Inefficiency + Joy with David Epstein

David Epstein (he/him) is the author of the New York Times bestsellers Range and The Sports Gene. He was previously an investigative reporter at ProPublica, where his work spanned from drug cartels to poor practices in scientific research. Prior to that, he was a senior writer at Sports Illustrated. He has master's degrees in environmental science and journalism, and has lived aboard a ship in the Pacific Ocean, and in a tent in the Arctic. His TED Talks have been viewed more than 10 million times, and he’s formerly the host of Slate’s popular “How To!” podcast.

Like a love letter to generalists, backed by mounds of scientific data, his second book, Range, makes the case that delayed selection is actually better for development. When you “sample” many different things, taking your time to find what really suits you, you might spend years looking “lazy” or “directionless” from the outside, but there’s a good chance you’ll find greater satisfaction when you finally find “your thing.” In fact, in combining all of your varied experiences, you might also fill a unique niche in the world—one no one else has ever considered.

And while the world might see this process as very “inefficient”—a hated behavior in an industrialized world—David and Brandi talk about how inefficiency is actually quite connected to the concept of “match fit,” which is really just another way to say “joy.”

Plus:

• Vincent van Gogh, who didn’t come into painting until very late in his life, after years of trying many, many different things and often seeming a “failure.”
• The first time David realized that normalizing life as a generalist might be incredibly cathartic, and why he thinks “Range” continues to elicit such an emotional response.
• David’s own path as a generalist and how his “average” skills in one domain, when applied to something seemingly unrelated, suddenly became very unique.
• How switching so many jobs in your life can be seen as “inefficient,” but often leads you to a better “match fit.”
• Why we’ve traditionally cared so much about efficiency, but what society actually calls for now.
• How things like school debt can keep us in jobs that aren’t a good fit for us, and what the “sunk-cost fallacy” has to do with it.
• How humans are actually more suited to late-blooming than any other organism.
• How David practices inefficiency to keep himself joyful and curious.
• The people currently inspiring David when it comes to “connecting the seemingly un-connectable.”
  
  

Listeners can find David Epstein at his website https://davidepstein.com/ (please do sign up for his newsletter there—you’ll get instant goodies to dive into) and on Twitter @DavidEpstein.

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Music: The in-house musicians at Slip.stream
Audio Engineering: The team at Upfire Digital