If you're going to be an elitist, please could you be an elitist about the really important things,

you know, which is, is someone kind, is someone nice, is their soul open? Are they thoughtful?

And maybe we can afford to pass judgment, as it were, on where people are according to this scale of values.

Hey, everyone, it's Adam Grant.

Welcome back to Rethinking, my podcast with Ted on the Science of What Makes Us Tick.

I'm an organizational psychologist, and I'm taking you inside the minds of fascinating people

to explore new thoughts and new ways of thinking.

Alon de Boton has been called a rock star philosopher, in part because of the way he

fearlessly engages with the messy, complicated ways we live our lives, and how he makes

those ideas engaging and accessible for widespread audiences.

He writes and speaks on a range of topics, including love, happiness, work, religion,

status anxiety, and therapy.

We're trying something new on the show, where we invite a past guest to nominate a future

one.

And one of our former guests, therapists and social media phenomenon Raquel Hopkins,

suggested a lot. I was excited about the ideas,

so I brought them together for a conversation about status anxiety and more.

So this is a little bit of an experiment. Requel, I think you might be our first guest co-host

to nominate your dream guest, and we got them. Thank you. Requel, I think you might be our first guest co-host to nominate your dream guest, and we got him.

Thank you.

Raquel, tell me first why this bald man made the top of your list.

So I think that his approach is practical, and I think that we've lost a lot of common sense today. I think I was reading about

...