How We Are Building Eduction for the Future

00:00.00	mikebledsoe	All right welcome to Monday morning with Mike and max Today we're gonna be talking about education and you know what this is a bit of a taboo subject because when I get in the conversations with the average. Person and I make certain comments about the education system a lot of people get very protective of it and they they get a little little scared around it and they want to reject things and and 1 of the things that I have to remember in those conversations is that. I am standing from a perspective that's very different than the perspective that they're holding and when that's the case we really need to stare step people into the conversation versus just saying well that's stupid so max and I are going to take a ah.
00:47.90	Max Shank	KA.
00:54.75	mikebledsoe	Stab at the conversation of Education. Hopefully we can help ah expand people's ideas about this and maybe change perspectives and maybe you're listening and you share the same perspective and we're able to help you put it into words more clearly so that you can share with others. As well and this was this conversation was inspired by the show we did last week where max was talking about how he would do things different with Education. So We decided to go deeper with it. Good to have you max.
01:32.76	Max Shank	It's great to be here Mike I think what I'd like to start off by saying is that there is a monumental difference between school and education education is the process of learning. Which is essentially like cheating. That's how humans have been able to become so dominant because we've been able to ah compound our acquired knowledge intergenerationally over long term I think schooling. Especially public schooling and even university has been a colossal failure in almost every way does more harm than good and I think the reason that people get so triggered and defensive when you make a comment like that is because they don't want to feel. Silly for having wasted their time having gone through that system themselves and especially if they have kids that they have put through that system. They don't want to feel like they have abused their children which they probably have so those are the 2 main reasons that people get charged up. When you make a comment like school is probably 5% efficient use of time. There are a few things that are useful about school but most of it is done in such a destructive manner for both the body and mind of a child. So those are the reasons that people get triggered schooling itself is a colossal failure education is the most powerful tool you have to increase your leverage which is going to allow you to have a greater impact in life with lower effort or less work There's a great. Mark Twain quote that says I never let schooling interfere with my education and I think that describes perfectly what we're talking about so there's a big big distinction big difference between school and education. So. Ultimately, it is your responsibility to educate yourself. It is your responsibility to educate your kids and then it is their responsibility to educate themselves beyond that and I think tying into our concept of freedom and personal responsibility. That's. 1 of the biggest errors is when you outsource your education you are priming yourself for propaganda and brainwashing and just essentially you end up in obedience school is what it becomes rather than an actual education that allows you to be more.
04:19.91	Max Shank	Self-reliant and contribute in a constructive way.
04:24.29	mikebledsoe	Yeah, when I think about I mean there's a few other distinctions to make here. So the distinction between education schooling you've made well another one that um stands out to me is Dr Andy Galpin he he always says that. Know the difference between education and training and the what he witnesses is the average student walking through the door at cal state is expecting training from a college university whose job is to educate.
05:00.43	Max Shank	A.
05:01.88	mikebledsoe	And and the point of education especially like a liberal Arts education is to is this is this is the way it was set up is that the wealthy would send their kids here so they could broaden their horizons. They could broaden their their scope of knowledge into many different areas. And then after they attended University They then entered the workplace and they were able able to enter the workplace being more cultured having more total information but not necessarily going to school unless you're going to become a doctor or lawyer or or something like that. Ah.
05:37.18	Max Shank	No.
05:39.13	mikebledsoe	A lot of so a lot of people have basically ah in in regard to college. They've confused education with training and it's not training and so some of these expectations around. Oh I'm going to go to college and then I'm going to get a job that's paying me close to 6 figures.
05:46.42	Max Shank	H.
05:58.46	mikebledsoe	You have 0 training All you have is education and so it's ah the the learning is going to happen when you start training or when you start actually doing so I like to have that as a distinction. As well. The just because so many people think they should should have that job and yeah, you're gonna have to get your training after college and which also brings me to ah a. A phrase. That's really stuck with me for a long time which is learning is behavior change and there is ah there are so many the education system the way that people have been educated have been really rewarded for memorizing and regurgitating. And they've mislabeled that as learning. So What I notice is a lot of people. They'll you'll start talking to them. They go I know I know I know we know this because max and I are both Educators. We tell somebody and they go I know I was like why aren't you doing it if you know it. And it's because they read it and they know it and so they almost get they the problem with education system is it rewards you with good grades a pat on the back like you did something good by memorizing it and then you go Oh I should get a reward for memorization.
07:27.81	Max Shank	Right.
07:29.45	mikebledsoe	And so people are very confused about why they're not getting a reward in the real world for just knowing shit and you be if you really live your life which I've really taken this on for myself that learning is behavior change if your behavior didn't Change. You don't get to say that you learned it.
07:47.70	Max Shank	Um, yeah I Really like that a lot I think the collapse distinction between training ah and education was that what you said between education and training.
08:01.19	mikebledsoe	Education and training. Yeah.
08:05.32	Max Shank	That's huge. That's huge um because you can go to welding school and you will learn a craft and you are now trained as a welder but the concept of broadening your horizons or as Charlie Munger calls it. The mental lattice work which I really like so you can borrow. Different ideas from a variety of topics and subjects and sources is really beneficial to your overall knowledge. But I also like the concept there of if the behavior doesn't change. You didn't really learn and it. Kind of makes me think of bf skinner classical conditioning right? If you if the behavior changes then learning has taken place. But if the behavior doesn't change then it has not ah that's.
08:55.64	mikebledsoe	Right? And and going to your point in the beginning is the school has become Ah, it's ah it's obedient school because what's the primary thing that people are learning. And they're learning to follow directions. They're learning to be at a specific. Yeah, be here at this Time. Don't do all these things do all these other things. Ah yeah, there are like you. So. Also said there's 5% of it is useful information.
09:14.86	Max Shank	Repeat What I say when I say it to you.
09:33.78	mikebledsoe	And I think that people tend to focus on the 5% because they want to protect I mean their identity right? because if you come out and say hey you you got screwed over by this education system which you believe so strongly in.
09:41.13	Max Shank	Exactly.
09:52.00	mikebledsoe	Because it's the only thing you know? Ah yeah, it could be. It's It's a blow to the identity Ego does not like to have that conversation and I'm curious max. What was what was your education. What was ah what was your education experience like.
10:02.62	Max Shank	Yeah, and.
10:11.12	mikebledsoe	Growing up.
10:11.25	Max Shank	Oh hellacious of of or pertaining to hell. Ah it. It was awful. Um, you know when you're a child the last thing in the world you want to do is sit in a desk and listen to someone who you don't like. Try to teach you something you don't care about for long long periods of time so it was horrible I almost got held back for bad bad handwriting ah made me think I was stupid and I mean once again I don't remember. 95% of the stuff I learned because that's not how that's not how memory works you know, even if you read a book and enjoy the book. You're not going to remember most of it unless you start using it and applying it in your everyday life and it is a tough pill to swallow. To recognize that you may be wasted 12 years of your life having your creativity and critical thinking skills essentially beaten out of you on some level but conversely. If. You don't accept that then you won't change your behavior so you have to sort of accept that before you can move on in a new and more constructive way. That's like that sunk cost fallacy. Oh well I did this for so long. Let me just do it a little bit more. So. Elementary school. Ah really traumatizing high school all the way up I did go to college before dropping out and it was it was really smart I didn't even have much left. To finish my spanish and economics degree. But I'm really glad I dropped out because it just proved ah how true that sunk cost fallacy is and it was almost better in terms of my actual learning and belief in that reality like. Am I going to spend another semester and a half to finish this degree when I have no intention of using it and I realized no so I went full hog into the career that I did enjoy that I was enthusiastic about and the gym that I had opened up.
12:28.50	mikebledsoe	Beautiful. Oh we boat dropped out of college to run a gym and.
12:30.89	Max Shank	Yeah, yeah, yeah, well and I I you know I I bought my house Thanks to book sales but I also failed English in high school.
12:46.90	mikebledsoe	You know? yeah I think that um.
12:48.60	Max Shank	So clearly I don't know how to write.
12:52.71	Max Shank	And the incentives the incentives are backwards right? So we've established that it's obedient school but there's no incentive for the teacher to do anything other than get you to behave yourself while in class and repeat back through rote Memory. Wrote memorization what she taught you. There's no advantage.. There's no incentive there for her to teach you. How to think critically because of the way that we measure is kind of like ah yeah, whatever, whatever way that you measure is. Going to affect the tactics that you employ. So if you're measuring Memorization. You're not really going to be incentivized to build critical thinking skills or expansive questioning. Um same as the incentive for college. You know there's no incentive for them to ensure that you get a good paying job and actually the only incentive there is to continue to increase the price of college because student loans for college are one of the only things you can. Get a person that young with that bad of credit to engage into a contract in I mean they're essentially like raping kids of their future by getting them to take out huge student loans that they can never default on due to bankruptcy So The incentive structures are. Um, completely backwards through the entire schooling process.
14:31.67	mikebledsoe	Yeah, by the way if if it sounds like we're just doing a lot of bashing we we do have solutions for each one of these things that we're gonna discuss we want to. We want to get all the problems out there first and one of the things that struck me is you know. The the rope memorization regurgitation is a really strong focus on what to think and as you were saying you know critical thinking skills. That's more about how to think and how to work your way through problems and we have an entire society that. Is easy to control because they're just told what to think if you if you log into Google Apple Facebook watch television listen to radio. They're repeating to you what to think about, but they're. Not telling you how to think about it. It's usually ah telling you what to think and then why you should worry about it and why you should be afraid of it and so this is it's a very fear drivenve experience in our culture right now and recognize this with.
15:34.92	Max Shank	11
15:47.32	mikebledsoe	My girlfriend especially she. She's got a master's in psychology and she's a certified you know, Psychotherapist and she did all the education racked up the student loan debt and she's very good at what she does like there. There's there's a lot of benefit out of it. But she's also since since her and I met and she's been swimming around the world of coaches who may not necessarily have finished their degrees which I know some coaches that were psychology majors but then just decide not to you know, go all the way or whatever it is and so.
16:14.74	Max Shank	And.
16:25.44	mikebledsoe	Um, now we get into this realm where people don't have you know certifications that fall under a board of ethics run by a bunch of academics and there was so much she I've heard this from her and many other people who have ah. Ah, ah, not certifications. But they have these credentials that could be taken away by a board. You know like a medical board or this or that and so what she shared with me is being in college. There was so much emphasis on.
16:52.30	Max Shank	Right? well.
17:02.73	mikebledsoe	You could lose your license for this. It's license not certification. You could lose your license for this lose your license for that like all the she said there was just so much fear and there was like if you don't follow these very specific rules then you're gonna lose your license and then you won't be able to work ever again and then she starts meeting everybody who.
17:04.23	Max Shank	Small cut.
17:20.96	mikebledsoe	Nobody has a license and they make good money and they get great results for their clients and she experienced ah ah quite a bit of frustration around that and ah, you know and there's so many things that she has because she went through. Like it was the perfect way for her to go she needed to go through that for many reasons part of it is you know, no one in her family had gone to college and her finishing at College made a big impact on the family you know and and there's there's all these. There's all these.
17:42.67	Max Shank	No.
18:00.30	mikebledsoe	Cultural narratives that really drive that but what I'd like for her to get to and I think she's getting there which is being really appreciative for the education she received but also recognizing it that its limitations and and going beyond. Ah.
18:09.42	Max Shank	And.
18:17.97	mikebledsoe	Where those limitations were at which which I've witnessed her due and I I hope that most people can do that? Um, yeah.
18:24.12	Max Shank	That's a tricky thing is changing resentment into gratitude when you know, full well with the benefit of hindsight that there was a much better way. But if you're not feeling that way your whole life. You're probably not paying attention. Like if you can never think back and go like there was a better way I could have done that than I want whatever you're having this can you imagine.
18:46.70	mikebledsoe	Yeah. Yeah, yeah, and one of the things that I also see missing in school that that really occurred to me after I got out of college was I remember taking a counting class in my first semester back to school after I was in the Navy and. I got a quarter away of the way through and the and the drop date was approaching and and I dropped the accounting clause because I was gonna get like a d in it or something and I had never gotten such a poor grade on anything and then um I go and i.
19:16.44	Max Shank	Ah.
19:25.56	mikebledsoe	Go on to physics you know a couple semesters later and do just fine which if you talk to most people accounting is way easier than physics for for most people. What I recognize when I look back? Ah what I really enjoyed about physics was the there was so much Context. This is why we're doing this. This is the practical application of this This is why we're learning this and when I sat down in the accounting class I was like all right. These are credits and these were debits. There was no and this this this teacher was so this accounting teacher was so.
19:55.71	Max Shank	Context.
20:02.48	mikebledsoe	Ah, popular for having it being a difficult class or you he was like pride prided himself on weeding people out of business school and I look back I was like it's just a bad teacher like come on you So proud of you Idiot like.
20:11.72	Max Shank	What an asshole.
20:20.93	mikebledsoe	A good teacher would be educating their students really well and giving them the tools to succeed but this is I think this is one of the dangers of you know I met a lot of ah I'm not saying that they're all like this but I met a lot of people who were. In the education department so they went to school specifically to become a teacher so we have to remember that the education system. It's not one of those things where we could just introduce new curriculum into the system and it would solve it because part of the problem is the teachers grew up in a. Memorize and regurgitate environment. They don't have the critical thinking skills in order to pass them down and I think that's at the core is really the problem. Um, you know there's a lot of problems but like. You can't expect the teacher that doesn't have critical thinking to be able to teach critical thinking.
21:20.83	Max Shank	Right? And unfortunately because the system is so entrenched and there's 10 year and there's um teachers who do really well actually become ostracized by the rest of the teachers. And I think the core problem with schooling the absolute core problem is the lack of incentive because if we talk about what the purpose of education is which is what the purpose of schooling should be It should be that you are. Self-reliant able to contribute understand value and values and because there's no connection. There. There's no incentive for the teacher to be able to do that. There's no incentive for the college to. Do a good job. Once they've gotten your tuition money. That's the biggest problem is there's ah, no incentive or sometimes there's actually a backwards incentive so you need to allow competition to happen with education. And there was actually a really good um thing that John Stossel did about education with regard to letting the free market help elevate the best teachers to the chop and I guess there's this. I want to say he's like a south korean guy. Um, who is a multi multi-millionaire I think like tens of millions of dollars because his lectures are so well attended both in person and online and actual learning is happening and. So that's part of it. But also if there was some correlation to how well the students do afterward. Um, just like if you offer coaching I'm sure you've offered coaching with a guarantee before hey I guarantee and yeah I mean that like like ah right.
23:20.33	mikebledsoe	Oh yeah, yeah, it's a conditional guarantee so you have to show us the work you did that we prescribed. Otherwise you're not getting your money back.
23:28.54	Max Shank	Yeah, right? But imagine though like that is that's an insanely good deal like if you pay me five k for coaching I guarantee that if you do what we say that you will get 10 k back like whoa. Are you kidding me. You have all the incentive to do a great job. They're bought in so they have all the incentive to do a great job I mean talk about a win-win and so that's my core point is the incentives are backwards and people respond to incentives more than anything else and that's why I like the. The ancient ah Roman ah bridge builder having to stand underneath the bridge when the first guys drive over it and they're like ah carriages I think that's that's essentially.
24:16.42	mikebledsoe	Seeing him.
24:22.94	Max Shank	How everything should be done. Is there needs to be an incentive for the people who are doing the work and the reward needs to also go to those who are incentivized to do so that's the core problem across the board.
24:34.20	mikebledsoe	Yeah, on your point 1 more out which is cost and the cost is soared and the quality has diminished over time I think it's at least in the the college university experience. The the government came in and basically subsidized through grants and they ah they stood behind loans. They guaranteed loans so that these banks would start lending money to people that have poor credit scores or have no credit.
25:10.34	Max Shank	Their children their children.
25:10.60	mikebledsoe	Or just too young to even know what they're getting themselves into yeah and so the education loans are predatory in nature for one they predatory loans I everyone I know that's got over $ $100000 in debt when I talk to them about. Experience of going into the financial aid office. It's always the same They're just always trying to max them out and the people in the financial aid office. They don't know any fucking better either. They're just doing what they're told they're not thinking they didn't they weren't taught to critically think they don't understand what's going on. They think they're doing a good thing.
25:41.83	Max Shank	It was just following orders.
25:46.66	mikebledsoe	Um, and and the the ah the cost as skyrocketed because these are guaranteed by the government. You can't be Bankrupt. You can't bankrupt your way out of these. So It has incentivized the schools to raise their rates because more people can get loans so simultaneously. Yeah, so the schools have raised their rates without actually making improvements to the education at all I Imagine it's just made the administrative.
26:12.73	Max Shank	Guaranteed.
26:22.73	mikebledsoe	Portion of the school much fluffier. Um, there's tenured professors that are in ah in a fluffy environment and in some way due to these things. So The football teams are probably getting you know, really great stadiums built who the fuck knows but um. Yeah, the the cost is to me is really disgusting in how much people are spending on education with what they get out of it and that is just long term debt. So it's. Pretty sickening.
27:00.87	Max Shank	Predatory is the correct word I think use the word predatory I think that's exactly what it is I think the guy Mike Roe who hosted dirty jobs and now has a foundation called micro works. Really has done a good job in illuminating the destructive cultural expectation that says oh going to university means you're good and if you're a welder and electrician that makes you bad and I'm falling back to the same examples. But. You know plumber there's nothing wrong with being a tradesman shoot I knew a guy who became a truck driver when he was 18 by the time he was 27 he owned like 3 or 5 semi trucks and he was basically retired you know so this whole idea that you need to be part of the intelligentsia is. Such a fallacy and it's very destructive because of course children they just want to be loved they want they want to get positive attention. So um, kids will do whatever gets them positive attention I mean the more interviews you listen to the the great people. In their fields. It's usually that they got positive attention for whatever it is they were doing.
28:19.63	mikebledsoe	Yeah, and another part of um, you know the the grants and the guaranting of the loans has basically made it possible for people who would not normally go to college to go to college and. With that has been the lowering of standards for accepting people to schools and so college education hasn't become special and it used to be special and now because everybody's going and the standards are lower. It's just kind of. It lowers the overall experience of what colleges it no longer stands out like the batch but the Bachelorsard's degree is what the high school diploma used to be.. It's It's not. It's not anything that's gonna make you stand apart and so we end up with just people that are in school into their mid 20 s or. Early 30 s just putting off actually getting their life started.
29:19.15	Max Shank	And with the exception of a few careers. It's totally worthless. It's for most careers, you'd be better off working and earning money when you're like 1412 1416 you know you can you can become an apprentice. For something when you're in your teens and by the time you're 18 have lots of money saved up and have a valuable skill and if you have a good mentor a valuable skill that you know how to sell and there's no better security than that. Ah, valuable skill that you know how to sell.
29:59.30	mikebledsoe	Yeah,, let's let's get into that So What are the now. What I want to do is I Want to talk about the important things that are that we should be learning So What should exist and. Education and then after we talk about the different things that are important. We can roll into how we would design an education system that included these things and excluded all the bullshit. So. What do you got Max. What are the important things for us to learn.
30:30.96	Max Shank	First off I just want to reiterate why? what? What were you trying to learn. Why is it important we have self reliance and contribution. We have value and values and we have physical and mental health. I think that pretty much covers what you would hope to learn right? Is there anything else. You can think of I think that's basically it.
30:56.42	mikebledsoe	Um I like that as ah as a context I started thinking about the things that like specifically when I think about what's commonly thought of being created in school is reading writing arithmetic. Ah.
31:10.90	Max Shank	O.
31:14.38	mikebledsoe	If you can if you can read and write you can you're going to be able to and if you can comprehend what you read at a high level you become more literate so that the more you can comprehend the better. You can comprehend the more literate you become which allows you to grasp information at much faster speed. But also be able to produce it and share it. So um, the reading and writing are super important there if you can I Really think I mean this this trumps math if you can read, you can learn anything. You can go anywhere if you can read really? well. Um, that's.
31:46.49	Max Shank	Agreed agreed.
31:52.67	mikebledsoe	To me is the primary thing I'm a little biased I'm sure because like I I have ah a super high reading comprehension but I look at my life and I see how beneficial that has been It's probably because I was homeschooled. And basically around seventh or eighth grade I was learning everything on my own so it was was kind of like forced into reading comprehension. Um.
32:15.72	Max Shank	Whole words usually make or break your life your ability to communicate with other people and cooperate with other people is totally dependent on your ability to express and interpret both. Ah.
32:20.81	mikebledsoe	You know.
32:35.49	Max Shank	Actual language and body language. So it it is the ultimate skill and we are the ultimate social emotional creature. So there's no question that word is important I have it split up into word number and movement basically and.
32:49.63	mikebledsoe	E.
32:54.10	Max Shank	That will give you the mental and physical health that will also allow you to understand the concept of value and if you understand the concept of value. You know that value is relative to the individual like you know, bottled water at Coachella. Is very valuable but bottled water on you know, an iceberg is is next to a ah pure stream is not that valuable at all. In fact, it might even be detrimental. You'd pay nothing for it. So that's really the the crux of it. So. With number I have it split up into economics engineering and music is how I would teach numbers econ so you can learn about risk reward cost and benefit. There's some accounting in there of course and then engineering. Would be where like physics and geometry and structures would come into play. So I think that covers most of the practical uses for numbers and I'm sure that our listeners would have other ideas of how that work I think music is. Ah, really good thing to ah teach people because it's actually pretty easy and the amount of effort required versus the benefit you get both ah psychologically and physically is very high so that would be number and then for words. You would want logic and rhetoric history to know what worked and what should be done differently Ww and Dd and then ah learning about programming. Learning about how humans are programmed learning how to program yourself using language learning about the power of stories and storytelling and maybe most importantly, learning how to craft an offer and sell that offer. And I think that really covers a lot of the word skills that a person might need. And lastly we have under movement I have meditation under movement because it's sort of the um I think stillness is actually a pretty useful. Exercise and then we have wrestling striking gymnastics and Ballgames and I think that would cover like 95%
35:41.39	Max Shank	Of what you need in order to be able to deliver value which allows you to be self-reliant and contribute and it would also enhance your mental and physical health and still leave lots of time left over for. Recreation and leisure and rest and play which I think are also non-negotiables.
36:06.61	mikebledsoe	Yeah, one thing I would add to that be law I think there's yeah, no manmade laws. The um, those.
36:13.36	Max Shank	Law like physical laws or so so crime crime and punishment.
36:25.30	mikebledsoe	Yeah, really I mean people people be don't understand how law works They don't understand I mean going back to because that falls under the the word category for you because law is just an opinion.
36:38.94	Max Shank	Yeah.
36:44.32	mikebledsoe	By a certain group of people that they then Hire Policy. You know they create a policy Hire Policy enforcers to make sure that everybody complies. Um. And most people are very confused about the law so it leaves it leaves law in the hands of very few people people people get involved politically in ways that they don't understand.
37:11.36	Max Shank	O.
37:18.77	mikebledsoe	Don't understand the implications of what's going On. Ah and they don't know how to make a change. They don't know how to how to change the law or take advantage of the law or to interpret the law and I think this is something I started learning some of that when I was in high school. I was I was blessed enough to have been exposed to constitutional law and take that high school and I was homeschooled so I got to study a bunch of shit that other people never I talked to anyone who went to public school. No one talked about constitutional law. Even though that's the entire basis of our culture So culture is made up of language in the most concrete version of culture is the laws that are written down and people are going around enforcing those laws I mean it doesn't get more concrete than that outside of.
38:12.54	Max Shank	Or else That's a strong incentive.
38:15.79	mikebledsoe	Yeah, or else. So I think that I think that law is is really powerful to to learn and another thing is most of the things that people avoid in this world that keeps them from being wealthy I had this conversation with one of my friends this weekend. Is people are scared to learn anything administrative in nature people due to avoiding administrative load ah remain poor They they don't engage with what's happening financially with and with their taxes. They don't know how to.
38:49.31	Max Shank	So.
38:52.36	mikebledsoe	They're afraid of it and they just you know whatever the accountant says I don't really know how to how to engage in that administratively and a lot of people confuse law with Administrative. There's a lot of administrative stuff going on if you just do these things that you're not going to be subject to certain laws because you went through these. Certain administrative Processes. So this happens with real estate this happens with what what we're seeing in the the crypto markets right now there's a lot of there's a lot of really complex and sophisticated administrative things that are built in a society right now that.
39:11.40	Max Shank	Ah.
39:28.85	mikebledsoe	The only people who really get the benefit of it are the people who are willing to engage in that administrative load and are willing to learn the complexity of it and so I see the administration falls under government and governance and law. Whether it's coming from a government or the governance is coming from a smaller institution. These things are all important to know about if you want to participate in society and make a difference in it.
39:50.27	Max Shank	The.
39:58.98	Max Shank	It's like how you want to? It's like how to manage your life. Basically right? because you know don't hate the player hate the game better yet. Just ah, don't hate anything just ah play the cards you're dealt. But you're right I mean law is so deliberately complex to obscure the truth accounting rules are so deliberately complex to obscure the truth tax rules, etc. But you can complain about how it's unfair. Which it is or you can learn the language of those pursuits and I think the fact that we don't teach kids about accounting and taxes and law in high school is a frigging crime.
40:50.69	mikebledsoe	Yeah, well be too many people learn it. They might get they they might start thinking for themselves. That's a problem so we won't go.
40:59.71	Max Shank	Well, they might realize how bad everyone's being screwed I mean that's why we also that's why we also don't get ah a transparent pie chart with a list of how tax dollars are being spent because we would all go like are you fricking kidding me. Like you couldn't you couldn't imagine a more egregious misappropriation of funds. But once again that is taboo because people are under the fantasy. That it's being spent well if their tax dollars are going to a good cause and so in order to come to the realization that they're being catastrophically mismanaged wasted or maybe even ah used for ah sinister acts.
41:51.57	mikebledsoe	Um, yeah.
41:53.53	Max Shank	Right is horrifying.
42:00.63	mikebledsoe	So horrifying. Alright, so we know we know what we want to learn so I don't have children yet. But I'm planning on it. Um I was homeschooled I feel very blessed for that I think. 1 of the things that people are mostly concerned about and it comes homeschooling is you know the social interaction piece and I said this last week is you know the 3 big things we want to learn that the reason we want to learn things is so we can benefit our health our wealth and our relationships. And ah, you know a lot of times people think about you know, homeschoolers being isolated and and I had plenty of opportunity I my parents hired tutors along with some other parents. So I would go to a latin teacher with 3 other guys once a week we would study latin. Um I had an algebra tutor I had a spanish tutor and I was getting little social engagement in these small groups throughout the week so I wasn't without a social structure. It was just different and I think I actually developed very well because of that because I actually spent more time. Amongst adults that I did with kids who are my own age who probably weren't as mature and had I been in that environment I would have behaved less maturely as well. So I had ah I was able to mature pretty quickly due to that. Um. And I know one thing that's really emerged. That's really exciting is this past couple of years. The kids weren't allowed to go to school and they all had to sit at home and and ah, they're basically being homeschooled.
43:46.12	Max Shank	Right.
43:54.49	mikebledsoe	By parents who may not even be interested in it or they're having to work a job and can't give them the attention and it just created this this whiplash in a way and you know they they started letting kids go back to school here in Texas and Florida you know the kids. Everything's pretty much back to normal when it comes to going to school sometimes I have mass sometimes they don't depends on the school here in in Texas and ah, but my friends in California who have children what they've done because California laws are so insane. Ah. Is ah a lot of these teachers have left these these really great teachers have left these amazing schools because they're tired of all the mandates as well and these parents have gotten together and they go oh there's 6 families. Getting together. We're all going to contribute $20000 to this teacher for the year the teacher gets paid more the kids get more attention that the ratio of parent a teacher is just right? The parents are in a constant conversation with the teachers. And there's not just one teacher to 1 group of kids. There's multiple teachers that have specialties and different things and so these kids are are and it's and it's very it's become very communal and what we're gonna what we're gonna be witnessing over the years is there's a ah decentralization of. Everything everything's being decentralized and so a lot of people are not going to like that because it's so different than the way it's been but education is becoming decentralized and it's gonna be very community oriented and when things decentralized things tend to become tribal and what I mean by that is. There are small cultures. There's these subcultures that start forming these bubbles I'm part of a subculture where I live we all have you know we we all share the same beliefs and all that kind of stuff and when you know we have kids and bring them up through that culture that's going to be that way. And we need to be good with other people having their own bubbles and their own beliefs and their own cultures. That's perfectly fine. That's what makes this world such a beautiful place. Um, but what I I see in the future is the reason this teacher can get paid much more. You know it could be making 6 figures and. Not working for the school. So the teacher makes more money it costs the parents less money to send their kids to school because're not paying for all this administrative bullshit and the administrative bullshit basically gets in the way of having a direct relationship with the teacher and it gets in the way of community because it's sets a centralized humane and control.
46:35.28	Max Shank	Right.
46:42.61	Max Shank	And no direct incentive either yet, you need to have um, correlated incentives. Otherwise you're always going to get a worse result. You're always going to get corruption. You're always going to get. Ah.
46:47.34	mikebledsoe	And the incentives are yeah are broken.
47:02.44	Max Shank	Like lobbying. For example, we're we're going to. We're going to convince the rule breakers to give us better rules I mean that's just that's just crazy.
47:05.19	mikebledsoe	Yeah, yeah.
47:13.45	mikebledsoe	so so I started throwing out a solution. that's that's 1 big broad solution. We didn't talk about how kids should be school choice.
47:19.84	Max Shank	School choice. Yeah school choice is the ultimate solution because if you want to send your kid to public school and you have what you consider a good public school and you're well-informed then hey you know more power to you but you have to have that choice. Which allows for competition so that the let's just say like the destructive schools don't have a monopoly on the hearts and minds of kids. It's ridiculous.
47:49.98	mikebledsoe	Um, yeah, how would you handle the 8 hours of sitting in 1 spot as a child.
47:57.10	Max Shank	You you don't I mean what could possibly be worse than sitting in a chair that is horizontal with a desk that is horizontal. It's catastrophically bad. You're looking straight down all the time. Or you're looking at the teacher talk. Ah I think for the body. It's awful. You know you could you could do you could do 100% of schooling outside if the weather was good. You could do most schooling outside depending on the weather just with like a. A notebook or a tablet of some kind I mean it doesn't have to be a fancy ipad or anything like that. You know we forget that you pay a premium for a luxury brand like that. But you could go to Walmart today and for like eighty bucks get a tablet that can connect to the internet. And write notes and has a little pen on there. So.
48:55.83	mikebledsoe	For all my friends kids were the school gave them Macbooks once covid hit like all the kids got macbooks I know well you're welcome kid.
49:05.43	Max Shank	Wow you and I paid for those. Ah, yeah, and obviously someone won big on securing that contract too. So that that's that sort of ah backwards incentive is par for the course and a lot of it has to do with transparency.
49:18.51	mikebledsoe	Oh yeah, for sure.
49:29.19	Max Shank	I think that's the main attraction of cryptocurrency. For example, especially like blockchain technology is that it's so transparent. Ah there isn't anyway, we don't want to get on that topic too much but when it's transparent and you know where everything's going. It's really difficult for there to be those. Dirty dealings behind the scenes and those backwards incentive structures. So I think that sitting in a desk, especially ah a single desk most of the day is. 1 of the worst things you could do to a kit to their posture to their eyesight to their skin to their body I mean it's horrible. You know if you don't see it as child if you don't see it as child abuse then you like don't understand physiology.
50:12.84	mikebledsoe	Well, the other thing is is.
50:21.37	mikebledsoe	Yeah, and the other thing that I've done a lot of work in the emotional realm and one of the things that I recognize is the emotional body and the physical body are so intertwined These are not different these are and.
50:21.90	Max Shank	At all.
50:41.36	mikebledsoe	And if you put kids in an environment where they cannot move and they're experiencing anything emotional that they're not allowed to express because you're not allowed to express yourself emotionally in class you gotta be quiet. You can't you know if you're crying. We're gonna.
50:53.91	Max Shank	And right? yeah.
50:59.33	mikebledsoe	You You know, get rid of you somehow or get you to settle down if you're if you want to be happy and Laughing. You can't do that either. So Not only is there this retardation of physical movement but ah of being in touch with the emotional body. So What I see. Problem with the desk is it's yeah, it's the the emotional body also gets stunted in this so you get the the physical body and the emotional body are suffering by being in this and while the physical body and the emotional body are being minimized.
51:17.99	Max Shank	Eq goes down.
51:35.57	mikebledsoe	We are then putting most of our attention on the memorization and regurgitation and so we end up in honoring and really I guess holding on a pedestal. The. The intellectual part of being human as being the most valuable so we've got 20 years of education telling us that what's in our mind is what's truly important and that our body and our emotional body are not as important you won't be valued in Society. If you have that So what we have is a bunch of people who have very poor development physically poor development Emotionally who have an overdeveloped psyche in a lot of ways that is that they identify as who they are and that that. Creates a very controllable population. It's a very,. It's very easy to create sheep in that in that case.
52:41.60	Max Shank	All being taught by an obedience teacher who has no skin in the game for how well they do in life.
52:51.11	mikebledsoe	Um, yeah.
52:52.80	Max Shank	Even even with the best of intentions I've I've met teachers who are amazing I've also met teachers who couldn't be worse and even if you have really good intentions. It doesn't mean that the action is good I Think that's.
52:57.84	mikebledsoe	I.
53:11.00	Max Shank	Something that I've really come to think about a lot as I study history as I Observe what's going on in our culture Good intentions doesn't doesn't make the action good if your intentions are good. It doesn't mean what you're doing is good. So Even with the best of intentions you can like horribly abuse a lot of people.
53:29.65	mikebledsoe	Yeah, yeah.
53:35.33	mikebledsoe	The the truth is in the results I talk to people about this which is somebody wants to start getting defensive of you know I speak frequently about the the medical system being fucked up and you know what people refer to as the health care system. Being fucked up and they're like well you know and they want to defend it I'm like all we have to do is look at the results I don't want to hear about why you think this is a good idea or not or people want to defend very specific actions when I go look I don't I'm not look. That action. You know was a good theory and it was put in place and all that but it didn't work out the way we wanted to work out. You know the american healthcare system is failing. How do we know? record breaking diabetes cancer mental health the heart disease people. That ah number one killer in the United States right now. Fentanyl overdose. So ah, prescription drugs.
54:37.86	Max Shank	Number 1 even above and beyond like heart disease that would surprise me.
54:44.30	mikebledsoe	I I Saw a new thing I think it became number one definitely beats Covid but um.
54:50.44	Max Shank	Maybe number one? No well, there's ah, there's a lot of iffy numbers around testing and things like that and the amount of deaths and cases there but we don't want to get ourselves censored.
55:01.35	mikebledsoe	Everything? Ah yeah, all arms. Ah yeah, if you're getting censored.
55:09.50	Max Shank	That's always a good sign by the way if ah if someone's trying to censor certain topics. They're probably doing it with good intentions.
55:16.98	mikebledsoe	Ah, yeah, so so we really got to look at the results and so anyone who still is hesitant to agree with us. Ah just look at the results you know or the results of the education system. What kind of what kind of people are going out into the world. Seems pretty chaotic to me at this point. Um, what I mean I too many too many kids to one teacher these classrooms with 30 kids 1 teacher. What? What's the number you'd like to see.
55:46.28	Max Shank	I well here's the thing I think if the structure were different that would be fine that'd be fine if if kids worked with each other in groups and they were learning things that were useful. Things that were important and interesting to them. Um, then you wouldn't need to have that teacher giving one thirtieth of her attention to everyone all the time it could be done in more of like a ah circuit style.
56:20.70	mikebledsoe	Um.
56:22.54	Max Shank	So I think the number of students to the teacher is relevant but it can work a lot of different ways. Ah no question, no question if you have ah a 1 on 1 relationship you're you're gonna get more.
56:29.36	mikebledsoe	You.
56:41.19	Max Shank	Information transmitted there you're going to get more direct and immediate feedback which can be very beneficial. Um, ah so I think 1 to 30 is not necessarily a problem but it is a problem especially with the structure that we have it in. You know everybody in an individual desk. We got 95% fluff. The rest of it is not really um, taught in a way that is principles based It's more rote memorization based so um, yeah, part of the reason that's no good is. Because of the structure we have in place ah school school choice though is the solution and unfortunately the worse we like dumb down the.
57:20.81	mikebledsoe	Got it? yeah.
57:38.17	Max Shank	School system the more ah like pork belt barreling the more like fluff we throw in there due to lobbying and teachers unions and stuff like that and the less incentive at play you just create are ah wider wider and wider chasm between the haves and the have-nots because if then. You know going to public school is actually worse and worse and worse for a child that makes the gap between that and a private school or a free choice school bigger and bigger.
58:09.43	mikebledsoe	yeah yeah I think about how I teach and we break you know Um I'm teaching adults so they learn the information on their own. They they try to apply it. Um, but then they also meet with a pod I put people in groups of a pod of 6 and that pod of 6 is led by 1 of my coaches and you know they're usually got more than no more than 25 or 30 people they're managing at a time but only 6 at a time.
58:32.57	Max Shank	This.
58:48.20	mikebledsoe	Is what they're managing and so I really like that that group of 6 I I grew up learning in in groups of 6 or or less I see a lot of value in that I do like what you were saying you know one teacher could be handling 30 kids if there was a certain rotation going on. But I think most teachers are managing like 150 kids and 30 at a time. So I think that and and the other thing we have to also think about is you know the age if you're if you're 3 4 5 6 7 eight years old you probably need that constant supervision. There needs to be a teacher all the time present or most of the time present you know I think it's really silly for thirteen fourteen Fifteen year olds to be under constant supervision of a teacher for 8 hours a day. It's I'm a big believer in.
59:31.71	Max Shank	A.
59:45.69	Max Shank	But.
59:46.61	mikebledsoe	Like let's sit down for 60 to 90 minutes to focus on a topic as a group and then go go fuck off for an hour. You know, go go ah go to recess. Go move your body go play. Do something you enjoy. If you want to study more if you want to learn more about it and continue to have the conversation. Great. But I'd like to see an environment where like as kids get older that they get more autonomy over their time and how they spend it and. Giving them the space to research and learn about things that they're curious about instead of having this need to cram all this useless information in your head so that you know the teacher can meet their quota the way to pause it real quick.
01:00:31.50	Max Shank	Um, yeah, sure. Yeah, so what we need is interest and incentive. Basically.
01:00:40.12	mikebledsoe	Hear the door knocking go.
01:00:49.19	Max Shank	Like if if you're interested in something and you're incentivized. You'll do it. That's that's what I've noticed with coaching adults as well is if you're interested and incentivized. There's no limit to the energy and enthusiasm that you'll have and if you. Reinforce that sense of ah contribution that good feeling you get when you share with others. It allows you to have this abundance of psychic energy which I think you and I agree you and I would agree is 1 of the main roadblocks. For adults in success in their business. It's not because they don't know how to do arithmetic. It's because there are personal blocks. Ah psychologically and emotionally right.
01:01:42.64	mikebledsoe	Yeah, absolutely absolutely. Um, how how do you approach teaching children to we. We talked a lot about memorizing and regurgitating as as not learning, but just as it is what it is.
01:01:54.65	Max Shank	Right.
01:02:00.54	Max Shank	Right.
01:02:02.19	mikebledsoe	How do we teach like what would be your idea of how to teach kids. How to think for themselves.
01:02:07.31	Max Shank	So I have ah I have a very controversial method. What I do is I have a pocket full of marshmallows and then I carry a long stick and if they do something I like then they get a marshmallow and if they do something I don't like then I hit them with the stick and I'll. I'll trick them. Ah, into just blindly believing what I say and if they do blindly believe what I say then I hit him with the stick and if they ask for context then they get a marshmallow I'm a little bit old school. Ah no I mean I.
01:02:45.13	mikebledsoe	Yeah, yeah, yeah.
01:02:49.75	Max Shank	I Think ah, encouraging curiosity and question asking is very valuable. Um I think relating everything back to how you're going to be able to liberate yourself and contribute. Is very important there needs to be context with the content. You can't have just content. You want to reinforce how learning to read will allow you to learn anything Else. You have to reinforce how ah economics and accounting are. Going to help you become wealthy so you don't have to worry about living paycheck to Paycheck. So I think having context with content and encouraging curiosity are probably the most important things when it comes to teaching kids. Um. The other thing is trying to have something physical in the world rather than just ah, verbal or visual something that they can hold in their hands I think is really valuable and making it a little bit more kinesthetic.
01:03:58.40	mikebledsoe	Yeah, there's ah ah well the the interesting there is um I read I read this book last year called Metaphors that we live by and it Yeah, do you.
01:04:11.60	Max Shank	I have that book. Yeah.
01:04:15.61	mikebledsoe	And it does a really good job of mapping out how the the mind works in Metaphor. So ah, the when we when we talk about if we talk about inflation the way that it's structured in a sentence. Makes it out to where we're creating inflation as a person you know inflation is bad and it's gonna come get you and all these types of things just as an example and so we tend to take Concepts and we we say the mind is a. Is an engine or a machine.. It's like that's not actually True. You know we we could think about it as a process but most people don't That's too conceptual So Most Concepts are made that we make sense of those concepts by ah, assigning Them. Ah.
01:04:58.40	Max Shank	Right.
01:05:13.25	mikebledsoe	It's a metaphor to something we can physically see and touch and and feel and all that kind of stuff and so to your point if there is a lack of of 3 D experience if there's a lack of what's going on then. I Think these when you when you're learning Concepts and you don't have the metaphors locked in well enough you you are going to you. You run the risk of just living in the conceptual world which I call the fifth dimension and.
01:05:49.10	Max Shank	Yes.
01:05:51.19	mikebledsoe	World of concepts the fourth dimension being our 3 dimensions that we exist in in this particular moment and then add time and for the fourth dimension fit dimension being concepts and so what we end up with is a bunch of people who are lost in their heads.
01:06:10.34	Max Shank	And.
01:06:10.71	mikebledsoe	And just doing you know mental masturbation that never know how to to practically apply these things and I have suffered from that a bit myself. So I I get it. But that's something that I think you're spot on I think the solution to that is a lot of hands On. Learning like I learned geometry and trigonometry in my high school years but the real application which was way simpler than what I was learning in the books by the way was going on the job site with my dad and renovating houses and having to cut pieces of wood that were going to fit.
01:06:45.50	Max Shank	Okay.
01:06:49.79	mikebledsoe	This angle over here and this angle over there and we were doing the math it Trigg made so much sense to me being on the job site. You get me in a book and all of a sudden. It's stop it. It doesn't it doesn't mean as much but again because I have the I have the carpentry background.
01:07:05.69	Max Shank	It's not rich.
01:07:09.11	mikebledsoe	I do understand trick really well I was able to get into physics really well because I I so I can take the conception when I and I've had practice making it practical.
01:07:19.84	Max Shank	Well and you know you bring up a really good point like pract I'm one of the most practical people I've ever met because I tend to think that if something is superfluous. You can do it for fun but otherwise it should be. Cut out like there's no reason for any of that unless you're specifically like trying to just have fun. So when I have the 3 categories of you know, word move and number there's a lot. You actually still have a lot of time left over so you could have part of schooling be woodworking and plumbing and learning a little bit about electric circuits and having these very practical schools like how about cooking and once again, we don't want to. Rely 100% on the state to teach your kid because they will ah do the worst job possible because there's no incentive for them to do a good job so having practical skills acquired that are not only. Ah. Applied in that moment but also applied for the rest of your life is hugely valuable. So I think um, that idea of no content without context would be. Like 1 of the most important things because you need someone to emotionally and intellectually buy in and apply that knowledge once they've realized that it's valuable.
01:08:59.99	mikebledsoe	Yeah, that also solves the problem of the fluff. The the useless information that is made important when you have context I think about history and how much history is taught and it's like.
01:09:10.34	Max Shank	A. So much fluff.
01:09:17.62	mikebledsoe	This battle happened at this point and whatever and you know on the test you got to make sure that you got the right battle in the right year and all that kind of shit and it just makes no sense and um.
01:09:24.18	Max Shank	Right? It's ridiculous. It's ridiculous. It's rote memorization with no idea for like why are we learning this. It's so we don't repeat the mistakes of history and history is all about how human beings clump together and cooperate or.
01:09:35.26	mikebledsoe	Right.
01:09:43.56	Max Shank	Or don't cooperate how they resolve their differences How you know that that kind of thing I agree.
01:09:47.79	mikebledsoe	Yeah, and so we could study the the purpose of studying history. The the grand context there which isn't taught school is yeah, don't repeat the mistakes and what's made us better. How do we do more of that and how does this. Why are we learning what we're learning today. How does that apply to today's environment and where we're going and what what are the pitfalls and and I I would you know when I have kids that conversation is gonna it's gonna be a conversation. You know what do you think about how that applies to what's going on in our world right now.
01:10:10.44	Max Shank	Right.
01:10:23.52	Max Shank	Hello text.
01:10:24.85	mikebledsoe	This and that and and talk it through.
01:10:29.89	mikebledsoe	Um, how would you incentivize creativity. What do you? What are you laughing about.
01:10:42.50	Max Shank	I'm just thinking about ah the the teachers who hear this who are going to hate my fucking guts and yours too probably, but but they'll hate me more after I say this next thing is it doesn't seem hard. It actually doesn't seem difficult at all. Once you add context to every piece of content and once you cut away all the fluff. There's not that much. You need to know to understand value and values and when I say value and values I Basically just mean understanding that value is relative understanding that you have to deliver value. To be able to exist within this societal framework and values to me essentially means like volunteerism like non-coercion Morality like we talked about before like if you if you don't like someone that's fine but don't punch them in the face.
01:11:28.89	mikebledsoe	Oh.
01:11:39.20	Max Shank	Ah, however, if they attack you then ah go ahead and make sure you win that battle in some way, don't steal. Don't lie like it's very simple stuff. But.
01:11:46.10	mikebledsoe	Yeah.
01:11:53.29	Max Shank	It's not a lot of stuff. It's more important to reinforce those things with practical application and context. That's what I was laughing about.
01:11:58.12	mikebledsoe	Yeah I on that I want to make sure that we have ah some type of solution for each thing we we named as a problem we we're talking about ah the the school system is stifling creativity. So.
01:12:06.54	Max Shank	Yeah, can you repeat it I I was off in my own little world. There. Those are the.
01:12:17.28	mikebledsoe	What? Ah how would you enhance? what would you do to help enhance creativity in children you were teaching.
01:12:22.66	Max Shank	I Suppose asking leading questions to how you could apply something. You know that seems unrelated to something that we're learning right now would be a good way to do it.
01:12:38.70	mikebledsoe	Yeah.
01:12:42.10	Max Shank	Um, asking what other ways could you try to solve this problem. Um I think music and art would be Useful. Creativity is a tricky thing because. If we try to nail down a definition. What does creativity really mean um, like an unexpected solution like if you say in sport someone came up with a really creative play. It would be something that you haven't really seen before it would be. Something that maybe you've seen elsewhere applied in a new way right? So I I think encouraging knowing what that means and then encouraging that behavior and recognizing that's what innovation is would be useful.
01:13:24.90	mikebledsoe	Yeah, one one of the ways I like her.
01:13:35.59	mikebledsoe	Yeah, yeah, I like the idea of well you know I train entrepreneurs I train people to be entrepreneurs basically and an entrepreneur is just a problem solver at the end of the day is.
01:13:44.50	Max Shank	Right. Yeah.
01:13:53.49	mikebledsoe	A problem in the world and you're gonna create a solution. So I really like the idea like creating an environment where creativity is enhanced by putting problems in front of them without the without saying solve it inside of this context but obviously.
01:14:10.74	Max Shank	2
01:14:13.24	mikebledsoe	This problem solving this problem it. The problem itself creates its own boundaries and so if I'm solving a very specific problem then I have to take all this creative energy that might be going in random directions and then focus it down into this one solution and I think that.
01:14:25.85	Max Shank	The.
01:14:32.62	mikebledsoe	Being able to approach different types of problems and then apply all this other knowledge that that exists in other Contexts and then see the the principles overlap and the relationship of those principles into this New. Ah. New context if you can do that then you're you're gonna be really well Off. So It's I think putting a I think putting problems in front of kids and letting them work it out in their own way and just see what happens also allowing them to be.
01:14:57.69	Max Shank	Ah.
01:15:08.12	Max Shank	That's that's a great point.
01:15:10.69	mikebledsoe	Kids just allowing kids to be curious and study what they want I mean ah the way I've thought about approaching is like you know what? I'm gonna make sure that my kids do math for like twenty thirty minutes a day I'm gonna make sure they read and write for twenty thirty minutes a day. It's like reading writing arithmetic.
01:15:12.84	Max Shank	Right? okay.
01:15:20.39	Max Shank	The.
01:15:28.18	mikebledsoe	And we'll cover some other stuff along the way. But you know what do they want to do you know? Let's ah, spend the first couple hours studying and on the stuff that I want them to learn they they may not want to but after that is like oh there's a piano right here. There's there's some guns over there. There's. Ah, you know we could build something over there. But there's a whole library of books like is there a topic that interests you and I think letting the kids explore get a lot of reward while learning for themselves is.
01:15:50.60	Max Shank	Right.
01:16:04.67	mikebledsoe	Is going to help improve creativity as well.
01:16:05.71	Max Shank	Just giving them the space and less coaching with these things I thought of ah you know how would you encourage creativity. You give them a problem. They solve it and you say okay could you solve it in a different way.
01:16:09.54	mikebledsoe	Okay.
01:16:21.65	mikebledsoe	Um, on her name.
01:16:22.89	Max Shank	Like that's one way you could do it? Okay, could you solve it in a different way and then also just giving them a task with no coaching whatsoever like I just had this vision of giving each group of like 2 or 3 kids like a huge rock and like asking them to move it to the other side of a field or something like that.
01:16:39.18	mikebledsoe	Man.
01:16:42.37	Max Shank	And you know just trying to figure out like how they could do that like what tools could you use? what? how could you get that to happen if you were teaching like a physics class and you wanted to learn about ah force and mass and friction and work.
01:17:00.10	mikebledsoe	Beautiful. Sounds like the school we would design be a lot of fun for a kid to attend So what's easier than a job teaching kid. Oh yeah.
01:17:07.54	Max Shank	I would kind of want to go there. It's way easier than a job if you do it right? going to the school that we're inventing.
01:17:19.57	mikebledsoe	You know to my point last week you know I think there's I was hanging out with some ah crypto entrepreneurs this weekend and a handful of guys who ah who understand blockchain way better than I do And yeah, the. I Mentioned the dow last week and I still like it's still hot on my mind. There's there is a way to create a decentralized education system that ah where we get to learn best practices. Best practices are kept and shared. And worst practices are just removed from the system altogether but there's always choice. So for me the bottom line for education is it's It's much more than Schooling. Ah. Kids who tend to be pretty bright. This isn't always the case. Some kids come from from pretty rough backgrounds all the way around. But you know the education's happening in the home. It's not very little education is happening in school aside from the obedience training which kids are also just getting at home. And ah so it's to me. It's about what's happening in the family unit. What's happening communally I know that when I have kids they will have a lot of aunts and Uncles not not blood aunts and Uncles but they will they will go hunting with my buddy manzel who who is a.
01:18:47.42	Max Shank	A.
01:18:54.29	mikebledsoe	Who is the best hunter I know and they will go. You know wherever with who like there's gonna be a It'll be a community thing and I imagine some people will. It'll be an official role for them and for other people it'll just be like oh yeah, he's really good with plumbing over there. So. Make sure to go to spend a few days with him and really putting putting them in the the world of of really amazing men and women to me is the the future and the big win got a last.
01:19:27.37	Max Shank	Ah.
01:19:29.64	mikebledsoe	Last thoughts on this max.
01:19:34.46	Max Shank	Incentives drive behavior. It's it's not that complicated actually and when you have the incentives in the wrong place things go really bad. Ah, you don't need to know that many things to live well you don't need to know that many things to be self-reliant and contribute. So ah, lastly accept the reality that school is. Mostly a waste of time mostly obedient school but don't be resentful of it be appreciative of the experience and recognize that education is an ongoing process recognize that if you're learning about something that you are truly interested in. And incentivized to learn. You will never feel a lack of energy I mean unless you're deeply sick. But even people who are deeply sick if they are enthusiastic about what they're learning and enthusiastic about the prospect of getting better better. Getting better and sharing that information then then you will create a surplus of enthusiasm which is essentially psychic energy. You know when you're interested in a project you work on it all day. And suddenly it's 10 pm and you're like oh I forgot to eat today and if you're doing stuff that you don't want to do you will jump at any opportunity to go mindlessly eat some snacks and I'm I'm the same way by the way this is not like a.
01:21:17.10	mikebledsoe	Right.
01:21:18.59	Max Shank	Pointing the finger I'm pointing the finger at at myself because I know that within my own self I'm a collection of stories and sensations and I have that 3 hree-tiered mind the lizard the mammal and the wizard and I am I'm part. Neocortex wizard able to imagine different probabilities for the future and I'm also a half retarded monkey who just wants boobs and snacks. So I respect. That reality and try to engage with things that I'm both emotionally invested in intellectually interested in and also incentivized by it. So if you care about something then you will do whatever it takes to learn it. I mean just an example I was reading a eo wilson textbook on genetics and it was fascinating I spent like 2 hours yesterday morning reading and watching this interactive textbook and it it was fascinating. Because I was interested in it because I'm incentivized within the context of my career. So ah, develop a love of education enhance and nourish that love of education. But um, bring it back to. Context so content and context go together interest and incentive go together and everything should help you live better and be able to contribute more That's it.
01:23:04.56	mikebledsoe	Yeah, well said well said where can people find you.
01:23:10.48	Max Shank	You can find me at http://mashank.com or at Macank where can they find you.
01:23:16.73	mikebledsoe	They can find me at Mike Underscore bloodso on Instagram and http://thestrongcoach.com I also want to remind everyone that I have the strong coach summit coming up March third through Seventh. So if you want to go check that out. Go to http://thestrongcoach.com/summit and you can get your tickets there. Thanks y'all. Love you max.
01:23:38.97	Max Shank	Thanks! Love you buddy.