Revisited: Choose Your Seven Humans Wisely with Author Fredrik Backman

0:00 My best friend and my wife, if they would have gone on one of like the matchmaking websites or something if they would have put themselves through an algorithm and said find me a person, they would have never found me. Like never in a million years would an algorithm have said this lunatic, he's the guy for you. Never. I was fortunate in the way that I stumbled upon people early on in my life that was very different for me. Yeah. And I found out very quickly that that was a good thing for me. That was like I needed people who were not like me.

0:47 Yeah. So, so that I could look at their best qualities and strive for them. If you're an avid listener of this podcast, you may know something about me that I'm not a reader. I've actually written more books than I've read. But this conversation with Frederick Bachman makes me want to read the way he thinks, the way he sees the world, the way he sees humans and friendships and people, it inspired me. I actually bought two of his novels, anxious people and a man called Ove, which was later made into a movie a man called Otto starring Tom Hanks. We live in a world where loneliness is an epidemic, and Frederick reminds us that meaningful relationships are built with intention. They take showing up

1:33 again and again and again even when it's inconvenient. His new book My Friends drives that point home. The people who have deep meaningful connections in the world, they're not lucky. They do the work and that work is worth it. I wanted to begin this episode talking about Frederick's fantastic viral speech that he gave about creative anxiety and procrastination at Simon and Schuster Centennial. He is of course humble about the video success, but it's easy to see why his words connected with so many people. It's brilliant, hilarious and painfully relatable for introverts like me, and that is a perfect description for the conversation that follows. This is a bit of optimism. Oh, and PS, if you ever go to Stockholm, Frederick and I reveal who has the best cardamom

2:27 buns in the world. This episode is brought to you by Porsche and like all great brands with great products, it's the people behind the products that make them so spectacular. You already know this, irrespective of whether people are fans of your books or not. The little video you did at the publishing thing went viral and made you a bit of an internet sensation.

2:59 They are fueled by pure panic. My wife has this thing where she doesn't give me all of the information, which she finds to be very effective. So she didn't. I thought my publisher was celebrating their 100 years Simon and Schuster and they only invited me because they needed like a Scandinavian. They needed to show, we have authors from all over the world and at some point someone in a meeting was like, do we have anyone from Scandinavia? And they were like, yeah, I think we have a guy. My wife also explained to me like, are they going to have a thing? And I thought based on what she told me that I was going to give a speech at a dinner. And then I arrived and it was at a theater in the presence of a lot of a lot of writers and a lot of people that I

3:48 really, really admire and really look up to. And I had prepared the speech full of stupid jokes. I don't know how to write a speech. Good evening. My name is Fredrik Bachmann. I'm here tonight because my agent said that this would be good for my career. She said, I need to learn how to speak in front of people.

4:15 It will be fun, she said. So I told her that I write books. I spend eight hours every day locked inside a room with people I have made up. If I was comfortable talking to real people, I would have a real job. But my agent said, you know, just go up there and talk about the life of a writer. And I said, all right, being a writer is the best way I know how to get paid for being insane.

4:44 So it was pure panic. What you saw on the video, that was just me panicking and thinking, this is going to be the end of my time at this very nice publishing house. Well, the good news is they hire you for being a writer, not a speech giver. And the better news is you nailed. But inherently, audience is always rooting for who's ever on the stage I've found. And where things are the best and we most enjoy what we hear is that somebody is showing who they truly are, which is if they're nervous or if they speak slowly as long as that's who they are, I think people fall in love. I am here tonight with all of my anxiety because I know that in this room there might be someone who is dreaming about writing a book, dreaming of becoming an author.

5:32 So I'm here to tell you that I am obviously an idiot. I have no idea what I'm doing but I became an author anyway. So you can too. And I hope that one day I will be able to tell my agent that the reason that my next book is not finished yet is because I was busy reading yours. Thank you very much. I think that's what happened, which is we fell in love with somebody who was very honest about how you were actually feeling in a day and age where we filter everything and everything's performing. I'm glad if it felt that way. There was a lot of people who told me afterwards it was so good because it wasn't perfect. It wasn't like practiced and I'm like, I tried. It wasn't my intention. It wasn't my intention for it to be good. You know,

6:23 you walk up on stage and I had a piece of paper with a speech written down and they said, no, no, we can put that on the teleprompter. And I was like, absolutely not. I'm holding on to the paper that did like this is like my life raft on open sea. I'm holding on to this like I'm holding on to like the edge of a mountain. It went all right, but it was there was a lot of panic involved.

6:48 This is also a lot of panic involved and that we talked about that earlier, but the reason that the reason that I said yes to this, I was going to explain to my children what I was going to do because they're all going to be in this podcast and what kind of podcast is in this. This incredibly intelligent man who has written these books on leadership and he invites these incredibly smart people to his podcast and they talk about profound things and they talk about like research and science and the world and the society. And you can see my kids looking at me like, when are we going to get to the part of why you're here? Why are you going to be on it?

7:30 But the reason that I couldn't say no was that my best friend, we know each other so we were teenagers of 30 plus years is a great extrovert. You know, it was always a good leader, always one of those guys that you followed everywhere because he just had that charisma. And when he was 19, he started working as a forklift driver and warehouse, food convegetables. And then over the course of 25 years, he's worked his way up and now he's the head of HR for the company of 900 people. He talks about, you know, your books and your writing and how it's affected his view on leadership, how it's affected his view on how to be of service to others. Like he talks a lot about, he talks a lot about how he learned that leadership,

8:24 it's not about the position, it's about the responsibility and responsibility to others. And being of service to others, we talk about it a lot. So I couldn't like, there was no way that he would forgive me if I said no to this. That's very kind. Thank you. What I'm taking away from that story, which is so beautiful, is how proud you are of him. You're glowing as you talk about it. And as I've been looking at friendship and trying to understand friendship, there's this very interesting observation that we all, I hope, have at least one but a few a group of people that we can turn to in dark times. When we're at our worst, when we're struggling, we can go to these people and say, I just need to vent, I need your help, I'm not doing well.

9:10 I hope that everybody has that group of friends. What I've found fascinating is that it's a smaller group of friends that we can call to brag, that we can call to say, I did something great, something great happened to me. My book hit the bestseller list, I'm so proud of myself, and there's no jealousy on the other side, and there's no envy. And what I find so fascinating is the number of people that we can brag to is smaller than the number of people we can go to in hard times. And so this says a lot, I think, about the quality of your friendship. You said, he's such a close friend, you've been, for instance, your teenagers, that you're talking about his accomplishments as if they're your own. Has it always been like that, or have you ever had

9:54 times in your, in that friendship where you were jealous, or something he did highlighted in insecurity in you? No, I think it's always been that we were really proud of each other. I think it's always, it was always that we rooted so strongly for each other. He's always been insanely proud of me, like for whatever I accomplished, but I think, I really, really think that I, he was the person who taught me how to be, that it was important to be happy for others, like that that was a genuine part of the friendship to be, to have that, to be able to be genuinely happy for each other. It's funny that you say that because I have that with him that I call him sometimes, and I say, I can't say, I can't say this to anyone else because I'm going to

10:47 sound like like a douchebag. I'm going to sound really full of myself, but this thing happened and I'm super proud of it. And we also have this, he can call me once in a while and he'll say, you know, this thing happened. I'm really, you know, I'm upset with this person. I just need to vent. Is that okay? And then he just goes off. And then at the end of it, it's like, I know I'm like exaggerating. I'm overreacting. I know that. But I have to like, sometimes you need to get it out to like edit yourself and like, yeah, this is not how I'm going to say it to them, but I needed to say it to you firm. I think you just summed up the problem with social media, which is our initial reaction, which is not the best reaction. It's the venting reaction. It's not

11:32 the way we actually want to say something to somebody. It's not constructive, but it is necessary for us to get it all out in the most exaggerated form so that we can be calmer and rational again that I think a lot of people are using the social media, the comments section, as that outlet, not the friend. If you're married and you're upset, you know, you have an argument with your wife and you go to your friends and you say, you know, I just, you know, it's this and this and this and this and this and this and you know, and we had this argument she didn't listen and whatever it is, your friends will tell you, yeah, but, you know, but you are that way. Like you're, she's right about these three things. Like you might be right about this one thing, but the other three things,

12:22 she's spot on there. Like you're, you're the annoying one. You're in the wrong and you have to go, like, all right, all right, fine. And then you kind of edit yourself. Yeah. Because they're your editors and you go back and you're like, okay, this is how I feel. You need people around you who edit you when people have read one of my books and they tell me like, well, I'm excited to meet you because I read one of your books and I want to tell them like, you need to tone down your expectations because you read my book. I edited the book for a year. That's the version of me. And if you didn't like the book, that's still the most you're going to like me because that was, that was the that was all I had. That was the best. That was the best way that I could phrase this. Like I,

13:07 maybe I rewrote that sentence 150 times before I'm like, yeah, this is how I feel about it. If you meet me in real life before editing, then that's how I found writing. When I was a kid, I was very bad at being in an argument, being in a confrontation. I didn't know like I always went away like, well, I should have said that. I should have said that. I should have said that. So writing was my way to find I was in argument. I think it was in an argument with my dad. He's very good with words. So he would win all the time because he knew more words. I mean, he could like twist an argument and maybe six or seven years old. And I was like, I went into my room and I was really angry. And instead of like engaging in the argument, I went to my room and I wrote him a letter.

14:00 And I started doing that a little bit with people like when I was upset with them, I sat down and I wrote them a letter because then I could edit myself. So it didn't come out. It came out the way that I wanted it come out. That's how I started writing, I think. I absolutely love this idea as friend as editor. And there are people who are better editors than they are writers, you know, where they can see the flaws in the argument or they can see how to make the argument better more than we can. They have clarity and we're open to editors. The good writers are open to editors. The good writers know that they won't get it right and they need somebody's input to see the things that we can't see. And to think of a friend, to have that same clarity and objectivity

14:46 and able to see what we're trying to say. And for us to be open to an editor rather than to just hire somebody to just agree with our writing, you said that you learned to be proud of somebody else from him. Did he actually sit down and teach you the lesson or did you just feel his joy for you and you learned it by example by watching him?

15:14 No, with him, I think I learned with that particular thing, I think I learned by example. And still do. I mean, he's still very much my role model. He's always you know, showed me how to be a better person. I'm always trying to give me an example. He was always the first with a lot of things. So he was the first to get a serious relationship.

15:42 We were 22, 23 and we would always watch movies. We would always end up at, you know, whatever night it was, we were up usually at my apartment and we would watch movies and or play video games. He met a girl and and you know, after a while they get serious and one night he just he just sat there and he like just looked at me and he said, you know what? I think this is going to be the last time for a very long time that I watch a movie with you guys. I was like, what?

16:17 And he's like, no, I've been thinking about it and this is something that we do but we're going to do other things like we're going to go we're going to go grab a beer. We're going to go grab dinner. We're going to hang out. We're going to go to concerts. We're still going to do all that. But this like Tuesday night just sitting around watching a movie. I'm going to do that with my girlfriend now because that time is really important for me to have with her if this is going to work.

16:45 And I want this to work. And he had this really discussion with us that that you know, you need to be happy for me for this. And we would you know, we were 22, which was a you know, and it was such a mature way of telling your friends like, I love you. I but but I have to invest time in her. And then a few years later, he was 25 and they had their first child. And we were 25 years old, you know, you're not the smartest. And we were all single the rest of us. So I remember we were in a room and three of his friends started as a joke and then it went a little too far. And then we kind of said, well, you never you know, you never hang out with us anymore because you always have to be with your family. Now that you have a kid, you always have to be with your family.

17:47 And he sat down and he did he did it in the nicest most compassionate way. But he sat down and he looked at us and he says, it's not that I have to be with them. It's that I want to be with them. And he says, you know, I love you. I love hanging out with you. But there is no situation where I wouldn't rather be with my kid. And he was so just he was such a moment for the rest of us. We were all single. We didn't have kids. We didn't know anything about that.

18:22 And we all and I remember and we've talked about it after it was like it was a profound moment for the rest of us in the room. And it kind of it impacted the way I really think it impacted the way that we looked at a relationship because after that, we were we were all, okay, that's what I'm looking for. That's the thing. I'm looking over the next five, six years. We all met someone. We're still with that person 10, 15 years later. We're still with that person and we all have kids. And we all look at our families the way that he told the way that he said that that day. We still we're all like we're all invested in our families in the same way. We all have this discussion all the time that people talk about quality time over quantity time.

19:21 Yeah. And I think that's the part where we would wildly disagree. Like all four of us is like I would rather have quantity. I would rather have a hundred hours with you over the phone than like going on this trip to Las Vegas and watch a formula one race or whatever, you know the super experience that you could have with a group of friends. I would much rather have a hundred hours with you over the phone. Yeah. Please impacted me tremendously because he's he's always been the one to do something first. It's very often he said something and then three years later I'm like I get it though. I didn't get it at the time but I get it now. You were right.

20:05 There's so many things that I'm taking away from this. He's also talking about growing up and that our life changes we grow and we have to by we have to reprioritize and sometimes that'll come at the expense of the people who aren't at the place we're at. You know, as you said, you were single. He was in a relationship. You learned some of the things he was saying. You understand what things he was saying only three years later when some of your life caught up with some his life. But I so appreciate that level of communication where you tell your friends just so you know and they get to have the reaction. No, no, no, you know, as opposed to getting angry because it's more passive, which is I think important what most of us do. A, because I think it's easier

20:47 and B, because I don't think we know how to tell our friends for fear of disappointing them or upset in them. And he didn't seem to have that fear. No, no, no, I think I practiced talking about my emotions because we we were that kind of group of friends and it was always very normal to us to to talk about how we felt, especially me and him. And it it so I had a lot of practice talking about my emotions. And he also, you know, he's a great editor. He's very good at telling me like, yeah, you're way off here. You know, you're talking about honesty. He's honest.

21:26 He was always what he was also also this, you know, did you talk me how to to view time. We live seven hours apart and Sweden now because I moved north. So we talk over the phone a lot. And so we can text each other like we both have dogs. So I'll text him like, are you going to walk the dog? He's like, yeah, at 9 p.m. I'm going to walk the dog. I'll call them. But we were always talking about time. Like time, like he was so clear, so early on in life that this is the amount of time I have. You know, and these are the things that I need to do. And I like, we're still going to hang out, but I'm going to have to take a little bit of it. He said on multiple occasions that like the only thing I can give you is time.

22:24 Like that's what I have. Like that's what I'm, that's what I have. A demable precious commodity. Yeah. And for him, it was, I can give you time. Whenever there's someone who loses someone, he's that person who he just gets in the car and he goes to their house. And he says, I'm here. And he says, if you don't need me for anything, I'll go sit in the car. But I just, I just want you to know that I'm here. And at so many occasions, he's, he's someone lost someone. And there's this thing that happens when he loses someone that everyone thinks, well, I don't want to call. I don't want to disturb. I don't want to intrude in there. So they end up sitting there alone. And he would say like, there are probably people

23:17 who can stay smarter things or or give you like more profound words at this time. Or like, but I can give you, like I can be around. I can be here. I can do the dishes or, you know, go get food or or I'll, you know, if there, there's a chore around the house, I'll do that. Like I'll, I'll give me something to do. A lot of people will listen to this are, I don't want to use the word jealous or envious, maybe feeling them long. That in their lives. And I know people are asking this, how do I get a friend like your friend? Look who you are and who you've become that we have to, we have to admit in some way, shape or form, whether it's you as a father, you as a husband, you as a friend, you as an author, in some way, shape or form, you have become good at those things

24:12 in part because of this person in your life who's rooting for you since the beginning, who's been honest with you since the beginning, who's been helping manage time since the beginning. I've been modeling what all of it looks like for you. And I know a lot of people listening to this are thinking themselves, how do I get that? I want that. There's beauty in what you're talking about. There's also profound sadness. Let's go have it.

24:43 We interrupt this podcast with an ad with authenticity. Authentic because we do our ads a little differently. And thank you to Portia for being open to something a little different. I met up with race car driver Patrick Long. He's competed with Portia in some of the most iconic races in the world, which is why I thought it would be safer if I did the driving. How did you come to Portia?

25:10 I was a young Southern California kid who was just chasing a dream of being a pro racing driver with it was for one weekend or for what had ended up being multiple decades. I was living in Europe and I had a phone call from Portia. I showed up to Germany not knowing much. I knew I loved Portia as a kid growing up, but I didn't really understand what was behind this brand, their story, their DNA, and just how successful they've been in racing. Every little boy wants to be an astronaut or a race car driver. Where did your dream of being a race car driver? Where did it come from? And how did you actually get into it? Yeah, my little league was go carts and at six years old on a closed circuit dirt road. I was in control of my destiny. There was no one telling me what to do.

25:54 What was your first professional race? How old were you? I was 21 and I was racing on the German DTM schedule in a one-make 911 cup series where down to the steering wheel in the seat, everybody's cars were identical as delivered from Portia and basically the driver was the differentiator. It was my college career, if you will. You know, I was the first non-German to be signed into the Portia junior team, the farm league, where they developed their factory fighter pilots.

26:24 By the fourth race, I had my first victory and I think people were shocked not only because I was a rookie, but because I was an American. And Americans racing in Europe are sort of black sheep's for whatever reason and just still loving every new journey within the brand. How do people get a friend like that? I mean, part of it is just I was lucky. Just the way that I talk about my wife, well, I was lucky. I ran into someone and they were my humans, me in Rio, my best friend. And that friend group that I still have, those three friends I still have in my life. And they're still my most important people. And I figured out with them and then I did the same with my wife. We figured out that, okay, there's there's two things that we need to

27:32 be aware of here. First, we need to have rules of fighting, if that makes sense. And like my wife and I very early on in our relationship, we had been just started dating. Like we agreed that we would never in a fight. No one could say, no one could threaten with, like maybe we shouldn't be together. Maybe we shouldn't, you know, maybe, well, maybe this relationship is a mistake. Maybe you should leave me like, no one could do that because that's like an atomic bomb in or in like the discussion is immediately over. Someone threatens to leave. Yeah. Then the argument is immediately over. And you want like we set up boundaries for fighting. And I think we talked about the way we fought like after the fight, we would talk for hours and hours and hours and hours

28:28 about the fight. If that made sense, like we would try to analyze each other and we would try to figure each other out. And I think it was coming from a place where we understood that we are very, very, very different. And I think it's the same thing with my wife. We knew immediately go and interact relationship. Like we are really different people. Yeah. This is going to be a journey for both of us. When you're young, people tell you that while our relationship is a lot of work.

29:00 And when you're young, you think it sounds unromantic because you think like while in that case, it's not true love. If you have to work on it, it's not true love. But that's because when you're young, you don't understand that the work is not under relationship and it's not, it's on you. The work is on you. That's what people mean when they say a relationship is a lot of work.

29:22 The work is on me. It's I have to work. I have to work on who I am, communicating better, explaining my feelings better, understanding me better so that I can explain myself better. But also the fact that when me and Rhea, we've been friends for 30 plus years. My wife and I have been together for 18 years. And we change all the time.

29:54 Like we've changed a lot. Like we've changed immensely. You find someone you get married and then you have kids. Like you become a completely different person in some regards when you have kids because then there's this whole other responsibility that I have to. You're unraveling some of the tropes and the punchlines. Relationships are a lot of work.

30:19 And to your point, it was like, yes, the work is on yourself. That's not people don't say that. I love my relationship because I've been working on myself and I'm a better version of myself. And that's my definition of a great relationship with as a friendship or a romantic relationship. The youth do the growth yourself. The other person can only support you. They can't grow for you.

30:39 And I think when we talk about sort of the sadness that goes along with hearing about a friendship like yours, I can't accept that it's a lottery. I can't accept that it's like some people are good looking. Some people are smart and some people get great friends. Like I can't accept that. You know, the good looking in the smart, you know, that's genetics. That really is a lottery.

31:01 But the friendship, I know you said you were lucky and that's probably how you feel. But based on everything you've been describing in your relationship about the choice to do the work and your friend's choice to spend time with his family and his choice to spend time with his girlfriend, I think the way you get one of those friends that you want is you choose to be that friend first. You choose to show up at someone's house in Sammy here. Give me something to do. That's the work on yourself. Like first you have to choose to be the good friend. Your friend made the choice to be a good friend of what he got back was a great friend.

31:42 What's the term you use in business ROI? Return of investment. That's why I talk more about quantity time than quality time. I think it's a return of investment for me. I'm the same way with my kids. I know that I'm not a great dad. I know that I'm not like I'm aiming to be an okay dad. I know that because I live in my head a lot and I'm easily distracted and I have all these things and I'm bad with stress and all of that. But I'm like if I'm around enough, then I will have time to make up for my mistakes. Does your wife think that you're a bad dad?

32:24 No, I think she would agree that I'm easily distracted. I think she would say that I'm a good dad because I really try. That's her definition. She's a better judge of the quality of your parenting than you I would imagine because there are her kids too and she doesn't want you to screw them up. No, no, no. She tells me that a lot. You are good. They think you're a good dad because they can see how hard you try to be a good dad. Then you make mistakes sometimes and that's all right and you mess it up. But I think it's the same way with friendships and it's the same way with my relationship with my wife. The thing we invest in is our friendship. If that makes sense. I view that relationship as it's a romantic relationship, it's husband and wife,

33:21 it's all of that. But it's also at its core. We invested in our friendship, like hanging out, doing things together. This whole conversation to me goes right back to where we started. On the four-minute speech you gave it, Simon and Schuster, which is you try. I think that you're tying together a lot of things. I've said a lot of things before that you're tying together for me. My girlfriend, we were having a fight that went like this. I said, here's what I got right and here's what you got wrong. She responded, well here's what I got right and here's what you got wrong and you can see how this goes back and forth. At some point, like I interrupted the fight and said, this is not going to go anywhere good. I'm changing the rules

34:10 and the rules are, I'm going to tell you what I did wrong. I'm going to tell you what you did right then you're going to go. That's what we did and within 30 seconds, what we both discovered as we're trying. I think this idea of letting people see that you're trying, not just tell them that you're trying, but let them see that you're trying. When you show up at someone's house and say, I'm here, give me something to do, meaning I don't know what to say. I didn't prepare anything.

34:37 I don't have a sense of what right or wrong is in this situation, but I'm here, give me something to do is the greatest indication of I'm trying. Telling your friends, guys, just so you know, this will be the last time I come to Movie Night, which is I'm going to try this relationship thing. And that's the respect we had for him is was the effort, the visual effort, the measurable effort is the most romantic thing in the world in a romantic relationship or a friendship or a work relationship is effort that someone is investing in in a person. Not that they get it right and I think you're an amazing father because you're trying so hard to be a good father.

35:28 Yeah, and I, I don't know why I'm so emotional today. Like I have close friends and I have a good relationship with my folks and there are both amazing parents, you know, I don't know why this is touching me so much. I mean, this is super emotional to me and who because we're talking about, you know, we're talking about these are my most important to like my wife, my kids and my best friends. These are my, you know, humans. I always separate, like I always try to explain that I don't there are people and there are humans. Like humans, you have maybe seven humans that you chose, these are your, and then people, people are the ones at the airport. You can be annoyed by people and still love humans. My best friend and my wife, if they would have, if they would have gone

36:22 on one of like the matchmaking websites or something, one of the apps or whatever it is now, it's like I'm too old for that, but I'm too old to understand the technology now, but if like if they would have put themselves through an algorithm and said, find me a person, they would have never found me. Like never in a million years would an algorithm have said, this lunatic, he's the guy for you, never. I was fortunate in the way that I stumbled upon people early on in my life that was very different for me. Yeah. And I found out very quickly that that was a good thing for me. That was like I needed people who were not like me. And so, so that I could look at their best qualities and strive for them. I want to sort of double click on one other thing, which is you're very self

37:18 deprecating. And there's a difference between being self deprecating and being having low self esteem. And I think you're self deprecated. You accept you. I think you find you funny. I think your ego is healthy. And I think the ability to be self deprecating in a way that you're is owning either real shortcomings or perceived shortcomings is by by naming it, you can say I'm not working on it. I'm trying. You can make it a thing as opposed to not naming it, keeping it hidden means it can never be addressed. It can never grow. And that then becomes it in security. And I'm fascinated by healthy self deprecators, you know, where by putting in those tools where to put it out. I mean, I do. I think there's a difference between saying,

38:16 I'm no good at this versus yeah, I'm no good at this. But it's not a giving up. It's an identifying and that's the difference. I think low self esteem is giving up and accepting this is this is my luck. This is how I am self deprecation when it's healthy is simply identifying something and saying, look, I'm maybe that's sometimes it goes better sometimes a good worse. I'm working on it, you know, having concrete yet, but still doing it that probably might take me my whole life.

38:41 And I may never get to the standard I want, but I'm working on it. And I think the ability to put it out there does so many things. Hey, I think it's super healthy. It also makes you super authentic. It also allows others to support you in whatever journey you're trying to grow in. I mean, I watched your speech and I was so inspired by it because I just love that you just put it out there and said, this is what I'm going to try and do. And here you go. I also wonder how much of it is just because you're Swedish. You know, what is it? Yenta? What's it called? Yanta?

39:16 Yanta. Yanta. The Yanta law. Yanta law. There's a certain part of it so that people know what we're talking about it. Do they teach it at school in Sweden? Yeah, it's just a common. Everybody knows Yanta law. Don't pick up yourself. Never brag. Never think you're better than anybody else. Don't see contention. It's all of these forced humility things. And Swedes, you know, I know like if you walk through the very, very fancy street with all the fancy shops in downtown Stockholm, like in the Gucci and the Prada in the window, nothing has a logo on it. You know, no conspicuous displays of wealth is looked down upon and talking about yourself and bragging about yourself. I think a certain part of it sure. And I think it's to a certain extent, I defend Yanta. I think it's, I mean, for

40:07 for for some of us, it's kind of good. It's it's like, you know, don't get too full of yourself. The bad quality of it is what do you call crabs in a bucket? Like one crab tries to get out of the buckets and the other crabs pull them back down. Yeah. But I think part of it is that Sweden is a small country. And I think it's the same if you grow up in America, but in a small town. Yeah.

40:34 Or kind of it does something to you. You have this idea that we kind of have to stick together a little bit. Yeah. And we have to find a way to get along because there are fewer of us. And some day, I think there's a there's a positive quality to it. But I also think honestly, I think it's a huge part of it. I've always looked for people who are different from me. I think I I very, it was good for me to very early on in life understand like the people that I bought headwoods like the people that I get annoyed by. Yeah. Very often people who are more like me.

41:15 Yeah. And I get annoyed with somewhat at the airport. And well, my wife and my kids will go like, yeah, because he's like you. That's how you are when you're having a bad day. That's how you are when you're annoyed by something. It was a blessing for me very early on in my life that I have stumbled on, but also have sought out people who were very different from me.

41:36 So that I mean, what you call self deprecating, it's also part of it is also that you know, if you hang out with people over at different from you, you kind of learn how to make jokes about how different you are. So you understand the way that you are different from the people around you. Sure, it can be self deprecating, but it can also be this we never feel that we deserve each other. Yeah. We always feel that we have to earn it. Like I always feel like I have to I have to earn the attention of my wife. Like I always feel like I have to try a little harder to make her laugh or to you know, to make her think that I'm doing okay. What you're talking about is doing the work. What you're talking about is doing the work of the relationship. Like it requires

42:34 effort. Like you can't take it even for granted. You have to earn it every single day. That's the work. Like I have very few close friends. I have very few humans in my life because I figured out very early on that I you for you to get the best out of me, you have to spend a lot of time with me because I'm also going to be very annoying and I'm also going to be very intense sometimes because I can you know, I'm very often at a one or an 11. I talk too little or I can't shut up. It's so there's a lot of things that I'm going to do that you're going to find highly annoying.

43:13 Yeah. So I need a lot of time from you so that you can see my good qualities too. And I figured that out and realized from you know, re-ets less than that. Okay, so everything is about time than I can't have I can't have 300 friends. It's because I'm never going to be able to give them the best of me. For the record, I like the the young to law. My only complaint about it is that all of those things are expressed in the negative. Don't do this. Don't be this. Don't do this. Don't please. And I would love to see it updated for the modern world that says, be humble. Be appreciative of others. See the value and others. I'd rather the young to law tells us what to do rather than not what not to do. And I wonder if it's a bucket of crabs because everybody say you can't do that

44:03 as opposed to let's lift each other up as opposed to pull each other down. As actually incredibly clever and very, very true. And I have to admit that I've been living with this my entire life. And I haven't thought about it that way. But it's exactly that. It should be if you if you would just turn around and say these are the things you should do then it would be a list of very positive things because that's the kind of like all of the things are things that you try to teach your kids. I like y'all. I just wish it was expressed. I'm going to rewrite all the young to laws and in the affirmative. That's what I'm going to do. You should.

44:46 This I think I think this could really benefit all of us. I wish I could have 10 more hours. The I'm so profoundly moved by this idea of time and choice. And I'm so I'm so curious about Riyadhem is if he's if his obsession with time if it's worn out of fear or something else. So I you know this is a very personal thing to say about someone that you you're having your life and that I love you know immensely. I think it's a fear for him. It's always been a fear of not being enough for people. Like that's his main fear. For a long time he strut like every if you rise within a company you get a new role you become all of a sudden you're the boss of people you used to work with. Yeah. And you have to change your identity a little you have

45:43 to this is certain there's a new responsibility now. And I have to think differently. I have to be a service to others and all that. I think he he had this self esteem problem at every new level he felt everyone knows more than I do they have more education that I do they come from this huge background they bring so much to the table you know and I don't have anything that I'm bringing so he always felt that he had to outwork everybody he had to come the best prepared the the moat like he had to just find so much things to bring to the table everyone else just showed up but he felt to the service either the table I have to bring so much more than everyone else. This is something that I learned later on in life that I'm dealing trying to learn now trying to deal with

46:33 now but I think I kind of I developed this fear of disappointing people which my wife has told me a lot like you you have this fear of disappointing people and it's so strong in you that you do like you try to do too much and then when you don't feel appreciated or you feel like oh I think they're disappointed me you kind of lash out even before they've reacted you're so afraid that they'll be disappointed that you're you lash out at them you become angry before they're even disappointed. Yeah you kind of you you took it out in advance and I'm really trying to become better at that my wife told me in so many words sometimes you the only thing you want is for the kids to be happy and you want that so much so if we're at some place and you wanted them

47:38 to be so happy when we get to this place and you get kind of upset with them for not being happy enough and and and that's not on them that's on you because you raised your expectations of how happy you were going to make them and so this is this is a you problem. I had a guest on my on the pregnancy mode got it and he talked about expectations and fantasy like and what happens is we have these expectations we have these fantasies and then what happens is if if real life doesn't match that that's where the disappointment happens so you you plan something for you kids and in your mind they scream and shout and dad you're the main is the best thing ever and that's that's the fantasy that you concocted in your mind when you shove and when reality shows up and

48:23 it's not that it's the delta that beeps you so disappointed leaves us so disappointed and his whole point was like can you let go of the fantasy that you plan the thing and the reaction will be whatever the reaction will be and trying to let go of the expectation but because you're only going to be disappointed no but it's entirely true. I've been plagued by this my whole life like I I'm so I am more excited for the things I plan for people than they are and I I've had to learn that the gesture is the thing and not the reaction and I still struggle with it. Here's another question for you. How can we understand bullies without excusing them?

49:06 I think for me is to see how much I have in common with them. I write books and it's not to be self-deprecating it's not to be humble but I often tell people that the the the worst people in my books the worst characters they're very often from me. The most annoying characters that the characters with a lot of flaws and a lot of who do stupid things they're very often from me and the best characters are from people around me. Those are the people that I aspire to. If people find something in my writing or in my characters that they connect to it's very often that. I don't start I don't I don't write about the best parts of me. I write about the really you know the parts of me that I'm not super proud of the the you know when I'm envious or or I'm you know I'm I'm

49:55 petty or I'm I'm mean. I don't excuse bullies by seeing all but there's good in them. I excuse them by seeing but the the things that they do they are within me too and maybe I'm not that far from them that I wish I was. As such a brilliant device which is instead of forcing each other to find the good of the people we don't like or disagree with but rather to find what we haven't common with the people we don't like or who bully us. I find that much more humbling and it's not so it's not so arrogant which is boy I'm pretty flawed too and I think what it does is it it produces empathy it helps you understand the other person who's who we don't like or disagree with.

50:45 I do that a lot with my wife that I say you know someone did something at you know we see someone do something or say something or behave badly and we come home you know maybe we're at a party or dinner or something and I come home when I say you know what I I saw him say this or I saw him behaving this way and I got this shame that that is probably something that I do once in a while and I have to become better at fighting that part of me and it's not to be it's not to be suffocating or humble but I think that I'm in large parts on narcissists I really do I just fight it and I think that's maybe that was my you know survival mechanism kicking in that that I have to find people around me who are different from me and better from me so that they constantly

51:44 remind me not to be a jerk yeah because I I struggle with my narcissism all the time like I fight it actively to be to be better because I think if I let it loose it would just I would I would be a horrible horrible person I think that myself is an idiot there are people who are much smarter than me much more disciplined than me much more school than me I the thing that I have though that I do recognize is and I and I don't joke when I say that I'm an idiot I'm not being self-deprecating and I'm not sort of it's not false humility the one thing that I'm very comfortable being is outwardly curious and saying I don't know or saying can you explain that again please because I don't understand the way you explain

52:32 it the first time and saying and asking the questions that other people are afraid to ask because they it'll make them look dumb and I already know I'm an idiot so I'm not going to look any dumber than I already think I am and so I ask those questions and I the result is I get to learn more because I simply ask the question and hopefully whatever I learn I want to share but I don't believe in being selfish with anything I've learned because I think the lessons are interesting and the other thing I hate is Tadaz like I hate I write my books I never wanted to be like wait for it wait for it and look how smart I am I I always want my reader to come to my conclusion one cage before I reveal it so that by the time I reveal it they go oh yeah yeah totally yeah

53:18 that makes perfect sense yeah of course but it's the whole I think it's a it's a very generous way of writing it's a very generous way of telling a story it's why I like sweeten it's why I like young to law and it's why I like I just wanted to done affirmatively but it's why I like all those things because because and you said it like it's that small country small town like it's either us or none of us like I don't necessarily like you but like we got to do this you know so we all have different jobs to make the machine go and just everybody has to do their job but it's every job is important to to the machine because I write that's what I do I I'm only interested in like writing and storytelling but you have this incredible inclusive way of writing

54:06 you have this way of writing where you feel immediately that someone is talking with you not to you not down to you there are so many people that I know my best friend included who will say I don't read a lot of books and read will say like they're like I'll read Frederick's books because he's my best friend and but I don't you know I'm not a great book reader and he says that all the time yeah but he's read all of yours yeah and I think a lot of people will say that no I don't read books but I read Simon yeah and that's like the the best compliment I get as a writer the the ones I value the most is when people come up to me at book signings when you know teachers or parents and they say no I have a teenage kid or my husband or someone in their life and they say they don't read books

55:05 they don't read ever but they read one of your books yeah and now they're reading other books yeah you were like being a gateway to a harder literature if that makes sense it's the greatest thing that a person can be and I think you're opening a lot of doors to people they read you when they feel like maybe I can read other stuff too and that's amazing thank you Frederick this is I know why they gave me this question to ask you this is though because I have a very strong opinion about this this question and who has the world's best cardamom bun on the world's best yeah we do the sweets I know a bakery in Stockholm that I will walk I walk out of town to go to it's called et baghari and it is profoundly good how good that cardamom bun is yeah but I think you

55:56 will you would raise a bun with butter oh I could just eat I could just sit there and eat bread all that yeah but you'll get I think from a lot of sweets you will get the same answer that you would get if you asked an Italian about the best pasta they would say my mother well I would like to compare your mother's to et baghari and we'll have a we'll have a bun off he's right up there I promise you I love cardamom and I love bread and I I also know that it ends with the letter N that not the letter M it's not cardamom it's cardamom I know that like a ring of 10 not a ring of tang uh but it's these little things anyway great complicated there's a lot of things to keep in your head and this is why I stay up all night you're absolutely right about that that baker it's it's uh

56:45 it's uh it's awesome I think we have uh you know baker wise stock hummus pretty great the best what an absolute joy uh didn't expect it to be so emotional and I'm really grateful I got to learn from you I get to try to be a little better version of myself today thanks to this thanks to you so I really really appreciate it really love really love the conversation lovely meeting I I really appreciated you having me on it was really nice I never know what people expect I don't know what you were hoping for with this so I I really hope your viewers aren't disappointed that because I imagine they they tune in for someone to be super smart and have profound insights and maybe know a lot of research and science well then they wouldn't

57:33 be coming to me because I know no research and no science so they'd be disappointed with with or without you that would the thing they're coming for it and that was it was a it was a real real pleasure and thank you so much a bit of optimism is a production of the optimism company lovingly produced by our team Lindsey Garbenius Phoebe Bradford and Devon Johnson subscribe wherever you enjoy listening to podcasts and if you want even more cool stuff visit simonsinic.com thanks for listening take care of yourself take care of each other