Tools of Titans: The Tactics, Routines, and Habits of Billionaires, Icons, and World-Class Performers

by Timothy Ferriss

flashbacks and lowers symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder.”

G4M3RS: A Documentary (can be found for free on YouTube) The King of Kong

Any useful statement about the future should at first seem ridiculous’ by Jim Dator.

‘When it comes to the future, it’s far more important to be imaginative than to be right’ by Alvin Toffler.

These quotes remind me that world-changing ideas will seem absurd to most people, and that the most useful work I can be doing is to push the envelope of what is considered possible. If what I’m doing sounds reasonable to most people, then I’...

“That you should never publicly criticize anyone or anything unless it is a matter of morals or ethics. Anything negative you say could at the very least ruin someone’s day, or worse, break someone’s heart, or simply change someone from being

a future ally of yours to someone who will never forget that you were unkind or unfairly critical. It’s so common today to complain or criticize others’ work on social media, or dogpile on someone for a perceived offense. I won’t do it. It’s not my job to be the world’s critic, and I’d rather not rule out any future allies.”

‘What do you think about that really gets you excited?’

Since 2008, Adam has hosted a party for diverse friends of his (usually 40 to 80 people) the first Friday of every month, called First Friday. He has vetted every type of alcohol imaginable for these events, and his current favorite is rye whiskey. His recommendation in our conversation was Whistle Pig rye. “Ryes are an interesting whiskey because they really were the dominant form of American whiskey pre-Prohibition, because the industry was more northern—Pennsylvania, Vermont, New York, etc.—where rye did really well. And then, with Prohibition and the move south with corn, bourbon exploded, which is still, by far, dominant. But rye is coming back, and I love it.”

“I would say to have no fear. I mean, you’ve got one chance here to do amazing things, and being afraid of being wrong or making a mistake or fumbling is just not how you do something of impact. You just have to be fearless.”

“I want to do fundamental breakthroughs, if possible. If you have that mindset, if that’s how you challenge yourself, that that’s what you want to do with your life, with your small amount of time that you have here to make a difference, then the only way to do it is to do the type of research that other people would think of as risky or even foolhardy. That’s just part of the game.”

Honey + ACV: My go-to tranquilizer beverage is simple: 2 tablespoons of apple cider vinegar (I use Bragg brand) and 1 tablespoon honey, stirred into 1 cup of hot water. This was taught to me by the late and great Seth Roberts, PhD. Some of his readers also noticed large and immediate strength improvements in exercise after a few days of using this pre-bed cocktail. Yogi Soothing Caramel Bedtime Tea: If you’re trying to avoid sugar (honey), this is an alternative. The packaging of this tea is targeted toward women to a comical degree. I recall dismissing it when an ex-girlfriend first offered me some, thinking it was for menstrual cramps. A few nights later, little Timmy found himself alone craving a hot beverage with flavor. I grabbed the caramel, let it brew for 5 minutes, and polished it off. 10 minutes later, I start getting wobbly, and then I felt like Leonardo DiCaprio in the pay phone scene from The Wolf of Wall Street. In the most awkward fashion possible, I dragged my ass to the bedroom and fell asleep. It was around 9 p.m. Note: This tea appears to affect only 30% of my readers this way. California Poppy Extract: If both honey + ACV and Yogi Bedtime Tea fail, try plan C: a few drops of California poppy extract in warm water. Yogi Bedtime Tea does contain California poppy extract, but taking it directly allows you to increase the dose.

“Visual overwriting” is what I do right before bed to crowd out anything replaying or looping in my mind that will inhibit sleep (e.g., email, to-do lists, an argument, “I should have said . . .”). Here are two specific tools that I’ve found effective: 10 minutes of Tetris before bed: This recommendation is from Jane McGonigal, PhD (page 132). The free version works fine. OR Short and uplifting episodic television: I’ll offer just one recommendation here: Escape to River Cottage, Season One. I’ve watched this series multiple times. If you’ve ever fantasized about saying “Fuck it,” quitting your job, and going back to the land, buy this as a present for yourself. If you’ve ever dreamed of getting out of the city and moving to Montana or God-knows-where rural Utopia, procuring your own food and so on, then this is your Scooby snack. It’s endearingly retro, like a warm quilt from Mom, and host/chef Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall will make you want to grow tomatoes, even if you hate tomatoes. And catch eels, too. Don’t forget the eels.

Life is also unpredictable. There are many unexpected problems that will pop up, and I’ve found that two things help me sail choppy water during the day. Both are done in the morning: A) read a few pages of stoicism, like Marcus Aurelius’s Meditations, and B) control at least a few things you can control. I’ll elaborate.

First, for A, here is one Marcus Aurelius quote on my refrigerator that often does the trick (bolding mine): “When you wake up in the morning, tell yourself: The people I deal with today will be meddling, ungrateful, arrogant, dishonest, jealous, and surly. They are like this because they can’t tell good from evil. But I have seen the beauty of good, and the ugliness of evil, and have recognized that the wrongdoer has a nature related to my own—not of the same blood or birth, but the same mind, and possessing a share of the divine. And so none of them can hurt me.” (For more on stoicism, see page 474.) Now, B) control what you can control. No matter how shitty your day is, no matter how catastrophic it might become, you can make your bed. And that gives you the feeling, at least it gives me the feeling, even in a disastrous day, that I’ve held on to the cliff ledge by a fingernail and I haven’t fallen. There is at least one thing I’ve controlled, there is something that has maintained one hand on the driver’s wheel of life. At the end of the day, the last experience you have is coming back to something that you’ve accomplished. It’s hard for me to overstate how important this ritual has become, but number one: Make your bed.

To be answered in the morning: I am grateful for . . . 1. __________ 2. __________ 3. __________ What would make today great? 1. __________ 2. __________ 3. __________ Daily affirmations. I am . . . 1. __________ 2. __________ 3. __________

To be filled in at night: 3 amazing things that happened today . . . 1. __________ 2. __________ 3. __________ (This is similar to Peter Diamandis’s “three wins” practice; see page 373.) How could I have made today better? 1. __________ 2. __________ 3. __________

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“We do not rise to the level of our expectations. We fall to the level of our training.” —Archilochus

“cultivating a present-state awareness that helps you to be nonreactive.”

meditation simply helps you channel drive toward the few things that matter, rather than every moving target and imaginary opponent that pops up.

As Tara Brach pointed out to me, the muscle you’re working is bringing your attention back to something. My sessions are 99% monkey mind, but it’s the other 1% that matters. If you’re getting frustrated, your

standards are too high or your sessions are too long.

(Tech nerd side note: Momentum extension for Chrome is also very helpful.)

“Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I’ll spend the first four sharpening the axe.” —Abraham Lincoln

We suggest finding a “mindfulness buddy” and committing to a 15-minute conversation every week, covering at least these two topics: a. How am I doing with my commitment to my practice? b. What has arisen in my life that relates to my practice? We also suggest ending the conversation with the question, “How did this conversation go?”

With “Just Note Gone” we train the mind to notice that something previously experienced is no more. For example, at the end of a breath, notice that the breath is over. Gone. As a sound fades away, notice when it is over. Gone. At the end of a thought, notice that the thought is over. Gone. At the end of an experience of emotion—joy, anger, sadness, or anything else—notice it is over. Gone.

Suppose you had to go through some horrible experience that involved physical pain, emotional distress, mental confusion, and perceptual disorientation all at once. Where could you turn for safety? Where could you turn for comfort? Where could you turn for meaning? Turning toward your body won’t help. There’s nothing but pain and fear there. Turning toward your mind won’t help. There’s nothing but confusion and uncertainty there. Turning toward sight and sound won’t help. There’s nothing but turmoil and chaos there. Under such extreme duress, is there anywhere you could turn to find relief? Yes. You could concentrate intently on the fact that each sensory insult passes. In other words, you could reverse the normal habit of turning to each new arising and instead turn to each new passing. Micro-relief is constantly available.

If the pursuit of excellence was easy, everyone would do it. In fact, this impatience in dealing with frustration is the primary reason that most people fail to achieve their goals. Unreasonable expectations timewise, resulting in unnecessary frustration, due to a perceived feeling of failure. Achieving the extraordinary is not a linear process.

The secret is to show up, do the work, and go home. A blue collar work ethic married to indomitable will. It is literally that simple. Nothing interferes. Nothing can sway you from your purpose. Once the decision is made, simply refuse to budge. Refuse to compromise.

And accept that quality long-term results require quality long-term focus. No emotion. No drama. No beating yourself up over small bumps in the road. Learn to enjoy and appreciate the process. This is especially important because you are going to spend far more time on the actual journey than with those all too brief moments of triumph at the end. Certainly celebrate the moments of triumph when they occur. More importantly, learn from defeats when they happen. In fact, if you are not encountering defeat on a fairly regular basi...

If the commitment is to a long-term goal and not to a series of smaller intermediate goals, then only one decision needs to be made and adhered to. Clear, simple, straightforward. Much easier to maintain than having to make small decision after small decision to stay the course when dealing with each step along the way. This provides far too many opportunities to inadvertently...

“If you set your goals ridiculously high and it’s a failure, you will fail above everyone else’s success.” —James Cameron

“If you find yourself in a fair fight, you didn’t plan your mission properly.” —Colonel David Hackworth

“Not my circus. Not my monkeys.” —P...

“It may be lucky, but it’s not an accident.”

“I wanted to go on offense. I wanted to have the time to focus, to learn the things I wanted to learn, to build what I wanted to build, and to really invest in relationships that I wanted to grow, rather than just doing a day of coffee after coffee after coffee.”

TF: He no longer felt compelled to take meetings he didn’t want. There were no more early-morning coffee dates and late-night social dinners he didn’t want to attend. Rather, Chris invited specific founders to spend weekends at “the jam pad” and “the jam tub” (the hot tub outside). He considers the cabin the best investment he’s ever made: “Everyone loves coming to the mountains. Over the years, that’s helped me build lasting friendships. Some of those have been the catalysts for my investments in Uber, Twitter, and others. I’ve even had a body-hacking, grill-manning, best-selling author stay there a few times. [TF: I also embarrassed myself with Euro-style Speedos.] I borrow the cash for a 3-bedroom house and get a lifetime’s worth of pals and a hugely successful business in return? Best trade ever.” Chris elaborates: “Generally, what all of this comes down to is whether you are on offense or defense. I think that as you survey the challenges in your lives, it’s just: Which of those did you assign yourself, and which of those are you doing to please someone else? Your inbox is a to-do list to which anyone in the world can add an action item. I needed to get out of my inbox and back to my own to-do list.”

TIM: “If working in a startup environment, what should one do or focus on to learn and improve as much as possible?” CHRIS: “Go to all the meetings you can, even if you’re not invited to them, and figure out how to be helpful. If people wonder why you’re there, just start taking notes. Read all the other notes you can find on the company, and gain a general knowledge that your very limited job function may not offer you. Just make yourself useful and helpful by doing so. That’s worked for me in a few different environments, and I encourage you to try it.”

A shirt might seem like a small thing, but Chris realized early on that being a successful investor isn’t simply knowing which companies to invest in. Part of the process is ensuring founders know who you are. If a single shirt can create seemingly unending media mentions and doesn’t hurt your reputation, it’s low-hanging fruit. On top of that: “It also saved me a lot of time thinking about what to wear and a lot of money that would’ve been wasted on suits.”

“I had a phrase I kept repeating in my head over and over again, which was, ‘Tonight, I will be in my bed. Tonight, I will be in my bed. Tonight, I will be in my bed.’ . . . It was something I repeated to remind me that the pain of what I was going through was temporary and that, no matter what, at the end of that day, I would be in my bed that night.”

“Experience often deeply embeds the assumptions that need to be questioned in the first place.

Empathy Isn’t Just Good for Life, It’s Good for Business “As a builder, as an entrepreneur, how can you create something for someone else if you don’t have even enough glancing familiarity with them to imagine the world through their eyes?”

“Good Stories Always Beat Good Spreadsheets” “Whether you are raising money, pitching your product to customers, selling the company, or recruiting employees, never forget that underneath all the math and the MBA bullshit talk, we are all still emotionally driven human beings. We want to attach ourselves to narratives. We don’t act because of equations. We follow our beliefs. We get behind leaders who stir our feelings. In the early days of your venture, if you find someone diving too deep into the numbers, that means they are struggling to find a reason to deeply care about you.”

your unapologetically weird self. I think authenticity is one of the most lacking things out there these days.”

“Weirdness is why we adore our friends. . . . Weirdness is what bonds us to our colleagues. Weirdness is what sets us apart, gets us hired. Be your unapologetically weird self. In fact, being weird may even find you the ultimate happiness.”

“Raise Prices” This was Marc’s response to “If you could have a billboard anywhere, what would it say?”

“The number-one theme that companies have when they really struggle is they are not charging enough for their product. It has become conventional wisdom in Silicon Valley that the way to succeed is to price your product as low as possible, under the theory that if it’s low-priced, everybody can buy it,

and that’s how you get to volume,” he said. “And we just see over and over and over again people failing with that, because they get into a problem called ‘too hungry to eat.’ They don’t charge enough for their product to be able to afford the sales and marketing required to actually get anybody to buy it. Is your product any good if people won’t pay more for it?”

Don’t Fetishize Failure “I’m old-fashioned. Where I come from, people like to succeed. . . . When I was a founder, when I first started out, we didn’t have the word ‘pivot.’ We didn’t have a fancy word for it. We just called it a fuck-up. “We do see companies that, literally, every time we meet them, they’ve pivoted. Every time, they’re off to something new, and it’s like watching a rabbit go through a maze or something. They’re never going to c...