179: How to Really Help a Hoarder | Feedback Friday

Transcript for How to Really Help a Hoarder - Feedback Friday (Episode 179)

Jordan Harbinger: [00:00:00] Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host Jordan Harbinger. I'm here with producer Jason DeFillippo. Here on The Jordan Harbinger Show, we love having conversations with our fascinating guests. And this week, we had Beau Lotto talking about perception and how our brains create useful illustrations like our senses and other things that we think are real but are not. And we had Michelle Lederman talking about types of networkers, connectors, and the spectrum of super connectors and of course, how we can become a better connector ourselves.

[00:00:29] I also write every so often on the blog, the latest post is about how to stop blaming other people. We go deep. It's a great topic and the solution might surprise you because it's not just simple accountability and taking responsibility for ourselves. There's a lot of good takeaways in that one as well. So make sure you have a look and a listen to all of that. The articles, of course, are on the website at jordanharbinger.com/articles.

[00:00:52] Of course, our primary mission is to pass along our guests and our experiences and insights along to you. In other words, the real purpose of the show is to have conversations directly with you. And that's what we're going to do today here on Feedback Friday. You can reach us at friday@jordanharbinger.com. Try to keep them concise if you can. It really increases the chance that your question will get answered on the air.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:01:14] So since we did the Clint Watts show, I've been getting bombarded on Twitter by Russian troll bots and people --

Jason DeFillippo: [00:01:22] Actual people, not just bots?

Jordan Harbinger: [00:01:23] I think not just bots. Yeah, they're real people. And I asked Clint about this and he said, "Yeah, they're real people. They're just not who they say they are. And when you look at the profiles and a lot of them are like hashtag hands-off Venezuela, sovereignty, hashtag freedom and you're like, "Freedom from?" But not from oppressive dictators that kill their own people and starve their own people. You know, freedom from foreign intervention from the pesky imperialist, the United States.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:01:48] As pig dogs.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:01:49] Yeah. And it'll be like just a Russian living in London. And I'm like just a Russian living in Moscow more likely or up at four o'clock in the morning routinely.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:01:58] Yeah, it was the Internet research center, those guys.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:02:00] Yeah, and there's just tons and it's weird because it's really amateur sort of manipulation where, and they don't care. They're just trying to convince dumb people, but they were like, "Oh, Jordan had Clint on the show. Therefore, Jordan is racist because Clint hates Russians. Therefore since Jordan is racist, that must mean he's a Nazi." So they're all like, "You're a Nazi." And I'm just like --

Jason DeFillippo: [00:02:23] It's a short-throw to Hitler.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:02:24] Yeah. It was just like they just jumped right to it and I'm just like, this is really dumb. And they're like, "I'm reporting you for bigotry." And I got an email from Twitter that was like, "Don't worry, we're ignoring all of this bullshit."

Jason DeFillippo: [00:02:34] It would be nice if you could get an IP address for every tweet. It really would.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:02:38] Yeah, yeah, yeah. I just thought it was really funny that Twitter sent me a note that was like, "Hey, I know you're getting your account reported, but we don't care. You're not doing anything wrong. And this is par for the course from these people." Like they're totally aware of this.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:02:51] Yeah. Probably in part because of Clint.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:02:53] Yeah. It probably, yeah. I noticed one of the people that tweeted at me that was really the most, like one of the original sort of aggressive people. She had 98,000 tweets, but she had joined in January 2016.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:03:07] That's a lot.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:03:08] So doing the math, and I'm going off memory here, but doing the math, she had tweeted like every eight to 10 minutes since joining Twitter, 24/7. And I was just like, "Hey, this seems fake. You've tweeted 98,000 times." She's like, "It seems fake. That's ridiculous. You're a Nazi." And I thought, there's no way this is one person controlling this. It's got to be an army of people that they see a tweet come in and it pops up in their custom software as needing a reply. And then the first available Internet warfare person in the Moscow station hits a reply.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:03:46] Yeah. It just bounces around between terminals.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:03:47] Exactly.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:03:48] Like whoever is up next gets the tweet.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:03:51] Exactly. Yeah. It was so interesting. Such an interesting phenomenon. And then they gave up after a while because I took Clint's advice and just like didn't engage much.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:03:59] Don't feed the trolls man, don't feed the trolls.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:04:01] Yeah, they got bored and they probably went on to something else. And we're back in LA doing stuff in person. It's going to be a fun week. I'm here for the week, which is always fun. And we're here at the Shay Jason.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:04:12] That's right. Back in the hood. Back in the crib.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:04:14] That's right. That's right. Shay Jason doing shows, putting my candidco.com/jordan aligners on your brand new desks.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:04:22] Yeah, I appreciate that. Thanks for swapping some spit.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:04:25] Yep, no problem -- well I don't think we really swapped spit.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:04:28] You swapped it with my furniture.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:04:29] Okay. Yeah, that's fair. That's fair. Just to be clear here, people. Anyway, we've got some fun ones. We've got some doozies as always. I cannot wait to dive into this. Jason, what's the first thing out of the mailbag?

Jason DeFillippo: [00:04:39] Hi, Jordan and crew. I'm in my late 30s and since I was 12 both of my parents had been hoarders. My dad was a firefighter and fire marshal. He used to collect model and hot wheels cars, which are now piled floor to ceiling in the basement. While my mom, an ex-school teacher, saves every newspaper she's ever seen and saved most of my clothes and everything else since I was born. She cleans her recyclables incessantly and even tears up paper by hand into microscopic pieces to compost, which is a new development over the last year. In addition, we've had many deaths in the family over the last few years and she's accumulated their papers and useless things to the newspapers or piled up all over the house, up over the windows in some places and are legitimately blocking exits. She's filled up every room upstairs with junk to the point that you can't open the doors. I once bag 70 bags of newspapers when I was younger and she wouldn't let me take them away before she looked through them all. So I put them in the garage thinking it would be a motivator and she would get rid of them. Of course, they filled that up too. She hasn't slept in their bed in years because she covered it up and sleeps in a reclining chair in the den downstairs. My dad has had three hip replacements about 15 years ago and has been addicted to Oxycontin ever since. It's led to massive pain, depression, and him sleeping most of the time in a bed in the living room. He has trouble walking, using a walker to get around, though there isn't enough room in the house to use it because of all the piles which he constantly knocks over. He still has his credit card and buys tons of coins from the Danbury Mint and similar places non-stop. My mom complains but won't take his card away. The coins aren't even worth the money he pays for them. I'm going to be left dealing with these and thousands of dollars of hot wheels, cars, shells, and rocks he has collected over the years. I'm worried for the weight this bears on the house and their safety because if something would happen, they wouldn't make it out in time. I brought this up and tried bringing my mom to a psychologist years ago, but she played controlling mind games and refused to go back because they recommended OCD meds. My brother brought her to his psychologist for his own issues, but she wouldn't ever mention this to me. I've tried to clean the house with her knowing and behind her back, but it has caused so much stress and consumed so much of my time. It wasn't worth it. When I was in my teens, I cleaned out all of the garbage in the kitchen and was excited to have her come back to a clean house. She basically ignored me for days because she was so angry and obsessed over what I got rid of. She's okay with me taking my father's things out, but she's still so controlling and overbearing about everything. It's not worth the effort of her passive-aggressive mean behavior and mind games. As you can imagine, it's a constant worry and turning into a serious issue as my father's health declines and the combustibles pile up. I would appreciate any advice you can give. Buried Under My Parents' Issues.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:07:12] Wow. It's a serious business. I mean it's really sad. I've seen that show Hoarders as have we all and that I feel probably oversimplifies the problem. As if they almost turned it into a cleaning problem and it's not a cleaning problem, it's really a serious mental disorder. This obviously is a legit hoarding. I actually googled how to tell if you're a hoarder and there's a picture rating scale one through nine and it's like, what does your room look like? What does your kitchen look like? What does your living room look like?

Jason DeFillippo: [00:07:41] Oh wow.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:07:42] And anything above four is hoarder status. And let me just say, a lot of people that you don't think are hoarders according to this, are absolutely hoarders, including every teenager pretty much.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:07:54] Yeah. With all the piles of t-shirts on the floor.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:07:56] Yeah, it's almost like a little bit skewed in one direction, but hoarders feel safe and comfortable with their attachment to things. That's what this really is. It's an OCD related issue. That's why your mom didn't want to go back because she was probably being told some uncomfortable truths. And at this point in their age, there's just not much you can do here unless they're willing to get help for this. And it sounds like they're not willing to get help for this. I mean, the fact that your mom is sleeping in a recliner -- it sounds so uncomfortable.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:08:28] Yeah. I mean, I'd been in a La-Z-Boy before and fell asleep or had a couple of beers too many and passed out and your back is killing you the next day.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:08:35] So what this tells me is that they're aware that this is causing problems. It is causing them physical pain almost for sure. But they're not able to control the compulsion to collect things and pack up stuff. So it's not just like, well, this is a really negative habit. I mean, by the time you're spending time sleeping in the living room on a chair, you're long past the whole ability to rationalize that this is normal behavior. They know that something's wrong and it's important to encourage them to seek professional help. The earlier a person seeks help with something like hoarding, the more successful the treatment tends to be. Now that said, it sounds like where we're in lost cost territory here. Some people believe hoarding tendencies are related to inherited brain patterns, so keep an eye out for this and other people that you're related to. They're often related to anxiety, OCD. For some, hoarding begins following a significant trauma event as well. So there might be something in the past year. I was surprised to hear that one in 50 Americans actually have some form of this and only 15 percent of that seek professional help.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:09:39] That's crazy.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:09:40] So here's some do's and don'ts when it comes to helping a hoarder. So first of all -- you already tried this -- don't remove things from their home without consent. It seems like, "Hey look, if we just clean everything up while they're on vacation, they'll be better off." But it doesn't address the extreme emotional distress caused by the idea of losing valuable or important items. It causes more anxiety. Throwing things away, getting rid of them without their permission. This is not a long-term plan. They're going to revert back to their old behavior and on top of that, they're going to be upset with you. I mean, you saw this with your mom and this. Then this damages your relationship, which damages your ability to encourage her to seek professional help. Also, don't enable the behavior. It doesn't sound like you're doing that, but a lot of people when it comes to hoarding, they're like, well, my mother and I bond over going to yard sales and her buying a trunk full of crap. You know that that happens. Don't clean up after them. Sounds like in this case it's not even possible and don't expect the cleaning process or the healing process if it does begin to happen overnight. It takes a long time for hoarders to get to the point of having a house that is literally unsafe and I feel for you, I mean you're imagining your house going up in flames with your parents inside it. It is sad. It is sad, but you cannot force them to do this.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:10:52] What you should do is encourage them to seek professional help. You can't force people to do that against their will as you know, but you can find them resources and make them available. Take the time to learn about hoarding. The TV show thing is kind of like the pop-culture version. It's not a correct picture of hoarding and how to help hoarders. You need credible sources like Mayo Clinic, National Alliance on Mental Illness, American Depression, and Anxiety Association of America. We can link to some of those in the show notes. Do help them if they ask for help during or after receiving professional treatment. A lot of times, hoarders want assistance. You can call 1-800-GOT-JUNK. They're great for this. My friend who's been on the show, Brian Scudamore, he started that company. They see this stuff all the time he said. And do listen to them. I know it's hard not to judge them. I know it's tough not to be like, "You have asthma or you have a problem and you're hoarding and you're making it worse. What the hell?" They know that you know, they know they just can't stop the compulsion and do recognize even little bits of positive change. Hoarding doesn't happen overnight. So it doesn't get solved overnight. And so if they're trying to take small baby steps, be encouraging, your support is going to be instrumental in getting a hoarder sort of on track. But there's not a whole quick solution to this, unfortunately. Best of luck with this one. I can see how this would be frustrating and worrisome. It is a bizarre sickness that develops over time and starts out innocently enough. Right? "Oh, I like matchbox cars...Why do you have 11,000 of the same one?"

Jason DeFillippo: [00:12:21] Yeah. Yeah, definitely. Especially if he's, this has happened his whole life. I mean, it's got to be tough.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:12:26] It's going to be tough. And I can see how it's unsafe. Like, hey, you have 8,000 copies of the same newspaper. And they're all in the garage. It's a tinderbox.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:12:34] Yeah. That stuff doesn't get less-flammable over time.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:12:37] Right, exactly. So keep us posted on this. What's next?

Jason DeFillippo: [00:12:41] Dear J Cubed, I'm currently an internal medicine resident at a big city university hospital. Throughout residency, I've dealt with a negative perception that I don't care or I'm not enthusiastic about my job. I'm a strong critical thinker and team leader from loving and playing football. I'm also someone who many consider a non-traditional individual where I enjoy a lot of life hobbies and interests outside of clinical medicine. I partake in many leadership, innovation, and quality and process improvement groups and have had great success. I look towards having a career mixed with clinical and innovative work in consulting, informatics, and design that will propel me towards future leadership roles. You can sum me up by saying medicine is part of my life, but not my whole life. I don't currently jive with the current workplace workflow where individuals are lauded for faking it until you make it and by just being extra. My approach is to take a step back and learn before jumping into action. While I try to stay cool, calm, and collected, my peers seem to run around frantically, which really makes for a stressful workplace environment. Unfortunately, I've received feedback that it looks like I'm disinterested because I appear so reserved. For example, I've been told that my bosses feel like my resting heart rate is 60 while there's this one 10. This doesn't mean I don't take things seriously or misjudge critical situations. I just focus on tackling situations in a cool and collected manner. Fortunately, this has been noted and applauded by medical students who rotate under me. I've sought advice from other mentors at my hospital, especially those whom I've worked with and they say that my personality is great and I do strong work as a physician so they don't think I need to change who I am. Yet this has caused peers who don't like me to make up multiple, unprofessional, high school drama S comments or write evaluations that have raised red flags to my program director who can't separate the subjective data. I don't feel supported or even accepted. It really caused me a lot of moral injury and burnout, which I've been surviving with therapy, support from peers, innovative work, friends, and family. I only have three months left, but is there anything I can do about this now? How do I curb negative press and perception in the future? Best of luck and continued success with the show. Signed, Calm Under Pressure.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:14:48] So the first thing that stands out is disinterested because I appear reserved. It sounds like code for not doing anything. I don't know

Jason DeFillippo: [00:14:59] about that because I tell you what, in a medical situation, I kind of want the calm guy who is --

Jordan Harbinger: [00:15:05] Yeah, me too.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:15:05] -- looks like he knows what he's doing. And remember the old misattributed Abe Lincoln quote. He's like, "If you give me five hours to cut down a tree, I'm going to sharpen my ax for four hours and then cut for an hour." I want somebody who is calm and reserved isn't going to make everybody panic. So I think this is a good trait personally.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:15:25] Yeah, I agree. I definitely don't want the doctor's like, "Oh my God, that looks awful."

Jason DeFillippo: [00:15:30] Yeah. "How do we do that?"

Jordan Harbinger: [00:15:31] How do we plug that hole? Yeah. It could be -- maybe just stepping back too much in their eyes. Perhaps your peers feel like there's more that you could be doing to help or contribute to the team. Maybe he's quiet. I don't know. There's just not enough info here because it all sounds like very positive traits for someone working in a hospital or emergency environment where there are curveballs and unexpected situations left and right. And I think this trait combined with action would be looked upon positively. So I'm not sure what I suspect, and this is just a hunch, I have no data here because there's nothing in the letter about this. I encourage you to dig a little bit deeper because you might be calm and reserved and maybe that's what's happening here. Or perhaps that's scapegoat behavior for something else and people just don't like you for some other reason. Maybe they're afraid to put that reason in the paperwork like, "Oh we don't like this guy. He's a turd, you know, and he's a know- it-all jackass." Like maybe no one wants to say that. So they're like, "Oh, he doesn't help out as peers." And then when you give, when you ask for clarification and they're like, "Oh yeah, you just seem like you're not really contributing," and they're just looking around at each other and like, "That he does not know that everyone wants to punch them in the face." I mean we don't really know. Has anyone else said anything to you? Like maybe you're not super well-liked in the unit or something? I suspect there's something else going on here. We're not getting all the information because even you don't have all the information. So I would find some people you trust and ask them what's really going on and just be unfiltered. "Look, don't put it in writing. Just tell me, do people not like me? What's the deal?" And if they're like, "Oh, well you know, you keep talking about how your dad bought you this Ferrari and everyone thinks you're a dickhead." Like who knows, who knows what's going on. I don't think you're really doing anything that bad obviously, but you never know. You could rub one or two people the wrong way and they decided they've got it out for you or maybe everyone goes and hangs out after work and you don't because you don't like them and they decided you're the odd man out. Who knows man?

Jason DeFillippo: [00:17:30] He says he's got a lot of interest outside of medicine.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:17:33] There you go.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:17:33] Like they're dedicated. That's all they want to do. They just go home, get all together, get drinks and watch ER reruns just to become that person and he's just like, I'm going to go play bocce ball with my buddies. You know?

Jordan Harbinger: [00:17:45] Yeah. Maybe they resent you for that. Like you don't know. At the end of the day if you don't figure it out and you can't get any further details, then screw it. If it's not actionable feedback at some point it's just like whatever. But I wouldn't, I wouldn't stop trying to figure out what it is because it's going to affect your career, but at some point, you just can't do anything about it.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:18:08] This is Feedback Friday. We'll be right back after this.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:18:11] This episode is sponsored in part by Better Help. Is there something that interferes with your happiness or is it preventing you from achieving your goals? Of course, there probably is unless you're super happy and achieved all your goals. Either way, we can all use a little help. Better Help online counseling is there for you and a lot of you have been using this. I actually gave it a shot. Jason, did you use this? I forget.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:18:31] Yup. I've been talking to my doctor all the time to go over some of my anxiety issues and it's really helping me out. I've been doing -- we texted a little bit and then we've done a couple of phone calls. I haven't gone down the video route yet because I've got a face for radio.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:18:43] What's causing your anxiety, Jason? I don't know. I can't imagine what that would be.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:18:49] Oh, I have no idea. Jordan. I'll let you guess on that one.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:18:52] Okay. Well, at least it's not your boss or your colleagues. On that note, Better Help offers licensed professional counselors who are specialized in issues such as depression, stress, anxiety, relationships, trauma, anger, family conflicts, grief, self-esteem, and probably some mix of all of these, I would imagine, because a lot of us -- I feel like they're just talking about me. Is that weird? Connect with your professional counselor in a safe and private online environment. Everything's confidential obviously, and you can get help on your own time at your own pace, secure video, or phone sessions. You can chat, you can text, which is awesome. It's like 21st-century therapy here. And if you're not happy with your counselor, obviously just switch, no additional charge. Jason, tell them where they can get it.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:19:37] Yeah, this is a truly affordable option. And for our listeners, you can get 10 percent off your first month with discount code JORDAN. So get started today, go to betterhelp.com/jordan. Simply fill out a questionnaire to help them assess your needs and get matched with a counselor you'll love. That's betterhelp.com/jordan.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:19:54] And if you're using sponsors from the show here, give us a shout. I'd love to hear your experiences with all of these things, especially stuff like this because this is really novel and unique idea. So let us know what your experience is with every sponsor on the show and with better help, I'm especially curious.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:20:07] This episode is also sponsored by HostGator.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:20:10] What's your online presence worth to you? If you only make your presence known on social media, you're not really in control of how others see you. When someone anonymous bozo has it out for you on the Internet, they can easily assault your reputation all over social media from the comfort of their own keyboard with little fear of consequence. But if you own your own website, you own your online reputation. It's as simple as that. And simpler still, if you let HostGator help. The cost of having control over your online base of operations is minimal. In fact, HostGator's plans start at under three dollars a month, but the value is priceless. And that's why we recommend HostGator's website builder. HostGator allows you to choose from over 100 mobile-friendly templates, so your site will look great on any device. And if you want to use WordPress for your site, it only takes one click. Add-on options, oh, they got many of them, so you can do things like integrate with PayPal and allow customers to buy directly from your website or increase your search engine visibility without being an expert in SEO. You get a guaranteed 99.9 percent uptime and HostGator's support team is there to help you with any issues you might experience 24/7, 365. Oh, and you can get unlimited email addresses from your website that you can hand out in place of those Gmail or Hotmail addresses you've been using for ages. Don't worry about breaking the bank, HostGator's giving our wonderful listeners up to 62 percent off all packages for new users with a 45-day complete money-back guarantee. Just go to hostgator.com/jordan right now to sign up. That's hostgator.com/jordan.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:21:32] Thanks for listening and supporting the show. To learn more about our sponsors and get links to all the great discounts you just heard, visit jordanharbinger.com/deals. And if you'd be so kind, please drop us a nice rating and review in iTunes or your podcast player of choice or if you're listening to us on the Overcast player, just click that little star next to the episode art. It really helps us out and helps build the show family. If you want some tips on how to do that, just head on over to jordanharbinger.com/subscribe. Now let's hear some more of your questions here on Feedback Friday.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:22:01] All right, next up.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:22:03] Hey guys, how do you respond to the small talk question "How's business" when an old neighbor or acquaintance sees you for the first time in a while and that's what they open with? I don't want to seem annoyed, but is this the best they have to offer. What do you say? It's great when it's really like Dow Jones up, down, up, up, down, down, up, down, depending on the day. Or do you tell them that you're struggling due to the real-life forces of competition, mental fatigue, and loss of passion? I don't know if there's a right or wrong answer or if being brutally honest and saying, "You know, I really hate that question because..." Is the correct response? Thank you. Signed, Not a Fan of Chitchat.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:22:37] All right, well, I'm also not a fan of chitchat. I think the intention from people is to show curiosity and to be polite though. So I get that. If it's not someone you care to be close with something like, "Oh, business is great. I definitely had some challenges like everyone else. How about yourself?" Just reflect it back to them. That keeps it vague. It doesn't open the door for anything else. I too find some small talk questions annoying and repetitive, but I also realized that they're being asked because people are at a loss for what to do here otherwise. So if you don't like small talk, take a page from the Chase Hughes-Jordan Harbinger Corporate Training. And what we're doing here is for executive protection people, aka bodyguards -- we don't use that word in the industry. We don't use that word in the industry.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:23:20] You're so fancy.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:23:21] We're training Facebook's team, Microsoft's teams about as specific as I can get there and some other Silicon Valley Titans. But we have a conversation formula and I'll get into that detail later on. But basically, if someone puts in some input like says, "Hey, how's business?" You can give two little bits of feedback and then close it down. And the way that you do that is, you know they say, "How's business?" And you might say, "It's good. Had some challenges like everyone else. Looking forward to some of the initiatives we have coming next year. What about yourself?" And you reflect it back or if you want you can cut it after one input, one reply. It's a little bit terse though. "It's great like everyone else," or, "It's great, had some challenges like everyone else," and then you can reflect it back to them. That will really cut the conversation down. The more input you put in, the more likely they are to continue that thread. So one input as a reply is generally going to cut conversation short because it requires and forces the other person, the other party to put energy in and it gets exhausting, but they will eventually stop trying to engage with you because you'll seem really boring and an energy drain, so be careful with it. That's why I recommend two replies. That would sound like, "It's great. We've had some challenges, ups, and downs like everyone else. Looking forward to next quarter or next year, how about yourself?" That way it seems a little more friendly and anything beyond two now you're in a deeper conversation. That's the conversation curve and we can get to that later on in another episode if people are really curious about it, but it's something we do during corporate training so it might be a little bit of a time suck here. All right. What's next?

Jason DeFillippo: [00:24:57] Hello to the Jays. I'm at a crossroads in my career. I've been successful in an office job for years and decided to take a life change since doing this. It's been difficult to keep a job and keep on track successfully. I've recently applied to become a police officer. It's an interesting turn of career and I've passed the most difficult part, which is the fitness test and I'm waiting on the psych part to come back before the next stage. I have a young family and would have to make a big move to make this new career work. My dilemma is, although I would consider myself a fairly well adjusted human being, I've never had to deal with any real trauma or violence in my life and I'm worried that I would feel overwhelmed or burn out too quickly being a police officer. I want to help people and feel that this could be a way to do that, but I'm worried that I might be throwing myself into the deep end. Should I be worried or should I jump in and make the most of what could be a rewarding career change. Regards, Why Kappa Kappa.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:25:48] Huh. Nice. Uh, well congrats on the big career change. Assuming that you get hired and complete the police Academy, then your concern actually is quite well-founded. The Los Angeles Port Police just had a senior officer commit suicide, unfortunately. And another officer friend of mine is also on the edge of being burned out himself. My advice would be to do a ride along with departments, see what the job is in the area that you want to work. And also find a department that has a culture that you like. Bigger departments mean more diverse jobs. So canine dope, homicide, air support, et cetera, so it's easier to move around and maybe not get burned out. And by the way, I got this advice directly from a police officer. I'm not just making this up. So that you guys know I'm not talking at the wrong end here. Ultimately you need to understand that no matter where you work, you will have to deal with trauma, burnout. There's a host of other issues that always come up and my advice is to have friends outside the job. A lot of cops will only hang out with other cops. They go to cop bars, they got cops in their family. You just can't get away from it. Right?

Jason DeFillippo: [00:26:55] I've seen Blue Bloods. I know what's going on.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:26:57] Okay, I haven't, so I'm behind the curve. You also have to have some good hobbies and you know, preferably not like video games where you're a cop or bowling with cops. You know you can do that, but like you have something that's not that. Remember it's only a job. I know it's a very serious job, but it's only a job. Talk to a therapist when you need to and talk to a therapist before you think you need to.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:27:19] Absolutely.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:27:20] Like if it's in the back of your head like, "Oh, someday I should talk about that." That's when you should go. Not when you're like, "Yeah, I'm constantly drinking five nights a week and taking three different types of pills." Like that's too late. I will say it's already good that you're considering what happens when I burn out. What are these things going to do on the job? How are they going to affect me? It's better to do that than to think you're invincible. And I got this advice from a lot of cops. Look, realize that this is going to affect you and it doesn't make you not tough. It doesn't mean the job doesn't suit you. It's a tough job. That's what it means. And every cop goes through this. There's no such thing as a person who's immune to this, except for people who are extremely dysfunctional in their real life and probably have other things going on and like the cops that turn into the crazy ones.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:28:11] Yeah. Over the years I've known a lot of police officers, some were friends, some were not friends. But the thing about it is everybody is traumatized the first couple of years on the job and a lot of people just leave. They can't take it. But he's thinking about this now, which I think is actually a really good thing for sure. He's going to see some stuff that's going to mess him up. There are no two ways about it. And even if he works in Mayberry, you know, he's going to see some stuff that's going to mess him up and he's going to have to have the tools ready to deal with that kind of thing.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:28:40] That's right. Even, Mayberry PD got shot at. I saw those episodes.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:28:44] That's true. Barney Fife had his one bullet.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:28:47] That's right. Special thanks to officer Timothy Dela Peña for the help on this one as well as the other guys that contributed to this one. It is not an easy job, man. Somebody has got to do it. I don't think I could do it. I would do it and then I would turn into a bad person because I get affected by that. I would be the person who's like, "Pick up that skateboard. Oh yeah. What you’re not going to look me in the eye when you do that. Carrying any dope?" Like I would turn into like a crazy aggressive guy.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:29:15] You'd be the bad lieutenant.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:29:16] I would be the bad lieutenant for sure. Yeah. Or I'd be like, "You know, we don't get paid enough for this give me that dope. I know where I can fence this."

Jason DeFillippo: [00:29:23] Yup.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:29:23] I like to say that I wouldn't, but there's no way I would stay. Like my brain does not work that way.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:29:29] Well, it's good that you're self-aware enough to know that and to stay out of law enforcement.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:29:33] Yeah. I mean I don't think I would turn into a blatant criminal, but I would definitely skirt the rules. Like, "You don't need that dope. You're going to prison."

Jason DeFillippo: [00:29:39] "Who's going to arrest me? I'm the kappa."

Jordan Harbinger: [00:29:40] Yeah. Right. I'm taking this home and making sure it's really dope.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:29:44] Yeah.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:29:47] We'll be right back with more Feedback Friday. Right after this.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:29:50] This episode is sponsored in part by Brother.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:29:52] It happens to the best of us right before a big deadline or just when you're printing handouts for a key presentation, the printer runs out of ink. Tired of the frequent expense and hassle of replacing ink cartridges. With an internal ink storage tank, larger ink cartridges, and an intelligent page gauge that displays ink levels, Brother INKvestment Tank printers can literally change the way you ink. Brother INKvestment Tank color, ink inkjet, all-in-one printers deliver ultra-convenience along with a low cost per page and affordable upfront price. Enjoy uninterrupted printing with your choice of up to one or two years of ink included in the box. INKvestment tank helps to eliminate frequently buying and replacing ink cartridges. INKvestment Tank printers can keep your business running while delivering super functionality for your business, including print, copy, scan, and fax. With INKvestment tank, there's no sweating over your printer running out of ink. Just the features, convenience, reliability, and affordability you need. Learn more at changethewayyouink.com and get ready to change the way you ink.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:30:44] Thanks for listening and supporting the show. Your support of our advertisers is what keeps us on the air. To learn more and get links to all the great discounts you've just heard, visit jordanharbinger.com/deals. Now back to the show for the conclusion of Feedback Friday. Live from my garage in Los Angeles.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:31:00] All right, next up.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:31:02] Hey, triple J's. I'm an over 55 woman with disabilities as a US citizen living in California. I'm currently a poster child for your not digging the well before I need it, but is it really too late for me? I'm an inside sales professional. I was trying to get settled into my last job when I had an injury that snowballed after several surgeries. I lost my job and found myself put out to pasture on disability. I don't have family and work friends disappeared during my convalescence. Leaving the various legalities of my dilemmas aside, it's too late for lawyers and this is the real world. After several years of recovery, I want to reconnect, but of course, the whole world has changed. I'm no longer viewed as skilled. I'm only viewed as old. I tried going to temp agencies and this isn't the easy end, especially with an old resume. I thought I could volunteer at events for companies only to find after I'd worked for free that they only mentor and hire young people. I was viewed as a joke. Time for creative thinking. I see companies who'd benefit from my input and I'd like to offer to consult with them. I feel my age and experience will be seen as an asset in my pitch. I'm already familiar with billing and specifying the scope of work and revisions in a contract. I'd like your input with A, how do I frame my request without giving my solutions away? And B, how to set my fee within the LA business market. Sincerely, Beaten is For Eggs.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:32:18] Well you should not be discouraged by volunteering for free. I know that you're probably in your mind too old to do this and that's an intern thing to do, but you did not dig the well before you get thirsty so you don't have a whole lot of leverage here. A good way to get a leg in with those companies that you have in mind is to offer free consulting first and you don't say, "Hey, I want to consult for free," but you can try to sell the gig and they have nothing to lose by trying it out. What you can also do is pitch it as, "I want to do this as a free engagement, but I want to get recommendations," and I'll go over that in a minute. If you do a good job with one company, the relationships that you formed there, the experience that you get, the referrals that come from that, that will be worth it. So you'll be compensated in that way. And I would use what's called the briefcase technique. They still need you to implement things that if your solutions are so simple that just a few sentences give away all the value, then there's not enough value there. I know you're worried about giving away your ideas. Your ideas are probably not that valuable. And I know that sounds mean, but the truth is if you're a consultant and all I need are your ideas, they're guaranteed to be written about somewhere else or I can get them from a 10-minute conversation or an email. There's not enough value in there for me to hire you. There really isn't. I need people who are going to implement it. I need people who are going to be able to set up the systems.

[00:33:41] So show what you'll do. Make projections about the value that you'll bring and set fees. You know, look, ask for what you need. If you come in a little bit low, fine. Just tell them you're coming in low, but you're looking to build a referral base and a testimonial base. So you'll ask for testimonials and a letter of recommendation after the engagement and you get them to agree to that upfront so that afterwards you're not like, "Hey, can you sign this letter of recommendation?" And they're like, "Eh, I don't know." That's your compensation. They have to get that to you, right? They can't dillydally. It's considered part of the engagement. This way it makes sense. Your fees are lower and you don't look desperate. "Look, I'm charging you less, but I want you to write a letter of recommendation. I want you to be, I want to be able to drop your name in my marketing," that kind of thing. It's a trade-off that way. It's not a trade of services or barter. It's a trade-off and you'll get referrals, you'll get testimonials, you'll get marketing materials from the engagement.

[00:34:33] Now, the briefcase technique is really good. It's amazing. It's probably gotten more people hired by me than any other set of tactics individually that I can point to. I'm also going to link to a video from my friend Ramit Sethi about this technique. It's an older post from his website, but the info there is still amazing and that'll be linked in the show notes as well.

[00:34:53] Tax season is right around the corner. We've actually gotten a lot of questions about tax planning, financial stuff. I can't give advice in that area, but I thought it prudent to bring on one of our sponsors, which is Intuit and they make great products for this. I actually started off using TurboTax, QuickBooks, a bunch of the stuff that those guys have made over the years has been super helpful, not just for the small business elements but for the personal elements. So we've got a little, got a little tape here with Jake from Intuit.

[00:35:22] We're speaking with Jake Whitman from Intuit, makers of TurboTax, QuickBooks, Mint, and Turbo to give us some tips for tackling debt taxes and finances. But Jake first, I was shocked actually to hear some of the statistics that you have on offer here. I didn't realize that a huge number of families literally can't handle a $400 emergency like that. That's a little terrifying because up here in Silicon Valley and some of my entrepreneur friends, like that's a sushi dinner, not a family crisis. You know what I'm saying? It's shocking in a bad way.

Jake Whitman: [00:35:58] Yeah. I mean these are some of the macro problems that are super important to talk about. There are very real statistics about how many people are really struggling with their finances in one way or another.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:36:09] You're worried about your next $400 because you got to pay for a medical emergency and somebody else's wondering where to go for dinner for twice that amount of money with their family. You know, for a special occasion you're going to have different ideas about how things should be managed. And I know that of course, the American dream is achieving prosperity for yourself, for your family. Tell me a little bit about the business stat that half of small businesses fail in their first few years. Because I hear that a lot and yet, you know, being surrounded by entrepreneurs all the time, we have a survivorship bias where we're only hearing from successful people most of the time.

Jake Whitman: [00:36:43] There's no doubt starting a business is hard and it takes a lot of hard work and a lot of grit and a lot of determination to be successful. And you know, a lot of the people I think do come into it with a positive mindset and they get into it and it's a challenge. And so a lot of what we try and do at Intuit is helping those people succeed. One of our core beliefs is that everybody should have the financial tools that they need to start and run a successful business. And so that is at the core of so much of what we believe in as a company and what we're trying to do with our products.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:37:18] I know that we live in a nation that is famously debt-heavy and finances are top of mind for a lot of listeners, business owners, and not because tax season is in full swing. So I would love it if you'd speak to that a little bit. I was raised to pay off your credit card bill and don't carry any debt other than student loans pretty much and a mortgage if that. Tell us what you are seeing at Intuit because obviously, you have a unique look and a lot of people's personal finances, first of all.

Jake Whitman: [00:37:46] Sure. So one of the sets of stats that we look at is the average debt per citizen is more than $59,000. So you know, there are a lot of people who are living in debt around the world. You talked a little bit earlier about people living paycheck to paycheck. Over 70 percent of Americans actually are living paycheck to paycheck. And we have this between a $400 and $1,000 emergency, more than 60 percent of people can access $1,000 in the case of an emergency. And so you know, you're right, it's very different than living in Silicon Valley. I think there are a lot of people out there who are trying to figure out how to maximize their financials so that they can live the life they want. You've mentioned the word prosperity earlier. At Intuit, our mission is powering prosperity around the world. And we talk to so many people, small business owners, entrepreneurs, people working hard to better their lives. You know, we find this that prosperity means different things to different people. It's not a consistent thing, which is part of the beauty of the mission because really what we hear is universally it means being able to live the life you want, whatever that means for you.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:38:52] So what about for entrepreneurs and small businesses? I mean, look, you're supposed to manage your day to day finances, guilty of a kind of not doing that/handing it off to Jen who's my wife. But I know that Intuit creates these products because, of course, before I had Jen to rely on, I was Mr. TurboTax, you know, and I was entering my stuff manually in Quick back in the day, even when all I had were Tacos as transactions generally, tacos and beers. Those are my initial transactions.

Jake Whitman: [00:39:20] Those are important transactions.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:39:22] They exist, that's for sure. Yeah. And then frankly there are some of the most fun transactions that I probably had, especially back then. The rest was tuition. But tell us a little bit about how this looks from Intuit's perspective.

Jake Whitman: [00:39:34] Yeah. You know, we have several products under the QuickBooks product. If you're self-employed, we have a product called QuickBooks Self-Employed, which allows you to track your income, deduct business expenses, do things like mileage tracking and figure out estimated taxes. You know, all those things that when you're first starting out, especially if you're self-employed, you may not be thinking about it. And then tax time comes and you realize that I need to do a whole bunch of stuff to figure out what I spend over the years. And I wish that I had spent the time trying to fake, trying to keep these things organized. And one of the beautiful things about this product is it works directly with TurboTax. We have a TurboTax self-employed product. Makes sense, right?

Jordan Harbinger: [00:40:14] Yeah.

Jake Whitman: [00:40:14] And so when it's time to file taxes, it syncs directly with TurboTax. So as long as you've been staying organized throughout the year through QuickBooks Self-Employed, it's almost a no-work kind of action. Everything syncs to TurboTax. Your expenses and deductions are all organized for you and you can go ahead and file.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:40:32] Yeah, I think this is kind of crucial. I know when I first started the business I really thought like, I'll just handle this later. You certainly do not want to do that. You want to make sure that you are tracking everything week to week at the latest because there's no greater nightmare than coming back and going, yeah, you've got to go back all through all your credit card transactions, make sure they all add up, which by the way, they never will. And then find out what each thing was for and then God forbid you're in an audit and you tell them, "Yeah, I just sort of went and spitballed it at the end of the year." It's like you are going to screw yourself.

Jake Whitman: [00:41:09] You know, to your point, preparation really is the best way to get ahead and stay prepared at tax time, right? Keeping track of taxes, determining your relevant expenses, and deductions ahead of time. So you know, it's really knowing what to expect. Using a tool like TurboTax will help you keep your tax history organized because it keeps your history year over year every year. And it helps you understand how you get your maximum refund each year. The other thing that's really cool that we're doing now and from a TurboTax perspective, and this is relevant, whether you're an individual or you are self-employed or an entrepreneur in the small business is we have this new service called TurboTax Live that lets you talk directly with the CPA to make sure you're thinking about things correctly. So we actually allow, we actually have a product where you can schedule a time with a certified CPA that's on our platform. It's a one-way video chat so you can do it from your pajamas on your couch while they're in their office and they're ready to provide personal tax advice, tax prep services on demand as you move through the process. It's really meant to give you confidence that you're doing everything correctly. And to your point earlier, you know when you're starting up and you have a small business, there's a whole lot of potential uncertainty as you're getting going.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:42:25] Yeah, I think another idea here that is important that was clutch for me and that I didn't do initially was you should not only sort your business and personal expenses separately and if you're not sure what a business expense is you should ask somebody, but you should set up a business checking account immediately because if you start mixing funds, man, and you know this, you start mixing funds if you ever end up with an accountant who's confused or worse and audit, you are just asking for so much trouble. Because once they create that nexus between your personal funds and your business funds, basically they just crack the whole thing open like a nut. Treat the whole thing like a business and then suddenly they're dipping into your remodeling-the-house fund or your vacation fund to pay off that tax bill because you have no protection. And that's a nightmare scenario for any business owner.

Jake Whitman: [00:43:17] Yeah, there's no doubt that setting up a business checking account early on is extremely important. And just to make sure that you're keeping everything separate.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:43:27] Jake, thank you so much, man.

Jake Whitman: [00:43:28] Thank you very much.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:43:29] Intuit powering prosperity around the world. Proud makers of TurboTax, QuickBooks, and Mint. Financial tools give you the power to prosper. Learn more about our financial products at intuit.com.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:43:40] All right, next.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:43:41] Hi, Jordan, Jason, and Jen. I've been in a bit of a slump. I'm about to be 28 in April and I'm one of those people who's stressed about where they currently are professionally and financially. About three years ago I started reading self-help books, business books, listening to podcasts like yours, and watching YouTube videos all in the hopes of gaining knowledge to improve myself. The main reason I'm writing in is because I feel like I'm constantly reading about how to improve myself in all this information is fantastic, but the reason I'm frustrated is because I have all this information. Seriously, I know a lot about behavior change and habit formation and yet I still face these ups and downs and ebbs and flows of motivation to help facilitate these positive habit formations like diet, finances, exercise, et cetera. I'm one of those guys who's enamored with people with nice bodies and a lot of money, not because of the aesthetic, but because of the consistency required to achieve those things. I'm jealous. I'm writing to you because when I hear some people's questions on Feedback Friday, you always seem to surprise me in a good way with a new perspective that I would have never considered. Any help with my consistency problems would be much appreciated. Thank you very much. Inconsistent Consistently.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:44:48] Nice. So you're envious. Yes, I know and that's a distinction. Jealousy and envy. We learned that distinction from Robert Greene earlier on the show. This is a great letter and we just did a Deep Dive on why self-help makes us feel bad, so please go listen to that. It's Episode 160 and that will shed a lot of light on this. Also, you're not unmotivated. What I think is happening here is that you don't actually want the things that you think you want. You don't actually want the things that you think you want in my opinion. This is okay. What I mean by this is that all the posts about fitness and money, et cetera are affecting you. That's what they're supposed to do. These types of posts, by the way, are marketing from these guru wannabes who are just trying to get you to feel less than so that you then buy their crap. You're not ripped enough by this crap. Business has not taken off, time from my insanely overpriced mastermind in Florida. Not sure what to do next. How about a self-help seminar getaway with other people that we made feel horrible about themselves at some guy's house in Hollywood Hills? Yes. We take credit cards. In your shoes, after you listen to why self-help makes us feel so bad, Episode 160, I would sit down and write down the things that you think you want. Make a list of the things you think you want. Then start writing down why you want each of those things. Then write down why you think that's why you want each one of those things. So that's kind of like why and then you get meta with it why do I think that's why. The more you dig, the more you're going to find out. The reason that you want some of these things is because you've been told that you should want them, not because you actually do.

[00:46:24] Six-pack abs. Oh yeah, I'm supposed to want those, so I'm attractive. I don't give a crap, but it took me a decade to figure out that I didn't care. For example, I go to the gym two to three times a week maybe, depending on if I'm on the road, I walk a lot. I'm not ripped, but I am trim. I'm in decent shape. I used to be 209 and I was ripped. Now, I'm 170, not ripped at all. I realized a while ago. I don't want to be huge and jacked. I want to be respected. That's the value I was looking for. So I went about a more effective way to get respect, which was becoming better to other people, developing skills, instead of just developing my body. That actually solved the problem. So I didn't have to work on these little accouterments of respect or what I thought people wanted to see in me. And I used to think that I needed to make a ton of cash. And then I thought about why it turns out part of it was respect like before. So we solved that and the other part was that I wanted cool experiences. So I focused on how to get those experiences without just cutting a check for them. Now, I have rich guys in my inbox asking me how they can take part in experiences, all the time a lot of I'm getting for free or as a side sort of shovel because of the job and the network I've cultivated that gets me those experiences. The network has gotten me more experiences and more opportunities than the money ever would have. And all this is not to say that you shouldn't be working towards what you want of course. What I am saying is that I'll bet you don't really want a lot of the things that you think you want, which of course leads to a crisis of motivation because your feeling brain knows you don't want those things and then you’re thinking brain is being bombarded with marketing all the time, 24/7. It's feeling less than and trying to motivate yourself temporarily to close that gap between what you have and what you think you should have. So you start doing it for a while and then you lose interest because deep down, you know you don't give a crap so you lose motivation.

[00:48:21] Do that journaling exercise I just mentioned and I think you'll find that you're not as interested in a lot of this self-help BS as you think you are. You're not as interested in having a bunch of money and being ripped in all this stuff as you think you are. You just want some other things to be liked or loved or respected. And once you figured out how to get that without going that side route through buying supplements and all that crap, you'll be much happier long term and it'll be easier, honestly.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:48:49] Is there a Lambo supplement?

Jordan Harbinger: [00:48:50] There's no Lambo supplements because you don't want that Lambo. You just want people to go, "Wow, cool car." And the reason you want that is because you want people to think that you're cool and the reason you want that is because you want love or whatever.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:49:03] All right.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:49:04] So just love yourself. No, don't. That's not the solution. That's part of the solution. Just not like that. All right. Last but not least.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:49:12] Hi Triple J, which is also my favorite Australian radio station. Interested in your perspective on LinkedIn networking, I get frequent LinkedIn connection requests from people who I haven't previously met or done business with. Many requests come from those in the same industry, similar fields, or where there may be an opportunity for indirect collaboration. In the spirit of building a robust network of professional contacts, I accept pretty much all requests that look legit. Almost all of the random connection requests I receive are not personalized and after accepting, there's rarely any follow-up by the requester with a message introducing themselves. Even with people I know, I always personalize the invite and then send a follow-up message when they accept so in most cases I take it upon myself to send a message to them to establish a conversation but rarely get a reply or anything meaningful back. While some of these people probably think this qualifies as "networking," I also suspect that a fair number of these people are simply trying to get their connection/follower numbers up to help establish credibility rather than endeavoring to establish meaningful professional relationships. There's a part of me that thinks I should subsequently remove random connections if they don't engage within a reasonable timeframe as I do want to try and maintain the integrity of my network, but there's also a part of me that feels doing so would be on my part and then I should be more focused on the long game. You never know when that connection might come in handy. Grateful for any discussion around this. Thanks. Not a Lazy Networker.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:50:37] So I like Triple J in Australia too. We actually have some of their swag because Australians have -- notably, our friend Matt Knight has been sending us TripleJ swag.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:50:47] There's a picture of the three of us on Instagram.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:50:49] That's right.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:50:49] So you can go check that out.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:50:50] That's right. I was also in the offices a while back and that was also at Triple M talking about interviewing and stuff. They have awesome studios now. FM stations are awesome and Triple M has so much cool stuff and so many cool rooms.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:51:04] Really.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:51:04] Yeah. I was like, wow, I could get used to this.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:51:06] I did like a podcasting course before podcasting was podcasting, like KCRW up in San Francisco and I think that was KCRW.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:51:15] Yeah.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:51:15] And it was so much fun. Those are so cool. And I took radio in high school so I knew how to work for the board and play with the carts and everything. That is so much fun. I miss those days. Now they just have a laptop. It's not as cool as it used to be.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:51:28] Yeah, the boards are dope. I never took radio. We didn't have it.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:51:31] Yeah, we had our own radio station. It was great.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:51:33] A friend of mine had our radio show in high school, but he had to go to another high school to do it in the morning and school starts at like 7:30. Dude, I had to get up at like 4:00. Ridiculous! He must've loved radio. I hope he's famous now. His name is Brian Grant. He had the Brian Grant Show. Hopefully, all that work paid off, Brian. Anyway, LinkedIn is different for me. I've got 4,500 requests that I started with like last week or something --

Jason DeFillippo: [00:51:58] Like pending, open request.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:51:59] Pending, yeah.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:52:01] Oh my God.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:52:01] And I also messaged everyone, I rarely get a reply back. I think I have 3,800 more to go. Something like that. A little more.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:52:09] Okay. We're taking your LinkedIn account away from you because you don't have time for that. Nobody got time for that.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:52:14] No, no. I know. And I even emailed LinkedIn and they replied and they were like, "You have a lot of pending requests." And I was like, "Is this normal?" And they're like, "No." So they changed some stuff on my profile because they thought that there might have been some automation happening where people are adding me. Anyway, in your case, I don't blame you for removing people who don't reply. They're never going to provide anything if they can't even be bothered to answer their LinkedIn inbox after they've added you there. They're going to be takers at best, time-wasters mostly. They're going to end up pitching you for their stupid sales calls. "Hey, do a free session with me." All that BS, it's all automated. There's no point in connecting with those people. They're just mining LinkedIn for leads. Having a lot of connections that are useless does nothing. It's always better to have fewer but stronger connections. And of course, it's great to have a lot of strong connections so you could just accept them and move on. And then once you need to reach out to them later, the problem is then you're going to want to check your message history and see if they're just adding tons of people or if they're the real deal. And that's what I do because I'm not relying on these connections for anything. I figured their show fans and if somebody's profile looks really goofy or doesn't have a photo, I deny those. But everybody else, I'm just kind of like, eh, I assume you know me from the show. I'll talk to you if you don't reply. I don't really care. I'm not using LinkedIn for anything.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:53:27] Yeah, me too. That's the other thing that I was like does LinkedIn really matter nowadays because everybody is just using it as kind of like a social proof mechanism to show their connection account.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:53:37] Yeah. There's that. It can. I do use it occasionally to reach out to somebody but to like, "Hey, I wonder if I know anyone at Quora," and I'll search for it, and then I'll be like, "Oh, hey, do I know you?" And they'll be like, "Yeah, I saw you speak at Hustle Con." And I'm like, "Great, I'm having this problem on Quora." But if their message history is me saying, "Hey, how do I know you?" And they didn't bother to reply, I'm like, oh great, this is just automated. She uploaded her whole Gmail inbox by accident or something. Yeah, so I don't worry about it. So you're going to have to filter at some point. You can either filter now you can filter later. It's up to you. If you don't have that many open pending requests, filter them now. That way you're just not connected with the people that are not men in the ship.

[00:54:15] Life Pro Tip of the Week. This is a good travel tip for people who drink coffee, at least Starbucks coffee. When you're leaving a foreign country and you've still got cash in hand like you still got Mexican pesos or you still got Thai Baht. Take it to a Starbucks, load it onto a gift card and then you can take the card to the UK, USA, Canada, Australia, Mexico, wherever you are, Republic of Ireland. You can use the cash on the card and it will auto convert to your local currency so you don't have to go to a bank and exchange it.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:54:45] Yup. This is a great tip. This comes from my friend Mark Frauenfelder. You might know him from Boing Boing.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:54:50] Oh yeah. Nice.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:54:50] Yeah. I've known Mark for years and this comes from his Recomendo Newsletter. Like every week him, Kevin Kelly, and another person put out six tips each. Each person does two tips and I found this on the newsletter and I thought this was genius.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:55:03] Genius. Yeah. Because I have little Ziploc bags full of like currency that doesn't even exist anymore.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:55:10] Me too. I totally got that.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:55:11] Because I went to Europe in the '90s and I was like cool, Deutsch Mark, oh crap.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:55:15] Yeah, exactly.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:55:16] I'm stuck with it now.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:55:17] I just keep that for fun because it's just fun to play with and go through some time.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:55:20] Sure, sure. It is fun to have that currency, but you don't need like $400 of it. Right?

Jason DeFillippo: [00:55:25] No you don't. That's a lot of frappuccinos right there that you could get.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:55:28] Yeah. Still, though I've totally used it. I don't think gift cards expire.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:55:33] No, they don't.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:55:33] It's like 10 years.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:55:34] It's illegal to expire gift cards because they're considered cash. I've got a $400 British Airways gift certificate that somebody gave me in like 1993 that I can still cash in, which I'm waiting for someday.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:55:46] That was like an actual flight to the UK in 1993 probably.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:55:50] Yeah. That's what it was supposed to be, but I just never got off my butt and went.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:55:54] Classic Jason.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:55:54] That's right.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:55:56] Recommendation of the Week, man. I'm obsessed with Theranos' thing. I know I told everybody about the Dropout Podcast and they also did a dropout -- I don't think it was called, was it called the dropout? It was on 20/20.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:56:08] Yes. It was the Dropout.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:56:09] It was also Dropout.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:56:10] Yeah. The Dropout Podcast was spun out of the 20/20 TV thing. They were combined together. The same team did both of those.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:56:18] Oh, I thought the Dropout on 20/20 came out after the podcast.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:56:22] The video came after. The podcast came first. It was like a six-part podcast and then after that, the 20/20 special came out. Then after that The Inventor: Out for Blood in Silicon Valley came out. So it was basically you had your Elizabeth Holmes trifecta to go through.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:56:34] Yeah, so look, I recommend to start with the Dropout Podcast. If you like it, I loved it, then go watch the Dropout on 20/20 and then if you like that, then go watch The Inventor: Out for Blood in Silicon Valley, which is on HBO and if you don't know about Elizabeth Holmes, she was the CEO of Theranos. This used to be a multibillion-dollar healthcare company founded by Elizabeth Holmes, and she dropped out of Stanford. She started this company, it was going to revolutionize healthcare. It was valued at 9 billion in 2014 which made her the next Steve Jobs, the youngest self-made female billionaire in the world. Two years later, Theranos was cited as a massive fraud by the SEC. The value is less than zero and now she's facing prison time.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:57:20] Couldn't happen to a nicer, crazier.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:57:22] She is completely nuts by the look of it.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:57:25] Yeah and I think you nailed it with the order of what to watch and listen to because I think the podcast definitely like gets you the whole backstory and then you get nuggets going once you start to watch the video and then you can really see like her crazy eyes and all of that stuff. Just like, "Talking a robot."

Jordan Harbinger: [00:57:44] She talks like the guy from Silence of the Lambs.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:57:52] Oh yeah. It puts the lotion in that basket.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:57:55] It puts lotion in the basket or it gets the hose again. She talks like that because someone told her that she needed to have a deeper voice to sound more credible. And you cannot talk like that in a bunch of media without a complete lack of giving an F about what other people think and/or just no self-awareness at all.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:58:19] I was talking to my roommate about this when we started watching the 20/20. She's just like, "Oh, she's just a poor girl who just got too far down the rabbit hole. And she started to believe her own press and then got too upside down and didn't think that everything was going to be able to," and then by the end of watching the HBO and she's like, "That bitch was cray-cray." She's cray-cray.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:58:40] Exactly, exactly. That's exactly what it is. I read the book Bad Blood by Carreyrou and I was like, oh, you know, I can see how somebody our age would just get so swept up in it and then try to sweep the bugs under the rug and then you're like, oh wait, nope, con artist. Straight-up fraud con artist. There's too much to ignore.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:59:02] I want to know how many people at Walgreens got fired over this because that should have never been available to the public.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:59:07] Oh, yeah, no way.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:59:08] Oh my God, it's so crazy.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:59:09] Somebody for sure got bent over the barrel. Hope you all enjoyed the show today. I want to thank everyone that wrote in this week as always, don't forget, you can email us at friday@jordanharbinger.com to get your question answered on the air and we'll always keep you anonymous. That's how we roll. A link to the show notes for this episode can be found at jordanharbinger.com. Quick shout out to a couple of listeners, far and wide, Benjamin Torrero in Mexico City. He's a law student. Sorry to hear that. He works at a law firm in the city. Look, I hope you love it. He listens to us every day on the commute and offered to take us out for dinner in Mexico City. So if I ever feel like getting kidnapped again, I'll take you up on that. Not that Mexico City is that dangerous. I mean it is, but that's where I get kidnapped the first time. So I'm not just trying to make you look bad or your country look bad. I do like Mexico and I really had a great time in Mexico City, other than that little field trip.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:59:58] That little side hustle trip there.

Jordan Harbinger: [01:00:00] That's right. And Ankie Hille Hagen which is a very Norwegian name, she is in Norway. She says, "I swear I'm not a stalker," which is what all stalkers say, "But if you guys are in Europe during the summer, come visit us in Norway." She's got a house on an Island and it sounds very peaceful. No electricity or running water, but they have solar panels.

Jason DeFillippo: [01:00:18] And where no one can hear you scream.

Jordan Harbinger: [01:00:19] No, no. Come out to this place where there's no phone and no running water and no electricity. Jordan puts the lotion in the basket.

Jordan Harbinger: [01:00:26] Have you ever seen what does that Misery with Stephen King?

Jason DeFillippo: [01:00:29] Yeah.

Jordan Harbinger: [01:00:30] That's how I feel where that's going. But thank you, Ankie for the invite. Maybe we can just meet at a nice public place instead, next time I'm there.

[01:00:38] Go back and check out Beau Lotto and Michelle Lederman episodes from this week if you haven't yet. And if you want to know how we managed to book all these great people, I manage my relationships with thousands of people. I've got systems, I've got habits, I've got consistency. I'm teaching you how to do this for free over at jordanharbinger.com/course. It's Six-Minute Networking. This course replaces Level One. We no longer support Level One. I have nothing to do with it. I've left Advanced Human Dynamics for a couple of reasons, which I can get into later. I no longer do Level One, but Six-Minute Networking is at jordanharbinger.com/course. Do not kick the can down the road. You will end up like that gal who wrote in and said, "I didn't dig the well before. I'm thirsty and now I can't get a job." I know you think it won't happen to you, but once you need relationships, you are way too late. The drills take a few minutes per day. That's why it's called Six-Minute Networking for God's sake, so ignore this at your own peril. It's free. I want you to learn it. It will change your life and your business and your everything. Jordanharbinger.com/course. I'm on Instagram and Twitter at @JordanHarbinger. It's a great way to engage with me and the show and jordanharbinger.com/youtube is where we all are. All the video interviews are up there on the YouTube channel. Jason.

Jason DeFillippo: [01:01:50] My personal website is over at jpd.me and you can check out my tech podcast, Grumpy Old Geeks at gog.show or your podcast player of choice.

Jordan Harbinger: [01:01:58] This show is produced in association with PodcastOne. This episode is co-produced by Jen Harbinger. Show notes for the episode are by Robert Fogarty. Keep sending in your questions to friday@jordanharbinger.com. Share the show with those you love and even those you don't. Lots more in the pipe. Very excited to bring it to you. In the meantime, do your best to apply what you hear on the show, so you can live what you listen, and we'll see you next time.

Jason DeFillippo: [01:02:21] If you like our show, you're going to love Divorce Sucks with Laura Wasser on PodcastOne. And this week, Laura is in studio with the hilarious actress-turned-to-podcast superstar Anna Faris. Download new episodes of Divorce Sucks with Laura Wasser every week on PodcastOne.