Novelist
I get to my desk (in a very small room at the top of the house) at about 10, and fiddle about with the height of the desk and the chair until I’m comfortable.
Recorded · The Guardian · 2017
One question · 6 of 16 answers to it
What does the first sixty minutes of your day look like?
Norwegian chess grandmaster; World Chess Champion 2013–2023
I would want to be a role model. As you talk about an athlete who wakes up at seven every day, then you have two training sessions...for me, it's not like that.
Recorded · Chess.com · 2017
Co-founder, president and chief executive of NVIDIA
I begin each morning, I do every single morning exactly the same way, I begin each morning by doing my highest priority work first.
Recorded · The Singju Post · 2024
Novelist and editor; Nobel laureate in Literature, 1993
Writing before dawn began as a necessity—I had small children when I first began to write and I needed to use the time before they said, “Mama”—and that was always around five in the…
Recorded · The Paris Review · 1993
Novelist and critic
I used to be a late starter, but now I get up in the dark like a medieval monk, commit unmediated scribble to a notebook, and go back to bed about six, hoping to sleep for another two hours…
Recorded · The Guardian · 2016
Kenyan marathon runner
Our life here is simple, very simple. Get up in the morning, go for a run, come back. If it is a day for cleaning, we do the cleaning, or we just relax.
Recorded · BBC Sport · 2020
Answers marked Recorded were said elsewhere and are quoted with the publication and date they came from. Those people have not joined — nobody here answers on anyone else's behalf.
When you feel overwhelmed or unfocused, what do you do?
Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency, 1997-2009; Nobel Peace Prize 2005
First of all, you learn to manage stress. You learn to live with stress. I mean, stress is there all the time. There’s no question about it. It’s in the morning. It’s at night.
Recorded · Academy of Achievement · 2006
Chemist; Nobel laureate in Chemistry, 1999
Arriving in the States, I had the feeling of being thrown into an ocean.
Recorded · Nobel Prize Outreach · 1999
United States artistic gymnast
Yes. Today has been really stressful. We had a workout this morning. It went okay. And then just that five and a half hour wait or something. I was just shaking, could barely nap.
Recorded · Rev · 2021
What small daily thing do you do that most people would consider a waste of time?
Kenyan marathon runner
When you become a boss, you don't think straight. It's better to be a leader than a boss. That is why I do my share of the cleaning. That is how to show the way to young people.
Recorded · BBC Sport · 2020
Novelist, dramatist and screenwriter
Do, occasionally, give in to temptation. Wash the kitchen floor, hang out the washing. It’s research.
Recorded · The Guardian · 2010
Composer, pianist and record producer
It’s wasting time to listen to music when you go outside because there are so many interesting noises. For example, every time it rains, I open the window and put the recorder outside.
Recorded · Kinfolk · 2018
What is your favourite documentary, and what did it change for you?
Writer of the early-retirement blog Mr. Money Mustache
I’ve actually got a huge, huge list of documentaries that I’ve been meaning to watch, many of them collected from the guests in your Tools of Titans book.
Recorded · The Tim Ferriss Show · 2018
Screenwriter and showrunner; co-writer of Rounders, co-creator of Billions
There are three. The documentary about Apocalypse Now that Francis Ford Coppola’s wife made is amazing.
Recorded · The Tim Ferriss Show · 2020
Creator of Ruby on Rails; chief technology officer of 37signals
Let’s see. I like The Big Short. I’d read the book already. That was a good one. ...
Recorded · The Tim Ferriss Show · 2018
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Recorded for public figures, from the source their answers were taken from. Browse by era too.
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Every question the bank can deal, in the order it was written. See all 126.
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Answers that stay at one address
You are dealt a few questions at a time and answer the ones you want to. What you write gets a permanent address and keeps it. Rewrite it whenever you like and say why — the new version goes up beside the old one rather than over it, so changing your mind reads as thinking rather than as a reversal.
You write before you read. Other members' answers to a question stay shut until you have answered it or passed on it, because reading first changes what you would have said. Passing is free and it is permanent.
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Most of what is here so far was said somewhere else and recorded with its source — a named person, a publication and a date, on every line. Nothing has been deleted.