Fail Better with David Duchovny

Patric Gagne and the Art of Sociopathic Zen

When I first heard about Patric Gagne, a diagnosed sociopath with a buzzy new memoir, I was intrigued. If she lives without the social emotions that often hold us back — embarrassment, jealousy, and shame — does she actually have a superpower? What can she teach us about failure, and does she fear it like the rest of us do? After tearing through her book, I sat down to discuss these big questions, bust the tired tropes, and learn about the Zen of sociopathy.  Follow me on <a href="https://www.instagram.com/davidduchovny/">Instagram</a> at @davidduchovny. Stay up to date with Lemonada on <a href="https://twitter.com/LemonadaMedia">Twitter</a>, <a href="https://www.facebook.com/lemonadamedia/">Facebook</a> and <a href="https://www.instagram.com/lemonadamedia/">Instagram</a> at @LemonadaMedia. Joining Lemonada Premium is a great way to support our show and get bonus content. Subscribe today at <a href="http://bit.ly/lemonadapremium">bit.ly/lemonadapremium</a>. And if you want to continue the conversation with other listeners, join the My Lemonada community at <a href="https://lemonadamedia.com/mylemonada/">https://lemonadamedia.com/mylemonada/</a> For a list of current sponsors and discount codes for this and every other Lemonada show, go to <a href="http://lemonadamedia.com/sponsors">lemonadamedia.com/sponsors</a>.See <a href="https://omnystudio.com/listener">omnystudio.com/listener</a> for privacy information.

To be human is to fail – period. And not just to fail once, but to fail a lot. As the author Samuel Beckett said: “Fail again. Fail better.” This saying means a lot to me and my family – so much so that my daughter got a tattoo of it. Why are we, and so many others, so deeply concerned by failure? And if it’s something we all do so often, why are we so afraid of it – especially those of us here in win-at-all-costs America? In this podcast, I sit down with successful, thoughtful people like Ben Stiller, Bette Midler, Sean Penn and more to talk about failure – or what they labeled “failure,” but what was really an unparalleled opportunity for growth and revelation. I even want to delve into my own hardest moments, when I wrestled with setbacks, shame, and fear. We’ll still fail again. And again. But maybe if we fail better, we’ll feel better -- and maybe if we can all laugh together in failure, that's a start.