logo
episode-header-image
Sep 2020
1h 43m

#460: Maria Popova on Writing, Workflow,...

Tim Ferriss: Bestselling Author, Human Guinea Pig
About this episode

This interview originally aired in 2014. You can find the show notes here: https://tim.blog/2014/10/21/brain-pickings/

Maria Popova (@brainpicker) is a reader and a writer who writes about what she reads on Brain Pickings, which is included in the Library of Congress permanent web archive of culturally valuable materials. She is the author of Figuring, the editor of A Velocity of Being: Letters to a Young Reader, and the creator and host of The Universe in Verse, an annual charitable celebration of science through poetry at the interdisciplinary cultural center Pioneer Works in Brooklyn.

Brain Pickings is Maria’s one-woman labor of love — an inquiry into how to live and what it means to lead a good life. From Mark Twain to Oscar Wilde and everyone in between, Maria finds the hidden gems. She is also PROLIFIC and makes me look like a sloth.

In this in-depth conversation, we cover just about everything: how it happened, her workflow, how she writes (and workarounds to problems), how her site generates revenue, her workouts, and many more details. If you want to know the habits of a hyper-productive person, this episode is for you.

***

If you enjoy the podcast, would you please consider leaving a short review on Apple Podcasts/iTunes? It takes less than 60 seconds, and it really makes a difference in helping to convince hard-to-get guests. I also love reading the reviews!

For show notes and past guests, please visit tim.blog/podcast.

Sign up for Tim’s email newsletter (“5-Bullet Friday”) at tim.blog/friday.

For transcripts of episodes, go to tim.blog/transcripts.

Discover Tim’s books: tim.blog/books.

Follow Tim:

Twittertwitter.com/tferriss 

Instagraminstagram.com/timferriss

Facebookfacebook.com/timferriss 

YouTubeyoutube.com/timferriss

Past guests on The Tim Ferriss Show include Jerry Seinfeld, Hugh Jackman, Dr. Jane Goodall, LeBron James, Kevin Hart, Doris Kearns Goodwin, Jamie Foxx, Matthew McConaughey, Esther Perel, Elizabeth Gilbert, Terry Crews, Sia, Yuval Noah Harari, Malcolm Gladwell, Madeleine Albright, Cheryl Strayed, Jim Collins, Mary Karr, Maria Popova, Sam Harris, Michael Phelps, Bob Iger, Edward Norton, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Neil Strauss, Ken Burns, Maria Sharapova, Marc Andreessen, Neil Gaiman, Neil de Grasse Tyson, Jocko Willink, Daniel Ek, Kelly Slater, Dr. Peter Attia, Seth Godin, Howard Marks, Dr. Brené Brown, Eric Schmidt, Michael Lewis, Joe Gebbia, Michael Pollan, Dr. Jordan Peterson, Vince Vaughn, Brian Koppelman, Ramit Sethi, Dax Shepard, Tony Robbins, Jim Dethmer, Dan Harris, Ray Dalio, Naval Ravikant, Vitalik Buterin, Elizabeth Lesser, Amanda Palmer, Katie Haun, Sir Richard Branson, Chuck Palahniuk, Arianna Huffington, Reid Hoffman, Bill Burr, Whitney Cummings, Rick Rubin, Dr. Vivek Murthy, Darren Aronofsky, and many more.

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Up next
Sep 30
#829: James Nestor — Breathing Protocols to Reboot Your Health, Fix Your Sleep, and Boost Performance
James Nestor is a science journalist and the author of the international bestseller Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art, with more than three million copies sold in 44 languages.This episode is brought to you by:Helix Sleep premium mattresses: https://HelixSleep.com/Tim (27% of ... Show More
1h 50m
Sep 24
#828: David Senra — How Extreme Winners Think and Win: Lessons from 400+ of History’s Greatest Founders and Investors (Including Buffett, Munger, Rockefeller, Jobs, Ovitz, Zell, and Names You Don’t Know But Should)
David Senra is the host of the Founders podcast. For the past nine years, David has intensely studied the life and work of hundreds of history’s greatest entrepreneurs. His new podcast, David Senra, showcases conversations with the best-of-the-best living founders and extreme win ... Show More
2h 55m
Sep 16
#827: Pablos Holman — One of The Scariest Hackers I’ve Ever Met
Pablos Holman is a hacker and inventor and the author of Deep Future: Creating Technology that Matters, the indispensable guide to deep tech. Previously, Pablos worked on spaceships at Blue Origin and helped build The Intellectual Ventures Lab to invent a wide variety of breakthr ... Show More
2h 31m
Recommended Episodes
Feb 2024
Making Waves While Breaking the Glass Ceiling
 Watch Carol and Tim LIVE every day on YouTube: http://bit.ly/3vTiACF. Lisa Lutoff-Perlo, Vice Chairman of External Affairs at Royal Caribbean and former CEO of Celebrity Cruises, discusses her book Making Waves: A Woman’s Rise to the Top Using Smarts, Heart and Courage. Hosts: C ... Show More
18m 5s
Nov 2023
Sports Podcasting On A National Level
“Think of our NFL network, it’s 38 podcasts. To source 38 podcasts, you don’t want eight different publishers and 38 different onboarding calls and invoices - it can be a nightmare. So for us, we like to just make it as easy for an advertiser as possible to activate with those mi ... Show More
44m 24s
Jul 2021
Lori Gottlieb and Guy Winch || Dear Therapists
Today it’s great to chat with Lori Gottlieb and Guy Winch on the podcast. Lori Gottlieb is a psychotherapist and New York Times bestselling author of Maybe You Should Talk to Someone, which has sold over a million copies and is currently being adapted as a television series. In a ... Show More
57m 2s
Feb 2024
TIP609: Fooled by Randomness by Nassim Taleb
On today’s episode, Clay reviews Nassim Taleb’s book – Fooled by Randomness.Nassim Taleb is a Lebanon-born American mathematician and statistician whose work concerns problems of randomness, probability, and uncertainty. He’s very well known for his popular books, including The B ... Show More
1 h
Feb 2024
S20 Ep19: NoSleep Podcast S20E19
It’s Episode 19 of Season 20. Come join us around the campfire for tales about scary schooling. “Detention” written by Jordan Underhill (Story starts around 00:03:25) Produced by: Phil Michalski Cast: Narrator – Kyle Akers, Mr. Thompson – Atticus Jackson “Moooooooooom… Something ... Show More
1h 9m
Nov 2017
501: PERSONAL - Tim Sanders, love your way to the top
Tim Sanders brings love into the workplace. No, we are not talking anything elicit, we are talking about possibly the number one way and fastest to accelerate your career, business, income and life. Tim knows what he is talking about, as he  spent most of his early career on the ... Show More
1h 20m
Feb 2024
⭐ The 5+ Star Challenge ⭐
Send us a textIn Episode 139 of Book Talk, Etc., Tina and Renee share their possible 5+ star reads. They also share what they've been loving lately, their latest reads, and have book talk about trying to find 5-star reads. If you enjoy this episode, be sure to FOLLOW/SUBSCRIBE on ... Show More
1h 4m
Feb 2024
The Science of Generosity: Why It Makes You Happier and How To Do It Effectively (It Doesn’t Need To Involve Money) | Chris Anderson
New episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for free, with 1-week early access for Wondery+ subscribers. --- How to cultivate a generosity mindset— and make a good thing less boring. Chris Anderson is the curator of TED. He is the author of New York Times bestseller ... Show More
1h 13m
Feb 2024
AaS! 218: How Do We Know What the Milky Way Looks Like?
Why is it so hard to get a picture of the Milky Way? How much of our galaxy have we mapped? What the heck is a “barred spiral” and what does that have to do with our core? I discuss these questions and more in today’s Ask a Spaceman! This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Give ... Show More
39m 57s
Aug 10
Q&A: Feeding, Feelings & Future Babies?
Episode 164: In this episode, Kristen and Luke open up about hitting some new milestones in their parenting journey—from sleepless nights to moments of joy. They catch up on Bravo’s “The McBee Dynasty” (warning: spoilers ahead!), dish on what feeding their baby has really been li ... Show More
49m 39s