Just Start: Avoiding the Plainview Trap
One of the most incredible things about the incredible film There Will Be Blood — which came out in 2007 — is that it so perfectly mirrors the experience of starting and maintaining a successful YouTube channel.
You might think this statement is insane. I’m going to do my best to explain it.
We first meet Daniel Plainview toiling in obscurity, relying on his own tools and sweat, a lone operator whose every breakthrough is earned slowly and painfully (obviously, I’m not comparing the actual physical risks of oil-prospecting to filming videos in your bedroom here, but stick with me). Eventually, he unearths a trickle of oil, and later, he hits a gusher: you might, if you have a YouTube channel, compare these to the joy you experience from getting your first hundred views, and later your first million, and the fact that neither of those things really stop you wanting more. Soon enough, Daniel hits (liquid) gold: if you’re even vaguely familiar with the promises of YouTube strategists, then you know you could switch oil for YouTube, views for barrels, and wells for channels, and his “I’m an oilman” speech fits basically perfectly:
'Ladies and gentlemen, I've traveled over half our state to be here tonight. I couldn't get away sooner because my new well was coming in at Coyote Hills, and I had to see about it. That well is now flowing at 2000 barrels; it's paying me an income of 5000 dollars a week. I have two others drilling and I have 16 producing at Antelope. So, ladies and gentlemen, if I say I'm an oil man, you will agree.’
(If you’re more of a newsletter person, you might notice that this also works with a certain type of newsletter)
The problem, of course, is that none of it is enough.
Plainview cannot be happy. He finds it impossible. He will say anything, perform anything, in order to increase the reach of his empire, from things that are simply calculated to appeal to a crowd to things he absolutely does not believe. He will lay his soul bare in front of a crowd of people he does not like, lie and cheat and deceive, and literally allow himself to be slapped around just to make more money, when all that he actually wants — if we’re to believe what he says in one of his most vulnerable moments — is simple, but depressing.
“I have a competition in me. I want no one else to succeed … I want to earn enough money I can get away from everyone.”
And ultimately (mild spoilers, I suppose?) he’s left with nothing worth living for.
This is what I think of as the Plainview Trap, and the tragedy at the heart of the film. Daniel Plainview isn’t a pantomime villain — there are moments, like his early interactions with his adopted son H.W., where you can see the good in him, little moments of tenderness where he isn’t just striving for more and more and more. 5,000 dollars, the amount Plainview is earning from one well in one week near the start of the film (if you believe him), is about $200,000 in 2025 money, or more than enough to scale things back and be happy. But it’s not enough. There Will Be Blood doesn’t actually mention capitalism at all, but it’s probably the best critique of capitalism I’ve ever seen: a film about how always wanting more can ruin anyone.
So how do you avoid the Plainview Trap?
It’s something I think about a lot, and I don’t think the answers are easy. A couple of things I think might be helpful:
Keep a Vonnegut list. You can read about these in the post I wrote about them, but the general idea is to keep a list of the little things that make you feel happy and fulfilled in everyday life, and look back on it occasionally. Hopefully, this way you’ll realise that they’re rarely the things you spend a ton of money on, and are instead things that come from cultivating good relationships with your friends, family, and yourself (by which I mean learning to not beat yourself up, and be happy in your own company).
Optimise for learning experiences, not just experiences. I feel like spending money on experiences and not possessions is pretty common advice these days — don’t buy bottles of champagne, buy hot air balloon trips — but that’s how you get space tourism, and I’m not sure that’s solving anyone’s problems. I can only speak for myself, but the most fulfilling (non-family) experiences in my life have all come from things I’ve invested a bunch of time in — whether that’s learning physical skills, or reading books. The time I accidentally put an extra 25kg on my double-bodyweight deadlift and the time I read 500 pages of Eiji Yoshikawa’s Musashi in one sitting were both peak experiences, and neither of them really cost much.
Remember what you’re actually working for. One idea that’s helped me out is to sit down and write down what a perfect day would actually look like for me, if I didn’t need to work. Funnily enough, it wouldn’t actually cost much money. I definitely wouldn’t need a private bowling alley.
Have a great weekend!
Joel x
Stuff I like
📖 Book - Dopamine Nation by Dr Anna Lembke
This is a useful, informative, and surprisingly honest book: it gets into the specifics of (and solutions for) dopamine addiction through a series of case studies, but author Dr Lembke doesn’t shy away from documenting her own struggles with addiction (she poured hours into e-reader romance, which is a lot less fun than it sounds). We’re all dopamine addicts to one degree or another, so it’s probably worth a read.
📝 Article - The Acceleration of Addictiveness
Think of this like a companion piece to the above: old but great stuff from Paul Graham.
📝 Article - You say you want a revolution
I’ve been following Natalia Antonova for a while — she posts fascinating stuff about opsec and geolocation — but I didn’t realise how insane her upbringing was. In this piece, where she argues that the people clamouring most loudly for the system to collapse are the worst prepared for it to happen, she gets into the whole thing. Really good.
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