July 16, 2020
TOMS, The Hoffman Process, Conscious Uncoupling, and Psychedelics | Blake Mycoskie on The Tim Ferriss Podcast
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Key Takeaways
- Blake Mycoskie’s drive came from wanting to become a professional tennis player
- “When I look back at my entrepreneurial career, those early businesses were just new vehicles for me to compete” – Blake Mycoskie
- Since Blake wasn’t very talented, he had to work incredibly hard. One year at camp, he won the hardest worker of the year award.
- “That was the only way I could even compete with some of those players because I outworked them” – Blake Mycoskie
- “Having that balance is what allows you to really enjoy the leisure activities…when your hobbies become your full-time job it quickly deteriorates the joy arriving from it” – Blake Mycoskie
- The Hoffman Process takes you through a series of exercises that help you recognize what patterns you adopted that aren’t serving you and want to remove
- “They give you the tools to really rewire your brain in a way so that you’re not a slave to these patterns and habits and it’s the most freeing experience ever” – Blake Mycoskie
- Blake also ended up losing 12 lbs of body fat a few weeks after doing the program. He says it was because he got rid of a lot of stress and anxiety he was having.
- “Literally I lost weight as I lost mental weight”
- Blake also ended up losing 12 lbs of body fat a few weeks after doing the program. He says it was because he got rid of a lot of stress and anxiety he was having.
- “They give you the tools to really rewire your brain in a way so that you’re not a slave to these patterns and habits and it’s the most freeing experience ever” – Blake Mycoskie
- Tim Ferriss’ advice on actions to take before you take any psychedelic:
- Use the Waking Up meditation app for 30 days
- Read Awareness by Anthony De Mello
- Watch the 6 part series The Power of Myth
- Schedule 2 sessions of whole entropic breathwork
- Then take a guided MDMA therapy
- After that, take psilocybin
- “I would not use ayahuasca until you’ve done all of those things” – Tim Ferriss
Intro
- Blake Mycoskie (@BlakeMycoskie) is an American entrepreneur, author, and philanthropist. He is the founder of Toms Shoes.
- Host: Tim Ferriss (@tferriss)
Books Mentioned
- Blake loved the book Awareness by Anthony De Mello and recommends every to read Rediscovering Life
- To learn more about the Hoffman Process, Blake recommends reading The Hoffman Process by Tim Laurence
- While splitting up, Blake read Conscious Uncoupling: 5 Steps to Living Happily Even After by Katherine Woodward Thomas, and was blown away by the concepts in the book
- Blake also recommends reading The Way of the Superior Man: A Spiritual Guide to Mastering the Challenges of Women, Work, and Sexual Desire by David Deida, to understand the optimal polarity of masculine to feminine in a relationship
Tennis & Hard Work
- What compelled Blake to begin his life as a serial entrepreneur from an early age?
- Blake’s drive came from wanting to become a professional tennis player
- “When I look back at my entrepreneurial career, those early businesses were just new vehicles for me to compete” – Blake Mycoskie
- Blake’s drive came from wanting to become a professional tennis player
- Since Blake wasn’t very talented, he had to work incredibly hard. One year at camp, he won the hardest worker of the year award.
- “That was the only way I could even compete with some of those players because I outworked them” – Blake Mycoskie
Taking A Sabbatical
- Blake has been an entrepreneur since he was 19
- He built TOM’s into a business that had hundreds of millions of dollars in sales
- After getting married, he wanted to take a break from work so he took a sabbatical
- “I just needed to have some time to kind of reflect” – Blake Mycoskie
- After getting married, he wanted to take a break from work so he took a sabbatical
- He built TOM’s into a business that had hundreds of millions of dollars in sales
- However, Blake ended up spending his time drinking beer and playing golf all-day
- Lesson Blake learned: The joy of your hobbies is lost if you don’t have balance and meaningful work
- “Having that balance is what allows you to really enjoy the leisure activities…when your hobbies become your full-time job it quickly deteriorates the joy arriving from it” – Blake Mycoskie
- Lesson Blake learned: The joy of your hobbies is lost if you don’t have balance and meaningful work
- After a few months, Blake went back to working at TOM’s
Rewiring Your Brain
- The Hoffman Process is an 8-day program that Bob Hoffman started 30-years ago
- Its main concept is called the negative love syndrome: Kids either copy the behavior of their parents to receive their love or kids do the exact opposite to demand their attention
- “All of the patterns that end up driving pretty much every decision in our life after the age of 12, are hardwired in there based on us wanting to either receive love or attention from our parents” – Blake Mycoskie
- Its main concept is called the negative love syndrome: Kids either copy the behavior of their parents to receive their love or kids do the exact opposite to demand their attention
- The Hoffman Process takes you through a series of exercises that help you recognize what patterns you adopted that aren’t serving you and want to let go of
- “They give you the tools to really rewire your brain in a way so that you’re not a slave to these patterns and habits and it’s the most freeing experience ever” – Blake Mycoskie
- Blake also ended up losing 12 lbs of body fat a few weeks after doing the program. He says it was because he got rid of a lot of stress and anxiety he was having.
- “Literally I lost weight as I lost mental weight”
- Blake also ended up losing 12 lbs of body fat a few weeks after doing the program. He says it was because he got rid of a lot of stress and anxiety he was having.
- “They give you the tools to really rewire your brain in a way so that you’re not a slave to these patterns and habits and it’s the most freeing experience ever” – Blake Mycoskie
- Blake loved the book Awareness by Anthony De Mello and recommends every to read Rediscovering Life
- To learn more about the Hoffman Process, Blake recommends reading The Hoffman Process by Tim Laurence
- Blake has started a scholarship and sent over 200 people to the Hoffman Process
- One habit Blake had to rewire: stop seeking to be the center of attention
Lessons From Psychedelics
- The 3 experiences that had a huge impact on Blake’s life: The Hoffman Process, psychedelics, and spending time with scientists studying what can affect a person’s mental wellbeing on a day-to-day basis
- What has Blake learned from plant-medicine and psychedelics?
- He recommends starting with a guided psilocybin journey instead of doing something big like ayahuasca
- On his trip, he experienced angels telling him he was enough and didn’t need to prove anything to anyone ever again
- “It was just like this..deep love and acknowledgment that there’s nothing more I could do or nothing I can’t do to not feel God’s love” – Blake Mycoskie
- “I am just perfect the way I am…it totally transformed the way I look at myself after that experience”
- “It was just like this..deep love and acknowledgment that there’s nothing more I could do or nothing I can’t do to not feel God’s love” – Blake Mycoskie
- On his trip, he experienced angels telling him he was enough and didn’t need to prove anything to anyone ever again
- He recommends starting with a guided psilocybin journey instead of doing something big like ayahuasca
- He careful with ayahuasca, you can have a bad experience on it
- Taking ayahuasca is like having knee surgery. If the first one goes well, you probably don’t need to do it again anytime soon.
- It’s also like knee surgery because if you don’t do your rehab afterward, you can end up worse off than you were before
- Taking ayahuasca is like having knee surgery. If the first one goes well, you probably don’t need to do it again anytime soon.
- PSA: Be careful with ayahuasca and 5-MeO-DMT, it can destabilize you for weeks or even months after taking it
- Tim’s advice and actions to take before you take any psychedelic:
- Use the Waking Up meditation app for 30 days
- Read Awareness by Anthony De Mello
- Watch the 6 part series The Power of Myth
- Schedule 2 sessions of whole entropic breathwork
- Then take a guided MDMA therapy
- After that, take psilocybin
- “I would not use ayahuasca until you’ve done all of those things” – Tim Ferriss
Splitting Up
- Blake and his now ex-wife were married for 7 years before they decided to split up
- While splitting up, Blake read Conscious Uncoupling: 5 Steps to Living Happily Even After by Katherine Woodward Thomas and was blown away by the concepts in the book
- Over 50% of people who get married get divorced, but there are very few tools to help people going through a breakup
- While splitting up, Blake read Conscious Uncoupling: 5 Steps to Living Happily Even After by Katherine Woodward Thomas and was blown away by the concepts in the book
- “At the end of the day, you realize…it’s not about blaming the other person, it’s about owning what my role was in those unmet expectations” – Blake Mycoskie
- By identifying where each person fell short in the relationship, talking through what happened, and hiring coaches to walk them through lessons from the book, Blake and his wife were able to split up while still being close friends
- “The book is incredible, the coaches are amazing, I can’t stress enough that there’s a beautiful alternative to staying in an unhappy marriage”
- By identifying where each person fell short in the relationship, talking through what happened, and hiring coaches to walk them through lessons from the book, Blake and his wife were able to split up while still being close friends
- Blake also recommends reading The Way of the Superior Man: A Spiritual Guide to Mastering the Challenges of Women, Work, and Sexual Desire by David Deida, to understand the optimal polarity of masculine to feminine in a relationship
Blake’s Next Project
- Blake is currently building Madefor: Madefor uses evidence-based research and proven scientific principles to help you cultivate the habits and mindset needed for lasting positive change
- “What we’re really trying to do is help shift your mindset…and your behavior” – Blake Mycoskie
- It takes about 30 days to ingrain a new habit or practice
- The program is 10 months long and focuses on one habit per month
- The 10 habits are: Gratitude, nature, connection, breath, hydration, rest, fuel, clarity, vision, and movement
- The program is 10 months long and focuses on one habit per month
- One simple yet foundational habit is the importance of hydration
- ‘There’s a large percentage of Americans that are chronically dehydrated” – Blake Mycoskie
- Our bodies are made of 70% water and even a 1% change in your optimal hydration can affect your mood and energy levels
- ‘There’s a large percentage of Americans that are chronically dehydrated” – Blake Mycoskie
