The James Altucher Show

"If you were on the outside looking in you'd probably think, 'This guy's got a really good life.' And on paper I did, but on the inside I felt like I was dying. I was depressed. I was unenthusiastic about my life because I knew I was in a career that was ill suited to me. But I just couldn't see my way out of it," Rich Roll said. He told be about the time he felt a tightness in his chest. He could...

We all have vulnerabilities. And I exposed mine to Linda because it's a free therapy session. She's a well-known psychologist and bestselling author born in Canada, living in the UK. I had to ask her about all her theories. And all her books. But mostly these 2: 1. "What Men Say, What Women Hear" 2. "Unfollow: Living Life on Your Own Terms" Because I am still outsourcing my self-worth to new measu...

"This guy tried to kill me. He had a gun to my head," Jon said.  "We were leaving the country.  We got intercepted." Wait. What? I was interviewing Jon Alpert.  He was trying to smuggle controversial footage out of Iraq. "I was basically a complete failure up until the moment that I started making films," Jon said. He was constantly trying to make his community a better place, but his attempts wer...

I started to get really itchy. Inside my head. I didn't know how to scratch it. So I avoided it. Until I broke out into hives and finally forced myself on stage. I think it started when I interviewed Gary Gulman, one of the greatest comedians ever. It was over two years ago. And even though he was deeply depressed, I was jealous. Because he was living my dreams. He was scratching my itch. So I sta...

I like the idea of experimenting for two reasons. A) widen comfort zone B) become a better person. I'll tell you about A first then B. But first, let me reintroduce my good friend AJ. If you listen to this podcast then you already know who AJ is. But just in case, AJ Jacob's is a professional at experimenting. All his books are experiments. Four are bestsellers. He told me about one he did with th...

Got to interview one of my favorite comedians for the podcast, Tiffany Haddish, star of "Girls Trip," her recent comedy special. "She Ready", and 20 years a stand up. I asked her what was the biggest change in her first few years of doing standup. (She's been doing it over 20 years). She said, "I learned to change the fear into fun". I think all of the above is great advice to achieve success in e...

If you're reading this, you probably don't know the name Stephen Tobolowsky. But I'll give you some hints. Ned Ryerson. (From "Groundhog Day") Jack Barker. (From "Silicon Valley") Sound familiar? Stephen Tobolowsky is one of the main characters and actors in one of my favorite TV Shows, Silicon Valley. He also plays the MOST annoying character in Groundhog Day. He's been in 200 movies and a thousa...

I wish I could take everything Ray Dalio said and turn it into a book. But he already did that. It's called, "Principles: Life and Work." And I'm going to be re-reading it for the rest of my life. He defines principles as "ways of successfully dealing with reality to get what you want out of life." And he's revealing how he used these principles to build BridgeWater Associates, (which manages $150...

You may remember Amy, she came on my podcast a few weeks ago. We discussed her book, "13 Things Mentally Strong People Don't Do." I asked her why is it a book about what people DON'T do instead of SHOULD do. It seemed counterintuitive to me. But her reasoning made sense. The book wasn't written for other people. It was actually just a letter to herself at first. And then she put it online. And it...

I got a call from my friend Mike Van Cleave a year ago. He told me had cancer. We hadn't spoken for years. "It's like mold in your refrigerator," he said. "All of a sudden you're like, 'What the hell happened? It's only been a week."   You never know who's going to call you out of the blue someday with cancer. It's scary, but luckily we don't live with these thoughts in our minds. We only think of...

I don't know where to begin. I'm a fan of Scott. I think he reminds me of someone I went to highschool with. He was bright and always cursing at the right time. I remember laughing. Because I felt close to being free. But he was the one with the ability to put himself in the middle of controversy. That's something I (still) can't do. He'd say eff this or eff that. Part of me felt compelled to egg...

Dennis Woodside left Google, for DropBox. Everyone thought he was crazy. DropBox was this little tiny company. What was he thinking? "So you ask why I would go from Google to Dropbox. Just play the movie forward. Where's it going to be in ten years? It's logical to me that the company that pioneered this notion of putting your files in the cloud is going to have all kind of opportunities and going...

I sat down with two women the other day. And I can't decide whether they've completely ruined my life or helped me. I decided they were going to help me decide before this podcast was over. Ellen Fein and Sherrie Schneider are the authors of the classic book, "The Rules". I know this book inside and out. Every woman I ever dated back in the 90's and early 00's read "The Rules" AND were following t...

I asked Frank Shamrock, a living legend MMA fighter, "How many titles have you won?" "I think I won them all." He calls himself a "super athlete." So I told him he lacks humility... And we laughed. But he's right. He IS a super athlete. He evolved the art form. And went one level deeper than any opponent. He didn't just say "how do I crush this person?" He said "How is the body working? What is th...

Anthony holds a lot of weird records. But the most interesting to me is the record for the biggest span between winning golds. SIXTEEN YEARS.    But first, let's start from the beginning. Anthony Ervin always had a gift for swimming. He had the talent. He had the coaching. And he had the success from an early age. But there was something else looming. Tourette's. I asked him how it happened. "What...

We've become too comfortable. We're innovating less and watching Netflix more. When I think of a "complacent class," (a group of people who don't care to move forward or move at all), I think of this: Americans soaking high wages off the backs of more aggressive global economies. I picture us eating delivered food, never moving, only using the remote. And having drones deliver everything we need....

Tim's doing a new experiment. (I'm not surprised.) He's looking at people and asking himself one question... "What happened to this person?" He said, "Normal people are just folks you don't know well enough yet, right? Nobody's normal. We're so full of stuff and trauma and nonsense and silly beliefs. Everyone's a work in progress and since you're a work in progress, it's very hard to know yourself...

I can't just call Chuck a writer. He's arguably one of the most successful pop culture critics. "Oh sure," he said. "And I have a big advantage. Most critics want to be the first to write about something, I get to be the last person. And that puts me in a very good position." "Why?" I asked. "I'm not just reacting to something," he said. "I'm looking at all the other reactions." He's interpreting...

I was really nervous for this podcast. Elizabeth Smart has been through so much trauma. And I'm sure everyone says that to her. Was she sick of hearing that after all these years? I wanted to learn how she survived. The kidnapper came through her window, held a knife to her throat and threatened to kill her. He said it was religion... God, that made him do it. But she saw through them and their ev...

Floyd exposed Armstrong. He exposed the whole US cycling team for doping. In 2006, he won the Tour de France. He made it to the heights of the profession. And then he blew the whistle. "People see it as exercise, a healthy, endurance sport. It's not that at all," he said. "It's war, and your body is a machine." I don't know if I'd be brave enough to be the whistle blower. I think I'd just quit the...

I wish they'd send Joan to space. She's a real writer... who wrote about true things. I want her to describe the feeling and the wonderment of what life would be like. But they don't send writers to space. Only scientists (for now). Joan Didion pioneered a new genre in writing: "creative nonfiction." Before her, storytelling and nonfiction never touched. They were separate. She's one of my all tim...

It's Scott's 3rd time on the podcast. In the first interview, he was "the creator of Dilbert." A famous cartoonist. The second time he was still "the creator of Dilbert" and a hypnosis/persuasion student. Now (appearance #3), Scott Adams is something new. He's reinvented. And no longer standing on the footbridge between old self and new self. He's the author of "Win Bigly: Persuasion in a World Wh...

He was trying out a role built for him. The screenwriter wrote the script with John in mind. He wrote his name in the margin. "A John McGinley type." "Did that give you high confidence?" I asked him. "No, they made me audition 5 times for a John McGinley type!" So I wanted to know how he landed so many incredible roles. He told me the secret. We either poison ourselves. Or we thrive. It's our choi...

Bill Cartwright and I have nothing in common. He's from the west coast and I'm from the east coast. He's 7'1" and I'm not. When Bill got drafted to the NBA, they called him "Moses". He held every important basketball title in high school AND college. But being tall and having talent are two very different things. I wanted to know the evolution of becoming a peak performer. So I asked him, "What ma...

Before Sheila Nevins, no one cared about our human stories. "I felt that there could be performance in every man, that every man could perform his life or his situation or his trauma or his successes or his failure," Sheila said. She's a 26 Academy Award winning HBO producer. She birthed the modern documentary. 1,700 of them in total. "I think everyone has something to offer," Sheila said. But not...