2:00

hundreds of notebooks with drawings of his plans. He's

2:03

also made plenty of observations about the nature

2:05

of work, craft, and doing a good job

2:07

at whatever you pursue. Mark

2:09

is the author of Building, a carpenter's notes on

2:11

life and the art of good work. And

2:14

today on the show, he shares some of the

2:16

lessons he's learned over his career in high-end construction,

2:19

including those that center on the less romantic aspects

2:21

of being a carpenter. We

2:23

discussed the comparative importance of will, talent,

2:25

and interest in learning to craft. The

2:28

challenge is not only construction, but managing

2:30

personalities, mistakes, and expectations,

2:33

why speed is essential for successful craftsmen,

2:35

and how the principles that make for a master

2:38

builder carry over into other pursuits. After

2:40

the show is over, check out our show

2:42

notes at aowim.is-building. Mark

2:55

Elson, welcome to the show. Pleasure to be here.

2:58

So you are a carpenter who

3:00

specializes in building and remodeling lavish

3:02

homes for wealthy clients in New

3:05

York City. Did you start

3:07

off your young life with the goal of doing what

3:09

you're doing now, or did you kind

3:11

of fall into this? I much more

3:13

fell into it than did it intentionally. The

3:16

only thing I knew as a young man

3:18

was that I didn't want to do most

3:21

of the jobs that I saw people around me doing.

3:23

I wasn't very interested in it. I mean, I

3:26

spent a lot of time in the woods as a

3:28

kid, and I considered becoming like a forest ranger or

3:31

a guide. But I

3:33

mean, those are... I'm not

3:35

a solitary person, and those are solitary

3:37

pursuits. And I just happened to...

3:40

When I talk about it in the book, I happened to

3:42

meet an itinerant Armenian American carpenter

3:44

who wound up on the couch

3:46

of our apartment in New York

3:48

City way back in 1980. And

3:51

he asked me to work on a project

3:53

with him, and I just liked it. I really,

3:55

really enjoy working with my hands. And I come

3:58

from... I mean, my mother has always... She's

4:00

so she's a tailor, she's woven, she

4:02

knits all the time. My father always

4:04

had a workshop. And so

4:07

working with my hands was something more

4:09

or less second nature to me. It's just that I

4:11

didn't know you could make a living at it until

4:13

somebody paid me to do it. And

4:16

then how did you end up working

4:18

with the clients you're working with now? It

4:21

just was a progression. I mean, I

4:23

moved from one company to another and

4:26

I always liked

4:28

the most, to

4:30

me, the most interesting things on every job

4:32

were the most challenging projects in every job.

4:34

I really enjoyed seeing if I

4:37

could make things that I didn't know how to

4:39

make. And if I could move up a step

4:41

and move up another step and another step and

4:43

incrementally over the first, say 10 years of my

4:45

career, I went from working to, you

4:48

know, the early projects

4:50

I worked on were just people up on the Upper

4:52

West Side who bankers and lawyers

4:54

and they were regular people. And

4:56

then as I got better and better at what I

4:59

did, I started to move into a higher echelon of

5:01

building until by about 1992,

5:06

I was working for one of the top companies in the

5:08

city that did the kind of work that I do now,

5:10

which is fancy renovations for

5:12

super rich people. So you're

5:14

a carpenter. And I think when most people think of

5:16

carpenter, they think of a guy who, you know, built

5:19

a bookcase or some cabinets, but your

5:21

work goes well beyond that. You not

5:23

only build things, but you serve as

5:25

a bridge, you

5:27

know, someone who can take a

5:30

theoretical architectural design and

5:32

then make them concrete in the real world. So

5:34

when someone hires you, a builder does a general

5:36

contractor, you take the architects plans

5:38

and like you spend a lot of time just like

5:41

going through the red pencil saying, okay, this is possible,

5:43

this is not possible, this is how we're had to

5:45

modify it to make this work. And

5:47

that's a challenge. And that takes your

5:49

expertise that you've developed over the

5:52

past 40 years to

5:54

know what's possible and what's not

5:56

possible, you know, taking theory into

5:58

practice. challenges does

6:00

your line of work present? Besides that, that's a

6:02

big challenge in and of itself. But kind of,

6:05

I mean, that's the thing that really impressed me

6:07

about your book is that your

6:09

job just seems really hard. There's

6:11

like just so many moving parts. It's

6:13

complex, complicated. Give us an idea of

6:16

what it's like working on a project.

6:19

Well, I mean, one of the reasons I still to

6:23

this day enjoy what I do is

6:25

that it's such a massive challenge. Even

6:27

just one house. Right now I'm building

6:29

two side-by-side townhouses in Brooklyn. And I

6:32

mean, it's essentially one building. But

6:34

you know, you start with the personality of the

6:37

architect. So I have an architect, the

6:39

architect went to Yale. And

6:41

people that go to Yale are accustomed

6:43

to thinking of themselves as knowledgeable, successful

6:45

people who have achieved something. So

6:48

the very first thing I have to watch out for

6:50

is not to, you know, I

6:52

don't want to take a set of blueprints and

6:54

mark them up so badly and treat them so

6:56

poorly and say, this is such a pile of

6:58

crap that, you know, I've bruised their ego

7:01

and they never want to talk to me again and they never

7:03

want to work with me again. And these days,

7:06

aside from the building challenges,

7:08

the biggest challenges I usually face are

7:11

challenges of personality. I mean, how

7:13

do you take somebody who has 10,000 times

7:17

more money than I do and

7:19

manage their expectations so they wind up

7:22

happy with their home? And how do

7:24

you take an architect who's very, very

7:26

well, you know, educated at the top

7:28

of the educational ladder and tell them

7:30

that 75% of what they

7:33

drew is wrong and then correct

7:35

it but get them to work with you

7:38

to do that rather than work against you?

7:40

And that goes all the way down, you

7:42

know, that goes all the way through the

7:44

entire project. I mean, I work

7:46

with, you know, 75% of

7:49

the people I work with on my job site,

7:51

their first language isn't even English. So

7:53

how do you tell somebody, how do

7:56

you tell a tile guy who, I

7:58

mean, by current Tyler, is barely

8:00

conversant in English, he's Chinese. And

8:04

how do I communicate with him a

8:06

really exacting tile pattern where every tile

8:08

has a place and

8:11

the specifications, there's no room for movement one

8:13

way or the other. It's not a, he

8:16

really has to pull it off exactly correctly.

8:18

And the challenges of that are some of

8:20

the most interesting and to me, fun part

8:22

of the projects these days. Cause

8:25

I mean, I've had to learn so

8:27

much patience and so much, and I'm

8:29

not a great diplomat, I mean, I'm

8:31

sort of angry by nature and, uh,

8:35

I have to curb some of

8:37

my more brutish impulses a lot

8:43

in order to pull these things off. And

8:45

so, yeah, so you're dealing with the architect, you're

8:48

dealing with the client, you're dealing with the, the,

8:50

the different workers who are working with you, but

8:52

then you're also having to deal with like

8:55

regulations, right? In New York city, there's a lot

8:57

of, uh, regulations. And you have to deal with

8:59

that's part of the environment. So it's like, well,

9:01

I want to do this thing to make this

9:04

work, but then the historical regulations

9:06

says now you can't do that. So you

9:08

have to work around that. I

9:10

mean, every, every single pursuit has

9:12

its set of rules and very

9:15

few of us get to make the rules by which at

9:17

least we work. I mean, I try as much as I

9:19

can to make the rules by which I live, but

9:21

I don't make the rules by which I work

9:24

and all the paperwork has to

9:26

be done. And the landmarks preservation

9:28

commission is going to come

9:30

around and inspect to make sure that the molding that's

9:33

on the front of the house was, you know, matches

9:35

the molding from the historical photograph they

9:37

have in their archive and

9:39

there's certain things like that, that there's nothing

9:41

I can do about, I can't, I can't

9:44

do it. I mean, and I don't try.

9:47

So there's a lot of constraints and I think this,

9:49

this is why I love this book. Cause you show

9:51

how, in a very subtle way, how this carries over

9:53

to other parts of our lives. Everyone else has the

9:56

same problems that you experience, maybe at

9:58

different scale. with people who

10:00

are frustrating, you got to deal with personalities,

10:02

you have to deal with regulations, there are

10:04

these rules you have to conform yourself to

10:07

in order to do your work. And so

10:09

in your book, Building a Carpenter's Notes on

10:11

Life and the Art of Good Work, you

10:13

share lessons on how you've managed to learn

10:15

how to do this from your 40 plus

10:17

years of work. And you

10:19

start off the book talking about the

10:21

importance of will and you capitalize will

10:24

W I L L, very

10:26

philosophical, I think. How do you define will

10:28

in your line of work? I

10:30

mean, will generally to me, even outside of my

10:32

line of work, I define will

10:35

as the ability to do. That'd

10:37

be my broadest definition of it. And

10:40

that's, you know, it's a big discussion, but how

10:42

do you complete anything? I mean, you know,

10:45

you could talk to a chef about how do

10:47

you make a beautiful meal? And

10:49

what are the psychological and

10:51

physical and temperamental

10:54

elements that go into making a

10:56

beautiful meal for somebody or making

10:58

a beautiful house or realizing any

11:00

vision of any kind? It doesn't matter what

11:03

the milieu is, it can be anything. And

11:05

I think if you spoke to people

11:07

who've become accomplished at doing

11:10

in their respective field,

11:13

they would pretty much all tell you the same sort

11:15

of things that they went through the same sort of

11:17

struggles. And it's only

11:20

by really mucking

11:22

things up and making huge

11:24

mistakes in my life that I've learned, oh,

11:27

the problem isn't everything

11:29

around me. The problem is I don't know how to

11:31

do this. This is the problem here is me. I don't

11:33

know how to talk to people so that they will

11:36

work with me. I don't know how

11:38

to be kind enough to somebody who I

11:40

kind of don't like so that they'll take

11:42

me upstairs in the elevator every day without

11:45

complaint. Those are the sorts of

11:47

things it takes to get something done. Doing something

11:49

in this world is not just a matter of

11:51

having the skills. I mean, that's a whole

11:53

matter of practice, but also

11:56

being able to engage people and make

11:59

friendships and... find your allies and

12:01

find people you can rely on and

12:03

to work on something with you. And

12:07

all of those are components of developing the

12:09

world to realize a vision of any kind.

12:11

It doesn't matter what the vision is or

12:13

what area you're working

12:15

in. The struggles are

12:17

always the same. To be able to really

12:19

realize a vision takes an enormous

12:22

amount of learning and practice and

12:24

skill and effort and swallowing one's

12:26

own failure so that

12:28

I realize, see the primary problem here is

12:31

me and that's what needs

12:33

fixing. Right, so Will, this is something that can be

12:35

developed. It's not something you're just born with. You can

12:37

develop this. Yeah, I mean,

12:39

I think it's, I think it's, I

12:41

mean, it can certainly be stunted early

12:44

on in life by poor parenting and

12:46

rough circumstances. But it's

12:48

definitely something that can be developed because it's a

12:50

learning process. It's like a rewiring

12:53

of your brain, essentially, or

12:55

of my brain. My brain's been pretty much rewired

12:57

by this business over the years. So

12:59

you mentioned that Will isn't the same

13:01

as skill. Will requires

13:04

skill, but they're not the same thing.

13:07

And you had this chapter on talent. What

13:09

have you learned about talent during your

13:12

40 years of doing what

13:14

you do? I just think

13:16

that talent is one of the most

13:18

useless concepts that the world has to offer.

13:20

And the reason I say that is because, I mean,

13:23

people certainly are born with certain proclivities. I

13:25

mean, there are people that are born seven

13:28

feet tall that are much more likely to

13:30

be a basketball player than I am. There

13:32

are people that are born with live athletic

13:34

bodies that are going to be a better

13:36

ballet dancer. There are people

13:39

born with very active minds or

13:41

an acuity from you. I mean,

13:43

people are born with acuities and

13:45

you might call that talent, but

13:48

it's not really a useful

13:50

concept because talent doesn't matter

13:52

at all without practice and

13:54

development and like regular daily

13:57

practice. I mean, it's funny because

13:59

people say I'm a talent. talented carpenter. Okay,

14:02

I haven't been carpenter for 40 years.

14:04

So I've put in 80,000 hours of

14:07

carpentry now in my lifetime. So

14:09

I've had a lot of practice. I mean, I'm

14:12

well beyond Malcolm Gladwell's 10,000. I've done that eight

14:14

times over. One with hope that I got

14:16

pretty good at it by now. Otherwise, something's wrong.

14:18

And also, to me,

14:20

talent is less important than

14:22

like genuine interest and

14:25

being attracted to doing something. I mean, when I started

14:27

doing carpentry for a living, I was attracted to it.

14:29

And I was interested in it. And I studied it

14:31

and I would read books and I would go to

14:33

the library and check out a book on how to

14:37

do framing. And

14:39

to me, my interest in my practice

14:42

was far, far more important than some,

14:44

I don't know if I have any

14:46

native talented carpentry. I mean, I also

14:48

have been practicing music for 50 years.

14:51

I don't, nobody early on would have

14:53

identified me as a prodigy

14:56

in anything. But

14:58

I have keen interests in things. And

15:01

I pursue them and I practice them. I do

15:03

have a strong habit of if I

15:05

want to learn how to do something, I will practice

15:07

and I will practice six days a week for

15:10

an extended period of time with all sorts

15:12

of pursuits. How long did it

15:14

take for you in your career before

15:16

you felt like you had some skill

15:18

at carpentry? It took about 15 years

15:22

before I could say, okay,

15:24

I got a handle on this. And

15:27

I specifically the trade of carpentry

15:29

at that point, like woodworking and

15:31

building, like home building

15:33

style building. Because that's what I

15:35

do. I build basically single family homes. I just

15:37

happen to build them within apartment buildings a lot.

15:40

It's about 15 years when I felt like I could

15:42

kind of handle anything anybody threw at me. And

15:45

that was before I got into sort of the crazy stuff.

15:47

And then how long did it take for you to like

15:49

feel you got to handle all the crazy stuff? Another

15:51

15 years. All

15:55

right. It's a slow road. I hate to

15:57

tell people, but it's a slow road. I

15:59

mean, I wrote my first book when I was 59. So

16:03

I'm not exactly a prodigy.

16:08

So one thing that stuck out to me from

16:10

the book for all these stories you tell about

16:12

projects you've worked on over the years is

16:15

the importance of resilience

16:17

in your line of work. When you're

16:20

working on a big complex project

16:22

where there's millions of dollars being

16:24

spent, there's potentially hundreds of

16:26

different people working on this project,

16:29

something is guaranteed to go wrong.

16:31

What's been the biggest, costliest

16:33

mistake you've ever made? And then how

16:35

did you learn to become a

16:38

nerd to those setbacks? I

16:40

mean, I don't I could I would be lying if

16:42

I said I was a nerd to setbacks. I mean,

16:44

to this, I hate

16:46

mistakes. I hate my own mistakes. I

16:48

write over mistakes. Whenever I make a

16:50

mistake, and I still make mistakes on

16:53

jobs, I don't make nearly as many

16:55

as I used to. And

16:57

my entire focus on a project is to

16:59

make sure that as few mistakes as possible.

17:01

To me, one of the most costly things

17:03

on jobs is mistakes. And

17:05

they can be made in all kinds of

17:07

different ways. I mean, from ordering the wrong

17:09

materials to making a poor decision

17:12

about the order things should be built in. And

17:14

I am in no way inured to mistakes to

17:16

this day, even small mistakes on any project upset

17:18

me. And I try to figure out why they

17:21

happen. And if there's a way I can make

17:23

them not happen in the future. I mean,

17:26

it's funny, because the most

17:28

consistent costly mistake I've made

17:30

over the years is

17:32

to underestimate the difficulty

17:34

of what it is I do and

17:37

to not prepare well

17:39

enough for the things that will go

17:41

wrong. And I'm still shocked to this day

17:43

at the things that go wrong on projects.

17:45

I mean, sometimes you just don't know with,

17:48

you know, I've got six or seven different

17:50

design professionals on this job, I have four

17:52

different clients, and I have 30 different

17:55

trades that I work with. And

17:57

you just don't know where the thing is going to

18:00

go wrong, it's going to go wrong. Even things

18:02

that are beautifully planned can go horribly wrong just

18:04

because somebody didn't read the plan right or didn't

18:06

read the drawings I sent them correctly as carefully

18:08

as I tried to or they

18:11

just assumed something. You know,

18:13

they assumed that they want I wanted it done the

18:15

way they always do it even though I tried to

18:17

explain 50 times that we're doing this one a little

18:19

differently. It's the thing that has cost

18:21

me the most money over the years and the most

18:23

pain is that I didn't

18:25

see I got blindsided by

18:27

something. I didn't see just how difficult

18:30

it was going to be. I was overly optimistic. It's

18:32

weird because my optimism is actually the thing that allows

18:34

me to do the crazy stuff that I do and

18:36

go like, Oh, sure, I can do that. And

18:38

then I have been beat up

18:41

so badly so many times for

18:43

underestimating the time underestimating the cost,

18:46

not realizing, you know,

18:48

the person I was working with wasn't up to it.

18:50

It's a tough row to hoe.

18:52

I mean, these days things mean I'm

18:54

knocking wood these days, my projects

18:56

tend to go pretty smoothly and things go well

18:58

and very, very few mistakes are made. But that

19:01

came at great cost. I mean, I made guided

19:03

projects where I calculated at the end and find

19:05

out I made like $8 an hour

19:07

for a year. You know, yeah, there was stories,

19:09

I think once they stuck out to me is

19:12

like little small things you didn't see being

19:14

a problem ended up being a big problem. It

19:16

was when guys were trying to do something

19:20

with the windows where there's had to like reshape

19:22

a frame that I use a grinder and it

19:24

would shoot out these sparks and

19:26

the sparks would get on the glass and

19:28

it would kind of cause these divots in

19:30

the glass. And you'd have to replace the

19:33

whole pane of glass and it was

19:35

a, you know, tens of thousands of dollars. We

19:37

were on that was on Central Park West. We

19:39

were on the 18th floor in the penthouse and

19:41

a metal worker was really

19:44

just cutting over there. We were doing demolition

19:46

at the time he was cutting away a sort

19:48

of a sort of straggling piece of steel that

19:50

was hanging out of the ceiling and

19:53

he sprayed the sparks

19:55

with the grinder he was using. He sprayed

19:57

the sparks towards a picture window that was

20:00

I don't know, probably 12 feet wide and 7 feet tall

20:02

and he pitted the glass. The

20:07

little hot sparks that came off of the steel

20:09

pitted the glass in a way that we could

20:12

not repair. We tried like hell to repair it.

20:14

We had glass companies come and try and grind

20:16

it and polish it and it would not repair.

20:18

And so here's this enormous piece of glass and

20:20

the only way to get it up there was

20:22

with a crane. I mean these days

20:25

just one pic with a crane cost over $15,000 in

20:27

New York City just to get

20:30

the permits, get the crane, get the people in. So

20:33

just the crane alone cost $15,000 and

20:36

then there's the cost of the window

20:38

and that was the only fix for

20:40

something that happened in 10 seconds.

20:43

So when you start a project today,

20:46

do you feel pretty optimistic about how

20:48

things will go or have you accepted

20:50

that something will always go

20:52

wrong no matter what you do? I'm

20:55

wise enough now to know something will always

20:57

go wrong. I don't and I

20:59

try to figure out what it's going

21:01

to be and one of the reasons

21:03

I work so much with the architects

21:05

drawings and try, I mean the last

21:07

project I did about, I mean

21:10

I did about 300 drawings on this last

21:12

project I did and the reason I do drawings

21:14

is I draw drawings of

21:16

actual assemblies. I'm not

21:18

so concerned. The architect draws what it's going to

21:20

look like. I draw the actual

21:22

assembly, how it's put together, every single component

21:24

that goes into putting it together and

21:27

that is in an effort to get people to

21:29

build things correctly and it mostly

21:33

works. I mean mostly, mostly works but I mean we're still

21:35

waiting on that project. We're

21:37

still waiting for countertops that were

21:39

ordered in February of this year

21:42

because they're countertops

21:44

and they got shipped from England and they all

21:46

broke on the boat. Something

21:48

happened where the crate got hit and all of

21:50

the countertops were destroyed and then so

21:53

that opened a whole problem with

21:55

who replaces them, what insurance pays for

21:57

them, how do I get the guy

21:59

to remain? them? Do we have to send

22:01

them more money? Then I got to talk to

22:03

the client. I mean, things like, I mean, a

22:05

ship coming across the ocean got

22:08

hit by too big a wave. My

22:10

creative countertops went over and here

22:12

it is 10 months later and I still don't have

22:15

counters for my kitchen in Brooklyn.

22:19

Yeah. And there's no way you could have foreseen

22:21

that. That was just not even on your radar.

22:23

I mean, it's actually the second time it's happened

22:25

to me. And actually, I mean, truth be

22:27

told, at the beginning

22:33

of the project, I had a stern

22:35

talk with the architect that said, you

22:37

know, whatever you do, order as little

22:39

as possible from Europe because there's just

22:41

huge problems with things coming from Europe.

22:43

It's expensive, there's all these duties and

22:45

taxes and it takes a huge

22:47

amount of time and it actually takes

22:49

a lot of my time just having to deal

22:52

with getting this stuff here. And

22:54

if something goes wrong, you

22:56

have no recourse. You can't sue, you

22:58

can't... And the

23:00

architect in this case overrode me and said,

23:02

no, we're getting this terrazzo from Europe and

23:05

here we are 10 months later and we have

23:07

no terrazzo. I mean, despite my warnings. So

23:09

that was something I actually did anticipate there being

23:12

a problem with, but it didn't

23:14

matter. It didn't do any good. It's his

23:16

decision exactly what material gets used. And so

23:19

he ordered this

23:21

very special terrazzo from England that we

23:23

still haven't seen. So

23:26

what can your line of work teach people

23:28

about planning and carrying out complicated and complex

23:30

projects? Like what are some lessons that you've

23:33

gotten there that you think carry over to

23:35

the rest of life? I

23:37

mean, it's the same in anything. If you're trying to

23:39

do something complicated, I try very

23:41

hard at the beginning of the project to

23:43

look at where are the likely failures so

23:46

that they don't happen. And you know,

23:48

I mean, people have all these different matrices for

23:51

doing it. You try and identify

23:53

all the different little points where if something goes

23:55

wrong there, the project is going to fail. And

23:58

I mean, I know from experience... where

24:00

failures generally occur. It's where

24:02

a lot of different things come together in the same place. But

24:05

I was watching a special,

24:08

some TV show, a documentary on

24:10

the making of a James Webb

24:12

space telescope. And they

24:15

went through a testing phase where they set up

24:17

the entire telescope. They did the whole thing, they

24:19

set up the whole thing and then they

24:21

shook it to simulate the shaking

24:23

that would happen as it launched off

24:25

the launch pad and got sent off to space. And

24:28

hundreds of bolts fell out because somebody

24:30

had not bothered to use thread locks

24:32

to permanently fix the bolts. And

24:35

you just go like, something with a million

24:37

parts, something's gonna go wrong. I

24:39

mean, at least they have a sense to test it and

24:42

the damn thing works now. But the first

24:44

time they tested it, all the bolts fell out, which

24:46

would have been a shame if it got to space and

24:48

they set it up and all the bolts had fallen out.

24:50

It's good to know things go terribly wrong. I

24:53

try to bring all my experience to bear

24:56

mostly on the things that won't go right. The

24:58

things that go right go right. The things that

25:01

people know how to do and are more common

25:03

things, they pretty much know how to do it

25:05

and they usually get it right. So

25:07

it always pays to look between the cracks of

25:10

the things that won't go right. I

25:12

think you can apply that to almost

25:14

anything, almost any endeavor. Yeah, I've noticed

25:16

that when I've taken on big complicated

25:18

projects, I go in thinking, oh, nothing

25:21

should go wrong. Everything should be seamless.

25:24

And then I'm always disappointed and I get, it's

25:26

managing my own expectations. That's been the

25:28

big learning curve for me. I

25:31

think when you're young, you have this expectation that things

25:33

will just go right and smoothly for

25:35

you, but that's not the case. And you set the

25:38

plan for Murphy's Law to rear its head

25:40

because it's gonna happen. Yeah,

25:42

I think that what separates people is

25:44

that some people go ahead and do

25:46

it anyway, except

25:48

for maybe two projects in my life, I have

25:51

pulled off every single one of them sooner or

25:53

later. And to different

25:55

degrees of customer satisfaction.

26:02

But I pulled off almost everything sooner or

26:04

later. And that stick-to-itiveness,

26:08

I think, is what's probably served

26:10

me better than almost anything else in

26:13

my life. And it's allowed me to go branch

26:15

into other things. Yeah, so it requires will. It

26:17

all goes back to will. We're

26:20

gonna take a quick break before we word from our sponsors. This

26:24

podcast is brought to you in part by

26:26

Squarespace, the all-in-one website platform for entrepreneurs to

26:28

stand out and succeed online. Everyone

26:31

knows the holidays can take a toll on your

26:33

bank account. If you're looking for creative ways to

26:35

increase revenue and give your family and friends the

26:37

holiday treats that you wanna give them, then you

26:39

need to get started with Squarespace's new feature, Squarespace

26:41

Courses. Squarespace has the tools you

26:43

need to create and sell your own online

26:45

course. Start with professional layout that fits your

26:48

brand, upload video lessons to teach techniques and

26:50

skills, and tailor your course with the powerful

26:52

built-in Fluid Engine Editor. With Squarespace Courses,

26:54

you can create engaging content your

26:56

audience will love, then simply add

26:58

a paywall and set the price.

27:01

Plus, you can charge a one-time

27:03

fee or sell subscriptions. Turn your

27:05

creativity into income with Squarespace Courses.

27:07

Head to squarespace.com for a free

27:09

trial. And when you're ready to

27:12

launch, go to www.squarespace.com/manliness to save

27:14

10% off your first purchase of

27:16

a website or domain. That's squarespace.com/manliness.

27:21

You're up for any challenge that comes your way, the Defender

27:23

110 is too. This

27:25

iconic vehicle has been re-imagined for

27:28

21st century adventure, and its unparalleled

27:30

off-road ability, as well as its

27:32

robust interior, are invaluable, whether you're

27:34

headed towards uncharted territory or just

27:36

a weekend of exploration. The

27:39

Defender 110 tackles challenging surroundings with

27:41

absolute confidence. This SUV conveys strength

27:43

outside and in, featuring peerless

27:45

technology like an intuitive driver display and

27:47

an award-winning infotainment system to keep you

27:49

connected no matter where the journey takes

27:51

you. Adventure is unique to everyone, and

27:53

so is the Defender. Choose from the

27:56

two-door Defender 90, the four-door

27:58

Defender 110, or the larger Defender 110. Defender

28:00

130 with the ability to seat up

28:02

to 8 passengers. You'll find

28:04

uncompromising performance in all three. Pack

28:07

up and go even further with the Defender 110. Learn

28:11

more at landroverusa.com/Defender.

28:14

That's landroverusa.com/Defender.

28:20

If you're looking for a gift this holiday season

28:22

for that hard to shop for person, check out

28:24

Masterclass. Masterclass makes a meaningful gift this

28:26

season for you and anyone on your list because both

28:29

of you can learn from the best to become your

28:31

best. From leadership to effective communication

28:33

to cooking. A lot of the classes

28:35

on Masterclass are taught by Art of

28:37

Manly's podcast guests. We've got Chris Voss

28:39

with negotiation skills, James Clear on habit

28:41

building, and Jocko Willink on leadership skills

28:44

and lots more. You can watch

28:46

Masterclass on your TV, listen in audio mode, in

28:48

the app, or on their site. With

28:50

Masterclass, you get access to world class experts all

28:52

for just $10 a month. One

28:55

course that my son and I have been watching is the

28:57

course taught by Steph Curry. It's on basketball skills. Really well

28:59

done and we've been able to practice this stuff out on

29:01

the driveway with each other. It's been a lot of fun.

29:04

This holiday season, give one

29:06

annual membership and get one

29:08

free at masterclass.com/AOM. Right

29:11

now, you can get two memberships

29:13

for the price of one at masterclass.com/AOM.

29:16

masterclass.com/AOM. Offer terms

29:18

apply. If

29:21

you're working up a big time sweat, you might need

29:23

a little extra help rehydrating. That's where Element can come

29:25

in. Element is an electrolyte

29:27

beverage without the sugar and other dodgy ingredients

29:29

found in other popular electrolyte and sports drinks.

29:31

That's right. It is zero

29:33

sugar and Element comes in a variety

29:36

of delicious flavors. They got a new

29:38

line of chocolate medley flavors that I'm

29:40

really, really enjoying. They got chocolate mint,

29:42

chocolate chai, and chocolate raspberry. My favorite

29:44

though is chocolate caramel. It tastes like

29:46

a delicious piece of salty, chocolatey caramel

29:48

candy. What I've been doing has been part

29:50

of my nightly routine. I'll warm up some Element

29:52

chocolate caramel. Yes, you can warm this up, drink it

29:54

hot. I'll go into the sauna,

29:56

work up a sweat, then I'll get outside. It's cold outside.

29:59

I'll just sit by myself. on the Chocolate

30:01

Caramel Element electrolyte beverage. It just tastes really

30:03

good. And it's just, I'm really enjoying, very

30:05

relaxing. Try Element totally risk-free. If you don't

30:07

like it, give it away to a salty

30:09

friend and they'll give you your money back,

30:12

no questions asked. Listeners of the Art of

30:14

Manliness podcast can receive a free Element sample

30:16

pack with any order when they

30:18

purchase today through

30:21

drinklmnt.com/manliness. That's drinklmnt.com/manliness.

30:24

Check out Chocolate

30:27

Caramel. And

30:29

now back to the show. So speaking

30:32

of not meeting clients' expectations a

30:34

few times, let's talk about that.

30:36

How do you deal with the expectations of your clients? Because

30:38

they want things done primo. Like

30:40

they're paying tons of money and

30:42

they want it done as quickly as possible because

30:45

they want to get back into the house and

30:47

live there. What have you learned about managing people's

30:49

expectations when you've had to

30:51

go to someone and say, hey, it's gonna

30:53

be months, maybe a year behind schedule, or

30:56

it's gonna cost more? What

30:58

have you learned about that? Because I think it's a big problem that a lot of

31:00

other people face as well, managing other people's expectations.

31:03

I try very hard from the outset, right? Really

31:06

from the very first time I meet a client.

31:08

I try very hard to

31:11

as gently as possible, but also

31:13

firmly deliver as close

31:15

to the brutal truth of

31:18

building as I can. And

31:20

that usually starts with, I

31:23

mean, it's funny, the project I'm doing right now,

31:25

I was asked to bid on the project and

31:28

the architect sent me drawings. And

31:31

I said right from the outset, and I

31:33

said this to, and this came

31:35

up in our very first meeting with the client, I

31:38

refused to bid on the project. And the reason I refused

31:40

to bid on the project was because in

31:42

my estimation, the drawings and specifications were

31:45

only about 25% complete. So

31:48

there were a couple different people, contractors in the

31:50

city, they had bids from two or three other

31:53

contractors that were actual bids, all written down like,

31:55

we're gonna do this, we're gonna do this, we're

31:57

gonna do this. And I'd seen

31:59

the drawings. And I was like, okay, we don't know

32:01

what the hardware is. We don't know what the plumbing fixtures

32:03

are. We don't want the light fixtures are. I don't

32:05

know what the appliances are. I don't know what the various

32:07

finishes are throughout the rooms. I know

32:10

maybe 25% of what this project is. And

32:13

I said to the client right on the very first

32:15

meeting, I said, so any bids you have are nonsense.

32:18

You're looking at a pile of bullshit. This is just

32:20

things that you ask for bids. If people sent you

32:22

bids, here's a bid. But I said, if

32:24

you look through the bids, you're gonna see that every single

32:26

line on the entire bid is written

32:28

as an allowance because they don't know

32:30

what the hell they're doing in that

32:32

particular instance. So with

32:35

the client right from the outset, I try

32:37

to say, I promise you the first struggle

32:40

on this project is gonna take at

32:42

least a year, which is

32:44

to get the drawings and specifications up

32:47

to the point where we actually know what the hell we're

32:49

supposed to build. I know you wanna be in in two

32:51

years. Well, the first year is gonna be spent just figuring

32:53

out what the hell we're supposed to build because

32:56

it's not there. It's not in the drawings.

32:59

And that can be an embarrassment

33:01

to the architect who's trying to say like, oh, no,

33:03

no, no, we're ready to go. And

33:08

I kind of give it to him tough right

33:10

from the start. I don't try to be insulting,

33:12

but I try to at least say, we

33:15

have to operate in reality here. And the

33:17

first reality is you don't have a plan.

33:20

So the first thing we need to do is get to a

33:22

plan. And I said, you don't have to hire

33:24

me. I don't care if you hire me or not, but

33:26

I have a very long track record. I have

33:29

a whole list of people you can call that

33:31

say that I dealt squarely with them. And

33:33

I will move this along as quickly as

33:35

I can. I mean, the project we're doing

33:37

right now is a year

33:39

over the original schedule. It's probably 40%

33:42

over budget, over the

33:44

original budget, but also

33:46

the project has completely changed in scope

33:49

while we've been doing it. I mean, they added

33:51

a whole backyard. They added this incredible green roof.

33:53

They've added, I mean, we're doing a handmade

33:56

glass mosaic covering the

33:58

entire project. bathroom that

34:01

shows scenes from the sinking of

34:03

the Titanic. I mean, that

34:05

wasn't in the original scope, so things

34:07

like that bump up the price and they extend

34:09

the amount of time it takes to do the

34:12

project. But I just tell them that. I'm like,

34:14

you don't have to do this. I mean, you're

34:16

telling me you want scenes of the Titanic in

34:18

your bathroom. That's going to take some time and

34:20

it's going to cost, you know, a

34:22

lot. Like a lot. But

34:25

you don't have to do it. You're

34:27

controlling your budget and you're controlling

34:29

your schedule. I'm just sending you

34:31

the cost. I don't mark up

34:33

costs. I'm like, here's the cost. Here's

34:35

the person who's going to do it. Here's how much money

34:38

they want to do it. Here's how long they say it's

34:40

going to take. I don't believe them. I think it's probably

34:42

going to take 50% longer. If you want to

34:44

do it, great. If you don't want to

34:46

do it, no problem. We'll just put in conventional tile.

34:48

So I try to make them

34:50

understand that I don't really have that much

34:52

control over the schedule and budget.

34:54

It really depends on what we're doing and

34:57

what you want and how crazy you

34:59

want to get with the place. And

35:01

they tend to believe me. I mean,

35:04

people still blow their stack now and

35:06

again. I mean, it's a tense process

35:08

for everybody and nobody likes to

35:10

move and nobody likes to... It's

35:12

just, I mean, it's dirty and

35:14

messy and gross. But

35:17

I do try to make them understand that

35:20

it's their decisions that affect the budget, not mine.

35:22

I mean, I know how to do the things.

35:24

I can actually, for the most part, pull things

35:26

off in a pretty smooth fashion now. But

35:28

if you throw a handmade glass

35:31

mosaic at me that covers 300 square

35:33

feet of space, that's

35:35

going to take a little doing, which is fine. But

35:37

just do it with open eyes. I'm not going to

35:39

promise you that I'm going to get that done in

35:41

the same timeline that the conventional tile is going to

35:43

go in. Alright, so proactively manage people's expectations. Be honest

35:45

with them. But what do you

35:48

do when someone does blow their stack at

35:50

you? Let's say you're in the middle of

35:52

the project and something, just some unforeseen thing

35:54

happened, right? The countertops fell into the Atlantic

35:56

Ocean. How do

35:58

you tell a client the bad news? Well,

36:00

this act of God happened and it's

36:02

going to put us back another year.

36:05

One of the things that's hard to learn is

36:07

the worst news you have to deliver the quickest. The

36:11

worst news is the faster you have to

36:13

deliver it and the more upfront you

36:15

have to be with a client about it. I mean,

36:18

there's just, I've worked for a bunch

36:20

of bosses who would try and hide

36:22

things and cover it up. And, you

36:24

know, something like that would happen.

36:26

I mean, I had a client, I had a

36:28

boss, the mill worker died and stopped

36:31

making the cabinets. And

36:33

he tried to hide the fact from

36:35

the client that his mill worker had

36:37

died. It didn't go well. It's better

36:39

just to say, I mean, with

36:42

this thing, we just went to the client. The

36:45

day it showed up, we sent the client the

36:47

picture saying, here are the slabs. They're destroyed. They're

36:49

useless. You know, I'm

36:52

sorry this happened. I didn't, I mean,

36:54

most, I mean, I

36:56

always give people the right to scream and yell.

36:59

I mean, if something bad happens, people react

37:01

badly a lot. Not everybody is a monk.

37:03

And I don't even know

37:06

any monks. And

37:12

something bad happens on their project and they

37:14

get upset. So you let them get upset.

37:18

I mean, if they attack me personally, I

37:20

usually will tell them, I'll come

37:22

back and we can talk about this later. You

37:25

know, you can yell your head off. But if

37:27

you, you know, there's

37:30

a certain level of personal vilification

37:33

that I won't take. Everybody

37:35

makes mistakes. I really try mightily

37:37

to limit them. And

37:40

it depends

37:42

on the situation. I mean, powerful

37:45

people are used to

37:47

mistreating people and I won't, I won't suffer

37:49

mistreatment, but I will give somebody the right

37:52

to blow their stack if something terrible

37:54

just happened to them. See, I don't

37:56

take it too personally when they do, unless

37:58

they're attacking you personally. I think one

38:01

thing that stood out from this book is

38:03

you pointed out that I think a lot

38:06

of people have this romantic idea of a

38:08

carpenter who takes his sweet time to artfully

38:10

create something that will last a lifetime, right?

38:12

Mortis, they're just making the dovetail joint.

38:15

But you argue that speed is an important

38:18

element of being a good craftsman. Why is

38:20

that? There is a

38:22

romantic notion of that. And

38:24

there's a lot of... I mean, if

38:27

you have to make your living at this.

38:29

I mean, I do this... Carpentry sent

38:31

my kids to college and college wasn't

38:34

cheap. And if

38:36

you have to make your living at it, there's just

38:38

no getting around that the more

38:40

you produce and the faster you

38:42

produce it, the more money you're

38:44

able to make. I mean, that's just the

38:46

formula of productivity. So learning

38:48

how to work fast is

38:51

something that will set one apart from everybody around

38:53

you. If I can put in six doors in

38:55

a day, I'm more valuable to the contractor than

38:57

the guy that can put in two. That's

39:00

just math. And it also helps

39:03

me to think like, how can I economize

39:05

my processes? How can I do things in

39:07

a way that I'm not wasting movement, that

39:09

I'm not wasting material? I talked

39:11

about it to some extent in the

39:13

book about different ways that I've made

39:15

myself a more efficient carpenter. There's a

39:18

great... There's actually a really wonderful book

39:20

by Larry Hahn called The Very Efficient

39:22

Carpenter. And that man can build

39:25

a crazy pitched roof faster

39:28

than any human being on the face

39:30

of the earth just because he's got

39:32

it down to perfect little science. And

39:35

every movement he does, every movement of

39:37

material and every movement of his body

39:39

is geared towards efficiency. And

39:41

so that's the first reason to develop

39:44

speed is to make better money and

39:46

get paid better. Because physical work doesn't

39:48

always pay that well. The

39:50

other reason is that

39:52

that romantic notion of somebody

39:55

sitting in their candlelit shop,

39:57

hand cutting dovetails, one thing...

40:00

I've found in my work and also with work

40:02

with a lot of my colleagues is

40:04

that people's brains,

40:08

like thinking brains, mind brains,

40:11

actually spend a lot of time interfering with

40:13

the movements of their body. And

40:16

after you've practiced skills, if

40:18

one has practiced hand chopping dovetails for years

40:20

and years and years, you

40:23

get to a point where your thinking

40:25

brain is the wrong tool to chop

40:27

hand cut dovetails. The right tool is

40:29

your body. And if you watch

40:31

somebody who's very practiced at it and who doesn't

40:33

think about it all the time, they will chop

40:35

up those dovetails so fast you can't believe it.

40:37

You're like, how can that chisel move so fast?

40:39

How can that person just, they're just like, clock,

40:41

clock, clock, clock, clock, clock, clock,

40:44

and the work emerges underneath their

40:46

chisel. That's because their

40:48

brains aren't interfering with their body. And one

40:50

of the ways you learn to

40:53

train the skills of your body so that

40:55

the brain doesn't interfere with them is to

40:57

work very, very quickly, like two times or

40:59

three times faster than a normal person would.

41:02

Because what it does is it allows the intelligence

41:05

of the body to usurp the

41:07

intelligence of the brain. And

41:09

at the beginning of a job when I'm planning it, I

41:11

need my brain all the time. But once I've done the

41:13

math, and once I've done all the planning,

41:15

and I know what I'm doing, then it's time to just work.

41:18

And I have learned that the

41:20

faster I work, actually,

41:22

the better my body works, it's actually more

41:25

skilled, and it's more efficient, and it's more

41:27

accurate. I mean, there's some caveats to that,

41:29

like it's easy to make a stupid mistake

41:31

when you're working really quickly. But

41:34

most people I know who are really good at

41:37

a physical trade,

41:39

a physical task, they do it so fast,

41:41

you'd be astounded at how quickly they do

41:43

it. They don't think about it. It's not

41:45

happening in their head. It's happening

41:47

with the skills they've developed in their body. You know,

41:49

I mean, people talk about the intelligence

41:52

of practice motion. I mean, there's all

41:54

these funny terms for it. Embodied cognition.

41:56

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's a

41:58

different way of thinking. and I can

42:01

touch things with my hand and know

42:03

with one touch like is that thin

42:05

enough, is that strong enough, is that

42:07

there and it's a really

42:09

wonderful thing to develop and a very joyful

42:11

thing to develop the point where when I'm

42:14

working at my fastest and things are really

42:16

going well it's a joyful

42:18

process. Another thing that stood out to

42:20

me this book is you point out that people pay millions

42:23

of dollars and you spend

42:25

months or even years renovating

42:27

or building a home and

42:29

you think with that much investment in resources

42:31

and in time what you

42:34

do your work would last decades

42:36

or even generations but you

42:38

point out that most of what you build

42:40

will be destroyed in 10 years. Why

42:43

is that and how do you stay motivated to

42:45

build something knowing there's a good

42:47

chance it's going to be destroyed here in about a decade?

42:49

Well I mean I work for

42:52

people that are enormously concerned with

42:54

fashionability and trends come and trends

42:56

go in interior design and they

42:59

come and go every decade people talk about the interior design of the

43:01

70s, 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s, you can sort of market

43:05

every decade and sort of imagine what the

43:07

interior design trends were of those eras.

43:10

I mean the social set

43:12

I'm working for is intensely

43:14

concerned with self-image and

43:17

fashion caters

43:19

to people's self-image and

43:22

they want to be perceived as fashionable not the clients

43:24

I'm working for right now I'm working for kind of

43:26

regular people right now they just happen to have some

43:29

money and I've had clients that

43:31

aren't so concerned with that but as a

43:33

social set the people I work for are

43:36

intensely concerned with being perceived

43:38

as fashionable. So no

43:40

matter what we build for them for the most

43:42

part 10-15 years later it's out

43:44

of style they'll sell the place

43:46

or they'll renovate it all over again we completely

43:48

got the place and completely renovated all over again

43:51

and they have the means to do it and

43:53

it's not I mean there these aren't people that

43:56

are building for resale value these are people that

43:58

are building to impress That's the

44:00

whole point. And they say

44:02

as much. They don't hide it. They're

44:05

building places to impress their friends and impress

44:08

whoever it is they are trying to impress. So

44:11

how do you stay motivated knowing that, okay, this

44:13

person's probably going to renovate it here in 10

44:15

years? Well, I

44:17

mean, for one of it, don't work, don't eat. So

44:20

that's a pretty powerful motivation.

44:26

When my kids were going to college, I mean,

44:29

people know this. There's a lot of people in

44:31

my shoes. The bills never stopped coming. And I

44:33

just had to keep making money and keep making

44:35

money. A lot of times, I

44:37

mean, there are times I don't really get too

44:39

concerned about I'll build anything

44:42

anybody wants as long as it's not dangerous or

44:44

unlawful. I mean, I don't care if it's ugly.

44:46

I don't care if it's... I mean,

44:48

I don't have to like it. I don't have to

44:50

like the thing I'm building. I have to build it

44:52

well and I have to build it well enough so that

44:54

they'll like it and pay me. I do

44:56

this for a living. It's not really, to

44:59

me, it's an artist's informant.

45:01

To me, it's not my

45:03

art. I mean, I do other things

45:05

for artistic endeavors. And

45:07

building is not really an artistic endeavor for

45:09

me. It's a craft and it's my living.

45:12

And I build it for money because without

45:14

money, I wouldn't have been able to send my kids

45:16

to college and I wouldn't be able to pursue the

45:18

things that I'm trying to pursue now that are

45:20

outside of my craft. So I'm

45:23

more than happy to build whatever people want. And

45:25

I always find... I mean, every project has its

45:28

challenges and its interests and there's always even... I

45:31

mean, like we've already spoken about, there's

45:33

the personal side of things. There's the

45:36

logistical side of things. There are all so many

45:38

challenges in what I do. It's endlessly interesting. I

45:40

mean, I'm never bored with my work. And

45:43

if they want to tear it out in 10 years, well, they

45:45

bought it. God bless them. It seems silly.

45:49

But I think the last couple

45:51

of jobs I've done will stand for decades,

45:53

the last few. But most

45:55

of the other ones I've built are in the dump. have

46:00

a certain amount of detachment. I mean, you have your creative

46:02

outlets where you feel like you're doing art. And we're going

46:04

to talk about that here in a minute. I mean, you

46:06

do music now, you do writing, but what

46:09

you do with carpentry, like that's a craft and

46:11

all that matters with that is, you know, whether

46:13

the client likes it or not. Well,

46:15

I mean, I'm a hired gun and it's work

46:18

for money. So I can't let,

46:20

I can't let

46:22

my ego get in the way of,

46:24

you know, what I'm, I mean, what I'm,

46:28

once I'm out the door, I mean, also, I mean,

46:30

quite frankly, once I'm out the door on one project,

46:32

I'm right onto the next project and there's a whole

46:35

new, I'm completely consumed by that project at work. And

46:37

I actually, it's hard for me to even remember some of

46:40

the places I build except that every once in a while

46:42

they appear in magazines and stuff like that. To

46:44

me, it's a job. This is actually a job. I

46:47

put a lot of energy into it. And I put a lot

46:49

of attention into it and I really do enjoy it. I really

46:51

do love doing it, but it is

46:53

ultimately my job and people are paying me

46:55

to do something. And I'm more

46:58

than happy to build them what they would like built

47:01

as long as they pay me for it. That's the

47:03

deal. I make this crazy house for you. You give

47:05

me money and that's what

47:07

work for money is. And,

47:10

and I, and I,

47:12

you know, I've had a real thirst to

47:15

explore what I consider my

47:17

own creative visions and my own creative

47:19

outlets that I would call more

47:21

my artistic pursuit. So, you know, especially with music,

47:23

music recently, and you know, I've made two record

47:26

albums now and that's a

47:28

completely different thing. Those to me are,

47:31

that's creating something forever. And it's deeply,

47:33

deeply important to me. The

47:35

quality that goes into that and the emotion that

47:37

goes into that and the feeling that goes into

47:40

it. I do get attached to those things. Let's

47:42

talk about your music. So what have you

47:45

learned about doing good work from

47:47

what you've done as a carpenter? How's

47:49

that carried over to your passion in

47:51

music? Well, it's interesting because I've

47:53

made two records now with a man named

47:55

Mark Ambrosino. He runs a studio

47:58

out in Queens called the Madhouse. And

48:01

he, you know, and

48:03

this isn't exactly now, but he's kind

48:05

of me in the music world. And

48:08

I mean, I've played

48:10

music my entire life. I've played piano since I was

48:12

four years old. I played guitar since I was 12.

48:14

And I play almost every day. And I

48:16

work at it because I love it. I totally

48:19

love it. Music just captures my emotions

48:21

and my, and to me, there's almost

48:23

nothing like a wonderful

48:26

song. And I particularly like song. I

48:28

like songs with words. And

48:30

Mark is a craftsman with songs. I mean,

48:32

Mark's worked with most of the greats

48:34

in the music world. He was a road

48:36

drummer with Ray Charles. I mean, he doesn't

48:39

get, you know, better than that.

48:42

And we made a record two years ago

48:44

that I'm not releasing.

48:47

That's a whole art project that's too long. I describe it

48:49

in the book. So I talk, if you want to know

48:51

about that, read the book. But then

48:53

I also wanted to make the record for him

48:56

for general release. And

48:58

he's such a musical craft. He's

49:00

such a brilliant drummer. And

49:02

I met him because I used to go to

49:04

his studio sometimes to just do little session work

49:06

playing mostly steel guitars for him. And

49:10

I sent him songs and he agreed

49:12

that we should make a record together,

49:14

which kind of shocked me. And

49:17

then we went and did it. And now we've released

49:19

it. And I just released it in September. And

49:22

the record is called Hard to Tame. And

49:25

it's my first real

49:27

public effort at music. And

49:31

you know, nothing in a way, it's, I

49:33

mean, it's closer to my heart than Carpentry

49:35

will ever be because it's so personal. Music

49:38

is so personal. I mean, nobody's ever written

49:40

a song that wasn't autobiographical somehow. And

49:43

here are 11 songs that are

49:45

deeply autobiographical, although not necessarily

49:48

explicitly so. And

49:51

they're very similar pursuits. Every note matters. Every

49:53

sound on that record matters. Nothing can be

49:55

out of place. The level of craft are

49:58

very similar, the way he works. works in

50:00

the way I work and we work together

50:02

beautifully. We love working together. And then

50:05

you bring in subcontractors. You know, there's a

50:08

professional piano player on it. Dave Morgan comes

50:10

in and then we

50:12

had professional horn players, David Mann and

50:14

Tony Kadlik, who I mean those guys

50:16

played with Sinatra and they're the

50:19

horn players on my record. These are

50:21

subcontractors and it's not that different and you have

50:23

to treat them, you know, how do you talk

50:25

to them? I mean, how do you talk to

50:27

a trumpet player who's played with Frank Sinatra and

50:29

tell him you didn't like what he just played? Which

50:32

happened? You

50:38

know, like what do I say to Tony Kadlik?

50:40

I mean, he's one of the living greats on

50:42

his instrument. And that was interesting. It was really

50:44

interesting. And but I

50:46

did find, especially musicians, musicians are so

50:49

generous with their time and their care.

50:52

A musician like that really wants you to,

50:55

he wants you to like, I mean, the same way

50:58

that I want the clients to like the place I

51:00

build for them. He wants me to be happy with

51:02

what he played on my record. I think the only

51:04

reason I was able to pull off the making records

51:06

was because I'd had so much practice

51:08

doing things. I've had so much practice

51:10

completing artistic visions that I

51:12

was able to transfer that same attitude

51:15

into music. I

51:18

think a lot of people these days, both

51:20

their work and their hobbies tend to take

51:22

place online or in the digital realm. Do

51:25

you think it's important for people to

51:27

have at least one area in life

51:29

in which they do something that's creative

51:31

and concrete, whether that's carpentry or guitar

51:33

playing, et cetera? I

51:35

find I don't really like my computer or

51:37

my telephone. I mean, I use my computer

51:39

to write on. And

51:42

then I usually actually, well, I mean, to

51:44

me, the computer stands, both the computer

51:46

and the telephone stand

51:49

between me and the world.

51:52

And I like direct experience

51:54

of the world. I like the feel of

51:56

stone under my hands. I like the feel

51:58

of wood in my hands. I like

52:00

to see what happens when I hit it. One

52:04

of my favorite guitars is one of my least

52:07

expensive guitars. And the

52:09

reason I adore it is because when

52:11

I hit it, it sounds like wires

52:15

by making wood vibrate. You

52:17

can hear the wire and you can hear the wood. And

52:21

there's no way to replicate that

52:24

kind of learning and that

52:26

kind of understanding digitally. I

52:29

mean, the best you can do with a computer is

52:31

look at it, listen to it, and click your fingers

52:33

on it. But that's not...

52:36

I mean, pick up a vintage Martin guitar and

52:38

strum one chord and it's

52:41

a completely different musical experience than sitting

52:43

on a computer creating music all day.

52:46

It's a visceral, multi-sensory

52:49

experience that has decades

52:51

of understanding of guitar building going into

52:54

it. Because of the... You

52:56

can sense the vibrations coming off the

52:58

instrument. I just... I

53:00

mean, honestly, I think the digital world is

53:03

a poor, a very poor

53:05

facsimile of

53:07

the real world. And

53:09

I mean, I would encourage people to do as much

53:12

mucking about in the mud and the dirt and as

53:14

they can. I

53:17

mean, pictures of nature online,

53:19

a picture of

53:21

the Grand Canyon and the Grand Canyon,

53:24

are so vastly different. They have nothing to

53:26

do with each other almost. You

53:28

know what I mean? I mean, I don't know if you've ever

53:30

been to the Grand Canyon, but the first time I went to the rim

53:33

of the Grand Canyon, I was like, oh, like

53:35

the word grand is... They picked the

53:37

right one. It's

53:41

mind blowing. It's earth shattering. It's

53:44

humbling. It's awe inspiring. And

53:48

as lovely as a picture online of the Grand

53:50

Canyon might be, it is none of those things.

53:52

It's not those things. It's like, oh, that's a

53:54

great picture of the Grand Canyon. Yeah, walk to

53:56

the edge of the thing at sunset some night.

54:00

At that point, I was dating this Ukrainian woman who,

54:02

it was her birthday, and we had to rush

54:04

there at 85 miles an hour to get there

54:07

by sunset. We came up over the

54:09

crest just as the sun was setting, and

54:11

we ran down there with two bottles of wine, and

54:14

that was my first viewing of the

54:16

Grand Canyon, and our minds were destroyed.

54:19

I mean, you can't do

54:22

that online. There is no online equivalent to

54:24

that. Well, Mark, this has been a

54:26

great conversation. Where can people go to learn more about the book

54:28

and your work? Well, the

54:30

book is available on Amazon, and it's

54:33

in almost every local bookstore in the

54:35

country, both in America and England and

54:37

Canada. It's really out there everywhere. The

54:39

book's been, I mean, shockingly popular. So

54:43

it's Building a Carpenter's Notes on the Art,

54:46

well, I don't know, what's it called again? Building

54:49

a Carpenter's Notes on Life and the Art of

54:51

Good Work. And the Art of Good

54:53

Work, yeah. And in England, it's

54:55

actually called How to Build Impossible Things. Don't

54:58

buy both, they are the same book. Some people have done

55:00

that and been sad about it. And

55:03

wherever books are sold, somebody can get

55:05

that. And my record is called

55:08

Hard to Tame by Mark Ellison, and if

55:11

you Google it, it's on every platform, every

55:13

streaming platform now. And I'll probably release

55:15

it on vinyl at the beginning

55:17

of next year for those that like vinyl. I

55:20

appreciate anybody who takes

55:22

an interest. Fantastic. Well, Mark Ellison, thanks

55:24

for your time. It's been a pleasure. It's

55:26

been a pleasure talking to you. My

55:29

guest today was Mark Ellison. He's the author of

55:31

the book Building a Carpenter's Notes on Life and

55:33

the Art of Good Work. It's available on amazon.com

55:35

and bookstores everywhere. You can find more

55:37

information about his work at his website, markellison.com. Also

55:40

check out our show notes at AOM.is slash building. Where

55:42

you can find links to resources where you can delve

55:44

deeper into this topic. Well,

55:53

that wraps up another edition of the AOM podcast.

55:55

Make sure to check out our website at artofmanliness.com

55:58

where you find our podcast archives. well as thousands of

56:00

articles that we've written over the years about pretty much anything

56:02

you think of. And if you haven't done

56:04

so already, I'd appreciate it if you take one minute to get

56:07

your view off of podcasts or Spotify. It helps out a lot.

56:09

If you've done that already, thank you. Please consider sharing the show

56:11

with a friend or family member who you think we get something

56:13

out of it. As always, thank you

56:15

for the continued support and until next time, it's Brett

56:17

McKay, reminding you to have a listen today on the

56:19

podcast, but put what you've heard into action. Pandora

56:36

makes it easy for you to find your

56:38

favorite music, discover new artists and genres by

56:40

selecting any song or album and will make

56:42

you a personalized station for free. Download

56:44

on the Apple app store or Google play and

56:46

enjoy the soundtrack to your life. Have

56:50

you ever told a friend, Oh, I'm

56:52

fine. When you really felt

56:54

just so overwhelmed or sent

56:57

a text can't sleep.

56:59

Are you awake? When you couldn't find

57:02

the words to say, I'm scared

57:04

to be alone with my thoughts right now.

57:06

Then this is your sign to reach out to the 9 8

57:09

8 lifeline for 24 seven

57:11

free confidential support. You don't

57:13

have to hide how you

57:15

feel. Text, call or chat

57:18

anytime.