Don’t worry about Elon becoming rich with his own money. Worry about politicians becoming rich with your money.

Mark Manson has a brutally simple way to spot a narcissist. On Raj Shamani’s podcast, he explained that narcissism isn’t real confidence — it’s fake confidence built on deep insecurity. Narcissists look confident to people who doubt themselves, but the difference becomes obvious when you disagree with them or tell them “no.” A narcissist will belittle you, argue, call you stupid, or refuse to accept it. A truly confident person will say “okay, let’s talk about it,” admit when they’re wrong, or even thank you for the feedback. This one is gold because it’s such an easy test that actually works in real life. Once you see it, you can’t unsee it. In a world full of loud voices and performative confidence, knowing how to tell the difference protects your time, energy, and peace. How do you spot the difference between real confidence and narcissism in people?

Intelligent people struggle with addiction. Their minds need more. They have obsessions nobody around them shares. Philosophy. Astronomy. Dostoevsky. Jazz. Quantum physics. Things they know deeply. Things they've gone so deep into that anything else feel like small talk. And small talk feels like suffocation. So... they drink. Work until 2 am. Doomscroll until they're numb. Because there is a gap. A gap between who you are and the conversations available to you. And it's one of the loneliest places a person can live.

Recent studies in neuroscience and psychology are reframing ADHD not merely as a set of cognitive hurdles but as a powerful driver of breakthrough creativity and innovation. Long stereotyped for difficulties with focus, attention, and impulse control, individuals with ADHD traits often exhibit superior divergent thinking—the capacity to generate a wide array of novel ideas by connecting distant or unrelated concepts. This stems from reduced adherence to rigid mental frameworks, enabling freer conceptual expansion and the production of more original, unconventional solutions than neurotypical counterparts. Heightened mind-wandering, especially when deliberate (purposefully allowing thoughts to drift), acts as a fertile source for this creativity, bypassing conventional boundaries to yield abundant "outside-the-box" insights. Complementing this cognitive flexibility is a neurological drive for novelty rooted in lower baseline dopamine signaling. This creates a chronic need for stimulation, translating into exploratory, risk-tolerant behavior and a propensity for adventure—qualities that can disrupt routine settings but prove invaluable in dynamic fields. Impulsivity, often reframed as rapid action initiation, becomes a catalyst for pursuing bold ideas and seizing opportunities in high-stakes environments. These traits align closely with the profiles of many successful entrepreneurs, inventors, and pioneers. In fast-evolving creative and innovative economies, the ADHD brain's wiring for quick associative leaps, tolerance of uncertainty, and motivation through novelty-seeking provides a distinct edge, turning potential challenges into engines of originality and progress. Emerging evidence from 2025–2026 research reinforces this view: studies link stronger ADHD traits to elevated creative achievements via mediated mind-wandering, intuitive insight-driven problem-solving, and higher real-world inventive output, highlighting neurodiversity's role in fueling societal advancement. [Maisano, H., et al. (2026). ADHD Symptoms Predict Distinct Creative Problem-Solving Styles and Superior Solving Ability. Personality and Individual Differences (February 2026)]

"Marc, why do you care about SPLC's crimes & other activists/companies/gov't agencies who may have done the same/complicit?" I sat in so many meetings for a DECADE where these groups determined who got cancelled/debanked/censored. Wholly un-American. People need to go to jail.

Stanford dorm room to billion-dollar exit in 32 months. Not in tech. In CPG. Grüns was founded in August 2023. Unilever just acquired it. Poppi took 9 years. Liquid I.V. took 8. Dr. Squatch took 12. The timeline: Month 1: First sales. Pre-seed from Stanford classmates. Month 6: $6M seed. Vanterra, SugarCap, Selva. Month 14: Profitable. Month 21: $100M run rate, online only. $35M Series B at $500M valuation. Month 24: $300M run rate. 6,300 retail doors. All Targets. All Walmarts. Every Sam's Club. Month 32: Acquired by Unilever. The product: 8 gummy bears. 60 ingredients. $80/month. 80% of customers use it daily. Chad Janis was a VC before this. Board observer at Chubbies, Brooklinen, Dr. Squatch. He watched the Dr. Squatch exit to Unilever from the inside. He didn't just build a brand. He built the brand Unilever was going to acquire. Unilever already owns Liquid I.V., Nutrafol, SmartyPants. They're not buying a gummy supplement. They're buying 80% daily compliance and a DTC subscription engine legacy brands can't replicate. 32 months. The fastest launch-to-billion in CPG history.

A few months ago Tyler Morgan from BFG Partners came on the podcast and said something that stuck. Vacation sunscreen was one of the only businesses BFG ever backed pre-product. He called it one of the greatest pitch decks he'd ever seen. VMG Partners just confirmed that thesis. $70M check. $210M valuation. Primarily secondary. VMG's beauty track record: Drunk Elephant → $845M to Shiseido K18 → sold to Unilever Sun Bum → $400M to SC Johnson at 5.7x revenue The numbers: $75M in 2025 net sales. Profitable. Ulta, Target, CVS, Nordstrom, Erewhon, Costco. 5M weekly organic social media views. Vacation didn't win by out-formulating dermatologists or chasing SPF innovation. It won by building a world. A scent. A tone of voice. An aesthetic that scaled from DTC to retail to merch to collabs without ever losing the vibe. In a category Coppertone and Banana Boat have owned for decades, Vacation proved that taste is still a growth engine. Tyler called it lightning in a bottle. VMG is betting it's a playbook.

I have tried dozens of these types of techniques and can attest that "own voice mind-changing techniques" are incredibly effective. Write and record a script, play it back and listen. For added penetration - meditate afterward. There is something about using the sound of your own voice that differentiates this from other affirmation-like meditations. Just be cautious with what you want to brainwash yourself with. It is effective.

NEW: NASA's Artemis II has successfully blasted off, launching toward the Moon for the first lunar voyage in 53 years. Here is what to expect next: - Mission is 10 total days. - The crew will get 5000 miles from the Moon's surface. - The crew will sleep in two four-hour periods. - On Day 2, Orion engines will accelerate the spacecraft to escape velocity and send them toward the Moon. - On Days 3-5, the crew will fine-tune the approach to the Moon. - Day 6 is when the crew flies by the Moon. They will be about 250,000 miles from the Earth. - Days 6-7, the crew will fine-tune their approach back to Earth. - On Day 10, the crew will put on their proper suits and get ready for reentry. - They will reenter Earth's atmosphere at 25,000 miles per hour. - Two parachutes will slow the capsule to 17 miles per hour. - They will splash down off the coast of San Diego, California. Video: @GuyFieri

My Pop infused an absurd level of self belief in me. In absolutely every facet. Made me feel like I could literally do anything. When I had absolutely no business thinking I could play pro ball, he SWORE not that I could, but that I WOULD. He'd tell his friends, our family, my coaches who didnt believe it. Same with Sports Media. Swore up and down after I broke my leg playing ball and made the move, that id change things somehow in Sports Media. Hearing his absurd, sometimes unrealistic belief in me SO MANY TIMES eventually permeated my mind, and its never left me. He was right about ball. Now its time I make him right about Sports Media.

What’s a phrase a narcissist says that instantly gives them away?

There are two types of gay guys… Afters or Brunch… yes you can do both but spiritually you really are on or the other and its not always the one that you think or want to be

working for yourself is addictive in a way most people don’t anticipate & the stress that comes with it is genuinely difficult to manage. when you’re the principal, nothing happens without you. you set the tone, the structure, the culture, & the motivation. you are the foundational layer. most ppl have never had to operate this way cuz they’ve always been embedded in a system & told what to do, when to do it, & what matters. aka the shawshank lifestyle. the human mind runs surprisingly well on prescription. strip that away & you discover pretty quickly whether you actually have an interior architecture or just a talent for compliance. that’s what makes it so damn dichotomous. the freedom is so fucking real, but so is the weight. all i’m saying is that most ppl have never had to locate their own gravity before.

“To be happy you must eliminate two things: The fear of a bad future and the memory of a bad past.” — Seneca

As fast you can Build a company Sell it for $30,000,000 Put 100% of the $24m you get (after taxes) into the S&P 500 Ask your private banker for a $2m/yr loan at 3% interest S&P goes up an average of 10% a year so sell your $2.4m in gains at the end of the year, pay off your taxes loan interest, repeat until you die. This is the way.

We have two daughters (1 and 3). I really like them. I’m 44 and my wife is 35. Should we stop here or have a third?

One of life's rarest combinations: Someone who's ambitious but not anxious. Driven but not desperate. Focused but not frantic. That calm determination is magnetic. Goals without panic is mastery.

The perfect spouse is the best life hack no one told you about.

Every family has a super academic kid with debilitating ambition that turns out gay

After reading Matt Shumer’s “Something Big is Coming” yesterday, which has hit 55M views, I started searching high and low for any and all counter arguments. Not because I believed he wasn’t being honest. Or revealing valid a tectonic shift coming. But because there is always two sides (minimum) to every story. Not sometimes. All times. Forming opinions based on one side is how you get lobotomies becoming accepted psychiatric practice for twenty years. So, is there any other viewpoint other than the end of the world as we know it where we’re all noodling at the local lake for our dinner? Perhaps. And, if so, this is the best I’ve seen. Take a deep breath. And read it. You’ll take a deep breath after reading it, too.