry. But then you have to remember that
(26:30):
getting angry at people only makes them defensive. It doesn't
make them listen or likely to cooperate with you in anyway. No,
I mean you just broke down like the central tenants
of the work, like Beyond Conflict, one of the leading
you know, conflict resolution organizations teachers and works on. Like
you're actually quite a natural rebi like that what you
just describe, I mean, yeah, you nailed it. This is
(26:51):
like if you attack someone, they defend the greatest vector
or lever for helping someone you know, change their perspect
they're actually creating cognitive distance. Is not presenting them with
a better case. It's actually introspectively realizing your own hypocrisies. Um.
And so when we present people with a safe opportunity
(27:13):
to reflect ourselves, like when we're presented with those opportunities
or when we don't take people to literally in their
attack of this specific thing or support of the specific
thing that they themselves or their team, you know, has
on zero one check mark against. It's like, I'm certain
that I'm not left enough for certain listeners, and I'm
certain I'm not right enough for certain listeners, and you know,
(27:36):
I think that that's always going to be the case
for all of us. And just like, I love this
idea that compromise is the you know, pinnacle of human capacity.
And today it's a dirty word, right, We're like, oh,
I don't compromise. I'm bad, motherfucker, like that whole thing.
It's like, that's actually, you know, compromise is incredible. It
(27:56):
means that we live together in a society and we
see things different, and we came up with a solution
that was shifting enough for both of us but also
good enough for both of us where we can set
it and forget it and move forward. Right, even if
the goal is not compromised, it can be even it
could it could even start off as manipulation, but the
(28:16):
unintended side effect of pretending to give a fuck can
be actual progress. I Mean, one of my favorite things
that I learned in therapy was principles. You know, especially
we as Americans are very principled people. We believe in
standing up for our principles. But principles are only good
insofar as they advance your own self interest, and often
(28:41):
we will act on our principles against our own self interests.
I'll use the analogy with the wife because everyone knows
what it's like to get a fight with their loved one.
When I now feel, you know, the hint of an
argument about to come up with my wife. What I
try to do now is I tell my self, create
a safe space, create a safe space, be on her side,
(29:05):
be on her side, And nine times out of ten,
in order for me to do that, I have to
essentially lie and pretend that I'm that I believe what
she's saying, that I think what she's saying makes sense,
so that it's right. I'm lying to myself because my
principles inside are saying no funk that, or you should
be offended or whatever. That's that's not right. But what
(29:27):
happens is in creating that safe space, in pretending to empathize,
I'm almost always surprised that I get to that point
at the end of every fight, which is the part
where you actually empathize, You actually start to see things
from that person's point of view. You start to care
more about their feelings than you do about your principles,
(29:48):
and in turn, you reveal some of the mistakes you
made on your own. Ultimately, all that you really want
when you get in a fight with your wife is
to fix it. Like that's it, And it starts with
creating a safe space and you know, trying to fight
for what they are thinking, what they're feeling. Well, it's
almost as though like we have our own teams inside
(30:09):
of the team. You know, when you think about it
in an American context or political context, it's like, you know,
we need Team America to be thriving. In order for
that to happen, we need all of our independent communities
to be thriving. And it's hard to care about others
when your house is on fire. Yeah, that's the concept
of intersectionality, the idea that we all are, you know,
(30:29):
we're all part of the same team, the same teams
within other teams. Whenever there's these conflicts between communities, it
is often an inability to focus on the things that
unite us rather than the ones that divide us. And
really the only way you can get through the divide
is through being united. I just wish that like making
(30:52):
things that are good for us sound bad enough for
us to want them, Like, it doesn't work the same
way as it does bad things sound and good Like
Blue Sky's Act sounds like it's not that it's like that, Yeah,
I want Blue Skies, But in reality, if you look
at like the Blue Sky's Actor, like, you know, instead
of calling it global warming, calling a climate change, like
make people less afraid of the outcome, right, Like these
(31:13):
are insidious language shifts that took place to you know,
sort of create more permission for you know, those that
had incentives to sort of shift the world the direction
that they want to. It's it's very difficult to make
broccoli look like chocolate. It doesn't seem to work in
the other way. Well, I think I think it's very
(31:33):
frustrating for Americans to go through the moment that we're
having this country because it feels like it's two thousand
and twenty and we shouldn't have to put up with
this ship. But what what what that frustration does is
it blinds us to the point in history that we
are and the the age of our country. We're young
as a country, and we're actually in the nascent stages
(31:55):
of its evolution, and we are, you know, one of
the not the most diverse countries in the world. So
nobody has had to deal with this level of change
and affording this level of fairness to so many different
groups of people, and just looking at it from the
perspective of kind of a generational inertia. You know, the
(32:20):
white Christian man has been in charge for hundreds and
hundreds of years, and so it's not easy to give up,
regardless of whether you consciously agree that you'd like the
world to change positively. An if you believe in this
idea that your psychology is inherited genetically, you know that
(32:40):
you inherit the experiences of the people before you. I
don't think it's so easy for people to change their
ways right away. I mean, and and for some people
they literally are openly saying, hey, I don't want to
give up what I have here. And for other people,
they want to give up what they have, but they
don't know the right way to go about having that conversation.
(33:03):
This was going to be messy. I can't see the
way that it wouldn't. I'm just glad that it's happening.
Part of the hustle will be right back after this
short break. Shifting to a more positive note, where are
you're going to take me when you do the next season?
(33:24):
The pursuit of happens great? Great question? What we should do?
I want to do if I get a season two.
I wanted to be about pivots in life and as society,
the premise being that I think we're in this moment
of our country that is going to hopefully end up
being our Arab spring, and so a big piece of
(33:47):
that for me, like we're hoping to move to the
East Coast at the end of this year, specifically to
find a simpler life, to seek kind of better communities,
a better like neighborhood itself to live in, like call
it normal people. People who who's most interesting about them
isn't their job. So I think there's probably I know
(34:09):
you're asking jokingly, but there probably is a story to
be told about community, because I think that is what
you guys have built and and and I think you know,
on a fundamental level, our happiness in life is derived
from the extent to which we've improved the lives around us.
And I don't know that there's any community that's more
(34:32):
devoted to that idea than the one that you've felt.
So maybe there's something there or we just go party
on a yacht. Um. It's like, you know, my whole
thing is like a large extended family is the greatest
luxury in life. And you know, the community aspect, like
we just don't do the things that make us happy,
you know what I mean? And like for me, it
(34:52):
makes me really happy to do for people that I
enjoy the company, ever learned from or inspired by, because
guess what when I do that, I typically get to
spend more time around them, which makes me more happy.
So that same sort of like workaholic cycle that you
describe that, like you know, you at we're experiencing and
really exploring in South Korea. You know, I think that
(35:13):
the same can be said for being like a communitarian, right,
like once you see a triangulation of good will come
back to you because you've like you know, helped out
a group or a person or an institution that you
care about, you know, like it pays for itself. This
is not like some you know, like hippie ship. This
is like our life experience that led us to like,
(35:34):
you know, everything that we've been able to achieve and
do and experience on and stuff. So you know, I
love that you're you know, using your platform to ask
these bigger questions. I'm sure you know you could have
been a game show host instead, you're like, you know,
taking us will still there's great money that by the way, dude,
what one thing that I will always hold you to.
We talked about this before I do legit. Want to
(35:56):
build my own neighborhood. That's part of the reason why
I movie these coasts as a research trip to do
the bigger picture, which is I want to create the
perfect neighborhood. And I wanted to be curated. Um I
want there to be kind of an artists entrepreneural element
to it, but I wanted to be more broadly around, um,
you know, just the perfect neighborhood to raise a family.
(36:19):
And I'm gonna want your help in doing that. Well,
you know, you have it and there's a lot of great,
great people that you know, it's been amazing getting into
that space. Like you know, we we were you know,
event event entrepreneurs and eight years ago with Powder Mountain
got into the community development and design space and sort
of like trial by Fire, had to like learn a
(36:40):
lot fast um. And you know, the truth is is
that you know, just like I don't know, I think
of it like sports, Like you know, you see somebody
who's like an All star for three or four years,
you make the mistake of thinking that they're like a superstar.
But when you think about the context of players and
around the eight season or they're like eleven years in
the game and they're still crushing it, there's just another
(37:02):
level of understanding and of like the game slows down,
you know what I mean. So we've you know, I
think that you need that entrepreneurial fire. You need that
like you know, person that wants to see this thing
come into reality. And what's funny is nobody will design
it for you. You can't just be like, Okay, here
are my principles and values designed me a community that's
(37:22):
it doesn't work that way. Like you really do have
to be involved in the creative process. But ultimately, when
it comes to actually like putting roads and infrastructure in
the ground, there's all these people have been doing this
for thirty forty years. They're just like fantastic at it.
And the truth is is it's like death by a
thousand cuts, you know, like you overspend on, like you know,
(37:43):
eight thousand different light items over only like say five
seven eight percent, you know, above what somebody more thoughtful
would have. But you know it happens over the course
of years, and you're like, oh my god, but that
same amount of money we could have built like a
brand new lodge or like add another lift. You're like,
done some amazing community venue for for kids, or like
you know, so ultimately, like uh yeah, just like anything
(38:06):
in life, like you want to combine. It sounds like
a d h D philosophy manifest is, you know, surround
ourselves with people smarter than us so we can actually
achieve the thing that we're trying to get. Well, I
would say, is the older I get, I don't I
no longer surround myself with people who are smarter than me,
and well, I guess I redefine what's smart is and
(38:28):
the older I get. Smarter people are not necessarily people
starting amazing companies or creating incredible shows. To me, the
most intelligent, the highest form of intelligence is emotional and
the people that I try to surround myself are the
ones who are the most loyal, the kindest, and that
that's been a conscious pivot that I've made in my
(38:50):
relationships over the last you know, five years, And you know,
you realize the older you get, like, those are the
people you want. Busy people are exhausting. Well on, man,
and thank you. We really appreciate you being on the podcast.
You're totally an inspiration. Back at your brother you and
your vibe and uh suit of happiness. HBO watch that
(39:11):
you'll enjoy it. Thanks for let me get the word
out here, Buddy good Chen. For more podcasts for my
(39:33):
Heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcast,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Art of the Hustle is a production of I Heart Radio.
You're listening to the Art of the Hustle, the show
that breaks down how some of the world's most fascinating
people have hustled and learned their way into achieving great things.
I'm your host Jeff Rosenthal, co founder of Summit, and
(00:23):
today on the show, I had the pleasure of chatting
with Robbie Patel. Robbie is a actor, slash model, slash producer,
slash entrepreneur. All these things are true, except the model part.
After graduating from u n C. Chapel Hill in the
late nineties, Robbie was an investment banker before a chance
opportunity to host a stand up show in Los Angeles
left him fielding calls from agents and managers. He went
(00:45):
on to act and over seventy national commercials and land
roles and films and television, most notably Scrubs, It's Always
Sunny in Philadelphia and Master of None, before co writing, directing,
and starring and Meet the patel Is. Alongside his sister
Get That and Tony thirteen, he helped co found This
Bar Saves Lives, a snap company whose mission is too
in childhood malnutrition worldwide with fellow actors Kristen Bell, Todd Grinnelle,
(01:09):
and Ryan Delvin, and most recently, his four part original
series The Pursuit of Happiness, premiered on HBO. Max Robbie
joins us to talk about how his penchant for mischief
has helped him succeed where he had to travel all
around the world to rediscover the values that Americans hold dear,
and how creating safe spaces can help overcome our most
deep seated differences. So please enjoy my conversation with Robbie Patel. Robbie,
(01:35):
thank you for being on the podcast. Good to chat
with you, buddy. What a time to be alive. Yep,
I believe the first time we came across one another
was maybe around a decade ago when you started this
bar Saves Lives. Yeah, I think our buddies Sundepa Hoojia
(01:56):
first connected us is my guest, another act your slash model,
slash VC slash founder. He is good looking um and
also just an incredible connector. Wow. It's it's probably been
like nine or ten years ago now when I lived
in Venice. One of the reason I mentioned that it's
just like you have such an interesting background, you know.
I I've been enjoying you in films for a very
(02:19):
long time. Um, you know, from from Meet the Patels,
which you made of course and Master of None, to
the stuff that you've been doing recently like Come as
You Are and Long Shot, um and of course your
new show proceed of Happiness on HBO. What always fascinated
me is like you had a poker magazine and you
founded this bar Saves Lives, and I'm sure you had
(02:40):
a bunch of other careers that I don't know about,
but like you know, this is you know, the art
of the hustle. Tell us, give us, give us some background. Yeah,
I mean, I think I'm probably much like all your
listeners and a lot of the people that you bring
together at summit, which is just a real passion for
ideas and finding new ways to connect. One of the
(03:04):
most calming pieces of wisdom I ever read was that
it was about the entrepreneur mindset, and our personality is
such that we have to have ideas and that's just
a part of our day. And I used to actually
carry shame about needing to wake up in the middle
(03:25):
of the night with I haven't I've always slept with
a notepad next to me since I was a little kid,
because I'd have all these ideas and I'd have to
write them down, whether it's like some weird idea for
a company, or a weird idea for a joke, uh,
just anything at all. I needed to write it down.
And I realized now in adulthood that that's part of
(03:45):
who I am, and people like us just need an
outlet to have those ideas, even if we don't act
on them. But what happens eventually is some of those
ideas you keep thinking about, you keep in thinking about,
and you eventually act on them. Know my career, I
I've never had a particularly mindful approach to my career,
(04:06):
increasingly so now in adulthood, now that I'm a father
and I have to be really intentional and thoughtful about
how I spent my time. But you know, like most people,
I grew up, you know, as kids were completely in
flow state of just doing whatever the hell we want,
and and we're doing it whenever we want. I grew
up just wanting to have fun. That's all I cared about.
(04:29):
I wasn't a good student, I didn't care for school.
It wasn't something that was tangible to me, you know,
like like any Indian, I could study the night before
and get like a B. Plus, I was basically like
a Ferris Bueller in high school, so I cheated on everything.
I had a copy of every exam. I look back
on that now and I realized that was my training.
(04:49):
Like I had such a passion for figuring out creative
approaches to problems. The problem then being getting by without
having to do the work. You know, I had a
copy of every exam. I was I like really reveled
in figuring out fun scams where I would get everyone involved.
(05:11):
And I had early dismissal passes in the back of
my car. And our school was like this giant public
school that was gated, and I was friends with all
the security guards and they were on the take anytime
I wanted to come and go, and I parked wherever
I wanted to. You know, it was such a fun
time and it's it's interesting because if I had to
(05:32):
reflect on it at that time, I would have thought
that I was just delaying growing up. But now I
look at that as you know, really my training for
what I do now, except I use it for more
kind of positive purposes, I guess, and so I was
just kind of going with emotions. I went to Chapel Hill,
a group in Charlotte, and then went to Chapel Hill
just because all my friends went there. I hadn't thought
(05:52):
one second about what I want to do with my
life or who I am or what I need. Then
staying with the motions, you know, I just parted through college,
played basketball. That's pretty much it. And then I cheated
my way into a banking job, like literally changed my
transcript to get that what do you talk? Wait, you
are you serious? Yeah? How how did you what do
(06:14):
you mean? How did you do that? I don't entirely
remember how I did it, but it was like, literally
my g p A that I was being interviewed with
was not the one I actually had, and you're trying
to protect some co conspirator or like you truly don't
remember how you change I vaguely remember. I vaguely remember
like printing out transcript and like changing things on it.
(06:36):
I don't remember exactly how I did it, but the
old school, very old school mom. Yeah, yeah, I finished
college in nineties seven, so this is when you could
do this kind of thing, and I was, look, I
was smart enough where I was able to still do
really well, Like I was interviewed for trading jobs and
they'd have you do all those kind of combinatorics using
(06:59):
case studies. I was able to do all that kind
of stuff. Like it's probably like this kid definitely faked
his g p A, but we like him. I don't
think they knew. But you know, I'll tell you what
my first investigating job, you know, the proof was in
the pudding. I was not built to do that. I
was a horrible employee. I spent all my vacation days
(07:19):
in the first like two months because the Bears were
really good for the first time in like a decade,
so I was like flying around to go watch and play.
I had never made that kind of money before. And
then nine not long after nine eleven, found out that
our group was bought and dissolved and I got a severance,
and I couldn't believe it. I was like, oh my god,
I was either gonna get fired or leave anyway, and
(07:41):
now I get free money. A few weeks later, I
got a one way ticket to Chicago because they had
made the playoffs. They lost the day after I got
there and I lost all my severance on a riverboat
that night. Are you serious? How much is a severance
that you lost in the river? But remember, I'm sure,
but you said you sounded like a real loose candid.
(08:01):
I still it's adorable and like an awesome friend to have.
I'd be like, you know, who's fucking amazing is Rubby.
He's so much fun. I love kicking out with the guy.
But you definitely sound like you had a really high
tolerance for risk. Oh yeah, Oh I'm obsessed with risk.
I mean, I still I'm I'm I'm an adrenaline junkie.
It's one of the things that I probably deal with
(08:25):
most in therapy, like, you know, trying to figure out ways. Look,
I recently, two months ago, I've got diagnosed with a
d h D and I'm like, Okay, that's like the
least surprising thing in the history of medicine. Welcome to
the club, bro, You have a too. Yeah. In fact,
I'm on the drugs right now that I'm on this
thing called cholesterol, which I'm thinking about getting off of
because it actually makes me really hyper and kind of anxious,
(08:49):
and I don't think it's improving my focus or anything
at all. Well, there's some there's some interesting theories on
what a d h D truly is. And like certain
jobs that you know you'll you'll a lot of, like
like air force pilots for instance, it's there's this ability
to hyper focus um that you know comes with a
d h D. And I'm obviously a d h D
(09:10):
for those and spend time with me. But you know,
I have like a quasi photographic memory for the things
that I find interesting. So like, you know, the if
it's something that I can't like deal with, my wife
thinks it's hysterical because it's literally like Charlie Brown listening
to the adults, like I am retaining nothing and I'm
very uncomfortable and I don't have great poker face for it.
(09:31):
But if it's like something that I find and that
and it's almost like category in specific to a problem point.
Now because of Summit, we're all like go and be like, oh,
I learned about you know, this completely random thing and
there's no bearing on any of the other stuff I'm
working on for the last like minutes and forgot time existed. Well,
I actually i I've I've read everything that you just said,
and you know, it's not just that, but it's also creativity.
(09:53):
I mean, I would imagine that the vast majority of
entrepreneurs have some version of a d h D. And
it's actually, you know, our strength. For me, I think
the older I've gotten, the more I've become wise to
my own limitations. And that's a strength of mine because
I'm able to make sure that I partner with people
(10:16):
who can first of all, people who are Type A,
people who are super organized and know how to be
focused on tasks and stuff, and that way, I'm able
to actually do the thing that I'm good at. And
that's actually the reason why I guess a d h
D is one of the most underdiagnosed disabilities amongst adults,
because the older we get, the more that we learned
(10:37):
to operate with our operating system. I just I'm not
certain I would call it a disability, you know, I
think that it's a learning difference certainly. And to your point,
you know, like guys like us are and you know,
people like us are more dependent on partners, which you know,
it seems like filmmaking an entrepreneurship in the way that
you've done it and I've done it certainly suits us.
(10:59):
We finitely have friends who like you know, the CEO
and founder and they own the whole company and they
sign every check and like typically not you know, the
person with d h D in the business. Um. But
you know, the truth is is that some of the
most visionary founders certainly have like you know, those types
of learning differences. Where are you at with your journey
with the disorder? Where when did you find out you
(11:21):
had it? Like are you is this something you struggle
with now? No? No, no, no, no, I've I've accepted
it as just like part of my standard operating you
know system. I just think that you know, normal is
the home of the stasis is not a real thing
in my opinion, you know, like there's no such thing.
It's like just balance, Like we all have strengths, weaknesses, differences.
You know, I've been able to build around my personality,
(11:44):
I guess um as a he. I mean the reason
I the reason, you know, my question around this for
you is like you did something that's very very rare
for anybody. You broke out. You clearly like weren't taking
all this stuff as seriously as the rest of us were,
you know, coming out of school, taking getting these jobs,
and then you then you were like, I'm going to
do something, you know, especially crazy trying to be an actor.
(12:05):
You know, like how did you how did you make
that jump? How did you make that transition? You know.
Most of my kind of big moments of my career
have been not surprisingly spontaneous, um and unintended. I was
in l A after that, you know, I was. I
took a year of just screwed around doing fun things
after the investment banking thing. And I was in l
(12:26):
A and my sister was here pursuing entertainment. While I
was staying with her. I got asked to fill in.
She was producing this big arts festival here in l A.
And every night there was an event that you know,
had musicians and comedians and various performers. The MC for
this guy, Assuf Monvi, who used us spend the daily show.
(12:47):
He had to leave at the last second to go
do some movie. They needed someone to fill in, and
my sister was like, you know, you can, you you
should do this, and I was like, okay, great, and
I did it. I did like thirty forty minutes of
improvised stand up throughout the course of this evening. To
this day, It's probably one of the you know, better
(13:09):
things I've ever done. And I ended up being kind
of the the big hit of the whole show. And
I got like fifteen calls in the next week, and
I don't know, like two or three months later, I
was I was a full time actor. You know, one
thing that I've always been comfortable with is being myself,
(13:30):
Like I'm not I'm not particularly um shy about, you know,
being myself in front of a large group of people
or even on camera for that matter, and so being
uninhibited in that way I think really helped me at
the top of my career because I think most of
the training that people do for acting is trying to
(13:52):
figure out a way to be uninhibited, to be yourself,
to not let desperations heepen. Now that said, you know,
like my whole first year as an actor, I probably
booked twenty or thirty things, and I didn't even have
a head shot, and so I didn't care. And as
a result of not caring, I was having so much
fun that I think, you know, people can sense that
confidence and it affected, you know, positively impacted my performance.
(14:15):
But then a couple of years in and I kept
I had have been deferring going to law school at
the time when I really figured out, oh, this is
like a career. Now I need to get better at this.
I need to figure out a work ethic around it.
It was a hard transition because once it started mattering
all that natural like the desperation that need to get
(14:35):
better at it, the self awareness. Um, I took a
small step backwards, and then, you know, my work from
then on has been about getting back to that place
I originally started, while also knowing how to move forward,
and then even more as I got older, um, and
meet the Patels was a big point of inference for this.
I realized that I was only like, I wasn't motivated
(14:59):
just by acting being successful. So I had to figure
out a way for that whole thing to actually be
substantive to me. And that was really hard. Like I
quit acting twice despite becoming increasingly successful because it felt
so vapid to me. Well, you it sounds like you
truly were fairest fueller, you know, and like I can
imagine like that archetype or you as a kid, like
(15:21):
going through what you just described. You know, I think
that there's a parallel in you know, the my and
my experience as an entrepreneur where like and I would
a dear friend who's a who's an artist, who's a
contemporary artist, and he put it really beautifully. He's like, looking,
you know, the tools that you have is like a
as you at your best, you know, in the flow
that you're in, you you're signing it. You're gonna build
(15:43):
you know, stone houses, you know, like you can do it,
and it's like it's artisanal and you're in the flow.
But the reality is that like they're not. Skyscrapers are like,
you know, cities like you just can't do things at
scale in the same like what got you here won't
get you there. In a sense, there's a great expression
that I love. It's it's that your twenties are about
becoming the person you want to be, and your thirties
(16:04):
are about becoming the person you are. And I think,
you know, especially when you have an a D D mind,
you you can't help but kind of be yourself. You're
not we're not as good at lying, like you said,
you can't. You don't have a poker face. And I
think people like us are just so driven by whatever
(16:25):
the thing is that we really want to do, and
so we were going to confront our real ones at
some point or another. We'll be back with more out
of the hustle after the break. Speaking of you know,
(16:47):
stuff that's happening right now. I recently saw your new show,
Pursuit of Happiness, and I really enjoyed it. Thanks, man,
I appreciate you watching it. Will you tell the listeners
a little more about the show. Yeah, So Pursuit of
Happiness is on HBO Max and we have four episodes
in this first season. The premise of the shows, every episode,
(17:09):
I travel with someone I love and admire and we
have some big question about life that we share and
that's what takes us to some international destination. And so
it's kind of a buddy comedy. I would say we're
basically comparing the way other cultures do things versus the
(17:31):
way that we in America do things as a way
of answering big questions about ourselves that we kind of
urgently want to answer. So we have an episode in Mexico,
um in one of the hottest retirement destination for ex pats,
and I went there with my parents to talk about
retirement and aging. And really, you know, how can my
(17:55):
parents and I make the best of the time that
we have left together? And that question was really urgent
to me because, you know, having like yourself, I'm you know,
a young father, and that has given me such incredible
empathy for my parents, and you know, realizing that the
way that I obsess over my daughter is how my
(18:17):
parents have probably obsessed over me their entire lives. And
I kind of want to reward that, and I want
to ask the questions today that I might otherwise be
asking in retrospect and therapy. So that's where that episode
came out of. And then I did another episode in
Japan with my wife, Ma Haley, and that was about
(18:40):
parenting in a place that's known for being the most
innovative and pretty much everything um and obviously there's nothing
more urgent than me trying to figure out the most
important startup in my life, which is my family. And ultimately,
as you know, parenting, you think it's about the kid,
but what it ends up really being about is the marriage.
(19:01):
And so that that's what that episode is about, is
a beautiful journey. Well, the episode that the episode that
I watched was your third episode where you went to
South Korea with our mutual dear friend Matt, who we
actually also had on the podcast recently. You went and
learned about work life balance. Yeah. Yeah, And and you know,
I think Matt and I story is probably something that
(19:21):
anyone who's listening to this will really relate to, which is,
you know, we're you know, pretty much everyone I know
these days is overscheduled, overwhelmed, and as a result, under satisfied.
You know, we optimize every minute of our day, whether
it's work or play, and then in order to distress,
(19:41):
we're scheduling even more things, whether it's yoga or meditation
or uh ted talks or going to summit series, you know,
and all these things cost more money, which in turn
makes you want to work more. It's about this kind
of obsession that our generation has with a achievement and
how you reconcile that with the thing that becomes increasingly
(20:05):
apparent the older you get. Which is the most important
thing in your life is the day you have today,
And all those other things tend to be forward looking,
and so you're so focused on climbing up the mountain
that you spend your whole life climbing up the mountain.
You realize there's no actual top to that mountain. All
you have is that climb the journeys. You have to
figure out a way to enjoy that every day. So
(20:27):
that's what that episode is about. You know. One of
my favorite scenes in the whole series is when we
visit that um what's called a death cafe, in which
we simulate you know, we literally laid in coffins for
ten minutes and wrote our own eulogies. I mean, I
don't know that there's a better way to figure out
what's important in life than to go through an exercise
(20:48):
like that and tell us more like, what are some
of the other wild things that you learned from this
new show. Yeah, so let's see. We went through three
of the episodes, and the fourth one was in Denmark,
and that was a question that was more urgently about
being American. You know, Denmark is generally known as being
one of the happiest places in the world. Um, but
that's really on the case if you're only the case
(21:09):
if you're white, it turns out for immigrants and refugees, Um,
it's not so great. And I realized that story was
emblematic of, you know, an issue that's happening worldwide, but
most prominently here in the US. We shot that before. Uh,
you know, the Black Lives Matter in a movement that
we're going through right now the last five six months.
(21:30):
But you know, I'm not sure that there's a more
urgent issue in this country right now than our inability
to reconcile you know, specifically racial differences, but intersectionality in general.
Just I mean, people are just so fucking dumb when
it comes to all that stuff, and the way that
(21:51):
we have conversations about it is you know, divisive rather
than you know, approaching them in a way that's familiy'll.
I think, like the reason we're going through all these
issues in this country right now is because we don't
feel like one we don't feel like we're part of
the same family. Rather, we feel like, you know, enemies
(22:14):
with each other. And all of that, I think is
all what we're experiencing right now is that big fight
that hopefully ultimately results in you know, everyone getting closer
and you know, being racially different from the South right
from what's you know, considered normal. Like you grew up
in North Carolina, you know, Indian America. I grew up
(22:35):
in Dallas, Texas, Jewish um. You know, I think that
there's a level of like. First it's like you know,
otherism that you experienced to a certain degree. But then
then you know, as an adult, I find a lot
of empathy. I try to find like with people that
I disagree with and don't share my politics, Like where
are the areas in which we, you know, do want
to see a similar future? And how do we move?
(22:56):
How do we just move the chains? You know, like
how do we like inch by inch you know, arc
towards progress? And I'm curious, you know, I imagine that,
you know, to be as good as you are, you know,
as an actor, you must have a lot of empathy,
um and sympathy for for people's perspectives and experiences. And
so what what you talk about, you know, us being
on the same team again, how do you think we
(23:18):
cross that bridge? I don't think it comes from I
don't think any my empathy comes from being an actor.
I would say rather it comes from having grown up
in North Carolina alongside a ton of Republicans in a
culture that is rooted in many ways in the major
(23:39):
tenets of conservatism, Southern culture, Southern tradition, you know, it's
it's all about tradition. It's all about you know, loving
the past and and kind of keeping it going. Family
is the number one priority in the South. These are
actually some of the most loving, boiled people that you
will ever meet. And if you know that then and
(24:02):
your friends with these people, then the conversation you have
with them is more familiar and with love as opposed
to antagonistic. Because I don't think that those people are
bad people. I think they I disagree with the values
that they're prioritizing. And for them, they prioritize loyalty. Their
(24:23):
number one thing is loyalty at all costs, which is
obviously what we're seeing even with Donald Trump right like
there's literally nothing he can say or do that will
get many Republicans to not vote for him, Like there's
nothing more important than just supporting your guy. If you
even look at like, I don't know if you follow
college football, like SEC fans are the biggest psychos because
(24:46):
it's all about rooting for your tribe. And so if
you know that, then it's not a matter of hey,
you're bad people, it's hey, you're prioritizing the wrong things.
Let's talk about out it. But underneath all of that,
we can't we can't doubt that the love is there,
(25:07):
because that's actually their number one thing. It's like, you know,
when you get in a fight with your wife, you know,
there's that first part of it where you're just trying
really hard to get the other person to understand your
point of view, and in the process everyone gets offended,
you say the wrong things, you get busy trying to win,
and all of that part of the conversation. It's like
(25:27):
you needed to do it because everyone had to get
their thoughts out. But the real conversation happens when you
decide to let your guard down, say you're sorry, even
if you don't mean it, start listening, try to habit
the other person's point of view, and next thing, you know,
surprisingly you actually finish it in a loving way. Pretty
(25:48):
Much all of my fights with my wife have gone
in that progression, and I think, you know, being from
North Carolina has you know, kind of kind of kind
of allowed me to know that, you know, these aren't
bad people. We just we're just disagreeing on, you know,
how to approach something. Yeah, you're totally I fucking hard though, dude,
(26:09):
it's hard. It's hard not to get really really angry
anytime someone dies from a gunshot. Certainly anytime you know
a cop you know, beats an African American. I mean,
these are all things where you're like, Okay, your support
is making all these things happen, and it's hard not
to get angry. But then you have to remember that
(26:30):
getting angry at people only makes them defensive. It doesn't
make them listen or likely to cooperate with you in anyway. No,
I mean you just broke down like the central tenants
of the work, like Beyond Conflict, one of the leading
you know, conflict resolution organizations teachers and works on. Like
you're actually quite a natural rebi like that what you
just describe, I mean, yeah, you nailed it. This is
(26:51):
like if you attack someone, they defend the greatest vector
or lever for helping someone you know, change their perspect
they're actually creating cognitive distance. Is not presenting them with
a better case. It's actually introspectively realizing your own hypocrisies. Um.
And so when we present people with a safe opportunity
(27:13):
to reflect ourselves, like when we're presented with those opportunities
or when we don't take people to literally in their
attack of this specific thing or support of the specific
thing that they themselves or their team, you know, has
on zero one check mark against. It's like, I'm certain
that I'm not left enough for certain listeners, and I'm
certain I'm not right enough for certain listeners, and you know,
(27:36):
I think that that's always going to be the case
for all of us. And just like, I love this
idea that compromise is the you know, pinnacle of human capacity.
And today it's a dirty word, right, We're like, oh,
I don't compromise. I'm bad, motherfucker, like that whole thing.
It's like, that's actually, you know, compromise is incredible. It
(27:56):
means that we live together in a society and we
see things different, and we came up with a solution
that was shifting enough for both of us but also
good enough for both of us where we can set
it and forget it and move forward. Right, even if
the goal is not compromised, it can be even it
could it could even start off as manipulation, but the
(28:16):
unintended side effect of pretending to give a fuck can
be actual progress. I Mean, one of my favorite things
that I learned in therapy was principles. You know, especially
we as Americans are very principled people. We believe in
standing up for our principles. But principles are only good
insofar as they advance your own self interest, and often
(28:41):
we will act on our principles against our own self interests.
I'll use the analogy with the wife because everyone knows
what it's like to get a fight with their loved one.
When I now feel, you know, the hint of an
argument about to come up with my wife. What I
try to do now is I tell my self, create
a safe space, create a safe space, be on her side,
(29:05):
be on her side, And nine times out of ten,
in order for me to do that, I have to
essentially lie and pretend that I'm that I believe what
she's saying, that I think what she's saying makes sense,
so that it's right. I'm lying to myself because my
principles inside are saying no funk that, or you should
be offended or whatever. That's that's not right. But what
(29:27):
happens is in creating that safe space, in pretending to empathize,
I'm almost always surprised that I get to that point
at the end of every fight, which is the part
where you actually empathize, You actually start to see things
from that person's point of view. You start to care
more about their feelings than you do about your principles,
(29:48):
and in turn, you reveal some of the mistakes you
made on your own. Ultimately, all that you really want
when you get in a fight with your wife is
to fix it. Like that's it, And it starts with
creating a safe space and you know, trying to fight
for what they are thinking, what they're feeling. Well, it's
almost as though like we have our own teams inside
(30:09):
of the team. You know, when you think about it
in an American context or political context, it's like, you know,
we need Team America to be thriving. In order for
that to happen, we need all of our independent communities
to be thriving. And it's hard to care about others
when your house is on fire. Yeah, that's the concept
of intersectionality, the idea that we all are, you know,
(30:29):
we're all part of the same team, the same teams
within other teams. Whenever there's these conflicts between communities, it
is often an inability to focus on the things that
unite us rather than the ones that divide us. And
really the only way you can get through the divide
is through being united. I just wish that like making
(30:52):
things that are good for us sound bad enough for
us to want them, Like, it doesn't work the same
way as it does bad things sound and good Like
Blue Sky's Act sounds like it's not that it's like that, Yeah,
I want Blue Skies, But in reality, if you look
at like the Blue Sky's Actor, like, you know, instead
of calling it global warming, calling a climate change, like
make people less afraid of the outcome, right, Like these
(31:13):
are insidious language shifts that took place to you know,
sort of create more permission for you know, those that
had incentives to sort of shift the world the direction
that they want to. It's it's very difficult to make
broccoli look like chocolate. It doesn't seem to work in
the other way. Well, I think I think it's very
(31:33):
frustrating for Americans to go through the moment that we're
having this country because it feels like it's two thousand
and twenty and we shouldn't have to put up with
this ship. But what what what that frustration does is
it blinds us to the point in history that we
are and the the age of our country. We're young
as a country, and we're actually in the nascent stages
(31:55):
of its evolution, and we are, you know, one of
the not the most diverse countries in the world. So
nobody has had to deal with this level of change
and affording this level of fairness to so many different
groups of people, and just looking at it from the
perspective of kind of a generational inertia. You know, the
(32:20):
white Christian man has been in charge for hundreds and
hundreds of years, and so it's not easy to give up,
regardless of whether you consciously agree that you'd like the
world to change positively. An if you believe in this
idea that your psychology is inherited genetically, you know that
(32:40):
you inherit the experiences of the people before you. I
don't think it's so easy for people to change their
ways right away. I mean, and and for some people
they literally are openly saying, hey, I don't want to
give up what I have here. And for other people,
they want to give up what they have, but they
don't know the right way to go about having that conversation.
(33:03):
This was going to be messy. I can't see the
way that it wouldn't. I'm just glad that it's happening.
Part of the hustle will be right back after this
short break. Shifting to a more positive note, where are
you're going to take me when you do the next season?
(33:24):
The pursuit of happens great? Great question? What we should do?
I want to do if I get a season two.
I wanted to be about pivots in life and as society,
the premise being that I think we're in this moment
of our country that is going to hopefully end up
being our Arab spring, and so a big piece of
(33:47):
that for me, like we're hoping to move to the
East Coast at the end of this year, specifically to
find a simpler life, to seek kind of better communities,
a better like neighborhood itself to live in, like call
it normal people. People who who's most interesting about them
isn't their job. So I think there's probably I know
(34:09):
you're asking jokingly, but there probably is a story to
be told about community, because I think that is what
you guys have built and and and I think you know,
on a fundamental level, our happiness in life is derived
from the extent to which we've improved the lives around us.
And I don't know that there's any community that's more
(34:32):
devoted to that idea than the one that you've felt.
So maybe there's something there or we just go party
on a yacht. Um. It's like, you know, my whole
thing is like a large extended family is the greatest
luxury in life. And you know, the community aspect, like
we just don't do the things that make us happy,
you know what I mean? And like for me, it
(34:52):
makes me really happy to do for people that I
enjoy the company, ever learned from or inspired by, because
guess what when I do that, I typically get to
spend more time around them, which makes me more happy.
So that same sort of like workaholic cycle that you
describe that, like you know, you at we're experiencing and
really exploring in South Korea. You know, I think that
(35:13):
the same can be said for being like a communitarian, right,
like once you see a triangulation of good will come
back to you because you've like you know, helped out
a group or a person or an institution that you
care about, you know, like it pays for itself. This
is not like some you know, like hippie ship. This
is like our life experience that led us to like,
(35:34):
you know, everything that we've been able to achieve and
do and experience on and stuff. So you know, I
love that you're you know, using your platform to ask
these bigger questions. I'm sure you know you could have
been a game show host instead, you're like, you know,
taking us will still there's great money that by the way, dude,
what one thing that I will always hold you to.
We talked about this before I do legit. Want to
(35:56):
build my own neighborhood. That's part of the reason why
I movie these coasts as a research trip to do
the bigger picture, which is I want to create the
perfect neighborhood. And I wanted to be curated. Um I
want there to be kind of an artists entrepreneural element
to it, but I wanted to be more broadly around, um,
you know, just the perfect neighborhood to raise a family.
(36:19):
And I'm gonna want your help in doing that. Well,
you know, you have it and there's a lot of great,
great people that you know, it's been amazing getting into
that space. Like you know, we we were you know,
event event entrepreneurs and eight years ago with Powder Mountain
got into the community development and design space and sort
of like trial by Fire, had to like learn a
(36:40):
lot fast um. And you know, the truth is is
that you know, just like I don't know, I think
of it like sports, Like you know, you see somebody
who's like an All star for three or four years,
you make the mistake of thinking that they're like a superstar.
But when you think about the context of players and
around the eight season or they're like eleven years in
the game and they're still crushing it, there's just another
(37:02):
level of understanding and of like the game slows down,
you know what I mean. So we've you know, I
think that you need that entrepreneurial fire. You need that
like you know, person that wants to see this thing
come into reality. And what's funny is nobody will design
it for you. You can't just be like, Okay, here
are my principles and values designed me a community that's
(37:22):
it doesn't work that way. Like you really do have
to be involved in the creative process. But ultimately, when
it comes to actually like putting roads and infrastructure in
the ground, there's all these people have been doing this
for thirty forty years. They're just like fantastic at it.
And the truth is is it's like death by a
thousand cuts, you know, like you overspend on, like you know,
(37:43):
eight thousand different light items over only like say five
seven eight percent, you know, above what somebody more thoughtful
would have. But you know it happens over the course
of years, and you're like, oh my god, but that
same amount of money we could have built like a
brand new lodge or like add another lift. You're like,
done some amazing community venue for for kids, or like
you know, so ultimately, like uh yeah, just like anything
(38:06):
in life, like you want to combine. It sounds like
a d h D philosophy manifest is, you know, surround
ourselves with people smarter than us so we can actually
achieve the thing that we're trying to get. Well, I
would say, is the older I get, I don't I
no longer surround myself with people who are smarter than me,
and well, I guess I redefine what's smart is and
(38:28):
the older I get. Smarter people are not necessarily people
starting amazing companies or creating incredible shows. To me, the
most intelligent, the highest form of intelligence is emotional and
the people that I try to surround myself are the
ones who are the most loyal, the kindest, and that
that's been a conscious pivot that I've made in my
(38:50):
relationships over the last you know, five years, And you know,
you realize the older you get, like, those are the
people you want. Busy people are exhausting. Well on, man,
and thank you. We really appreciate you being on the podcast.
You're totally an inspiration. Back at your brother you and
your vibe and uh suit of happiness. HBO watch that
(39:11):
you'll enjoy it. Thanks for let me get the word
out here, Buddy good Chen. For more podcasts for my
(39:33):
Heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcast,
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