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Joshua Fields Millburn & Ryan Nicodemus help over 20 million people live meaningful lives with less through their website, books, podcast, and documentary. The Minimalists have been featured in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Boston Globe, Forbes, TIME, ABC, CBS, NBC, BBC, CBC, and NPR.

Podcast 109 | No

By Joshua Fields Millburn & Ryan Nicodemus ·

In this episode of The Minimalists Podcast, Joshua & Ryan are back “in studio” to speak with minimalist filmmaker Matt D’Avella of The Ground Up Show. Together they answer the following questions:

  • How do the two of you split up the responsibilities and obligations of The Minimalists?
  • To what ideal career did you aspire as you were graduating from high school?
  • Did you always know you were discontented or did your discovery of minimalism help you realize you were discontented?
  • How did you address the risks involved in deciding to leave your careers in the corporate world?
  • How did you keep from falling back into the rat-race mentality with The Minimalists?
  • What advice do you have for other entrepreneurs regarding consistently creating meaningful content?
  • How do you determine what’s working and what’s not working during the creative process?
  • What advice would you give to someone that wants to be an entrepreneur who’s starting with nothing?
  • How did you not obsess about statistics when you were first starting out?
  • How can someone make an unrealistic goal a reality?
  • How do I create and maintain a balance between my personal and professional lives?
  • What’s the simplest advice that’s the most important to follow?
  • What can a person do today to turn their life around if they’re stuck in a career that’s unfulfilling?
  • Where do you go to reset when you’re feeling doubt?
  • What drives you?

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Minimal Maxims

Joshua & Ryan’s pithy, shareable, less-than-140-character answers to the lightning-round questions:

  • Joshua on simple, important advice: “You can’t change the people around you, but you can change the people around you.”
  • Ryan on simple, important advice: “Love people and use things because the opposite never works.”
  • Joshua on resetting one’s life: “Don’t just know what you want to do—know why you want to do.”
  • Joshua on resetting one’s life: “Find something compelling. And that’s usually within the why.”
  • Ryan on resetting one’s life: “Pick one thing to focus on, and then actually put in the work.”
  • Joshua on places for quiet reflection: “The LACMA.”
  • Joshua on places for quiet reflection: “There’s going to be a lot of sediment before you find gold.”
  • Ryan on places for quiet reflection: “My own mind.”
  • Ryan on what drives him: “All of the work I do is a net positive.”
  • Joshua on what drives him: “Improving and contributing.”

Mentioned in This Episode

This episode was produced by Shawn Harding. Our theme music was written and performed by Peter Doran. Our podcast is completely free, so if you find value in these episodes, please consider donating a dollar. Your donations help keep this podcast advertisement-free (because advertisements suck).

If you’d like to comment on the podcast, you can leave a review on iTunes. Not only do we read every review, but positive reviews also help our simple-living message reach more ears.

Questions? Leave a voicemail at 406-219-7839, or send a voice memo to [email protected]. We’ll also answer lightning-round questions from Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter if you use #AskTheMinimalists.