Inside the North Tower on 9/11 | Chief Joseph Pfeifer

Michael speaks with FDNY Chief Joseph Pfeifer, who led the first fire units into the North Tower on 9/11 and later gave the order to evacuate the towers. Chief Pfeifer later served as the FDNY Chief of Counterterrorism and Emergency preparedness, is a Senior Fellow at Harvard’s Kennedy School, and …

Trauma Does Not Define Who You Are | Elizabeth Smart

Michael sits down with Elizabeth Smart, who was abducted at 14, survived nine months of captivity, and spent the decades after building her own path to recovery. She is the Founder of the Elizabeth Smart foundation and host of The Survivor Files with Elizabeth Smart, a true-crime podcast where she …

Avoiding Anxiety Makes It Stronger | John Delony

John Delony argues that anxiety can be a signal, and avoiding the thing behind it often makes the alarm louder. Michael sits down with Delony, host of The Dr. John Delony Show and author of Building a Non-Anxious Life. They discuss: - The most common relationship problems he hears (from thousands …

A Trial Lawyer's Rules for Hard Conversations | Jefferson Fisher

Michael sits down with trial lawyer Jefferson Fisher, author of The Next Conversation, on why hard conversations are some of the most uncomfortable things we do and how to do them better. They discuss: - The hardest conversation Jefferson has ever had - Exactly what to do before having a hard con…

Should You Take Peptides? A Doctor's Evidence-Based Answer | Dr. Jordan Feigenbaum

Michael speaks with physician and competitive powerlifter Dr. Jordan Feigenbaum about what peptides are, why they suddenly seem to promise everything, and what the human evidence actually shows. They discuss: Why GLP-1s normalized injections What counts as a peptide drug Why BPC-157 lacks human tri…

A Navy SEAL's Case for Being Humble and Obsessed | Eric Frohardt

Michael speaks with Eric Frohardt about his twelve years on SEAL Team 6 as a sniper and assaulter—and what you can learn from it. They discuss: - How to stay calm under pressure (lessons from sniper training) - Why farm kids outlast the fittest gym athletes in SEAL training - Mindset lessons fro…

A Harvard Psychologist's Case Against Following the Rules | Ellen Langer

We treat aging, fatigue, and even disease as things that just happen to us. Ellen Langer, the first woman tenured in Harvard's psychology department, has spent five decades showing that our way of thinking has a massive say in all of it. Michael sits down with Langer, author of The Mindful Body, t…

You're Living Through the Fastest Revolution in History | Tyler Cowen

Tyler Cowen has spent decades studying what makes people, societies, and economies thrive. He thinks we’re living through the fastest technological revolution humans have ever faced—yet most of us are still planning our lives as if nothing is changing. Michael sat down with Tyler to find out how to…

What AI Is Actually Doing to Your Workday | Cal Newport

Modern work has a giant problem: It keeps us stressed enough to be miserable, but never stressed enough to quit. Cal Newport, a computer scientist at Georgetown University, says that's not an accident: When work switched from factories and farms to offices, we never figured out how to measure the p…

Lessons From the Most Dangerous Job: Hotshot Firefighting with River Selby

Hotshot firefighting is one of the most physically demanding and dangerous jobs in the United States. River Selby spent seven years as a wildland firefighter, four of them on elite hotshot crews, the teams that jump into the worst blazes in the country.  Michael sits down with Selby, author of Hot…