Optimal mental this altitude I can run flat out for a half mile before my hands start shaking and oils with us with questions, but Nettie walking distance living tissue over metal endoskeleton.
This episode is brought to you by PornHub. Just kidding. This episode is brought to you by 4 Sigma attic which is part of my morning routine. Also part of my afternoon routine routine saves me. So there are a number of ways that I use for Sig mattock in the mornings. I regularly start with their mushroom coffee instead of regular coffee and it doesn't taste like mushroom. Let me explain this. First of all zero sugar zero calories half the caffeine of regular coffee. It's easier.
Stomach taste amazing. And all you have to do is add hot water. I use travel packets. I've been to probably a dozen countries with various products from for somatic and their mushroom coffee is top of the list. That's number one. I travel with it. I recommend it. I give it to my employees. I give it two houseguests. So if you're one of the sixty percent of Americans or more who drink coffee daily consider switching it up this stuff is amazing.
That's part one. That is the cognitive enhancement side easy on the system side energizing side. The next is actually their chaga tea which tastes delicious. It is decaf completely decaf and some may recognize chaga. It is nicknamed the king of the mushrooms. It is excellent for immune system support. So needless to say I'm focused on that right now myself and so I will often have that in the afternoons.
They make all sorts of different mushroom Blends. If you are doing exercises, I am on a daily basis to keep myself sane cordyceps, excellent for endurance. They have a whole slew of options that you can check out. Every single batch is third party lab tested for heavy metals allergens all the bad stuff to make sure that what gets into your hands is what you want to put in your mouth and they always offer a 100% money back guarantee. So you can try it risk-free why not? I've worked out an exclusive offer with for stigmatic on their best-selling.
Lion's mane coffee. I literally have a mug full of it in front of me right now. And this is just for you my dear podcast listeners receive up to 39 percent off. I don't know how we arrived at 39 percent but 39 percent off its a lot their best-selling lion's mane coffee bundles to claim this deal. You must go to for Sig Matic.com Tim. This offer is only for you and is not available on their regular website go to for Sig Matic. That's fo you are SI G. M-- atic.com Tim.
Get yourself some awesome and delicious mushroom coffee full discount is applied at check out.
This episode is brought to you by element spelled LMN t What on earth is element? It is a delicious sugar-free electrolyte. Drink mix. I've stocked up on boxes and boxes of this was one of the first things that I bought when I saw covid coming down the pike and I usually use one to two per day element is formulated to help anyone with their electrolyte needs and perfectly suited to folks following a keto low carb or paleo diet or if you drink a ton of water and you might not have the right balance that's
When I drink it or if you're doing any type of endurance exercise mountain biking Etc another application, if you've ever struggled to feel good on keto low carb paleo, it's most likely because even if you're consciously consuming electrolytes, you're just not getting enough and it relates to a bunch of stuff like a hormone called aldosterone blah blah blah when insulin is low, but suffice to say this is where element against build LMN T can help. My favorite flavor by far is Citrus salt, which is a side note. You can also use to make a
a kick-ass no sugar Margarita, but for special occasions, obviously, you're probably already familiar with one of the names behind it. Rob wolf are obb. Rob wolf who is a former research biochemist and two-time New York Times bestselling author of The Paleo Solution and wired to eat Rob created element by scratching his own itch. That's how it got started his Brazilian jiu-jitsu coach has turned him onto electrolytes as a performance enhancer thinks clicked and Bam company was born so if you're on a low carb diet,
Or fasting electrolytes play a key role in relieving hunger cramps headaches tiredness and dizziness sugar artificial ingredients colouring all that's garbage unneeded. There's none of that in element and a lot of names you might recognize are already using element is recommend to be by one of my favorite athlete friends three Navy SEAL Teams as prescribed by their Master Chief Marine units FBI sniper teams, at least five NFL teams who have subscriptions. They are the exclusive hydration partner to Team USA.
Weightlifting and on and on you can try it risk-free. If you don't like it element will give you your money back. No questions asked they have extremely low return rates. So again element Element e came up with a very special offer for you guys. They've created Tim's Club just go to drink element.com Tim select subscribe and save and use promo code. Tim's Club to get the 30 count box of element for only $36. This will be valid for the lifetime of the subscription and you can pause at any time. So again,
Check it out its drink LMN T.com Tim for this exclusive offer using promo code Tim's Club One More Time drink LMN T element. So drink LMN t.com, Tim and promo code Tim's Club. Check it out.
Hello boys and girls, ladies and germs, this is Tim Ferriss and welcome to another episode of the Tim Ferriss show where it is my job to interview world-class performers from all different disciplines. And my guest today is Mike novogratz Michael novogratz at novogratz. That's a novio GR8 easy on Twitter is the founder and CEO of galaxies digital Galaxy Digital Dot IO, he was formerly a partner and president of Fortress Investment Group LLC prior to Fortress. Mr. Novigrad, spent 11 years at Goldman Sachs where he was elected partner.
298 Miss turnover got served on the New York Federal reserve's investment advisory committee on financial markets from 2012 to 2015. Mike also serves as the chairman of the bail project and has made Criminal Justice Reform a focus of his family's Foundation. He serves as the chairman of Hudson River Park friends and sits on the boards of NYU langone from getting that correct Medical Center and Princeton Varsity Club, Jazz Foundation of America and artists for peace and Justice. Mr. No grass received in a b and economics from
In University and served as a helicopter pilot in the US Army Mike welcome to the show
and thanks a lot Tim
and this has been a long time coming. I'm excited to have you on the show. You have so many stories. You have an unvarnished personality and you have just a such a medley of experience that I'm glad that we were finally able to get on the phone to record this for public consumption. So thanks for making the
time.
Now I'm excited. Sometimes feel like we were separated at Birth me and you
yeah, we got yeah, we have Long Island who have Princeton we have wrestling as you put it a little bit crazy psychedelics meditation crypto. The list is long and I thought we could start with a place that might seem like a total non sequitur, but I have to ask I was in preparation for this conversation reading a really nicely done profile in the New Yorker written by Gary Stein guard and there is a there's a
phrase that came up multiple times that I have to ask you that which was Speed Racer pants. He kept on mentioning you're wearing speak Speed Racer pants. And what are these
pants? I have a pair of white pants with a big red stripe on the side of them and they look like the pants Speed Racer used to wear a bottom in La at Fred Segal one day when I was just bored and I started wearing my route and no one in New York was wearing striped pants. And so it was quite the thing for us for about a year
and you seem to have a fair amount of
Surrounding you which certainly became even more clear as I was doing homework for this conversation. And one of them is piloting a helicopter down Prospect Avenue now, I'd like to know if that's true and either way maybe you could explain what Prospect Avenue is, but did that actually happen,
you know, unfortunately, it did happen. I've had a tendency to drink too much I think parties and you know Princeton has this reunions celebration every year where all the classes
has come by and and after the pier a this is a parade of you know, hundreds and hundreds of people starting with the oldest graduate who you know is often a hundred hundred three years old all the way to the new grads everyone migrates to this Prospect Avenue and one year. I had to leave early for an event and I was like, okay just I'll I'll show off to my friends a little bit. And so I got a helicopters going to get back to New York City and I asked the pilot if I could drive and we just buzz the buzz Prospect Street.
Much to the thrill of my friends and probably the dismay of everyone else.
What was your Princeton experience? Like I we're going to zoom backwards in time to Childhood in just a little bit. But what was your experience like at Princeton,
you know, I wasn't a middle-class kid. So I showed up a little intimidated and you know, I thought I was smart in high school and I shove a prince and I think I just am not that smart. I thought I was a great wrestler in high school and I went to Princeton. I got my butt whooped and I was like, I'm not that good of a wrestler and so
You know, it started off intimidated in lots of ways and you know, I look back. I took easier classes than certainly my kids take I think it how do I get through this place the survived it and you know, athletically that flipped my junior year socially it flipped early and that was probably the biggest positive academically it never really flipped. I never really felt maybe until I did my thesis like I was really a good enough student. Did it really feel?
Martin left I actually joined the army and on a test was 700 other guys got first place and I was like, dude. I'm actually pretty smart. I learned something but I was intimidated most of Princeton, you know, it's interesting that the positive side was socially I was a depth and realize you know, I had my first roommate actually was a Gloria Vanderbilt son Carter Cupra who unfortunately tragically committed suicide years later, but he was kind of aristocracy, right?
You did not just a wealthy New Yorker, but the you know the Vanderbilts where aristocracy and I went to New York and you know realized he had his own insecurities as well and he had nice friends. And other than teasing me about having my hair parted in the middle, which I thought was a very cool look back then but not in New York City, you know, I quickly realized that rich guys middle-class guys, they all use the same toilet this yet and and that part I think gave me a lot of confidence in life that I could compete in.
So this is the point we were competing mostly for girls, but I can compete with with anybody and that sounds like a small little wind but it was actually when I look back, you know, where a lot of kind of confidence started
and you mentioned Athletics what flipped junior year if I'm remembering correctly for you and Athletics, you know, I
don't think I reached puberty till I was about 20. No, I I was a decent wrestler and I work pretty hard at it and I just got good enough to make the varsity.
So my first two years I was really on the junior varsity. There was one guy that was better than me at the same weight and and he actually took a year off and so open the spot up for me and having that opportunity to wrestle, you know, I just started doing better and better and I made the, you know, the Eastern tournament that I made the national tournament and fact that making the Nationals was a huge check Plus for you. You felt like, you know your real guy in the wrestling community. And so I came back senior year ready to ready to be an All-American. So it was a whole shift of
You know my my confidence level again, but also I got stronger, you know, nowadays kids Redshirt. They take a year off. I really wish I was just getting strong and just getting good my senior year. I kinda always needed one more year probably why I've stayed involved with wrestling my whole life what did
wrestling give you that's a leading question. I should probably just ask what impact it had on you but having wrestled myself you wrestled longer than I did but
but I'd love to hear in your words what part wrestling has played in your life if aside from the involvement that you had later with Beat the Streets and and and the the Olympics and so
on. Yeah, this is I think it's a sport that almost like no other sport beats the hell out of here. I mean it is so tough from cutting weight to going out on the map by yourself. I just getting crushed and so you learn to pick yourself up after you get crushed and you're like, okay. I got it.
That bad I don't need to get crushed next match and I got to work a little harder and so its resilience if anything the the training wheels and people is grit our resilience when I started be the strength, we looked a lot at wrestling and and it's interesting 14 of the 44 presidents United States had wrestling in their background. There's no other sport. There's no other Sport with that menu Abe Lincoln used to go from town to town to wrestle for money Teddy Roosevelt was a wrestler and often.
That toughness and grit ends up in leadership. And so you see a lot of wrestlers that move on in life and to leadership positions. Hmm. So let's
talk about the resilience because when I pulled a number of my friends and ask them what they would most like me to discuss with you it came back to resilience in some form or another and in the New Yorker piece. There's there's one line which we could also dissect if we wanted but sis.
A Princeton like Wall Street where novogratz is made at least three fortunes and lost at least two is full of stories about him. So you have this incredibly powerful and public hero's journey that you've traveled more than once and I want to read from a speech. This is the commencement speech in Iowa. I don't even know the story of how this came to be but I we can get to that so as it relates to grit so you say as I've gotten older this is in the middle of the commencement speech as I've gotten older I've realized that we have two missions on this Earth to know thyself.
Or as my wife would say to sort our shit out and to walk each other home. Most people I've met don't start this journey until they've really screwed up. They've lost a job ruined a marriage abused drugs or alcohol destroyed friendships or just can't get out of bed. I started my journey at 33 when I had done most of the above. I was a rising star at Goldman Sachs. I was a partner president respected Man In The Wall Street Community and then I wasn't right after I resigned from Goldman. I literally thought my life was over I had ruined it. Okay, so this is winding its way to a question. So
Little bit of back story for people who don't have familiarity. And the question is when that happened when you have what you might consider a public experience like that. How do you work your way through it like psychologically and emotionally, what do you tell yourself? What helps? I'm very curious to know how you dust yourself off and what you did that that help after something,
you know, that was my kind of first public humiliation failure.
Personal failure in a failed the people I worked with and it was painful II. There's no two ways around it. You know, it was helpful that I had a supportive family that were just letting me be I went into depression and it took a while to kind of work out I was
I had this narrative later. I'd ruin my life and I would never get it back and I remember, you know, there was lots of little pieces of advice first by I was a lawyer. I was so worried but everyone thought about me and this lawyer said dude, do me a favor write down on a piece of paper. The people that you think will be at your funeral when you die a t worry about what those people think all those other people. They don't really think about you that much and that was kind of liberating because you as a partner Goldman Sachs every partner that had left Goldman Sachs when you left you
Got this beautiful little memo about all you had done and you know, it was a it was a goal as a bit of a cult and there was a very nice way they exited partners and I just disappeared in I was not spoken about I was like, so I kept worrying that I was going to run into my ex-partners on the street and be be so embarrassed. And so first he helped me get over that just think about it. But in the long run I end up going up to a rehab in Arizona and you know, that was a kind of got snookered.
A little bit I had this therapist. I never had a therapist before he's a dude you talk so much. You got to go somewhere where you can tell your stories and have a safe space and there's this beautiful holistic place in the middle of Phoenix or Tucson called Sierra Tucson, and and it looked I looked on the pamphlets. It looks so nice. And so I went out there and you know on day one and I had a drink or a drug or got any trouble for three four five months at the time. But so I flew out there and you checked yourself into a mental.
Well health facility and you're like what the f just went on here and my first roommate was in the throes of trying to kick heroin and he was not having a good time of it. And I'm like how in God's name did I end up at this place? But it was probably my first experience with really digging in and trying to sort out like what are the patterns of my life that led to this? It was kind of traumatic in that, you know, the thesis that a lot of rehab centers use and addiction
Special issues is that there? Are these deep emotional scars either Big T traumas or Little T traumas that people have a hard time dealing with and they start using some substance. It might be sex or alcohol or drugs or control of your food to medicate those feelings and that medication all of a sudden engine has you end up doing more stupid things that you did more of the medication and it's this cycle of and so that if you could get to those core issues,
It would really help in your journey. And you know, you're sitting around a circle with people and one guy's father kicked them in the spleen. He lost his spleen when he's 12 and almost all the women that were bulimic or anorexic had supper incest and I'm thinking here. I had nice parents like what about you know, I had a pretty nice and it was traumatizing not having the big trauma and you know, one of my insights was sometimes the little trauma 10 years 20 years 30 years later can have just as much
Psychological duress as big trauma, you know, and so one man's pain is no different ten years later. It's just pain or fear or and and so starting the search to find that out was unbelievably helpful. It also really started building an underdeveloped empathy muscle, you know, I remember I met one woman who had been the teacher of the year in Florida for like nine straight years and she had
she was probably 45 years old and had a had a relationship maybe 30 40 years old had a relationship with a senior and wasn't even sexual but it was close to sexual got caught and next thing, you know, she was the Pariah of the town and got thrown out of teaching and everyone in a shooter. And as you met her she was one of the nicest woman I had met and she had a story. She had been abused by her both father and then stepfather and had developed over.
Ship addiction which unfortunately then patter having a relationship with a Seer or school. But instead of being angry when it'll ensure you wanted a hugger and so that that process of trying to understand where people's mistakes came from allowed me to start kind of forgiving myself a little bit. And then since I didn't really get to that holistic place, I realized maybe this is the trick of how to get started again. I just needed to create a
A new narrative and some of the narrative was fucked up. I went to try to understand I fucked up. I haven't solved at all but I'm starting over and you know, it wasn't till 9/11 happened. I was trying to figure out what to do and when 9/11 happened my brother called me and he was in one of the big buildings right next to the Twin Towers and he's like do it a plane just hit what am I supposed to do? And I was like by Euro dollars and he was like, what the fuck?
talking about I was like by short-dated treasury contracts and I was like I said, oh no get out of the building and and I was like, okay brains kind of screwed up and then I was with my young son who was like to at the time and I was
Looking on the TV and I was like we got to go help so I go running to run down towards the Trade Center to see what was going on and he started crying and I was like, okay, that's not helping so we ran back and watched it on TV, but I you know had my Army side of me wanted to participate and they there was no real room for volunteers and I felt like I got to go do something and I realized I hadn't fulfilled kind of my my Wall Street Journey. So I literally was a 911 insight and I, you know went back to work at Fortress and
And luckily, you know had a lot of good luck and good great Partners, you know five or six years later. We not even yet six years later. We rang the bell at the stock market and you know, we were all billionaires and it was just kind of heady experience because the journey from you know, walking out of Goldman Sachs and having one of the senior partner say, well, you know, maybe it will work against some time thinking to myself cheese wasn't that bad but really feeling like you might never work again until six years later.
You feel like you're on top of the world, you know, it was kind of a heady ride. Hmm. What
did your self care program if it existed look like between rehab and ringing the bell did anything change noticeably any type of habits or routines or anything that helped during that period
so I gave up drinking for 13 months and you know, I have been a man who loves parties who loves drinking who doesn't drink at home, but a very social Drinker by hole.
Life and that was difficult this trying to be able to be social not with a glass of wine or a beer Jack Daniels in my hand was tough and I gave up recreational drugs and you know, 40 months later. I did something which I think was important. I ran this thing called the marathon at the Sands which was six marathons that are row across the Sahara. It was one of the earlier Original Adventure races 700 people from hundred.
Trees and you're literally run across the damn desert and it would get to a hundred thirty degrees during the day and freeze it night and about halfway into it. I was like, ah, it's good to be alive and it just felt like what the f are you complaining about? You're alive this beautiful settings and you're meeting new people and that was really the big trigger and so staying fit, you know that age I ran a lot but it was that push yourself into the uncomfort Zone physically even
and realize you're still alive, dude, you're not dead. And so that's that was right before the 9/11 have that was what I heard the June before September, but that was really the turning point. Now the ask the question where I felt like, okay, I can go back to work and then Fortress, you know, there was a lot of stress at work because I felt like, you know, even though I thought I'd made some big breakthroughs. There were parts of my story. I had it sorted out one is why I carried all this pressure all the time. You know that stopped it from being. Joyful.
And so I you know exercise I still I wasn't really in the meditation until probably 2006-2007, you know, so early on it was just exercise. My core issues were pressure. I when I made partner at Goldman Sachs, I felt relieved I remember Lloyd blankfein called me up. He said don't tell my wife was one of the most joyful days of my life even more than my wedding and I'm thinking to myself I think doesn't I should have said that boys going to come get yell at me. I did it feel that I
Relieved like ah, I got checked that box and I was thinking back on it. I was like, wow, that's kind of shitty that he felt that much pressure to be a partner Goldman Sachs what the hell really care, you know, I lost most of the big wrestling matches in my life because I felt so much pressure to win that when I knew it was an important match I wouldn't wrestle as well. And so I got a lot of second places and I would remember walking out of the mat feeling exhausted beforehand and Italy a while matter of fact, I remember that moment where I had my first
Site, I had the year before I had been at this investor conference called Lyford key and Byron wien used to run and he was a legend for Morgan Stanley. And this was the first legendary investor conference. You had to be a legend to be there and you had to share ideas and I got invited in 2006 probably maybe 2005 and it was such an honor to be there. I was one of the young guys and you had to give your three stories stocks and all right.
Xander it came to me and the guy before me at used one of mine and I just panicked I literally was like I'm sweating. It was one of the most miserable five minutes of my life so much. Some of the guy next to me was like dude. That wasn't that bad. But I've got to play leaving soon if you want to go and I remember feeling all this stress about and I was telling my wife I was like, I don't think this is so much stress. I'm not having fun I should just do
Something else in my life and she was like dude, you hired all these people you just hired one of your best friends the left at his firm to work for you like sort it out and you know has luck would have it. I have this life where I've stolen mentorship or found it or, you know been gifted it, you know in strange places and I was one of my investors suggested I have lunch with who'd Barack who had been the prime minister of Israel and one of their great generals one of the
He allegedly had the highest IQ of the Israeli Army and I was sitting with them and he was a Charming Charming guy later became a friend and he looked at me. He said no regrets. I think I figured you out. You know, you're not very smart. I'd like to thank you. He's a but you're lucky you're lucky and then he said that don't worry about it. You know Louis bacon who's one of the macro Legends, you know, one of the best investors of all time and Bruce Governor there. They remind me a little think they think they're smart, but they're
Mostly lucky and I'm looking at him and that he gave me a quote in French. Of course. I don't speak French and I was like translate, you know, I'm not so smart and it was from Napoleon. I don't hire smart channels. I lucky generals and it was a it was about intuition and that his Napoleon's thought was these generals nowhere to be on the battlefield to the right that they can pattern recognize the thing they have a certain intuition and we don't have a word for it. Therefore we call it luck and the moment he
That the way my brain function as an investor the way I operated in life. It clicked. I was like, that's what I do. I have Patrick like I'm actually and I realized I didn't need once I knew what I needed to make investments to make decisions. I didn't need to fulfill what you think I needed right? I remember being so worried when I was at Lyford Cay that's almost going to ask me who the Finance Minister of Russia was because I was telling him I own all these Russian rubles and I forgot the guys name, but I didn't really need.
I know the guys name for my investment confidence other people might and that was liberating and from the moment that happened I could tell the story of how I made investment decisions and has so much more confidence. I had that my hedge fund went from 300 million to two billion in six months. The returns went up but most importantly The Joy showed up. It was more fun and the confidence came. I was like, I know I can always if I need to sit in front of the screen and sort out markets and made money from and so
You know, one of the great breakthroughs letting was was from this guy who you know was a famous Jewish General Israeli General and I don't have sex I seem to have gotten sidetracked from your question. But
this show is all about such tracks. Those are usually who are they interesting Ali's have all sorts of tidbits. So let's dig into intuition because this seems to show up again again again in your life, and I'd be very curious to know let's just say that six-month period where you go vertical basically
In assets under management, how have you learned? If you have to discern intuition and pattern recognition from say overconfidence, right or irrational confidence in a position or a trade or something like that? How have you learned to wield and discern? What is what yeah, it's a
great question and the world the world's best speculators or macro Traders have two things in common.
They have this pattern recognition intuition. I put that in one bucket and I have discipline and
I said the three things and then they have an unbelievable competitive spirit. And you know, I look at guys like Stan druckenmiller and Paul Jones Louis bacon, and to be honest, they're just they've done better than I have and it wasn't because I spoke to him enough to understand of their understanding of markets or intuition. Their discipline was just better and it was kind of like, why are they Super Sport disciplines? And I think partly they're just more discipline than I but they're more competitive. They just cared more.
It was interesting. I couldn't tell if that was in life a strength or a weakness. But they are you watch that Michael Jordan documentary and the one thing that every single person who watches it comes out as he cared. So he was the most competitive man. I think I've ever seen in anything like oh Jordan, you know, the great speculators are very competitive like that and shockingly. I'm just not as competitive and listen, I've done spect I've done very well by almost any standard but not in the legend standard that
You know, I know who the Legends are because I've been around them. And so I think about that a lot and I'm trying to figure out you know, that that's not all terrible. Like you'd like some more discipline and I think it was loud me to have a more diverse life than some of my peers but I think about that but that's how you the only way you end up trusting your intuition to get to your question is to have some set of rules that you manage your risk by your life by your because you're you're still anxious, right?
Ready to trust ourselves. So I think I'm right right think this business. I think not that I know you really think like this lines up. I'm almost positive Bitcoin is going to go up right now. But if it doesn't you've got to have some circuit breaker that says, you know, I could have been wrong, you know, no one's right a hundred percent of the time right? No one's right 80% of the time in Marcus and so you need a circuit breaker. And so that's a series of rules that you manage your portfolio by.
Manager Life by lots of ways and that's for discipline really helps and that's where I've often. Let myself down a little bit and that's sometimes just trying to do too many things sometimes, you know, just not being tough enough on myself, but that's the challenge of anyone who goes into my business. It's those it's really hard to learn that you're actually good at it because you know, it's not a skill that you know, how do you say I've got good intuition, right? It takes a long time for you to trust yourself. And then how do you
Hold Steady to really having your portfolio constantly being a collection of your guesses. It sounds like it should be a tautology right? I'm bullish therefore I'm long but I would tell you that 19 out of 20 people that try to be traitors that sentence isn't consistent with them 90% of the time could yield
their elaborate on that? Yeah.
Yeah. So someone is bullish they say I think the stock market's going up, but I'm not going to buy it yet, right. I think the stock market's going.
Going up but I'm gonna buy a little bit but I'm a cell calls on it so that it goes up. They barely make any money Stan druckenmiller when he's here mon TV. If he says I think the markets going up you can better believe he's long,
you know and just for people who are not in the investing world. So long meaning he is I suppose in the simplest iteration buying things with the expectation. They will appreciate their good value. Yeah apologies. I sometimes forget the oddness
and so
That's the Battle of of being a Speculator but that's translates into the battle day life. And you know, listen, even I guess that you're investing in movies. You have some algorithm in your head or a written algorithm of what you think makes for a good bet. And so you invest you invest you invest at one point, right your track record your wins versus losses are going to tell you any good at this but really taking the time to understand what that algorithm is. Like, how do
You make decisions in investing in movies or investing in small businesses, right? If you're a venture capitalist or investing in markets and so one of my insights was always like any one of those processes you take in information you process it through an algorithm and you have to then manage it like manage the risk of it somehow and so that I use that process in lots of things but some you know, and not every job certainly not every investing job is based on intuition and quite frankly very few are
Because the more tuition based the investing is the more anxiety there is right if you're an arbitrageur you buy something for you know, eight dollars on one market and sell it for 10 on another. There's not a whole lot of risk. And so then it's just being commercial and so I always tell people that you got to try to understand yourself and figure out where your DNA where your personality type fits it into the space.
Let's come back.
Back to one of the names you mentioned and that's Paul Jones or Paul Tudor Jones who has hit the news quite widely in the last few weeks because of his extensive discussion of Bitcoin specifically in one of his memos. I'm not sure if he refers to them as memos or letters or something else, but nonetheless this is made the rounds at that Paul Tudor Jones has D risked Bitcoin for institutional investors Here Comes Wall Street, etcetera. You've referred to yourself as the force.
Of Bitcoin, so I'll give you 2 questions and you can choose which one you want to tackle first. So one is why are you the Forrest Gump Bitcoin? And then the second is how are you different from Paul Tudor Jones? Like how do you guys I know you know each other quite well, how are you most different are most similar?
So that's very question. So the Forrest Gump of the climb was kind of a stick. I was the First Institutional grade investor that started talking about it, you know For Better or Worse, you know back in
And when it was trading around a hundred I was on and it was I I promised my partner's quite frankly that we wouldn't talk about crypto because Fortress was a real asset company and we weren't going to talk about these digital assets and I was at some conference. I didn't know the Press was there. I made some witty comments about Bitcoin and the next day. I was on the cover of the financial times and then I got sucked into Bitcoin because everyone would call me and ask me what I thought and at that point. I didn't really understand how it worked that much. I understood that.
It was a thing that was gonna go higher but partly by being forced to publicly speak about it. You know, I got asked to speak at the Oxford Union and I really had to study and you know try to understand how the damn thing worked. And so I became kind of an unofficial spokesperson are one of the unofficial spokesperson for it Paul and I are as close in terms of what we have done. We ran similar businesses his was bigger and a little bit better. He's been a
A role model in philanthropy in spirit, like if I had an older brother 10 years were different, you know that my parents didn't tell me about it would be Paul and so it's fun to see him getting involved in Bitcoin for me personally. It's important because you know I said I was pretty damn good. But Paul is one of those Legends Leo. They're literally honestly three or four guys of his stature in the whole macro space in the last 30 years and so for him to get involved.
It basically says this is this is a real macro instrument. You know, there's no more debate on is Bitcoin. It might not always go up if I go up and down you might not put in your portfolio, but there's no shame in being involved with this space anymore. And that's a big deal because for stores of value and Bitcoin is really becoming a store of value. They only become stores of value when people believe they are and so it's a belief system Bitcoin is
Is not just the code. It's really the social construct. I say it's this you say it says therefore it is this and so we already have Jack Dorsey whose Twitter handle says Bitcoin and Abby Johnson from Fidelity and Pete brigher from Fortress that all bought it personally or had their businesses involved with it. Once was Casta race and Mickey melkor. I mean, these are kind of Legends in their space Paul's the first kind of legend in the hedge funds based that didn't just buy it personally, but he bought his fund and so it opens up a
A whole new Avenue of potential participants in that Community, which I think is really really
significant. If we had to put on the hat of forecaster or Nostradamus, what do you predict if you're comfortable going for it with Bitcoin and cryptocurrency Etc. And the next let's just call it 12 months. It's greatly May 18th, when we record this
2020 Market down and write it down. We're
Roughly ninety six hundred dollars per Bitcoin right now. I think we'll take out ten thousands soon and end the year closer to 20,000 the old highs once these store of values start building momentum. There's not a lot of Supply we've had this thing called The Happening where there's half the supply being mind, then there was even a week ago, but mostly the story is finally catching broader adoption, and it's not just Hedge.
Is there gonna be able to buy it you're going to see wealth managers start selling it to their clients through products. We have a Bitcoin fun that's targeted to the 50 to 80 year olds in America that by their that make their investment decisions through TD Ameritrade or Charles Schwab or Goldman Sachs are registered investment advisors, right Bitcoin has been a young man's game. It's been gen Z in the Millennials. It's been bought on coinbase a poor square a Robin Hood those things.
Going away quite frankly. They're gonna be more of them, right Facebook's calibra is going to allow you to buy Bitcoin about will be 2,000 3,000 people using that wallet. And so there are so many more Avenues of access. I always tell people if it was easy to buy the price would be far higher already Bitcoins been hard to buy and a year from now is going to be that much easier so I can I'm really bullish and I you know, listen I don't have I'm always careful what I'm when I say really because
Cuz you know these things are recorded and come back later and people are got damn that guy was stupid. He doesn't work. And so you're cautious to be that bullish publicly, but I haven't seen things line up as well in a long
time. Let's rewind the clock as promised. It's feels like probably an hour or so ago, maybe maybe a little bit less to family. And I know this is a little bit like Memento and how nonlinear this is but you grew up in a big family. It seems like with
No shortage of strong personalities. Could you describe for folks what your family was like what your childhood was like growing
up? Sure. So for people my age that used to watch John Hughes movies like Pretty in Pink and Sixteen Candles. That was pretty much the neighborhood I grew up in like we were straight up the metal Suburban middle-class All-American family. My dad was an army officer. So he was a major. He went to Vietnam twice when I was very young.
Young major than a lieutenant colonel for like my my growing up years. I went to a public high school. We had you know, seven of us seven of said a house that had one and a half well two bathrooms one for my parents one for the rest of us and you know, we fought over the brush and the blow dryer because back then you blow-dry your hair. If you're a cool, dude, my mother didn't go to college. She got married when she was 18 to my dad. They just had their 60th anniversary or 19.
She got married 60th anniversary and she was beautiful and I think she had this fascination with the Kennedys because she named my sister Jackie and my brother Bobby and we've got a John John and you know, my dad was a handsome football player football star at West Point and my mother thought we should you know, we should be them why not us. And so she was the one that kind of drove the pressure to succeed not an overly harsh way just in a
like, you know, we used to complain about kids and she says well if that girl would jump off a bridge would you jump off a bridge in the same old saying that most Suburban parents use but there was a pressure my mom put of Excellence that we could rise and in the background, my father had been the lineman of the year in college football. He never has once mentioned a thing he would he's the least braggadocio guy very humble, but he didn't have to say much because you had my mom would say it all for him. But we have this sense of Excellence from my dad that he had been this star football player.
We also had a sense of service. You know, my mom used to always say you're given so much you got to give back and I look back. I'm like we had seven kids fighting over one brush, but you know, we were you know, it was a Catholic Family there was lots of love evolve. We might become from a big extended family as well. And so we felt special it was special to be a novogratz. My mother made it special to be an over grass. And so we ran for office at the student elections and you know didn't always win actually a
lost most of the time but but like even the confidence to be the third grader running for class president came from I think parents that made you feel special at my dad was tough like it was not he was a military guy and he grew up in a Austrian immigrant family. And so we got whacked around a lot of my brother and I we always complain that by the time my little brothers and sisters who are there was a seven-year gap between the top three of the bottle for came around my parents were soft. But you know, I
But this big family all the time and I look the one thing that I'm sure that came out of it was you're willing to take more risk in life when you know, if you screw up there's people are going to catch you there's brothers and sisters that I love you anyway, and they also on the flip side when you're doing really well. They don't buy that stick either, you know, they're appreciative of it. They applauded but you're not more special just because you made a bunch of money or
I got this award or and so it's humbling. It's safety on the downside and it's humbling on the upside. And so that's listen. We've all drafted off of each other. You know, I always laugh don't you know, it's a pain in the ass. That's such a famous sister because Wherever I Go everyone knows my sister because she's always trying to save the world.
What is it? You should say a few words about that because people may not recognize Jackie equals Jacqueline Jacqueline novogratz just a few words about your excuse a few words.
Better my sister's one of the unique Souls that from like Age 5 decided she wanted to change the world. And so she was like a brownie that a girl scout and she started this organization the Acumen fund which was really kind of the father of venture philanthropy or impact investing and has spent her whole life trying to figure out how to change systems how to do invest in the poorest of you know, the citizens on this cut the
planet to build permanent structures around housing and and and water and education and really to change the conversation to start with the conversation of dignity and you know, she's developed a huge following in that developed world and in the conference World, she's got you know branches all over the world now of young acolytes that want to be like her and so, you know, it's interesting what I notice about her and I notice about some other leaders, but not many.
Is that she's never not known True North like she's and most people in myself included. I try to be a pretty good guy and I do a lot of good stuff but my compass gets out of kilter plenty of times gets killed her for my own desires feels pretty good gets out of kilter because I get excited about something. I lose my own Focus. Yeah. I put my sister in a special bucket. I you know Bryan Stevenson is one of my heroes from the Equal justice initiative whose
Is really one of our great civil rights leaders and you meet with him and you're like after just a few hours with more like he's probably never not known true north. And so, you know, that's listen. It's inspiring to be around those people. It's sometimes humbling and frustrating because you're like oh, but it's good to have morale because it grounds you a little bit.
Just a quick thanks to one of our sponsors and we'll be right back to the show. This episode is brought to you by Magic spoon a brand new cereal that is low carb high protein and zero sugar. I just had a bowl of their cocoa flavor. That's my favorite an hour ago. It tastes just like your favorite cereal that you remember from childhood, but it's actually good for you. Each serving has 11 grams of protein 3 grams of net carbs 0 grams of sugar and only 110 calories and their flavors are delicious. It comes in your favorite traditional cereal flavors. You might remember like
Co frosted and blueberry, they also have limited edition flavors like Honey Nut and peanut butter my favorites are cocoa and peanut butter. I'll usually have them with really creamy whole milk or some type of unsweetened coconut milk something like that. Another fun fact one of this podcast most popular guests. Dr. Peter Atia routinely crushes six to seven servings at a time with no glycemic response. That means practically no blood sugar response, which is pretty miraculous. He likes this product so much that he
invested in Magic spoon listeners of this podcast get free shipping and a 100% happiness guarantee it magic spoon.com Tim. So if you don't love it, you get a full refund. No questions asked again. That's magic. Spoon.com Tim and used code Tim pretty easy to remember magic spoon.com, Tim and used code Tim. Check it out.
See spoke earlier of feeling immense pressure. So I going out on the wrestling mat or at the investment conference coming up to your five minutes and so on you have a large family many high Achievers in that family. Do you think any part of that comes from a pressure or expectation to succeed that was made explicit or implicit Lee clear?
Your parents and I know that's a very binary question. But I'm just curious.
I mean, it's a big yes, and I don't know if it was I think it was more implicitly. You know, my mother was very good at making us all feel like we were the special one and for whatever reason from you know, kindergarten on like teachers treated me better than everybody else my parents and so I literally remember if I got did it get an A in like first grade on the way home taking the paper crumpling up and throw it in the sewer.
Our and I'm thinking my stuff now that I've had young kids it's incomprehensible for me to think that a five or six or seven-year-old would throw a paper way if you didn't get a day like I would like who thinks like that so somehow at that very young age. I said in that article at Gary Steiger died when I was at rehab I had a complaint my mother because everyone's gotta blame their parents. I said you put so much pressure because she used to tell everybody because I talked all the time that I was going to be a senator and my mother
Cutter feet said yeah, he did. All right, I should have said he should have been the
president,
you know, your little kid you pick up cues that my parents never meant to put pressure on their kids. I don't think that kind of way but you pick up cues and they become your operating system and I operated with that system. I probably still have a little bit of enmity for so long a period of time that I needed to be perfect. So I remember cheating like I'm not it was like why am I cheating on a high school test but I just
The smartest guy that got in class because I know the answer and what I'm not going to get an A like that pressure was irrational and of course my second dad never told a lie in his life. He's another choirboy. They're not going to condone cheating on a high school test. My mother wouldn't condone it. But like and so it's interesting when I talked earlier about Big T trauma and Little T trauma like the little T trauma of picking up some story for me was just as powerful as
It up then unfortunately first other people haven't gotten beaten up. And so that I think you know again, I I have a loving mom and dad an interesting about them is they've got nicer and nicer with each year. So my dad's 83 my mom 79 and you literally it's just fun to see parents grow and change and so I've got nothing but great things to say, but I do think and I said that in that speech I wrote that, you know, everyone's journey is to kind of figure out their parental issues.
It's and how their parents impacted them and then to understand it to let it go and love their parents and you know, took me a long time to figure out where that pressure came from. And again, I don't blame anybody for it, but it certainly was there.
So let's let's come back to that speech because this might be related what what I'm about to ask so you have I would not call it a small tattoo on your forearm. Can you describe can you describe?
This tattoo for people please
I have I have a forearm length Jaguar / poobah I act as I call it a puma but you might think of it as a Jaguar big black Puma tattoo that goes from my basically the whole length of my right forearm that I got. Literally my brother had given me a tattoo for Christmas a few years earlier and after my first Ayahuasca experience where I literally on day three transformed into a puma
I wasn't going to call a black panther but the movie had already come out. So I was like I'm a boom. I'm not a panther and growled and crawled around the floor two nights in a row and was so moved by the whole beauty of that experience. I decided I would get a small tattoo and I walked into this famous tattoo parlor called Smith Street Tattoos where my brother had, you know got me the appointment is set it up and I told the guy would get this tattoo and I was going to get a small one on my shoulder and the guy looked at me and he was like
With all respect your old as fuck and getting a tattoo to get a tattoo that people can see
and
I was like that was such a genius selling. I was like, I got the cheese. It's just you know, what you hear truth. So I put my forearm down there and I walked home with this giant 8-inch tattoo of uh of a Jaguar poom on like on my right arm and I love it. I have to say I loved it gives me power. I realize your forearms don't get flabby. It's like the one part of your body that stays fit.
So
you mentioned Ayahuasca and this experience - the Puma in this Commencement Address. Why did you use that? Why did you decide to include that? You know, it
was my first commencement address and I worked hard on it and the thesis was know thyself and there's so many ways one can learn about themselves and and that Journey that I went on in Costa. Rica was unbelievably powerful and I end up getting different things.
From it that I thought I would but afterwards I was trying to convince my sister and brother-in-law that they should do this and I really then started thinking barring people that have you know bipolar or mental health issues. Would an Ayahuasca trip not benefit. Someone is as much as it might be tough and scary like should we put every politician on the world through that experience before they're allowed to serve and I kept coming up with yes.
Yes, and so I was like if you're young college student and you're physically okay to do this. Is there anything bad and I couldn't come up with it. And so I thought, you know, I'll talk about it publicly and part of this was in a chapter are a part of the speech about D stigmatizing mental health. Like I think you know, one of the things we need to do as a society is to allow that people have mental health issues that depression is real and and
That you know people have shit to work through and that we should help them work through that and you know both psilocybin and Ayahuasca are I just think two things in that toolkit powerful things and that toolkit of how one can process trauma one can learn about themselves when can dig into places that they haven't understood before and he was funny once you see it. You can't unsee it. Yeah. That's true. I have a sister to tell.
Her story, but I will that went down to after I did to the same same place and I had was laughing about being a puma and she's like god dammit next thing, you know, her her hands were becoming kind of furry and like a cat and she hates cats just hate can't take it because I can't believe I become a cat and next thing, you know, she climbed up this ladder and she's looking at Anna brought her back to this high school. I'm not high school. I'm sorry like, you know a little little school.
Theater where she was the Cheshire Cat looking out on the audience and I remember she told me the story. I remembered I was the older brother sitting there. She was probably five or six at the time and she was the cutest kid in the plague. Of course. She was my sister and after the play I Remember tell your daughter. She stole the show. She stole the show. She was so great. I mean she probably had like three lines, but she was the Cheshire Cat in Alice in Wonderland and for her coming off what she saw in this Ayahuasca trip.
It was all the other girls being mean to her because she was getting all the attention and interestingly enough her whole life. She never put her head up again. She always has been unbelievably supportive of everyone. She is literally our support system in our family and she came out that trip and she was like, I didn't put my head up because of those six year old girls that I do remember and so like again once you see it, you know now she's got her own podcast and she's putting her head up. And so I find I find that's a sweet story to tell
Because it's not so, you know damn Lele personal but there's so many opportunities like that that I figured, you know, it's time at least two to broaden the conversation now, listen University of Iowa to the teacher's college might not have been the exact right place, but it was where I was invited to speak. So
I'd love to highlight two lines from that speech and one is in the middle of a paragraph. So I'll just highlight verbally one.
None of it really but it was it's discussing your time at that holistic health center and the desert of Arizona 28-day rehab center. And it says the 28 days didn't fix me or change me. No, it just gave me a start of understanding who I was what forces controlled me and then here's the part that really jumped out of me. What stories in my life were so strong. I didn't even realize they were stories. Right? So now I'm Kazuma zooming out because many of the stories we have our narratives about ourselves and the world
May not be stories were aware our stories. They're just our reality and they're often stories that were given to us inadvertently or purposefully and we're not aware that we've absorbed them. So my question relates to the next line and that is coming back to the Ayahuasca the lesson I learned in my last ceremony was that this medicine this process was meeting me where I was and that was gentleness. You must start by being gentle to yourself. So
Like you I think you've competed at a much higher level in many many Arenas, but I've always been very very very very competitive and to the extent where being second place has often for me been worse than being 50th place, right? It's kind of like second place is first loser type mentality. So I've been very mean to myself in the same way that this those six-year-old girls were to your sister. Right? And so that that has been kind of internalized.
And I'd be curious to know what has helped you to be gentle or more gentle with yourself gentler. I guess would be one of the to you. Yeah, I think as a writer I would have this English figured out but what has helped
when a lot of
people would view, you know competitiveness as your
Superpower, right and it's such a driver. How have you how have you learned to be better at that?
Well, you know, it's a work in progress. I remember before going down there. I like I'm an easygoing guy and I don't lose my temper a lot. So I think I'm a nice boss and I am told yellow people that often and I'm and I told my lawyer who's been with me for 10 years. I say I'm of course. I'm an easy boss and she's like dude. You're absolutely not a fucking easy. Boss. You're such a tough boss.
You're nice, but you're tough and I was already means he's a you never give a compliment. You're like wow, that's pretty good. But we're having the best party like that. But if we only and they're like, you know how disheartening that is. I was like, oh maybe feel terrible. It was what I was on that Ayahuasca thing. I realized you can't be nice to people you're nice to yourself. And I'm I never thought I was tough on myself. Why because I let myself get away with, you know, the stuff that sent me to rehab but drinking or drugs or breaking the rules. I better rule breaking my whole life. And so I thought that's well if you
Can do that you're not really being tough on yourself. Those are two different subject matters. I did the rest of that stuff because I was so tough on myself. And that was the interesting part of us ago. You should have your oh, yeah. Oh you only and that internal angst. I think some of it was just getting older and I think with success there's a little less pressure and some of it is now just trying to have awareness of it and say it's not that important but you know, I if I think I pulled my
Please they say you changed a little but not a lot yet. And so, you know, it's certainly a work in progress. I do notice it with my father. You know, my father was this great-looking guy football star spent his time in the Army always was nice to people want the Vietnam twice and in lots of wage, you know became a colonel but didn't make General and I remember what he did it make General was painful in our family because of course you want your
The
succeed and and the military it's like not making partner at Goldman Sachs. There's a hierarchy and either get it or you don't and and it was painful for my parents for my mother who had done all the and there was some Scandal behind it and there's always some backstory but I remember thinking 20 years later like looking at my father at 70 now, he's 83 and think and do you think he gives a rat's ass that? He didn't make General any more like his priorities that you
shifted he was so happy to be around his family the work he was doing at the church and and how we were all doing that that ego peace. He just let it go and you know, and I didn't act like he let it go he let it go. And so I think there's something about aging gracefully where you let that shit go because it just doesn't really matter nearly as much as you think it does at the time and I think seeing that as helped, you know act like Dad don't act like a jackass was kind of
The mice my internal Cohen, are you the Mantra? But for me at least it's a work in progress like you it's kind of built into the DNA of like wanting to do things right when I throw a party I wanted to be a great party and you know, I forced my persistence once bought a tent that was too big and I literally thought I was gonna like it was like, I died a thousand deaths. I saw this tent. I knew we had 200 people coming to the party. We had a tent big enough for three.
300 in all the energy would be diffuse. Have fun in the Big Ten jackass, but I'm trying to learn that it's but it's
As a process.
What advice do you think you're older self 10 20 years older would give to your current
self, you know to to say you're okay. Like it's you're doing fine. You're doing great. It's what I have a shrink by my wife calls him the greatest enabler of all time his whole mission is say that's great. I like make some confession. He's like Ah, that's great. That's like well, I'm not gonna get in trouble.
That is just to accept yourself. I have a funny story. There's a friend he's become up. He's not really a friend of mine. I've made only met him three times when I had a great time with them every time I met him but he's a dear friend of Paul Jones a guy by the name of Peter gosk you and Pete has a famous business where he was like a posture expert and that was movement and he had come back from war Vietnam War and healed himself and that he's literally healed thousands and thousands of people celebrities at
Leads the agofsky method it's called and when you meet him you go through his process. He gives you a menu of exercises how to get your back and has his philosophy as if your body is in alignment. You'll be in alignment. Your emotions will be alignment. And so I went to meet him the first time in a supposed to be at our meeting and we spent like three hours talking and I'm waiting for my menu with my menu my menu at the very end. He said no no, no, you need to strip down naked stand in front of your mirror every day for 15 minutes and
just accept yourself. Sounds like what that's that's my fucking menu. So I remember getting getting back and calling Paul Jones and he laughed hysterically you didn't even get a menu. And so I think that's my 20 years from now. Hopefully mine. Tell him just accept yourself you're good and that was a little bit that was a little bit the tattoo. I was like, I am a fucking puma and so put it on your arm and remember like that's part of who you are. So I
have to ask did you try the 15 minutes before the mirror?
I did it twice.
Embarrassed by my body type enough. I didn't have the patience. I did try it a few times but I didn't I didn't I didn't follow through like you needed me to
well work in progress as we all are like you said, let's chat about Criminal Justice Reform. I know this is incredibly important to you. I don't know the Genesis story. I don't know how this became important to so I'd love to hear you describe how that came to be.
You know, it's funny, you know, I guess if
I met a physical about it I go back and I think well, my my parents talking. I remember my mother my mother bring me to Head Start when I was 4 or 5 years old and this idea of philanthropy being part of our family, but the more practical side was I saw Bryan Stevenson speak once and was wildly impressed at Ted he gave us kind of seminal speech. And so that was in the back of my head and then my daughter Anna got a job at thing called the Bronx Defenders.
Where she was a twenty-year-old summer intern and she was traveling around the Bronx collecting evidence for her lawyers cases now like you're actually the evidence collector. Like how do you not like she's getting you know video from bodegas and I'm like, you're you're the defense team and I was like and so I was very impressed with the work she did and I was like, wow, that's what Public Defense is and
You know I had made this movie with Nate Parker when I say made I didn't do anything other than invest Nate Parker was a good friend of mine. He's a wrestler and he had this dream of making this movie called Birth of a Nation and blurry after 15 Jack Daniels. He convinced me to invest because I really don't want to invest in a independent movie. Just thinking I'd lose all my money, but Nate was very persuasive and he's a winner and so I bet on and it won every award at Sunday incident.
For more money than any independent film ever to this day still right we sold for 18 million dollars independent movie and you know, it's a painful and beautiful movie but there's a big lynching seen in it and I saw Bryan Stevenson who was building a lynching Museum. And so I said she's gonna take my profits or something like profits and give it a Brian and but I said Brian you got to come and have breakfast at my house and so he came and course my daughter. Hi.
Jack the breakfast but we had breakfast and really hurt his story personally. That's a bunch of questions of Criminal Justice System and I just started getting angry and then there was a thing called audacious, you know, the year cryptocurrency when a much higher I made a whole lot of money on this thing called etherium and you know to some of you it felt like Wampum be about whomping went way up in price and I sold it and and it was a, you know, kind of a breathtaking amount of money and I
Do something fun for myself and I wanted so I didn't feel so guilty. And because I kind of thought it would have been karmic Justice give an equal amount to something else. So I bought a G550 I never had a jet which was which was extreme, but I decided to take the similar amount of money and and I heard this story about cash pay a lot of fordable cash bail that Robin Steinberg told it is a really simple story there a half a million people that go to bed every night in jail cell solely because they can't afford to pay bail.
And you know the average bail we pay is somewhere close to $1,800. Most people in America don't have $500. Most people are getting arrested don't have access to five hundred dollars. So they stay in jail. There are seven times more likely to plead guilty. If they're in jail, then if they're not in jail what we bail them out 50% of the time the da dropped the charges when you're in jail, 40% of all prison death and prison rape happens the first the 14 days or there and it has horrific long.
Consequences for the person and the and the city and it just felt so stupidly on just that I impulsively said I will donate a bunch of money and share this thing the Bell project and then I woke up and I was like, well Avail projects going to be the biggest bail fund by a factor of 30 or more in the country. You better understand the criminal justice landscape. And so I hired a guy to Ability Watterson who's been an A+ and the small team
and we started mapping out having activists come in formerly incarcerated people come in visiting prisons and jails and with every Rock we looked under you just get more and more pissed off you get infuriate. It is a system of stupidity. It is a system of spite meanness. There is nothing rehabilitated at all. It's racially oppressive. It's literally like let's figure out how we can strip people of their dignity. Oh,
Let's make them shit in public. That's a very nice. You know, it's like it's the whole system is just bizarre and it doesn't have to be that way. We participate on a trip where you took 35 people to Norway and into Germany and you look at the German prisons and you would give them a 95 out of a hundred and he'd give Norway and ninety-nine out of a hundred and we're not a 60 out of a hundred. We're like a 14 like we're that bad. And so it's just got to be angry, you know fair to sit always been a thing in my life.
life I think growing up middle-class you thought was not fair that rich kids had a you know better start that I did and you know, he talked about not fair middle class to the rich kids. The prison system is just absolutely unfair and it you know, it it preys on communities that are already in duress, you know, I think about women in prison. How about this statistic 95% of women in prison have been raped. So we're taking people that have been
Sized and putting them into a trauma machine like who in the fuck thinks that's a good idea. And so anyway, I get angry thinking about it. But so we've we've got involved. I think we're you know, I'm on the board of this thing called the reform Alliance which has been fun because we're doing great work around Probation and Parole and that's Jay-Z and Meek Mill and Robert Kraft and we have been a participated and funded or partially funded probably 15 20 different organizations. And really it's been a big
part of my life. I still am a novice to be fair. I'm less than three years in and so I'm a good enough story teller that I can tell the story other people's stories and hear them, but we need a complete overhaul and the only optimism I see is that you know, when I started even there was like only a hundred million dollars of philanthropy coming into the space and four years later. There's six hundred million dollars or more. It feels like the ball starting to roll downhill does covid thing is
Really Shine the Light on just how horribly we treat the most vulnerable people. I would say it's interesting. I looked before I came on there are 15 countries that have D car serrated by 18 percent Italy Iran of all places France right there like okay shouldn't keep people in prison when they're going to die because of this damn virus the u.s. Is about two and a half percent. And so while that's a lot of people right and they've all come out of jails not
since so for you to those who don't know jail is one year and under it often pretrial in prison is when you're in longer and so we just haven't gotten around to saying, you know, we need to fix this and we're way off. Our sentences are three times longer than Germany's for this same crime, just me
and for people who would like to learn more about this there any starting points you would recommend share some talk.
Or website or anything
else, you know, Brian Stevenson's Ted Talk is spectacular because it really gives a framework of where this all started right? It started its with slavery and we've never really dealt with the trauma of slavery Robin Steinberg gave a TED Talk that's fantastic about bail and the bail project and Philip golf fill up the tea bag off did what about policing and so like we're not anti-police to be fair. We're like, okay, how do you help the police department actually?
Ali you know have have data so they can, you know, be fair and how they please and so, you know, that's a controversial one because people like Oscar the police are there at their you know that you can't you got to have people all engaged all parties have to be engaged inside and say hey we need to make a better system and I do feel some optimism even Trump as much as I dislike Trump and would love to meet a cage match, you know criminal justice because Jared Kushner is a father spent time in jail.
It's cruel Justice is one of the few things that the Trump Administration has been okay on not great, but I'll certainly okay. The first step back was a great start, you know, and they've been helpful. And so but again the put it in perspective we have 2.3 million people in jail or prison and having a whole lot of analysis on this. I think that should be 800,000 and that's a little big difference. We have five million people that go to prison every year. It's like a jail every year. It's like a revolving door.
Or they stay in an average of 45 days two and a half million of them were going there just for violating parole, which is bizarre. We should have nobody on parole. And so we have we have a long way to go and I fear you pass one or two acts you declare Victory and the Numbers Never Change and so we're working on trying to get like a scoreboard. So the whole country can say, alright, this is where we think we need to get that people agree to it and then work to get
there. I want to shift gears just a little bit to a few.
Questions, I like to ask a lot of my guests and if any of them are dead ends we can we can scrap but I'm curious to know what if any are books that you've given an often as gifts to other people.
There's one book that I've given 40 copies away probably and it's called reminiscence of a stock operator. And for anyone who wants to be a Trader or investor. This is the Bible it was written in 1932 by a guy who was at that.
Time may be the world's greatest Speculator. Jesse Livermore is the fictional character and what's crazy about it is you can read it today and 2020 and it literally is still the Bible and so every great traitor annotates it tears Pages out of it. I used to be a telling people to come to interview to work in this I've really I'm all I care about is trading I will tell you two books you've read about trading. Oh, I haven't read any books and I was like, okay.
About card reader and come back when you run it, but you're not get a job, you know, cause like cause you lied to me because you really didn't care that much about training if you've never read a book on but that's that's the book and you know, there's there's a, you know anecdote but afterward to it is that two years after he wrote the book The guy committed suicide because they just couldn't take the he lost his fortune yet again, but he put every rule that you need to give the discipline side of it is all in that book. And so it's and it's a quick read you can read in three
hours.
I want to ask about because you mentioned earlier that you run into certain people who seem to have a finely honed True North that they've had since age eight, right someone like your sister or as some of the names that you mentioned when you feel unfocused or overwhelmed scattered filling your adjectives, even temporarily. What do you do you personally if you're feeling like you've committed to too many things or just not sure how focused you
Energies, are there anything you do to
refocus? Yeah, I think saying no for me saying no is like been the hardest thing you didn't want to disappoint people rights comes comes from my mother wanted me to be a senator and so learning how to say no and and draw a boundary has been really important to me and it's hard for me call my three phone calls and finally say no and so by cutting a couple things out I think helps me and actually
the other thing is writing at all on a whiteboard. So it takes it out of my stress Zone it onto the Whiteboard and I'm like, okay, I see it all it might be a fuckload of stuff. But at least it's up there on the board and I can put boxes around and I can start attacking it. And so I think that's probably the most powerful is literally getting it all out of my head and putting it and I'm a very visual person. So like it's different for me like a whiteboard or a big piece of paper is different than writing notes because I put little box
As I say, okay, here's my criminal justice that I want to work on. Here's by and like what are the stress points? Hmm?
Yeah, Doug mcmillon of Walmart the uses a whiteboard very similarly. I need to get a whiteboard this pick what this is. This is saying to me other than my like envelopes and Diary of a Madman scraps of paper. I think I need
something like a lot of my a lot of my white boards are metaphoric there the back of the back of a piece of paper, but they function the same way.
Do you have any quotes?
It's that you live your life by our think of often. I mean there any any of the come to mind
for you. One of my favorite quotes is from st. Augustine, it's Lord. Give me Chastity incontinence, but not just yet. You know, I remember leaving rehab and that was my joke. But yeah, we had a big circle and everyone's ghetto banging the floor you had to give us a story and I was like what like part of that is that tension always between doing
You're supposed to do and you know, you're supposed to do and what you want to do. And so I do think I laugh at that quote but I do hold that tension and you know in my hands part of being alive as being impulsive and breaking relate, you know, I take take personality test and I just I'm 37 out of 40 as a rule breaker. And so so we have a son that will break a rule to this keep off the grass. He will he keeps off the grass. He doesn't drink because he's not old enough to drink, you know, every high school kid drinks other.
That my one son Kashi. Oh, who's the sweetest kid around and I was thinking himself. It's just different brain chemistry because it's just part of its certain that nature nurture but part of its Nursery but so much I think is also a brain chemistry because like, you know, his brothers and sisters like the the we have a whole family of Social and yeah the way to pressure the guy to drink a little bit here and there but he's like no and I'm so impressed at how confident he is with his ability to put up boundaries and just say no and then be like Dad you're going 90 miles an
Are you speed limit is 60 and I hope sorry and so for me that quotes important because it holds those things
intention. Mmm. I just a few more questions. This is what on on investing but it's a little broader than financial instruments. It could be but what is the best or most worthwhile personal investment you've made or just one of your your better Investments that could be an investment of money time energy or other resources does anything come to mind? It could be a
trade.
You know Le sigh, you know cheeky. I bought a theory when it was one and it went to 1300. I did, you know, like I bought jet like in lots of other things but I don't think that really I because that kind of felt a little bit lucky and I was already rich I actually think investing in friendships, you know, I partly I'm a hyper social guy and so it came natural to me but what I think about my life and what gives a joy it is the circles of friendships. I have my highlight to my
Life is this party? I throw every two to four years depending on health eventually doing where 300 odd people 350 people from my universe get together and we play sports and listen to music and drink too much and and it's a three-day event that takes a huge amount of effort to put on but I feel like most complete in some ways. Like this is my exclamation point on the world on how I want to live and so for me, it's friendships. You know, their High School freshman was College friendships work.
Friendships friendships people I meet at conferences and they're not all and they need to be invested in. Otherwise, if you don't have new shared experiences, they're just the they go kind of go
away. Well, it goes back to what you mentioned earlier in a way which was the advice you received of looking at who's at your funeral right and worrying about those people and no one else. Well Mike this has been extremely fun. Is there anything else you'd like to add anything else you'd like to discuss your mention before we wrap
up. I think you covered a broad range.
To
my life. I don't want to bore your listeners. I think that was great. I think it was great. I you know, I remember meeting you freaking probably 12 13 years ago when you're an up-and-comer and it's been awesome and just because you went to Princeton you wrestled. I have took a special interest, but I've been amazed at you know, the following you've built the adventures you've been on I still go back to the I was telling you this your first book the testosterone chapter and
and the and the orgasm chapter are required reading I think for everybody and so I you know, just proud, you know, proud to be your friend and love that. I got to get on your show and congrats on all the
success. Thanks so much Mike. Yeah, the 4-Hour Body of the chapters with so many vagina illustrations that I got yanked from Costco. That's my claim to fame and it's been nice to get to know you and adults should get all
their teenage boys that chapter and I will
Happier boys that have your girlfriends.
Well Mike, thank you again for taking the time and to everybody listening. You can find Mike on Twitter at novogratz. You can learn more about Galaxy digital Galaxy Digital Dot IO, I'll put links to everything in the show notes. All the books TED Talks organizations that we've discussed and until next time. Thanks for listening.
Hey guys, this is Tim again. Just a few more things before you take off. Number one. This is five. Bullet Friday. Do you want to get a short email from me? And what do you enjoy getting a short email for me every Friday and that provides a little more soul of fun for the weekend and five. Bullet. Friday is a very short email where I share the coolest things I've found or that I've been pondering over the week that could include favorite new albums that I've discovered. It could include gizmos and gadgets and all sorts of weird shit that I've
How
dug up in the the world of the esoteric as I do it could include favorite articles that I've read and that I've shared with my close friends for instance, and it's very short. It's just a little tiny bite of goodness before you head off for the weekend. So if you want to receive that check it out. Just go to four hour workweek.com. That's 4-Hour workweek.com all spelled out and just drop in your email and you will get the very next one and if you sign up, I hope you
Enjoy it. This episode is brought to you by element spelled LMN t What on earth is element? It is a delicious sugar free electrolyte drink mix. I've stocked up on boxes and boxes of this was one of the first things that I bought when I saw covid coming down the pike and I usually use one to two per day element is formulated to help anyone with their electrolyte needs and perfectly suited to folks following a keto low carb for Paleo diet or if you drink a ton of water and you might not have the right balance.
It's that's awesome. When I drink it or if you're doing any type of endurance exercise mountain biking Etc another application. If you've ever struggled to feel good on keto low carb paleo, it's most likely because even if you're consciously consuming electrolytes, you're just not getting enough and relates to a bunch of stuff like a hormone called aldosterone blah blah blah when insulin is low, but suffice to say this is where element against bulb LMN T can help. My favorite flavor by far is Citrus salt, which is a side note you
Can also use to make a kick-ass no sugar Margarita, but for special occasions, obviously, you're probably already familiar with one of the names behind it. Rob wolf are obb. Rob wolf who is a former research biochemist and two-time New York Times bestselling author of The Paleo Solution and wired to eat Rob created element by scratching his own itch. That's how it got started his Brazilian jiu-jitsu coach has turned him onto electrolytes as a performance enhancer thinks clicked and Bam company was formed. So if
Low, carb diet or fasting electrolytes play a key role in relieving hunger cramps headaches tiredness and dizziness sugar artificial ingredients coloring all that's garbage unneeded. There's none of that in element and a lot of names you might recognize are already using element is recommend to be by one of my favorite athlete friends three Navy SEAL Teams as prescribed by their Master Chief Marine units FBI sniper teams, at least five NFL teams who have subscriptions. They are the exclusive hydration.
Tanner to Team USA weightlifting and on and on you can try it risk-free. If you don't like it element will give you your money back. No questions asked they have extremely low return rates. So again element Element e came up with a very special offer for you guys. They've created Tim's Club just go to drink element.com Tim select subscribe and save and use promo code. Tim's Club to get the 30 count box at element for only $36. This will be valid for the lifetime of the subscription and you can pause at any time.
So again, check it out. It's drink LMN T.com Tim for this exclusive offer using promo code Tim's Club One More Time drink LMN T element. So drink LMN t.com, Tim and promo code Tim's Club. Check it out. This episode is brought to you by PornHub. Just kidding. This episode is brought to you by 4 Sigma attic which is part of my morning routine also part of my afternoon routine.
Routine saves me. So there are a number of ways that I use for sick mattock in the mornings. I regularly start with their mushroom coffee instead of regular coffee and it doesn't taste like mushroom. Let me explain this. First of all zero sugar zero calories half the caffeine of regular coffee easy on my stomach taste amazing. And all you have to do is add hot water. I use travel packets. I've been to probably a dozen countries with various products from
or somatic and their mushroom coffee is top of the list. That's number one. I travel with it. I recommend it. I give it to my employees. I give it two houseguests. So if you're one of the 60 percent of Americans and more who drink coffee daily consider switching it up this stuff is amazing. That's part one. That is the cognitive enhancement side easy on the system side energizing side. The next is actually their chaga tea which tastes delicious.
It is decaf completely decaf and some may recognize chaga. It is nicknamed the king of the mushrooms. It is excellent for immune system support. So needless to say I'm focused on that right now myself and so I will often have that in the afternoons. They make all sorts of different mushroom Blends. If you are doing exercises, I am on a daily basis to keep myself sane cordyceps, excellent for endurance. They have a whole slew of options that you can check out.
Every single batch is third party lab tested for heavy metals allergens all the bad stuff to make sure that what gets into your hands is what you want to put in your mouth and they always offer a 100% money back guarantee. So you can try it risk free why not? I've worked out an exclusive offer with for somatic on their best-selling lion's mane coffee. I literally have a mug full of it in front of right now, and this is just for you my dear podcast listeners receive up to 39 percent off to know how we arrived at three nine percent with 39% office.
A lot their best-selling lion's mane coffee bundles plane this deal. You must go to for Sig Matic.com Tim. This offer is only for you and is not available on their regular website go to for Sig Matic. That's fo you are SI G. M-- atic.com Tim to get yourself some awesome and delicious mushroom coffee full discount is applied at check out.
