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Blake Boles' 10-or-11 Dirtbag Rich Resolutions
796 Plays1 month ago
FOR ONCE IT'S NOT A PERMIE 😱
Please enjoy this fun-as-fuck conversation with Blake Boles, who, in an unexpected deviation from regular Reskillience programming, is not a permaculture educator and is in fact a renegade unschooler, vagabonding wordsmith, teen travel leader, bikepacking blogger, tango maestro and passionate spokesperson for the Dirtbag Rich life.
We romp through topics such as quitting school, defying relocalisation, AI playdates, post-app dating and failure resumes.
🧙♀️ LINKY POOS
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Transcript
Introduction to 'Resculience' Podcast
00:00:03
Speaker
Hey, hey this is Katie, and you're tuned into Resculience, a podcast about the hard, soft and surprising skills that'll help us stay afloat if our modern systems don't. I'm gratefully recording in beautiful Jarrah Country, central Victoria, listening to the golden whistlers sing just outside my window.
Discovery of 'Dirtbag Rich' by Blake Bowles
00:00:26
Speaker
To be honest, I had no idea today's guest existed till I received an email from him, out of the blue, sharing that he had this project happening, something called Dirtbag Rich. And would I be interested in an interview? This strange combination of words piqued my curiosity. Dirtbag Rich. So I clicked through to his website where I was met with branding that reminded me of Super Mario and writing that reminded me of why I love reading.
00:00:55
Speaker
Blake Bowles writes and speaks with a clarity and honesty that grabs you by the collar and pulls you in. And what's more, this term that he has coined, Dirtbag Rich, is very aligned with the podcast.
Exploring the Concept of 'Dirtbag Rich'
00:01:09
Speaker
It's about striking that elusive balance between time, money and purpose, pursuing meaningful work that not only supports you, but also a life of adventure.
00:01:19
Speaker
Blake is a writer, podcaster, teen guide and tango extraordinaire advocating for self-directed learning, blazing your own trail and deftly sidestepping bullshit. So of course, I replied to his email saying, yes, yes, please join me as a guest. But in a comical twist, Blake clarified that he was actually reaching out to interview me for one of his dirt bag rich case studies.
00:01:44
Speaker
not to pitch himself. But nevertheless, he agreed to an on-air chat, which I am so happy he did, whipping up a list of 10 things that is surely our most colourful and irreverent yet.
Discussion on Self-Directed Learning and Alternative Education
00:01:56
Speaker
We talk relocalisation versus globetrotting, the ethics of AI, why to check your virtue signalling, the sheer joy of bike riding and creative alternatives to dating apps. It is a whole lot of fun and I'm stoked that Blake was up for the challenge.
00:02:12
Speaker
I noticed too that he's just dropped his first episode of the Dirtbag Rich podcast, which broadcasts everyday people's stories of prioritizing their passions and values while radically reducing their overheads and working smarter, not harder. So you might like to cue that up after this conversation. Here's Blake Bowles. Enjoy. Blake Bowles.
00:02:34
Speaker
I've only recently come across your work and I was instantly enamored of the phrase dirt bag rich, which you will be, you know, tiptoeing us towards over the course of this conversation. And I really don't want to give too many spoilers, but I thought a nice way to start would be a simple mood weather and location check maybe in the reverse order. Actually, where are you right now? Hello, Katie. I'm in Brussels, Belgium. It is beautifully sunny autumn weather.
00:03:04
Speaker
And mood is, I want to use the word desultory, although I'm not even exactly sure what that means, but I'm pretty sure that's the right word. I really liked the way you said that though, Blake, because I can visualize what you mean, but you emphasize the salt. And so not only do I imagine a gray sky, but also like a little bit of kind of saltiness about that precipitation, which may be falling. I think there is some saltiness in the air. Are you feeling desultory or is the sky?
00:03:33
Speaker
I just had a writing session this morning and I just would like went some places inside myself that just like I need to maybe maybe spend a few hours walking around the city to to process and to move forward with the day. Do you find that the writing exumes the demons and then you have to walk them gently through the park to calm them down or is the writing process itself, you know, you're transforming things on the page?
00:04:01
Speaker
ah Both are true, but definitely the walk or the run or the cycle or there there needs to be some physical processing of all the stuff that you dredge up into your brain. That's, that's how it works for me.
00:04:15
Speaker
Yeah. I also like, I don't know if you've ever felt like this, but as a writer, I almost feel a bit like I'm cheating because I get to live again. It's like writers live twice. We can go back over those those events and either reimagine them or reintegrate them in some beautiful way or just regurgitate them.
00:04:35
Speaker
Yeah, it's a good thing if you have experiences that you do want to relive or regurgitate or taste in your mouth again. And yeah, I've been fortunate enough to have a lot of those and it is a pleasure. Yup. Nice. So you have definitely done more homework than most for this resilience interview, because now I am enlisting, um, calling on my guests energy in a way that I haven't before to concoct a list of 10. Well, I don't know what.
00:05:05
Speaker
we're officially going to call them but I'm going to call these ones 10 dirt bag rich resolutions and I'm curious to hear what you saw them as maybe after you wrote them but you have created a list of 10 things for us ostensibly to take into 2025 but possibly just to live our entire lives by and I really love the idea that who you are and what you're about um and your broader philosophy is going to be woven into these responses and revealed to the listener as we go, rather than me, you know, giving some kind of pithy and succinct definition of who you are and why should we care at the top of the interview. It's like, listen along and we'll all get to see what Blake really cares about. I'm ready for the ride.
00:05:48
Speaker
Well, actually, if you don't mind, and if this isn't too irksome, I just found like a couple of sentences that you wrote on your blog, which I felt like were the best articulation of someone I wanted to listen to. So I wonder if I could just read them and then make sure that you feel that we're going to do this justice because it's just, I want to hear how you did this. And what I mean by this is you said, I made it to my forties without taking a single bullshit job, going bankrupt or burning out.
00:06:18
Speaker
Most importantly, I've seen, done and lived enough to die happily tomorrow. And I really think that is a kick-ass goal or outcome or state of being as it were. So I really hope that you might share a little bit with us along the way about how you arrived at that place. I'll do my best. All right. Do you want to fire off number one?
00:06:38
Speaker
Sure. Number one is if school is not working for you or for your kids, then stop going to school. And I put this as number one because it feels pretty foundational. Education in school is something that we all deal with in some way. And it's um kind of the mission that I gave myself around age 20 was to contribute something that makes ah the experience of school and education a bit better for a number of kids out there.
00:07:08
Speaker
And I was a successful straight A student in California public schools. But what was going on in the background is I was actually quite bored and disengaged, even though I could play the game very well. And I realized that I had this like inflated sense of myself that I didn't really deserve because I could take the tests and I could figure out how to answer the questions and I got the the good grades and the praise. And so I was put on top of this hierarchy that I never even asked to. Yeah, I didn't ask for that. And then none of us do. There's so many young people who are just thrust into this the system of weird metrics and competition and very narrow outcomes. And this idea that academics is the end all and be all.
00:07:59
Speaker
And even the winners in that game are somehow the losers. And and so I i realized through a series of events, I wanted to become ah a scientist and I wanted to become a high school science teacher. And then I read books by former US public school teachers who had quit the profession.
00:08:17
Speaker
and realized I just didn't want anything to do with the school system. And I started to to research and to write and to speak about why the school system is deeply flawed and what the alternatives are. And and there's tons of them and they're very accessible. It's not only for rich families. It's not only for for families from X or Y or Z background. There are people from all across the board doing this. And Australia is a wonderful place to pursue alternative education options, as is the United States, Canada, the UK,
00:08:50
Speaker
a few other countries out there. Here in continental Europe, it's not a great place to do it. And it's hard to tell someone if school isn't working, don't do school because legally it's just
Finding Communities and Building Connections
00:09:02
Speaker
extremely complicated or burdensome or straight up illegal. But if you can do it, if you have the option, and if either you yourself are struggling in formal education or you have a kid that is struggling in formal education,
00:09:16
Speaker
Man, that'd be a great way to kick off 2025. Just be like, let's get off the struggle bus and do self-directed learning and have a much better time. Yeah. Nice. I love that. And I wonder how you placate that part of yourself that may really yearn for that kind of learning experience in your younger formative years that it sounds like you didn't have access to.
00:09:44
Speaker
Yeah, i'm I'm actually going to get to that with the the future comment about AI. But oh nice long story short, the best advice I ever heard on this um the subject was you just need to find small groups of people ah who are nerdy in the same way you are and who are fascinated by the same problems that you are. And sometimes the only way to access those people is through an institution like school or university or graduate school.
00:10:12
Speaker
But other times, and often far more than we expect, you can find this small group of like-minded nerds outside of the formal education system. And that that is where real learning happens, in my opinion. You just need to find them and to work on projects together with them. And there are so many different ways this can look. And so often, I think this is what we imagine is going to happen in formal education.
00:10:38
Speaker
You imagine your kid is going to find some incredible friends and a great teacher. You imagine you're going to go to college and have this incredible you know community of highly engaged learners around you. And like that's mostly a fairy tale. You need to create this for yourself. You need to go out and find these people for yourself. You need to learn how to organize other people together to work towards something. You can't just wait for this to happen. That is like this old outdated model of education of pouring knowledge into someone's head. or imagining some magical community and and connections are waiting for you. No, you have to do it yourself.
00:11:13
Speaker
Yeah, brilliantly said. And there are so many things I want to ask you ask you off the back of that, but I am absolutely loathe to um preempt anything you're going to say in the next
Financial and Career Alternatives Outside Traditional Systems
00:11:23
Speaker
few points. But one, maybe a comment, is that I know in the States, especially you you know the the uni fees, the tertiary education fees are just so astronomical that then it kind of starts this debt cycle that really dramatically shapes your life choices and hamstrings you. and I know that that would be something that you've thought about given your position around freedom and removing some of those shackles that we so unconsciously in many ways adopt. So I just wanted to say like in Australia, they've been raising the university fees as well, especially in like the humanities um and thoughtful creative subjects. And it just feels like your kickoff point about if this isn't working for you, drop it feels so liberating because you can get into a real
00:12:08
Speaker
a real shit pickle when you have that degree of debt at such a young age just because you felt like you had to do the thing. It's incredible that we will allow an 18-year-old to take on $100,000 in debt. And yeah, this was the topic of my second book called Better Than College, how to build a successful life without a four-year degree. And yeah a lot of what we were just talking about It's essentially the the approach of be a self-directed learner, find other people, find your own like mentors and teachers, use a combination of online and offline ah technologies, old old school and and new school together.
00:12:47
Speaker
and um And there are some very large barriers to doing this. If you want to go into a licensed profession, then it's really hard to get around the credentialing um part of things. And so a lot of people I've met, a lot of young people who don't have this taste for the formal education system or just don't want to be burdened with the debt and don't have parents or another source who can i pay for it.
00:13:13
Speaker
have They are the the ones who are going outside of the formal credentialing system and and creating very interesting careers and usually very flexible careers in in these newer territories. And those are a lot of the people who I ended up hanging out with and I learned from them.
00:13:35
Speaker
Yeah, nice, nice. We don't want any bush neurosurgeons, but the rest maybe you can figure out. So let's come out of our heads and into our legs for the second point. I really love this one.
Cycling as Adventure and Travel
00:13:47
Speaker
Would you like to introduce number two?
00:13:50
Speaker
Yeah. In 2025, go ride your bike from one city to another. And I recognize that this means different things in different countries. The first long bike trip that I did was in the U S started in New York city and went down the East coast on the very first day I had to Google maps, took me across a highway on ramp in New Jersey. It was like by far the most dangerous thing I've ever done. Taking my bike across the highway on ramp because I could not go backwards.
00:14:17
Speaker
And, uh, and there was other moments like that. So cycling in the U S is a bit harrowing and requires a bit more caution, but here I am in Europe, which is like Mecca for cycling. And, uh, especially in the countries like Germany, Belgium, Netherlands, Austria, Switzerland, France, um,
00:14:39
Speaker
it is just ridiculously easy. And if you get into a pickle, you can just hop on a train somewhere with your bike and it will take you to your destination. And so I've spent a lot of my time while I've been living here in Europe cycling in between cities, as long as I have the the energy for it. And when I don't have the energy, I just hop on public transport and it's transformed my life. I haven't owned a car for ah more than three years now. And as a person from the Western US where cars are essentially mandatory,
00:15:07
Speaker
it's It's such a liberating feeling and I'm not sure if I can ever go back. Is that is the main um rationale behind that point, I'm sure there are many, but is one of them just the economics or is it the health benefits or is the feeling the feeling of the wind in your beard, like what is it that you love so much about riding?
00:15:27
Speaker
Yeah, the health and the economic benefits that I think those are secondary to just remembering that even if you decide to live in one place like a normal person, the sense of constant adventure is always accessible to you and it just requires not taking the most efficient path to get somewhere. And in this case, if I wanted to go from Brussels to Ghent or to Amsterdam, I could easily hop on a train and be there in very little time. But to cycle there might take one day or a few days and require staying overnight someplace, finding affordable accommodation.
00:16:07
Speaker
Uh, all of a sudden my life becomes, uh, less efficient and much more interesting. And I just feel like that's some sort of secret to life that we have to constantly remember and to bring back into our lives, which is, which is deprioritize efficiency in order to increase adventure, um, at various moments, especially if you're feeling like you're in a rut cycle to another city. If you're feeling a bit down, it w it will change your day.
00:16:34
Speaker
gold, gold. I hope people aren't like me and hear wonderful advice and think that's that's so great. I'll never do that. Take these these nuggets as what they are, which is gold. So number three, what have you got for us?
00:16:49
Speaker
I'm having a lot of fun playing around with artificial intelligence right now and I recommend that other people do that too because
Experimenting with AI and Ethical Considerations
00:16:56
Speaker
I feel like we're in this kind of golden era of of experimentation and it feels to me like the late 90s when I was growing up with the early internet, the early web and we had these sites called ah Geocities which were like the first like really accessible personal web pages that you could build.
00:17:16
Speaker
And when you you look at them now, they just look charmingly old school with like animated gifts that are rotating around. and And there was a certain innocence and and communal spirit that came with that age of the internet before like really large social media companies and and other information companies started to really take over. And I feel like we might be in that age right now before artificial intelligence turns into a Skynet, you know, and the killer robots come for us. Uh, I was having fun just this week playing with the advanced voice mode on chat GPT, which is, you know, it doesn't require you to type anymore. You can just talk. I've, I've already read, read stories about people using this as their therapist, using this as their tutor. And when you asked earlier, how can you get a really great learning experience without formal education?
00:18:13
Speaker
I think it's incredible that I can pay $20 a month and have access to this like voice AI robot right in front of me that will do all my research, answer all my questions. And of course, caveat, caveat, yes. It's good for first drafts. Verify, yes, yes, yes. But ah we need to recognize that we are in this like next wave of incredible technological boom. And like have some fun with it. Play around with it. um Have it write poetry for you.
00:18:42
Speaker
I created a list of adventures that teenagers should go off and do. And i I had AI pick emojis to represent each point on that list. And it did a really good job. um i I found a service just the other week about that take a podcast episode and transcribe it completely for you and summarize the episode. And like this is something that would have cost hundreds of dollars ah just a few years ago. And now all of a sudden, it's super accessible. um Yeah.
00:19:12
Speaker
I have concerns about AI like everyone else does, but we should have fun with this too. Like ride the wave while it's here before it becomes calcified and corporate. So I know I say really flippantly, you know, the artificial intelligence will be one day feasting on my atoms will be farming me for my atoms. And that's a bit of a throwaway line. But then I wonder if we lean in and have fun and play around in the shallow waters. Like are we not bringing that apocalypse kind of closer and, um, do you have like an ethical standpoint on whether we can wisely choose to not engage with the technology that has that kind of power or do you just see it as inevitable and individuals can have their fun and we can't really influence the bigger picture? I think there's a lot of really big forces in the world today that we can get bogged down with anxiety and worry about because they're really far outside of our control.
00:20:11
Speaker
And this is probably one of them. And I prefer, maybe this is putting my head in the sand, but I prefer to dance my way to the apocalypse instead of sit there grinding my teeth. And and I think, again, like the early internet, there's always going to be good and bad that come with these these new developments. And if you just have more fun with the good parts and you emphasize those and you share them with other people, then, I mean, what else can you do?
00:20:41
Speaker
That's it. So yeah, that's pretty much it, Katie. I'm on board with things that are fun and I hear you. We're up to number four.
Valuing Time and Experiences Over Materialism
00:20:51
Speaker
The next time you want to buy something to feel better, stop, think about how much free time that money ah could purchase if you didn't have to work to earn that additional money. And then go spend that time doing something cool, ideally in nature. So this is not a controversial idea that time equals money in some way.
00:21:14
Speaker
But the reason that I put this on the list is because I've recently made a foray into the world of TikTok and decided at my my ripe age of 42 to try to like see what all the the late teens and and early 20-somethings are up to and to see if I can somehow contribute and connect to that world.
00:21:32
Speaker
And one of the videos that has really struck a chord essentially shares this message, which is just, just stop buying stuff and then go spend your, you know, pay yourself in time instead of money. And that's, I guess, a message that is resonating with a lot of, a lot of people right now. And I'm just taking the feedback that I've, that TikTok is giving me. I mean, is there a practical,
00:22:00
Speaker
dimension to that in terms of, do you have to literally get out your notebook and do those calculations for a period of time so that you interrupt that habit that so many of us probably have to reach for the expensive um designer organic cookies or the vintage jeans or the thing that you're coveting to make yourself feel better? Like, do you literally add it up so that you can see that figure or is it more of an in your head thing? No, it's more of an in your head, more of a gut thing.
00:22:29
Speaker
And the way that I feel it in my body is when I have just made a purchase that probably felt a little bit coerced or like I was being swept along with with something. Like some people are going out to eat at a kind of expensive place and I'm just like, I'd rather just eat at home or just go get a full off hole over there.
00:22:53
Speaker
And then I have this sense of of regret afterwards that I spent maybe $20 more than i I could have. And if let's say I earn, um yeah, $20 an hour, then that's that's literally an hour I could have spent somewhere else, maybe just walking in a park, right? Nothing nothing crazy that I will need to now go earn that amount of money to to put back into my like time savings account.
00:23:21
Speaker
And it's it's of course not that straightforward or simple, but this just sounds so cliche, but you know so many of the things that we we really value in life just really cost almost no money. It's like time with people we care about, time in nature, reading something interesting, sitting around cuddling with someone, watching a movie together. And and we we do need to fund these activities with our efforts. No one gets by for for free completely.
00:23:50
Speaker
And I just finished reading a ah book all about waste and garbage and recycling and where it all goes in the world. And the book's cover promised that it would be a hopeful book. It was not a hopeful book. By the end, it's just like all these things are going really poorly. We don't know what we're going to do with all our trash and landfills and nuclear waste. And the one takeaway at the end, the author said, just buy less stuff.
00:24:19
Speaker
That's it. Just buy less stuff. And that's always spoken to me. I remember um celebrating Buy Nothing Day instead of Black Friday, which I learned about from the magazine Ad Busters, which I read as a teenager. And it's ah yeah it's a universal truth and it's really hard to practice. So I feel like I need to remind myself every year that even if if I make a little bit more money this year, that doesn't mean I should spend it.
00:24:45
Speaker
Yeah, that's a great point about renewing your vows and also acknowledging that it's especially tricky when you're being role modeled something quite different by the people around you. So I imagine you've both influenced and also wiggled your way into more aligned circles so that things like cuddling on the couch become far superior to eating out of an expensive restaurant that everyone feels a little bit sick about afterwards, but it's just the dancing in certain spheres. yeah What a superpower like being able to surround yourself with people who also feel this way about time and money. That just makes it incredibly easier instead of always swimming against the tide.
00:25:24
Speaker
Yeah, I know how highly you value your friends and what emphasis you place on those connections that you have all around the world. So um yeah, that's also such a strong value of mine and totally irreplaceable in my non-bank bank account. So we're up to number five, the midway point. And I feel like we need to sachet into this point.
00:25:46
Speaker
Well, it might sound a bit out of left field.
Exploring Tango for Connection
00:25:49
Speaker
It's very specific. And it is learn Argentinian tango. This is actually connected to the last point though, because one of the activities that costs very little money that has come to mean so much to me is dance and specifically partner dance. And so this means a dance in which there's a lead and follow role, classic examples are like salsa,
00:26:14
Speaker
swing dancing, blues dancing, and tango. And the reason I specifically recommend tango is because for people who really don't feel like they can dance, and that was completely me for most of my young adult life, um it is, I think, that the easiest, the most simplified while also the most disciplined way to enter into the world of partner dance.
00:26:40
Speaker
I was always intimidated by those Latin dancers who were like moving their, gyrating their hips in this way that I felt like my body just literally physically could not move. And swing dancers looked fun, but it also looked super acrobatic. But then I saw tango dancers and they were generally a bit older, some of them in their 60s, 70s, 80s.
00:27:02
Speaker
And they're moving very upright, a bit stiff even, and it was precise ah little steps. And for me as a non-dancer, I thought this seems really accessible. And so I started taking some Argentinian tango lessons first, very fortunately in Buenos Aires, and then after that in Portland, Oregon, where there's a thriving tango scene.
00:27:27
Speaker
And it was this this bombshell introduction to to the idea of connection for me. And this is the word that the the teachers kept using, which is connection, connection. And I'm like, what does that mean? And for them, it was this chest to chest physical connection in the tango dance that all of the communication that it filters through your chest and a bit through your arms. It's called the frame.
00:27:53
Speaker
And I had never experienced something like that before, this this consensual way to share intimate physical touch with someone who you don't know at all, a stranger at a social dance. And and again, Tango feels more accessible because it's It is so focused on like elegance and precision. um This is eventually what what took me away from tango. It's a bit too serious for me. I eventually found some other forms of dance that are also about connection, but they're a bit more playful and and silly and open um and fewer gender roles also. But
00:28:36
Speaker
I recommend Tango for those who are afraid to move their hips, but really any form of partner dance. If you don't have partner dance in your life, I recommend just finding some teachers, some class, some workshop somewhere, and just try it a few times because I think it has this truly life shaping potential. And when, when I want to spend time doing something that is very meaningful to me, that costs almost no money or zero dollars. I find people to dance with.
00:29:05
Speaker
Very cool. And I love, um, I believe you studied astrophysics many moons ago and I feel like maybe tango and its precision is the on-ramp for people who have been really heady and cerebral and need to get back into the groove of their lower regions. There are a lot of cerebral people and also like specifically a lot of psychotherapists yeah in the tango realm in the same way that there's a lot of engineers in the realm of swing dancing and Lindy hop.
00:29:32
Speaker
Yeah, there are definitely personality types that gravitate towards the different spheres of partner dance. Just ah find your sphere. That's so awesome. I don't know much about dance, but those um divisions ring really true for the people I know and the dancer
Creative Approaches to Dating and Relationships
00:29:46
Speaker
into. so All right, Blake, you have some amazing dating advice coming up for us. Well, not for me. I'm very happily partnered, but I reckon there's a lot of people who love to get this.
00:29:59
Speaker
I'm not sure if this is amazing advice, but ah if you are someone who is single and you're looking for a relationship, I recommend spending a lot less time on the apps, which are yeah kind of designed to to hook you and keep you feeling anxious and and often feeling either either completely overwhelmed and swamped or like total crickets, depending on on who you are.
00:30:28
Speaker
And to go ahead and sort of take back the reins of control with this wonderful thing we call online dating. It's really incredible how we can connect with people we would otherwise never run into. them But to take it away from the these companies that want your eyeballs and your your money. and to just create your own simple webpage, which is your own personal dating profile. so I first did this in the year 2017. I registered the domain dateblake.com. and It was just a simple write-up of who I am and what I'm about. and then you know i learned I taught myself how to make webpages. It's very easy with WordPress anyways.
00:31:11
Speaker
And so I just made it exactly like I wanted to. I chose the the photographs, I put them where I want, I listed my information as I pleased. And then I sent an email to my close friends and I said, hey, just like at the airport, if you see something, say something. If you see someone who might be a good fit for me and my weird life, please just share the link to dateblake.com with them.
00:31:33
Speaker
And i nothing really came of it. I had two leads, and but both fizzled, and I very promptly met someone in real life at at a partner dance weekend who became my next long-term relationship. um But recently, I have ah rebooted dateblake dot.com. And so if you want to see my approach to this in all of its vulnerable honesty, then you can go check it out.
00:31:58
Speaker
um And if nothing, even if nothing comes of it, I think it's kind of like writing a book proposal for a book you think you might want to write. It's a good way to organize your thoughts and talk about what am I looking for? What do I have to offer? um And to not just fill in these little blanks on on your phone, on an app, but instead just be like, okay, it doesn't have to feel like a resume. It doesn't have to feel like someone is you know, applying for a job if they want to reach out to you. In fact, I've even recruited a friend to be my middlewoman so that if someone is like kind of interested, but they're like, who is this guy? He seems a little weird. Like they can email my friend Julie and and then like, Have like a little conversation and then can be direct can be directed towards me if if it seems appropriate and so you just need to have a lot of fun with it and your friends will have a lot of fun when you send them your personal dating web page also and they'll start to look out for you and This is really how I think we're you're probably gonna meet someone that That's a long-term connection. It's always through friends. It's always through shared activities. And so just be a bit bold. Be willing to embarrass yourself a little bit. Be that weird person and create the page and share it with your friends and tell them to share it with any hotties who they meet.
00:33:15
Speaker
I really dig that one. And I'm definitely all about the creative communication and being the Technicolor weirdo in a sea of beige. And yeah, I think that is such cracking advice. And I was speaking to a friend about this the other day about um just how quality friend matchmaking services are people who know both parties and can vouch for them and can really see something that you may not perceive in all your your your weird schemas and hang ups and parental um juju from the past. But I wish we talked more about dating on this podcast. So maybe this is going to be my kick to bring it into conversation. Fantastic. Speaking of vulnerabilities, you did do a late scratching of this point, number seven, and then
00:34:02
Speaker
you suggested that I could bully you into it. So I'm going to invite you to share this point that you weren't completely sold on and see how we go. All right.
Reading and Reflecting on Personal Beliefs
00:34:14
Speaker
So the idea is to go out and find a book that challenges your beliefs and specifically challenges your virtue signaling.
00:34:27
Speaker
And I think a book is really the best form for this, not just a social media account or a movie or something like that. But I essentially believe that all of us like to think that we are we are morally righteous and we're on the correct side of history. It's just so easy to convince ourselves of this and that to sort of inoculate against this, yeah, egotism, essentially,
00:34:55
Speaker
requires, I think, a constant drip of exposing ourselves to, I won't say the other side, but I will say, like, smart the smart people in the room who somewhat disagree with us. And this is what I think the the idealistic vision of what university life can be. It's like all these different people with different ideas and beliefs coming together and debating a bit and learning from each other.
00:35:20
Speaker
but Maybe that's true. um What seems to really happen is that we just all fall into our silos really quickly and the people we end up with in work and in relationships and the people who we talk to online, have we just it's so easy just to fall into the the group where we're all patting each other on the back. And it can be socially um dangerous to be the one who is like challenging sacred cows within our friend groups or within our relationships.
00:35:55
Speaker
And so the somewhat easier way to to go about this is to just constantly read books that are not just telling you what you want to hear. And actually the book I mentioned earlier, which I i finished recently, Katie, which was about trash and recycling and and where Yeah, where all of our waste goes, which was written just recently by a UK journalist, it is something that I think I picked up because here in Europe, and especially with my
00:36:26
Speaker
the people I tend to hang out with in Western European countries, they take recycling so seriously. And it's like we are separating everything. we yeah There's like five different trash cans in Germany for five different types of things. And it's one of these little acts that makes us feel um you know, pretty good about ourselves. We are doing something for the environment. We are not just throwing stuff in the trash. And reading this book, you know, this book is not anti recycling, but it's like eyes wide open ah discourse on recycling and where waste goes and where it ends up and landfills and incinerators being shipped to other countries and
00:37:13
Speaker
I think I do this not out of wanting to then feel superior to other people who are like mindlessly washing their their plastic containers when it's all going to end up in the same place anyways. No, but to just continue like dancing with with truth instead of of retreating into this safe little cocoon of like, um I'm doing something in, it's almost a religious vision of life. Like I'm doing something that makes me this highly virtuous person.
00:37:43
Speaker
I think we just all need to constantly remind ourselves that we are not that virtuous. We do our best, but even when you do your best, we just by existing on this on this planet, we are we are taking from from others and we are we are messy and we are polluting. and um And to have this like bulletproof sense of virtuousness about some things that we're doing, again, a lot of my friends in Europe refuse to take planes and will only ah fly, ah excuse me, will only take trains or or buses to go somewhere. um I feel like that can lead to a sense of have moral complacency and and the idea that while I'm doing my part,
00:38:27
Speaker
by not taking the easy jet flight. I'm not, I'm washing my plastics before I recycle them. Um, and can lead us away from doing something that actually feels that actually has some effect and actually requires a bit more risk and vulnerability, uh, from us. So there I did my best Katie. I hope that landed with you. I'm so glad that you could speak to that and share that because I,
00:38:57
Speaker
could never have articulated it in such a wonderful way, but I very much enjoyed that reflection, that provocation. um And yeah, there's so much to say on that topic, but I just generally feel like that, as you call it, a dance with the truth or the holding of complexity or the you know sitting with paradox and seeing that paradoxes aren't impossible, but they're actually a fundamental facet of the universe. It's all to me like a maturing of who we are and what we're capable of engaging with as opposed to that bypassing kind of, like you said, the retreating into those virtuous codes and behaviours. So I'm glad you brought that up, Blake, and didn't shy away from it. So number eight.
Embracing Failures for Personal Growth
00:39:41
Speaker
Uh, write a failure resume. This is an exercise I've done with teens that I've worked with over the years and it's really stuck. It's really been valuable for them because it's a great way to like flip the, the basic ideas of competitive meritocracy that are floating around us all the time on their head in the name of a form of like vulnerability that can lead to connection. And the idea is really simple. and We all.
00:40:08
Speaker
know how to write a resume or a CV and it essentially is our way of glorifying our accomplishments. Try writing the opposite. Try writing a failure resume or a failure CV in which you list all the things that you have tried and failed to accomplish.
00:40:25
Speaker
And I feel like this shows you so much more about a person because it shows you what they have risked and how they have flubbed and and the chances they have taken. Because if someone has only taken the chances that lead to success, they're they're leading not a very interesting life, in my opinion.
00:40:43
Speaker
and so If you're a teenager, it can be maybe maybe you haven't had just enough time and freedom and resources to take many big chances. um If you do this exercise in your late 20s or your 30s, I hope that you have a full page.
00:41:00
Speaker
on your failure resume and don't just limit it to things you would put onto a normal resume, you know, work or projects or school, but include your love life, include your artistic and creative ah pursuits, include like I tried to live this lifestyle and it didn't work. i I fizzled out after three months. One of the biggest entries that has always been on my failure resume is When I was 22, right after university, I was very intent on hiking the Pacific Crest Trail from Mexico to Canada through California, Oregon and Washington. It takes about five months. And I made it roughly two and a half weeks.
00:41:40
Speaker
And I got off the trail ah for reasons that I could not fully explain to myself. I just knew that it was not the right place for me, but I felt pretty bad and a bit embarrassed because I told everyone that I was going to spend the next five months hiking. Instead, I went on a nice hike through the desert of Southern California.
00:42:00
Speaker
And then I jumped ship and I went to go work at a summer camp with my brother on the East coast. And I had to process that and to ask myself questions about my identity and whether I'm really like a hardcore outdoors person or just a fair weather hiker about whether I can commit to things that are big and scary and it'd be very easy to just not talk about my failed bid to hike the PCT. And that's why something like a failure resume resume helps us dredge this stuff back up and to think like, ah, who was I at that moment? What did I learn from this experience? Why did I believe in that so much? Yeah, it's useful stuff. And the kind of people who talk openly about their big
00:42:50
Speaker
desires and goals that became big failures are are my kind of, those are my kind of people. Those are the people that that have interesting conversations that that have taken risks that lead to a rich life. And so I'm trying to create more of those people so I can hang out with them. How are you creating them? Like in Petri dishes?
00:43:11
Speaker
Well, that's why I like working with teenagers. they're They're at this stage where they can wipe their own butts and they understand sarcasm. That's kind of my minimum threshold for interacting with young people. And they are not quite ah out there in the world and acting autonomously yet. And I feel like <unk> it's this magical period where a a non-parental adult like an educator or a summer camp counselor, a family member can have a really positive experience and excuse me, a really positive influence and shape a young person's trajectory. And I have a lot of, yeah, a lot of people to thank for helping shape my trajectory during those those teenage and very early 20 something years. Yeah, nice. So many zits and possibilities. So,
00:43:58
Speaker
We are getting to the end and, uh, you do have a bonus allocation of a point. So just so everyone knows is actually going to be 11, which is super tasty. So we're up to number nine. This one is is very close to my heart. It's about, uh, staying with strangers.
Engaging with Hospitality Networks
00:44:16
Speaker
And I bet a lot of people have heard of the network called couch surfing and.
00:44:21
Speaker
Uh, you might not have heard of all these other networks that are similar to couch surfing. One of them is called warm showers, terrible name. it is the word It's like couch surfing, but just for lunch, it is the worst. Well, it's cause it's what a long distance cyclist wants the first, as soon as they get into a house, it's like, please give me a ah shower, you know, not a cold shower, a warm shower, wipe off this filth. And then I can rejoin you. So warm showers is like couch surfing for cyclists. And then there are all these other.
00:44:49
Speaker
websites that came up when couch surfing, uh, went from a not-for-profit company into a privately held company and became less responsive to its users. And so those are sites like be welcome or trust roots or something called couchers. Um, so any of these sites, which go under the title of hospitality networks, um, I'm a big fan of, and I say, if you are in a position where you can host a traveler, if you have a a spare couch, if you have a guest bedroom, if you just have a place in in your living room where someone could throw down a sleeping bag, then put yourself on one of these sites and offer to host people. It's not just a nice service for people who are coming through your area, but it's a way to bring the world to you. And there are so many people who want to travel, who want to do more world travel, and they just cannot for very practical reasons. And I would like to live in a world in which
00:45:44
Speaker
There are really robust networks, how ah hospitality networks like couch surfing, where when you're passing through an area, or even if you live in the same area as someone else, you can access this network of essentially strangers who also have a reference system so that bad actors can be weeded out. And if somebody is using the network for the wrong reasons or is being abusive, then they can get you know flagged and removed from it. So that's important.
00:46:11
Speaker
um I want to live in that world where you don't have to go to a new city. Uh, you don't have to travel through an area and always have to look for a hotel or an Airbnb when you're just going to go there and be kind of lonely. When there, you are surrounded by people who have extra space in their houses and often people who are living alone or maybe they're living with families or partners, but they would like to meet you. The nice, interesting person that you are.
00:46:42
Speaker
um But this just it's a collective action problem. It requires a lot more trust and it requires us putting ourselves out there and a lot of like politeness and communication. And these are all hard things. yeah um But it begins with people and becoming hosts on these sites. And so I say become a host. And if you're not able to do that,
00:47:02
Speaker
Go stay with someone. And even if you are not really traveling someplace new, you don't really need a place to stay. You can use these networks to just reach out to people who are in your area and to essentially find potential friends. They're extremely good filters for finding um people who are high in openness to experience that personality trait.
00:47:25
Speaker
And, uh, and people who are very conscientious and just anyone who shows up on these networks, most people who show up on these networks are probably cool, open-minded people you would enjoy hanging out with. and And just like any social network, the more people that are on it, the better it gets. And so I always like to push people towards hospitality networks, just try it as an experiment. And I, I started using them in 2009, uh, in California where I'm from.
00:47:51
Speaker
And then in 2010, I traveled to New Zealand for the first time and I got picked up by these two nice ladies from the airport. took They took me back to their apartment. They fed me dinner. They said, here's the key to the guest room. We're going to go to bed because we have to work early tomorrow, but we will see you tomorrow and enjoy your day in Christchurch. And I was like, what?
00:48:14
Speaker
ah incredible faith in humanity. And then some years down the line, I returned a similar favor to someone else who was coming through Lake Tahoe, California, where I was living. And it's it's like this vehicle, this engine for increasing your faith in humanity and no longer looking at the the nameless, faceless crowds as just a bunch of weirdos and creeps. But yeah, to meet to meet the good eggs, we have to keep finding the good eggs.
00:48:44
Speaker
Yeah, ah those networks are so utterly affirming. We um stayed with a woman in Kyoto who wasn't even in an A4 sized apartment. It was like A5. It was tiny. And she was a really busy, you know, no physical or mental space in her life, but she was the most generous individual, had us she she kind of gave over her bed to us and slept, you know, somewhere else. And we just were completely astounded by her spirit um of generosity and also the insight that we gained into these really picture perfect um Japanese spaces that she could kind of flesh out for us and realityify. So I, yeah, I'm really grateful that you brought that up, Blake, because I almost like that's kind of dropped off my radar in recent years. And I wonder if it
00:49:31
Speaker
It had its moment in the sun and we've collectively or maybe in Australia like forgotten about it a little bit. It's a bit dusty. So I have rekindled my excitement for catch surfing. Thank you very much. Happy to help. she Okay, so we are at number 10.
00:49:49
Speaker
There's a wonderful online content creator named Brendan Leonard. His website is Semirad, and he's a friend who I made online and that I got to meet in person. And he ah recently sent out a post about how to stay in touch with friends. And I thought, oh, I I like staying in touch with friends. I wonder what his advice is on the subject.
Maintaining Friendships and Community Ties
00:50:11
Speaker
And it was really simple and I'm just stealing his advice. ah And it is this, the next time you stumble onto something on the internet that you find useful or entertaining and makes you think of someone, just stop right there. Take 20 seconds to share that thing.
00:50:28
Speaker
message it or email it or whatever it to that person and say, hey, this made me think of you. And then you can add on something like, ah you know, it makes me think of this time we did this thing together, or how you like this, or how you have a weird hangup about this, or just I miss you. And he said, this is the way that you basically stay in touch with friends in the modern era, friends who would otherwise They don't live near you if you both have busy lives are naturally going to fall off the map. And I was, it was really affirming to read this um from, from Brendan, because this is something that I've, I've practiced over the years um to maintain my, my extremely dispersed network of friends, because I, Katie, I never really grew up in a single place. Like my parents split up early.
00:51:20
Speaker
So I was bouncing between different parts of California and school years with mom, summers, and and other holidays with dad, and went to a bunch of different schools, lived in different houses. and um So when people have this like one place where all of their friends and family are centralized, I sometimes feel a little bit jealous, but I'm also just like, yeah, that's just not my reality. I don't know what that's like. And then I went to go work um at some summer camps where I made these incredible friends, but the people coming to these summer camps were coming from all over the US or sometimes internationally. And so I would have these incredible, formative, intense experiences that would happen in just a few months and then poof, everyone would be gone, scattered to the wind. And so I had to start making these hard decisions, like which friends to prioritize and who to try to keep in my life.
00:52:12
Speaker
And this more or less led me to this nomadic, constant migration experience ah lifestyle that i've I've been practicing for almost 20 years. And it's because I decided there are very few friends who I want to let go. And I want to be that person who, you know, everyone says, it'd be nice if my friends came and visited me. Well, it's a two-way street. you know You need to be like the person who is able to come visit also. And so I've just decided to play that role.
00:52:42
Speaker
And so I make it a priority to go and and physically travel and and stay with ah my friends as much as I can. But since they're all over the place, it's it's still a bounce-around game and mostly I'm not in the same place as other people. And so just having this practice of being the one who reaches out and pings people and having, you know, a stumbling upon some photo or video or article that makes you think of someone's just an easy way into that. Um, I just hate seeing how adult friendships dissolve in people's thirties or even in, in their late twenties, uh, when they seem so strong in their earlier mid twenties, especially your, you know, at the time you might be in university or your first jobs or,
00:53:31
Speaker
the time you have you know to go traveling with friends before things get more busy. I just really hate busyness. It's this like thing I feel almost allergic to, but I realize it's a facet of of the world. and And so if you are someone who can figure out how to have a less crazy busy life, and I'm in that category, then you know this is something you should dedicate your time to, which is like be the person who reaches out, be the person who thinks of someone and sends a nice note to them,
00:54:00
Speaker
and be the person who visits. You don't have to go full Nomad to do this. You can just up it by 10 or 20% and it will make a tangible visceral difference in your life. Yeah. My little brother role models this superbly. he makes a point. He takes the time to send me the internet's most offensive content about three times a day, and it's really brought us closer together. Oh, bless his heart. Yeah. And I've also discovered that writing a a physical letter or postcard to someone is is almost like this like magic bullet these days. When someone gets something physical, but that's not a request, you know, or not not a wedding invitation or whatever,
00:54:44
Speaker
When they just get like a, Hey, I was thinking about you. Here's something that's going on for me. What's going on for you type of letter or postcard. It like melts their hearts. And it requires like 15 minutes of effort on your side. And then you get to go to the post office. It's like a fun, the old, old timey experience. Yep. Couldn't agree more.
00:55:04
Speaker
So before we get on to your biggest kahuna on this list of 11, I wanted to quickly take a ah pause and I can't help but ask you about this because Resculience does have a massive re-localization bent. And actually when we spoke previously, you brought this up around, you know, maybe the values of the podcast. We slightly differ in terms of A big core practice or belief or aspiration that I have in my life is to relocalize, not only to bring you know food and energy systems home, but my soul to some place where it can feel committed and connected and rooted. And you just shared with us this kind of fragment of your your childhood and inner world being
00:55:48
Speaker
one of nomadicism and ping pong in between places and I wonder now, you have you fully embraced this life or are you wondering in search of a place? Yeah, I just wonder like if you could share some thoughts on the localization versus globetrotting split you got going on there.
Nomadic Lifestyle and Balancing Life Choices
00:56:08
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, happily.
00:56:11
Speaker
ah For a long time, I thought I was bouncing around to find the place where I would stop bouncing around and really searching for the place that could feel like home. And there's many great contenders. I lived in some awesome mountain towns in the western United States. I got to experience living in Wanaka, New Zealand, Buenos Aires, Argentina.
00:56:34
Speaker
Berlin, Barcelona, and at some point in my early or mid-30s, I think I had a moment of reckoning where I realized, oh, this might not I might not be actually looking for the one place to stop and settle down. I think the motion might really be a core part of me.
00:57:00
Speaker
and you know Yeah, we might have different values around this, but I really feel like it's more of a symbiosis. And it comes back to that idea of of like we need the people to go and and visit the friends who are stationary, the friends who have the young kids and can't travel, ah the friends who have super demanding jobs.
00:57:24
Speaker
So that's one little little version of it. But more broadly speaking, I'm just a big believer in like the free exchange of ideas and cross-pollination between all sorts of different spheres. And I think the kind of places that people want to live in this world are often like the nexus points but for lots of different people coming together and making these exchanges. And that can look like ah exchange of goods or exchange of ideas or ah you know people falling in love with people who they would have never imagined themselves falling in love with.
00:58:03
Speaker
um You want to live in the kind of society that's an open society that that promotes this kind of stuff. And this is part of the package deal of cities. i've I've always had a very troubled relationship with big cities. I've always dreamt of living in some beautiful small mountain town where trailheads are not that far away. But then when I spend a lot of time in those beautiful small mountain towns where trailheads are not far away, I miss the dance. I miss the the cultural diversity. I miss the that people who have more wild ideas and more wild lifestyles, everything that Berlin represents. I i miss that.
00:58:39
Speaker
and so Yeah, I have a troubled relationship with this idea of hyper-localism. And also, I'm very happy to hang out with people who are really into their local scenes and who want to foster their local, they you know really know their place and know their community and have these relationships and have that that resilience that comes with with like a tight community and and these close relationships.
00:59:07
Speaker
um But I do think somewhat reluctantly, because I know it comes with a lot of trade-offs, that I'm the traveler. And maybe we can map this on to Lord of the Rings. you know there's There are the Hobbits, and then there's Gandalf or the ah Strider. Jeez, it's been a while. There are the ones who are who are traveling between the communities who are trying to do the cross-pollination to bring the ideas, to bring fresh ideas and perspectives, and also to learn from people um who are not traveling around. I don't want to live in a world where everyone is bouncing around like me. I'm not sure what that world would even look like. But I also don't want to live in a world where everyone has really retreated into their little local spheres. I mean, that's it in some ways, that's a world of of xenophobia and and I think of unnecessary poverty.
01:00:00
Speaker
to me. And so I'm trying to find that balance and trying to just see what works with my personality and with my mental health. And every time I've tried to force myself to settle down, like I go into dark places. So I'm 42 now. I'm not sure how much more I'm going to try to force myself into that.
01:00:19
Speaker
Maybe if I had a kid, a young kid, that would be like the best reason I could find to stay more planted for a while. But then I probably want to put that kid into a into the back of a bicycle and travel for a few thousand kilometers. So it would only be for as long as necessary. We need the seeds, the stem, the leaves and the roots.
01:00:43
Speaker
or a lot of the rings and allergies. They are all welcome. Okay.
Embracing the 'Dirtbag Rich' Lifestyle
01:00:48
Speaker
So you've taken us so many places and this is number 11. Would you like to introduce us to this final point?
01:00:56
Speaker
The final suggestion for 2025 or literally anytime is to forget about trying to become rich and instead to try to become dirtbag rich. And I have to explain this word dirtbag because it's only familiar to a pretty narrow slice of outdoors people largely centered in the US.
01:01:16
Speaker
um The word dirtbag was originally used by climbers in Yosemite in the 60s and 70s who were so dedicated to climbing big walls that they would essentially refuse to take normal jobs. They would sleep and in the dirt. They would dumpster dive food because they just could not be bothered to go work for money when they could be climbing. And so they repurpose the word dirtbag, which in the dictionary means someone who's not very nice or you don't want to hang out with. um And there is a book that i I read a number of years ago when I was on a cycle trip through through Europe.
01:01:54
Speaker
called The Dirtbag's Guide to Life by but Tim Mathis, who I befriended online. And he introduced me in that book to this term, dirtbag rich. And he said, dirtbag rich people are people who still live like dirtbags, like pursuing their passions. and And his focus is really on people pursuing their passions in the outdoors.
01:02:13
Speaker
I look at it with a slightly larger lens of just anyone who is purposefully reorienting their life to do what they're passionate about full time. So that could also be art or activism or writing or you know a deep personal journey. Just anyone who feels like, oh my God, I really have better things to do than go work for money full time.
01:02:35
Speaker
And so, yeah, Tim Mathis said dirtbag rich people are ones who live like dirtbags. They still have a lot of time to do what they want, but their income, they have a professional level income. And so that means that they can work extremely part time. So definitely 50%, you know, 20 hours a week, but maybe 15 hours a week or 10 hours a week or less.
01:02:58
Speaker
and still earn what's considered like a decent amount of money. And because their costs are probably so low, they can save a lot of that money. They can see their their savings or their net worth increasing over time. And so you have a bit of the the kind of classic dream of becoming rich, of becoming a bit more wealthy, but you are you were not making all the sacrifices that so many people do to try to become rich in which you're working all the time. You are crazy busy. You are stressed out. You are sacrificing your relationships. You are sacrificing your health. You're doing it all in the name of this theoretical future moment called retirement or for some
01:03:40
Speaker
one or two week vacation that you're taking at the same time everyone else is taking a vacation. Jesus, no thank you. And so I really think ah that this dirtbag rich concept is brilliant and I decided to expand upon it and I am currently working on a book called Dirtbag Rich and I'm recording interviews with people for a podcast called Dirtbag Rich. And it's this is by far my my biggest passion project.
01:04:05
Speaker
at I do something else to make money. I take teenagers on international trips. We didn't even talk about that. But what I am spending most of my time doing right now is working on this dirtbag rich ah project and meeting all sorts of fascinating people who are coming out of the woodwork after I made just a few little online announcements.
01:04:21
Speaker
to try to find people to interview and to learn from who are living lives that are dirtbag rich or adjacent. And it is it is really cool, Katie, like there are people out there who are have found really cool ways to live and to not work full time, to have purpose, to have ah time wealth, and to still have some basic economic security, not to always be living right on the edge of of having nothing or bankruptcy or debt.
01:04:51
Speaker
you know these original dirt bags, they were really like they chose to be really poor. And that's not something that is sustainable for almost anyone in the long term. You need to have a bit of security, a bit of optionality moving forward. And so I just want to find these people who are walking this magical tightrope, who are doing this dance. Because I'm trying to do this myself, but my story is only one among many. And I just feel very motivated by this right now.
01:05:20
Speaker
Absolutely. Yeah. And so you should. I think this concept that you've coined that obviously chimes with so, so many people is going to be beautiful to see unfold and see those case studies really bring it to life and empower the subject and give give us all something to hang onto as scaffolding to kind of build our lives um if that's the way that we feel called to do. And I think that's what's ringing for people, you know, this idea that we can reclaim our time and also redefine things for ourselves. you know What is enough? What is richness? What is wealth? like You've written extensively about these topics on your your blog, your sub-stack. I invite you to point people in the direction of your work. Actually, yeah, now as we wrap up, but I just want to say that you've already got so much amazing inspirational stuff for people to chew on in your catalogue. But um yeah, this book and the podcast is going to be really something I'm excited about, and I know a lot of listeners will be as well. So
01:06:16
Speaker
Yeah, where would you direct people um if they want to engage with you after this conversation, Blake? It's really easy. Everything is on BlakeBoles.com. B-O-L-E-S. Easy. Don't forget about date, Blake.
01:06:32
Speaker
ah If you see something, say something.
01:06:38
Speaker
Brilliant. Well, it has just been such a wild ride. And I'm so, I'm so glad we ran into each other. And thank you for taking me up on this suggestion, because I know it has involved a little bit of extra work for you, maybe a lot. But I feel it's like you've really cut to right down into the meaty business with your list. And I am definitely gonna sit with that and take some of those on. I really like the failure resume. I think it'll be humbling for sure, but I think the usefulness for me is gonna be holding myself compassionately through that exercise. Yeah, I'll list these up in the show notes so everyone can have a little look. And obviously we have our AI cuddly fuzzy friends who are gonna transcribe it. That's always there in iTunes if people wanna read.
01:07:24
Speaker
So Blake, yeah, thank you so very much. A lot of gratitude to you for spending this time. It's been a pleasure Katie. Thanks for creating the container and for giving me a chance to to share stuff I really haven't shared elsewhere. It's great.
01:07:37
Speaker
Thanks to Blake Bowles for being, as they say around here, a bloody legend. If you're an international listener who likes to dance and loved what Blake had to say, perhaps you too should go on a date. I've linked Blake's dating page and all the rest of his colourful hijinks in the show notes.
01:07:55
Speaker
Next week, I'm sharing one of those gently magnificent conversations with a particularly beautiful friend of mine, Lucy Richards, who is the person I turn to on matters of business, strategy, poetry, deep nature connection, and messing with capitalism from the inside. It is such a wonderful conversation, so come back next Monday and soak it up.