I pay the bargain price of $1,250 per month to sleep in the top bunk of a bunk bed crammed into a 10ft x 10ft room that I share with a 32-year old man. The 'house' is a dorm-style converted low-income apartment building in San Francisco's Tenderloin, the city's epicenter of drugs and poverty. I have 50 roommates, many of whom are software engineers, physicists, Ph.D. candidates, or startup founders. It is even said that the founder of Ethereum, Vitalik Buterin, once stayed in the house. "Welcome to the Negev!" reads the subject line of the email requesting my first month's rent.
My first night in the house, I sit with a guy named Yuval at the dinner table. Yuval has a Ph.D. in physics and works as an infrastructure engineer for Facebook. Yuval blasts so much intelligence out of his every spoken word that I'm immediately uncomfortable and self-conscious. I feel like an imposter and that these "way too smart for me" people will figure out pretty soon that we are not equals.
Thankfully, I don't have much time to sit with my insecurities. After my first month's rent and the housing deposit, I only have $4,500 of cash – or, in San Francisco terms, 6 weeks until I'm screwed. My immediate routine leaves me sleeping five hours a night as I UBER all morning, work for free as an intern in the afternoons for a friend of a friend, attend networking events at night, and apply to jobs through the night. I become known in the house for a ravenous work ethic after several roommates find me sleeping on my keyboard on different occasions – a reputation I take delicious, masochistic pleasure in.
Unfortunately, my efforts struggle to pay off, and the universe seemingly conspires to hold me down. UBER removes surge pricing, so I'm barely breaking even, the handful of neurotechnology companies that exist in San Francisco tell me to please god leave us alone, my car is hit while parked on the street, and my backpack is stolen. In my bag, I lose my laptop, all of my job-hunting materials, $400, my glasses, and the journal that had my whole life etched in it.
My soul begins to wilt. I start wandering the streets of the Tenderloin in a ten-block radius for a week kicking through the rubble and ash of human misery, looking to no avail for only one item — my journals. The universe gains ground upon my spirits as cynicism takes hold. I don't give up on my goal to find work, but I do enter a job-hunting stage where I'm writing cover letters and emails to employers while drunk on red wine. I'm using the wine to medicate my soul, but it has an added benefit of liberating my words from modesty and neediness. My writings to potential employers begin to fall just short of saying, "and in conclusion, you're a fuckin' jackass if you don't join the line of people who want my marketing brilliance."
As it so goes in a love story, suitors begin paying me attention. Within a week, I have three conversations going with startups. The first to offer me a job is a company called Sherpadesk. Sherpadesk sells one of the most boring, least revolutionary products on the planet – software for IT Tech Teams. But, they are four years old, profitable, and the job is to work as their first marketing hire. And I only have two weeks of cash left. And yet — I balk and almost pass on the job because it feels like a concession from my dream, one that 'Steve' would have never made. Mario whips me into shape.
"Frawley! That's incredible! Get realistic, man. You have a 3.0 GPA from VCU, and you're in competing for an entry-level job in Silicon fucking Valley. You are up against the top talent in the world. This sounds like a great way to show you can run a marketing program."
But what about, I say, "Elon Mu –"
Mario, who is loving life as a Venture for America fellow in Detroit now, cuts me off and shuts me down before I can even finish the name of Tesla's CEO.
I accept the job at SherpaDesk.
***
I feel as if I am in a black void, and the crunching pressure of the universe is pressing, squeezing, suffocating my spirit. My eyes feel heavy. The room all around me feels as though it is winnowing smaller. My alarm just went off, I'm sitting in bed, and my mind has one question – what the hell is going on?
I accepted the job at Sherpadesk three days ago. The job doesn't start for a few weeks, so I've spent the last two days celebrating the end of a long, arduous, multi-year quest. I called my mom, then my dad immediately. They were so proud. Even I was proud. I had finally done it. I'd disproven everyone again. Every coach, teacher, friend, neighbor, and the whole every cumulation of doubting looks I'd received from elementary school to middle school to high school to college – here I was. These last two days have been the two best days of my life. I felt like the king of the world. But right now, I feel empty.
I climb down my bunk bed ladder, toss on a junk Henley Tee and sweats. I have a forearm-sized burrito leftover in the hacker house kitchen that gets only 15 seconds in the microwave until I anxiously jump into devouring it. In the wake of my feast, I sit looking into space, waiting for the carnitas to spark joy. But joy never arrives.
A week later, nothing has improved, and I'm talking to my Hacker House roommate, Nimesh.
"I'm losing my mind," I say. "Ever since that morning, man, I feel incredibly lost and unmotivated. It's terrible. The world is gray to me all of a sudden, with no clear reason at all. Thank god work hasn't started."
"Hmm … I'm sorry to hear," he says, stirring his coffee and pursing his lips. We're sitting in the Hacker House living room, which has about 12 couches in it, a life-sized Costco teddy bear, a projector, six guitars hanging on the walls, endless board games, an errant fish tank, and a beautiful scaling mural of the San Francisco city skyline all around the room. It's a nice room, but the energy is panicked under my desperation. I'm talking to Nimesh because he had the misfortune of walking into the living room while I sat in lonely anguish. But also because he's brilliant.
Nimesh is a total concoction of wisdom, efficiency, and coolness you'd never expect from a normal-looking guy aged only 27. He's worldly after growing up traveling around our pristine world. When you ask something profound, he'll stop, purse his lips and shuffle them back and forth across his face as if he were a bartender preparing a cocktail of knowledge. After a few "lip laps," as I've begun calling it, he assuredly will drop some knowledge bombs. And I can feel it coming right now.
"I have to say," he begins, "I think there is a book you should look into."
I grunt agonizingly but in approval. Nimesh laughs.
"I promise you'll like it. It's called the 'Growth Mindset' by Carol Dweck. I read it last year, and it totally changed how I look at my life."
"Okay. What's it about?"
"Well, over decades of research, Dr. Dweck figured out that one of the major distinctions in people's quality of life is their mindset. She found that there are two types of mindsets – a Fixed Mindset and a Growth Mindset."
Nimesh pauses and eyes me. I'm anxiously prodding a grape I found on the floor with a pen. I am paying attention, but my spiritual pain has me restless and clawing for an outlet.
"Yeah, go on, I'm listening," I say as the grape spurts open.
"She says people with a Fixed Mindset believe capabilities are Fixed, so they measure themselves against what they achieve as evidence of where amongst society their 'Fixed' capabilities rank. People with a Growth Mindset believe everything can be improved with hard work. So, they live more freely as they know individuals are fluid and all self-determined by their efforts."
"Sounds intriguing," I say, setting aside my now wounded and juice gushing grape. "Is there more?""
"Yes, but it might hurt,"
"Oh, just beat down my soul. How much worse can it get?" I say, foolishly challenging the universe. Nimesh gives me a worried look and then gets up and walks across the room. He grabs the massive teddy bear and places it next to me.
"Here."
"What's this for?"
"This is your safety bear. Even when I am not around, this will still be your safety bear."
"Well, I guess technically it's 1/50th of my bear since it's shared among all of us."
"Damnit, man. That really could have been a moment."
We laugh.
"So anyway," he continues, sitting back down, "People with a Fixed Mindset live their lives obsessing over goals. Goals, in and of themselves, become the meaning to their life. Oftentimes, it is people who, for whatever reason, feel insecure or inferior. This eats at the mind, which causes them to feel the need to prove they aren't insecure or inferior by accomplishing really big or lofty goals. As Dweck then says, the achievement of the goals is measurable proof of worthiness for Fixed Mindset people."
He pauses, "You still following?"
"Yeah, of course, people are insecure and then crave external things to make themselves feel better. It's interesting, but I'm not motivated by cars or money." Nimesh's words make plenty of sense to me. If anything, I am feeling validated. I've never struggled to grow and change. Hell, I won the superlative in High School for "Most Changed." I've done more self-work than almost anyone I know.
"You can still be seeking external validation in non-physical ways, though."
"Yeah, sure."
"Okay, well, she has found that Fixed Mindset people, once they reach their goal, they're really happy for a few days, and then they get really sad. This is because they place their life's value and meaning in their goals, so once they're achieved, the person's life becomes meaningless. And a meaningless life and its lack of direction causes many people to become depressed. Most of these people ignore the reality and set new goals in vicious cycles."
"Well," I say, "that does sound like something I should read."
"Yeah… you should hug the bear," he says.
***
When I get my hands on a copy of the Growth Mindset, I'm smacked in the face immediately like one of those clowns from the Three Stooges. Dweck's every word feels manifestly destined for my eyes and mind. I have to check multiple times to make sure I'm not reading a book titled "On the Psychology and Frailties of Andrew Frawley." Each bit of wisdom lands and imprints on my brain like a planet caught in a meteor shower. There's no going back to the world I once knew.
Dweck's book brings me the first bit of light I've seen in weeks, but like an exorcism in the night, I see my old soul in its truest form as it claws and carves me up worse than ever for my grave sin of blazing a spotlight upon it. That's when I see it plainly – I am insecure, I am suffering, and all of my life's many obsessive pursuits have been a part of the charade.
I see my deepest quest – to change the world, to record our dreams – for what it truly is in its most honest form: a desperate quest to validate my hurting soul. That's when I realize that if you often say you want to change the world, but you don't know why, my belief is that you're probably suffering. The idea of changing the world is the ultimate quest for the suffering individual because of its grandiosity. The thinking goes, subconsciously, that if one can change the world, they've accomplished the mightiest quest making them the all-mighty and the all-powerful mover of the universe. How can he who moves the universe be inferior or unloved?
Being the wise guy that I am, when I finish Carol Dweck's book, I quickly race to clear my life of this toxic mindset I've been living under. I take all of my life's goals, hopes, dreams, and motivations with ease, and I drop them into the trash.
"Problem solved," I say to the safety bear Nimesh handed me weeks before.
As it unfortunately goes, problem not solved.
My depression – which I coolly referred to at the time as being 'spiritually lost' – had been induced by getting a job which inadvertently removed a significant source of meaning for me. While I thought removing all of my other hopes and dreams (and meaning) would be a cure, it was as foolish as counseling myself with a life-sized teddy bear. I lost every bit of meaning I had in life. Consequently, while I paid rent for a place in San Francisco, I lived for months in the pits of hell.
It wasn't until one day, while brazenly and dispassionately laying flat across three bar stools in the middle of a WeWork kitchen, that a light bulb went off. I was musing Nietzsche's quote, 'Man can bear any how with the right why,' when it clicked. I thought, Wow – if I can't bear this moment I must be lacking my why.
Bingo.
In the ensuing days as I meditated on my new quest: to find a meaningful quest. I could feel myself gradually ascending from a darkened world.
"Well, you could help me save humanity from Artificial Intelligence (AI) taking over the world," Nimesh suggested one day as I opined to any listening ear what might be a worthy quest for a life.
I laughed, "Oh, now you're pushing the AI Safety schtick on me again, huh?"
Nimesh's field of work is what some call AI Safety. The worry that keeps these patriots awake at night is that someone will create a super-intelligent software that will wreak unchecked havoc on humanity. Nimesh has been educating me on AI ever since I moved into the hacker house.
"What could be a bigger problem than the extinction of the human race?" he says.
"I mean, that would be less than ideal. But someone will figure it out," I say, thinking of all of the other existential threats to humanity we've managed to avert, such as everyone saying 'Wassssup' in the 90s or, more recently, Snuggies.
"No way, man. You just believe everything works out because you grew up as a white guy in the suburbs. For people like you, things do work out. Your life was stable. But the rest of the world is not."
His wisdom makes me pause. Is that true? No. It can't be!
"Okay, well, AI taking over society is so far away, anyways. I mean, c'mon, have you used a printer recently? Those things are so terrible."
"Dude AI and printers aren't even the same categories. AI and advancing technology are already powerful enough that it's taking millions of jobs. I mean, look at manufacturing in the US."
"No way! That's China. China took all the jobs," I say, parroting talking points I didn't even know were in my brain.
"No. Not China. Look at this chart."
Nimesh shows me a chart on his computer. I stare in disbelief at the unambiguous data: one line labeled 'US manufacturing jobs' is going very down, and a second line labeled 'US manufacturing output' is going very up. I stare in utter disbelief. I think about that South Park episode I watched when I was 10. They didn't 'terk er jerbs'?
"Wow," I say, feeling rattled. I'd never researched a thing beyond self-help, startups, and marketing at this point in my life. Why should I be surprised I don't know a thing about manufacturing trends? And yet, it's not until this Nimesh body slam that I first realize I carry all of these beliefs about the world, the USA, and society without ever having consciously developed them.
"Yeah, man. AI is coming. It's scary," Nimesh concludes.
***
Nimesh is right. AI is the greatest threat to human civilization. After I read a few books, and Nimesh showed me some simulations, I am convinced. We have only a few decades until all of society's naïve plans about the future are smashed into pieces by whatever this technology will unlock.
I've begun thinking about this a lot lately because, as it turns out, Nimesh was also right about my childhood. My beautifully bureaucratic suburban childhood was exceptionally stable. This has colored my worldview with a "nothing will go wrong, and if it does, we'll be fine" attitude. Plus, I'm white, which means when things have gone wrong, I tend to get that subconscious benefit of the doubt from people. For me, things have worked out, and as Nimesh has slowly made clear to me, that's rare. We all need a friend like Nimesh. More importantly, we need all need to listen to our friends like Nimesh.
As I told Nimesh recently, this "not a depression, depression" I've been living through is the first time in my life I've ever felt real suffering. At least that's how it feels, but the mind is tricky with that sort of thing. All of this got me thinking — if I can grow up as a protected white kid in the suburbs with my every basic need met and still end up with insecurities, how much psychological pain must there then be in the world?
This has me deeply worried, even more than the threat of Nimesh's AI takeover. At night I writhe in pain thinking of it. I've started obsessively reading through psychology, philosophy, biology, and sociology for the answers to a life well-lived. What is the good life? What policies might most effectively move society along Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs? I've been shaking in my boots ever since I saw the developed world's mental health statistics. What is the point of our capitalist spoils if everyone wants to kill themselves? Well-being is the only 'Key Performance Indicator' we should be measuring, and shouldn't that be obvious?
The most terrifying 'aha' moment I've had recently is that I realized before AI will become a super-power, it will take everyone's jobs. In a world where we've been told our work is our worth, it's a sure-fire bet we will see mass suicides. In some ways, we are already seeing that. I am utterly melancholic when I see news and numbers of suicide. Having just waded through the murky, swamp-like grudge of depression, I am insufferably empathic to the mental state one must be in to make such an act. The caving, pressing, hopeless, chaotic existence of a mind crying for an end against all of it's nature is a shaking image that ought to be at the forefront of society.
"I don't know what I will do," I say to Nimesh, "but I believe I've discovered a worthwhile aim for one's life."
***
In June of 2017, I was scheduled for a big trip to NYC. It would be the first time back in the city since my VFA nightmare. I was going to a conference, and I had a big meeting with Gary Vaynerchuk. Gary Vaynerchuk was my next biggest idol in college right after Steve Jobs and Elon Musk. Gary's preaching of "take risks and work hard" had been fuel to the fire that had pushed me to San Francisco. Since college, I had worked incredibly slowly to court Gary and his staff into letting me meet him. One day, Gary asked his followers on Instagram if anyone owned a Quiet Riot record he could put up in his office. I claimed to own it, messaged him, bought it off eBay, and then became connected. On this trip to NYC, I was cashing in my hard work by meeting with Gary.
Attending the conference with me was Mario, a massive fan of Gary's in college. I debated long and hard about inviting Mario. I only had five minutes with Gary, and my old wailing ego was hungry to own every second of it. My newer San Francisco mindset battled my ego. My mind argued that I should share the moment and the glory as inclusion and abundance are appropriate principles to live by.
My good soul won out, and I opted to invite Mario.
"Oh hell yeah, man, that'd be so dope," Mario said when I invited him.
"Oh shit, wait," he said, "I have a meeting with Andrew Yang at the same time. How about I move it back, we go to Gary together, and then we both say hi to Andrew?"
Sure, that works, I said. I didn't really think much of an Andrew Yang meeting. I had long since moved on from VFA and was beginning to feel fortunate for my rejection given the growth San Francisco and my hacker house roommates had squeezed out of me. Also, I had gained some perspective on Andrew Yang. The guy was dope, but he was kind of a nobody compared to the people in Silicon Valley.
When the Gary Vaynerchuk day came along, Mario and I spent the whole morning, just like three years prior, back again in a Manhattan coffee shop. The only difference was that rather than wearing the startup uniform, I was in an existentialist uniform – black jeans, a black t-shirt, black vans, shoulder-length hair, a meditation bracelet, and an obscure ring from Thailand. Also, this time we were ogling over Gary Vaynerchuk, not VFA or Andrew Yang.
When the time came for the meeting, Mario and I went to the wrong address. We found ourselves sprinting through the NYC summer sun, laughing our full heads off over how cliché it was to be running to a meeting in Manhattan. After our sweat-drenched, manic meeting with Gary, Mario and I made our way to the same VFA offices we had visited in years prior.
I felt relaxed and calm, except for one little wrinkle.
"Do I say hi to him? Or act like we've never met?" I asked Mario.
"Oh geez, man," Mario laughed, "yeah, that's tough. Just go with your gut."
My gut, or in other words, my subconscious, was sure he'd not remember me. Easy. Decision made!
As Mario and I head into the VFA offices, we make our way over to Yang's desk. As Mario catches his attention, I jump in, "It's nice to mee –" until I'm cut off.
"Hey, Andrew! It's great to see you again," Yang puts out his hand, two years later. My hand leaves my waist and meets his hand. How in the hell did he just remember me? Did he look me up? Did Mario remind him? Am I an asshole now?
As we head to the same conference room from years prior, it registers in my mind how weathered down Yang looks. For one, he's wearing a disheveled button-down shirt with a widely visible wife-beater. It's a Friday, but this is a far cry from the sharply tailored suit in 2015.
I play an active role in our conversation with Yang. Things are flowing calmly and casually until Yang suggests that he will be leaving VFA in a few months for a "big new project," of which he wouldn't tell us what.
"We have a big crisis in this country, guys. New technology and automation are blowing out huge chunks of our communities, and no one is doing anything about it," he says.
The skin on my arms perks up. I'm like a dog who just heard the magic word. Did Yang just say automation? I can't help myself, and words begin gushing from my mouth like an unhinged fire hydrant.
"Oh my god, did you see the 2017 Davos Global Risks report? They don't even mention robots, AI, or technology! No one even knows it's coming. The governing class is totally asleep! Self-driving cars are just years away! All of those poor drivers will be in terrible straits without economic or communal support."
As we're talking, or, as I'm talking, I pull out a stack of books regarding economic and sociological theories that I had lugged to NYC.
"Look, man, I'm with you," I scramble through the pages, "We need a whole new system! We're measuring none of the right things. Our priorities in society are all wrong! I don't know what the new system is, but I'm looking!"
With my every word, Andrew Yang is nodding and shouting approval, "Yes!! Yes!!" an image college me would have likely sold his 10 toes for.
As we say goodbye to Mr. Yang, I'm vibrating as if I've just returned from a deep, out-of-the-body, spiritual experience in the red rocks of Sedona. Mario doesn't know how to react besides approval, "Well, that was crazy and not what I expected out of that meeting."
Over the coming days, I teem with thoughts of Andrew Yang and his big project. I feel as though I know Yang on a deeper level. As I share with Mario later, "this must be the type of instant connection they refer to in love when 'you just know.'"
I send Yang an email two days later, "Hey soo, whatever your project is … I want in."
Yang's quick response blows the lid off my world, "I'm running for President in 2020 with a message of Universal Basic Income in the face of automation … If you're into that, feel free to join."
What! President? Feel free to join? What does that even mean? What the fuck did I just read? What the hell is Universal Basic Income? Which circuit in the simulation just haywire?
It takes me 12 hours to respond. For those 12 hours, I mostly stare at the wall in shock. I don't know what to say, or think, or process. Yang wants me? To help him? Run for … President? I immediately think of the only thing I know about political staffers — door knocking and putting out yard signs. I can't imagine an activity I have less interest in doing than that. But we have an important message.
I remain uncertain, but I respond with, "I am totally in."
I don't know what I am 'in' for, but I figured if I said no, the door would be closed forever. Maybe I would help him part-time or something. Worst case scenario, a few hours knocking on doors would warrant me Yang as a professional connection for good. That seemed cool.
A few days later, Yang and I hop on a call to better understand what "feel free to join" actually means. Preparing for the call, I am nervous.
"Yeah, we're building out the core team right now," Yang begins, "We'll build you in. We think San Francisco is going to be big for us, given the nature of the message. Having you as the marketing lead for young people would be tremendous."
My heart begins pounding through every step of this conversation. Core team? Me? Marketing lead? For a presidential campaign? I'm 23. I hate politics. What is going on!
"Ok, all of this sounds good," I say, acting cool, "But uhm, I have to admit I literally don't know a thing about politics. Should I read some books?"
"No. That's a good thing," Yang says decisively, "Don't read any of the political books. Your outsider approach to marketing is what we will need early on to stand out. We will try to run a grassroots campaign. Like Bernie Sanders."
"Ok, yeah, that sounds like a plan. Got it."
"We'll talk again soon."
After the call, I pull up Google; what is a grassroots political campaign?