Episode 1,000: Rich & Julie Piatt Celebrate By Going Back To Where It All Began

**Rich Roll** (0:00)
I've spent a lot of time talking about my Rivian, driving my Rivian, obsessively sharing photos of my Rivian on Instagram. But the best is when I hand the key fob over to someone who's never driven one, and there's always this moment, that instant where they feel the acceleration, silent, immediate, and they just start laughing because it doesn't feel like any car they've ever driven before. And it reminds me, this is one of those things you really have to experience. It's not just fast, it's smooth, it's quiet, it's focused, it's the kind of movement that makes everything else feel a little outdated. And Rivian makes it easy to try for yourself. You can book a demo drive online, pick a time, show up, and just get out on the road, no pressure. So if you've ever been curious, don't just take my word for it, go to rivian.com and feel it for yourself.
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Hey everybody. Welcome to The Rich Roll Podcast. We're having a ton of fun doing this podcast.

**Julie Piatt** (2:09)
It's been really overwhelming to even imagine that it's been 14 years since you launched the podcast.

**Rich Roll** (2:17)
There's no better way to celebrate than to take it back to the beginning.
That's how it started. It was you and me hitting record in a warehouse, on a farm, on a mango farm, and just seeing what would happen. There was no, we weren't launching anything. It wasn't necessarily going to be a show. I didn't even know there was gonna be an episode two. It was just like a fun creative experiment at the time.

**Julie Piatt** (3:12)
On the sacred island of Kauai.
And it was more a response to you being landlocked and feeling totally trapped on the island. And I think-

**Rich Roll** (3:25)
It was a very interesting, special and difficult time for our family. We were under unbelievable financial duress. Finding Ultra had come out, and I did my best to push that book out into the world.
And in the aftermath of, I wouldn't even call it a book tour. I was hustling every opportunity I could to get the word out and said yes to anybody who would talk to me or let me kind of host a small event. And I showed up for more than a few quote, unquote, like book events where two or three people showed up. Like that's what it was like back then. Yeah, well, there was a lot where it was just, I remember I did a signing at a Barnes and Noble somewhere in Northern California and like one person showed up.

**Julie Piatt** (4:16)
Yeah.

**Rich Roll** (4:17)
There was a lot of that back then, but I was proud of the book. And despite what people might think, it wasn't a New York Times bestseller. Like it's done fine and it's been a perennial bestseller. Like it continues to sell and find new audiences. And I think that's what I'm most proud of. But at the time, it did okay, but it didn't like light the world on fire or anything like that. It's had a lasting impact in a very kind of like gratifying way, but it wasn't like a book that suddenly everybody was reading, like not by a long stretch. Anyway, when that was done, we were sitting in a lot of uncertainty.
I was convinced that the phone would start ringing and opportunities would begin to arise. I had cut ties with the law. I let my bar membership lapse, and we were hurling ourselves into the unknown with an incredible amount of faith and trust that things would work out.