Are We Part of the ‘Optimisation Podcast’ Problem?

After hundreds of conversations with extraordinary people, Jake and Damian stop and ask a question they've been circling for a while prompted by a recent social media post from Rob Beckett: how has High Performance changed since it started and are we part of the 'grindset' problem?

When the show began, they were fascinated by winning: routine, sacrifice, discipline, marginal gains. Jake once wrote a post about getting up at 5am that he now calls one of his biggest regrets. In this episode they play back their own early conversations, including Jake's advice to Steven Bartlett and Ant Middleton's definition of high performance from the show's second episode, and ask what they'd still stand by and what they've changed their minds about.

The shift started with Jonny Wilkinson, who told Jake that suffering doesn't lead you to joy. It just builds stronger habits of suffering. From there they get into the difference between high standards and grind culture, what the Special Forces told them about never feeling like they'd done enough, and whether the people who change the world are driven by obsessive or harmonious passion (they don't fully agree). Mark Manson and Jimmy Carr help them land it.

As Jake puts it: high standards ask something of you. Grind culture asks everything of you. If you've ever wondered whether you're doing enough, or whether "enough" is even the right question, this one's for you.

Clips featured (full episodes linked below):

Steven Bartlett https://pod.fo/e/16ca9

Ant Middleton https://pod.fo/e/15f9f

Jonny Wilkinson https://pod.fo/e/9cca4

Mark Manson https://pod.fo/e/15bfe7

Jimmy Carr (released on October 26th!)

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