In the age of AI, investing in great companies is by far the easiest way to make a lot of money (still difficult). Basically, the only way to get rich (legally) is to own a great business, or multiple. Investing is by far the quickest way to do that. With that said, investing in companies and outperforming index funds is hard and most fail. But most fail because they get distracted in bullshit strategies, they are working alone, and/or they aren’t actually trying.

I spent 25 hours distilling my research into this essay because 1. Helps me think/gain conviction; 2. I wanted to see how much my readers like this stuff (not much apparently), and 3. It is like a bat signal attracting and helping other intelligent investors

Anyone investing meaningful amounts of money in great AI companies is going to get very rich. Getting rich by yourself is like, not that fun… It’s a bit like going to an amusement park or doing anything really, by yourself - it’s fun for like five seconds. At least for me, more weighty and lasting satisfaction is in creativity, social connection, helping people… I think people don’t always recognize that money in and of itself has no value. We live in a world of abundance, moving toward hyperabundance. It is the friends and creations (including children), experimentation and experiences, that is the substance of life that makes it truly rich, and makes the inevitable (sometimes very painful sufferings) more than worthwhile.

Honestly I’ve not heard other people say this (maybe it’s just me), but making a lot of money from investing feels a little unfair? compared to people who bust their ass doing customer service… So perhaps it will feel a bit better for me knowing I helped a few people better invest their money along the way.

There is a bountiful and beautiful intellectual commons on the internet (among the carnage and slop dumpsters) that I have benefitted incalculably from, and this post is a token of my gratitude and a small contribution.

Throw your stick, no matter how small, onto the fire. And invest your money… carefully. Don’t let it wither away in dollars…

I have deep respect and admiration for people posting thoughtful long-form content for the intellectual commons. The internet is a gold mine of cogent thinking and helpfulness if you can find it. Keep going.

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This is not financial advice. I wrote this in March and April of 2026, and circumstances may have changed.

Introduction & Overview

I love autonomous vehicles. All winter, I was taking Waymo and Tesla Robotaxi nearly every day around Austin. AVs are my favorite use case of AI robotics right now. They are safer, more affordable, private, and smell better than conventional ride-hailing. Very few people have access to autonomous ride-hailing, but that will change over the next ten years, in part thanks to the work of the WeRide team.

Some of the smartest people in the world work for Amazon and Tesla. Yet WeRide is beating both of them in self-driving. Governments in a dozen countries and 40 cities have issued permits for WeRide to test and operate. The only company WeRide is not beating is Google/DeepMind/Waymo—and that’s a tough coalition to beat.

As of writing, WeRide and Waymo have the only two robotaxis in the world on the Uber platform. In terms of scale, WeRide is about 1-2 years behind Waymo, a company that was recently valued in a private round at $126 Billion. That’s around 100X WeRide’s enterprise value (valuation minus) their cash in March 2026. It will be hard for WeRide to catch Waymo. But they are not competing in the same countries, and it will be a long time before they ever are.

There are two classical ride-hailing companies in America (Uber and Lyft). Two. Why not ten? Because it’s very difficult, and after there are two established players, it becomes even harder to break into the market and be profitable. It’s a natural oligopoly.

Self-driving technology is similar in that regard. The more people use it, the safer and more efficient it gets, the more consumers know about it, and the more governments approve it. There is a huge advantage for an early mover in a regulated, capital-intensive, high-tech business like autonomous vehicle transportation.

Founded in 2017, WeRide is one of those early movers. As of March 2026, they have 1,100+ robotaxis and robobuses serving cities in China and the Middle East, aiming for 2,600 by EOY. The company is expanding into Singapore, France, Switzerland, and Belgium. They are partnered with Geely, Uber, Grab, and others to deploy “tens of thousands” of robotaxis across China, Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and Europe by 2030. (Chinese robotaxis are not allowed in the United States.)

It’s sci-fi that a fully autonomous taxi is even possible. If you’ve not experienced robotaxi yet, I’m excited for you. It’s unreal.

After a sharp decline in valuation, WeRide was trading at roughly $2.1 billion in March 2026. They have a billion dollars of cash and will likely be bringing in more than $1 billion of annual revenue by 2031, and still have tremendous growth ahead of them. They could command a 10X revenue multiple, implying a $10B+ market cap, roughly 5X the recent $2.1B valuation. Both revenue and the assigned multiple could be substantially higher, depending on how their multiple businesses develop. In addition to robotaxi ride-hailing, they license ADAS software and sell/operate B2B robobuses, robovans, and robosweepers. And I wouldn’t be surprised if they come up with additional new products/businesses in the future.

I started buying WeRide in January. As the valuation declined, I did more due diligence and bought more shares. As of writing, WeRide is ~5% of my portfolio. If it were an American company, it would likely be even more. But WeRide is a Chinese company, and I don’t know what I don’t know. There are geopolitical risks. Although unlikely, WeRide could find itself barred from more than just the United States. Also, they may find themselves in fierce competition with giants like NVIDIA, Waymo, Tesla, and Baidu in Europe/Asia. However, I think the autonomous ride-hailing business will be an extremely large and profitable oligopoly with regionally dominant players, similar to cloud computing and legacy ride-hailing. I predict WeRide will continue to be a big winner.

When I make a big investment, I look at the company’s products, leadership, earnings potential, financials, competition, macro forces, near-term catalysts, and insider actions. Here’s what I found:

Products/Businesses

ROBOTAXI

Customers open the app, summon an autonomous WeRide taxi, and it takes them where they want to go. This is the product that drives the majority of the market capitalization. WeRide, like Waymo, partners with Uber in some markets, and operates their own fleet in others. In China, WeRide owns distribution and operations. In the Middle East, they partner with Uber. In Southeast Asia they are partnered with Grab — they just launched robotaxi in Singapore. In Europe, they will have multiple local partners. This GTM strategy helps them to scale faster and more capital-efficiently across the world.

ROBO-BUS/SWEEPER/VAN

Robobus/Robovan are commercial vehicles for transporting larger numbers of people and freight, respectively. Robo-sweeper is a real thing that is autonomously cleaning the streets of Singapore, and cities in China and Middle East. B2B is less exciting than B2C robotaxi, but the combined profits from these businesses at scale are nontrivial.

ADAS TECH & LICENSING

WeRide has partnered with Bosch to supply automakers with Advanced Driver Assist Systems that can do most of the driving while the owner supervises. In the 2030s the vast majority of new cars will be able to drive themselves like Teslas do today, but better. WeRide is already partnered with multiple automakers like GAC Group and Chery. It’s difficult to predict how much WeRide can earn from this business line but it’s in the realm of hundreds of millions of high-margin, recurring revenue. This business alone could command multiple billions of market cap.

On a recent earnings call, the company said:

Across our diversified applications, WeRide’s global AV fleet, spanning Robotaxis, Robobuses, Robovans, and Robosweepers, grew rapidly from 1,089 vehicles at the end of 2024 to 2,113 as of today, strengthening our global presence across 12 countries. Take our Robobus business as an example. It has seen impressive growth in 2025, increasing by 190% year-over-year. We’ve entered multiple European markets, including Switzerland, France, Belgium, Spain, and Slovakia, where labor shortages in public transit systems are creating real opportunities for autonomous shuttles.

in 2025, our Robotaxi contributed 22% of the total revenue, and the Robobus contribute 34%. Our L2+ + ADAS and data service contribute 29%. Together, these three pillars accounted for around 85% of our business, with Robovan and Robosweeper making up the remaining 15%.

Leadership

Conviction is extremely important when investing in volatile companies. Conviction allows an investor to hold on tight through the dips and the rips, and acquire more when the valuation is depressed. For me, a great deal of conviction comes from knowing the people at the helm are extremely intelligent, focused, and high integrity.

The success of a company is determined by the quality of the people within that company. It’s very difficult, if not impossible, to hire someone substantially smarter than you. The CEO hires leaders who then hire people, so the intelligence of the CEO is the upper limit for the overall average intelligence of the organization. The CEO needs to be very smart for the company to achieve excellent outcomes, especially in a hard tech business like self-driving vehicles.

The CEO is Xu “Tony” Han. Before founding WeRide, he was a computer engineering professor at the University of Missouri and Chief Scientist of Baidu’s self-driving car project.

When I hear Tony talk on the earnings calls, he sounds like a guy who wants to win, and win very bigly. I like that he has close ties with elite American universities, and the company has a Silicon Valley office, for access to top engineering talent. Tony strikes me as a guy I would want to work for, and I don’t want to own a company run by someone I wouldn’t work for.

The rest of the leadership team appears exceptional as well.

Earnings Potential

A company is only as good as its ability to generate earnings (profits) for shareholders. When we buy a stock, we are buying the rights to the future profits. So there better be substantial future profits.

The ride-hailing market is $200B of annual revenue today (with human drivers), and is projected to explode into the trillions as robotaxis proliferate.

In the long term, if WeRide captures 1% of $2 trillion, that’s $20 billion of annual revenue.

Basic math for the robotaxi business: WeRide could operate 20,000 robotaxis in 2031, averaging $180/day, x 360 operating days = 1.3 B x 60% gross margin = $780 million of gross profit just from the robotaxi business, which would be nowhere near maturity. UPDATE: WeRide announced they are partnering with Lenovo (for hardware) to deploy 200,000 robotaxi by 2031. My 20k forecast could look laughably low in hindsight. One way to think about this is every 1,000 robotaxis is worth about 1 billion of market cap.

This Goldman Sachs estimation sizes Europe, China, and Other, each as larger than the robotaxi market in the US.

WeRide is targeting that multi-hundred-billion-dollar annual revenue pie.

Competition

Waymo - the global leader, majority owned by Google, focused on scaling their robotaxi service in America, with plans for expansion into London and Tokyo. Valued at $126 B.

Pony.ai - the other Chinese robotaxi pure play company. Partnered with Toyota. Valued at $5 B.

Baidu Apollo Go - Owns and operates a driverless taxi fleet across major Chinese cities. Planning to enter Dubai and other cities soon.

NVIDIA - recently announced they will partner with Uber and others to make a self-driving vehicle and launch in 2027 in America.

Tesla - has been trying to do fully driverless robotaxi for 10 years and has not been successful thus far at a meaningful scale. Tesla is operating a ride-hailing service in San Francisco and Austin with safety drivers, and launching soon in Dallas and Houston. The CEO opted for a system with only cameras and no lidar or radar. Valued at $1+ trillion.

Wayve - London-based team focused on making self-driving tech for auto manufacturers. Valued at $8.6 B in early 2026.

Will self-driving software get commoditized?

Robotaxi is very difficult. It requires integrating advanced sensors, AI hardware and software, simulation technologies, and collaborating with regulators, manufacturers, fleet operators, and insurers. The moat is putting all of the pieces of the puzzle together and getting a permit to operate. Once in operation, it is scale, price, and operational excellence that will set companies apart.

Consumers want quick pickup in a clean, high-quality vehicle at a low price.

It’s easy to check the price of multiple ride-hailing services. In Austin, I quickly check the pricing of Tesla Robotaxi, Waymo, and Lyft. Since the quality is higher and more consistent, consumers (including myself) are actually willing to pay slightly MORE for a robotaxi than a human-driven taxi, even though the robotaxi operating costs are less.

As robotaxi manufacturing and operations scale, and the cost per mile of ride-hailing drops closer to the cost per mile of car ownership, demand for robotaxi ride-hailing will explode. Demand will outpace supply. By the time the supply of robotaxis saturates demand and margins compress, WeRide’s annual revenues will be massive.

Financials

as of April 2026

• 2025 revenue: $97.9M, +90% YoY. Q4: $44.9M, +123%.

• Gross margin: 30.2%

• Net loss: $235M, narrowing 34% YoY

• Cash: ~$1B

They have ample runway to reach profitability, likely around 2028.

• Average trips per robotaxi per day is increasing

• Average price per trip is increasing

• Fleet size is increasing

• Cost of vehicle manufacturing and operations is decreasing

Considering these trends, substantial profitability appears imminent.

Catalysts, Macro Forces, and Insider Actions

What we want is near-term catalysts that suppress the valuation (so we can buy) and long-term tailwinds that grow the profits and valuation, so we have the option to sell for substantially more than we bought for.

In early 2026, WeRide began operating its robotaxi service in UAE and Saudi Arabia however, the Iran conflict shut down operations for a few days. That, plus bearish sentiment on Chinese tech companies and a broad tech selloff, contributed to the substantial decline of WeRide’s share price. These are likely short-term issues. A long-term tailwind is growing labor shortages for bus and taxi drivers, and growing awareness, acceptance/approval, and demand for AVs.

In March, the company announced the board has approved a $100 million share buyback program, which means management can use up to $100M of their billion dollars of cash to buy their own shares. Suggesting the board and management believe they have surplus cash, and WeRide is substantially undervalued. It shows management’s confidence in the company. Furthermore, CEO Tony Han did a voluntary lockup of his shares until 2028, showing his long-term conviction.

Major companies are invested in WeRide, including Uber ($100M investment), Renault-Nissan, Bosch, Grab, Fidelity, Ark Invest, and others. But very few retail investors have even heard of this company. As WeRide enters more countries and cities and becomes profitable, more and more attention will be drawn to the stock.

Conclusion & Prediction: This is going to be huge

WeRide is becoming an international Driver-as-a-Service company operating multiple vehicle form factors. Their combination of access to Chinese manufacturing, American engineering talent, early-mover advantage in a high-tech/regulated market, and global partners like Uber, Grab, Geely, GAC, and Chery, positions them to be a dominant player in a massive global autonomous transportation industry.

Tony and the team have proven their ability to bring high-tech new products and services to market. WeRide has survived the hardest part. Now we will see how well they can scale their business and generate profits for shareholders.

American investors should be aware that WeRide could be delisted from NASDAQ because it is a Chinese tech company. It is prudent to hold shares through a broker who could convert to Hong Kong exchange shares in the event of a NASDAQ delisting, or purchase shares on the Hong Kong exchange.

WeRide is likely to achieve 10,000+ robotaxis by 2030, and 100,000+ in the 2030s. This will drive billions of dollars of revenue and a strong CAGR of the company valuation. In addition to the autonomous taxi business, they will collect recurring revenue through licensing their software to automakers, and from their robobus and robosweeper businesses. The icing on the cake is that WeRide’s highly technical engineering team may create new products and services leveraging their AI robotics expertise, similar to how Tesla is shifting from an automaker to an AI robotics company. One of these businesses could be developing and/or licensing world models and simulation environments for robot training.

WeRide is well-positioned to grow from $2.5-3 to a $10+ billion company over the next few years. I predict that in 2031, WeRide will be valued at $25+ billion.

Afterword

WeRide is a shower stock — a stock I found myself thinking about in the shower multiple times per week. The last shower stock I bought was Tesla. It returned 3k% for me over 10 yrs. I think WeRide could also return over 1,000%.

Pre-2020, few people, <1%, had experienced a Tesla vehicle. No other mass market cars had a large, iPad-quality touchscreen, Apple-quality software, instant torque, and autopilot-level ADAS. It was obviously superior and millions of people are about to want this so badly that they will pay a premium for it. The big question was could they scale manufacturing profitably and the answer was yes.

It is similar for robotaxi. The Waymo/WeRide experience is substantially superior to that of conventional ride-hailing. These are roughly the two options consumers will have:

1. Random vehicle, driven by a random human

2. Luxury vehicle, professionally maintained, all to yourself

The vast majority of people will choose the latter, and it is a more profitable business!

Another tech sector I’m watching: neo health insurance

In addition to AI and autonomous vehicles, I’ve been interested in neo health insurance. In 2025, it began exploding in popularity. For my American friends, check out CrowdHealth, an alternative to legacy health insurance that uses a crowdfunding model. For me, it’s been reliable and affordable since I joined in 2022. This affiliate link gets you a discount; the code is BIGWIN. I wrote about it last year and will post an update soon!

Please leave a like or comment so I know you made it to the end!

PS - I am hosting an AGI Investing Group Discussion on Monday. If it’s at capacity, just send me a DM and I’ll get you in.

This was truly one of the more ridiculous things I’ve ever done. I do not recommend it, unless you have a very strong lower back and a fetish for fear.

In spring 2025, I was in Lisbon, Portugal, watching an HBO show called 100 Foot Wave. I watched Garret McNamara discover a secret spot—Praia Norte in Nazare, Portugal—where, a few times per winter, the waves grow monstrous, 50 to 100 feet.

Garret figured out how to surf these swells using jet skis to get towed in and rescued. Now Nazaré is the most famous big-wave surfing location in the world. And the site of countless injuries and one fatality.

Naturally, I decided I must go there.

Six months later, and I’m back in Portugal. Waiting patiently in Porto, checking the forecast for incoming swells. The app says, December 3-6: HUGE.

I rented a car and a B&B near the famous lighthouse, the prime location for big wave watching.

I pulled into the old beach town and descended upon the lighthouse like a kid running down the stairs on Christmas morning.

It looked exactly like the TV show.

Monster rollers were coming in and crashing into the cliff. A band was playing on the roof of the lighthouse.

I looked at the waves.

This is it? I’m just going to stand here and watch for three days?

No way.

I needed to get in the water.

I’m not a person who lives life on the sidelines. When I see an arena, I like to get in it.

I opened my old friend Google Maps and searched: Big wave jet skiing.

That’s how I met Freddy Olander — a German, pro big wave surfer, who, as a side hustle, takes idiots like me out on the back of his WaveRunner, a modified jet ski that goes up to 100 mph, to outrun 100-foot waves.

I had no intention of going swimming on this trip, but that’s just how it goes sometimes.

Steve Jobs once said, “Have the courage to follow your heart, even when it leads you into the 50-70 foot waves with Freddy from the internet.”

The Big Show

The next morning, I rolled out of bed and went straight to the lighthouse. Hundreds of spectators lined the cliff watching the Boeing 747-sized waves assault the cliff. Dozens of jet ski pilots attempted to get a handful of mentally ill surfers onto said waves, and then rescue them afterwards, before they get completely murdered by the following set of waves.

I find a spot on the cliff — where people’s legs are dangling off (this place is not big on safety features).

Soon enough, there’s a flipped jet ski and multiple people thrashing around in the white water get pushed toward the cliffs — where they will surely be shredded by the force of Mama Nazare pounding their bodies into prehistoric jagged rocks.

Rescue teams swarm the zone, trying to reach them without also getting flipped.

Eventually, everyone gets saved, and the wrecked jet ski is dragged across the beach by a tractor.

I look at my phone, it’s Freddy, “Can you come now?”

I put my hands on my face.

“Okay”

I run back to the car and drive to the port of Nazare.

I pull in, and it’s like a sketchy port from The Sopranos. I find a small warehouse with a nice wooden table and a MacBook on it.

Five minutes later, Freddy arrives. He’s a shredded German with a big smile and he embraces me like we’re old friends.

He tosses me a wetsuit, pulls a hardcore life preserver over my head, and next thing I know, we are speed walking across the dock. I’m jogging to keep with my vest on that’s so tight I can hardly breathe.

We look at the jet ski. “Okay hold here and hold here, and stand a little, or your lower back will be in a lot of pain tomorrow,” he laughs.

We start motoring through the marina. A tan man on a jet ski is arriving back from his excursion.

“It’s beeeg,” the man says with wide eyes. “HUGE.”

“You can see them from here,” says Freddy.

We are over a mile away.

I see a MOUNTAIN RANGE of waves on the horizon.

I immediately knew this is the craziest thing I’ve ever done in my life.

The skyline is eerily similar to the White Mountains in my home state of New Hampshire. The difference is these mountains are mobile.

The breaking peaks, snow-capped summits.

Before we’re even out of the harbor, the waves are ten feet over my head.

Training

“What happens if we don’t work as a team?” says Freddy.

“I don’t know”

“We flip the jet ski.”

“Okay”

“You’ve ridden a motorbike?”

“Yeah”

“What do you do when you ride a motorbike?”

“Uh”

“When you turn…”

“Lean”

“Yes, I need you to lean, but not too much, or we flip.”

“Okay”

“Let’s practice now.”

He whips us around doing S-turns and a doughnut with the radius of a penny.

I lock in like I’m in a James Bond film.

“Okay, you’re leaning well,” he says.

Freddy’s jet ski piloting performance gives me confidence we’ll be fine in the mountains of the sea. But my nervous system remains unconvinced that this is a safe situation.

He brings the ski to a stop, and we bob in the rollers.

In big wave surfing, every jet ski tows a ‘safety sled’ for the surfer to climb onto when they get picked up after surfing a wave.

“See those orange ropes on the sled,” says Freddy, “Throw them in the water.”

I throw the two thick ropes into the ocean to drag behind us.

“Those are the Last Chance ropes,” he explains. “If you miss the sled, your last chance is to grab one of the ropes.”

“Okay”

“Okay, now get in the water.”

I look at him blankly.

“We are going to practice a rescue.”

I gingerly slip into the ocean.

He throttles the ski, and I get blasted in the face with water.

I flail around, adjusting to the buoyancy of my Iraq-grade life preserver.

He comes screaming in on the ski and does 180, and I grab a Last Chance rope and pull myself to the sled, where I grab two handles, and he takes off again.

He slows down. “Don’t hold so high on the sled because when I slow down, you will come forward and hit your head on the back of the ski.”

I almost said: Can I get a helmet?

So I shimmy down the sled a bit, leaving my bare feet dragging in December’s North Atlantic.

“If we are in between waves and there is no time, then you need to grab my arm as I drive by, and I will swing you onto the sled.”

“Okay”

“Okay let’s practice that now.”

I slip back in the water.

He drives by, and we nail it first try.

“Good,” he says. “Let’s do it again, but faster.”

He swings me onto the sled again and then jetskis like a madman, like he’s trying to throw me off. I hang as we go up and down rollers; my field of view totally blocked by the back of the jet ski.

When he’s done, I climb onto the back of the ski, pat him on the shoulder, and say: “Let’s never do that again.”

My training is complete.

For half a mile, we climb and descend twenty-foot rollers en route to the fifty-footers that are being pumped out from the depths of the underwater Nazare Canyon.

100 Foot Wave

Freddy explains that ‘Peaks’ are locations where the largest waves emerge.

“There are three peaks,” he tells me, “Peak 1, Peak 2, and Peak 3.”

We summit a roller and get eyes on the horizon.

“Looks like Peak 1 is the biggest today… Oh man,” he says, “It’s huge. We’re going into Peak 1 now.”

“Okay. Sounds good.”

My knuckles are snow. I’m clutching a strap on the back of this jet ski behind this guy I met fifteen minutes ago, heading into the biggest waves in the world.

He turns and tightens the strap I’m holding on to.

“If this comes loose, let me know.”

“Okay”

Small tsunamis are occurring in front of us. We’re heading into the mixer like the police are chasing us.

Am I ready to die?

A former girlfriend flashes in my mind’s eye.

No. Not like this.

A million years of evolution buried deep in my cells is telling me I’m in over my head - literally these waves are way over my head.

[I wasn’t thinking about filming or photographing during our incessant ventures into the song of tsunamis. I was just trying to hold on and not pee my wetsuit.]

The sun beats down, warming the air that is vibrating with white noise decorated in thunderous rumbles—deep exhales from the Atlantic.

Walls of water look like they are going to break on our heads but they don’t. Somehow Freddy knows they won’t. Once we get eyes on the next set, Freddy positions us so we don’t get crushed by an aquatic avalanche.

There are jet skis everywhere I look. Some with surfers holding tow ropes. Most are here to help with rescues.

Freddy throttles hard to evade a monster wave. Positioning is everything.

“How much are these things? Like $100k?” I say, referring to the machine.

“No, when we are done with them, only like $25-30k.”

I’m fascinated by the organization and the logistics, and the art of the positioning. I keep asking him questions. He responds in perfect English with his German accent and every now and then abruptly stops talking and throttles the ski to get us into a non-fatal position.

“Wow,” I say, “How big do you think is, like 50 feet?”

“50 feet, easily.”

“Are any of the big names here today?”

“Everybody is here,” he says.

“Is Tony here?”

“He’s in Spain.”

“The French lady?” (from the show)

“Justine yeah, I saw Justine”

“McNamara?”

“No. Garret is getting older, so that’s why.”

“He’s like 60.”

“Still charging though.”

A beautiful Brazilian is bobbing in the water, surfboard strapped to her feet, holding a tow rope, waiting for the 100-foot wave.

I smile. “I know who that is,” I get Freddy’s attention. “That’s Michelle, from the show.” 1

To my surprise, Freddy drives right up to them and begins a conversation with Michelle and her driver.

Her driver goes on a rant, “There was a huge wave - perfectly glassy - this other guy cut us off and we let him have it, then he crashed on the wave!

We waited for two hours for that!”

I’m thinking, how could you be out here and complain. On second thought, they are here to perform. Not just take pictures. And two hours is a long time in the North Atlantic in December

I wave a shaka sign. Michelle squints at me like Who the hell is this guy? Then I realize the blazing sun is at our backs, and she can hardly see me.

We speed by the cliff and the lighthouse. Hundreds of onlookers are watching.

I shake my head. People are not going to believe this.

I request that Freddy give me his phone so I can photograph to at least prove I really did this.

“There’s Sebastian,” he points to a man in a black and yellow wetsuit holding onto a tow rope.

Sebastian Steudtner is one of Freddy’s German compatriots. He holds the world record for the largest wave ever surfed—86 feet.

Freddy’s eyes are always watching the water.

“There’s a big one coming,” he says. “It’s just building up now.”

Sebastian’s driver accelerates and places him on the wave. The monster wave passes in front of us with Sebastian surfing it.

“You’re gonna love these photos,” I tell Freddy. “I’m gonna sell these to you.” He laughs.

It felt like we were in the waves for hours, but it was actually more like 45 minutes.

En route back to the marina, Freddy wanted to give me one last thrill: “We’ll go fast now.”

“No, it’s all good,“ I said, to preserve the remaining cartilage in my lower back.

Aftermath

Quite the way to start the day.

Back at the warehouse/office at the marina, Freddy says, “Did you have fun?”

I balk.

“It was boring. Terrible time.”

He laughs the laugh of someone who has been playing around in Nazare for eight years.

He starts running around the warehouse like an animal in heat. Like his wife is going into labor and he needs to get to the hospital, but really it’s just that Mama Nazare is pumping, and he wants a piece of the action.

“I need to go to work now,” I say.

“Really?”

“Yeah I need to get on a Zoom call with an investor.”

“I need to go work too,” he says, and holds up his board.

Outside the building, a wet Portuguese man in a wetsuit comes up to us. It’s one of Freddy’s surfing buddies.

“How is it??” Freddy says, eager for me to fuck off so he can go surfing.

“No one is out anymore,” the man says, shaking his head.

“Really??”

“Big drama going on. Someone’s in the hospital. I’m trying to figure out what’s going on.”

I get in my rental car and put my hands on my face, which is caked in salt.

I’m so happy I’m alive.

I say a prayer for the guy in the hospital, Carlos Burle, and for everyone else as well.

Photos

The following four photos are of the same wave with Sebastian Steudtner surfing it. As of writing, he holds the world record for largest wave ever surfed.

Freddy said afterward, “Next time we can go in the zones for proper shooting”.

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If you’re ever in Nazare, you might consider Freddy’s Big Wave Experience.

Song

I’m really into worship music right now. I Surrender by Hillsong has been my go-to this winter.

Alternative to Health Insurance I Use

Everyone wants to get out of health insurance system without feeling stupid or taking a big risk. I’ve been using CrowdHealth since 2022. It’s a better service at a better price than anything else I can find. If you’d like to join, use code BIGWIN (affiliate).

Book

All Outcomes Are Acceptable is probably like nothing you’ve ever read before. Bestselling author Paul Millerd texted me, “This is a work of art” and “I want this to spread”. Insight and entertainment is guaranteed. I even did a trip to Pennsylvania to live with Amish people.

Epilogue

Back at the lighthouse, I watch the handful of skis left in the meat grinder. My lower back clenches just looking at them.

It’s mute but the waves. Everyone mutually mesmerized by Mama Nazare.

On the beach.

I’m nowhere near the water, but a beach custodian waves me away from it just in case a monster comes up and tries to take me home. Five minutes later, where I was standing has a foot of water over it.

Even the beach is dangerous.

There’s a giant hole, and if you fall in at high tide, there’s no way you get out without going swimming, in which case you’ll get swept out to sea, then die.

At the crack of dawn, it’s low tide and I find myself in the hole.

As Steve Jobs said, Have the courage to follow your heart, even when it leads you into a hole in Portugal.

One thing I’m fairly certain of: If I live another decade, I’ll find myself back in Nazare filming a hero surf the 100 foot wave.

You can just do things.

Five months earlier I was sick for weeks with a severe set of infections and nervous system dysfunction. It was effort to watch a television show. I put everything I had into watching 100 Foot Wave. Sitting on the floor of the kitchen, too tired to go back up the stairs, I thought, Maybe someday I’ll get to go to Nazare and film and photograph. Wouldn’t that be amazing. Maybe I could do that someday.

And I fucking did.

Basically as soon as I was healthy enough (really I wasn’t) I full sent it.

You can do cool things too.

Reflecting on the venture, much of it was not that intense because we were mostly bobbing around in safe zones, not cutting it close at all, relative to what the surfers were doing.

Part of me was scared the entire time we were near the large waves, but I really enjoyed it. It was fascinating, beautiful, and awesome.

Thanks for reading this edition of All Outcomes Are Acceptable. For more stories delivered to your inbox for free, just add your email to the list (only pay if you want to).

Notes and Other

Sebastian’s 86-foot world record wave:

This video provides a good perspective of what it’s like to be out there bobbing around:

From head injuries to Catholicism to multimedia creation — Steven and I could talk forever. We met through ’s Pathless Path online community and began a series of lengthy calls and WhatsApp exchanges.

Steven wrote a book called Restored in the Rhythm, and I bought it, because that’s what I want in 2026: to be restored in a rhythm. As I began reading Steven’s devotional, my friend David (the one from my book) asked me if I know anyone on a Christian mystic path who he could connect with.

I thought, Man, do I have the guy for you!

So Steven, David, and I got on a call and I was a fly on the wall as they plunged into the depths of the mysteries of creation. Steven was rattling off Biblical quotes right and left and David had no shortage of mysteries to prompt Steven and perplex me. I took notes and added four books to my Amazon cart.

I thought, how blessed am I to be in conversation on matters of truth and living with such minds? Steven and David are exceptionally verbally gifted, blessed fathers, and humble entrepreneurs.

I told Steven that I’m not the only one who wants to listen to him talk on these matters, and David is not the only one who is looking for a brother in Christ on a path of contemplation, self-examination, and prayer.

And thus we decided to do another conversation, this time on Substack Live — a first for both of us. To our pleasant surprise, 19 kind souls joined the stream. As I expected, Steven did disappoint with his oratory prowess.

We talked about what is meant by the terms “Spiritual Director”, “God” and “Sanctification”. We also talked about Steven’s evolution from California surfer working with Steve Jobs to Spanish Mystic making YouTube videos in rural Idaho.

If you don’t have a 1 hr 15 minutes of listening time to spare, here’s a few things I learned:

• Book of Job hits hard

• God is love, loving

• Substack live is fun

• I want to buy a rosary

• Steven speaks amazing Latin

• In a post-AI, hyper-abundance world, the path of the mystic is both elusive and vital

• The life of a lay mystic begins at the crack of dawn

I pray David will join us on our next call to talk about miracles, the Bhagavad Gita, theosis, and whatever else. We will schedule it, and I hope to see you there.

I had a great trip to Austin where I met Chris Camilo, one of the highest performing investors in the world, and the CEO of Apptronik, Google’s humanoid robot company. I wasn’t planning to meet them, it just happened. On my last day there, I was wandering downtown. I called the Waymo back to my Airbnb but at the last minute i cancelled so I could pop into Capital Factory, a cool-looking co-working space. A presentation was starting, soI sat and watched. I was blown away by exceptional four exceptional startups. Then Chris and Jeff did a Q and A, and we hung out afterward. Good guys. We agreed on a lot.

We’ll be hearing a lot more about Apptronik as their humanoids are released into the wild over the next few years.

I’ve been watching Chris Camilo on YouTube for a year and occasionally sparring with him on X, so I was pretty surprised to meet him in a city that neither of us are from. He’s probably the number 1 person in Texas I’d want to chat with. He’s obsessed with humanoids. I’m obsessed with building a parallel healthcare system. Two different paths. But who knows, maybe they will overlap down the road.

The whole thing felt extremely serendipitous. I guess the takeaway is, just show up and follow your curiosity, ya never know.

The director of Capital Factory asked me if I’m an investor in Apptronik.

“No but I’m interested”

“The funding round is closing today.”

“What’s minimum?”

“$1 milllion”

“I’ll get back to you”

Book Release: Art of College

Last year I started a writing coaching practice with three paid clients. My youngest client was a senior in college , who felt called to write a book about her college experience. So we did that, and it came out great.

I was blown away by her pace of progress and willingness to create something beautiful just for the sake of it. Books are hard, and she nailed it first try. Incredible.

We have so many amazing young people in this country. I’m humbled and honored that I was able to help someone achieve their goal of writing, editing, formatting and publishing a book.

With 1:1 guidance, people can vastly accelerate their self-development and productivity.

Coaching remains underrated.

I just hired a mentor/coach to help me transition into my new role as leader at a software startup. I couldn’t be more excited to crush this new chapter.

Jamie’s book is all about transitions, self-inquiry, and insight into the life of an ambitious young person in the 2020s. Although I’d read a bunch of her chapters earlier this year, I enjoyed reading them again this past weekend. Many books are boring and prescriptive. Not this one! Definitely grab a copy for yourself and your friends. It’s nice because it’s like 11k words.

I was struck by how emotional it made me when I got to the end. Helping someone else write their book was an awesome experience. I’ll probably do more of this.

CrowdHealth Surge

I’m at my New Hampshire home base right now, prepping to shoot an explainer video about CrowdHealth, the best alternative to US health insurance I know of. A lot of Americans are worried about their health insurance prices going up, huge deductibles, limited doctors. Not me. I use CrowdHeath, and the price is going down! I’ve actually never bought regular health insurance in my life. Always seemed like an obvious giant scam. There are a bunch of alternative insurance solutions, mostly religious helathshares. CrowdHealth is the best secular for-profit solution I know of. I wrote about it and a dozen people joined after learning how it costs so much less and delivers better protection and customer service.

I found Crowd in September 2022 when turned me on to it. So many awesome people, products, and ideas in my life have come through Paul.

People experimenting, curating and talking about things is extremely valuable, especially today when there’s so much cool shit rolling out that few people know about. One cool and useful new thing few people know about is sublingual ketamine.

Ketamine

My nostrils are flaring and eyes are watering just thinking about writing about it.

I’m laughing.

Ketamine has been such a powerful experience for me. There’s a tear streaming down my face.

I had no idea something like this existed. It totally exceeded my expectations.

I first heard about ketamine in college as being a horse tranquilizer (lol - reminds me of Ivermectin is horse dewormer). In 2023, a doctor friend told me he got a ketamine IV and didn’t enjoy it. Earlier this year, through my research into psychedelics, I read about “at-home ketamine assisted therapy” which is now a flourishing service that is legal in every state. I was pretty sick this past summer and in chronic pain and suffering. I was experiencing debilitating fatigue, headaches, malaise, cognitive problems, throat problems, and nervous system dysfunction. In part caused by Epstein-Barr Virus and mold exposure.

I talked to a doctor via InnerWell, she said ketamine would probably help reduce my suffering, so I tried it. In short, you put a tablet under your tongue once per week. After it dissolves for ten minutes, you sit or lay down and listen to music. The experience varies and is remarkably safe. It’s profoundly relaxing and when combined with massage, or even just light stretching, it’s like nothing I’ve experienced before.

Ketamine assisted body work will be huge. Massage, yoga, physical therapy. If ketamine was a stock, I’d be all in.

I’m happy this is a thing. It will help millions avoid macabre suffering. Yes, some people abuse it. That’s how it goes, and that’s okay. On net, at-home ketamine assisted therapies will help many people, as it has for me.

It helped lighten the load, even if it didn’t fully resolve my complex chronic illness. I cringe at the thought of saying I have complex chronic illness, but that is simply the reality of what I’ve been experiencing for over a year. Not dissimilar to Chris Williamson’s saga, which he recently shared a documentary about. There’s a natural aversion to sharing medical details, but at the end of the day a lot of people are experiencing weird health stuff that doctors are struggling to solve. We have to help each other figure this shit out, and that might mean sharing a bit more than what is immediately comfortable.

I wrote a good amount during my ketamine experiences. Incredible art came through during the sessions.

One of the things I wrote down while listening to Amazing Grace was: God is laughing so hard right now.

I am too.'

There’s been a few times in my life when I almost died. I’m so glad I didn’t die. I have so much left to give. So much cooking. So many seeds have been sowed.

Things are progressing nicely. My 2025 magnum opus essay is in the work.

I’ll be back in Portugal for a while. It’s a much more social place than America/New England. I’m aiming to surround myself with people at least as ambitious as I am.

Zoom, Substack, WhatsApp, and more recently, Mentor Cruise, have been amazing for connecting with people, but nothing replaces IRL.

I hope you are thriving, and if you are not, please reach out and I’ll see what I can do to assist you with your woes and ambitions.

May god bless you, and have a great rest of your day.

Music Recs

Here’s a Mac Miller gem you’ve probably never heard. Pure genius, this young man was.

Poor Wayfaring Stranger from my favorite WW1 movie. I love singing this one.

Suzanne Santo is underrated and super hot. Blood on your knees.

New Investment: Figma

I’ve started to acquire Figma shares. I’m still doing my due diligence. It helps a lot that I’m using their software to develop my software. I like to buy the rights to the profits of exceptional products and services built by exceptional people.

At the end of the day, it’s a bet on the jockey, Dylan Field, the youngest CEO of a public multi-billion dollar company.

As of today, Figma is selling for $21 billion. Inflation-adjusted, it’s less than what Adobe tried to buy it for two years ago. If anyone knows the creative SaaS market, it would be Adobe. Since Adobe failed to close the acquisition, they had to pay Figma, their fiercest competitor, $1 billion.

Figma has big plans and is aggressively investing that billion dollars. If they execute well, $21 B could look tiny. Definitely do your own research—and share it with me!

Photos from Austin

Things I like

Check out CrowdHealth - Best alternative to US health insurance.

My book is available on Amazon. A bestselling author recently messaged me: “i appreciate your willingness to push the edges, this is art” … “I want this to spread”

Hello from New Hampshire. This month I’ve been eating at an awesome Brazilian restaurant almost every day which allows me to focus on working 50-60 hour weeks. Many people hate their work, which is sad. I love my work right now. I started working on a new startup earlier this month, with a few close friends and contractors. It’s clear what needs to be done and who I need to recruit. Starting a new company is often a kamikaze mission impossible. My favorite kind. Optimizing for safety is something I’ll leave to the herd.

I’ve been thinking about launching this venture for the past ten months. At the end of August, I went to an island in Maine where my family owns a few properties. I was out there by myself for four days with no phone, laptop, TV, or even a radio. Just the birds and what not.

On day 4, I paddle-boarded back to my car, and drove back to New Hampshire, listening to the Founder’s Podcast episode about Isaacson’s Elon Musk biography. I realized that I need to do this, and I need to do it now. Nobody else is going to do it. And every day that I don’t work on it is potentially hundreds of lives deleted from the timeline.

“If you want something done right,” my father said, “do it yourself.”

The next day, I named the company, Vital, and David and I began what could be a 100+ year project.

Turns out it’s an all consuming job that I’m uniquely well suited for. I procrastinated on doing it because I thought I’d hate it, and that it would be too hard. Turns out I love it.

A big benefit of funding the company with my own money (at least for now) is that we aren’t getting sidetracked into creating pitch decks to appeal to investors. We are laser focused on designing, creating, and delivering products and services that people love. The workmanship is the reward.

The company objectives are:

1. Save customers money

2. Improve health

3. Increase fertility

In the past three weeks I’ve spoken into dozens of founders, engineers, designers, video editors, and marketers. A few of them I’ve hired, a few of them I’ve already fired.

A girl from Reddit just called me, interrupting my writing. She was very nice. We’re exploring running an ad campaign on Reddit.

I like doing all this stuff. Recruiting, product, design, marketing, evangelizing. It feels like I’m doing what I was made to do.

On Day 25, after drafting a design for our dashboard, the gravity of the ambition hit me. I said to David, “I feel like an untrained mechanic cobbling together a plane, and we’re about to try to fly it. This does not feel safe.”

David, who has bootstrapped and exited a startup, said “Yup. That feeling never really goes away.”

Underrated Book

Jeff Bezos is awesome. He’s more introverted, focused, and thoughtful than other heavy hitters like Musk and Trump.

Since he was in high school, he’s been thinking about moving all polluting industries off of earth, and he’s made substantial progress toward that objective. His rocket company was just selected to take a rover to the moon.

If I’d read this book a year ago, I would have invested three times as much into Amazon when I was buying shares last April during the tariff panic. The next best time to buy is probably now.

As an entrepreneur, to even have a chance of making it to cash flow positive, one must learn from the greats who came before. These passages exemplify Bezos’ clear thinking and timeless principles:

Sometimes (often actually) in business, you do know where you’re going, and when you do, you can be efficient. Put in place a plan and execute. In contrast, wandering in business is not efficient—but it’s also not random. It’s guided—by hunch, gut, intuition, curiosity, and powered by a deep conviction that the prize for customers is big enough that it’s worth being a little messy and tangential to find our way there. Wandering is an essential counterbalance to efficiency. You need to employ both. The outsized discoveries—the “nonlinear” ones—are highly likely to require wandering.

…

The biggest needle movers will be things that customers don’t know to ask for. We must invent on their behalf. We have to tap into our own inner imagination about what’s possible. AWS itself—as a whole—is an example. No one asked for AWS. No one. Turns out the world was in fact ready and hungry for an offering like AWS but didn’t know it. We had a hunch, followed our curiosity, took the necessary financial risks, and began building—reworking, experimenting, and iterating countless times as we proceeded.

…

As I said in the first shareholder letter more than twenty years ago, our focus is on hiring and retaining versatile and talented employees who can think like owners. Achieving that requires investing in our employees, and, as with so many other things at Amazon, we use not just analysis but also intuition and heart to find our way forward.

The Child-Maxing 5%

My family has been decimated—absolutely cooked—by low fertility. Both my maternal and paternal sides failed to procreate enough to keep the family from dwindling to almost dead. The family tree is an upside-down pyramid.

There are eight properties in the family and zero people in the generation below me to inherit them.

I started to ask, how could a person or group raise the fertility of a specific person in order to avoid familial deletion?

I messaged my friend, Simone Collins , who is due to have her fourth child in a few days. She recommended this book to me:

Chapter five begins with this:

The project of this book was motivated by a single intuition: that if a phenomenon is sufficiently consequential, then its absence must also be consequential. Vaccination for smallpox was discovered when it was noticed that some people had an uncanny resistance; the deadly effects of the disease were strangely absent among cattle workers and milkmaids. And though most Americans are having fewer children, the birth dearth is not the whole story. Averages hide a lot of variation in the lives of actual women, some of whom are doing something very different. I undertook this research convinced that the study of high birth rates could shed light on the problem of low ones.

Largely hidden from popular view, there are women around the country having five, six, even seven or more children. The Census Bureau estimates that 5 percent of women aged forty to forty-four have five or more children today. This works out to about half a million women

While the number of women having five or more declined from 20 percent in 1976, it did not continue to fall after 1990; the 5 percent has remained relatively constant since then. “The 5 percent” are strangely immune to the trend toward below-replacement fertility. Why they exist in a two-child world is as much of a puzzle to scholars as is the plunge of the general birth rate to below replacement.

…

From chapter one:

I suppose it boils down to some sort of deeply held thing, possibly from childhood—a platinum conviction—that the capacity to conceive children, to receive them into my arms, to take them home, to dwell with them in love, to sacrifice for them as they grow, and to delight in them as the Lord delights in us, that that thing, call it motherhood, call it childbearing, that that thing is the most worthwhile thing in the world—the most perfect thing I am capable of doing.

Hannah, one of the main characters, says things at the level my ears yearn to hear:

“across generations, individuals have ancestors to whom they have debts and also offspring toward whom they have responsibilities. Childbearing cancels the debts, as it were, while giving rise to new obligations. Paying it forward, we would say now. Having children confers an eternal status on any one individual in the chain, making her equal in dignity to her kin for all time. “Continuing the legacy by having children,” Hannah says, “is a way to be a part of this chain of infinity.”

YouTuber I’m watching

Last winter, I was researching bipolar disorders. I stumbled upon the insane story of Matt Baszuki. His father is the founder of Roblox, and because of that, a multi-billionaire.

Matt, tragically, went insane during college. He stopped sleeping, and quickly departed from reality.

His father tracked him down and found him with a garbage bag in a Starbucks, hundreds of miles away.

Matt was hospitalized four separate times with psychosis. He tried 29 different medications. But the manias kept coming back.

Today, Matt is now an exceptional YouTuber talking about how he and his team were able to cure his severe mental illness with metabolic therapies. He credits therapeutic ketogenic diet as the main thing that saved him.

I think Matt is going to have a big impact on a lot of people (he already has) by helping people put into remission their psychiatric maladies with metabolic therapies. His family started an advocacy group, Metabolic Mind.

Gum I’m Chewing

I can’t chew gum with aspartame in it because that chemical, like many other synthetic additives, causes me migraines — which do not help my sanity.

A few years ago, I found a gum that doesn’t have aspartame. It’s sweetened with xylitol instead—a naturally occurring sugar alcohol.

Cavities are caused by the mouth bacteria, streptococcus mutans, secreting acid on your teeth. Turns out xylitol kills this bacteria, thus preventing cavities.

It’s a miracle, in my book, that xylitol is both natural and sweet-tasting, and prevents cavities.

Why don’t dentists tell people about this? No money in that, I suppose.

From 2017-2022, I developed 15 cavities, despite daily teeth brushing and a relatively low sugar diet. Anyone who has read my book knows about my visits to the dentist haha. Three years ago I started chewing xylitol gum, and using xylitol toothpaste. I’ve not developed a cavity since.

Companies I’m buying (not-investment-advice)

If you’ve been reading this blog for a while, you’ll know that last winter I changed my investment strategy. I sold the majority of my TSLA shares, after holding most of them for 7+ years.

I’ve since bought meaningful amounts of Amazon and Google, and a smaller amount of Berkshire Hathaway. Another company I’m considering buying, although I feel late to the party, is NVIDIA.

My job as an investor is to develop conviction in the future cash flow growth of a company, and invest proportionately. To do this, I listen to the leaders of the company. The leadership has a massive impact on the earnings potential, which determines the future value of the shares.

I like to get to know someone very well before I put them in control of my net worth. I listen to their podcasts and earnings calls, and read their writing. I’ve started to get to know Sundar Pichai and Demis Hassabis at Google, and Big Dawg Bezos and Amazon Andy Jassy. This approach to investing is synergistic with being a founder because much of what they say is applicable to my own ventures.

This is really an incredible time to be alive. I’m grateful for it, and excited to see what happens. My preference is to predict the future by creating it, as much as we can.

Thanks for reading, and have a great rest of your day!

Photos from New Hampshire

Summit of some random mountain in the Northern White Mountains. Ended up being a 10 mile day.

Two things I like (affiliates)

Nervous System Mastery with Johnny Miller. Discount code: CHRISJAMES

CrowdHealth - best alternative to US health insurace. Dicount code: BIGWIN

Hi friends, I’m starting this newsletter series, which features things I’m reading, watching, doing, creating, buying, and investing in. It’ll be once per month, then bi-weekly, and maybe weekly — we’ll see. I’ll keep it to five minutes maximum read-time.

Stumbling into a GardenBnB

I subleased an apartment in the Boston area for August. Turns out the person before me had a cat, and the place was covered in cat dander, which I’m allergic to. Plus the traffic noise was insane, and I couldn’t get a parking permit.

Wow. This sucks, I thought.

So I went on Airbnb to see my options. There was a new down the road and I quickly booked it. I moved out of the original place after a week of sneezing, and got a partial refund. (I put a “new resident, permit pending” sign in my car and never got a ticket.)

Now I’m at my Airbnb. It’s gorgeous. Right on the river. $90 / night.

It’s weird living out of Airbnbs, but no complaints here. It’s another example of how things can go way better when they don’t go according to plan.

One door closes, and another opens. Just gotta keep going.

I first posted on Substack almost three years ago. It was the story of my e-bike being stolen from my garage. Spoiler: I baited the thief and took it back. The story was too good not to write and share, so that’s what I did. Initially, I thought a newspaper would want to publish it (lol), but they didn’t email me back. So I published it — to no one. To my surprise, a few random people found it on Substack and hit the like button.

The genesis of this blog, which led to multiple meetups, friendships, a book, another book, and soon a line of hats, was me forgetting to shut my garage door and an opportunistic group of criminals who thought they scored a free $5,000 Intense Tazer. Little did they know, their sin catalyzed this email list.

Thank you, criminals!

The first draft of my second book, Keep Going, is almost done. It’s on this theme of things you want coming from things you don’t. I’ll send a pre-publication copy to anyone who replies to this email and says they want one.

It’s been a year since self-publishing my first book. Hundreds have people have read it, and it’s earned 4.8 stars on Amazon. I like how the fiction chapters weave into the memoir and merge at the end. I’m going to make it into an audiobook in September.

Series I watched all three seasons of

I was pretty sick last month, July, and watched a bunch of shows and movies.

I found 100 Foot Wave on HBO. Director Chris Smith brilliantly shows the roller coaster of life by following Garret MacNamara, his family, and other big wave surfers, on and off the ocean. It is a cinematic masterpiece.

I saw things I’ve never seen before. People surfing 50+ foot waves, someone giving birth at home, and someone actually dying in a TV show.

This show is nuts. I don’t know how anyone can top that.

I hope to someday work on a docu-series of such caliber. Making videos has been a side passion for me for 15 years. Last April, I made a video of my friend urban mountain biking in an old New England mill city. I filmed and edited the entire thing in about 7 hours. The song is Right Kind of Dream by Sturgill Simpson, a gifted multi-genre artist. One of America’s finest. I’ve listened to Right Kind of Dream dozens of times and it hasn’t gotten old.

Quote I’m Enjoying

“It’s not about having the answer, it’s about being in the question”

I first heard this from Joe Hudson. Sometimes when I think of it, I physically feel it in my body. I’m not entirely sure why. I also got this from Joe: The answer isn’t words. It makes me smile.

What I’m Reading

I read few things on substack. I’m really only capable of reading personal stories. wrote this piece called The intellectual poverty of women’s society. Unsurprisingly, it went viral. It’s poignant insight from the IRL trenches. Things go viral when they’re both true and controversial.

I’ve not posted much on Substack this summer, and subscriber growth has plateau’d. But rest assured, a wave of bangers is in the works, including Greatest Psychiatric Result Ever Seen, Chicken Tendies Fund, and Solving the Smartphone Problem.

That’s it, folks!

Thanks for reading, and if I don’t see you, have a great rest of your life.

PS — I love getting replies from readers. Say hi, let me know what’s up, and if you like this new format!

Who Pays

A fundamental part of the healthcare system is who pays.

Who is paying has a lot of power.

Placing that control with insurance companies (who own pharma companies) has yielded poor results, to say the least. They deny reasonable claims, and require people to take pharma products that mask symptoms, before treatments that address root causes. It’s a deep rabbit hole of darkness. In the long run, twisted incentives make the legacy health insurance system profit more from chronic disease and increasing prices. And that’s the result we’ve gotten.

But we need some form of insurance - some way to socialize large health expenses when someone gets hit with unexpected illness or injury.

Pooling money with an insurance company and asking them to pay for our treatments is just one way to do it. Many countries have the government do that. And it kind of works, some of the time.

Another way is a crowdfunding network, such as CrowdHealth, which launched in 2021, a few years after the Trump admin repealed the mandate that everyone has to purchase ACA insurance. I wrote about how CrowdHealth works in Solving Healthcare 1 and how it costs so much less. So far, a dozen people have joined CrowdHealth from reading the latter.

Rather than pooling money before bills arise, members request funding after they have a health issue. The money goes straight from contributing members to requesting members, without a middleman taking a cut. The administrator of the crowdfunding network collects a flat monthly fee.

This is a more natural way.

It removes the bureaucracy between health providers and patients, resulting in lower prices. It also incentivizes better health. The company facilitating the crowdfunding network has a clear incentive to keep bills low, but not at the expense of a member’s health.

Crowdfunding networks aren’t a good fit for everyone in America. Some people have exceptional medical conditions that require long-term intensive care. For those people, it probably makes the most sense for the government to socialize those expenses across the tax base. This is what’s done now via Medicare and Medicaid.

People in a crowdfunding network are incentivized to keep others healthy. In my crowdfunding network, CrowdHealth, we share what we’ve learned in our online community (a telegram channel). We share doctor recommendations, product recommendations, book recommendations, answer each other’s questions, and keep each other company (as well as one can in a digital setting).

What gets paid for

In the insurance model, you either get approved or denied funding, based on the judgments of nameless, faceless insurance administrators.

In the 90s, Lyme disease was running rampant around Lyme, CT, where we lived. My family and others had to petition lawmakers to force insurance companies to pay for my father’s life-saving treatment, IV antibiotics.

Is that the world you want to live in?

A crowdfunding system is different. In mine, a health expense falls in one of four categories:

• Eligible with no initial commitment (deductible): This includes an annual preventative care doctor’s visit, telehealth urgent care, and various preventative care tests.

• Eligible for funding beyond the $500 initial commitment: The member guide outlines what is eligible for funding. Members can go to any doctor, including MDs, OD, and NDs. The emergence of crowdfunding networks is an opportunity to shift the healthcare system from reactive allopathic care (pills and surgeries after symptons emerge) to proactive functional care (preventative, root cause focused). Ultimately, each crowdfunding network needs to decide a process for determing what is eligible for crowdfunding.

• Not eligible: Oh you want a sauna for your house to help your health?

• Variable: Even if something is not technically eligible for CrowdHealth family adopted a child. There were $3,000 of unexpected healthcare bills associated with the adoption. This wasn’t outlined as eligible for funding in the guide, but the CrowdHealth team sent a message to members that there’s an opportunity to contribute to this family. I went to Venmo and sent a contribution. Seeing and reading the messages from other CrowdHealth members on Venmo made me teary-eyed.

To be clear, the crowdfunding is not usually run through Venmo, this was an exceptional

Sometimes people request funding for their health bill, and they actually get MORE than the cost of the bill, because generous members in the network have empathy for and extra capital.

Can you imagine an insurance company paying you more because they know what you’re going through?

The funding facilitator, in my case, CrowdHealth, has outlined what is eligible for crowdfunding in the member guide. But this is an impossible job to ever complete because there are countless medical treatments and new ones are always being invented. So there’s a process for determining what is and isn’t eligible for crowdfunding that involves CrowdHealth management, third-party healthcare providers, and network members.

People won’t want to join a network that doesn’t fund treatments they might need, but also they won’t want to join a network that is funding high-cost, low-efficacy, perhaps unnecessary treatments. America needs a plethora of healthcare crowdfunding networks, so consumers have options. Plus, competition breeds innovation.

New Technologies

I see the crowdfunding model as the bedrock of a new system that integrates things that have been pushed aside in conventional healthcare: preventative care, functional medicine, metabolic therapies, nervous system therapies, and new technologies.

I foresee a user creating a ticket (a health issue—a discrepancy between their experience of life and the one they prefer), and the system doesn’t stop working until that ticket is closed. The incentive structure is such that fewer tickets means more profits. That’s the foundation of my preferred future.

Beyond new ways of paying for healthcare, other game changer include AI and lower cost testing, which could enable much more personalized medicine. The usefulness of AI is increasing. Naturally, more and more people will continue adopting AI systems to help with their health.

These two these things: new crowdfunding systems and AI-native personal health systems are poised to change the lives of millions of Americans, making healthcare lower cost, and more effective and enjoyable.

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Unlike some people, I actually do stuff.

I’m doing IRL shit.

Making music

Building trails

Building a startup

Playing sports

Working on my health

Watching Christopher Nolan movies

Traveling, exploring

Mountain biking

Dating

My life is like desire triage right now.

All these things feel more important to me than editing, polishing, and publishing stories on Substack. I’m actually writing as much as ever, and will share when I feel called to share, like today. After 6 weeks off substack, I opened her up and got it done.

In the past two months, I’ve slept in twelve different places. In the next month, I’ll sleep in another five or more.

I woke up this morning in a former Catholic church that my friend rents. I checked my messages. Anu is interested in doing a Substack live stream to talk about Christianity with me.

My roommates left for work. I put a rake and chainsaw in my car and drove to a mountain where I’m building a new mountain biking trail from top to bottom. I did an hour and a half of scouting and marking. It got hot and I drove to a nearby mountain lake where I conveniently found my snorkel mask in the back of the car and used it to easily swim to a small island. I sat on the bank and thought about all the emails I need to send. Follow-ups to people I’m building a healthcare system with.

Google calendar dinged me, telling me it’s time to depart.

Now I’m at Walmart, drinking a remedy organic berry immunity smoothie in the parking lot while they put new tires on my car. I’ll try to get my emails done and drive back to my house before my calls at one o’clock and two o’clock. Then cook lunch and see if I can move the ball forward on some AI projects, then my friend is coming over to record music.

Tomorrow night is date night, Saturday is a hike to a lake in the White Mountains, Sunday I’m co-hosting a brunch with 16 people coming, and after that I’ll go to a watch party for the NBA finals.

My smoothie has a Lion’s Mane mushroom in it. At least that’s what it says. I’m on a mushroom kick right now. I started growing them when I lived in Oregon five years ago. I’m planning a trip back to Oregon, where psilocybin mushrooms are now legal for medicinal consumption, no prescription necessary. There’s a lot to learn, a lot of evolution to be found, with mushrooms. I’ll be in Oregon next month, researching and experimenting.

I have a missed call from a doctor’s office requesting I fill out more forms. I have unread messages from a Canadian girl I was hanging out with in Portugal last month. We’re planning a retreat in New Hampshire. Walmart texts me my car is ready.

My life feels crazier than it is. It’s a weird time to be alive. It simultaneously feels like I’m doing too much and not doing enough.

I’m happy with my life. I recognize it can feel like I’m drowning in an ocean storm, but really I’m in a jacuzzi and the jets are on a smidge too high.

It would be dumb if I drowned in this jacuzzi. But whatever, all outcomes are acceptable.

Thanks for reading, and have a great rest of your day. If you like this, read the sample of my book, All Outcomes Are Acceptable, of that combines memoir, sci-fi, and poetry. To my surprise, it’s only received five-star reviews.

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CrowdHealth, alternative to US health insurance that I use. Discount code: BIGWIN

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I could just sit in still, lukewarm water, but the evidence suggests I like it HOT with jets blasting from all directions.

Song

My friend Ken is often anxious. Every time I see him, he’s talking about the impending “AI-pocalyse”. He’s chronically on his phone and never has enough time. He says he’s worked for years to feel “less autistic.”

Doctors put him on medications, and he sees a talk therapist. He doesn’t seem to credit these two things for helping him. In fact, he’s frustrated that he can’t find a doctor to help him safely taper off the psych meds he was put on years ago. So he’s just kinda stuck on them, despite not needing them for the original thing he started them for.

I suspect variations of Ken’s story are common. More common than anyone other than demonic profiteers would like.

A mutual friend of ours, Lizzie, asked me to go hiking. I suggested we swim in the cold river by the waterfall. She thought it was a joke. I’ve been swimming in cold water since 2019, so I forgot that regular people don’t do that, and are unaware of what that feels like. They just assume it’s crazy.

Ken decided to join us.

As we hiked through the lush, early spring forest, Ken fired off text messages, mumbling about not having enough time and his chronic anxiety.

“You want less anxiety?” I pulled his phone out of his hands and put it in my backpack, where my phone was also quarantined.

“Thank you,” he said.

I took off my shirt to go to the waterfall. Lizzie noticed the continuous glucose monitor on the back of my bicep.

“Chris, do you have diabetes??” she asked, bewildered.

“No,” I said, “These are like $50 and over the counter now, so I put one on to see what spikes my blood sugar.”

“Wow, I might try that because I feel like my blood sugar is linked to my anxiety.”

It’s all connected — the gut, nervous system, hormones, neurotransmitters.

We hiked around in bare feet and found a hole to swim in. I went first. It was colder than I thought it would be, in the high 50s.

I held my nose and dunked myself, emerging born again.

Lizzie and Ken both took a dip, yelping like the primates we truly are.

We stood around admiring the river, basking in lucidity and presence. Not a fucking notification to speak of.

“Isn’t it wild,” I said, “that this would be a totally novel experience for like half the country.”

“And seventy years ago,” Lizzie said, “This was like all there was to do.”

Walking back to the car, his phone still in my pack, Ken said calmly, “I think I need a digital detox.”

I’ve noticed.

I drove us through hilly, forested, southern New Hampshire, listening to Stick Figure and Sturgill Simpson. I slammed the brakes. Someone is selling sourdough in front of their house. We ate chunks of spongy sourdough, warm from the midday sun, and headed to a chilly mountain lake for more swimming. I could argue that breaking bread with friends is a nervous system therapy.

Afterward, back at my house, I showed Ken the new vagus nerve stimulator I’d been telling him about.

He put it on and instantly felt the calm.

“You said this thing is $150?” he said.

“More like $250”

“I feel a sense of calm.”

We’d already been doing vagus nerve stimulation via our cold water swims, which I’d wager amplified the effect of the Pulsetto’s electrical current through both sides of Ken’s neck.

I told him about Wim Hof, whose story inspired me to experiment with cold water and breathwork. Wim’s wife, suffering from psychiatric disorder, died by suicide. Wim learned to use breathwork and cold exposure to become a master of his mindbody, to the point where he can control his autonomic nervous system, including his body temperature, and even his immune system. In a scientific study, he trained others to do the same.

Over the past six years, I’ve been experimenting with nervous system therapies to create a more preferable experience of life. Cold therapy, breathwork, yoga, VNS, Somatic Experiencing, cranial sacral, sound therapy, photobiomodulation, psilocybin, neurofeedback, dancing, Christianity. Each warrants an entire essay or an entire book.

My definition of a nervous system therapy is anything that deliberately works with the flow of electricity in the nerves and neurons to create a more preferable experience of life. Many things can be a nervous system therapy if approached with that lens.

The nervous system refers to our neurons and nerves. The three big neural networks are in the head, heart, and gut. The largest, most critical nerves are the spinal nerves and the vagus nerve. Neurons communicate with chemical messengers called neurotransmitters, many of which are made in the gut (serotonin, GABA, histamine, dopamine) and the endocrine system.

I’ve come to view psychiatric disorders/mental illness as nervous system disorders. Anyone in America knows how widespread nervous system disorder has become: anxiety, depression, sleep problems, gut problems, autism, migraines, are tragically rampant.

It’s woeful how slow establishment conventional medicine has been to implement modalities beyond drugs and talk therapy for treating root causes of America’s health problems. Very few doctors will prescribe cold therapy, VNS, dancing, neurofeedback, breath work, or yoga. Dr. Navaz Habib is one of the few, who pointed me toward VNS.

Pathological anxiety is the number 1 nervous system disorder in America, affecting tens of millions. The results are in, and the standard drugs and talk therapy approach has not resulted overall in less anxiety in America.

It’s the early days of nervous system therapies, and I’m excited where it goes, after decades of the myopic view of medicine as patented pharma chemicals—daily perpetual drugging.

Anxiety is being trapped in your head, in a tornado of thoughts, pulled a million ways at the same time. And of course, running out of time!

How do we get out of the head and into the body? Put awareness into the body. Right now, if you'd like, shift awareness into your feet and see what happens.

It's impossible to have your life force over-indexed on your head when you’re submerged in fifty-degree water. This I know.

There’s no quick fix for modernity-induced nervous system dysfunction. It’s an ecology of practices over months and years that can evolve a nervous system from torment to bliss.

True wealth is nervous system health.

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Thanks for reading, and have a great rest of your day. Check out my experimental book of that combines memoir, sci-fi, and poetry. To my surprise, it’s only received five star reviews.

Thank you to , , and David for the feedback on the draft.

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Nervous System Mastery course with Johnny Miller. I met so many cool people. Discount code: CHRISJAMES

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Tiny Health gut health test for actionable insights. $20 discount with code CHRISJ

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Keeper.ai

Did not work.

Total waste of time and money.

The idea is you sign a contract to pay them a large sum if you end up “marrying” (which means living with) one of their matches. I said what the hell, paid the sign-up fee, and answered 100 open-ended questions. They never sent me a match, and it does not appear they intend to. [I emailed them to see what’s up and they refunded me the signup fee]

Dating Apps

I moved to Greater Boston, a metropolitan magnet for young adults.

I hopped on Hinge and got some matches. Corrinne was a short, brunette, Christian, with a nice smile. We exchanged messages for a few months, and she was keen to meet up.

I once made the mistake of setting up a dinner date as the first date. Just do drinks. I rarely drink alcohol, so I choose a cafe and order tea. If the date was my idea, I pay for the girl.

On the way to Life Alive café, I felt a little nervous. It had been months since I’d done a first date. As the Tesla drove, I pulled up a note on my phone from when I was meeting new women every week in Peru. It said, “Family, recreation, dreams, occupation”. That’s what we talk about. I transmuted any nervousness into excitement.

I got there on time. She was already there. That’s a green flag. She was super nervous and talking at 2x speed. I wasn’t nervous. I paused, looked around and said, “Wow this is a really nice cafe.” She relaxed.

Turns out we are from the same area and went to the same college. She knows people from my hometown. “Do you know Emily B—?” she says.

One of her best friends is a girl I used to hang out with as a teenager. I find this to be hilarious.

We had a similar level of goofiness and conversational skills. We aligned well on religion. The conversation was balanced and enjoyable, intellectual and fun.

We talked and drank tea for an hour.

I walked away feeling good. Glad I went. I followed up, but she did not reply. That’s how it goes sometimes. [Oddly, she replied two months later, “Hey sorry! Took a little break on here! It wrapped up well though”]

After that, I set up a date with another Hinge match, Amanda. I drove to Life Alive again, and within a few minutes, I knew it was not a good match. I got the ick and wanted to leave. But I stayed and kept a cordial conversation going.

After an hour, I said, “I need to leave soon.” She was not responsive to that and just kept talking, interested in learning more about my Tesla. It came out that she listens to NPR and CNN. That’s a dealbreaker.

The café started playing Closing Time.

“I guess it’s time to leave,” I said.

“Why?”

“Because it’s closing.”

I walked back to my car and sat in traffic for another 25 minutes. I resolved not to waste my time like that again. A five-minute zoom call would have been sufficient.

A few days later she messaged me, asking about my Tesla, again. I considered ghosting but instead, I replied, “It was great to meet you, I don’t think we’re a great match”

Upward

A friend recommended Upward, a matchmaking app for Christians. I downloaded it, added some banger photos, and got dozens of “likes”. To accelerate the process, I paid the $20 fee to see the list of women who “liked” my profile.

Here’s the first thing I saw:

The app glitched, making it look like bots. Here are some of other profiles:

The optics are not great. Some of these people, if they are even real people, live hundreds of miles away, despite my filtering for people in my area.

I requested my money back from Apple, and they granted the refund. I selected “Does not work as expected”

Of dozens of profiles, only one person looked promising. She had photos of her hiking, at the beach, and with friends.

Marissa

We “matched” and chatted for a few weeks. I said, What’s your schedule like this week?

Remembering the last dating app date experience. I said, Is a zoom call in the deck of cards?

She said, Yes we can do that!!

I set up a Google calendar event. She showed up twenty minutes late to the call, and said it “Felt so official.”

Perhaps a spontaneous FaceTime would have been more romantic.

She asked me a lot of questions then said, Sorry I’m asking you so many questions.

I love that.

She told me she’s obsessed with bears and visiting national parks. Overall, she was cute and energetic so I said let’s do this in person. We set up an afternoon coffee date at Cafe Nero.

Flip phone photo with Santa

I park my bike and grabbed a table inside the cafe.

“Just parked,” she texts me.

It’s December and a Santa Claus walks in. She comes in behind him. We do a light hug.

A disheveled older man says, “Excuse me can you take our photo?” gesturing toward the Santa.

He hands me a flip phone and smiles with Santa as I click the OK button to snap the worst photo of two people I’ve ever taken in my life.

I hand him the phone and smile at my date.

The homeless-looking man starts blabbering to us incoherently, something about a Santa Claus getting drunk. I nod. He just keeps going. My date is very cute. I’m very uncomfortable. I’m about to punch this guy in the face.

Marissa stands there smiling and looking at the guy, totally relaxed. If she can deal with people like this, that’s a huge plus.

“Yeah okay thank you bye” I say. I turn and order a decaf Americano.

After talking for a while, we walked around the lovely downtown.

She said, “What does your walk with God look like?”

“Wow,” I said, “that’s a big question.”

“It is?”

“Yeah, how bout you go first.”

She told me she likes reading the Old Testament. She asked me when I gave my life to Jesus.

I didn’t have a great answer for that one.

We walked and talked about books we’ve enjoyed and Joe Rogan, whom she’s a fan of.

Afterward, I felt excited to potentially see her again. She was young, based, kind, hardworking, smart, physically fit, cute. It made it easy to overlook the fact that she’s substantially more religious than me, and a little crazy (but aren’t we all).

I followed up with, Hey, I enjoyed our coffee and walk (:

She said, Hey!! Yes so did I! At the moment I don’t think I’m in a good spot to seriously date, thinking of travel nursing and moving around a lot in the near future. But it was great getting to know you and I wish you the best!

This is the adult thing to do. She’s a good person.

I looked at other profiles on Upward. Many of the women said they are looking for a “Christ centered relationship”. I’m sure exactly what that means, but I don’t think that’s what I’m looking for.

My conclusion is that dating apps generally suck. It’s weird to meet a stranger from the internet. It’s silly that this is the mainstream default solution for dating.

Cold Approach: You can just talk to people

I like cold approach. It’s difficult and exhilarating. Many men never even try.

Just now, as I write this, I went up to a random girl at a coffee shop.

We made eye contact, twice. I got off the couch, walked over and stood in front of her.

“Excuse me,” I said. She removed her AirPods.

“I’m writing an article about dating, could I ask you a few questions?”

“Oh, yeah,” she said, “I’m meeting someone soon, but I’m around later…”

“Okay, I’m just wondering, do you think dating apps made the dating scene better or worse.”

“Worse. For sure.”

A nerdy-looking guy walks in, and she stands to greet him.

“Thanks for answering my question.”

I sit down, thrilled. Cold approach is fun.

Georgian Heartbreaker

I was alone at my apartment on Thursday night in December. I hopped on the T and went to a networking event at a popular co-working space next to MIT. I had a feeling I’d meet someone there.

I resolved to talk to the hottest girl in the room. I stood there and looked around. No hot girls.

I saw an attractive girl walking toward the door. She looked at me as she walked out. I decided now is a good time to leave. I exited and she was standing there. I said, “Hey, do you know where an outlet is to charge my phone?”

“Um…” she says.

“Here’s one,” I say, and plug it in.

She’s 5’ 2” olive skinned, dark hair, large brown eyes.

We talk about where we are from—always a great place to start. She says she’s from Georgia, the country.

I pull out obscure knowledge about Georgia.

“The religious leader there offered to personally baptize any couple’s third child in an effort to raise the birth rate, and it worked!”

Her mouth hangs open.

“Yeah,” she says, “People were really excited about that.”

We trade Instagrams. She holds eye contact with me as she walks away.

It felt intense.

The next day I messaged her: “Hi, would you like to meet for a coffee one day next week?”

Eight hours later, I check my Instagram to see if she’s replied. Nothing.

Just then, I got a message:

“Heeey, I am leaving on Tuesday next week. What about next year or between Christmas and New Year?'“

Wow that was uncanny.

After a bit of logistics, we meet for coffee at Life Alive.

She was 15 minutes late.

We sat in the low-light basement of the cafe and talked about our lives, books we like, places we’ve lived, mountains we like to ski.

She asked me about the scar on my neck, which almost nobody ever does. I tell her the story of the accident.

“Let me see it.” I turn my head, and she leans in.

“Did it hurt?” she says.

“My neck was sliced open, so yeah, it hurt.”

We talked and laughed for over an hour. At one point, I became agitated. It felt like she was drilling through the walls I’d spent years strategically building around my heart. I’m a sucker for foreign women.

Eventually we hugged and parted ways.

Over the next few days, I found myself thinking about her, a lot.

I followed up. She replied. I noticed her level of responsiveness was around one text every 24-48 hours. That’s not a good sign.

I said, Did you make a New Year’s resolution?

She said, Happy New Year! No, I don’t do New Year’s resolutions. Do you?

I said, Yes, my resolution is to take you out to dinner

Nothing.

The next day I got a text from Elena. I saw the word “boyfriend” and immediately knew. She has a boyfriend. Of course she does. Goddammit.

That sounds super nice but I thought this might happen. I have a boyfriend and I would be happy to be friends with you if that is smth you are interested in. Sorry if I caused any confusion for you, I just don't want to assume that every guy that approaches me has a romantic interest

I replied, That’s actually awesome. Not everyone is like that.

Intellectually, I’m fine with that. But my heart is crushed.

After that, she started replying to my texts nearly immediately. I decided that just friends would not be feasible. I shared a link to my writing in case she was curious. And that was that.

To this day, my heart is excited by the prospect of talking with her again.

That would be funny if she’s reading this.

A note on infatuation

Some people call it “love at first sight” or “falling in love”. Neil Strauss, legendary writer of The Game and The Truth, coined it “One-itis”. A man’s heart goes crazy, and he becomes convinced. This. Is. The. One.

A gift from god Himself.

She’s. Perfect.

I’ve known her for three hours, but I’m completely sure we’re destined to get married.

There’s typically a degree of physiological illness that accompanies this phenomenon. It can last a week or so. “Lovesick” they call it. Frankly it’s annoying. It becomes hard to think clearly and hard to sleep. When this happens, I tend be more prolific with my creative wok, but often there’s a crash.

Shuffle

At this point, I’m feeling burnt out on dating.

I looked at the relationships around me and decided I don’t even want that right now. I deleted the apps.

Then I got a text from Shuffle Dating.

Three months earlier, a reader said that she went to a Shuffle speed dating event and liked it. It was only $25 so I’d bought a ticket. Now, Shuffle is texting me saying that the event is tomorrow night, and if I don’t go, it’s a $50 no-show fee.

The idea of Shuffle is ten men and ten women go to a well-chosen venue and talk to each other for at around eight minutes each. The host is remote, which I suppose keeps the price low. Participants enter their description into the web app, then the app tells you who to look for next.

Half the women were obvious no’s. Nonetheless, I enjoyed talking to everyone. I was having fun with it.

The app provided cheesy prompts (“What’s your favorite food?”), but I had fun tweaking them (“What’s your take on Trump?”). Most women weren’t my type, but the last one was a gem. We kept talking and didn’t even notice the event had ended.

On our first coffee shop date (not at Life Alive, that place is cursed). I also initiated an important conversation about intentions and timing. What are you looking for? Where are we at in our lives?

I told her the truth: I was burned out on dating, and the reason I went was to write about Shuffle, and to not get charged a $50 no-show fee. I’m not looking to get married anytime soon. I’m planning to travel soon, possibly move, and I’m juggling a bunch of projects.

She was very receptive to that. We’ve been talking and hanging out since.

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One thing Shuffle could do is have people enter their basic info and preferences, then organize and invite particular people to events with a high probability of match. Also, they could do less boring prompts and more authentic relating games.

Jigsaw

One of the guys at the Shuffle event said he likes Jigsaw events better, which he said was speed dating while playing ping pong. I like ping pong, so what the hell. I showed up. The vibe was 10 guys per one fat girl while “Buy you a Drank” plays. For a second, I thought it was a gay bar.

Oddly, someone from the internet recognized me. We chatted for a bit, played ping pong, and talked to a few odd-looking women.

I will not be attending another singles event where the organizer doesn’t balance the ratio.

Social Circle

I’m in a large group chat of local young adult Catholics. They put on a lot of events. I went to a swing dance in southern New Hampshire. It was majority single guys, a few couples, and a few single women. I knew most of the people there.

Then I went to a swing dance in near Boston. It was a huge, beautiful venue with 100+ young adults, mostly women. I danced with a dozen of them. One of them asked me a lot of questions, then said, “You’d be a good date for a wedding.” I wasn’t feeling it. She was pretty bad at dancing.

The following weekend I went to a nondenominational church in the same area, just to see what’s up. I sat in the back. Everyone I could see was in between the ages of 20 and 40. In my field of view, I counted 14 women and 3 men. Afterward, three people came up and talked to me.

The hack for meeting good people post-college is finding the right church.

In the past four months, I’ve had three friends start exclusive relationships from friend group connections. I recently went to a brunch hosted by a friend. Both of her roommates were awesome. We hit off. I’m curious to see how our paths align in the future.

It’s great to get to know people in a group setting, see how they interact with others, meet their friends. There’s less ghosting and confusion.

Keep going

Overall, if someone came to me and said, I’m serious about meeting people and finding a partner, I would say

• Live near the people you want to date

• Have friends. Embed yourself in community, church is great for this

• Go to singles events, like Shuffle, that maintain a 50/50 ratio

• Optionally, roll the dice with the most useful matchmaking app in your region and demographic. Make a banger profile and see if you get lucky.

• Learn to dance and go to dances with your demographic. This is so underrated.

If you do these things, you will meet people. If you like someone, open your phone, click Create New Contact, and hand them the phone. Set up a time to get drinks. Being clear about intentions can save everyone time.

The solution to the dating problem is keep going. Try a bunch of stuff. Show up detached from the outcome.

Dating is a roller coaster. Rejection is normal and sucks. Infatuation is real and also sucks. Authenticity wins.

If you simply keep going, keep meeting people, keep learning and developing, good relationships are inevitable.

What is a good life but a series of experiments.

Thanks for reading, and have a great rest of your day.

Links

My first book on Amazon: All Outcomes Are Acceptable

CrowdHealth is alternative to health insurance that I personally use and love. Discount code: BIGWIN

Join Pathless Path online community

I post videos and podcasts on YouTube.

Five-week 1:1 writing coaching program for ambitious storytellers.

Song

Bonus: The girl at the coffee shop

The girl from earlier is on the couch, writing. I walk over

She looks up. “Are you actually writing an article on dating?” she says

Yeah I am

For…

Do you know Substack?

Yeah, I was wondering if it was Substack. What’s your Substack?

She’s sitting up straight now, facing me, fully engaged.

“Do other people do cold approach or am I the only one?” I ask

Like random people coming up and talking to me?

Yeah

In the context of dating?

Yeah

No, people don’t do that. I have a boyfriend but if I was single I’d love that.

You said dating apps definitely make the dating scene worse. What makes you say that

I feel like they crush your soul. What’s your experience been?

Bad. How do you meet people? How’d you meet your boyfriend?

Through church

She tells me about her non-denominational church. The meeting she just had with her pastor.

She’s a writer. She asks me about monetizing writing. She looks up my book on Amazon.

We talked for half an hour about writing movies. She’s written four screenplays.

“This was inspiring,” she said. “I’m going to write.”

I got an email that Joe Hudson was hosting a live rapid coaching session. I clicked the link and joined, Just for a little bit I told myself. Of course, I was there for the full 90 minutes, as I was when I first watched Joe rapidly bring the Zoom call question askers to the reality of the situation and feel the emotions of it.

One year ago, I shared a review of Joe’s Great Decisions Course - a five-week program I embarked on. Readers loved the review, and so did Joe. One reader told me he revisits it every few months, which blew my mind. Since then, 500 more people have joined this email list, so I’m resharing an updated version with additional insights. (see below)

I often listen to the Art of Accomplishment podcast, co-hosted by Joe and Brett. On a drive through New Hampshire, I listened to them talk about death, as Brett’s brother was terminally ill. In the middle of the podcast, Joe shared a poem that he wrote and shared at a friend’s funeral.

This was part of it:

I fall to my knees in gratitude of this illusion of me

It is what allowed me to laugh and cry and with you

My friend

It’s what allows me to feel, the endless depth of missing you now

I recall these lines off the top of my head, which speaks to how much it resonated with me. There’s a wisdom in there that few people I’ve ever met have come to know, let alone articulate in such an elegant few lines.

In another podcast episode, Joe told a story about his daughter’s “billion-dollar idea.” Not something that would make a billion dollars—something she wouldn’t sell for a billion dollars.

Wow. That resonated. I posted on Notes: I’m not trying to build a billion-dollar business, I’m trying to build something I wouldn’t sell for a billion dollars.

I messaged Joe a copy of his poem, and said:

In AoA world, making someone cry is among the nicest things you can do.

I was watching Joe do a coaching session, and the participant said something like, “I’m gonna cry.”

Joe said, “I’m already crying.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, I was crying as we were talking.”

It struck me that crying doesn’t necessitate tears streaming down the face, or an inability to speak. My intuition is that crying during a conversation without anyone even noticing is downstream of deep emotional fluidity.

The revelations per minute with this guy is second to nobody else I know of.

I’d wager Joe Hudson is one of the top active psychologists in the world, although he does not identify as one. What makes him such a good psychologist is that he’s not one—he’s not in an ivory tower writing papers, or behind closed doors helping a few wealthy clients. He’s in the trenches helping people in public.

Originally posted April 1, 2024, updated April 2025

Joe Hudson's Great Behavior Course

Freedom lies in the space between stimuli and response.

“Joe Hudson made me disappear.”

“I’m on the bleeding edge of existence.”

“Is this real change? I think this is real change.”

These were comments from participants in Art of Accomplishment’s Great Decisions Course. 

In January 2024, I saw Joe Hudson, founder of Art of Accomplishment (AoA) on ’s Pathless Path Podcast. Inspired, I joined the info session for Joe’s Great Decisions course. It blew my mind. My eyeballs were pinned to the screen for 90 minutes. I cried.

There were 100 people on the call. Joe selected volunteers for coaching sessions in front of the audience. They call it Rapid Coaching. I’d never seen anything else like it. For each session, things were emotional within 15 minutes. It was clear to me that Joe was fluent in the language of emotions, and I was not. 

At the end of every value delivery chain is desired feelings. Improving our ability to feel emotions expands our ability to receive value. Savoring all emotions, looking forward to them, and flowing with them, to me, sounded like the ultimate skill. The man who loves all emotions can’t lose.

Joe calls it emotional fluidity. When I first heard the phrase, I knew I didn’t have it but would like to experience it. Many times in my life, I have felt emotionally illiterate. I might be too emotionally retarded to take this course, I thought. Then I realized, that is the reason I need to take this course. 

The 5-week course began while I was both sick and traveling but they only run it once a year so I bit off more than I could chew. There were partner sessions, small group sessions, large group sessions, and solo work. I can talk about the intellectual lessons, but most of what I learned is nontransmissible because it was at the emotional level in the form of somatic experience. 

Overall, the course was high quality, impactful, and useful. It’s the first course I’d buy for my children. Our decisions, which is the same as our behavior, determine a large part of our life experience.

Here are my highlights from the course:

Simplicity is powerful

Exercise:

“I feel _____ and that’s okay.”

Partner: “You feel _____ and that’s okay.”

Everything powerful is simple. And that’s okay has echoed in my thoughts for weeks. 

I feel love and that’s okay. 

I feel scared and that’s okay. 

I feel helpless and that’s okay. 

I feel confused and that’s okay. 

I feel stupid and that’s okay. 

I feel wonder and that’s okay.

I feel desire and that’s okay.

This activity validates feelings as acceptable and helps to neutralize resistance/self-conflict.

I didn’t think this is what we’d be doing in the Great Decisions Course. I thought we’d learn a formula for decision-making. But the key insight is that our decisions, our behavior, is driven by the emotional part of our system. By working with emotions, welcoming emotions, we can improve our decision-making. 

Head Heart Gut

A revelation for me was that my neural network is more than just my brain. I knew this at an intellectual level but the course helped me tune into my heart and gut, which are also important neural networks. My gut especially was being neglected. I had no idea how much I was clenching my gut. 

We did an exercise where we spoke from each neural network. What does your head say about that? What does the heart say? And what does the gut say? I learned my gut doesn’t speak good English. Some people spoke from their gut with animal noises.

At the beginning of each of the many course exercises, Joe states the purpose of the exercise. An aim of the head-heart-gut exercises is “to access many forms of our intelligence and integrate them together.”

VIEW

Vulnerability 

Impartiality

Empathy 

Wonder 

This framework is the foundation that AoA is built on; and for me, VIEW is a good answer to the question, What is love?

The AoA podcast is part of the course content. Here’s Joe in episode 70:

“Meeting emotions with VIEW: Vulnerability, allowing it. Impartiality, being neutral. Empathy, keeping yourself company. Wonder, looking at the emotion as if you’re kid finding a turtle for the first time.”

“Emotional expression and moving emotions is great, but the most important thing is, how do I look at this with some curiosity, wonder, vulnerability, impartiality.”

Emotional Inquiry

This is the backbone of the course and a potent source of transformation. 

Emotional Inquiry (EI) is like an audio-guided meditation where you conjure an emotional experience, listen to the audio, and see what happens. 

From AoA podcast #96, which I highly recommend:

“[EI] is a tool for when you resist an emotional experience. It’s basically looking at the emotional experiences through the eyes of VIEW. It’s vulnerable, you’re actually feeling it, it’s impartial, you’re not trying to change it, you’re full of wonder, and having empathy for yourself. You’re not lost in the emotional experience but you’re not dismissing it. We teach it as a guided meditation but it can soon become automatic.”

“This is one of the most powerful tools if it’s applied. Most people will slow down on the application of it or find distraction because it can create so much transformation so quickly”

This was my experience. Lots of sadness came up. And one time, an anger, fear, sadness sandwich. It helped me to speak about things that were previously avoided.

Says Joe:

The typical question: Why would I ever want to invite anxiety, welcome anxiety? I’ve spent my whole life trying to fucking get rid of that. And that’s the answer. You’ve spent your whole life trying to get rid of it and it hasn’t fucking worked. That’s the reason you go to welcome it. Because each one of these emotions was a rejected part of you

From podcast episode 70:

Emotional inquiry: it’s an undoing not a doing. Doing is in the resistance to the emotions. That’s what takes energy, effort. Not resisting and welcoming takes less effort. It might take a little activation energy. I have more energy if I experience an emotion unresisted. How to drop a hot frying? It’s an undoing.

“3 Major mechanisms that transform our lives because we’re embracing, welcoming emotions:

• Decision making

• Stopping the patterns

• Increase of connection”

A note on trauma:

“When we experience a trauma, we weren’t allowed or didn’t feel something because it was too intense at the moment, so we keep repeating patterns to get back to homeostasis and feel it.”

“If a mouse is being shocked and can’t run away, it will numb itself.”

Emotion Inquiry Audio on SoundCloud

The Ironic Algorithm

Joe calls this the Golden Algorithm—I call it the ironic algorithm:

We create the feeling we’re trying to avoid in the way we’re trying to avoid it. 

To know what emotion you’re trying to avoid, look at the one you’re inadvertently creating.

I was scared to feel like a failure so I didn’t try, then felt like a failure. 

I tried to avoid feeling lonely by traveling, then felt lonely while traveling. 

I didn’t want to feel angry so I suppressed my anger, then acted passive-aggressive.

I didn’t want to feel out of control so I flailed and felt out of control. 

This one is a classic:

I didn’t want to feel like shit (disconnected, anxious, pain) so I drank and did drugs…then felt like shit

It can be horrifying to see the matrix that’s been driving your behavior for decades. 

Update: The trick here is to allow the emotions, in VIEW, to stop inadverantly creating it. One way or another we experience the emotion we’re avoiding, either resisted or unresisted. Emotions feel different unresisted. For example, when I coached mountain biking, clients would get scared (rightfully so)—we would allow that emotional stimulation and suddenly it was no longer fear, it was excitement. The Great Decisions course is that on a larger that on a larger scale—clarity through emotional fluidity and admitting to the reality of the situation.

Principles

Behaving from principles automates decision-making. What are the five principles that would ensure success and make decision-making easier?

Principles I’m experimenting with:

• Go outside 

• Embrace intensity 

• Think long term 

• Be in my power (breathe)

• Don’t do what I don’t actually want to do 

• Set my frequency

If I live by these principles am I guaranteed success? The only way to know for sure is to go find out and adjust accordingly.

Update: Reflecting on this one year later, I’ve crossed out two that I don’t feel serve me as much as the others.

Clarity Hacks for Decision-Making

“Find the right problem statement: the right question to make the decision around. Then find the criteria to let you know you’ve found the solution”

Exercises:

“What’s the next most obvious thing?” … “Then what’s the next most obvious thing?”

“What do you know about this decision?”... “What don’t you know about this decision?”

“What’s the next thing you need to know?” … “And after that?”

Joe says, “When you’re in a decision, you’re already in fear.” When I’m not feeling good about a decision, it’s usually becuase there’s more I need to know. What are the details, what is the plan? I ask the right questions, get some answers, and the decision gets made on it’s one.

There’s a speaking from empowerment exercise to “access the part of you that’s not afraid” and “understand the somatic state that has an increased likelihood to make good decisions”. It’s a guided audio meditation which is available to people who have purchased the Decisions Course.

Wisdom Nuggets from Joe

“How" or “What” questions are more useful than “Why” questions—which often sound accusatory.

Why did you do that? → How did that benefit you?

Aren’t I right? → How much does that feel true?

Update: This has been such a hack for me over the past year—simply replacing “Why” with How or What.

Why don’t you… → How much would you enjoy, or, What be the reasons to, or, How much sense would it make to…

How would it be possible to read more of my work?

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Joe once suggested that when you’re talking to someone, keep fifty percent of your attention one inch below your belly button. I tried it. It helped reduce the friction I’ve felt in interacting with other humans. It helps you stay grounded in your body.

Joe also said that keeping 10% of your attention in your body at all times yields profound change. I tried that too. Keeping some attention on my body lets me see when I’m clenching my gut. It helps me breathe deeper and relax into the moment. 

A “should” is two desires in competition. “I want to follow my passion and I want to please my parents” becomes “I should become an accountant.” 

“I should get out of bed” is “I want to stay in bed and I want to get up.” It feels good to acknowledge reality.

Joe said on an coaching call: “Just admit to the reality of the situation.” That line still echos in my head. “Admitting to Reality” could be a book or blog.

Anger Pop-Ups

This is one of the crazier parts of the course. People gather in a small group on a zoom call and take turns screaming while the others observe. The rules are no hitting and no directing anger toward someone on the call other than the facilitator. The facilitator’s job is to help the participant be angry in a safe way. 

The lesson for the mindbody system is that anger can be safe. 

There was a person in my group who had done this before. He went first, moving his anger. He began screaming. Almost immediately, my hands covered my face. Someone else on the call did the same. 

I felt even more uncomfortable around an angry female. I know the reasons why. How much of my behavior has been driven by avoidance of this discomfort? The way to change is to embrace the discomfort. 

I took my turn. It was difficult. In the past, I’ve been afraid of my own anger. Afraid of my rage. It was a new experience for me to experience it safely with others. The lesson for my system was that anger can be safe. It’s difficult to know how much it changed me. I do know I’d like to do it again.

Conclusuion

People will take the same AoA course multiple times because the course is less about data/algorithms and more about experiencing emotions and participating in exercises that teach something new each time.

It’s an emotions gym.

Every now and then I feel like My life just changed. I got that feeling when I committed to doing this course. I was right. Sometimes I think of my life as pre-AoA and post-AoA. It feels like jumped from one branch to a larger one, in the tree of possible outcomes.

$300 off the AoA’s Connection Course with code CCOUTCOMES (no affiliate kickback).

Congratulations! You made it to the end (:

Subscribe now

An new version of my book, All Outcome Are Acceptable is on Amazon. It includes the best stories from my life. One reader described it as “Absurd. Blatant. Truth 1 millimeter from your face. I feel like I’ve been slapped around a bit.”

Links

All Outcomes Are Acceptable - My first book on Amazon

CrowdHealth - alternative to health insurance (Affiliate link) Discount code BIGWIN

Pathless Path online community

Joe Hudson’s Connection Course $300 discount Code: CCOUTCOMES

Videos and podcasts on YouTube.

Song

Bonus - Notes on the April 1 Rapid Coaching Call

I machine gunned 1700 notes into my Notes app as Joe Hudson coached people on the zoom call. It felt like damn near everything he said I had to write down.

“It doesn’t matter what I stay

It matters what experiment s can you run”

“My path was deconstruct every narrative and be in the unsettling place you are now

Most nondual traditions speak to that

Every narrative has some truth and some untruth”

“How much of OCD was trying to maintain control in an environment with someone abusive?”

As you relieve the OCD you confront the fighting in your head

Can’t win a war in your head

How do you stop fighting? Stop resisting

In that lack of fighting, there’s this tremendous amount of freedom and energy.

On Shoulding

“You’re not feeling, you’re spacing out

You’ve been avoiding aimlessness with “shoulds,” which reinforces aimlessness

The trick is to fall in love with aimlessness

I am dedicated to building this business, being of service

I occupy my life with this

You occupy your life with shoulds

Both are probably as inconsequential as the other

I love aimlessness

I’ll drive around instead of drive to work all day long

You're talking, not feeling the aimlessness

“It makes me panic a bit”

What’s that core panic really about?

Let’s assume there’s no point. What makes that not freedom?

The panic is there, the depression is there, clearly, because there’s an idea that life has no meaning.

What’s wrong with seeing this existential fear as your freedom

What if it gets too bad and kill myself or something?

That seems to be what you’re doing. What if the purposelessness is actually freedom?

shoulds are repression of emotions

Without going to the past or the future what’s wrong with this right now?

You’re killing yourself

Alternatively you could just be yourself

Every time your pissed, your beating yourself up

If you move anger every day for a month, everything would change

I’ll make you a deal

I’ll make decisions course free if you move anger every day for a month

It’s gotta be out loud visceral anger

Move anger

Oh - and can’t make it a should

On Procrastination

How I get to the root of procrastination?

What are you procrastinating on?

[personal projects that make money, including a website]

Confluence of something like taking care of self, and money

Taking care of someone else?

Not a problem

What makes you not want to take care of yourself?

What’s the real fear?

Fear of success is fear of failure

But Working for someone else, all that shits not going through your head

Doing it for yourself, how does it feel?

If it was for your kid, how would it feel?

You procrastinate on things that make you feel like shit

If you had to do it perfectly, you’d stop doing it.

Great websites connect; they’re not perfect.

Perfectionism stops you from doing it, even starting

The only thing making it not fun is you think it’s important

Prove to all of us it’s important

If I don’t do it, I’ll be working for someone else and my income will be limited. Won’t have the income and lifestyle I want. I’ll be stuck

You are stuck

I know. For a long time

It’s so important that it makes you stuck

Which is worse - work for someone else or being under the yoke of a perfectionist

Ya wanna work for yourself? You gotta be a good boss

I gotta take the pressure off myself

That’s a way of putting pressure on yourself

Imagine how horrible I’d be if I needed to get a result

How do you just enjoy?

This moment right now?

You just did

I just appreciated I’m here, on this call

Make your work something lovely for you to do and you won’t procrastinate

Photos - April 2025

Thanks for reading, and have a great rest of your day.

You may have heard of CrowdHealth. It’s one of the fastest-growing startups in healthcare. In Solving Healthcare Part 1, I wrote about how it works and how the incentives differ from health insurance.

I was lucky enough to join CrowdHealth as a member in 2022. It entirely replaced health insurance for me. On average, I pay $155 / month. Insurance would be more than double that just for the premium. Then there would be a high deductible and a co-pay. With CrowdHealth, my average annual expenditure is 65-75% less, and I get services that I wouldn’t get with legacy insurance plans, like find-a-doctor and unlimited telehealth.

How the heck is this even possible?

I’ve been thinking about this for over a year, and talking with Andy, the CEO and founder. He told me about a member in Montana who accidentally shot himself and how they handled the bills—more on this incident later.

Three main things allow my CrowdHealth membership to be so much lighter on my wallet:

1. Health of our members (the crowd)

2. Self-pay, cash-pay pricing

3. Professional shopping and negotiating

Subscribe now

1: Health of the Crowd

CrowdHealth strives to make members healthy and keep them healthy because they are financially incentivized to do so—and also because they are good people. I’ve talked with a bunch of CrowdHealth employees over the years, and many members in the community telegram channel. Andy and the leadership have created a culture of actually caring about people’s wellbeing.

We are paying each other's healthcare bills. Healthier members means we all pay less because healthier people have less healthcare bills on average.

In Solving Healthcare Part 1, I discussed how America stumbled into a disastrous situation where health insurance companies are financially incentivized to cultivate a chronically ill population and exorbitant healthcare pricing.

Nobody in the CrowdHealth crowd is obese or a chronic smoker. It’s not allowed. 1 Unfortunately, the American health insurance system is loaded with fat people. Most of America is fat and sick. It’s crazy. It weighs heavily on the wallets of people paying into the insurance system.

I take care of myself. I don’t smoke or eat like crap. I’d rather not pay for people’s insane medical bills because they’re doing that stuff. I want to support people who are mindful of their health and do what they can to avoid preventable chronic illness.

I’m optimistic that removing out-in-the-open corruption from regulatory bodies, and re-aligning healthcare incentives will end the 50-year health decline, and actually reverse it, returning America to our former health greatness.

Insurance, sadly, doesn’t really care about the health of customers. One reason is because for them, there’s no money in it. The average policyholder switches insurance companies every 3-5 years. And in the end, it’s the federal government footing the bill when people go on Medicare fat, sick, and loaded with pricey prescription pills. Meanwhile, the insurance companies made a fortune from premiums and pill sales. It’s the big insurance companies who own the pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) who set the inflated drug prices. It’s dark stuff.

CrowdHealth emailed me a discount code for a DEXA scan - Dual Energy X-ray Absorptiometry. It’s fully crowd-fundable as a preventative care “quarterly special”. I went and did it and I was blown away. It was a 2-minute, full body scan that showed my distribution of fat and muscle, plus bone density.

My DEXA score was an A-.

A minus sign… I could hardly believe it.

Andy, the CEO, told me that CrowdHealth is working on implementing a system where members can submit health test results and receive discounts for having excellent health. I learned about DEXA scans, got a near-perfect score, and I’ll soon be saving money for it. That’s a triple win.

2: Self-Pay Cash-Pay Pricing

There’s a weird thing in healthcare (doctor visits, surgeries, pharma) where they charge different prices to different people. The main variable is whether or not you have insurance.

A friend of mine, who works in healthcare, thought people get better prices from providers by having insurance. The exact opposite is true. People get way worse prices because they have insurance. The industry standard to attempt charge insurance companies an absurd price for the healthcare they are buying for the policyholder. After I tell the provider, “I don’t have insurance,” the price is lowered substantially—every time. This is crazy.

But it makes sense…

I talked to a dietician whose team uses therapeutic ketogenic diets to treat a range of conditions, mainly psychiatric disorders—something the legacy health system is largely failing to help with. She told me that if they were to accept insurance, their small business would have to hire four additional people just to do the paperwork and deal with insurance companies.

Businesses want you to pay cash. They get the money immediately and there’s less work on their end. Self-pay cash-pay gets substantially lower prices.

Weirdly, insurance companies make more money from prices being high. I detail this in Part 1. The system is convoluted on purpose—“the margin is made in the mystery”.

With CrowdHealth, members get the self-pay cash-pay price, upload the receipt to the app, and get reimbursed by the crowd within weeks. If it’s a huge bill that is too big for a wallet or credit card, it can be funded before the bill is due, and sent directly to providers.

Unlike insurance, neither the crowd nor CrowdHealth makes more money if we pay more. CrowdHealth’s compensation is a monthly flat rate from members, to grow a healthy crowd and facilitate funding of legitimate, fair-market bills.

3: Professional Shopping and Negotiating

A big part of Crowd’s job is sourcing healthcare for members and negotiating big bills on our behalf.

One member, David, posted in Telegram that he got the discounted self-pay cash-pay price for an MRI. Then CrowdHealth got it EVEN LOWER by $700.

Boo yah, baby.

That’s less money out of my pocket. And ya know what that means? More 1 on 1 swing dancing lessons!

If there’s a big bill or an upcoming surgery, CrowdHealth sends in their pro negotiators.

They post their wins on their socials:

It’s messed up that the industry norm is for the healthcare business people to attempt to charge exorbitant prices. These huge numbers get thrown around and contribute to the perception that health insurance is reasonably priced, and an absolute necessity, because if anything substantial happens it’ll be a million-dollar bill!

The guy who shot himself

A CrowdHealth member was fly-fishing in Montana (boo yah, baby). He got a big fish on the line. During the battle, his revolver fell from his holster, landed on a rock and shot him!

The bullet bounced around inside him, destroying his organs.

Green stuff oozed from his chest.

“Dude, I’m dead,” he said.

Sad!

But no, he didn’t die!

The helicopter got him out.

He woke up from a three-day coma, and they handed him a $1 million bill.

“Holy f*ck,” he said.

Just kidding, CrowdHealth handled it. The negotiating team got the bill down to $250,000.

You know what that means?

More swing dance, baby! Let’s goo!!!

Like everyone else in the crowd, the guy who shot himself paid the first $500 for his medical bills, and the crowd covered the rest.

I tell a lot of people about CrowdHealth. The most common question I get is, Can it cover a huge bill?

The answer is yes, easily.

The Crowd team estimated the man’s approximate total bill and collected the funding over multiple months. The money was ready to go before the bill even arrived.

Boo yah, baby.

The future is here, it’s just not evenly distributed

CrowdHealth is obviously the future. It’s a better service at a way better price.

I’ve been investing in businesses for a decade, constantly looking for incredible, underappreciated products and services. This is one of those ultra-rare, once-in-a-decade companies, where an entire industry that’s been failing us for fifty bloody years is beginning to dwindle, as a superior parallel healthcare system emerges.

Realigning incentives so that regular people have more capital and options is critical for solving the healthcare problem, and increasing swing dancing per capita.

Thanks for reading, and have a great rest of your day. Join CrowdHealth (affiliate link). My referral code is BIGWIN.

Subscribe now

Related Readings

a wrote a story of how people in the health insurance system did their damndest to scam her. She’s fighting back, as we must, to end this nonsense and criminality.

Time Magazine Story about Crowdhealth: They Hated Health Insurance. So They Started Paying For Each Other’s Care

Podcast: Ex-Pharma Rep: It's Way More Corrupt Than You Think - Brigham Buhler Chris and Brigham suggest that healthcare would be better if it wasn’t for-profit. But if the incentives are aligned, then for-profit is no longer a concern, it’s a benefit, as we see with the CrowdHealth crowdfunding model.

Links

My book All Outcomes Are Acceptable on Amazon

Join CrowdHealth (Affiliate link) Discount code BIGWIN

Join Pathless Path

Free writing gym

Songs

As usual, I’ve been doing many things. I’m working on a season of podcast episodes I’m excited to share in the coming weeks.

I’ve been going hard in finance and investing for the past few months, paying close attention to the businesses I own, the macro-environment, and making changes to my portfolio. Naturally, I wrote and shared three essays about finance.

I’ve also been working as a writing coach, helping people tell their stories, go deeper, and share with the world. It’s been great. I love it. I often find it easier and more rewarding to help others than to help myself.

A friend told me that he invested in a company, and it went to the moon. I forwarded him intel that suggested it could be a good time to consider selling that company’s shares. He sold, and it crashed.

At a party, we talked at length about finance. He asked me, Can I just pay you to teach me what I need to know about investing?

I said, Yeah, we could do that.

I’ve been working as a coach for five years. First in skiing, then mountain biking, then writing coaching.

It took about two hours to create V1 of wealth coaching.

We launched today. It went great. He went from not knowing what market cap means to grasping the relationship between P/E ratio and interest rates, in about an hour. These are fundamental requirements for being a successful investor. The next step is to take action to internalize how these concepts help us never lose money, which is rule number 1.

Years ago I took a college finance class taught that risk is volatility, but it’s more useful to think of risk as not knowing what you’re doing. Increasing knowledge, doing due diligence, decreases risk.

I told two people what I’m up to in regard to wealth coaching, and both indicated interest in signing up. It occurred to me that skiing, mountain biking, and writing coaching are nice-to-haves. Wealth is more of a need-to-have.

It’s sort of silly that I didn’t think to do this earlier. But, I finally feel I’m ready for it, after 9 years in the finance arena.

Back in business school, I was less than impressed with the finance classes. I struggled to find other students as interested in investing in businesses as I was. I created a video course on investing in businesses, and gave it to one of my classmates for free. He completed the course and thanked me for it. I then graduated early and went into ski coaching and building solar roofs for Tesla, among other things.

At the end of the first wealth coaching session, the client asked if I had any homework for him. I suggested things including creating a spreadsheet overview of his financial situation. Afterward, I remembered the video course that I made 6 years earlier. I searched my drive, and there it was, still as relevant as ever.

That’s basically how you start a business with trying, grinding, or advertising. Help people until they ask to pay you.

Financial education is generally abysmal. This friend/coaching client went to “good” schools for 20 years and is a math teacher. Somehow no one told him essential information about wealth creation. It’s weird that financial illiteracy has been normalized. The education gap is a main driver of the increasing wealth gap.

I’m happy to share what I’ve learned and help people never lose money.

Coaching is underrated. The generation above me has internalized the value of coaching for sports, but not for other things like health, wealth, relationships or creating.

I think the demand for coaching will grow.

Schools are a not teaching what we need to be healthy, wealthy, and well. Legacy credentialed professionals are in short supply, expensive, and not as useful as you’d think. Coaches are part of the solution.

It’s late now, and I have late-winter snow to get up early for.

God bless, and have a great rest of your day.

Music

Recently, I’ve been thinking about three investments: Tesla, Amazon, and Carvana (short). DeepThink was able to come up with fair valuations for each company and show its work. All three valuations were similar to mine.

I asked Google’s Gemini AI to do it. It said, Nope. Not gonna happen, buddy.

providing a precise "fair valuation" for Tesla is inherently difficult.

There's no single "fair" valuation for Tesla.

It is very important to conduct your own due diligence before making any investment decisions.

I hope this helps.

It doesn’t.

ChatGPT got its math wrong, and begged me not to use it for financial advice.

DeepSeek, Claude, and Grok 3 all performed well.

DeepSeek is the most viral thing to come out of China since covid. I don’t know how many child workers and Foxconn nets were required to make it, I hope less than my phone.

AI is already useful for doing due diligence, valuing companies, and building a portfolio. And today is the worst AI will ever be.

A few months ago I took a Waymo driverless taxi. I was amazed how quickly it gained my trust. After 15 minutes, I decided I prefer AI robotaxi over human controlled taxi. I think many people will be surprised by how quickly we choose to trust machines more than other humans. We already trust Google more than our neighbor.

I think this trend will continue, not just for taxi drivers, but doctors, lawyers, real estate agents, and money managers too.

In driving, the AI’s progression went like this: Assistant → Supervised self-driving → Unsupervised self-driving.

First, the AI is a student, then assistant, then executing supervised, then executing unsupervised and owned by a human. Then potentially executing autonomously, unsupervised, as a sovereign entity. I think sovereign AI Agents will first come from AI equipped people dying and leaving behind sovereign agents. Also they could come from people birthing sovereign agents just for fun and/or to increase their power.

What a time to be alive.

Top performers are now AI-assisted humans. Eventually, top performers will approach pure AI. There could be human wrappers, like a customer-facing human, for marketing purposes. But eventually, people won’t care whether there’s a human wrapper or not.

Any fund manager would have to be an idiot not to include digital superintelligence on their team. DeepThink R1 already does more unbiased critical thinking than most human analysts I know, and we are in the early days.

Autonomous AI Agents

In the next decade, a nonzero number of people will die and leave their wealth in the hands of an AI agent to execute on their directives, and even evolve the directives over time given new information.

This is a potential point for conflict between carbon-based and silicon-based intelligences.

The capital is with the dead person’s Agent, but a human is pissed off because it expected a big inheritance. Now it’s human vs AI in a fight for the keys to the capital. But of course, the disgruntled human has an Agent to go after the Agent.

When will we see the first lawsuit against an Agent?

Claude.ai thinks in 1-3 years.

The lawsuit would likely name both the AI system itself (as a novel legal entity) and the company that created it as defendants, raising complex questions about liability distribution between creators, operators, and the autonomous system itself.

How does an AI System show up to court? I guess we’ll see.

Capital Follows Intelligence

The ratio of biological to digital compute is changing fast. Digital compute, AI, is growing much faster than organic intelligence (collective human brain power), which due to low and declining birth rates, is flat and on the verge of shrinking.

Capital follows intelligence, energy, and integrity. Over time, capital will flow into the servers of digital superintelligence. Far more will flow to AI than from AI back to humans.

Right now, humans have all the money. But I’d wager that in my lifetime, much of it shifts into the control of silicon/digital/artificial intelligence. This could have unexpected, unintended effects.

Wealth comes from technology and investing in it. The way to get rich, without getting lucky or stealing, is by owning businesses. The quickest way to own a business is to invest in a business. The quickest way to do that is public equities.

“Stocks,” they say. I like to say, I don’t buy stocks, I buy businesses.

I started investing the week I turned 18. Nine years later, I’ve done very well, substantially outperforming index funds. But nine years is a small sample size.

How do I continue my success in a world with AI?

Codify what has worked, and employ digital intelligence to help me.

Investing is hard. Few people beat the index funds over the long term. I wouldn’t have had the success I had if it weren’t for other independent analysts sharing their work on YouTube and X. But humans are biased. We love wishful thinking, which is believing something is true because we want it to be true. We can get caught up in echo chambers.

I’m consulting with DeepSeek DeepThink R1, Claude, and/or Grok 3 on all major investment decisions. Subscribe to stay updated on new AI insights and my investments.

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I’m testing LLMs by prompting to come up with fair valuations for three companies I already know a lot about: Tesla, Amazon, and Carvana (short).

I first did this with DeepSeek. It showed it’s work. I was impressed by its logic, reasoning, and competence across multiple valuation methodologies including DCF, comparables, and sum of the parts. I can work with it, and check its work because I’m familiar with valuation methodologies and finance jargon.

The LLMs' level of thinking in some areas is stronger than mine, and it’s doing work I’m often be too lazy or distracted to do. It’s a complimentary intelligence, on tap 24/7, for free.

Prompts I’ve used:

• Come up with fair valuation for X company

• Assume X% growth rate of revenue/free cash flow/net income. Use Y% as terminal growth rate after year X

• What is a fair valuation for 2025 and 2030

• Now consider a scenario with a mild recession in 2025-2026

• This is the recent Q4 data: X revenue, Y Net income. Come up with a fair valuation using sum of the parts, do a DCF for each part

• What is the present value of Tesla’s Optimus program assuming they deliver X units in 2030

It’s worth noting that it makes mistakes, uses ridiculous numbers, and cannot be trusted.

BUFFET.AI

I am a Buffet-Munger Style of investor.

That means evaluate many investment opportunities, and make one investment per year, or do nothing. Identify wonderful companies, buy at or below a reasonable fair price, hold for decades, and do periodic check-ins to make sure they are still wonderful. It’s an extreme amount of thinking per trade.

Early BuffetBot Gets The Dollars

The best investors are smart, disciplined, focused, patient, self-aware, and honest. Lousy investors gets caught up in the noise. They are impulsive, impatient, and act on hubris, greed, fear. They take risk, which is not knowing what you’re doing. They don’t even know much they don’t know.

Digital intelligence has a huge advantage: It doesn’t rest on top of a primal limbic system that experience or act from these dangerous emotions and biases. It can just do the work, analyzing thousands of investment opportunities, looking for substantial discrepancies between reasonable valuations and market prices.

Market inefficiency refers to volatility, where valuations deviate substantially from fundamentals like earnings (profits for shareholders). I think inefficiency comes from stupidity, bias, wishful thinking, gambling, margin calls, groupthink, mania, FOMO, media manipulation, and so on. Everything humans are good at.

AI analysts/advisors/money managers could make markets more efficient because high quality intelligence on tap democratizes high quality thinking. It’s possible less investment decisions will be rooted in emotionality, ignorance, and wishful thinking.

If capital shifting to digital intelligence stewardship reduces inefficiency, then markets may be the most innefficient they’ll ever be, right now. Since great investors capitalize on the mispricing of assets, early adopters will of AI for investing could benefit the most.

Ask the AI

I think the best investors reason from first principles, which is boiling things down to fundamental truths and reasoning from there. This is hard.

Can AI reason from first-principles?

The LLM says no, not yet. But I don’t see any law of physics that says it can’t.

From Claude:

The most advanced AI systems today (including large language models like myself) excel at recombining knowledge in novel ways and following chains of reasoning, but we lack the genuine curiosity, conceptual understanding, and creative insight that characterizes the most profound human first-principles thinking.

I think a barometer for how smart AI is vs humans is how much capital is under the stewardship of each. Right now, humans are winning, by a lot.

I asked Claude, If capital follows intelligence, and humans aren't getting smarter, and AIs are getting smarter, then will capital flow into the stewardship of AI?

The question about capital flowing to AI stewardship depends on several factors:

1. AI systems aren't autonomous economic agents (yet) - they're tools owned and controlled by humans or human organizations. Capital currently flows to the human enterprises that effectively deploy AI, not to AI systems themselves.

2. Decision-making authority versus advisory roles - AI systems are increasingly valuable for analysis and recommendations, but final decisions about capital allocation still rest with humans in virtually all contexts.

3. Potential future developments - As AI systems become more capable, we might see novel arrangements where AI has greater autonomy in certain bounded domains.

The more likely near-term scenario is that capital will flow to human organizations that most effectively integrate AI capabilities into their decision-making processes, rather than AI systems themselves becoming independent stewards of capital.

I agree. It’ll be a few years before DeepThrill R69 is autonomously managing money. For now, DeepThrill, Claude, and Grok work for me. They are the personal analysts and advisors I’ve been looking for, for a decade.

The challenge now more than ever is having the right questions to ask. I’m blessed to have more questions than answers and digital superintelligence on tap.

Thanks for reading, and have a great rest of your day.

Tesla Update

In January 2024, I made a video where I predicted Tesla would be valued at $4 trillion in 2029. Since then, things have changed. Elon is working at the White House, not the Tesla factories, and does not have a compensation plan with Tesla. Full list of changes and analsyis here. If Elon circles back to working hard for Tesla, and the team executes well, I think Tesla could reach a $2 trillion market cap in 2029. This is a low-confidence and optimistic prediction. I have sold the majority of my Tesla shares. I sold in January at $432.10. The price is now under $300.

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Song

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I’ve noticed there is a conflation between paper net worth and consumption, and a misconception that the pie is fixed.

This combo of falsehoods makes people angry.

These dang billionaires are hogging all the pie!

But really, more often than not, they created a massive pie, and they are not even eating it.

Thank you billionaires.

Thank you Jeff, for Amazon Prime.

Thank you Elon, for electric cars with self-driving features, and rockets and tunnels and satellite internet and paypal and neuralinks and all the other stuff.

Thank you Bill, for the world’s worst computer operating system.

Thank you Larry, for Google Docs and Gmail and Chrome and the list goes on.

Thank you to the women billionaires too. I can’t think of any right now but I’m sure they are out there.

Thank you also to the multi-millionaires, who also took risk and worked hard. Not all of them, but most of them.

Thank you to all the people who are doing legitimate useful labor, instead of just consuming.

I think and write, allocate capital and coach people. It’s useful but pales in comparison to the work of a billionaire, or a mother or father.

Billionaires don’t actually consume much. And they don’t actually have billions of dollars.

Can you imagine having 100 billion dollars? That’s so much money!

That’s not actually what they have. They own company equity that is in theory worth that much. But as soon as they start selling their equity for dollars, the market price of said equity goes down. They also pay a massive amount in taxes if they sell [and don’t use loopholes].

So, often, instead of selling their shares, our beloved billionaires use their equity as collateral and borrow money via a margin loan.

This avoids taxes, devaluing their company, and they retain control of their organization.

But we want billionaires money to go to the government! Tax the rich!

Really? We want the bloated bureaucratic government to have more money, and the useful people to have less money?

But the deficit! The billionaires need to pay off the federal government’s debt!

The feds need to stop overspending. It’s actually really simple.

Even if you took all the wealth from all the billionaires, it still wouldn’t pay off the national debt.

But the billionaires are still hogging all the wealth!

It’s reported that the top 1% of America owns 30% of the wealth, $40+ trillion. That’s wild. Imagine one person owned 30% of a town. Seems like a lot, even if that person did a lot to build the town.

Generally America’s billionaires are people creating wealth. As they created billions of dollars of value, they created thousands of millionaires as well. The path to wealth is owning businesses. One way to own great businesses is buying them through the stock market.

My friend in college thought there is only so much money. I explained that’s not the case. Money in an abstraction layered atop Goods and Services - the real wealth. And that is unlimited.

There are unlimited resources. UNLIMITED.

New knowledge and new technology allows us to do more and create more resources. There is no limit on knowledge, technology, and resource generation. Almost all of the growth of human wealth, the availability of products and services, is thanks to technologies. This is why I invest in the inventors of new technologies.

I was skiing in -10 weather. A nice woman gave me her toe warmers. Little bags filled with dust that stay warm, despite it being -10. That’s an amazing technology.

Tech is not just electronics. It’s also chemistry, simple machines, and even programs like the US Constitution, and therapeutic practices like yoga and breath work.

Technology unlocks human potential, expands our ability to create. We can always do more with the hand god dealt us, thanks to our ability to use and create new technologies.

The availability of resources is determined by our level of technology, and that level knows no bounds.

Billionaires of today are the creators of tech companies.

An actual shitty situation, which I think people think we are in, would be if billionaires got their wealth from stealing it, then go around hyper consuming goods and services. Like buying food and not eating it, flying around the world skiing and partying, building houses no one lives in.

It’s true, billionaires have more food and bigger houses and do more flying than the poors. But that additional consumption is water under the bridge in the grand scheme. And anyway, they earned it.

Almost all billionaires in America get their money from working their butts off. Billionaires love to work. They can’t stop. They spend their days trying to be useful because that’s what makes humans feel good.

God bless our billionaires, and god bless America.

Have a great rest of your day.

And get “billionaire” out of the pejorative.

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If you like this story, you’ll probably like my book, All Outcomes Are Acceptable. Readers are loving it.

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My favorite investing platform is Public.

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Bonus:

Paper Net Worth, Sesame Street for Iraq, DOGE, Bring in Big Balls

If I have 1 million jelly beans, and John buys a jelly bean from Dan for $1, am I worth $1 million?

Some would say so. But really no, because I can’t sell my jelly beans and get a million dollars. But this is the logic used when people say how much money billionaires have.

Some people think Elon Musk has $300 billion in cash in a bank account. But really it’s tied up in the shares of the many companies he helped build.

There is an entity consuming billions upon billions every year. The US Federal Government is a trillionaire. And it’s not from creating more pie, it’s from taking it from taxpayers.

The government spends trillions of dollars every year on consumption, and things very few people want. Wars, DEI, gender programs, and many things we don’t even know about. There’s been a transfer of wealth from value creating taxpayers to parasitic rent-seeking fools. I paid the Feds tens of thousands of dollars. They spent it on Sesame Street for Iraq, projects at the Wuhan virus lab, and endless other crap that got us nothing.

Recently, wealth creating billionaires have taken over the federal government and are reversing the addiction to wasting taxpayer dollars, overspending, and fast-tracking the country to bankruptcy. The script has been flipped. Instead of value creators serving a wasteful and retarded government, the government is now seeking to serve the people.

The beauty of capitalism is it’s a game to create something other people want.

Long live value creators.

Bring in Big Balls

Elon Musk hired 19-year-old engineer and former Neuralink employee, Edward Coristine, to work for DOGE, the Department of Government Efficiency, created by Elon and President Trump. Edward’s internet name used to be Big Balls. Legacy media eating it up.

This is a video montage of legacy media investigating Big Balls.

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Boston libraries

I sold my Tesla Model Y and 75% of my TSLA shares.

When I bought my first Tesla five years ago, I was all-in on the stock. Back then, people would ask me, Who makes Teslas?

I would say, Tesla.

They would say, Who owns Tesla?

And I would say, Me.

Much has changed. Everyone knows about Tesla. The cars are everywhere, and the company valuation is around 1.4 Trillion. I’m stoked. It was a big success.

Now people asking, Why did you sell your Tesla?

1. I wanted to try no car life. Lasted a month.

2. I switched apartments and no longer have home charging. Supercharging costs more than gas and it’s a nontrivial time commitment.

3. Teslas are depreciating a lot.

4. The product got worse. They turned on the internal cabin camera to watch my eyes and beep at me if I didn’t monitor the car while self-driving was engaged. If I did not comply, the car would slow down and stop and suspend me for 1 week from using the self-driving features. The days of self-driving around America eating, sleeping, and watching movies are over.

5. Costly. I was chewing through thousand dollar sets of tires. Teslas are heavy and have high torque, and eat tires for breakfast. Plus, I got two flats last year, which wasn’t cheap. Tires, insurance, taxes, and supercharging makes Tesla ownership more expensive than I’d like, considering I would only get 200 miles of range in the winter.

The truth is, I don’t give a shit about electric vehicles.

I bought two Teslas for the same big reason I’ve purchased five iPhones. The software experience is the best. Tesla autopilot was, and still is, an amazing feature. But the gap between Tesla and legacy auto has narrowed.

Legacy automakers copied Tesla’s superior software experience, as best they could, adding a larger touch screen, Apple/Android CarPlay, variations of autopilot, and a useful smartphone app. It’s not as good, but it is competitive.

To me, it’s worth it to pay 50% more to get an iPhone. It’s only a few hundred dollars more. But for cars, 50% more is like $15,000+. It doesn’t seem worth it now, and/or people just don’t have the money.

I sold my Tesla, traveled for a bit, enjoyed taking the T around Boston for a week, then found a great deal on a hybrid through a friend. I filled my car with gas for the first time in over 5 years, adding 400 miles of range in 90 seconds. It felt like a huge upgrade compared to 200 miles of range in 20 minutes. What’s more, I sold my Model Y for $25k and bought the hybrid for $12k.

I’m happy.

Teslas have depreciated a lot and I think it will continue. I’m seeing long-range Model 3s, great condition, low mileage, selling for around $20k. Three years ago, I sold that exact car to CarMax for $48k.

My dad, who used to drive a Model 3, bought a 2025 hybrid Camry.

My mom, who has a Model 3, said she can’t get anyone on the phone at Tesla to help her service her car, and she’s trading her Tesla for a hybrid Toyota RAV4.

Meanwhile, the TSLA stock price has doubled over the past 5 months.

In zero-interest-rate 2021, the stock went on a manic rampage to $420. I didn’t sell any shares. I borrowed money to pay expenses and make more investments.

I watched my portfolio fluctuate wildly, then drop 80% in Fall 2022. Because of the margin debt I accumulated, I almost lost everything. The small amount of discipline I had to not go completely crazy with borrowing saved me from bankruptcy. Some of it was just luck.

Now, despite a poor outlook for Tesla’s auto business and uncertainty in the robotaxi and humanoid robot projects, the stock is back on another manic rampage to the moon.

I feel like God gave me a second chance to do things differently.

Over the years, I’ve motivated a few close friends to also invest in Tesla. I texted them the update:

Sold my Tesla shares for $420.69

Not joking

Also sold my Tesla

Friend 1: Taxes next year bout to go crazy

Friend 2: Should I dump mine for that too lol

I’m seeing delusion at an all time high among Tesla bull accounts

One person told me there’s no way the stock drops below $400 😂

I’ll considering buying back under $250.

The robotaxi thing is taking longer that we thought

Feeling rly grateful the price doubled for us

On Instagram, I DM’d a TSLA uberbull about the stock price

Richard: No chance won’t go below 400 ever again

Me: Would you put money on that?

Rich: I have ~60k in calls on the line

Me: Nice. I’d make a bet it drops below $400 in 2025

Rich: 100 push ups it won’t, I’ll send a video

Also what’s your reasoning for it dropping below 400? I’m curious

Me: The short answer: What would make you think that the most volatile stock in the game couldn't drop 10%?

I sent a longer answer too, full message here. My favorite paragraph:

From a customer’s perspective, I am not happy with the total cost of ownership or the current FSD user experience. Supercharging is more than gas with an efficient vehicle. Teslas chew through expensive tires for breakfast. The FSD films your fucking face and beeps if you blink.

I sold a big chunk of my shares at $420.69, then another chunk on 1/18, for $432.10. If the stock price continues rising rapidly without merit, I have more shares to sell.

A trillion dollars of valuation is riding on Robotaxi and Optimus. Two products that are generating $0 in revenue and no earnings. I’m betting that these projects don’t deliver accelerating earnings in the near future.

If I’m right, I think there will be an opportunity to invest in Tesla at a substantially lower valuation, a handful of years before the launch and scale of two of the most significant products ever. I wrote about this in Tesla AI.

It’s a weird trade because I believe the company is likely to experience extreme growth over the next 10 years, but decline substantially over the next 18 months. I could do nothing and just hold. But instead, I sold the majority of my shares.

All outcomes are acceptable. The stock goes up, great. The stock goes down, great.

A week after the Instagram convo, the TSLA share price dropped below $400 and I won the bet. I asked Richard if he’s done his push-ups.

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How I’m spending and investing

I buy a lot of stuff on Amazon, including this MacBook Air I’m typing on. Yesterday, I couldn’t find a supplement at the store, so I bought it on Amazon, free shipping, and it was at my house five hours later. I could even track the driver as he drove it to me.

I’m accumulating more Amazon shares this year. The ecommerce business is incredible, but it’s Amazon Web Services and its position to benefit from AI that has me most excited. I like what I’ve heard so far from CEO Andy Jassy. He seems like a smart, balanced, forward-looking innovator.

I’m still deciding what I think is a fair valuation for the entire company. Reading Amazon’s 1997 letter to shareholders, it strikes me that even today, almost 30 years later, we are in the early years of computing, the internet, cloud computing, AI, and robotics. I think the winners in these industries will continue winning.

Amazon and Tesla are the only companies I own. The majority of my portfolio is in high-yield savings with my brokerage, Public. It feels good to earn 4.1% on cash, waiting patiently for great buying opportunities.

I laughed at Bezos and Musk, the founders of my two investments, standing together at President Trump’s second inauguration.

I sold your car and your stock, Elon, but thanks for making me rich.

Thanks for same-day delivery, Jeff.

Love you both.

Subprime Loan Debacle Incoming

During the 2020 lockdowns, I read a report from Hindenburg Research on fraudulent EV company, Nikola. I still laugh at the name. Trevor Milton, the fraudster founder, rolled a semi truck down a hill pretending it was a self-driving EV. He eventually went to jail.

A week ago, a Tesla analyst brought to my attention Hindenburg’s latest investigation: Carvana: A Father-Son Accounting Grift For The Ages

Initially, only read the part about the auto market at large, because it pertains to Tesla. But I’m glad went back and read the entire thing because it’s a remarkable story of a convicted felon collaborating with his son to do clever business tricks, profit billions, and screw over banks, customers, and soon shareholders. The felon father, Ernest Garcia II, is now the richest man in Arizona.

I decided to see for myself.

On the Carvana website, I clicked on a $30k car. I gave them my name, address, and made up a fake number of $40,000 annual income. Seconds later I was approved for a $30,000 loan with $290 down, $600/month for 78 months at 12.75% interest. They did not check my credit. I made up the salary. They assume the applicant is honest and doesn’t experience a drop in income. A $600/month is more than double a reasonable car payment for someone living on $40,000 / year.

A section of the Hindenburg report:

Repossessions are nearing an all-time high. The party is coming to an end.

Carvana is due to start paying massive interest payments on their debt starting in February.

On January 17, Carvana was trading at a $48 billion valuation and 25k Price/Earnings ratio. The share price is up from $4, two years ago, to $230.

I will likely short Carvana stock, just for the hell of it and the life experience. If I make a profit, I will give away ten percent to people who inspire me/people in difficult situations.

Have a great rest of your day.

New Song from Mac!

Affiliates:

If you like this story, you might like my book, All Outcomes Are Acceptable. It’s about true wealth, AI drone battles, Amish people, and beating up my roommate. Readers are loving it.

I’m a member of CrowdHealth, a superior version of health insurance, at a better price. They helped me out a lot. Join here.

My favorite investing platform is Public.

Photos from Arizona

I didn’t realize it until reflecting: this year was unbelievable. I saw a total solar eclipse, I helped build a beautiful in-person community, 400 people joined my email list, I published a paperback book, it sold a bunch of copies and got great reviews.

I attended a best friend's wedding, and the bachelor party of another friend.

My cousin gave birth to a baby boy.

I hosted a tech-free retreat weekend at lake house in New Hampshire with creators and entrepreneurs.

I realized massive profits from tech investments.

I launched a writing coaching service, collaborating with writers to create books and essays that readers love.

Revenue from my businesses grow substantially.

Adventures

I traveled in Peru, Spain, and Costa Rica.

I visited Oregon, Colorado, Texas, and explored northern New Hampshire and Maine.

I solo summitted the tallest mountain in the northeast.

I took a driverless robotaxi around Austin, Texas with

I completed three game-changing online courses:

• Great Decisions with Joe Hudson

• Connections with Joe Hudson

• Nervous System Mastery with Jonny Miller

I started the Chris James Podcast for conversations with creators, entrepreneurs, and health experts. We recorded 12 episodes.

I interviewed a homeless 26-year-old and realized my second book, Keep Going, had started writing itself. I’ll ship early copies to beta readers in 2025. Comment if you want one.

I got to experience appendicitis, E. Coli, an episode of anxiety, severe back spasms, tinnitus, and other fun stuff.

I forged friendships with people who I will love until I’m dead.

I’ve never been more excited to keep going.

Reflecting Forward

Tripling down on

1. Health

2. Relationships

3. The great work of my life

Things I will do

• Experiment with nutrition, try a keto diet for a 2+ months

• Experiment with NAD patches

• Reduce phone scrolling and increase long-form book reading

• Promote my first book, All Outcomes, on more podcasts

• Go on more dates, hopefully with the same woman

• Host another retreat, True Wealth Weekend, for creators and entrepreneurs. Join the waitlist for more information.

Drafts in the works for 2025:

• Added Sugar: The drug we swim in and products to get off it

• What I learned from Nervous System Mastery

• Solving the Dating Problem 3

• Solving Healthcare 2

• Book Writing Process 2

• Keep Going book draft

• 21-year-old brilliant writer is publishing a book about her life and college experiences

Top photos from 2024

Croissants in Barcelona with

I have no idea what I did to deserve this life.

Thank you so much.

2024 Essay Superlatives

Most views (1,070):

Highest Open Rate (45%):

Most Comments [44] and Most “Likes” [41]:

Second most likes [39]

Notable mention:

Have a great rest of your day.

I’m a big fan of his startup, which offers a replacement for health insurance. I haven’t felt this way about a young company since I found Tesla, 9 years ago. It feels like the Tesla of healthcare. A fundamentally different, superior product (at least for me), at a superior price. Growing fast. Changing the game.

“When I saw Tesla,” I told Andy, “I saw how disruptive it would be. I thought they’d kill Elon.”

“Dude, the UnitedHealthcare guy got taken out. Did you see that?”

“No, I didn’t see that.”

“You didn’t see that?”

“I’ve been busy.”

“The CEO of UnitedHealthcare got gunned down in New York, like assassination style.”

“Wow,” I said. “They’re not going after you, I hope.”

Allegedly, Luigi Mangione murdered Brian Thompson, the CEO of UnitedHealthcare, an insurance company notorious for denying health insurance claims. Mangione is innocent until proven guilty.

I’ve never met anyone happy with the American health insurance system. I don’t think Luigi is, either.

But the bigger the problem, the bigger the opportunity.

I’ve never purchased health insurance, and I don’t think I ever will. It looks awful. Sky-high monthly fees, huge deductible, “co-pay”, and they often don’t want to pay for what you want or need to survive. Insurance companies deny 10-20% of claims.

I had insurance through Tesla, as an employee. Then I went self-employed and had nothing for a while. I called it the preventative care plan. In 2022, I heard about CrowdHealth when they sponsored ’s podcast. I talked on the phone with them for 45 minutes, and signed up.

18 months later, I was in a mountain biking accident and they funded my healthcare bills. Then again when I had a triple stomach infection. They connected me with amazing doctors [Shoutout to Boston Holistic]. I made friends with Andy, the CEO, and Taryn, my care advocate. And perhaps most importantly, I’m actually excited about the future of healthcare in America.

Luigi Mangione and I are the same age, born a month apart. We both went to top-rated schools, worked in tech, and traveled the world. Now, unfortunately, he is in jail. I am in a beautiful private library, writing about ways of paying for healthcare. Meeting with CEOs, instead of murdering them.

A new way to pay for healthcare

Ways to pay for healthcare include self-pay, government insurance, private insurance, Health Care Sharing Ministries, and now, a crowdfunding membership.

The latter was brought to market by Andy and CrowdHealth the team in 2021. I joined the following year.

As a member, I go to any doctor or healthcare provider and pay the cash-pay price. I upload the bill to the app. CrowdHealth gets funding from other members and reimburses me. There is a $500 initial commitment (deductible), per health issue. I pay a $55 monthly membership fee to CrowdHealth, and a variable monthly contribution toward other members’ healthcare bills, up to $135. If the crowd is healthy, bills are low, and my monthly payment is low.

An illustration of the CrowdHealth system, by

CrowdHealth boasts that 99.8% of bills have been fully funded. Which is amazing. Insurance companies are around 85%. But what CrowdHealth doesn’t say is that the .2% of bills that didn’t get fully funded came from members with “generosity scores” under 90%. Those few members are denying funding requests, then asking for funding, and not getting fully funded. That’s how it should be. The system is working.

Every month I get an email like this one:

This month it’s a bit higher than usual at $119. I don’t always check the email; I have it set so if I don’t do anything, it automatically approves the request.

My favorite thing to see that I’m funding a pregnancy. Unfortunately, this month, it’s for stage 4 melanoma.

Instead of nameless, faceless, insurance company algorithms, approving funding, it’s me. It’s the members in tandem with CrowdHealth employees, who make sure the bill is fair-legitimate, fair-market price, and eligible for funding based on the member guide.

The dual payment model is the key. A flat rate to CrowdHealth, and a variable rate straight to healthcare bills. It’s a win-win system. When we are healthy, we pay less, and Crowd makes more money, because more people are keen to join and stay.

I don’t think I’d be be a member if it wasn’t effectively a 100% chance that I receive full funding for my eligible healthcare bills.

When I submit a bill, I know it will be fully funded because my generosity score is 98%. In three years, I denied one funding request. And that was just to see what would happen. When a member denies a request, it goes to another member, and that bill can still get fully funded. I won’t deny any more requests.

Origin story

Ironically, the US healthcare system got so twisted and painful that it catalyzed the creation of new way.

After selling his first company, Andy moved from Ohio to Texas. “I thought I was going to play a lot of golf and eat a lot of tacos,” he said on a podcast with Bridget Phetasy.

“Because I sold my company, I didn’t have health insurance. I went on Obamacare thinking that was my only option. I joke, It worked until I had to use it. My little one, who was 1 at the time, was having recurring ear infections and needed tubes in her ears. She had a hole in her eardrum. The ENT said go get tubes in her ears, it will correct it. So we went and got tubes. We got the bill, and it was $8,000. For a 15-minute procedure.

I was like Holy crap, 8 grand for 15 minutes? That's nuts! And then I got a note later from the insurance company that said they weren't going to pay for it. It was “medically unnecessary”.

On the CrowdHealth website, Andy writes:

I realized the system was broken and decided to create CrowdHealth, a more compassionate and reliable alternative to pay for healthcare.

Traditional health insurance is often impersonal and unreliable, with twisted incentives. At CrowdHealth, we're changing the narrative. We treat our members like family, assisting them on their health journey, and managing their bills at an affordable cost. We're creating a system where the focus is on keeping our members healthy, rather than profiting from their illnesses.

Price gauging, double-billing, and deceptive business practices have become commonplace in the healthcare sector. Somehow, business people in the legacy healthcare system have the audacity to not tell customers the prices, then make up an insane number just to see if we will pay it. It happens in every state in America, every day. Taking advantage of people when they are at their weakest.

I didn’t understand how the healthcare system got so messed up until I hosted a podcast with Andy. He explained that:

In the private insurance model: the buyer of healthcare (insurance) and the seller (hospitals) both want a high prices. Higher and higher, every year.

How that happened:

1. Insurance corporations legally must make more and more profits for shareholders. This is the “fiduciary duty” of the executives and board of directors.

2. The Unaffordable Care Act mandates that insurance companies spend 85% of premiums on healthcare, effectively capping their profits at 15%.

The only way for profits for shareholders to keep going up (which legally they must do) is for healthcare prices and doctor visits to keep going up. More and more. Every year. As required.

The United States stumbled into a system of regulations and warped incentives where we have artificial insurance prices increasingly deviating from the self-pay market price. For example, in 2022, I went to a pharmacy for prescription pills. They said it would be $225. But that was the “insurance” price. I didn’t have insurance, so they told me the actual market price: $10.

There is a “gag clause” in the contract between pharmacists, pharmacy benefit managers, and insurance companies, preventing pharmacists from telling customers that the self-pay price is substantially less. In some cases, the market-price is less than the customer’s co-pay. Only after a customer says that they don’t have insurance, can the pharmacist reveal the self-pay price. This is to protect the profits of insurance companies and PBMs.

“Insurance is the crux of the problem”

Brigham Buhler, founder of Ways2Well, is a former pharma salesman and former pharmacy owner. He explained the system to Joe Rogan. This is an incredible clip.

There's the insurance company, then there's the pharmacy benefit manager. Pharmacy benefit managers are a middleman between the insurance companies and big pharma. They were put in place to negotiate the price of pharmaceutical drugs for the average American because so many drugs were coming into the marketplace the government couldn't decipher what drugs make sense, what should we cover, what should we not cover. So they allowed Pharmacy Benefit Managers to do that. Within a decade the big insurance companies went out and acquired Pharmacy benefit managers. Within a decade from that date, the PBMs began to negotiate rebates to themselves, not discounts to the patient.

The margins are made in the mystery.

The more confusing the insurance companies can make it and the more convoluted they can make it, the more profits they can make.

My buddy [an employee] who has MS, his treatment is $14,000 a month. I have 260 employees across both organizations. We met with the insurance company. They're raising our rates because they claim they paid $14,000 a month for his drug. He had a huge out- of-pocket burden on that drug but was happy because he thought, Well hey man, it was going to be 14k and I only had to pay X. And then they never paid the 14k because they negotiated a rebate on the back end. And then they turn around and they mark up my insurance plan for all my employees every year, year after year.

It is a profit driven system, not a patient outcome driven system. That's all I'm trying to hammer home with patients, who say, Why don't you take insurance? Because insurance is the crux of the problem. You cannot operate in that ecosystem and provide quality care. You can't. Everything's controlled, everything's dictated. It’s terrible.

A lot clinicians don’t know about PBMs. The only reason I know is because I’ve been in every aspect of this business. I would get into it and go, now I get the magic trick. I understand what your doing here, how your moving and shifting profits, monetizing disease states.

If I can monetize your diabetes. Why would I cure or prevent your diabetes?

The insurance system incentivizes exorbitant prices and chronic illness, and that’s the result we got, and what we will keep getting until a new system supplants it.

The dual payment crowdfunding model (flat rate to CrowdHealth, variable rate to health expenses) is the best new system I know of, for getting better patient outcomes, at lower prices. The healthier we are, the less it is per month, per member. The better of a job CrowdHealth does, the healthier we are, the less we way pay, the more people join and stay, and the more money CrowdHealth makes. They are financially incentivized to keep members healthy. This is important. Incentives drive results. Show me the incentives and I’ll show you the results.

CrowdHealth has 10,000+ satisfied members and it’s only four years old. It’s just a matter of time before a competitor comes along, and I hope that they do soon. Competition is a good thing. If I were an audacious entrepreneur looking for what to work on, I’d consider working on healthcare.

The bigger the problem, the bigger the opportunity.

Similar to how Tesla can’t convert the entire world to EVs, CrowdHealth can’t serve the entire market. Other people can do this and innovate. There might be an even better way that we haven’t discovered yet. In fact, there almost certainly is.

CrowdHealth is not legally classified as insurance, which means it can exclude metabolically unhealthy people: Fat people and smokers. If you’re over 260 pounds, you can’t join. You have to lose the weight to get in. And people do it. There’s a clear-cut massive financial benefit to losing the weight because CrowdHealth is so much less expensive than an insurance policy. If the person drops from 280 to 260 lbs, and they aren’t a smoker, they can save thousands of dollars every year, and get a better healthcare service.

Building a new ship

America’s health has been in decline for fifty years. Reports from the failing CDC are tragic. People are dying prematurely. People are going bankrupt unnecessarily. The legacy system is irreparable, and that’s okay. We are building a new ship, and taking it to the moon.

America will once again live among the healthiest countries in the world. We are seeing to it.

As Tesla was the catalyst for the electric vehicle market, CrowdHealth could be the catalyst for draining the insurance swamp, and putting power and capital back in the hands of patients and providers.

The crowdfunding model, or something even better, is essential for the future of amazing healthcare. This model motivates placing preventative, functional, and naturopathic medicines before allopathic medicine (surgeries and pills). As opposed to shunning the former and going straight to the latter.

There are dozens of emerging health technologies and healing modalities, from digital super-intelligence to OTC CGMs. I will write and publish about them here.

But applying new tools to a system with misaligned incentives is adding fuel to a fire that isn’t cooking what we want. Like upgrading the hardware of a system that lacks software to do what we want it to do: keep us healthy, and make us healthy when we aren’t, efficiently. The current dominant system is not optimized for that.

Changing the underlying software is the key.

I tell a lot of people about CrowdHealth. The number concern: would this work for large bills?

At the cafe in Austin, Andy said, “Did I tell you about the guy in Montana who shot himself?”

Part 2 is coming soon.

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You can join CrowdHealth at discount with this link.

Epilogue

I shared a draft with a group of writers in a workshop hosted by . Someone emailed me after: “Just wanted to say thank you for sharing the info about CrowdHealth. This is what I’ve been wanting my whole life.”

I shared a draft with my friend, Emily. She told me her daughter’s prescription medication is $10,000 per month. I blurted out laughter. That’s just so ridiculous.

It’s a fake price. They just make that up. If left unchecked, they’ll make the price $100,000 per month. They pass it along to customers by raising premiums. They need to do that to increase profits.

I wrote about this in my book All Outcomes Are Acceptable:

The premium, the deductible, the co-pay—they want you to pay three times. They want you to pay absurd medical bills.

I went to the pharmacy to get prescription pills. “$225,” they said.

“For some pills?”

“Who’s your insurance?”

“I don’t have insurance.”

“Oh, okay, hold on… It’s $10.”

“What is this insane business you scammers are running?”

I’m not fighting the old system, I’m opting out. Self-pay. The future of crowdfunding large health expenses is crowdfunding large health expenses.

Other Resources:

met Mangione wrote about the him and the murder.

argues it’s the providers screwing us because they are overcharging.

“The actual people charging you an arm and a leg for your care, and putting you at risk of medical bankruptcy, are the providers themselves”

But insurance companies actually need and want higher and higher prices to increase profits shareholders, as they are legally required to do. They like the high prices, which is why they pay them.

Matt points the finger at insurance companies in this article.

“I think it is totally fair for people to identify private insurers as the key bad actor in our current system. They are directly responsible for over half a trillion dollars of administrative waste and (at the very least) indirectly responsible for the provider rents that are bleeding Americans dry. The quicker we nationalize health insurance, the better.”

Much of health insurance is already nationalized via medicare and medicaid. Nationalizing the entire market (if that were even practically possible at this point) would run the risk of gaining the problems that Canada and England struggle with. Large governments are often bad at running things. There is no competition or incentive for greatness. Do you like your DMV experience?

I think, before advocating for total nationalization of insurance, writer Matt Bruenig could consider CrowdHealth’s model as part of the solution.

If I was to point a finger, it would be toward the people wrote and voted for the Unaffordable Care Act, specifically the people who wrote the clause mandating that for-profit insurance companies must spend at least 85% of premiums. I would suggest deleting that part, immediately. And deleting Pharmacy Benefit Managers. And enforce price transparency and no double billing in healthcare, just like any other industry.

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Music

Merry Christmas, happy new year, may God bless you.

“Be careful when you tell people about this because it comes off as culty and weird,” says Tommy. “The hallelujah thing, the sat nam thing.”

The room laughs. Three of the walls are glass. It’s the top floor of a Hindu castle where jungle mountains hit the Pacific Ocean in Costa Rica. I’m in the back, grinning, pleased by the self awareness and honesty. I’ve been here for a week, doing various group activities that are hard to describe.

We learned and chanted the Mahamrityunjaya Mantra

Om

Tryambakam Yajamahe

Sugandhim Pushtivardhanam

Urvarukamiva Bandhanan

Mrityor Mukshiya Maamritat

I didn’t know what I was signing up for, and frankly I still don’t know. I got an invite, and I like the leader, Tommy. The website looked like a yoga retreat. In some ways it was, and in many other ways it was not.

For me, the experience was opposite land.

In my regular home life, I wake up alone at 8 or 9, stare at the sun, eat some food. Do some stretching, push-ups, whatever I feel like. I eat most of my meals alone, and work mostly alone. I pretty much do whatever I want. On average, I talk to five or six people face-to-face per day. And I eat meat every day.

This week was 6am morning exercises. Sadhana, they call it. Followed by a group therapy meeting that I walked out of multiple times. Followed by vegetarian breakfast. Followed by three hours of lectures and physical exercises. With roughly 69 people at all times, for 7 days.

After a vegetarian lunch is a few hours of free time to nap, shower, or walk down to the beach. Programming starts again at 4. More lectures, workouts and meditations. Followed by a vegetarian dinner, and more activity from 7-9; music and dancing, my favorite part.

One evening was free. My mom and I walked a mile down the beach to the town where we met friends from New England, who were also in Costa Rica for Thanksgiving. It felt good to be at a relatively smaller table, with people in their thirties, talking about anything other than yoga, spirituality, and health recovery.

I was the youngest person at the “immersion” by four years, and 20 years younger than the average age.

Someone thought I was 37.

I learned many things. I learned there are way more kinds of pants than I had ever imagined. I learned Tommy Rosen's wife is hot.

I re-learned how much I dislike workout classes, especially yoga classes. And how much I love music. And hugs. I love hugs.

If you want hugs, this is the place to be. It’s called Gateway to Gratitude.

I’m grateful for food, god, and not dying in a riptide.

I’m grateful that I’m not a talk therapist and never will be.

I’m grateful I got to meet unbelievably beautiful people.

I sat with Kia Miller at lunch, one of the co-hosts. I wrote about her in Experience of Anxiety.

Like almost everyone else, she asked, “How’s it going? How’s it been for you?”

“Frankly, this is the craziest thing I’ve ever done, and I’ve done a lot of crazy things.” Her facial expression morphed three times. “In the best way,” I add.

She smiles, as she does all the time. I love it.

“I understand,” she says, in her British accent. “Take what works and leave the rest.”

I like that.

There’s a lot I’m leaving, and just as much I’m taking. Both intellectually and somatically. In my body, heart, lungs, stomach. And sore arms.

Friends, too.

I talked to many of the people on the trip. It was an incredible group. Tommy attracted people from all over who experienced crazy and hard stuff and still somehow have the money and sobriety to be here. A few don’t, but made it anyway. Thank god.

At the final breakfast, I was feeling pretty happy, for many reasons, one being that I get to leave soon.

I sat by myself, eating and thinking.

10 minutes earlier, I told a story to the entire group. It went pretty well.

Bella, a farmer from northern Canada, actually the most beautiful woman you’ve ever met, pulls me over to a big table of women who comment on my share.

“Thank you for sharing”

“That was the best”

“That was perfect”

“That should be in a book”

Little do they know.

“Where are you going after this?” I ask Bella. I see God tattoo’d on her wrist.

“Liberia,” she says. “A friend is asking me for farming advice. But I’ve only been doing it for five years. I’m no expert, and I don’t know what Costa Rican chickens need.”

“Are you going to do anything in Liberia?”

“I don’t have a lot of money left,” she says. “Well, I guess I have my Visa, so I have unlimited money,” she smiles.

“Yes, that’s how it works,” I say, laughing.

Inside, I’m feeling holy shit. I’ve never been to zero or negative money. Can’t even imagine.

That problem is now fixed, I decide. At least in the short term.

“I’m gonna run,” she says. “Do you want me to take one of your plates?”

I could rationalize well why it makes sense to give a cash gift to a “random” Canadian farmer who I met five days ago.

I’ll skip that and just send it.

That was yesterday. Today I’m writing by the pool at The Gilded Iguana, a badass hotel for people even richer than I am. I stayed at a shithole hotel last night, for free, because it was so bad. It used to be nice. I invested a small amount into the company that built it. They went bankrupt. So it goes.

I came to Iguana in the morning and now my phone is about to die. Thank god.

One thing I say in the writing coach role is, Let fear be thy compass and laughter thy guide.

I give advice and then take it.

Here’s what I said at the final group meeting

In the circle with fifty people

Carlos speaks, hands me the mic, and plays his wooden flute for the group.

When he’s done, I say to the audience, “Wow, I gotta get a flute.”

They like that.

“The microphone finally found me,” I say.

I haven't shared anything with the group. Everyone is paying attention now, curious to hear what the only 20-something has to say.

Something easy, something funny, something meaningful.

“Hi I’m Chris.”

Hi Chris, they say.

“Today was a big win, I got from my cabin to here without getting lost.”

The level of laughter was appropriate for the mid level joke.

“I don’t use alarms,” I plow ahead.

I see a smiling Kia, a beautiful sight.

“God wakes me up when God wakes me up.”

I’ve been “late” to every 5:55 “morning practice”.

“I awoke this morning and was almost certain it was 5:55. I checked my watch, it was 5:53. Just enough time to get here.”

I take a breath and think of something to say.

“Last night, in this room, during the thunder and lightning, I was thinking… How low, how unimaginably, how…”

I say a prayer in my head. In the name of the father, of the son, and the holy spirit

“The odds of me being here are so unimaginably low.”

People nod. It was the feeling of gratitude.

“I’ll try to tell a story,” I say. “A few days ago, I went down to the beach and into the water. You have to go far out to get to deep water.”

I look around and see faces know what I’m talking about.

“I was walking out and heard,

Trust the process

I was swimming in the big waves, and when I looked back, I saw I was further from the beach than I wanted to be. I started swimming back, but when I looked up, I wasn’t making any progress.

I flashed back to an experience last year of being swept out to sea in a riptide.

I could see a few people on the beach, and I thought, Should I call to them?

Then I thought, Can I stand here?”

I see my friend Chrissy smiling.

“Then I stood up.”

The crowd loves it. I’m totally in the moment.

“And that made sense.

Then I dropped to my knees and started laughing. And I remembered…”

I choke up for a second.

“I remembered, it’s all gravy.

And that made sense, because it was Thanksgiving.”

“It’s very special, to even know that this is a thing that exists.”

Epilogue

“That doesn’t sound that crazy. That sounds like Austin,” my friend Paul said.

Crazy is subjective. It was crazy to me because it was so radically different from my daily life, anything I’ve ever done before, anything I’ve ever seen, or what I expected.

It’s bizarre, really, to be in a hot and sweaty glass room above the jungle canopy with 69 people chanting in Sanskrit - all Caucasian.

Like plucking a kid from Ghana and putting him into an MIT physics lecture. Or putting me in Ghana.

It’s crazy.

I’m not a yogi, never attended an AA meeting, not a 6am person, and definitely not a vegetarian. Early in the week, I exited the compound and walked a mile down a highway to get a piece of chicken.

For most of the attendees, though, this experience was not crazy at all. They were surrounded by their tribe and enjoyed every minute of 6am workouts, visualization, chanting, breath-work, and listening to people share their traumas.

I did not. And that’s okay.

I loved the people I met, the conversations, dancing, the beach, pool, and smoothie bar. I loved seeing how the experience affected people. My conviction is stronger than ever that creating retreat experiences is a valuable service.

But I’m not going to host one in Costa Rica. I understand why they do it there. It’s world-class. But there are equally, or more, powerful experiences to be had in America.

I want to create an event of this caliber, with my own vernacular, no 6am meetings, less people, younger demographic, and steaks for dinner.

I’m hosting True Wealth Weekend in New Hampshire next spring. Join the waitlist here.

Thanks for reading. Have a great day.

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My book, All Outcomes Are Acceptable, is on Amazon. It’s about true wealth, AI drones, Amish people, and the wilderness survival. Readers are loving it.

The Pathless Path is my favorite online community.

Open gym for writers on Wednesdays.

I use CrowdHealth. They helped me out a lot so I am spreading the word. They created a group of 10,000+ healthy Americans crowdfunding each other’s healthcare bills. As well, they paired me with great doctors. I recommend seeing if it’s a good fit. Join here to get a discount.

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