11 Uncomfortable Truths About Life - Mark Manson - #340

**Chris Williamson** (0:00)
Hello, friends. Welcome back to the show. My guest today is Mark Manson. He's an author and blogger, and we are talking 11 uncomfortable truths about life. Mark is the king of telling people things they don't want to hear, but probably need to hear. I couldn't bring him on without using this as an opportunity to dig out some of his most insightful and painful lessons about life. So here we go. Hold on tight. Expect to learn why almost nothing is ever about you, why there's a fundamental selfishness attached to anxiety, how Mark transitioned from party boy to fatherhood, why you're probably the problem in all your relationships, why contrarians aren't as smart as they think, and much more. On top of that, Mark's also just announced that he is releasing a book with Will Smith, of all people, The Fresh Prince, and you get to find out what it's like to work with Will Smith for a couple of years, which to be frank sounds like perhaps the best job in history. On top of that, Mark sold 15 million books and that he's completely worthy of the success, as far as I can see. His insights into human behaviour and the way that our minds work and how we engage with other people is, he cuts through and does a lot of sense making. So I really hope that you enjoy this episode. And if you do hit the subscribe button, it's the only way that you can ensure that you will never miss an episode every Monday, Thursday and Saturday when they get uploaded. It supports the show. It makes me very happy that you have no reason not to do it. Take your fingers for a walk, please. And just make sure that subscribe button is pressed. A thank you. But now it's time to learn some uncomfortable life truths with Mark Manson.
Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, welcome back. I'm joined by Mr. Mark Manson. Welcome to the show.

**Mark Manson** (2:10)
It's good to be here. Thanks for having me.

**Chris Williamson** (2:12)
My pleasure, man. So you are as much of a fan of truth bombs and red pills and uncomfortable insights as I am. So what I've done is I've scraped your social media from the last few months and pulled out some of the best ones. And I've kept some absolute corkers for the end. But before we get into going through those, you're writing a book with Will Smith, or you're producing, releasing a book with Will Smith.

**Mark Manson** (2:36)
Yeah. So, I mean, my part is kind of over. But yeah, he and I linked up in 2018 He wanted to write kind of a memoir slash life lessons kind of from his career and his life. And he was looking for a co-author. And so he and I just hit it off at Good Chemistry.
And I was a little bit hesitant at first. I was like, I don't want to do this just because it's a celebrity. I don't want to be part of a PR puff piece. It needs to be real. It needs to be raw. There needs to be a good reason behind it. And when I met him for the first time, I asked him why he wanted to do a book. The first thing he said is he said, look, my whole career, I've been hiding myself as a huge celebrity. You hide yourself from the world. Everything is polished and pristine and catered for the viewer. He was like, I want to put the real me out there. And I was like, fuck yeah, dude. I'm on board.

**Chris Williamson** (3:48)
What's it like working with Will Smith?

**Mark Manson** (3:51)
Honestly, man, he is a dream. Like he and I've heard this is not the case with a lot of famous people, but he is honestly one of the easiest people to work with. He's really professional. He's super nice, very smart, very down the earth. We honestly, like we just had a blast. Like we just hung out. He took me to all these crazy fucking places that he was going to.
And we just sit around and like talk about his life and talk about his ideas. And it was easy for me because I just sat there and listened and then I got, I like basically just pick out like his greatest hits, you know, like, oh, that's a really good one. We'll use that, you know.
And so that was it, you know. And then I did the first draft and he's done the, he kind of did a revision of that draft.

**Chris Williamson** (4:47)
Oh, that's cool. So you sort of ghost wrote it and he edited his own work kind of.