Most everyone has experienced restlessness from time to time. A feeling of wanting more, but being unsure of how to find it; of struggling with distraction, but being unsure of what to focus on; of striking out in various directions, but not feeling any more fulfilled.

While we tend to think of restlessness as a very modern phenomenon, a French diplomat and philosopher, Alexis de Tocqueville, observed the very same problems in America two centuries ago. And the roots of our restlessness go back even further still.

My guests today will trace some of these genealogical branches for us. Their names are Benjamin and Jenna Storey, they're a married couple, professors of political philosophy, and the authors of the book Why We Are Restless: On the Modern Quest for Contentment.

We begin our conversation with how the Storeys' inquiry into restlessness began from observing existential meltdowns in their students and a constant but unfulfilling busyness in their friends. The Storeys then explain how Tocqueville observed a similar phenomenon at the start of the 19th century, before digging into two of the philosophers Tocqueville's observations were shaped by: Michel de Montaigne and Blaise Pascal. They first unpack Montaigne's ideal of living a life of cool, nonchalant, existential indifference, which sought contentment in the here and now, and then discuss Pascal's critique of that philosophy, in which he argued that seeking diversion and distraction for its own sake only makes us miserable, and that humans must engage in an anguished search for something beyond ourselves. We then explore what happened in the West when Montaigne's approach to life was adopted by the masses, and how it's led to feelings of existential failure, an impossible search for constant happiness, envy, loneliness, and acrimonious political debates. At the end of our conversation, the Storeys argue that while restlessness can never be entirely extinguished, it can be tamed, and suggest a few ways on how.

Get the show notes at aom.is/restlessness.

#701: Why Are We Restless?

When we think about people who can live anywhere, we tend to think about corporate-employed remote workers and online entrepreneurs. But many other kinds of professionals, from teachers to doctors, could hypothetically find a job anywhere, and thus live anywhere they’d like.

If you’re what my guest Melody Warnick calls an “anywhereist” and have seriously or casually considered moving somewhere else, today we’ll talk through the factors to consider in making that decision. Melody is the author of If You Could Live Anywhere: The Surprising Importance of Place in a Work-From-Anywhere World, and in today’s conversation we discuss the factors that you should include in what she calls a “location strategy,” from the cost of living in a place to whether it allows you to build the kinds of relationships you’re looking for. We also talk about how the place you live can be part of your purpose in life and the elements that contribute to an overall quality of life.

#827: Where You Should Live When You Could Live Anywhere

Do you feel stuck in life? Inwardly you keep repeating the same thoughts, outwardly you keep repeating the same routine, and on and on a cycle of unhappy disappointment goes.

To break the cycle, maybe what you need to do is watch a film that has become synonymous with this kind of stuck-ness — Groundhog Day — which my guest says contains the roadmap to escaping a life lived on autopilot. His name is Paul Hannam, he’s the author of The Wisdom of Groundhog Day: How to Improve Your Life One Day at a Time, and today on the show, Paul unpacks the deeper philosophical layers of what’s considered one of the best movies of all time. Paul explains how the film teaches us that to escape the ruts of what he calls the “Groundhog Day condition,” we must first make an inner change where we learn to approach life in a more grateful, present-focused, engaged way. From there, we can embrace the film’s unique strategy for change, which is to experiment with doing something new every day, thereby refining and improving our lives through the process of trial, error, and progressive improvement.

#828: The Groundhog Day Roadmap for Changing Your Life

No kid forgets getting his first bike, nor the surge of independence he felt the first time he pedaled away from his parents. And even as adults, the bike seems to give off a feeling of romance, of freedom, and, when you get going fast enough, even of flying.

The special allure of the bicycle can really be traced back to its simple yet elegant design, and my guest today will unpack the intriguing history of its creation. His name is Jody Rosen, and he’s the author of Two Wheels Good: The History and Mystery of the Bicycle. Today on the show, Jody explains the origins of the bicycle’s design, including how it was an anachronism at its birth, may have been inspired by a volcanic eruption, and helped liberate mankind from dependence on draft animals for transportation and exploration. We also get into how the bicycle was associated with flight right from the start. Along the way, we discuss how cycling represents an uncanny fusion of man and machine and produces a set of one-of-a-kind pleasures.

This episode will make you want to mount your trusty bicycle steed and take a ride.

#829: The Bicycle as Freedom and Flight

“Don’t be a quitter!” “Quitters never win, and winners never quit!”
 
These maxims encapsulate our usual attitude towards quitting, which is to see it as a bad thing, a weakness, a character defect. We celebrate those who stick with things, who have grit.
But my guest would say that quit and grit are just two sides of the same coin, and that quitting is a valuable skill to learn and get good at. Her name is Annie Duke, and she’s a former professional poker player, a speaker, a consultant, and an author. In her latest book, Quit: The Power of Knowing When to Walk Away, she seeks to rehabilitate quitting by showing how — whether it’s in the context of ending a relationship, leaving a job, or climbing a mountain — it has essential benefits. We discuss those benefits in today’s show, as well as how to know when to quit. We unpack how whether you should stick with something comes down to an equation of its positive “expected value,” how setting goals too rigidly can get in the way of our being able to assess that value, and the cognitive biases that keep you from quitting when you should. We end our conversation with two strategies for overcoming these biases, including establishing “kill criteria” to give yourself a timetable for how long to go after an aim.

#840: When to Quit

The two years, two months, and two days Henry David Thoreau spent at Walden Pond represent one of the most well-known experiences in American literary and philosophical history. Thoreau’s time at Walden has become something of a legend, one that is alternately lionized and criticized.

Yet though many people know of Thoreau’s experience at Walden, and the book he wrote about it, far fewer really understand its whys, whats, and hows.

My guest, who’s dedicated his career to studying Thoreau, will unpack the oft-missed nuances and common misconceptions about Walden. His name is Jeffrey S. Cramer, and he’s the Curator of Collections at The Walden Woods Project, as well as the author and editor of numerous books about Thoreau, including Walden: A Fully Annotated Edition. Today on the show, Jeffrey explains the reason Thoreau went to Walden, which wasn’t originally to write about that experience, and which ended up evolving over time. We discuss what Walden Pond was like, the dimensions and furnishings of the house Thoreau built on its shores, and how he spent his days there. Jeffrey explains why Thoreau left Walden, how he was less attached to the experience than we commonly assume, and how the significance of the experience came less from living it and more from writing about it. We then discuss how Walden the book became a classic despite an initially slow start, before turning to what Jeffrey thinks of the common criticisms of it, and the popular impulse to tear Thoreau down. We end our conversation with what we moderns can learn from Thoreau’s experiment with living deliberately.

#841: What People Get Wrong About Walden

As long as humans have existed, we’ve had to choose between our lower and higher desires — between what we want in the moment, and what we want in the long-term. As long as humans have existed, we’ve had to exercise self-control.

While exercising self-control has always been part of the human condition, our ideas about it have changed through the ages, as have the number of obstacles to doing so.

My guest charted the course of these changes in his book Temptation: Finding Self-Control in an Age of Excess, and he takes us on a tour of them today. His name is Daniel Akst, and we begin our conversation with a definition of what self-control is. We then discuss how Freudian psychology and the scientific study of self-control took it from being something the ancient Greeks and Romans considered an essential virtue of character, to something you shouldn’t or even couldn’t exercise. We also talk about what it is about the modern age that makes self-control uniquely difficult to put into practice. We end our conversation with how, despite the addition of complexities and hindrances, self-control remains a fundamental resource in a flourishing life, and Daniel shares practical tips for preserving yours by changing your environment, so you actually don’t have to exercise self-control as much.

#842: What Happened to the Idea of Self-Control?

A lot of people feel dissatisfied about how they spend their time. They often feel busy, but that busyness doesn’t add up to anything — not to fun, not to fulfillment, not to memories.

My guest, Laura Vanderkam, has spent a lot of time thinking about and studying time, and last year she decided to run an experiment to see if the insights she had gained from that study could help average people get a better handle on their time. She had 150 people try out nine different time-management rules, which were sorted into three categories: Calm the Chaos, Make Good Things Happen, and Waste Less Time. She shares these field-tested strategies from what she called the Tranquility by Tuesday project in her new book by the same name.

Today on the show, we talk about my seven favorite rules from Tranquility by Tuesday. Laura explains why you need to give yourself a bedtime, plan your week on Friday, make a “punch list” for tackling small tasks, and more. We also discuss the principle that can allow you to read a hundred books in a year.

#843: 7 Ways to Achieve Tranquility by Tuesday

The Twilight Zone is arguably one of the best and most influential shows in television history. The reason it endures, and is still being watched and talked about more than sixty years after its debut, can not only be traced to its superior storytelling and innovations in the genres of horror, science fiction, and fantasy, but the fact that each episode is embedded with a lesson on how to grapple with life’s moral and existential dilemmas.

Here to unpack those life lessons is Mark Dawidziak, author of Everything I Need to Know I Learned in the Twilight Zone. Today on the show, Mark and I discuss the parable-like morals from a selection of Twilight Zone episodes, drawn from those that are my favorites, Mark’s favorites, and simply classic. And, since Halloween is coming up, Mark and I both offer our picks for the just plain scariest episodes to watch.

#844: Life Lessons From The Twilight Zone

There are two parts of the mind: the conscious and the unconscious. While the former dominates your attention, the latter actually occupies far more of the brain, influencing your mood, generating inspiration, and making you who you are, all behind the scenes.

My guest would argue that to become all you’re meant to be, you have to make your unconscious mind your ally and that this may be life’s most important task.

His name is Daniel Z. Lieberman, and he’s a psychiatrist and the author of Spellbound: Modern Science, Ancient Magic, and the Hidden Potential of the Unconscious Mind. Today on the show, Daniel first offers an overview of the nature, function, and study of the unconscious. From there we discuss Carl Jung’s perspective on the unconscious, and his ideas around its archetypes and shadows. We then get into the way that things which are connected to magic and the supernatural, like fairy tales and tarot cards, can be seen as manifestations of the energy of the unconscious and as age-old attempts to confront and understand it. We end our discussion by talking about the quest for individuation, which requires bringing together the conscious and unconscious minds, and how to go about tapping into the power of the unconscious to become a kind of magician yourself.

#845: Magic, Archetypes, and the Mysteries of the Unconscious

In the 80s and 90s, few sports stars loomed as large as Bo Jackson. A Kansas City Royal and an Oakland Raider, he was the rare athlete to play two professional sports. His strength and power seemed supernatural. He soared into end zones, ran the 40-yard dash in 4.13 seconds, hit meteoric home runs, and broke baseball bats over his head for fun. And those were just his documented exploits. Because Bo played in an era before smartphones, stories circulated — that could never be entirely proven or disproven — that he was capable of even more impressive feats. The guy was the stuff of legends.

For this reason, Jeff Pearlman has entitled his new biography of Bo: The Last Folk Hero. Today on the show, Jeff and I talk about Bo’s Paul Bunyan-esque stature, and the real life behind the legend. We discuss both the flaws and the strengths of Bo Jackson, and how natural talent can be both a hindrance and a help, as we trace his life from an impoverished upbringing as one of ten kids, to how he managed to secure an arrangement where he got to play two professional sports. Jeff explains how Bo never liked to practice — because he was so naturally gifted he didn’t need to — why Bo didn’t take the deal when the Yankees tried to draft him out of high school, the flash-bulb moments he achieved in college and the pros, how a hip injury ended his football days but didn’t entirely finish him off for baseball, and why, after such a neon career, Bo has largely disappeared from the public eye.

#701: Why Are We Restless?

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