The James Altucher Show

Steven Pressfield wrote all of the greatest books for writers. He's a pro. And in part 1 he talks about turning pro. Now he talks about HOW to develop your skills. "I have a writing practice," he says. "And what that sort of means is you detach yourself from the outcome and you're looking at the long picture. If somebody says to me, 'Steve you're gonna live to be 97.8 years old. Are you going to b...

HOW TO GO FROM AMATEUR TO TURNING PRO? I had a full time job. I was trying to run a business on the side. I was pitching two TV shows. And I was obsessively playing chess day and night and traveling to tournaments. And nothing was going well. My attention was scattered. I was unhappy. I felt stuck. One time I was talking to one of the partners in my side business, Randy Weiner. I said to him, "I'm...

I was very late and I was very upset at myself. I had flown three thousand miles. I moved into an Airbnb right next to where Tim was staying. I had written thousands of notes on ripped pieces of paper and stuck them all throughout the book. I had notes written up and around all the margins. I listened to dozens of his podcasts. And I've known him for years. All morning I had jotted down possible q...

I was very late and I was very upset at myself. I had flown three thousand miles. I moved into an Airbnb right next to where Tim was staying. I had written thousands of notes on ripped pieces of paper and stuck them all throughout the book. I had notes written up and around all the margins. I listened to dozens of his podcasts. And I've known him for years. All morning I had jotted down possible q...

The Explorer's Code:  I wanted to wake each morning, not anxious about my day anymore. Not worried about what so-and-so would say, or where my career was going, or what was I going to write today. My only job each day is to explore something new. So I called up Josh and asked him how I could be an explorer. He told me. - Have A Mission Every day, whether it's "be creative today." Or "go some place...

What does it sound like when you change your mind? That's the name of Seth Godin's next book. He only printed 5,500 copies. And he's not printing anymore. He doesn't just view a book as pages surrounded by two covers. He makes a 3-dimensional object that's beautiful to look at and read. "It's not new," he said on my podcast. "It's the best of the last four years of my work. And it's illustrated wi...

Brian Koppelman and his wife Amy Koppelman saved my life. Many years after he ruined my life. First off: when he wrote the movie "Rounders" I became obsessed with poker. I went to the same club he played at and played for 365 nights, including the night my first daughter was born (I was there for the birth though!) .   I was an addict. But eventually I stopped in order to start another company. I...

WHAT I CAN LEARN IN ONE MINUTE THAT WILL CHANGE MY LIFE FOREVER Stephen Dubner (Freakonomics) has a new podcast and it just hit #1 in the iTunes charts. "Tell Me Something I Don't Know" is the name of it and it's about to change my life. He came over to play backgammon and I asked him about it. He told me he became a journalist because it was an easy way to start talking to people. He said, "If I...

He died. He was giving a speech, sat down, and the next thing... he was dead. They called an ambulance. They got paramedics. They did that thing. They brought him back to life. But his body didn't like living. He died again. Eight more times they used machines to convince the machine in his body that we call a heart, to come back to life. Please come back to life, the machines said to his heart. A...

http://ryanholiday.net/dear-dad-dont-vote-donald-trump/ ------------What do YOU think of the show? Head to JamesAltucherShow.com/listeners and fill out a short survey that will help us better tailor the podcast to our audience! Are you interested in getting direct answers from James about your question on a podcast? Go to JamesAltucherShow.com/AskAltucher and send in your questions to be answered...

JOKE Last night I wrote down six things I wanted to do today. I kept number six blank. "JOKE" was just a reminder to start this post with a joke from Jon Macks... "If you live in Florida, ya know, God's waiting room..." "If you're Jewish, like me..." Those are just a few lines from my interview with Jon Macks. He was the top writer for "The Tonight Show" with Jay Leno. He wrote 100 jokes a day. Th...

I can't tell you the secret to selling half a million books. Or half a million anything... Every day, business changes, the world shifts on its axis and your skin peels off a little bit. New cells are generated and with each blink, your eyes are rehydrated. "I'll admit, if there was some formula, I'd do it again," he said. Without new experiences, your soul rots. And your book or product or whatev...

"I know you've made tens of millions of dollars in various areas of life," I said. "Tell me how you did it." "Hmm." He scanned his memory for money. And landed in 1969. "I put all my possessions in the back of my Mustang and drove to Washington, D.C. I figured if I got $5,000, I could hitchhike my way through South America... but more importantly, Africa." There are about 220 countries on the plan...

  "Terrorists have moms," he said. Jeffrey Schilling was kidnapped in the Philippines and held hostage for 7 and a half months. The terrorists said they were torturing him. But Chris Voss didn't fall for it. Chris is a former FBI hostage negotiator and the author of, "Never Split the Difference: Negotiating As If Your Life Depended On It." "Find a way to mention his mother's concern for him," Chri...

Jewel was broke and homeless, but she still turned down a million dollar check when she was 19 years old. Jewel was broke and millions in debt after selling 30,000,000 albums, and built back from scratch when she was 30. Jewel has switched genres, written music from folk to pop to country to even children's music. She wrote a children's book. I love Jewel. Abused from the ages of 5 to 15. Moved ou...

You're either horrible or miserable. Woody Allen has this joke in "Annie Hall." He says, "Life is divided into the horrible and the miserable. That's the two categories. The horrible are terminal cases. You know? And blind people, crippled... I don't know how they get through life... It's amazing to me. And the miserable is everyone else. So you should be thankful that you're miserable. Because th...

If I can tell my children to read one post of mine, it would be this post. Influence is how they will navigate a world of uncertainty. Robert Cialdini is the most influential person in the world. And by that I mean, he wrote the book, "INFLUENCE", which sold 3 million copies and defines the six critical aspects of all influence. Now he has a new book, "Pre-Suasion", going 10x deeper into the conce...

I had to stop trying to get ahead. There are 8 million people in New York City. And 7 billion in the world. That's 875 New York Cities. You can't get ahead. Information is compounding. Technology is growing exponentially. Nothing is predictable-except maybe your expectations. But not your success. I used to complain. Now I pivot. "There is no try," Yoda says. Hans Solo didn't believe he could use...

By the time you finish reading this, everything I'm about to tell you will already be over. What you choose to do with it is up to you. Caleb Carr was beaten as a child. His father, Lucien Carr, was an Ivy League boy, friends with Jack Kerouac, William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg. They were the rebels of society. Known as The Beat Generation. But Caleb reminded me of their other legacy... "My...

One good story can save your life... (literally).   Jordan was taken, strapped to a chair and kicked around. First in Serbia and then again in Mexico. But you already knew this. Here's what you didn't know...   I was taken too.   Or at least it felt like it. Everyone reading this has talents. And you want to express those talents.   Maybe you feel taken too. You want to choose yourself but you don...

You can learn a lot from a sociopath. How to be charismatic, charming, convincing... They know how you think. "That's the mindset we want," Jordan Harbinger said. He was kidnapped twice. Once in Serbia. Once in Mexico. He talked his way out both times. "We knew there was a problem," he said. "The cop gets in my face and says, 'In your country, can you walk around with no identification and no pass...

I was at a restaurant with this beautiful, thick-cut bacon. The kind you use a knife and fork on. It had fat running through it. And I felt that feeling when you fall in love in junior high school. My friend AJ Jacobs is going to prove bacon is the the path to immortality. "I am very skeptical of health gurus," he said. "You can find a study to support anything." I want him to find that study so I...

Beautiful women with laser boobs. If you asked me "What's Playboy's future," that would've been my guess. But then I spoke to Steven Kotler. I asked him, "When are we going to start 3D printing houses and cars?" This was 7 or 8 months ago. But I was too late. China 3-D printed ten homes in two days. And they were cheap. $5,000 a home. Then they 3-D printed a mansion. And a five-story apartment com...

There was a time when the only word I said was "no." I think that was the best time of my life. But I can't remember it. My memory sucks. It was "the terrible twos." A defining age. You tell your truth. But everyone says you're a terrible person. And somewhere along the way you start listening to them. They make up rules. And send you to school, where girls wear white gloves and can't blow their n...

What you'll learn from today's podcast: [6:58] - Who should everyone be an entrepreneur? [9:12] - How do you decide what a "rich" life is to you? [19:43] - Make $50,000 in one month with a simple site [25:03] - How to attract the right audience/customer [34:00] - Get better than anyone else in your space [43:30] - How to test your idea... before it "tanks" [54:40] - Two marketing myths you need to...