The 10x Question for Deciding What Matters
In a Nutshell
The core message is to stop obsessing over squeezing marginal gains from everything and instead ask what it would look like to invest 10× more in the two areas that matter most—health and relationships—because that single question forces different choices and crowds out low-value busyness. The second takeaway is that deliberate focus must be balanced with engineered serendipity: schedule health and relationship activities that naturally generate chance encounters, while periodically creating space for unplanned inputs (e.g., interviews with people who hold opposing views) so over-control doesn’t blind you to opportunity.
These notes were generated by AI and may contain inaccuracies.
At this stage of life, the question arises: what have you consciously chosen not to improve anymore, and why? Improvement can often be considered extracting water from rock, trying to squeeze every last drop of efficiency out of something. However, rather than focusing on what is no longer being improved, it is more valuable to identify what is being over-invested in. When too much is invested in certain areas, they naturally crowd out things that would appear on a "not-to-improve" list.
Ramit Sethi, known as a financial expert with a podcast interviewing couples about financial problems, asks: "What would it look like to invest 10 times more in one or two areas that are most important?" This approach avoids excessive austerity measures like giving up coffee. The focus is on investing 10 times more in health and 10 times more in relationships. These two priorities leave little time for pointless activities that may appear productive on the surface.
The question "What would it look like to invest 10 times more in health?" and "What would it look like to invest 10 times more in relationships?" forces different thinking about life, similar to Peter Thiel's approach. Even without an immediate answer, the question itself shifts perspective.
Herdika raises the point that while a good life can be consciously designed by defining values, understanding priorities, and organizing circumstances, many important experiences arise from unplanned events. The question becomes whether over-engineering life makes one less receptive to unexpected opportunities, and how to make room for happy coincidences when naturally inclined toward targeted action.
There is agreement that over-engineering life reduces receptivity to unfolding circumstances. There is no magic answer applicable daily and continuously. Instead, there can be periods of intense focus alongside periods of reasonably engineered coincidences. One approach is placing things on the calendar likely to produce chance encounters.
Deliberate interviews can be conducted with people who have completely different opinions. An example involves a friend in Austin who is politically far right, yet extremely intelligent and adept at questioning assumptions. Sitting down to ask questions opens exposure to ideas and opinions not presented in briefings tailored to reinforce existing biases, which applies to every briefing on any platform.
"The Surrender Experience" by Michael Singer was recommended by Kevin Rose as an intentional counter-example. The book was read before knowing whether it would be a good or bad example of reducing over-planning and organizing. The book was found helpful, though Michael must have said "no" to many things to focus on what the book explains, raising questions about general versus selective submission. This represents an extreme approach compared to usual ways of living.
Investing ten times more in health and relationships opens doors to happy coincidences. Health approaches including group fitness activities and training create interactions with people never met in professional contexts.
If too deliberate and engrossed in the illusion of control, blindness to surrounding circumstances results. This creates a fine line, because adopting the identity of someone who goes with the flow and gives in to everything could result in becoming a "floating general," as Seth Godin describes, treating every distraction as an opportunity. This balance is currently being written about extensively.
Keep Tim Ferriss in your library
Save the videos and channels worth coming back to, and find them again in one place.
