The Dream University List
Pick your own professors, then let the list become your treasure map.
- Difficulty
- Starter
- Time to result
- ~weeks to results
- Steps
- 5
- Confidence
- 87%
Banayan knew what he didn't believe in — a Forbes algorithm of success. So he did what he does whenever he's in trouble: called his best friends. They gathered in his dorm room and he asked, if we could build our dream university, who would our professors be? Bill Gates for business, Warren Buffett for finance, Maya Angelou for poetry, Jane Goodall for science, Pitbull for Latin American studies. Goofy kids making a goofy list — but that list became the treasure map for the Third Door. He printed it on a note card and carried it everywhere, showing it to anyone he told about the book. One in ten wouldn't know a single person on it but would have an idea: Spielberg's speaking at this event, I have a friend who met Buffett. The list turned strangers into a distributed search engine.
Origin
Created in Banayan's college dorm room with his best friends, explicitly as a rejection of ranked-list definitions of success. It directly produced the note card that led to Cesar Bocanegra, DonorsChoose, and ultimately the Tim Ferriss interview.
Core principles
- 01Reject algorithmic definitions of who's worth learning from — pick your own faculty.
- 02The right question is 'if we built our dream university, who'd be our professors?'
- 03One professor per subject makes the list concrete instead of aspirational.
- 04A written list becomes a treasure map — it converts random conversations into leads.
- 05Show the card to everyone; you can't predict which stranger knows someone.
How to run it
- 1
Name what you don't believe in
Banayan started by knowing he didn't subscribe to a Forbes algorithm of success. Clarity about the rejected standard makes room for your own.
- 2
Call your friends
Gather the people who know you and ask the question together. Banayan says calling his best friends is what he does whenever he's in trouble.
Pro tip The goofiness is a feature — Pitbull for Latin American studies made the list honest rather than impressive.
- 3
Assign one professor per subject
Business, finance, poetry, science — one name each. The constraint forces real choices and makes the list finite and workable.
- 4
Print it and carry it
Make it physical. Banayan printed his in his dorm room and carried the note card everywhere he went.
- 5
Show it to everyone
Every time you tell someone about your project, show the card. About one in ten will hand you a lead you'd never have found.
Pro tip Leads are absurdly random — a nonprofit staffer whose boss went to high school with Tim Ferriss.
Watch out Don't pre-judge who might know someone. The connections come from people you'd never predict.
In the wild
Banayan gathered his best friends in his dorm room and asked who the professors would be at their dream university. They landed on Bill Gates for business, Warren Buffett for finance, Maya Angelou for poetry, Jane Goodall for science, and Pitbull for Latin American studies.
→ The list became the treasure map for The Third Door and he ultimately interviewed all of them across seven years.
Carrying the note card everywhere, Banayan showed it to Cesar Bocanegra, who worked at the nonprofit DonorsChoose.org. Bocanegra said his boss had gone to high school with Tim Ferriss.
→ That random connection didn't produce an intro directly — but it gave Banayan the DonorsChoose gift card he handed Ferriss at the conference, and the mutual friend who eventually vouched for him.
Common mistakes
Letting a ranking pick your teachers
Deferring to a Forbes algorithm of success means learning from whoever a magazine scored highest, not from whoever actually holds the knowledge you want.
Keeping the list in your head
An unspoken list can't be helped. The whole mechanism depends on showing a physical card to people who might have a random connection to a name on it.
Is it for you?
Best for
Anyone designing a self-education path or building a network from zero.
Not ideal for
People who need to go deep on one relationship or one skill and would be scattered by a broad list.
From the transcript
“i said guys if we can make our dream university who would be our professors and that's how the list came to be”
“it was really by making that list that it sort of became this treasure map for the third door”
From the episode
Alex Banayan: Unlocking The Third Door To Your Success
Alex Banayan