26: Getting Excited without Banking on the Outcome | Feedback Friday

Transcript for Feedback Friday | Getting Excited without Banking on the Outcome (Episode 26)

Jordan Harbinger: [00:00:00] Welcome to Feedback Friday. I am your host, Jordan Harbinger. I'm here with producer Jason DeFillippo. Here on the Jordan Harbinger Show, we love having conversations with our guests. You know, that's what we do twice a week. And our primary purpose of course is to pass along their experiences, their insights 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. And every Friday here on Feedback Friday. You can reach us friday@jordanharbinger.com and Jen and I are both in that Feedback Friday inbox and we used to reply with, “Hey, this is Jen here”, but 90% of the time, it's me. I appreciate all the notes, all the letters, everything does reach me friday@jordanharbinger.com and this week as usual, we got some fun ones and we got some doozies and we can't wait to dive in. So Jason, what is the first thing out of this mailbag here?

Jason DeFillippo: [00:00:51] Hi Jordan and Jason, I made the hardest decision in my life today. I decided to break up with my long-term girlfriend of multiple years. We just weren't right for each other. She's not herself and she spent most of our time together, unhappy about her life. She would constantly keep oversleeping, procrastinating or stress eating. I feel like a failure. I wanted to be there for her through everything, but then I realized that I'm just as unhappy when it comes to the relationship. When we first got together, I wasn't as disciplined as I am now. I've since found a good job that challenges me and more importantly, I've lost 125 pounds, which kickstarted everything for me. -- Congratulations. That's huge. Literally, literally, and no pun intended. Yeah. --  I found a new sense of myself, but that's where the problem started.

[00:01:38] I feel my girlfriend started to use my successes for an excuse as to why she couldn't complete hers. I made it look too easy, which anybody who's accomplished the big task knows that's not the reality of the situation. Our relationship ended with some harsh truths. “I changed so much of myself for you. I don't know how to be myself anymore. You're just giving up. I wanted to marry you. I don't want to be with anyone else and I became comfortable being intimate with you and I don't know if I can with any other guy now.” All these statements and more are all a result of my own mistakes and self-interests. It highlighted the fact that I'd unintentionally made her dependent on me, but I don't know how I'm going to move on either. I took this risk and I'm certainly not in a comfortable situation.

[00:02:21]  How can I move forward and keep on my path of self-improvement? I fear most of all that I'm going to revert to the way I was before I met her. I expect to be derailed, but I want to get ahead of it. I imagine that your situation with your previous company is a lot like going through a breakup as well. There must be as much that you blame yourself for it that may not necessarily have been your fault, but I'm equally assured there wasn't a mistake or two that you'd made toward the other side of your breakup. How did you get past any self doubt and move forward? And how did you take the mistakes that you acknowledged and became points that you might work towards in the future? Thank you so much for all the work that you do. I don't take any of it for granted. Signed, Less Than Jake.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:03:00] So, the first thing that strikes me here is that this is a classic example of outgrowing someone in your life. So he took drastic action to get rid of 125 pounds, started to feel better about himself. And then this girlfriend who was left in the dust, not by Jake, but just by her own inaction, depression, conditions that she's not really doing anything about. She's using that not only as an excuse to why she couldn't complete hers, but she's trying to control him with guilt. I noticed that all of these things that she said, first of all, he made it look too easy. I mean, I'm sorry, but that just makes me angry that so, “Well you made it look so easy that I can't do it.” I mean, Uhh! Get out to here with that. That is just so aggravating. And then, “Oh, I changed so much of myself with you.”

[00:03:49]  “I don't know how to be myself anymore. You're just giving up. I wanted to marry you. I don't want to be with anyone else. I became comfortable that…” Hmm, someone's a little bit self-centered. This person is focused on everything they need and everything you're doing to make them a victim, make her a victim. I can't lose the weight. I can't do that. She's depressed, you know? And she doesn't seem to want to get through this, which is unfortunate, but I don't think that you can stay with anyone like that. She is going to hold you back as long as you'll let her do that. And here's the thing. I know that when I left AOC, I knew years ago I needed to do that. I just didn't do it. And I think Jake's in the same boat, I think he knew years ago and he just put up with it for so long that now it finally came to a head.

[00:04:36] I don't think you're going to revert to where you were before. You made this progress on your own inspite of her not taking the journey with you. It would be, I would understand this if it's like my girlfriend's really into fitness and we both lost a bunch of weight and we both keep each other accountable. This is the opposite of what's happening. She's using you as an excuse not to do it and trying to drag you down to where she's at so that she feels better about herself. You're not going to revert to where you were. You're probably going to take off and lose even more or gain even more muscle or be in better shape, dah, dah, dah. You can really not even know how far you can go without somebody like this weighing you down. And the biggest regret that I have, almost always about big leaps in my life,

[00:05:19]  big action steps -- applying for something, getting a job here, dating, and getting married. All that stuff is always, my regret is always not doing it earlier. And I want to have kids now, but I'm going through a stressful time, thanks to this whole rough breakup, you know, and all the stress and harassment that's come with it. So I'm glad that I'm not pregnant right now. Learn of that. We're not pregnant right now I should say, but…

Jason DeFillippo:  [00:05:42]  Yeah, I was going to say, “I'm very glad that you are personally, not pregnant right now.”

Jordan Harbinger: [00:05:54] Yeah, yeah. This morning sickness is killing me. But we are definitely planning that and I know that when finally this happens, I'm going to be like, “Oh I should've done this years ago.” Just like I did with marriage, just like I did with, you know, living abroad and language, and all these other things that I’ve loved doing that I knew I should've done ages ago.

[00:06:04] And these hardest things were the first month of the split from AOC. I mean, what are we in Jason? Month two or something like that? Or is it the beginning of month three?

Jason DeFillippo: [00:06:13]  Yeah, we're starting month three.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:06:15] So we're in this beginning of month three and I'm already excited for the future in ways that I never was excited for while I was a part of AOC because of all the limits, self-imposed and otherwise, which are now gone. Not to mention, we've all been able to reinvent ourselves and the brand in a much healthier environment as well. How do you feel Jason? I mean, whenever I go through stuff like this, the beginning is always rough and then afterwards it's like, “How the hell did I not do that earlier?”

Jason DeFillippo: [00:06:39]    Everything's good. It's like, you know, yeah, we waded the anchor, we're moving on and smooth sailing. There's going to be some rough patches for sure. And that's just to be expected. But overall, it's really nice to wake up in the morning and be able to do what we want to do without, you know, outside interference as it were. So I think all in all, I think Jake is going to be, or Less Than Jake is going to be in a fantastic position because he doesn't have that anchor anymore because it did sound like she was warming up for the opera with all the ‘me, me, mes’ going on.

Jordan Harbinger:   [00:07:07]    Yeah, I see what you did there.

Jason DeFillippo:   [00:07:09]  Yeah, I think Jake is going to be just fine, so yeah, he might be a little lonely at first, but you can get over that. That's a problem that is easily fixable, you know.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:07:19] I agree. I agree. Let's move right along.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:07:23] Dear Jordan and Jason, greetings from Eastern Canada, bastion of the French language in North America -- and by the way, don't forget maple cookies. Yep. Eastern Canada, best maple cookies in the world. -- I guess this makes the Jordan Harbinger Show international. What are your thoughts on needing continuous novelty in your professional life? Personally, it seems that it's something that I need to stay happy at work, but I'm starting to feel that it's having a bad repercussion on my overall happiness for the long run. I love new challenges and I find that starting a new job or position is very rewarding. It's full of new stuff you need to learn. You need to make a name for yourself and show that you're right for the part. It's new, difficult in a perfect setting to keep the mind busy. I always aim to deliver more than required, helping where I can and keeping a good attitude, but after a year or so, the novelty wears off.

[00:08:08] Challenges become routine. The new stuff is really just old stuff in disguise. I eventually end up grinding the hours and my mind starts seeking something else to keep the flame lit. I don't necessarily wish to change employers. I've been with the same one for almost 10 years. I've occupied different functions inside the business, but it's more or less similar stuff in the end. It's a big business where there's a certain lack of flexibility of adapting your position to your needs. Somehow, I feel I'd be happy if I had a really different job every year in different settings, but it's not a worthy endeavor, especially with a family to take care of. I understand that sometimes work is just work and you can't have a dream set up all the time, but how can I keep the new newer longer or is there a problem with my mindset? How would you approach this situation? Cheers. Bored North of the Border.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:08:54] Yeah, this is tough. I view this as completely normal and it seems like we have similar personality types, me and Bored North of the Border. It just means this sort of sentiment in my opinion just means you're continually growing, you're learning that you're not satisfied with being a cog in a machine at work. And I don't know Jason, you seem like the kind of person who would be used to something like this. Like, “Ahhh, this is the lame, I've got to get a new thing.” You're always sort of switching it up. Even sometimes I'm like, “Oh man, sit still.” You know, you don't even do that.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:09:26] No, I mean I love podcasting because there is a lot of novelty in it and lots to learn. But you know, some days it does become routine. But, and back in the day I loved programming for the novelty. I was a programmer for over 20 years because there was always something new to learn and new problems every day.

[00:09:41] But over time it got tedious like everything else. But there are some tricks that I use that I can think of that can be found in any company. So when you’re bored, talk to your coworkers about their pain points and what they see as problem spots that might overlap your set of skills or skills that you want to learn. When you have downtime from your normal job, you can work on ways to solve their problems. For instance, when we were in between releases for our website I was working on, I talked to like the editorial side and see if there were any tools that I could build that they could use that would streamline the workflow. So in my downtime, when there was nothing to do, I crank them out. And when I was done, the company got more value out of me as an employee and the other team members could do more with their time at work because I was the one that helped streamline things for them in the editorial process.

[00:10:22] But then I also learned what the editorial process was so you have even more valuable. See what I'm saying? This is just a software example, but it can be extrapolated to any company. When you have downtime, look for the pain points and work to solve them or at least come up with like proposals to solve them. Since you're in a big company, you might not be able to implement it, but you can at least write a proposal and put it on somebody's desk and it shows you're a team player, but also satiates that need for novelty that you know we all have and you can scratch that itch without having to change jobs in the company. And who knows that research might lead you to a better job and just don't burn yourself out with trying to fix these problems because it can kind of turn into obsession if you let it, because you see novelty everywhere then. And that's pretty much my advice for it, for what he's going through inside of a big company. That makes sense?

Jordan Harbinger: [00:11:07] I think so.  I wouldn't know. I mean, my real jobs are quite limited, so that's how I flag all the work questions and like, “Okay, I got to go ahead”, and save this for somebody who's got more experience than a couple of years at a law firm, which is also not like a regular corporate gig. It's like, you know, I don't want to get into that. I don't want to smack talk my firm, even though it doesn't exist anymore. Everybody there was cool, but it was almost too cool.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:11:33] Too cool for school.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:11:34] Yeah. At some point you just can't be like, “Oh, I understand that you had to work seven days a week, 20 hours a day, but doesn't your boss drop cocaine off on your desk when you're tired?” I mean like that's, you know, I don't want to go down that sort of Wall Street road. It doesn't make any sense. So yeah. So we won't.

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Jason DeFillippo:  [00:14:05] Hey Jordan and Jason, I work at a small creative field in the entertainment industry. I've worked mostly at smaller studios, but recently had the opportunity most people dream of, to take a test at one of the major film studios. I was introduced to the head of the department through a close friend who said he'd been meaning to get in touch with me and had some openings coming up. We met several times where he spent most of our meetings talking about himself and selling me on working with him. He asked me very little about myself and my experience, which I saw as a possible red flag. He talked to me as if the position was already mine and was asking if my union paperwork was in order. Then he wrote me asking if I would like to take a test, a little unpaid test on a short film to get an idea of where my creative skills are at and to just have fun with it, and he said he wasn't going to be too critical.

[00:14:49]  So I submitted the test and I'm confident in the creative quality of the work. I waited a few weeks to follow up when I didn't hear back. He responded that he didn't watch my one minute test because of a minute technical mistake, which could have been easily remedied by changing a single drop down menu. I wrote back to clarify the error that I understand how it affects working with other people. I will correct it and resubmit happily. To this, he gave me a stonewall answer. Essentially eight hours of my work wasn't worth one minute of his to watch the test. I understand this man is a dick, but if I hear from him again, should I take these red flags as a sign not to work with him? There are only a few bridges in my profession and I'm reluctant to burn such a big one. Thanks for your help. In Search of a Studio.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:15:30] Oh, this guy sounds like such a dick. I mean it is, but you know what? Sometimes people have bad days. I'm sure I've done similar stuff, not knowing it or knowing it and being like, “Eh, it's fine”, and then not realizing the lasting impression that this has had. But this guy sounds like a real dick. And so I reached out to our friend, our mutual friend Jason Caleb Bacon, who spent years and years writing for television, film and all that stuff. And you know, because this was, my thing is, “Yeah, screw it. You don't want to work with people like that.” But also maybe like you said, there's few bridges in the industry. So Caleb said for one, the meeting where the other person only talks about themselves -- Welcome to Hollywood. I've had those, got the job. I've had those not gotten the job.

[00:16:13] Caleb says that's where he likes Bruce Lee's Be The Water. And that's just kind of like, be the rock. Go with the flow. Let them flow around you. We know the situation's not unique. It has nothing to do with you personally and everything to do with the other person when this stuff happens. But the question is what to do if you hear from that person again? Sort of an odd thing to ask after all that, but it doesn't sound like that's all that likely. I'm going to guess this person is an animator, editor, sound designer and someone who pretty much works alone and in their own head and you know we could be wrong about that, but the career is not one based on social skills from the sound of it, which makes this a little bit tougher. You know, if the person is an animator and that executive is from Pixar or something like that, yeah, try again because there's not a ton of options in that discipline.

[00:17:00]  It's hard to know based on what's written here, so balance that person's position with the work and the pain in the butt involved in reconnecting. It's probably not worth it even though it seems like these opportunities are rare, but you can also try different timing. You can reach out again and again. You might just get stonewalled. My other opinion is, you know, if you do reconnect, you could just pretend this never happened. Don't bring it up. They might be embarrassed about it. They might forget that that was you when you reapply later and they’ll just like your work again. You know, they don't even remember you because they're so freaking self-centered or they get so many applications and they go, “Oh, I like this person’s stuff.” And then they see your work and they go, “Oh, okay, this looks familiar”, but everything goes smoothly and they think, “Oh, didn't I hire you already? I thought I hired you already anyway, come on on Monday.” I mean, you just never know with this kind of stuff. Jason, you worked in the film industry.

[00:17:50] I mean you were a male performer in adult movies, but it's still in the movie industry.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:17:53] Yeah, yeah. I was no Magic Mike. Yep, that's for sure. But I did work on the lot at Paramount for about 20 movies then outside creative agencies for another 50 or so movies. And Caleb was 100% right about that type of person in Hollywood. Just let it go. People in the movie biz are utterly self-absorbed. If you can't tell by me who also used to work in the movie business. So they tend to move around a lot. So even if this guy isn't in the same studio, you might find him down the line at another studio or a creative agency in the future. So I wouldn't burn the bridge. But I also would definitely, you know, figure out if that's the guy that you want to work with because there are a lot of studios in Hollywood and a lot of people move around a lot.

[00:18:35] It can get very clique-ish though. So you want to get in with a crew at some point. I recommend not going directly to the studios because this is how I did it. This is how I got my job at Paramount. I worked for a creative agency that I knew worked with that studio and did a lot of work for that studio. So I became very valuable to the studio by doing work for the creative agency, made my relationships with all of the people in the studio. And then they eventually offered me a job and I left the creative agency to go literally work on the lot at Paramount. That took about three months. That was it. And that's what I would recommend now because you know as Jordan will always say on the show, it's about relationships. So you need to get that foot in the door, start those relationships and not just with the guy who stonewalled you, but with everybody on the team.

[00:19:19]  That's the best way to do it and make friends with everybody. And once you get that in and you do good work and you're easy to work with and you have the relationships, it's a no brainer for them to bring you on board. And when those people move to their next place and they need another guy, they might bring you along. And that's kind of how Hollywood works. You know, it's very small groups that move from studio to studio to agency to agency, but nobody stays put for long. So I wouldn't expect this guy to be there forever. And you still might get in the door there. But there are a lot of studios in Hollywood, so don't focus on just one.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:19:50] Nice. That's good advice. I didn't know you had it in you.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:19:53] Hey man, I had a life before I met you. Believe it or not.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:19:56] You don't have a life now though. What happened? What happened?

Jason DeFillippo: [00:20:00] I met you.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:20:01] True. That does happen around here. That does happen right here. Just ask my wife. All right, next up.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:20:09] Hey Jordan. Loved the new show and the guests you've already had have been amazing and I can't wait to hear more. I've been on a journey of self-improvement that has led me to taking up competing in West Coast Swing dance events. Your partner is selected at random as you're lined up to begin and you don't know what the song is until the music starts playing. -- Ooh man, that sounds stressful. -- I'm placing well, but it seems the largest distinguishing factor in people who get into the finals and myself are their look and feel of flirtation and happiness. I'm an INTJ and the only flirting I do is with disaster whenever I try to mess with emotions and looking happy. Nice. Yeah. Do you have any advice on how to approach someone cold and build rapid trust with them? I want to be warm and friendly without being fake. I suspect if I can fix this with hundreds of people watching, then approaching women socially will take care of itself. Thanks. Swinging on a Rising Star.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:20:59]   So he's talking about like this competitive West Coast Swing. Because I take West Coast Swing but it's just me and Jen. We have a private teacher. We're not competitive. I'm never going to do it in public because, holy crap, I can't even do it in private. This sounds like you said it sounds stressful. Imagine, I go to the same songs more or less, I mean the same five or six songs. So all that happens is the speed changes. But imagine you're just with somebody.  Neither of you know what the song is going to be. It's like improv dancing, you know, you got to be pretty good at it to not be really bad at it. And I haven't been back to West Coast Swing in a while because of the whole AOC breakup and the legal drama taken up all the time and stress. And I know what he's talking about with the approaching or the flirting with disaster.

[00:21:43] And the solution here, and this goes for any group setting, is to set the stage ahead of time. So get social with the people beforehand, develop a little bit of the setting for a relationship. And if you're not good at the spontaneous emotional stuff, and I know I'm terrible with this as well, or I used to be. Work on improv and joking around, don't try to like work on flirting. That's when guys, when anyone tries to work on flirting, it is so awkward and so weird. And that's why these sort of like pickup artist bootcamps, things like that -- that stuff just does not work well because it's weird as hell. It just turns into this sort of weird robot automaton. And it is, improv though, the whole point is, it's not scripted, fake BS. It's not supposed to be for flirting. But flirting in general is often just joking around and having fun.

[00:22:33]  You don't have to turn it into a flirtatious situation. The dance part sort of takes care of that. That's like an acting phase of it, right? You're sort of fake flirting when you're dancing because it's part of the dancing and it's more important that you look happy and spontaneous rather than let's say sexually interested. So it's less tango style flirting and more high school style flirting. Just shy of yank and the old ponytails, if you know what I mean. So think of this is more Grease and less Dirty Dancing -- to use that sort of analogy there. And this type of vibe is helpful in pretty much any mixed social situation and it's not going to get you into trouble. Even in today's day and age of me-too where all this stuff is sort of like, is this still appropriate?

[00:23:18] I don't know. Better to err on the side of caution these days, but being fun, happy, friendly, that stuff that's not going out of style anytime soon. So work on the improv stuff rather than the how-do-I-flirt stuff and you will find yourself in a much better situation that also won't get you banned from class.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:23:38] That's true.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:23:40] This episode is sponsored in part by Rhone. You should never have to question your gear. In fact, that's why we wear the Rhone at the gym and I'm wearing some right now. In fact, there's a good chance anytime I'm doing one of these ad reads that I'm wearing a little bit of Rhone over here in the studio. They've also got this salient running short sleeve shirt, which is made with a nice seamless construction. There's a lot of venting and this fabric called salient, which is the first FDA-determined fabric to promote blood flow, increase energy, endurance, performance.

[00:24:08]  Now I've probably never pushed myself enough to need something like that, but it's good to know that it's there when I need it, so the shirt really does go the extra mile. And they've got silver tech threads, which is pretty cool. I didn't know until it really just taking a look at this stuff from Rhone, that silver naturally fights bacteria, doesn't allow it to grow very well. I've got to look up how that works because I think that's kind of fascinating and they weave this stuff directly into the shirt to keep you smelling fresh. They've also got those commuter pants. Jason, you've got these commuter pants. You're into these things.

Jason DeFillippo:  [00:24:38]   I'm actually wearing them right now. They are my favorite pants. They're the most comfortable pants I own. Hands down. They're made with this really comfortable Japanese stretch fabric and they've got a little security zipper pocket in the back. So when I'm out for a walk with the pooches, nobody's going to steal my phone. It's great.

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Jason DeFillippo:   [00:25:17]  Hey guys. I had a job interview a couple of weeks ago and I was lucky enough to get picked for a second interview. Everything went great. I had amazing feedback from the company and I left feeling like I was on cloud nine. I was told I would be hearing back from them after a week. My issue is that during that week of waiting, I was having the expectation about how I was going to get the job and then after that everything would be fine. I could buy a house, get a new car, et cetera. But the entire time I tried to suppress those happy thoughts. I've been let down a lot in life and I hate to get my hopes up. So my question is, is getting your hopes up bad for you?  Rather than acting like you won't succeed? I feel like hyping yourself up will only be worse for you if you don't succeed rather than having a negative outlook on it. P.S. I didn't get the job, but I'm still searching. Thanks, guys. Happily Be Funneled.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:26:03] You know, getting excited, I'm a fan of it. I know that sounds dumb, but this used to be a very big problem in our old organization was it's kind of like you weren't allowed to get excited or if you did, people sometimes, depending on who you're talking to, would actually kind of do their best to make sure that that was stifled and that was unhealthy. I didn't realize it at the time, but getting excited at the right time is great because it keeps you motivated. Getting excited at the wrong time can be demotivating, but it doesn't have to be. So if I were you, I would use the excitement to keep your eye on the goals and moving forward, but realize somewhere in your head that if it doesn’t work out, it doesn't mean that the things you're excited about are never going to happen.

[00:26:47]  It just means they're not going to happen the way you thought or that they're not going to happen this time with this opportunity. And like I'd mentioned before, Jason and I could never really show our excitement for opportunities with the show and things like that because other people didn't want to get excited. They didn't want other people, they didn't want us to get excited. I don't really still understand that psychology in full and looking back, you know, that was unhealthy for the whole organization. I love getting excited. I find it motivating. So my advice to you is keep getting excited and when things don't work out the way they're supposed to, just realize that's part of the game. But don't let that crush your excitement or you might find that you're no longer motivated as much as before, which I always think is a shame. You know, I always think that's a shame. But Jason, what do you think?

Jason DeFillippo: [00:27:32] You know, you definitely get way more excited than I do. More excited. And yes, way more excited than I do. But I find that that's infectious and it actually makes me more excited because then I've got somebody to be excited with. You know, I'm usually less excited than you because like as a teenager, my life was built on buying things out of magazines because that was our Amazon. We had mail order only and it got kind of ingrained in me that about 50% of the time the things that you ordered from the back of a magazine actually show up. So I kind of took on the mindset that, “Look, if it doesn't show up, it doesn't show up. But if it does, I just won the lottery.” So I tried not to get too overexcited about the thing that was coming that I really wanted and I learned that so young that I think it got ingrained in me.

[00:28:15] So I find it hard to get excited. But what I'm not is negative about the opportunity. I just try and be neutral, you know? You know the difference between the two is one is like, “Oh, I'm never going to get this. Yeah, I had the interview, but it's never going to happen for me”, versus, “If it happens, it happens. If it doesn't, it doesn't. But I'm not going to count my eggs before I get the offer.” So I kind of keep a baseline level of excitement. But when I'm with you and we're doing new stuff, you totally jazz me up and it's actually more fun going down the Jordan route of excitement than it is the baseline, “Eh. If it happens, it happens.” You know what I'm saying?

Jordan Harbinger: [00:28:48] I do. I always like to daydream about what it's going to be like when certain things happen. I don't spend a lot of time doing it, but it is motivating at times. And then I do like to get excited about opportunity. You know, I don't think this is going to quadruple the audience overnight with anything. You know? I've had enough experience to know that that's not how these things are going to work. But I also don't want to go, “Hey, we've got this great opportunity, but I'm going to refuse. I refuse to enjoy it because it's probably just going to be a bunch of crap. And my life sucks.” Like I don't want to do that either. You know, that's not nice. You shouldn’t be able to enjoy things. If you're going to get a big piece of media, you know, say, “Wow, this is going to be really cool. It's going to build some credibility. It's going to be fun to film or talk to the writer and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah”, but don't think, “This is going to be great. This is going to change my business forever. I can't wait. There's nothing that could possibly interfere with this. My life is about to change”, then you'll let yourself down. Right? So I'm all for having a moderate level of enthusiasm and thinking about the potential outcomes while not becoming attached to those same outcomes.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:29:49] Yeah. It seems like this kind of ties in with a scarcity mindset too, that you think, you know, on our side, if this opportunity doesn't work, we're going to make a new opportunity. But some people might say, “Oh, if this opportunity doesn't work, what am I going to do now? Because this is the only opportunity I have.”

Jordan Harbinger: [00:30:04] Yeah. Well, you see those people on Shark Tank, they're like, “Thanks for the time. It's all good. I'm happy I came here. This validates my idea's could talk to the sharks if they don't get a deal”, right? And then other people are like, “I'm screwed. I have a double mortgage on my house. If my light up shoelaces don't succeed, I'm F--ed”, right? Like that kind of thing. It's like, “Oh God.” So there's a fine line -- actually, it's not a fine line at all, it really is just allowing yourself to be excited without banking on the outcome.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:30:34] Yup. Well put, I like that. You can get excited without banking on the outcome.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:30:37] All right, next up.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:30:40] Hi Jordan. I am attracted to a colleague but the feelings are not mutual. We don't work together but have similar friends and hang out as a group a few times a month and we all went to school together. What advice do you have for hanging out with this colleague at social events when you don't want to see them flirting with other people, but you also don't want to skip the event with friends? Usually, I would just either stop hanging out with this person and move on. But there are also a professional contact that I would hate to lose touch with. Best, Covetous and Confused.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:31:08] Okay, I don't want to be a jerk here, but you don't want to see them flirting with other people, but they're not attracted to you and you're attracted to them? So what? You don't get to not see them flirt with… you don't have any control over these people. You don't get to have them because you want them. And I understand that you understand that, but you also don't get to not experience the feeling of rejection that's outside of their control. They don't have to do anything differently. So if you're not together and you're just crushing on them, you don't have any say over whether they flirt with other people. Hell, even when you're married, you're going to see people flirting with your wife and they might flirt back in a harmless way. You don't own anyone, you ever will. So the best thing you can do is just not worry about things like this.

[00:31:52]  And I don't want to say I'm accusing them of this. I think I'm probably laying it on a little thick here, but it sure sounds like this really bothers him or her and I don't think that it should. Life is all about not getting what you want and just dealing with that. That's okay. It's a part of life, especially when you're talking about other people's feelings. So this is a lack, I see the deeper issue here I think is a lack of trust in yourself in some way. It's like you're not confident in your ability to interact with this person that you like, so you get jealous when other people do that. And I think the more you interact with people, the better off you're going to be here. You can also just forget about it and move on. Unrequited love, which isn't really love anyway, and unrequited attraction is just a fact of life.

[00:32:38] There's just nothing new here. It's definitely a mistake to let it affect your personal and professional relationships. And last but not least, I would say where he says, “Usually I would either stop hanging out with this person, but they're also a professional contact I'd hate to lose touch with.” You've got to ask yourself, is hanging out with this person, even though you're crushing on them and they're flirting with other people and it's bothering you, is this building a positive image for you in their mind or a negative one? And also, do you really mean that this is a professional contact that you'd hate to lose touch with? Or is that sort of an excuse to just keep hanging out with somebody that doesn't like you back? I can't really tell from the writing, but you might want to ask yourself that question pretty honestly. Because I feel like a lot of people write things like this in the mail, like, “Oh, you know, we're best friends.

[00:33:23]  I don't want to leave her because dah, dah, dah, dah, dah, dah, dah.” And it's like, no, you're just being chicken and you don't want to break up with this person who's bad for you. Or, “Oh, well, you know, I'm going to see her all the time because we live close by, so we might as well live together.” It's like, no, you just live with somebody that's bad for you. I feel like we see these sort of built in excuses a lot because it is really hard to read the label when you're inside the jar and see your own excuses.

Jason DeFillippo:  [00:33:47]   True that.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:33:48] All right. Next up.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:33:49] Hi Jordan. I'm hearing your comments on Feedback Fridays about people sending messages to your inbox that you then forward to the other inbox. I had a couple of thoughts I felt like sharing. It's possible that these people are looking for personal advice or responses from you, but maybe asking things that you feel are beneficial for others to hear. Alternatively, they may not understand the work process on the back end that is going into handling these emails. So if they're just looking for an answer without the intention of having it featured on the program, those get sent to you. I'm certain you have better insight as to whether this is what's going on, but since FMF developed fairly organically and transitioned into Feedback Friday, it might be worth spelling out the nature of emails or questions that should be directed to either inbox. For example, I can't tell which way to go with this email, so I figured I would start here. As always, thank you so much for what you do for our community. Sincerely, Just Trying To Help.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:34:39] Sure, so this makes sense to me. I personally think it's pretty clear. Anyone asking us for advice of any kind goes to friday@jordanharbinger.com. Everything else goes to my personal inbox, but anyone asking me for advice in my regular inbox, I used to forward to the Friday inbox. Now I just archive it because I don't even send it downward. There's so many people that are actually following the rules that I just can't really deal with those people that don't. I used to forward it and then it would be marked as read, but go into the Friday inbox and now I can’t, if something is marked as red, it's basically gone because every time that I checked the inbox, there's two or 300 more messages in there. So there's no chance I'm ever going to go back and go, “Wow, here's all the people that didn't follow the rules.

[00:35:26]  Let me see if I can get to them before all the people that did. So the other thing is if somebody wants advice but doesn't want it made public, I don't have any time for that. I have to archive the email without a response other than maybe a one line explaining that. And the reason is there's so many, I mean, we're putting out three shows a week. Creating these takes hours and hours and hours and hours. So somebody's asking for advice that, “Oh, by the way, I only want this to benefit me. I don't want it to benefit the other hundred plus thousand people listening to these.” It's not only selfish, but it has zero value for the audience, which means that a zero value for us, which means there's no chance in heck that I'm going to reply to it. There's no way. I know that sounds a little harsh, but I don't think there's any possible reason ever for anyone to write into the show asking for advice that can't be made public.

[00:36:18]  Now, if someone said, “Look, I've got this really personal thing that identifies me by nature of the situation or puts me in some kind of danger”, I would make an exception, but if you're just like, “Oh, I don't want to be embarrassed online on the one in a billion chance, my boss listens to this and figures out who that anonymous letter is from, which is impossible.” That's just not valuable enough to do that. If you really needed advice in that situation, you should hire someone for that, in my opinion. Does that make sense?

Jason DeFillippo:  [00:36:48]  Totally makes sense to me.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:36:49] I mean, look, I would love to get to every Feedback Friday message in that whole inbox, but since we have to select from those, there just isn't any point to selecting from the random ones that go to the wrong place and that people don't want to share. It just seems like it's a little bit self-important to think, “Well you know, don't share this one but I want a three-page reply to my seven-page letter.” Nope.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:37:12] We have limited time for what we do and we try and maximize the value that we can give back to you guys and it just doesn't make sense for you, Jordan, to be going through and giving personal one-on-one feedback. For our mission, it's not really pushing the ball forward so I totally get where you're coming from with this.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:37:29] Yeah, there is one option for people that really need advice from me and that is so far, there's one option there. There may be more in the future. I do these clarity calls and usually people use them for business. You know, like, “Hey, I need to figure out some things from my show, my podcast”, or “I'm trying to run this event and I want to get some influencers involved. How do I do it?” And those people can email and get my clarity link and it charges them per minute and it automatically bills them and I don't have to deal with any of that stuff. And we just stay on the phone as long as necessary. And it's like a 1-900 number from me. You remember those, Jason?

Jason DeFillippo: [00:38:06] Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Who was that psychic woman? That black psychic woman?

Jordan Harbinger: [00:38:09]  Miss Cleo.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:38:10] Yes. You're Miss Jordan.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:38:12] Yeah. Miss Jordan. I had to dream about you. Call me.  Remember those? They got in trouble for that.

Jason DeFillippo: [00:38:20] They totally did.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:38:20] Yeah, they got in trouble for that. I think it was like the FTC or something like that was saying, “Hey you, you know you're going to rip people off with a fake psychic”, that's on them, but if you're going to call them, because it used to save your number and it would call you and say Miss Cleo had a dream about you, you should call back. And that was just too aggressive because it was like, “All right, if you're going to take advantage of dumb people reaching out to you, that's one thing. But if you're going to start reaching out to dumb people, we're going to have to draw the line.” I'm not exactly sure what their legal argument was, but they're just like, “Okay, you can victimize people if they're dumb enough to reach out to you. But at some point, you know you're just conning people to the point where we got to draw the line.” I wonder what that case was about. I should go back and read that legal case. It's got to be online somewhere.

Jason DeFillippo:  [00:39:00] Oh I'm sure it is. I'm sure it is.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:39:02] Recommendation of the week: Scam City. Jason, you recommended this a long time ago and I watched an episode and I was like, “Eh!”, but then Jenny's brother and Jenny found it and they were watching it. It actually kind of grew on me. Have you been watching this?

Jason DeFillippo:   [00:39:16]  I got to the end of the first season and started on the second season and then I noticed that it's not really real because there was one guy who was a taxi driver in like Lithuania who also turned out to be a bodyguard for them in Buenos Aires. So you know, the lessons that they're teaching are fine, but they pass it off as real. Kind of like Miss Cleo did. And that bothered me that they were kind of trying to show you these behind the scenes videos that weren't really real. And so I kind of let it go from there, but the lessons that you can learn from them are actually pretty solid. Even though they…

Jordan Harbinger: [00:39:50] They just kind of hoped that you wouldn't recognize the producer. You know, the thing is they probably re-enact some of the stuff because the footage is gone. Or like, “Oh the camera battery died.” Or like, “Oh, it only filmed the side of the car.” You know, they probably like, “Screw it, let's just redo the whole thing.”

Jason DeFillippo:   [00:40:06]  Yeah. But all in all, I mean the lessons are decent but it just got a little cheesy for me. But I mean if you're into it, go for it. It's popcorn TV. They're short, they're free on Netflix and you can learn something.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:40:19]  That's called Scam City. You can find it on Netflix. Hope you all enjoy that. I want to thank everyone that wrote in this week. Don't forget, you can email us friday@jordanharbinger.com to get your questions answered on the air. We're happy to keep you anonymous. Of course, a link to the show notes for this episode can be found at jordanharbinger.com. Quick shout out to The Gabe. He turned 10 years old this past month on the 31st and he listens at breakfast with his super cool mom. Hey Gabe. Happy birthday, little brother. I'm on Instagram and Twitter, @JordanHarbinger. It's a great way to engage with the show. And Jason, tell them where they can find you.

Jason DeFillippo:   [00:40:55]  I'm on Instagram @JPD. Twitter as @jpdef. That's J P D E F and you can check out my other podcast, Grumpy Old Geeks every Monday,

Jordan Harbinger:  [00:41:03]   All right. Keep sending in those questions to friday@jordanharbinger.com.  Share the show with those you love and even those you don't. We've got lots more like this in the pipeline. We're 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.