How to Master the Art of Learning in a Fast-Paced World | Michael Simmons | Glasp Talk #19
This is the eighteenth session of Glasp Talk!
Glasp Talk delves deep into intimate interviews with luminaries from various fields, unraveling their genuine emotions, experiences, and the stories behind them.
Today's guest is Michael Simmons, a renowned expert in the field of learning how to learn, serial entrepreneur, and 3x 7-figure education entrepreneur. Michael is also a bestselling author and respected contributor to prestigious publications such as Time, Fortune, and Harvard Business Review. With over 72,000 followers on Medium, he has empowered countless individuals through his insights and expertise.
In this interview, Michael shares his journey from being a curious teenager to becoming a leading voice in thought leadership and education. He discusses his early passion for learning, the significance of journaling, and the power of following one's curiosity. Michael also delves into his experiences writing for major publications, his meticulous research process, and the evolution of his writing career. Join us as we explore Michael Simmons' remarkable journey and his contributions to the world of learning and thought leadership.
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Transcripts
Glasp: Welcome back to another episode of GlaspTalk. We are very excited to have Michael Simmons, a renowned expert and thought leader in the field of learning how to learn. Michael is a serial entrepreneur, a three-time seven-figure education entrepreneur, a best-selling author, and a respected contributor to prestigious publications such as Time, Fortune, and Harvard Business Review. He’s also one of the top writers on Medium, with over 72,000 followers, which is really impressive. His work has empowered countless individuals to master the art of learning. He also leads the “Learning How to Learn” and “Mental Model” clubs. So today, we are very excited to dive into his insights and experiences. Thank you for joining us, Michael.
Michael: I'm really excited to be here and to be an interviewee on your podcast.
Glasp: Yes, thank you. First of all, you are a really famous writer, but we want to know what made you become a writer.
Michael: I feel like, just like we have an innate desire for curiosity as children, as we learn things, there's some sort of innate desire to express ourselves as well. At least that’s what I felt. When I was 16, I just became addicted to learning and the idea that I could buy a book and get years of people's experiences for $15. It was their most edited, most refined thoughts on a particular area. After doing that for a few years, I realized that a lot of my insights were different from what my peers were having, and that gave me a desire to want to share them with other people. When I was 19, I started journaling for an hour every day. I went to a creativity conference, and I was convinced about the power of journaling. I've really kept that up over the years, and I think that also helped with writing publicly.
Glasp: I see. And now you focus on learning how to learn or empowering other individuals to learn better—the art of learning. I'm curious, why did you choose that topic, or why were you intrigued by that topic in the early days?
Michael: Well, I think in some ways I'm surprised I didn't get to it sooner. I became really excited about learning in 1998, buying all these books and things like that. I did take a course on speed reading and things like that, but I didn't really become rigorous. I was like, "Okay, I'm reading hundreds, maybe thousands of books, but if I'm going to read so much in my lifetime, why wouldn't I actually learn how to learn better? Like, pick better books to read, memorize them, process them more deeply, and use them in my life?" So, I just saw it as one of the most valuable skills someone could learn.
Glasp: I see, and it leads to learning in public and that kind of topic and concept, I guess, eventually?
Michael: Yeah.
Glasp: And also, contributed to many major media publications like Fortune, Time, and Harvard Business Review. How did you get that job? Did you reach out to them, or did they offer you to write something? How did it happen?
Michael: I first wrote for them when I was in college. I wrote a little bit for Entrepreneur.comwere.com—they had a teen startup section. I did a few publications then, but in 2012, a friend of mine introduced me to Forbes. They were looking for people who were entrepreneurs or experts but not journalists to be writers. My writing did really well there, so that made it very easy to get into other publications. I think all the publications are looking for people who are credible, people who can write well, and who don’t need to edit much. They are looking for content that performs really well, so I was able to provide that. It’s like a lot of markets: on the one hand, it feels hard to get in, but on the other hand, it’s actually easy if you have what they’re looking for because they’re looking for how to get more great content.
Glasp: I see. So, what was your first publication? Was it Forbes?
Michael: Yeah, I wrote a little bit for other publications when I was younger, but I feel like this part of my writing career started at Forbes.
Glasp: Interesting. The first publication Forbes is pretty impressive, I think. So, at that time, were you writing on Medium as well?
Michael: I started writing on Medium in 2015 or 2016.
Glasp: Oh, okay, very late there. But you have over 72,000 followers on Medium. That’s very impressive. I've never seen someone who has that many followers. How did your audience grow over time? Did one of your posts go viral, or were you featured by someone?
Michael: I think Medium’s algorithm fits really well with the type of articles I wrote, which are heavily researched, and pretty long-form. Their algorithm was based on the time people spent reading it, and I spent a lot of time editing it. Each article took me on average over 60 hours. I spent time editing and creating really good titles, so it was enticing. Probably my average article out of all my Forbes or Medium articles is like 200,000 views or something like that. They just did well, and once people read one, then they would read other posts.
Glasp: I see. And was it growing exponentially or linearly in terms of subscribers or followers on Medium?
Michael: I’d say some articles did a lot more than others, but I feel like it’s pretty linear.
Glasp: And you mentioned that it takes around 60 hours to write one article, right?
Michael: Yeah.
Glasp: So, which part takes the most time—writing or preparing? For example, does researching take 30 hours or something? Is it editing or writing? Which part takes the most?
Michael: I spend the most time on the research. I chose a writing process that wasn’t necessarily the most efficient for how to publish the most, but it was focused on quality and on creating and sharing rare and valuable ideas that weren’t being shared anywhere else. It was also based on my curiosity, so even though 80% of my time was on research, that was also the reward for me—things that I was deeply curious about and wanted to learn more about.
Glasp: But at the same time, editing is an endless process, right? If you want to edit, you can edit forever. At some point, you need to publish. How do you decide if something is ready or not? Do you have peer reviewers or friends you ask to review? How does that work?
Michael: I’d say I’d ask for feedback, and I had a form to say, like, I forget the exact question, but "How much of a blockbuster do you think this is, from 10 out of 10 to 1 out of 10?" I liked to get the idea that people felt like this was really an eight or ten or higher. For me, I would ask, "Before I publish, is this a blockbuster?" It’s a really basic question, but it’s kind of just like a moment of honesty. Oftentimes, I found that I’d say, "Okay, it’s there, like I really want it to be done, but it’s not quite done." So, sometimes I’d have to rewrite huge parts of it, but just keeping a commitment to that level was important. Also, I’d ask, "Am I proud of what I’ve written here?" That was another criterion.
This year, I’m doing an experiment where Medium really changed their algorithm to make it more human-curated. The articles don’t do as well there, and that also made me want to write somewhere where I felt more in control of the algorithm. You build up a following, and then suddenly the algorithm changes. So, I’m now on Substack, and I’ve been testing doing it weekly. I’m putting a little bit less time into articles, but also because I’ve done so much research and so much practice writing, I’m able to create a pretty high-quality level. So, I’m kind of deciding if I still like that or not. It’s working in some respects, but in other respects, I do enjoy just deep diving into research and having a whole day of just going deep on research.
Glasp: And when you do research, how do you manage what you research? I mean, there are so many interesting ideas on the internet and in academic papers and so on. Do you collect ideas into Google Docs, Notion, or Pocket? Do you have some system?
Michael: I’ve used it a lot. I do have Notion that I use, but I’ve also found that a great structure is actually writing the articles in real-time. If you come across interesting research, create a draft and write the article. The article writing itself is actually a pretty awesome note-taking system because it forces you to go through all the steps you would take to write an article to teach other people. It’s also the steps you need to go through to teach it to yourself, so it’s kind of a win-win. By the time I’ve written an article, I really deeply understand the information and will probably remember it forever.
Glasp: I see. So, in your Medium and Substack articles, I see many great examples from past people. Where do you usually get ideas? What is the source of information or knowledge for your writing or personal learning?
Michael: I’d say it’s evolving. I went through a period where, in every area, I kind of had this realization just through reading books. One book is "The Halo Effect," where a lot of times people who are celebrated as experts are not experts. They might have gotten lucky on some level, been at the right time and right place, and then created an explanation for why they were successful. I also saw that there’s a difference in the level of success versus one level of success versus the top in all time. They might both be technically successful, but they have fundamentally different approaches. So, I developed very fine criteria for people who are true experts at the top of their craft, and I found that really valuable.
Then, I hit a little bit of a plateau with that methodology. On a personal level, I felt like a lot of the people I was studying were very successful in their careers on metrics that could be easily measured, like book sales or net worth or something like that. But as they got older, and as my kids have gotten older, I’m also interested in exploring my own intuition and tapping into that more as a source of knowledge. I also want to learn from people who are a little bit more well-rounded. Oftentimes, for somebody to become world-class at something, they’re just very myopically focused on that one thing, and they make sacrifices in other areas of their life. I was finding that I really value holistic parts—like when it comes down to it, I don’t really need a billion dollars or desire to be on a list of most prestigious people. So, I’ve been reinventing my writing as well more recently.
Glasp: I see. To reinvent your writing and for personal growth, do you do book clubs with some people? Because recently, I saw the interview with you and [another individual], and I didn’t know you guys were friends. You have really great writers as friends. Do you exchange ideas or do book clubs together?
Michael: I don’t really do book clubs, but I have a pretty wide network of people who are just really passionate about learning and growing as individuals. I kind of know what different people are into. One person might be a very successful entrepreneur or investor; another person might be into AI; another person might be a fellow writer. So, I love having a network of people such that anything I’m curious about and really excited to share, there’s somebody interested in it. And then, vice versa, I love listening to what other people are learning in those areas as well. So, not a book club, but it’s, I guess, an idea club.
Glasp: I see. But how do you reach out? Are they your existing friends, or do you reach out to professionals to learn from them?
Michael: It’s a combination. You feel like you’ve had a good conversation with someone and rapport. Oftentimes, it’s like, "Okay, we’ll connect in a year or something like that," and then you just follow up. In those situations, sometimes I’ll say, "Hey, I love learning and sharing ideas. Do you ever do voice notes? Would you be interested in exchanging info and just seeing how it works?" Most people say yes because the people I ask are pretty selective, where there’s some rapport. Some people already love notes, and for others, it’s new. But that’s how it evolves.
Glasp: I think you're following your curiosity to learn something new and expanding your knowledge and interests in topics you want to follow, right? But I think many people are struggling with following their curiosity, learning a new topic, and so on. Do you have some advice on how they can overcome this struggle? How can they cultivate their curiosity and knowledge?
Michael: I think curiosity is this innate sense that we have—like we’re kind of born learning machines. Oftentimes, we shut it down because it’s not directly on the path to the goals that we have. Over time, studying and learning, I’ve become more and more convinced that curiosity is maybe one of the most fundamental hacks. The more we invest in our curiosity, the better we can get at understanding, the better we can get at refining our taste, and noticing how different things trigger our curiosity. Then, building the muscle of, if we’re curious about something, if we have a question about it, actually looking for the answer to it in any area of our life.
When we’re curious, number one, it gives us a compass. Oftentimes, there’s something—it's not just some random sense that we’re curious about random things. There’s something interesting about it, so we have this ability to notice things that are interesting. I always find that when there’s a deep curiosity, there’s always something profound at the end of it, guiding it. Curiosity is also a source of motivation. When you’re deeply curious about something, you could do it for five hours, and then you have more energy than when you started, or for 10 hours. So, it provides direction and more energy. The energy is contagious when you’re really curious about something. It makes you a more effective communicator and teacher of that idea. It’s just more fun to feel curiosity than to feel like, "Okay, I’ve got to go through my to-do list, and parts of it I don’t really want to, but I have to because it leads to the goal." I’m not saying that discipline isn’t important—I just think it’s more fun to explore one’s own curiosity.
We all have unique curiosity, so the more we follow our curiosity, the more unique we become. In a world where there are millions of people creating content, being unique in a way that’s authentic to you is fundamental. Then there’s also research that when we’re curious about something, we just memorize the information way better. It’s so simple—it’s one of those things sitting right in front of us. Everyone’s heard about the power of being curious about the world, but it’s one of those very simple things that if we give ourselves permission to, a lot of the learning things we want to develop happen just automatically without even trying.
Glasp: And also, I love how you empower people with "Month to Master," where you teach people to learn something and also to teach others. It’s a form of learning by teaching, and I love that concept.
Michael: Yeah, I think one of the best ways to learn is ironically by studying all these learning techniques and then writing about them. I found that I learned the most through the writing process itself. The writing process was an incredible learning engine and forcing function. It’s a way for me to get paid to follow my curiosity, and it allows my curiosity to evolve in 60-hour increments basically, rather than five-year increments or something where it’s like, "Okay, I’m starting a company, but it’s hard to be curious about other things that don’t directly help the company unless you set aside extra time." So, I love the idea of a lifestyle business where it’s my job to follow my curiosity.
Glasp: Interesting. Maybe this is a redundant question, but what do you think kills curiosity? Because I believe curiosity is important, and it’s beautiful to follow one’s curiosity, but not many people are following their curiosity because it’s probably shut down. As you mentioned, they’re probably not curious. So, what kind of advice do you give to people who don’t dare to follow their curiosity?
Michael: I read a book when I was in high school called How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci, and I think it still holds up. It has a workbook as well. I remember one of the things it talks about is how Leonardo was the kind of person who would just ask, "Why are the clouds blue?" or something that everyone sees every day but might not understand. Why is the sky blue? There are just so many things right around us that we don’t understand. Sometimes even being curious about the small things—the curious things. Or if somebody’s talking and they say something, and you kind of understand it, but you don’t really understand it, ask a follow-up like, "What did you mean?" I try to practice that. There are a lot of times I don’t really understand what the person is saying, but I just don’t want to break rapport.
In that book, there’s an activity where you ask yourself 100 questions stream-of-consciousness, and that was an awesome activity because it really forces you to go into your subconscious mind. You start listing questions and notice themes around topics. Then, you narrow it down from 100 questions to several themes, and you can pick one to deep dive on.
Glasp: That makes sense. At the same time, as a writer, and in life, people have ups and downs. I know that having long-term thinking helps us because adding small things leads to bigger things eventually. But do you have some technique or mental model to manage your ups and downs as a writer?
Michael: You mean the emotional part of the ups and downs?
Glasp: Yeah, I think so. Or do you have emotional ups and downs?
Michael: I definitely have lots of emotional variance, but I don’t know if I track it in my head as ups and downs. I feel like during the writing process, sometimes I get bored on a topic after I’ve researched a lot, or there’s a lack of clarity or confusion, or I’m not sure if it’s going to succeed or how it’s going to come across. I also feel like those difficult emotions are often doorways to the most learning. So, if you’re going through something that’s confusing, that means you’re stretching yourself—your models of how the world works. It’s actually a good thing. I think it’s also about how it’s framed as well.
Glasp: Nice. Going back to the previous question, how do you choose the idea to write next? There are a lot of ideas to write on, and you’re researching many ideas. How do you choose the one?
Michael: The simplest way is I try to find the most interesting one to me. It gets hard in the sense that often what’s interesting is novel—something I don’t already know. But it’s something I can know; it’s not like I have to research it for thousands of hours. It’s this ripe zone. It gets harder because, in some ways, the more you learn, the harder it is to find novelty. Somebody who’s just born—everything is novel. So, you actually need more and more skills to find novelty. I think that’s part of the fun as well—can I find something as I get older, as I turn 30, 40, 50, and not feel like, "Okay, I’ve figured everything out," but how do I look for the things that will blow my mind?
At the same time, I’m not completely writing about everything. I’m also thinking about what’s going to resonate really well, what’s in the topic of my newsletter. I purposely chose a very broad topic, which is thought leadership. Within thought leadership is learning, following your curiosity, and self-expression—the things that I’ve been most passionate about for the longest can fit inside that container.
Glasp: Interesting. Following curiosity, so being interested in something, you can know more about it.
Michael: Exactly.
Glasp: This might be a common question, but people learn something new, like productivity tips or mental models. Applying those techniques in real life is pretty difficult. You learn a technique and apply it today, but tomorrow you forget it. Is there a way or technique to help people apply what they learn on a daily basis?
Michael: Well, one that’s widely known is the more you use an idea, the more you remember it. I particularly like knowledge that feels underrated as a category—knowledge that will be true forever, that’s kind of like core mental models that you use often. That way, you’re constantly using it. It’s different than just "in case" knowledge, where you’re learning something that you may have a 10% chance of using in 10 years. That kind of knowledge you’re less likely to remember. But there are a lot of things we do every day around prioritizing, following habits, learning, decision-making, communicating with people—there’s just evergreen knowledge. People could spend years just on that type of knowledge, and that knowledge is also really valuable because it lasts. If you want to compound your knowledge, it’s hard to compound your knowledge if all your knowledge is getting outdated. If the main way of learning about something is reading industry news, that’s outdated within a month. Over time, you look back and realize you’ve moved out of that company, and you have a lot less knowledge than it might feel like because you’ve been reading the industry news every day, so it feels like you have a lot of knowledge. What I love about evergreen knowledge is that it puts you in a different world.
Glasp: It’s called the Lindy effect, right? Something that lasts.
Michael: Yeah, Lindy knowledge. But I write and teach, so that’s how I remember. I don’t personally do well with systems like spaced repetition where I need to look at a note card. I feel like if I’m just designing my lifestyle such that as I learn ideas, I’m sharing them with other people—like my voice messages. The really important ideas to me, that I’m deeply curious about, my mind is trying to figure out. I’m thinking about it in my sleep, and then I spend hours rewriting it, thinking about it, finding metaphors, visuals, and examples. That helps it go down. I like those kinds of naturalistic approaches. There are so many things we do well automatically, where sometimes we create all these time management systems, discipline systems, and learning systems that are laborious to actually follow through in day-to-day life. If we focus on what works naturally, it doesn’t have to be that way.
Glasp: I see. I’ve been following you on Glasp, and thank you for sharing interesting quotes and ideas. Just as a user, I’m curious—what do you use Glasp for? Capturing some ideas and highlights? But I think you don’t highlight and capture everything you learn, right? Do you have some criteria?
Michael: I love that whenever I’m reading an article, it’s always there, so I see the highlighter menu multiple times. Sometimes I feel like there’s a quote, and I can put it in an article that I’m working on, so I might move it there, and therefore I probably wouldn’t Glasp it. But if I come across something really interesting that I want to remember but I don’t really have somewhere where it fits well, I’d say that’s when I Glasp it. I also like that it’s just natively there, so it’s really quick to do.
Glasp: Thank you so much. I was always curious about your highlights and the context behind them.
Michael: Yeah, I’m so glad to know that. Thank you.
Glasp: In addition to that, do you look back at your profile on Glasp? How does it work? You capture it, but do you automatically forward it to Notion, for example?
Michael: I should review it more often, but I feel like it feels good knowing it’s there. Then, if I need to be like, "Okay, I read this article," I’ll go back and find the exact quotes when I need them.
Glasp: Oh, when you need it. And it’s really impressive that you have around 700 followers on Glasp. I didn’t realize that. We hope people are learning from your quotes and your learning process.
Michael: Thank you for that.
Glasp: You said you’re learning many topics, but what are you currently interested in or following? Do you have certain topics you’re learning today?
Michael: I’m very interested in augmentation, for lack of a better container word. AI is obviously a huge shift that’s going to be unfolding over decades, and a lot of the focus on it is with automation—like what workflows can we give to AI? I 100% see the power of that. Improving your workflows, allows you to really expand what you’re doing, and focus on the things you love. But it’s one of those things where I feel like I should be more interested in it, but I’m not. What I am really interested in is human potential—what can we as humans do? It just strikes me that as we gain tools, what we can do expands. I love exploring that. How can AI impact our intelligence, our empathy, our learning, or even our awakening in spiritual terms? I just find that there aren’t a lot of people thinking about it that way. So, I feel like it’s a hole I can fill. Maybe it won’t matter in the end because we build artificial superintelligence that’s way smarter than humanity combined, where every minute of its time is like thousands of years of our time. I don’t know what to do in that case anyway, but it’s something that no matter what, I’ll benefit from, not just on a business level, but just on an experiential human level, and I’ll be able to share that with others. In my newsletter, Blockbuster Blueprint, we’re doing an augmented intelligence class where every week I share different prompts for how we can use AI to augment our intelligence.
Glasp: Have you found any interesting prompts or interactions through that process so far, or through figuring out?
Michael: Yeah, definitely. I’ve built all these mental models of how learning works, so I have a very fine understanding of step-by-step. It allows me to think, "Okay, we’re looking for knowledge; how could we be better there?" The last session we did was on breakthrough knowledge. We’ve all had the experience of reading a book that changed our life or having a conversation that changed our life. There’s knowledge out there—it’s like a needle in the haystack—that right now is ripe for us, that if we read it, it would actually really transform our lives. But it’s pretty hard to find that because most of the time we go through bestseller lists or recommendations from friends or book lists, which can be helpful. But breakthrough knowledge is also customized to where we are in life. That’s one of the most recent bots I’ve been exploring—one that introduces novelty in books that you wouldn’t have thought of otherwise.
Glasp: Oh, that’s very interesting. Do you use AI like ChatGPT for other use cases in your workflow or with your class?
Michael: Yeah, I try to use it as much as I can. I’m just even exploring what are the most helpful things it can do and practicing interacting with it, asking prompts, and things like that.
Glasp: I see. I think our audience consists of aspiring writers, thought leaders, and entrepreneurs. They are seeking knowledge and want to know how to learn how to learn, and to become like you. Do you have some advice for them on where to begin? What kind of mental model or ideas should they have in mind?
Michael: I can only share my experience, so it’s not going to be necessarily helpful for other people. I’m 42 now, and I think when I was in my 20s, I was in super achiever mode like I wanted to build a billion-dollar business, impact a billion people, and was very goal-focused. I think there are a lot of benefits to that stage of my life, and it was also incredibly restrictive in ways I couldn’t really understand at the time. A really great book that changed my life was Why Greatness Cannot Be Planned by two AI researchers. Thinking about how deep to go, and realizing that there was a paradigm beyond goal setting, drastically increased the quality of my life and led to more success and reach.
Glasp: Thank you for the advice. Also, Glasp is a platform where people can leave what they’re reading and learning as a digital legacy. People are accumulating their legacy and knowledge. As a writer and entrepreneur, what kind of legacy or impact do you want to leave behind for future generations?
Michael: Actually, before I answer that, I just want to close the loop. I kind of mentioned the book, so just to communicate the ideas more clearly. One, I think goal setting has its place, but a lot of times we don’t realize the downsides of it. It just sounds so obvious that goal setting would just be a positive. But let’s say we set a five-year goal to do something. We say, "Okay, to accomplish that five-year goal, I need to set a two-year goal, then a one-year goal that leads to that, then quarterly goals, then today’s task." We add accountability on whatever the key tasks are that lead to the quarterly goal and things that are outside of that are typically viewed as distractions. You measure your progress by, "Am I moving closer to this five-year goal? Does this task help me move closer or not? Is it the best path to moving closer?" In the book, they talk about how goal setting can work really well in a context where you know all the steps to your goal, and you just need to follow them. But in a lot of areas of entrepreneurship or even creativity and innovation, we have this big goal, and we actually don’t know the steps. Sometimes the most direct path isn’t the best path. Let’s say you want to become a millionaire. If you just take the highest-paying job at each step, that’s probably not the best path. Maybe it’s better to do a free internship with someone where you’re going to gain all this knowledge and skills that will help you earn more money later. Or, if you’re in high school, choosing the highest close-to-minimum-wage job may not be the best use of time compared to learning more. But you could expand this to so many different areas.
That’s number one. Number two, anytime you focus on one thing deeply, you don’t focus on lots of other things. Life, in every moment, has multiple parts of each of us. Parts of us are feeling different ways, things we’re saying, things we’re not saying, the context of this moment. Right now, we’re in a podcast interview, but we’ve talked before, and who knows, there could be collaboration down the line. I’m visiting you guys in San Francisco—maybe next time I’m there, we’ll catch up. It’s hard to know where anything goes. There are also moments that come up during the day where there are learning opportunities, like something didn’t sit well with us emotionally, and sometimes there’s an urge to say, "Okay, I’m not going to deal with that because I need to get through my to-do list," or in a relationship, "I’m not going to value this work because it’s not related to this immediate goal." It strikes me that life is really complex—there are all these variables we want to optimize over time. Some of it’s intuitive, it just happens automatically. When we set one goal, we do increase our chances of getting there, but we miss moments of serendipity or learning opportunities that, in the moment, don’t seem important but could be really helpful in other areas—maybe your marriage, children, conflict resolution. Who we are is constantly changing. How old are you guys?
Glasp: I’m 32. And I'm 30.
Michael: It’s hard to predict how much we will change in the future at a fundamental level—not just, "I’m going to like the color blue," but fundamentally, our values, curiosities, and beliefs about the world evolve. There’s something called the "End of History Illusion" from Daniel Gilbert, where they surveyed people about how much they think they’re going to change and how much they actually change. People drastically underestimate how much they’re going to change. Therefore, when we’re setting goals, we’re kind of saying, "This is important to me now, and it’s going to be important to me in five or ten years for my future self." I don’t know if you’ve ever had this, but I’ve had this where I set a big goal in the past, and my future self almost feels constrained by it, or even like a failure if I don’t live up to the past goals. So, we keep focusing on the goal rather than the part of ourselves that’s emerging—new interests, curiosities, things we want to do, people we want to connect with. But because it’s not related to the goal, we shut down some of our own personal growth and evolve more slowly in life. So, it’s a pretty large cost. Those are some reasons why I think the goal paradigm is powerful but often overused and has consequences that people don’t realize.
Glasp: I totally relate to that and agree with that. Thank you for all the advice, and insights, and for sharing your experience with us. We learned a lot. How can our audience follow you if they’re interested in your course and newsletter?
Michael: Just to go back real quick to your question about legacy. I feel like I’m answering questions off the seat of the moment, and I might disagree with myself tomorrow, but I feel like we’re forming a legacy in every second in ways that we’ll never really see or understand. There’s the legacy of having one accomplishment, but also companies come and go pretty rapidly, and more and more rapidly. I feel like if you have kids and they survive, they have kids, that’s probably the easiest way that everyone has a huge impact on the future because it goes throughout time into the future for however long humans are alive. They have kids, and so there’s that. Or if I have knowledge that can last 50 years, that can be it. But I also feel like we are constantly having an impact on everything we interact with. It’s easy to underestimate that because it’s so small, moment to moment, and we can’t see it. I feel like focusing on how we evolve and show up differently in the world automatically creates changes as well.
To answer your question about the best places to follow me, I have a newsletter called Blockbuster Blueprint where I share more on doing thought leadership in a way where you’re constantly learning, and it’s a process that sparks your curiosity but also can build a significant business. I also recently started something called Substack Campfire, so if you’re interested in Substack, it’s a great place as well. We do 30-day note-writing challenges to practice getting into the habit of consistently sharing your personal story through Substack.
Glasp: Thank you. Before we end this, I’d like to bring up the quote you shared with us: "Sharing your knowledge is a way to achieve immortality." Your talk reminded me of that. Thank you so much for joining today.
Michael: Thank you, guys. I really appreciate your energy and all the conversations we’ve had over the years. Congratulations on your success. I think both of you are incredibly genuine people, and that really comes across in all your interactions. I look forward to more conversations in the future.
Glasp: Thank you so much.
Michael: Thank you, guys.
