How to Set Up Your Life Like Dan Bilzerian

I’ve done a lot of sh**, but I’ve never thrown a porn star off the roof of my house. Or, at least no one can prove that I’ve ever done that. In Dan’s case, there was a photographer there for Hustler magazine documenting the whole thing — such is the nature of his life.

I guess that’ll set the tone here. We’re talking today about his recent quasi-self-help book, The Setup, and what we can learn from it. Either positively, as in “here’s a great idea that you should be aware of or implement in your own life to get what you want,” or negatively, as in “for the love of whomever and whatever you hold dear, please do not follow in this man’s drunken footsteps.”

Because the reality is, Dan Bilzerian is…a lot of things to all people. Hero to many, villain to many, and something different to me.

This book is his autobiography — a genre which, of course, is notoriously suspect — but the basic rundown of his life is that he was relatively unknown until he was well into his thirties, after which he started his Instagram account, where he posted pictures and videos of his “lavish lifestyle” that hordes of people wanted to copy, and that other, different hordes of people hated him for.

I’m in neither camp — I was just interested in this dude’s life. I don’t think he’s a bad person, I don’t care where his wealth “really” came from (people suspect that he didn’t win it all gambling, as he claims, but rather inherited most of it from his father), and I don’t even really want to live like him.

Nobody believes me when I say that, but it’s true. I have zero desire to live in a house with dozens of strangers and hangers-on traipsing about, sticking their nose in my business — I just want to sit and read.

Although, I will say that there are aspects of his life that are definitely appealing. I mean, I have to like…go out to get girls to have sex with me, and he has like all these models living in his mansion. Of course I find that part of his life interesting — that’s part of why I read the book!