3:21

that's very kind thank you very much

3:34

i wish i could say that was a deliberate decision

3:37

mr clean charles

3:40

, barkley and that no

3:43

one has ever had that thought but you're

3:45

welcome to the backstory i know

3:48

you are a theater actor for a long time he and this

3:50

was not party or plant not

3:52

at all i was not at little

3:55

disturbed kids from suburban seattle

3:58

and i grew up kind

4:00

of with a television kind of raising me

4:03

and watching all of those great sitcoms

4:05

from the from the 70s I would record Monty

4:09

Python sketches on a Panasonic

4:11

tape recorder held up to a PBS

4:14

television station at like 1 a.m.

4:17

to record Monty Python and then memorize

4:20

the sketches and Then when

4:22

I started doing theater, I kind

4:24

of thought hey, you know, I'm pretty good at this and I can

4:26

make people laugh maybe I'll go to New York and study

4:28

theater and That's really

4:31

where I thought I was gonna make my living.

4:33

So I spent 10 13 years

4:36

total in New York kind of pursuing a life

4:38

in theater and Never

4:40

really making it above the poverty line

4:42

as an actor and all true so, you

4:45

know the idea of being like

4:47

a star or a celebrity

4:50

or making a lot of money and Being

4:52

a part of one of these most iconic shows

4:55

like one of those shows that I grew up watching as a kid

4:57

is Beyond my wildest dreams

4:59

and not at all the path that I

5:01

thought I was gonna take oops Oh,

5:04

I feel like it worked out. Okay, then it worked out just

5:06

fine. Look at me. Look

5:08

at this It's incredible. So what happened

5:10

after a decade? What led you to TV? Well,

5:14

I was doing this tour. It was a bus and truck

5:16

tour of Shakespeare plays So I spent two

5:19

years on a bus with a group of

5:21

like 20 actors going from

5:23

high school to college to community

5:25

center doing Midsummer Night's Dream

5:27

and Romeo and Juliet and two gentlemen of Verona

5:30

and night after

5:32

night after night doing 10 a.m. Matt and mays in

5:34

high school cafeterias and At

5:37

the end of this long long stint

5:40

on the road. I was on the road with this actor

5:42

We got back and we were collecting our mail after

5:44

being on the road for six months and he

5:46

had a residual check and he opened

5:48

it and he had spent three days

5:50

on a Harrison Ford movie and he had

5:53

like a $4,000 check

5:55

which was more than I had saved for the entire

5:57

run of doing the theater and he was like, yeah And

8:01

I got home and I got a call and they said,

8:03

they canceled the show. Tear

8:06

up your plane ticket. And I was like,

8:08

yes. So I picked up the phone, like, hey, they're doing this

8:10

office. And I was literally the

8:12

first actor in on the very

8:15

first day of auditions. And

8:18

I auditioned for both Dwight and Michael.

8:21

What? Yes. And mine

8:24

just exploded. My Michael audition

8:27

was terrible. I

8:29

was such a huge Ricky Gervais fan. I just

8:31

was doing a Ricky Gervais imitation. I

8:33

was like, so I'm the world's

8:36

best boss. I was just doing a lot of mannerisms.

8:39

It was just awful. But really when

8:41

it came to Dwight, I was like, you

8:43

know, I know this guy. And

8:48

it was one of those cases where I was like, there's

8:50

really no one else that can play this role. I

8:53

know exactly who this guy is. I

8:55

used to play Dungeons and Dragons with guys like

8:57

this. I

8:59

literally played Dungeons and Dragons

9:02

with a guy named Chris Cole. If you're listening,

9:04

Chris. Chris Cole

9:07

had Battlestar Galactica

9:09

glasses. I'm not making

9:12

this up. He was skinny as a rail, 97

9:14

pounds. And his

9:16

D&D characters would always be these giant warriors.

9:19

And he would draw them with giant rippling

9:22

muscles. Oh, and he studied fencing.

9:24

So thank you, Chris. Because

9:27

although that is not Dwight Schrute, the

9:30

people in suburban Seattle that I hung with were

9:32

absolutely cut from Schrutean

9:34

claws, so to speak.

9:37

I have to ask, did Chris eat beets? I

9:40

don't think he probably ate beets. I think

9:42

he only ate McDonald's, so yeah. Okay,

9:46

so you got the part? Yes. You

9:49

become Dwight? Yes. Tell us what it was

9:51

like to be on that show. The

9:53

thing that I've since learned is how

9:56

exceptionally collaborative it

9:58

was as a set. As Dunder

10:00

Mifflin was not collaborative whatsoever,

10:04

the office was completely collaborative.

10:06

As long as we got the lines as

10:09

scripted and got them well, we

10:11

could say whatever the hell we wanted.

10:14

If we wanted to take a scene in a different direction,

10:17

we would try it. That's

10:19

one of the amazing things about it having

10:21

to be documentary is that we just had two guys

10:23

with cameras. If

10:26

you want to go skip over here or start

10:28

wrestling, they're going to capture it. Even

10:32

on friends or a sign-filled set, you

10:34

have the camera moved and it's blocked. You

10:36

can't just start improvising

10:39

or doing physical comedy on the side. It

10:42

was wonderfully collaborative. Greg

10:44

Daniels, the showrunner,

10:46

was incredibly open

10:49

to ideas. He would have two different cuts

10:51

of a scene and he wouldn't know which one to do.

10:54

He would ask the janitorial staff and

10:57

the security guard and the people

10:59

doing craft services and he would bring

11:01

them all into the editing room and he would show them

11:03

the two scenes and they would vote

11:05

and he would pick that one. There's

11:08

very few people, trust me, in

11:10

Hollywood that work in that way.

11:13

He didn't have an ego about it. That

11:16

generated a good feeling in

11:18

the cast that was pretty astonishing.

11:21

I remember we had a director who came in who had

11:23

just come from directing a show that

11:25

shall not be named, Desperate Housewives.

11:30

He said, oh my God, first

11:32

of all, no one on that show is even talking to each

11:34

other and they wait in their trailers

11:37

until they absolutely have to come out and many of them

11:39

won't do scenes together. But you guys not

11:41

only six years in, talk

11:43

to each other like you love each other. You come in, you

11:46

hug, you high five, you laugh.

11:49

We kind of all, as we were shooting it, we were

11:51

all kind of new, like, you know what, this is probably

11:53

going to be the best job we ever have, hands

11:55

down. movie

12:00

and TV clips combined. And I'm

12:03

curious about what you learned. It sounds like there

12:05

was quite a contrast between the dynamic

12:07

you had on the show and then the office you were

12:09

creating at Dunder Mifflin, but what did you learn

12:11

about making work better and creating

12:13

good jobs? Well, one of the things that

12:16

was astonishing to us in making The Office

12:18

was how popular it was with high school and

12:20

college kids who had never set foot in

12:22

an office. We thought

12:25

we were making a show for work

12:28

folk in their 20s and 30s that

12:31

had a jerk boss and had office

12:33

romances and struggles in the office.

12:35

And that's what we thought we were making the show

12:38

for. And then all of a sudden we were like the

12:40

number one show among teenagers. But

12:43

the other thing that's pretty nuts is I

12:45

cannot tell you how many times I've

12:47

seen written online or people

12:50

have actually told me that they longed

12:52

to work in a place like Dunder Mifflin. And

12:56

I think they're getting confused. I

12:58

have so many questions. The

13:01

spirit of the show, the heart of the show,

13:04

the love by, for,

13:06

and in between the characters that's revealed

13:09

in the show, the vulnerabilities are

13:11

what people fall in love with. And they

13:14

mistake that for being

13:16

a kind of really lifeless

13:19

corporate drone in a paper company.

13:21

Because first of all, this whole idea

13:24

of like it's the worst kind of

13:26

hierarchy patriarchy of

13:28

like the boss who kind of knows

13:30

it all and you're a captive

13:33

audience. You can't flee their jokes

13:35

or their whims. So that

13:38

feels very like 1950s kind of. And

13:43

the kind of the drudgery of the nine to

13:45

five and everyone is in their little box. There's

13:48

so many things about it that feel

13:51

timeless and yet completely outdated. I

13:54

would agree. If

13:56

you were going into Dunder Mifflin, if

13:58

Jan hired you.

14:46

That's

16:00

so sweet of you. I

16:02

don't think I authorized that. And I'm a little

16:04

creeped out right now that you did that. But I

16:07

appreciate the sentiment and the dedication. I

16:09

found $2.17 in the various ashtrays. You're

16:13

welcome. You can have them if you want them. Wow.

16:16

Thank you. I will say. How much

16:18

longer is this improv gonna go on? I

16:21

do have to ask you a question, Mr. Schrute, which

16:24

is, I've heard you're incredibly dedicated.

16:26

You're conscientious to the max. You scored off the

16:28

charts on our assessment of industriousness and

16:31

diligence and grit. Angela Duckworth

16:33

actually vouched for your grit personally. Good.

16:37

I have beautiful grit. We

16:40

did get some feedback that you don't

16:42

always play well with others. And sometimes

16:45

you even stop people from doing

16:47

their jobs.

16:48

That's ridiculous.

16:50

I think it's ridiculous

16:53

too. Ridiculously true.

16:56

Really? Because

16:59

their incompetence is nauseating.

17:02

Okay, I'll tell you what. So it

17:05

sounds like you want a raise. You asked for that. I

17:07

hear you also want a promotion. If

17:10

I give you a list of ways that

17:12

you can make other people better and

17:15

then offered you a raise and promotion if you hit

17:17

those targets, how would you feel about that? Argh.

17:24

I feel... Argh,

17:27

does not compute. And

17:31

scene. And scene.

17:36

Good. He's good.

17:37

Okay, so what, you've

17:40

worked

17:40

on now, you've worked

17:42

on a lot of projects. You've worked with a lot of people.

17:45

My goal was to try to figure out what motivated

17:47

Dwight Schrute and then connect what I

17:49

cared about to Dwight's motives. How well did I do?

17:52

You scored off the charts. That was amazing. That was

17:54

absolutely incredible. Yeah. Well,

17:57

thank you. How would you have done that with Michael? Well,

18:00

are you going to give us your mic? No, we don't have to play that. My

18:03

read of Michael was that he's actually not a

18:05

bad guy, but he really wants to be famous. And

18:08

his antics are in front of the camera. And so

18:10

I would try to get him off camera, would be

18:12

my first thought. My second thought would be to help

18:15

him see that becoming a famous

18:17

hated boss is probably not the ideal place

18:20

to land. Well, I think he

18:22

was famous before the cameras were

18:24

there, putting on a live show for

18:26

the audience. And then the cameras just threw

18:28

kerosene on the fire. Yeah, I'd want to hold up

18:30

a mirror and have him see how disliked he is. And

18:33

then the hope is he wants to be loved. Although

18:36

I remember him also saying he wants people

18:38

to fear him and love him. And he wants them

18:40

to be afraid of how much they love him. That's

18:44

very good. You've seen the show. Once

18:46

or twice. Yeah. So

18:49

I want to talk about a bunch of other things. But before

18:51

we temporarily leave the office, I

18:54

had two questions about your experience on the show. One

18:57

is, you achieve success a

18:59

lot later in life than many people

19:01

in your industry do. How old were you when you were

19:03

cast as Dwight? I was 38 when

19:06

I was cast as Dwight. And

19:08

I had a peculiar baby face.

19:11

So I appeared younger,

19:14

but I was older. But by the time the office

19:17

was really kind of off and running, I was in my early

19:19

40s. And one of the great things about Dwight

19:21

is you can't really put your finger on how old he is. Sometimes

19:24

he seems like he's 25. And sometimes he

19:26

seems like he's 45. So it's just

19:28

kind of this general area. But yeah,

19:30

it was very interesting for me to achieve

19:32

fame kind

19:33

of in my 40s after

19:35

a

19:36

long, long slog

19:39

of trying to pay

19:41

my bills and be a professional actor. It's

19:43

such an interesting contrast to a dynamic that I think

19:45

a lot of people watch, which is the opposite of

19:48

somebody gets too much success too soon. It goes

19:50

to their head. They end up with a giant

19:52

fragile ego. They lack humility. They

19:54

end up becoming more takers than givers.

19:57

There's a whole syndrome that I'm sure you've watched a lot

19:59

of people follow. victim to. What

20:02

is your version of that? That's what happened to John

20:04

and Jenna and Mindy and BJ

20:08

and I'm kidding. No, but

20:11

I am struck. We've known each other for a few years now,

20:13

although we haven't met in person until now. And

20:17

I'm just blown away by how down to earth you are. Like

20:19

you don't have 19 handlers. You

20:23

book your own flights as far as I can tell. Is

20:25

this who you are? Is this your character? Is this a

20:27

function of the late stage

20:30

at which you achieved your success? Well, it's

20:32

something I've talked about a little bit recently and

20:35

has been blown completely out of proportion.

20:37

I talked about how at times,

20:40

not all the time, at times I

20:42

was very, very unhappy while

20:45

doing The Office. Here I am

20:47

in a job that is beyond my wildest dreams. Here

20:50

I am making millions of dollars, making

20:52

people laugh. I'm being nominated for Emmy's.

20:54

Movies are being offered to me. Development

20:56

deals, all kinds of amazing

20:58

opportunities that if you had cut

21:01

back to six years before,

21:03

it's me not even being able to get the law

21:06

and order. Janitor, audition,

21:09

let alone the job. So it

21:11

was an incredible transformation

21:14

in my life. And it

21:16

did go to my head. There were a lot

21:19

of times when I was really wrestling

21:22

with my ego and when I

21:24

was very unhappy because it

21:26

wasn't enough. And it goes

21:29

to that kind of essential human not-anuthiness

21:32

that we're often dealing with where

21:34

we can't just 100% and

21:38

absolutely be in total kind

21:40

of grace and gratitude for the gifts

21:42

that we have that are right in front of us. But

21:44

we're always yearning and longing

21:47

for the thing that's just outside

21:50

of our grasp. In this case, like, why

21:52

didn't my movies work? Why didn't I get offered

21:54

better movies? Why didn't I

21:56

get this other development deal? Why didn't I get more

21:58

money for this? Why did...

21:59

I mean, heaven, when they, I mean, for Christ's sake.

22:04

I can't answer that question.

22:05

But this,

22:07

this is part of

22:10

kind of the spiritual conundrum. And

22:13

you know, I'm a member of the Baha'i faith, and

22:16

the son of the founder of the Baha'i faith,

22:18

Abdul Baha'a, came to America about a hundred years

22:20

ago. And there's a story I love

22:23

because he landed in America. He was going to do a speaking

22:26

tour, essentially, kind of like Adam Grant

22:28

does. And a reporter said, hey, do

22:30

Baha'is believe in Satan? And

22:33

Abdul Baha'a said, yes, they do. And the reporter's

22:35

like, oh, what is Satan to a Baha'i?

22:38

And Abdul Baha'a said, the insistent

22:40

self. So I

22:43

love that idea that Satan

22:45

is not some boogeyman creature with red

22:47

scales or something like that, but that we

22:49

have this battle within

22:52

us. And this is in every faith tradition in

22:54

the world. But I came up against

22:57

that hard during the office. And

22:59

it was just ask my wife. It was some very

23:01

difficult times. And I had to do

23:03

a lot of soul searching during

23:06

that time and therapy and whatnot

23:08

to kind of come out on the other side of that. And

23:11

that might be a life lesson for every

23:13

single person here to just enjoy

23:15

it more. It's kind of startling

23:18

to hear because this is

23:20

as good as it ever gets for an actor. I'm

23:22

sure you've thought many times, no matter how successful

23:24

I become at anything I do in the future, there will never

23:26

be another office. Absolutely true. And

23:29

you didn't enjoy that as much as you wished. I

23:32

didn't. No, I wasn't in the present

23:34

moment. And in Soulboom, I draw on

23:36

a number of different faith traditions. But

23:38

in Buddhism, there's a concept of the hungry ghost.

23:41

And in kind of Buddhist practice,

23:44

where a few billion hungry ghosts on

23:46

the planet. And the hungry ghost is

23:49

someone who has died, who is

23:51

living in craving, living in constant

23:54

craving and is constantly

23:56

unsatisfied. So in

23:58

the death realm, there are really... Reaching

24:00

craving longing for grasping

24:04

and you just described everyone's worst stereotype

24:06

of warden But

24:09

truthfully like Why business

24:12

is it to make money to achieve fame

24:14

to have control to have high status?

24:17

I think these spiritual questions are very relevant

24:19

no matter what your career paths, but especially

24:21

to people that are seeking

24:24

to Change things and shake

24:26

things up through entrepreneurship. I think

24:28

it's important conversation to have Let's

24:30

talk about soul boom a little bit because I was floored

24:32

by this book. I expected it to be funny

24:35

It is I didn't know it was

24:37

gonna be this deep in this broad I feel like you're

24:39

delivering a message that could not be both

24:42

more timeless but also more timely for

24:44

a generation That's about to enter the workforce or

24:46

re-enter the workforce. I've been teaching

24:49

here for 15 years I have a lot of conversations

24:51

with students who feel like there's a

24:53

gaping hole in their life around purpose or

24:55

meaning And they've filled it

24:57

with ambition

25:00

And that sounds a lot like the hungry ghosts that you're

25:03

talking about So talk to us a little bit

25:05

about your case that we need not a religious revolution,

25:07

but a spiritual revolution Yeah,

25:10

I think that's very well said And

25:12

I really relate to that by the way I think

25:15

that in order to really make it as an actor and

25:17

show business you have to be incredibly driven

25:19

and you have To be incredibly ambitious You

25:22

need that coupled with with talent

25:24

and a lot of luck that Hungry

25:27

ghost phase that I went through when I was on

25:29

the office was really one driven

25:31

by kind of like un

25:34

ending ambition, but I

25:37

Think

25:38

one of the things that I'm most grateful for

25:41

is the mental health crises that I've

25:43

undergone in my life Did you just say you were

25:45

grateful for having a mental health crisis?

25:48

Yes, I am Can you impact that

25:50

for us? Sure, when you turn to

25:52

the teachings of the Buddha his number

25:55

one rule of the four noble truths

25:57

is life is suffering

26:00

The Buddha used the word suffering with the translation

26:03

the original word in Pali Sanskrit

26:05

is Dukkha and Dukkha means

26:07

kind of anxious Discontent

26:10

right so life is anxious Discontent

26:13

and maybe some of you can see some heads nodding

26:16

have felt some anxious Discontent

26:19

in their lives. Why aren't things the way that I want

26:21

them to be why can't it be more like this? I want

26:23

this outcome and why does this person keep

26:25

acting this way and how come I didn't get what I

26:27

wanted and We live our lives

26:29

with those gears Grinding we're

26:32

wired to do that as human beings

26:34

because it's what's kept us alive for hundreds of thousands

26:37

of years but how does

26:39

it come to play in the modern world so For

26:42

me in my 20s when I was struggling

26:45

as an actor trying to get an audition for

26:47

law and order I suffered

26:49

a lot of anxiety and depression

26:52

and addiction issues loneliness

26:54

and Again through trying to substitute

26:56

purpose and meaning and vision for

26:59

ambition Thinking that ah

27:01

once I get this next Big

27:04

acting gig then I'm gonna

27:06

feel content then I'm gonna feel at peace

27:09

And it's always just outside of my grasp and then

27:11

I get it that big movie, and

27:13

it doesn't do well I'll need the next big movie

27:15

I need the next big thing and you can apply

27:17

this to any career that one wants

27:20

to undertake But what it forced

27:22

me to do these mental health issues

27:25

was to get a lot of therapy and

27:28

to do a lot of soul searching a Lot of

27:30

meditation and praying and a lot of reading

27:32

of the world's holy writings I feel

27:35

like that work that I've

27:37

done on the spiritual side

27:39

of being a human being and my spiritual

27:41

reality has brought me great

27:44

peace and vision and

27:46

mission and Purpose that

27:49

can feed my creative life and also help

27:51

me to like write a book and spread the word and

27:53

also talk to young People about this most

27:55

great crisis that's happening

27:57

right now. There's two great ones. There's climate change Maybe

28:00

we'll get to that later. But the mental health crisis

28:03

that's affecting young people and destroying young

28:05

people and tearing their lives apart is

28:08

something that spirituality

28:10

does hold some answers to. So

28:13

without me suffering, I never

28:16

would have been driven to read

28:18

and explore these issues that

28:20

I've written about that I would never

28:22

have allowed me to transform

28:25

from a hungry ghost into the

28:27

incredibly handsome international

28:31

talent you see sitting before you. I

28:34

love that. As you were describing

28:36

your experience, I was thinking about what

28:38

Talben Shahar calls the arrival fallacy,

28:42

the misguided belief that once I get

28:44

this job or this recognition

28:47

or once I fall in love

28:49

and get married or once I have kids, fill

28:51

in your wants that everything will

28:53

be different. And I think Hemingway put

28:55

it best when he said, you can't get

28:57

away from yourself by moving from one place to

28:59

another. I think your book

29:02

really speaks to this in you spend a lot of

29:04

time on inner work and sort

29:06

of walking us through what

29:08

you learned spiritually that helped with

29:10

your mental health. I'd love to know what

29:13

came out of that. And I think our audience is probably curious about

29:15

that too. One of my favorite

29:17

quotes that I throw around a

29:19

lot is, we're not human beings having

29:22

a spiritual experience. We are spiritual

29:24

beings having a human experience.

29:29

And as deceptively simple as that phrase

29:31

is, for me, that means a tremendous

29:34

amount. And the understanding

29:36

that I am an essence, a spiritual

29:39

being, and I get 80 or 90

29:41

or 100 years, I hope, in

29:43

this magnificent fleshy tuxedo

29:46

running around, is

29:49

to me, puts everything into crystal and

29:51

clarity. Every

29:53

day is a kind of spiritual test. Every

29:57

day is a spiritual obstacle

29:59

course. where I'm going to be beset

30:01

with things that are going to make me impatient

30:04

or frustrated or feeling

30:06

less than. And I get

30:08

to use spiritual tools to

30:11

help me combat this,

30:14

you know, what's coming at me. I know you've also

30:17

worked a lot in positive psychology, and

30:19

there are so many tools from positive psychology

30:21

that are essentially spiritual

30:23

tools, like gratitude is

30:26

a great one. Meditation is

30:28

a tool that works on so many different levels, so

30:30

I have a daily meditation practice. And

30:33

one of the things that meditation does

30:35

is it allows you metacognition.

30:38

And as Arthur Brooks writes about

30:40

in his new book, this idea that when I'm

30:42

in a meditative state, there's

30:45

a part of me that gets to float above

30:47

and look down at my thoughts and

30:49

go, oh, I'm not my thoughts. And

30:51

there's part of me that gets to look down and have feelings,

30:53

and I'm like, oh, I'm not my feelings. My

30:55

reality is greater than my thoughts and my feelings, and

30:58

certainly greater than my body. I

31:00

think the way that you just articulated metacognition

31:02

is really compelling. And I think... Well, I want to

31:05

say something about that. Yeah, please do. I

31:07

wake up in the morning, I look at a couple of emails,

31:10

and make my half-calf latte,

31:13

and my head is a beehive. So

31:15

it just... I

31:18

need a practice to help me

31:21

gain kind of perspective. And

31:23

I will also say that I have this beautiful little

31:25

bench out in our backyard that's gorgeous. We have

31:27

an olive tree and some flowers, and there's tons

31:30

of hummingbirds out there. And sometimes

31:32

I'm trying to meditate. I just can't meditate for shit.

31:34

And so I just turn and I just witness

31:38

the beauty and majesty and wonder of

31:41

the hummingbirds and the leaves and the trees and

31:43

the wind and the light through the leaves. Anne

31:46

Lamott has a great book called Help,

31:48

Thanks, Wow. And those are the three prayers

31:51

that you say. Help, you know, God

31:53

help me, thanks, thank you God, gratitude,

31:56

and wow. And then I just try and live in

31:58

the wow. And if you can live in the wow... wow

32:00

for five minutes, 10 minutes, 15 minutes, just

32:03

like, this is fucking

32:05

great, man. Listen to those

32:07

birds, I didn't know hummingbirds chirped. Wow,

32:11

like if you can live in that, to

32:13

me it helps my day tremendously.

32:16

I could take a data driven test,

32:19

you know, on one of your websites and.

32:22

Man after my own heart. And find a 12 and .5% increase

32:24

in wellbeing over

32:28

the course of that day when I had lived in

32:30

wonder. I mean, that makes

32:32

a lot of sense to me. And there have been a few papers showing

32:35

that even when people do transcendental or

32:37

loving kindness meditation, sometimes

32:39

they come out more self focused. It's about,

32:42

it's like, I want to be more loving. I'm

32:44

going to be kinder, I'm going to be more generous. How

32:47

do you think about making sure that whatever

32:49

reflective or contemplative practice you do

32:51

isn't self centered? Well,

32:54

I think that's a problem with how spirituality

32:57

is viewed in contemporary society. Because really

33:00

spirituality has become commodified

33:04

and has fit into

33:06

our kind of capitalist way of doing

33:08

things where it's like, I'm

33:11

really anxious and out of

33:13

balance. I'm angry all the time.

33:16

Let me download this app and subscribe

33:18

to this mindfulness app. Let me download

33:21

this Eckhart Tolle podcast. Let

33:23

me subscribe to this roomy quote of the day

33:25

on Instagram. Let me go to

33:27

my yoga class and I'm doing all

33:29

this so that I can reduce my

33:32

anxiety. So that's a transactional

33:34

nature. I'm going to spend this money and I'm going

33:36

to invest this time so that I

33:39

feel better. So it

33:41

really pisses me off that spirituality,

33:44

which is all about connecting with the mystic

33:47

divine, beautiful purpose

33:49

of the universe in service and in community

33:51

and in transcendence with others has

33:54

been commodified to such an extent that

33:56

it becomes this selfish

33:59

act of life. I want my life to be

34:01

better. That was a great screed

34:03

against make mindfulness. Exactly

34:06

what the world needs. If you think about the

34:08

void of spirituality, the sense of purpose and

34:10

transcendence that a lot of people are looking for in life.

34:13

I remember Derek Thompson wrote a great Atlantic article a

34:15

few years ago on workism, where

34:17

he said that work has taken the place that

34:20

religion and faith and spirituality

34:22

traditions used to hold in our society. I

34:24

read the article and I thought, yeah, I teach a lot

34:27

of students who pray to

34:29

the high priest and hustle, and who

34:31

worship at the altar of status. Like

34:34

you were saying earlier, I don't think we should strive to

34:36

strip work of its meaning. I want people

34:38

to have meaningful, worthwhile jobs. But

34:41

there is a sense in which this gets blown

34:43

up or reified and work becomes too important

34:45

as a part of somebody's identity and

34:47

their contribution to the world. And I wonder

34:50

how you've navigated that. So with

34:52

this perspective that you bring to the table, how do you think

34:54

about your work being meaningful but not the

34:56

most important thing on earth? You know,

34:59

I had this incredible acting teacher

35:02

named Zelda Fitchandler. She always talked

35:05

about the shaman. And

35:08

I always loved that, that she

35:11

compared actors to shaman.

35:13

And it sounds a little self-important, but what it

35:15

does is then it

35:18

elevates being an actor to, I'm

35:20

not just someone who memorizes lines and tries to

35:22

make them sound convincing. I'm someone

35:24

that gets to play all kinds

35:26

of roles in theater and film and

35:28

TV, in spoken word,

35:31

gets to use language and

35:33

tell stories that help

35:36

shape our culture. And I

35:38

was really fortunate with The Office because the

35:42

genius writers wrote the words that

35:44

I got to use to help shape culture.

35:46

I remember when I was talking to Greg Daniels

35:48

early on, I'm like, what do you hope to do with The Office? And he goes, you

35:51

know, American comedy is really bad right now, I

35:53

wanna move American comedy like one

35:55

degree in the right direction. It's like steering

35:58

the Titanic.

37:34

We

38:00

got to go to Iceland, one of the world's happiest

38:02

places. Bulgaria, one of the world's

38:04

unhappiest places. Ghana,

38:07

West Africa, one of the most optimistic

38:09

places in the world. Thailand, one

38:11

of the most spiritually connected places.

38:14

And then I got to bring it back home to Los Angeles,

38:16

which is a god awful, culturalist

38:19

void. To try and bring what I learned

38:21

back home. Although there are a lot

38:23

of hummingbirds. Too many frickin'

38:26

hummingbirds, if you ask me. You gotta do

38:28

something about that. So you went to five places?

38:30

Five places, it's amazing. In

38:33

the book I referenced the grant study

38:36

from Harvard University, which I'm sure you know

38:39

tons about. They followed these 300 men for

38:41

like 80 years to

38:44

find what made them have a good life.

38:46

And it all boiled down to essentially connections.

38:49

And having better, deeper,

38:52

richer, more frequent connections.

38:55

And guess what? We live in a time of increasing

38:58

isolation when we're all doing this

39:00

all day. And connecting less and

39:02

less. And that's really

39:04

what I learned out on the road. And it was so beautiful

39:06

to see whether it was, you know these beautiful

39:08

valkyrie, Viking women in Iceland singing

39:11

and holding hands and walking, doing a cold plunge

39:14

into the Arctic Ocean. Whether

39:16

it was a communal group of people

39:19

in Ghana, growing cocoa beans

39:21

and collaborating together and trying

39:23

to kind of uplift their community. Whether

39:26

it's in Thailand where people spend their birthday,

39:29

not receiving presents, but on

39:31

their birthday, giving to others.

39:34

They spend their birthday going

39:36

and feeding the poor and tending

39:39

to the monks and monasteries

39:41

and temples and giving of their time,

39:43

which I thought was a wonderful inverse.

39:46

And in Los Angeles, where

39:49

everyone has a podcast, but again

39:51

it really was just about these beautiful

39:54

ways that humans connect and

39:56

how that's where the work lies.

39:58

And just... bringing people

40:00

together in unique ways, creating

40:03

bonds of love and unity and community, and

40:05

social change based in grassroots

40:08

movements of loving people working together.

40:11

I love this idea of turning

40:13

your birthday into giving, as opposed to getting.

40:17

I'm also struck, as you talk about the Iceland

40:19

experience, Durkheim called

40:21

it collective effervescence, the idea that

40:23

we're gonna be immersed in a group with

40:26

shared energy around a common purpose. And

40:28

he described that as the most transcendent

40:30

experience that people have. We

40:33

were at the Eagles game on Sunday, and

40:35

there was an amazing AJ Brown touchdown,

40:38

and the whole stadium erupted, and all of a sudden

40:40

it hit me, I don't have that in my

40:42

life, other than going to a sporting event. Like

40:44

we feel that at the family level, but the community

40:47

level, that's gone. I

40:49

think you put your finger on something really important.

40:51

But what religion, I

40:54

believe, can give folks at its

40:56

best, is a group of

40:58

common folks coming together, seeking

41:01

transcendence, seeking communion,

41:04

seeking connection with nature, with

41:06

God, with eternity, living,

41:08

especially if they're doing service to others,

41:11

and serving the poor, and coming together

41:13

to give of their time, and their

41:16

energy, and their schedule, and their

41:18

status, to serve other people.

41:20

And I do think that humanity

41:23

is missing something by having

41:26

lost that transcendent need to

41:28

commune in community.

41:32

Let's put the commune back in community. Well

41:35

put. I think it's time for a lightning round.

41:37

Okay. All right, here we go, pass.

41:39

You're

41:42

fired. First question,

41:44

what kind of bear is best? Sun bear,

41:46

Tibetan sun bear. Favorite office

41:49

episode? The injury.

41:52

Favorite office character other than Dwight? Creed.

41:58

Favorite Jim Prank unto us.

42:00

putting the desk in the bathroom. Oh,

42:04

classic. I thought you were going to go for when the

42:06

phone was full of nickels and then you slammed yourself

42:08

in the back. Yes, that's the psychology

42:11

one because that was based in the Pavlovian

42:14

theory. Pavlovian conditioning. That's why

42:16

I loved it most. Okay. Your favorite

42:18

scene that you improvised on the office?

42:21

The scene where Michael had two Michael

42:23

heads and I was dressed as a Sith Lord and

42:26

we were having a conversation in Halloween

42:28

about firing Dwight and I was

42:31

like, don't fire Dwight. Yeah, should I? I don't know.

42:33

That was all improvised. But I have to rewatch

42:35

that. What is the Dwight attribute

42:37

that's most like you? She's

42:40

the world in an offbeat, odd,

42:43

fractured way. And his

42:45

trait that's least like you? Bullying.

42:50

Touche. Something you've

42:53

rethought lately. I've

42:56

rethought assault weapons

42:58

bans due to Malcolm

43:01

Gladwell's exploration of that

43:03

particular issue around gun control

43:05

on his podcast. Me too. This is a great episode.

43:09

This one I have to say comes from a student. As a person

43:11

born and raised in Scranton, Pennsylvania, I

43:13

have to ask, how much time have you

43:16

actually spent in Scranton, Pennsylvania? So

43:19

one of my favorite events

43:21

that ever happened in my life, the office

43:23

had just started. I got a call and

43:26

they're like, they want to pay you an extraordinary

43:28

amount of money and sign autographs

43:31

and help open the Steentown Mall.

43:34

Remember I'm 40 years old. I've been broke

43:37

my whole life trying to make it as an actor. And

43:39

I was like, oh my God, this is incredible.

43:42

So I land at the Scranton airport. The

43:45

mayor's entourage

43:47

picks me up with full

43:49

retinue of police cars and a limousine

43:52

and full sirens. And the mayor's

43:54

like, come on in. They're making me an honorary

43:56

Lackawanna County sheriff. And

43:59

they're giving me the key. the city I was

44:01

bigger than Justin Bieber

44:04

you know for a day and

44:07

when the office ended we went to Scranton and we

44:09

did a parade we stayed up till 4 a.m.

44:12

all the bars stayed open and

44:14

it was it was just nuts so here's

44:16

to you a great city of Scranton

44:17

Pennsylvania.

44:22

You've been doing a lot of work on climate change you

44:25

in part have a mission to make climate change

44:28

fun and even occasionally funny can you tell

44:30

us in a sentence how to do that? One

44:35

sentence sure I can do this in one

44:37

sentence and here continues the sentence

44:40

into saying that I've been working with

44:42

this nonprofit called Arctic Base

44:44

Camp and now Climate Base Camp and

44:47

we try and speak science to

44:49

culture and to power through

44:51

using hysterical media activations

44:54

that are attention-grabbing and

44:57

targeted towards the movable middle

44:59

because too much climate work focuses

45:02

only on converting the already

45:04

converted or else arguing

45:06

with the people that will never be converted of the

45:09

importance of climate change. That was

45:11

a sentence. Do

45:15

you have a favorite example of one of those

45:17

activations? We towed

45:20

an iceberg from Greenland to COP26

45:23

conference climate conference in Glasgow

45:25

Scotland and set it up in front of the conference

45:27

center so that it was melting as

45:30

the attendees were going into the conference

45:32

and we bottled the water from the iceberg

45:34

and gave it out along with data

45:36

points about the melting global

45:39

ice sheet and we got a lot of very

45:41

interesting media play and

45:43

it was also very hard-hitting. Wow

45:46

yeah excellent I have a lot of

45:48

takeaways from this conversation I learned that you have a

45:50

real vendetta against law and order and

45:54

a little bit Jeremy Piven a little bit

45:56

I wasn't gonna say it what's a closing piece

45:59

of advice or wisdom you'd love to share

46:01

with our audience. I had an acting

46:03

teacher, Andre Gregory, who

46:06

had the movie My Dinner with Andre, which everyone should

46:08

see, and I met

46:11

with him once, and I told

46:13

him I was feeling pessimistic and kind of run down,

46:16

and he grabbed my arm,

46:19

and he was like 80 years old. He grabbed my arm and he was

46:21

like, don't, don't do it. You

46:24

need to be optimistic. You need

46:26

to bring hope. You need to feel joy.

46:29

Don't get cynical. You cannot get

46:31

pessimistic. If you're pessimistic, if

46:33

you're cynical, they win. The forces

46:36

of darkness want you to feel pessimistic,

46:38

so you'll sit on your couch all day and do

46:40

nothing. You've got to keep hope alive.

46:43

And I really think that that is the clarion

46:46

call for young people these days, that

46:48

there is a lot of hope. Humanity can

46:51

transform and come through these

46:54

very difficult and dark times to

46:56

a much more beautiful, vital,

46:59

connected world that's not pie

47:01

in the sky, naive, eye-rolling, daydreaming.

47:04

That's absolutely true, and it's

47:06

something we can all work for,

47:08

even in a very small way. Beautifully

47:11

said. Thank you for coming, Rainn Wilson.

47:12

Thank you. Thank

47:14

you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank

47:17

you. Thank you. Thank you.

47:25

Rethinking is hosted by me, Adam Grant, and

47:27

produced by Ted with Cosmic Standard. Our team

47:29

includes Colin Helm, Eliza Smith, Jacob

47:32

Winning, Asia Simpson, Samaya Adams,

47:34

Michelle Quinn, Ben Van Teng, Hannah

47:36

Kingsley Ma, Julia Dickerson, and Whitney

47:38

Pennington-Rogers. This episode was produced

47:41

and mixed by Cosmic Standard. Our fact checker

47:43

is Paul Durbin, original music by Hauntea

47:45

Su and Alison Leighton Brown.

47:53

What are you hummingbirds? I

47:56

feel like your alter ego would know the answer to this. Yes.

48:00

That needs to be an app like ask Dwight

48:02

like chat GPT I

48:05

think a Dwight GPT would be a big Dwight GPT

48:08

could be idiot Hawks