Alexis Ohanian: Why Discipline Creates Freedom & How to Incorporate Routines in Your Schedule in Order to Succeed

**Alexis Ohanian** (0:00)
The more comfortable you can be in the discomfort of constant change, the better.

**Jay Shetty** (0:03)
His co-founder of Reddit, Alexis Ohanian has stepped in the room.

**Alexis Ohanian** (0:07)
When we build any kind of social media platform, we are ultimately deciding what belongs and what doesn't. If you can be equipped and you can exercise those muscles around problem-solving and learning, you will be at the forefront for however this technology changes things.

**Jay Shetty** (0:23)
What do you uniquely understand about the human mind? The number one health and wellness podcast. Jay Shetty.

**Alexis Ohanian** (0:33)
Jay Shetty.

**Jay Shetty** (0:34)
The one, the only, Jay Shetty. Hey everyone, welcome back to On Purpose, the place you come to listen, learn and grow. I'm so grateful because I get to dive into the minds of people that I find fascinating and interesting, people who have incredible insights, who are willing to share their soul, their hearts with the pains, the overwhelms, the stresses and the joys of their journeys. Today's guest is going to do just that for us. His name is Alexis Ohanian, founder and general partner at 776, co-founder of Reddit. Alexis Ohanian is a tech founder and venture capitalist. He wrote a national bestselling book without their permission, and his co-founder of Reddit, one of the largest websites in the US, currently valued at more than $15 billion. In 2020, he founded 776, a new firm built like a technology company that deploys venture capital with over $900 million plus in assets under management. In 2022, Alexis launched the 776 Foundation to support marginalized individuals and announced a $20 million commitment to climate action through his 776 Fellowship Program. Ohanian is also a vocal advocate for Paid Family Leave and also hosts the Business Dad Podcast. Make sure you subscribe if you don't already. Welcome to the show, Alexis.

**Alexis Ohanian** (2:01)
Thank you, Jay. That was great. Can you introduce me everywhere?

**Jay Shetty** (2:03)
Happily, happily. Let's do it. I'll record an interview.

**Alexis Ohanian** (2:06)
Let me bring that everywhere I go.

**Jay Shetty** (2:08)
I would love for you to do that. It would be an honor. It would be an honor. Alexis, it's so great to see you.
We bumped into each other randomly at Angel City FC Games in Cannes more recently. And I've always been fascinated by your journey. And when I heard that you were interested in talking to me, I was really excited about that because I think you can have so many perceptions of tech founders and community app founders from afar. And then getting to know them more intimately always leaves me feeling like I've learned something. So I'm happy you're here. And I wanted to start off by asking you this. What do you uniquely understand about the human mind that has helped you get to where you are today?

**Alexis Ohanian** (2:51)
The human mind seeks community. And Reddit was noteworthy, especially in 2005, because it was pseudonymous, right? Because you didn't have to have your government name, didn't have to have your photo at a time when Zuck was building Facebook, which was very much that. And you could come together, not because you have something to say and you want people to follow you. You come together around community. That is the goal. We all love Angel City FC. We join that community. We're a part of it. We all love stapling bread to trees, which is a real subreddit. You know, everyone's got their hobbies. We all join. We post photos of the bread stapling. We talk about it. We commune. And I grew up on the internet. I learned how to code from strangers on the internet. I convinced other strangers when I was a teenager to basically pay me to build websites for them. Because HTML, building websites was a thing. I was very keen on. I just enjoyed the design. I enjoyed building. And it made me feel really cool to be a child on these message boards, like a teenager being able to get paid by adults because I had a skill they didn't have. And so I learned so much to those experiences. And I learned from video games, leadership skills, if you can believe it.
And in building Reddit, it was simply a way to build a better type of forum that would be a better way for online community to form. And over the last now 20 years since, I look first and foremost for these things. And I think in a world increasingly more fractured and divided, and where people spend just frankly more of their time online, these spaces matter even more. And it's something, you know, for the first probably 10 years of Reddit, most people didn't think it was possible for people to care that much about their online identity as they did their offline. That was one of those things that I really held fast to. And I think today we sort of take for granted. Of course, people care in many cases much more about their online persona than their offline one. And I just hope to see it get used for more and more good at a time when, like I said, there's more division than ever. And the power of community is still something I think runs deep in our species. And the Internet is just a new medium to connect and hopefully for good.