Two Percent with Michael Easter

Ginny Yurich, founder of 1000 Hours Outside and author of Until the Streetlights Come On, explores childhood, nature, and family life. She discusses why outdoor time and autonomy matter, how busy families can make room for them, and setting healthy screen boundaries. They also cover play, bad weather, risk, overscheduled sports, delayed phones, and preparing kids for an AI-shaped future.

Robert Greene, bestselling author of The 48 Laws of Power and The Laws of Human Nature, reflects on surviving a near-fatal stroke and writing his latest book by hand for seven years. He explores awe, transcendence, rites of passage, meditation, boredom, nature, discomfort, and mortality. Along the way, he reveals how everyday rituals can make life feel astonishing again.

Dan John, a veteran strength coach, author, and former competitive athlete, shares six decades of hard-earned training wisdom. He explores how strong is strong enough, why movement patterns beat muscle isolation, and how three weekly sessions can go a long way. They also cover simple strength tests, building a minimalist home gym, avoiding burnout from high-intensity workouts, and ending every workout with a walk.

Ravi Gupta, author and educator who once led schools serving children in poverty, turned his neglected ambitions into a year-by-year adventure. He and Michael explore the “invisible list,” choosing passions, making time despite family life, learning through deliberate practice, and embracing beginner-level failure. Their conversation spans powerlifting, screenwriting, surfing, tennis, the MCAT, Italian cooking, and the friendships forged by shared challenges.

Coltan Scrivner, an Arizona State psychologist and author of Morbidly Curious, explores why danger is so hard to ignore. They unpack the four forms of morbid curiosity, why women gravitate toward true crime, how horror fans weathered the pandemic, and when crime stories distort risk. Plus: the perfect fear level, creepy clowns, haunted houses, and horror’s most unsettling villains.

Robert Moor, author of On Trails and In Trees, joins a wide-ranging conversation about his Appalachian Trail journey, why hikers quit, and the strange rewards of discomfort. They explore going off trail, finding outdoor rituals in cities, tree climbing, curiosity, bonsai, and how wounded trees offer a powerful lens on aging.

David Samson, an evolutionary anthropologist at the University of Toronto and author of The Sleepless Ape, explores why modern humans sleep longer yet worry more about sleep. He examines Hadza sleep, circadian mismatch, sleep anxiety, common myths, melatonin, trackers, light exposure, and whether blackout curtains help or hurt. The conversation ends with practical ways to strengthen your body clock.

Marcus Elliott, physician, sports scientist, and founder of elite performance lab P3, explores Misogi: a deliberately daunting challenge designed with a 50% chance of failure. They discuss failure, hidden capacity, kooky adventures, modern rites of passage, and a mountain challenge with his son. Elliott also explains what performance data misses, why uncertainty matters, and how to keep life from shrinking with age.

Brian Driscoll, former FBI acting director and Hostage Rescue Team veteran, recounts his unexpected rise to the Bureau’s top job. He discusses resisting political pressure, protecting thousands of agents, and the price of refusing to stay silent. He also explores lessons from counterterrorism, organized crime investigations, crisis leadership, and rebuilding after being fired.

Dan Lieberman, Harvard evolutionary biologist and author of Fed Up, puts popular diets to the test. He explores why modern humans struggle with food choices, what paleo and carnivore diets get wrong, and why nutrition advice keeps changing. They also tackle protein hype, ultra-processed foods, diet tribalism, sustainable eating, and exercise’s role in weight loss.