The Jordan Harbinger Show - 163: Todd Herman | The Alter Ego Effect

Episode Date: February 21, 2019

Todd Herman (@todd_herman) is an entrepreneur, coach, mentor, and author of The Alter Ego Effect: The Power of Secret Identities to Transform Your Life. What We Discuss with Todd Herman: How you can harness the power of your own secret identity -- and why you would ever want to. What it takes to adopt seemingly out-of-character characteristics and dominate your personal and professional life. Why taking on an alter ego isn't a "fake it 'til you make it" scheme, but channeling little-used facets of yourself you may not even realize exist. The hidden enemy forces that oppose your attempts at accomplishment and how to resist their subtle and not-so-subtle influences. How to honestly understand and come to terms with what truly motivates you -- and deal with what keeps you from following these motivations. And much more... Sign up for Six-Minute Networking -- our free networking and relationship development mini course -- at jordanharbinger.com/course! Like this show? Please leave us a review here -- even one sentence helps! Consider including your Twitter handle so we can thank you personally! Full show notes and resources can be found here.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with my producer, Jason DeFilippo. Sometimes when I look at world-class athletes or other high performers, they're like superheroes somehow. They have an air about them. Superhuman skills, superhuman focus and drive. It's really impressive, and it's something I would think is impossible to sustain. And often when I meet these people in real life, they're surprisingly normal. The most aggressive NFL player is a nurturing dad and a friendly neighbor. The ear-biting, skull-cracking cage fighter is a goofy video game nut. What is going on here? How do we transform from one identity to the other?

And more importantly, how do we harness this for ourselves? Today, Todd Herman, coached to many of the high-performing athletes we see on TV and on the world stage, talks about the alter ego effect, how we can harness the power of so-called secret identities and adopt characteristics we need to dominate at work or even at home and develop these superpowers for ourselves. Todd's been a close friend of mine for years now, and he's great at helping people shake bad habits and practices so they can become champions.

And we're taking a page or two out of his work here today. By the end of the show, you'll know how to create your own alter ego, turn it on like Superman changing in a phone booth, and utilize your newfound superpowers to take your work and personal life up a notch and operate at peak level essentially on command. I book guests like Todd and have great people in my network because of systems, because of consistency, because of tiny habits, and a little bit of help from some software here and there. I'm teaching you guys how to do this. It's important because it makes the world better and it'll make your business and personal life better.

There's a free course for all this at Jordan Harbinger.com slash course. So if you haven't checked that out yet, go grab six-minute networking for free, Jordan Harbinger.com slash course. All right, here's Todd Herman. Now, this alter ego stuff that we're talking about here, I'm fascinated by it because I thought, oh, I need this. You know, I need to find out what version of me is what I want to present. But that's not quite what the alter ego thing is about. No. Because that to me, originally was like, oh, I can be fake.

Yeah. No problem. Yeah, no. Everyone can be. Yeah, that's what the... I lived in L.A. The wrong idea that it gets entangled with is the idea of fake it to you make it. And like anyone who knows anything about, you know, messaging something, it's a terrible message.

Fake something to you make it. And that's why there's like so much resistance against it because no one wants to fake it. I mean, that's like the definition of being inauthentic is trying to deceive people or trick people. And alter ego has nothing to do with that. And alter ego in its root form comes from Cicero, who coined it in 44 BC. And he's like, you know, Roman statesman, Roman philosopher. argued as one of the most important of them all by some people. And he said, in its root, it means the other I or trusted friend.

And that's a really, really useful idea for people to keep in mind. Because when you think of like how many people operate in their own heads, it's sometimes very much a merry-go-round effect of like constant self-bullying, telling yourself you can't do it. Yeah, that sounds about right. What an idiot you are, judging yourself. Why didn't I think of that? All that kind of stuff.

and alter ego steps in in those areas where you're really trying to perform and bring your kind of best self out there and acts as that trusted friend. So all of a sudden, in your own head, it's really healthy to understand that there's this duality that we all exist inside of, right? There's up down, there's inside outside, hot, cold. Same thing in our head. There's that Carl Young shadow, right, that Carl Young would talk about. Well, if there's a shadow that has to be a light, so then the alter ego we bring in and we use, as a mechanism for our creative imagination to, you know, as a force to push that shadow self, what I call the enemy in my book, to the sidelines, and allow that kind of more heroic self to get out there. Well, we'll get into all this in detail, of course.

Yeah. What is, does this mean that we're just not good enough as ourselves? Like, you know, a lot of people are going to go, oh, no, you know, I don't want to have to front. Yeah. I don't want to tell my normal self that I'm not good enough to do what I want to do. all that stuff. Yeah, what is the normal self?

Yeah. Like, that's, like, people, people are operating with about a kindergarten, kindergarten, like, education of themselves and psychologically how we operate. And they say things like, oh, well, you know, shouldn't we just love ourselves anyway? Yeah, exactly. I'm imagining every Instagram influencer. Wonderful idea. And that's my biggest issue with the personal development and self-help role to begin with anyway,

is it's all a bunch of, a lot of it is like bubble gum, pop, you know, cotton candy type ideas. sound wonderful. It's the stuff that ends up going viral. Yeah, bumper sticker BS. Totally. But, you know, I've been working with people one-on-one for 22 years now, 16,000 hours of one-on-one work with people. Not like in a group, not in a stadium in front of 5,000 people standing on a stage, you know, awkward. Not like e-book downloads or whatever, right? Not treating everyone like a nail because I'm a hammer kind of thing. No, like human beings are fantastically nuanced and our greatest, our greatest superpower, the thing that totally makes us unique on the planet, is our creative imagination. That's it. That's what suspends, that's what separates us from everything else that's

here. Our ability to create worlds in our heads, to tell ourselves story, to narrate, to suspend disbelief about what we think we can and cannot do. And so an alter ego is simply leveraging the superpower that we already have to help you go out and do the difficult things, because we are all, anyone who's trying to strive, if, listen, if you're a someone who wants to sit on the couch and do nothing with your life, there is no need to read this book or any book about improvement. Yeah, see you later. See you.

But if you're someone who wants to constantly explore more of what you can do, that means that you're going to probably confront challenges and obstacles along the way. And maybe over the course of your life, you've had some trauma in the past that causes you to maybe not think so highly of yourself. Or maybe there's this imposter syndrome that might be running around in your head where you're saying, oh, well, any achievement I've ever had in life is just out of dumb luck or where I grew up and you dismiss away every single thing that you've done. Or maybe there's like a, I talk about in the book, like the tribal narratives where you've got, you know, well, my family has never been an

entrepreneur, so why would I be an entrepreneur? Oh, yeah. There's a lot of that. No one from my country has ever gone and done that or no one with my color of skin could go and do that. Like, those are insidious little hidden forces that pull people into that shadow. or that kind of trapped self, like I call it. And so this has nothing to do with the idea that, well, shouldn't I just be myself? You are extraordinarily layered. And it's important to understand that we live in context in life. Who you are with me right now is, of course, going to be slightly different than who you are when you're home with Jen,

or when you're with family, or when you're on the sports field. Of course. I'm never on the sports field. Let's be realistic. Yeah, yeah. I get the point. So that is literally the shadow. That's the only way that you're on the history,

like some shadow has been cast on a sports field. But, you know, so we all have elements of our personality that show up highlighted and different in these other areas, very, very useful for people. And so when we're building alter egos for ourselves, and I'm doing it with like athletes or executives or public figures or entrepreneurs, it's in context to we're trying to be very intentional about who and what you're bringing to that field to help you. succeed because maybe there's elements of your current way that you're operating that are getting

in the way of that success. Okay. So let's. So here's, I don't like the term devil's advocate. Yeah. What comes to mind is, great. So if we're successful, if I'm successful and people then love us and I'm applying this alter ego thing really well where it's like I've got this best version of myself forward,

don't they then just love our alter ego, thereby reinforcing my already crippling imposter? syndrome because I'm like oh yeah well of course they like this but it's all it's all my alter ego you know now no i i i can't even accept the fact that i have this yeah fandom or yeah well i mean um again this goes back this goes back to the context of man we don't know everything about everybody anyway so everyone's love for each other is in the context of what i already know about you I can't know everything. You know, I shared something deeply personal a little while ago, and I'm sure you were like, holy crap, didn't see that coming.

Sure. I thought that guy had it all figured out or something like that. But we're not building it. Again, I am not building something in my mind using this trusted friend and alter ego to help me go out to impress other people. Okay. Okay. It's literally acting upon the natural intrinsic motivators

that are inside people to go out there and grow, to learn, explore more of ourselves, seek adventure, curiosity to see what we can go and do. That's the spirit that when you infuse that to push that heroic self using an alter ego out there, we can, you know, whether some, I, I intellectually understand that the version that people are interacting with me is not a complete version. Of course it's not. It's impossible. They're not in my home with me when I'm with my kids and my wife. So I'm not, people shouldn't be overly concerned about that's the version that people are falling in love with. I mean, I talk about in chapter number two with Shep Gordon, right? Chef Gordon, one of the most prolific Hollywood agents working with some of the biggest stars in music, Alice Cooper, Teddy Pendergast, Luther Vandros.

And he always told him that never forget, when you're on that stage, people are in love with that version of you. That's why we build that second self for that performance so that we can protect that other kind of like more gentle or sensitive self that you might have. So that when someone's writing a review of your work, they're not attacking that identity. They're talking about the identity that you're presenting

on that particular field of play. Okay. Okay. So we want this to protect us because it pretty, The ego takes, the alter ego takes all the damage when someone's like, oh, Todd Herman's book sucks. Yeah. It's like, well, that's fine. It doesn't mean anything about me as a father, entrepreneur.

It just, it's, they're attacking the alter ego writer of this book. And again, it's that Kerry Grant, the famous Hollywood kind of golden era actor, you know, well known for being debonair, charismatic. He had this great quote before. He passed away where he said, I pretended to be somebody I wanted to be, and I finally became that person or he became me or we met at some point. And he was so, the only thing I would change about his quote in the way that I work with people is I activated. I activated somebody I wanted to be and I became that person or he became me or we met at some point. And it's very useful

for people to think of it that way because if you think of your current self as like we've got this two circle Venn diagram, there's where you are right now. now and what you think you can do. And then there's this version of like that vision of how you want to be living. And that creates a gap. And maybe you have the hardest time thinking that you can go and do that right now. So an alter ego becomes that bridge. Oh, right. So it's like maybe I can't do that, but Super Jordan can totally do that. Super Jordan who's inspired by Superman or by whoever can help do that. Because what you're doing is you're suspending your narrative and you're now stepping into someone or something else's narrative to help you get there. Now, I always ask people, which one is the actual you? Yeah, that's what I'm worried

about, right? Like, what if I, I do so much great work with Super Jordan, right? And then people love that, but then regular Jordan still feels like a turd. You know, what, what's the problem here? Because isn't everyone's love piled on Super Jordan going to reinforce the gap between who, who I feel I really am and the alter. Again, this is going, you're going back to how people are, trying or you're thinking of other people and and that context whereas if you're always going to be in the mindset of thinking of other people that will always keep you trapped if that's a that's what I call like an outside in approach your your your motivations are for how other people are thinking of you or your motivations are for only winning the medal or for winning the race that's

all about outcome and that creates extraordinarily high levels of stress and anxiety like helping with people for performance, we always need to pull people into the process because that's where the flow state sits. And the more and more that you do this, because there's a version of Jordan that's sitting here right now. Right. And I'm thinking that this version of Jordan is definitely different than the version of Jordan three years ago. You've built up skills. You've built up new aspects of your personality. So was that version of you fake three years ago? Definitely not. No. It was probably a little too real. I don't know. But there's this development that happened. all an alter ego is doing is helping you to develop yourself.

It's just that you're doing it on your terms because you're being very intentional about who and what you're trying to be bringing out there, not so that you can impress other people so that you can actually get the results that you're looking, that you know that you have the capability for. Nothing is more frustrating for people than what they put their head on the pillow at night and they say to themselves, why didn't I say X, Y, Z in that meeting? or why didn't I raise my hand and speak up?

Or why didn't I say this when I had the chance? Or why didn't I, when that person looked like they would be a perfect client for me, I didn't close the deal. That makes people feel trapped, right? Because the real you that knows you can do that didn't act up in that moment or didn't speak up. Well, an alter ego might be a vehicle for people to do it. And again, it's not a weird idea. This is not strange at all because every single listener,

listening to this right now has 100% at some point in time of use this idea because it's a part of the human psyche. It's part of the human condition. There's no denying it. No one has ever said that they haven't used this because when you were a child, you pretended to be your favorite rock star or your favorite sports star

or you pretended to be Superman or a cowboy or a nurse or a teacher when you were playing. We naturally do that. And we're doing it at a young age because that's when we're our most creative. That's when we're using the most of our imagination. And then what happens? People start telling you to grow up or act your age or stop being childish. And we internalize that as being, oh, the things I did when I was six and seven, we need to shed that and I need to start acting

more serious and like an adult, right? And so this isn't about acting childish right now. There's a big difference between childish and childlike. What this is doing is bringing, I mean, if there's a mission with this book of mine, it's to bring people back to help people realize that your creative imagination is truly the thing that will help set you free or get you to where you want to go with a lot more grace and a lot less friction. If there's a mission with this book, it's to get people to understand and to appreciate that our creative imagination is our ultimate tool to help us to get to where we want to go with more grace and less friction.

And so this idea of being childlike and tapping into an alter ego isn't something new. This is like, for me, a great remembering for people. It's like, you have already done this. And then there are extraordinarily successful people that I highlight in the book that have already done this too. I highlight some clients,

but I more importantly highlight people from history that have used this. One in particular, which is actually the inspiration for the image, that's on the cover of the book. So a lot of people that know me know that when I started in business, I was terribly insecure, lacked confidence, and was not decisive with any of the work that I needed to be doing to get my business out there.

It's because I felt like I looked like I was 12 years old and who was going to listen to me on the baby face. Yeah, the baby face. Yeah. I hadn't thought about that. I have that too. Yeah. So now I can worry about that also.

Oh my God. You're going to be my client for a long time. Yeah. But, and so he was stopping me. And I was like, who's going to believe me to talk about mental game stuff? I look like I'm 12 years old. All this narrative in my head, was it true? No, because I was already getting really great results with young athletes that I was working with.

I wasn't asking to go work with pros yet. I wasn't qualified. But I was qualified to help that young group of teenagers who were ambitious. But I still wasn't getting out there. So I developed a belief at a young age that, anyone who wears glasses is smart, articulate, they're intelligent, because my best friend growing up, Mark had glasses. And I mean, he won literally the national math test in Canada. Is it a math athlete? Yeah. Oh, he was so smart. He got me into the appreciating science.

And so he had glasses. And so again, we adopt beliefs at a young age and whether they're true or not. So I was like, wait a second. What if I used, I used, I used, this alter ego when I played football and it was Geronimo. You know, Geronimo really doesn't fit for for business. Yeah, it could also be a little racist. Yeah, too, too aggressive. And so I was like, but this idea would work.

So I went out and I, and I stepped into that character when I put on my helmet and I clicked that chin strap on. That was the, that was the moment where I'd be intentional about that self that I'd bring into the table. but I didn't have, I talked about how important it is to have like a totem or an artifact, you know, put something on, wear something. Yeah, we'll get to that. Yeah. And then I get into that there's the psychological phenomenon in the science behind why that's effective.

But I went out and I bought a pair of non-prescription glasses in the late 90s, long before wearing glasses was actually cool. They have lenses. They're not lensless. Like, that's very quickly. Yeah. They're, you know, now it's popular to wear it for dress. But I went out to the lens crafters in West Edmonton Mall and I bought a pair of glasses. And even the optometer is like, you got 2015 vision.

You don't need glasses. And I'm like, no, I get that. I get that. Just give me the glasses, please. My alter ego needs glasses. His vision is terrible. It is terrible. But I used it as my reverse Superman.

I put on those glasses and I stepped into that Superman version of myself in business. And that name that I gave myself was Richard, which is my first name, actually. I was Richard in business. And Richard never thought of himself being indecisive or insecure about any of that stuff. he went out and you took action because he believed 100% in what he was doing. It allowed me to move past whatever those insecurities I had. And so people think that sometimes those glasses are like an homage to myself. And it's not.

Those are a replica of the glasses that Martin Luther King wore because he had perfect vision as well. And I did a speech in 2004. And I talked about how I, you know, I use the glasses, but then how I use it in a larger context where I'm working with athletes to help build an alter ego for their performance and other professionals in business. And, you know, just I was talking about just the mental game of stuff. And she came up to me, this lady came up to me afterwards. She said, you know, I loved your talk.

And I loved what you were saying about the glasses because Martin never used glasses either. Or never needed glasses either. And people don't know that. And I said, and I looked down at her name badge and it was Credit of Scott King. Oh, wow. And so, and then she went on to tell the story about how he, He used them because he felt like he was carrying such an important mission, and he didn't want to get in the way of that with his own, maybe frailties or insecurities. And he really wanted to honor that.

And he wore them to be his distinguished self. And those glasses were almost a shield against any of those sort of arrows that would be thrown his way. And now at the Atlanta Hartsfield Airport, there is. I know. They're on display. They're on display. And there's a little note card that says he had perfect vision. and he used these to step into his distinguished self.

You're listening to the Jordan Harbinger show with our guest, Todd Herman. We'll be right back back. 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 Jordan Harbinger.com slash deals. If you'd like some tips on how to subscribe to the show, just go to Jordan Harbinger.com slash subscribe. Now back to our show with Todd Herman.

You got to put a little QR code on the display case. 12% off my ultra ego book. I need to do a partnership with Warby Parker. That's what I used to do. Yeah, there you go. I'm going to head there after this and pick up my alter eco glasses. You met Bo Jackson, too, who we all know from the Tiger Electronics game that flips over. One side is football and the other side is baseball or possibly Nintendo.

Yeah. He uses this, too. A lot of the people in your book, of course, are people that figured this out maybe on their own in some circular way. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So I was doing, again, I was doing another time. in Atlanta, and I was in the green room waiting to go on stage.

And all of a sudden, this, you know, physical specimen of a human being walks through the door. And I'm like, oh, my God, I played that guy on Nintendo as a kid. And that's Bo Jackson. So he, like, B-Line and kind of walked over there. I was the only one I was in there. And he's like, hey, I'm Bo Jackson. I said, yeah, I know who you are. You won me a lot of games on Tecmo Bowl as a kid because people don't know.

He was the cheat code. You could hand the ball off. You could hand the bell off to Bo Jackson. and you couldn't tackle him. You could maybe push him out of balance, but he would never be tackled. He was the ultimate cheat code. So he laughed and he's like, yeah, I've heard that before.

And he said, are you talking? And I said, yeah, I'm going up next. I said, although I might have just got bumped by you. And he laughed. He said, no, I came in really early here to see a friend. So he said, what are you going to talk about? And I said, I'm going to talk to him about, like, just, you know, what I call the triune athlete,

the mentally, emotionally and physically tough athlete, but I'm going to talk to him about how to build an alter ego to really bring out the best of their capabilities. and really find the zone. And he kind of looked at me and got this, like, quizzical look on his face, on his face, kind of cocked his head to the side. And he said, BoJack's never played a down of football his entire life.

And I'm like, interesting, tell me more. And he was like, yeah, you know, if you know my history, I was an angry kid. Like, I got into trouble. And it sounds like anger would be a great emotion to take on the football field, but it wasn't helping me because I'd get to take penalties. I wasn't that coachable. and one night I was watching a movie

and this character came on the screen that was cold, calculating, methodical, unemotional. And I sat there and I thought, wait a second, why didn't I go out on the football field as that? And so I don't get into as much trouble because right now I'm super emotional and that's not helping. And it was Jason from Friday the 13th.

So his alter ego was Jason. And people are like, every time I tell it, sort, People are like, what? Here's someone who's angry and he chooses a serial killer. Yeah. And I'm like, this is the power of the human imagination. It's your takeaway.

Not my takeaway. Someone else judged that and says, why, would you go out as a serial killer? What does it matter? The result he got was the only athlete in the history of American sports to be an all star in two major leagues, two major sports, major league baseball and the NFL. Kind of hard to deny that he's maybe figured it out a little bit. And again, he also had phenomenal physical. skills, but there are so many athletes I've come across and other people have seen who are like,

there is no way that guy shouldn't dominate in the league and they wash out and they don't make it happen. So yeah, he stepped into Jason and that's who he activated when he went out there. And he said, I'm sure you don't talk to the kids about goals, but, you know, I didn't have a goal of getting to the NFL. I just had one mission to destroy anything that got in my way. Now, on that field of play, Again, context matters. On that field of play, what a wonderful way to get the best of yourself. Because if you're carrying a football, destroying everything that gets in your way is kind of what you need to do because you need to run over people. So very powerful.

And so, but could he take that out into the real world or real world or off that field? No, but that's the power of this. If people started living more in context, when I go home, I don't bring confident, decisive and articulate dad to my kids. That's not who they want. That's not helpful. Yeah. Instead, I bring playful, fun, and gentle self.

And where I got the word gentle from is because I did, I'm a new dad. You know, my oldest is coming up on six. And a few years ago, I was home. And again, I'm a challenger personality. That's all I do is coach, train, you know, do live events where I'm challenging people constantly to push past things and to get out there and perform. And, you know, I'm dealing with some tough personalities like pro athletes, not necessarily easiest personalities, public figures, not necessarily easiest personalities.

And I need to break through that because they've got nothing but yes people around them. Well, they're not hiring me to be a yes person. And so it would be very easy after nine hours or ten hours of that in my day to go home and just carry that emotion and self with me, right? Yeah. So easy. And in some ways I would. Now, I definitely challenge my kids, but that's because I want them to grow.

Sure. But I'm not, it's a different thing. They're not like this artwork sucks. Exactly, exactly. Who do you think you are? Get to your room. So the alter ego, first of all, we can have more than one. So you have like the dad alter ego that brings out the best qualities in your natural self that would fit that context.

Yeah. So the alter ego is a version of who we are deep down. Because even with Bo Jackson and his anger thing, nailed it. He wasn't born. It wasn't born angry. That's exactly it, Jordan. That's exactly it. You nailed it.

It's that you just said natural self. What's the natural self? That's where we're all trying to get back to is figure that thing out, right? We're all, like, I mean, my job is to peel the onion away. I talk about in the world of performance, the number one thing I am doing with people, more than anything else, is subtraction. I'm deleting and removing most of the time. You know, if you're trying to climb to the top of the mountain,

the people who get there the slowest are the ones who want to take everything with them, right? All of their trauma, all of their past hurts, all of their judgments or whatever. Or, you know, it could be like building a house. It's just anyone who's trying to pack a lot of stuff on them doesn't get there. It's slow. The most, the highest performing people, we're constantly removing. It doesn't work. Get rid of it.

Chuck it away. And so I'm subtracting and deleting. And what an alter ego helps us do. do is compartmentalize you're like, you know what? I'm not going to take all of this other stuff, but I'm going to act through Oprah because we do this. It taps into this grass is greener on the other side effect that we all do. Right. You look at me or you look at someone else and you're like, oh, I can see why that guy has it all together. That lady has it all together. We do. We just, we minimize a lot of things. Well, I'm the, what the personal development world likes to do is

try to fight the internal resistance with another force called willpower. It's been the number one tool that's been bandied about for decades and decades, willpower. Just do it. Just do it. Just grind it out. And I'm sitting here with my clients going, why? Why would you do that? Why would you meet force resistance, which is backed up by who knows what narrative. And I don't want to go poking around all that stuff to see. because again, I'm not a therapist. I'm not saying you don't figure that crap out. I'm a perfect example of that.

But that doesn't mean it has to stop you from doing the things you want to do right now. So you've got this force called resistance, and it's backed by anyone of a number of different things, judgment, imposter syndrome, trauma, all sorts of other... Social programming. Nefarious things, exactly.

And then they say, yeah, but we're going to meet it with the force of willpower. resistance is backed up by the unconscious a bunch of unseen things that habitual attitudes beliefs willpower is very much a conscious idea that's like a mouse staring down at an elephant good luck with that have some people use willpower to overcome things sure they have because again this isn't about saying that something doesn't work yeah you're just swimming upstream though if you do it that way yeah so i'm like well why would i that's that doesn't make sense in my head that I would use that force.

Instead, I'm going to use the most powerful force that we have, our creative imagination, suspend the disbelief. So if you think that you stepping into Wolverine or the Black Panther or Wonder Woman or Ziva David from NCIS or insert any character that you're inspired by to move through, it moves around resistance with far more grace so that you can get yourself out there. like that's i've i've had this yeah so you're sidestepping this instead of meeting it head on yeah it's like oh that resistance the jordan deals with that but super jordan doesn't have the same it's it's like the principle of ikedo it's power versus force sure i'm going to take that force

and throw you this way don't worry about it and and it's can continue to move through tell me about the enemy right this is another force that stops us from being our best self but it's kind of required right you can have the yin without the yang yeah yeah without the Exactly. The enemy isn't there for us to hate on it. The enemy is there for, again, us to establish this, like, healthy relationship in our head. Where instead of having this, like, merry-go-round of just beating ourselves up, understand that, no, no, no. There's this enemy that's here to try to keep us safe for whatever reason. Or to, you know, whisper kind of seeds of doubt so that we don't go out and take action. Again, it's to keep us safe. well, this enemy, again, I talk about it in the book about how it uses these forces. Common forces are things like we always talk about things like judgment and worry and doubt and social pressures and trying to conform and things like that. But then there's more insidious ones that we've kind of highlighted personal trauma, tribal narratives, like us acting through, you know, some people say they don't even realize that they're doing things because they're actually an American. Really? Like what?

Well, so... Versus as opposed to a Canadian or with American. Or, yeah. Like, an American does this. This is who I am. This is what Americans. This is what we... What kind of examples are you think? Oh, Canadians are so nice.

That's right. Yeah, Canadians are... Correct. That's, yeah. I'm Canadian, so I get to say it, right? Or Americans are... Americans are proud. Americans are tough.

You know? Oh, yeah. The tough thing is real. Yeah. And so how that plays out then, is, um, quick to argue maybe. You know, that, that, I'm not quick to, oh, wait. So, but I'm not saying that that's everybody, but sometimes we can act through, uh,

that national self, right? Well, Bulgarians don't do that or Italians don't do this, or Italians are this way, right? And, and you, and you end up playing to a stereotype and you don't even realize that you're doing it. This tennis player, Rachel from the book was doing this, right? Yeah. So one of the kind of other forms that tribal narratives comes in, tribal narratives are all things that, or there's this layer that sits below or unconscious called core drivers. And these core drivers are things like our family, you know, we can be very motivated by our family or we can be sometimes trapped by, you know, what we think we can do because of our family. Then there's like, sometimes, you know, you end up adopting the core drivers and the attitude. and beliefs of the profession that you're in.

You put on a police uniform and all of a sudden you start acting, you know, in a certain way. Sometimes it's very, a lot of times it's actually very helpful, but sometimes it hurts you. But one of the other qualities is these, is this thing called values, right? We operate through our values. And Rachel was a top, top tennis star and started working with her. And I was working for a little while. and I hadn't quite cracked the nut on why she was sort of sabotaging herself on the court.

And we were sitting down at lunch one day. And Rachel, by the way, she was the type that classic was supposed to be winning a bunch of major championships, but she hadn't yet. And everyone's going on what's going on here? Well, yeah, yeah. This is amazing talent, but she's not winning. And so we're sitting down at lunch one day here in New York City over at, Penelope's on the east side. Best BLT in all of New York City, by the way.

It's a great place. And I grabbed the bill when it got a place down. And she reached across to grab her from me. And she started to get really annoyed by me. And because I had paid for the previous two lunches that we'd had. And then it kind of dawned to me. I'm like, oh, wait. She is 100% driven by fairness.

And that was why she was sabotaging herself on the tennis court. because she would get out to a fast start on people and just start beating them because she's just that much better than them. But then she would immediately start taking the foot off the peribial gas and allow that person to start getting back in the game because she was feeling bad that she was beating people so badly at her core. At her core driver, she felt bad for that other person. And so she wants to beat them, but not like terrible.

And that's her being fair. And that's her being fair. And so when I brought it up to her, or in so she would take the Ford off and the worst thing you can do in sport is give someone momentum. Momentum is everything. As soon as you give someone momentum,

then they have confidence. When they have confidence, they have certainty. And now you've got someone that has average that has now been equalized to your level. And then she would lose matches that she should be winning. So fairness though,

on that field of play does not matter. Now we're not talking about sportsmanship. That's a completely different thing. But being fairness, actually you're being very unfair by not beating someone like you can because you're robbing someone of the opportunity to grow because that person is not getting an actual insight into how good they actually are. And so if you beat them as badly as you can beat them, what you've just done is you've given them and shown them the real gap that exists and that you know what? Maybe I need to be getting

myself on the court more. I need to find myself a better trainer or whatever the case is. So it's actually more fair to do that. And to other people, I mean, I'm not going to argue people about whether that sounds mean or whatever. Again, it's the field of play of sport. That's where it exists. We're not talking about in the context of like teaching eight-year-olds how to play soccer. That is all about development and growth, not about winning and losing at that point in time.

So anyways, we created the alter ego. So her core self really values fairness, but not on that field of play. So we put her to the sidelines. and now fairness becomes a part of the enemy's way of trying to pull you back into that world. And her alter ego would in that moment be able to talk back at it when she kind of finds yourself sabotage. She's like, listen, now you can have a tennis match conversation with the enemy in your head. And it's extremely healthy now because you see yourself as this dual heroic self and this

trapped self where the enemy wants to pull you in. And you're like, listen, get to the sidelines. This is my court. I own this thing. Fairness belongs out there, not here. I own this. Typically, the conversation would sound a little bit more colorful than sometimes people's heads. Sure. Because it helps to really set the emotional tone of it. So, um, but that enemy, it's just, we all have it. We all have that voice that we can feed it. It's like the, the Cherokee proverb or analogy of the old Cherokee chief talking to his young grandson. And the old Cherokee chief says, I've got two wolves living inside of me. One is the wolf of jealousy, pride, ego, trauma, anger, resentment, judgment. The other wolf is of joy, happiness, growth, helpful, and on and on.

And the little boy says, which one's going to win? And the old Cherokee chief says, the one I feed the most. And so this helps create that great duality of, like, really feeding that more powerful wolf that we have inside, too. You're listening to The Jordan Harbinger Show with our guest, Todd Herman. We'll be right back after this. 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 just heard, visit jordanharbinger.com slash deals.

And don't forget the worksheet for today's episode. That link is in the show notes at jordanharbinger.com slash podcast. And if you're listening to the show in Overcast, please click that little star next to the show. We really appreciate it. And now for the conclusion of our episode with Todd Herman. So we're creating these stories in our head because it's funny that these, the concept of fairness then melds into this professional tennis player. It's like, well, nobody wants to be unfair.

Nobody wants to be a bad person to be a good athlete. Some people obviously are doing that. But now it makes a little bit more sense that these guys and gals probably can't really control which one comes out. They're feeding the bad wolf because it serves them in the field of play. But then they bring that into the rest of their life and it screws everything up. They can't hold a relationship. They don't have friends. They're freaking breeding, fighting dogs or something like that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, exactly. And this is what makes this so healthy is that we start to see ourselves as, as the many selves that we actually are. In fact, one of the core theories of psychology that's been torn down in the last few years, a fundamental principle of psychology has been that the human being who has a single self, identifies himself as a single healthy self, is the most mentally healthy. That was always a key core principle, fundamentally proven to be untrue now.

They've actually abandoned that idea. And it's actually people who see themselves as a single self, Jordan here is the same as as at home as he is in business as he is in sport or with his friends or whoever, that's actually where you find typically the highest rates of mental health issues. People who identify and understand that they have multiple selves. There's multiple contexts of how I experience life are extremely healthy mentally. Because we live now on that field. It's like this is my work self.

This is my home self. And so if someone from my work self sees me at home and they go, Oh, you're so different here. Yeah. That makes sense. Right. Yeah. It's like, yeah, I'm not running around yelling at people in my house.

I'm not yelling at my kids to finish the project on time so we can get the art campaign out to NBC or whatever the case is. Yeah. Of course. I need to do that. Right, Jen? That was a nod. The yes nod. So people.

So people know that. Yeah. Yeah. I'm not. I'm not faking it well. There was a smirk. Yeah. Mm-hmm.

It was more of a mm-hmm. Yeah, exactly. All right. So how do we get into the alter ego? How do I come up with the whole thing in the first place? Yeah. So, I mean, the first thing I want to just like impress upon people is, A, understand you already know how to do this.

You did this as a kid. Yes, in the book, I walked through the actual process because, you know, I codified it because I was actually, you know, being paid to do this. But there's no one way to do it. It was actually one of the struggles I had with writing the book. because it's, you know, a book is you've got to turn a page and its process and stuff, but really it's like the center of town. There's many ways to get there.

So, you know, I even encourage people in, I think it's chapter number four after I kind of lay the foundation that, you know, going forward, if you want to skip ahead to chapter 12, go do it. Because then, then you're going to bounce back to this one to learn more. And it's, and that's fine. But how we do it first is always in context. Where are you building this all three you go for? Like what is the place that is maybe frustrating you the most or where you want to get the biggest win right now?

Is this something we can do in real time or is it going to take three hours? No, in real time. Should we do it right now? Let's do it right now. All right. So the biggest win for me would be delivering like a really entertaining but educational program. Yeah. Like this.

Okay. Great. So if the context is business, more specifically, that interviewer person, that's that role that you want to, right? Right. Yeah. Yeah. But I don't want to be boring. But I also don't want to be like, I'm so funny.

There's no content. Great. So what would you be frustrated with right now? What am I, like, what could be better or what am I frustrated with my performance? Like, what isn't coming out right now? You know what? Yeah. I have the answer to this.

I was just doing some coaching on camera. And one of the, I thought, oh, I've got to be a certain way on camera. I got to do these certain things on camera. The whole day was like, hey, how come when we talk to you, you're really funny and you have all this cool commentary and you're really relaxed? And then the cameras turn on or the mic is on. and you don't do any of the stuff that makes all of your friends and family like you. It's just totally different. People go, is he the same person that he is when he's on air?

I am more interesting and funny and fun when these cameras are not on when the mic is off. Yeah. By a factor of 10. Okay. So what is that a byproduct of, like, is it because you're more in your head when you're doing this? Probably. Yeah. Because, I mean, to the listeners, by the way, because you,

interviewed me before. And in fact, the interview that you and I did years and years and years ago was the first time I ever talked about alter egos in public, unless someone had paid to come see me speak of what so. So I'm, uh, cool. But you are world class at asking questions. So if you're getting in your own head, it might be because you're out thinking things for yourself, like overthinking things and you're, I mean, again, I'm just spit. Yeah, that's for sure, true. Yeah. Which means then that there is, there has not built, that you have not built up possibly an innate trust that if you didn't have a bunch of things written down in front of you, that you would maybe somehow lose control of the interview and it would like derail off into some, you know, terrible place or something. And it's not even just having notes. That's part of it for sure.

But even in front of the camera, it was like, hey, Michael Port, my camera coach was like, hey, hey, Michael Port, my camera coach was like, hey, you're turning into like this, all right, everybody, welcome back. And it sounds kind of good on its face, but it doesn't, there's no reason for me to do that. I don't need to do that. I can just be like, hey, welcome back, we're doing this. I can talk, I normally talk, and it would be better and more relatable than the BS thing that I've seen on TV. Sure. So, okay, so we've started to find out, like, what are the things that are frustrating.

what would be those like if there was like a superpower or there's the characteristics that you're bringing out what are the ability or how you want to be showing up most like what's that version that you want to be in the interview? I would like to just have my normal personality this is so ridiculous but the you know one drink in had a beer sitting at a bar with friends

chatting so relaxed yeah there's this element I'm just like really on fire when I get into certain conversations. Oh, I know. I know. Because I know you personally. Yeah, that's true. Literally when we go to events, we have to both be mindful of the fact that we don't, we don't actually isolate ourselves away from other people. It's like, hey, inside voice. And also, you're totally talking about the person who's on stage right now. It's not nice. You know, it depends on what we're doing. Yeah. Yeah. So if I could get that version to come out on, and I do sometimes. It happens. And when people see that, they're like, wow, that was, you were on fire on that episode. And it's

This is actually you right now. Yeah, this is here. This is, but I mean, again, it's because, A, you can't beat yourself up because you've got, I mean, you're one of the top people on the planet in this, in this genre. So, um, uh, but it's also because you're trying to bring the best thing of the other person. It is.

You know, and it happens whenever I try to improve my, I'm always trying to improve my interview skills. So it's whenever I'm on the edge of like, oh, I need to focus more on this. I get out of the, I get back in my head because I'm like, oh, remember to stick to the practicals. Oh, yeah. remember to guide the conversation. Yeah, yeah.

Yeah. So, but you kind of just hit on one thing, which is that relaxed self that you want to bring out there. Is there anyone or anything that, like, you look at and you go like, oh, that's, that's a, that's a great kind of, you know, shining, you know, example on the hill of would be amazing to constantly have that. Like, again, so I said, for myself, it was like, you know, that's super. version, like he took off his glass or put on glasses to become Clark Kent. I'm putting them on to put on my cake. Yeah, it's funny. You don't think of Superman's alter ego being Clark Kent. You think of Clark Kent's alter ego being Superman, but it's not true. He was Superman his whole life. Yes. And he used Clark Kent to blend in. And that's, and I say that in the book, right? And how

that's because I do it on stage, I'd say, hey, you know, who's the alter ego? Clark Kent or Superman? and people will be like, because you merely associate alter ego with superpower. And they go, Superman. I'm like, think about it. The real self is Superman, but he put on the glasses to blend into society. Now think about yourself. Who's the real you? Is it Superman?

Or is it this version where you've got all these masks that you're taking out there to somehow blend in, to conform or whatever? So really, what I'm doing with the alter ego is helping you draw that Superman version actually back out so that just like Carrie Grant said, I became that person that I wanted to be. So for you. Yeah, this is an interesting reframe. Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt you, but here's, here's, I just realized this. I'm, I've got the same problem, right? I'm bringing in, I'm doing the Clark Kent thing on the show, but it's like, why are you doing that? Yeah. I don't need that. My alter ego, while I break things at your house, well, my alter ego is actually less interesting

than if I could just not. So my alter ego is when, not serving me. This isn't the real... No, 100%. The Jordan on the podcast is actually an alter ego that's just not tuned correctly. Yeah. It's not working. It hasn't been dialed in yet.

Right. Yeah. And so, you know, to play this out then, okay, so we identified the context. It's the role of being an interviewer in business. Okay. We found the kind of things that are frustrating you and how you would more like to be kind of bringing that actual, more real you that's sitting inside out, which is kind of kind of my argument in the book in the entire time.

Right. The more real you, you're just allowing and using a tool of a character of someone or something else, draw that out of you. I can see, though, why a lot of people would want a different character. I think for a lot of people, like a comedian, when they go on stage, often they're bringing out, that's a different alter ego who's really funny and happy and jovial, whereas, you know, the cliche of comedian is they go home and they're all sad and they're like, yeah, yeah, right?

But for me, I have like the inverse, where if I was just, if you could just have microphones on when I'm hanging out with my friends and family, it would be like, this is great. Oh my God, no wonder this guy has a show. And then you turn the mic on and it's like, wait, what's going on? Yeah. Okay, but to get back to the idea of that relaxed, that kind of just relaxed you, is there anyone or anything that helps to inspire that? Like, is there any other kind of interviewer or, and you don't think it was so literal. Sometimes it's, you know, Kobe Bryant with the Black Mamba. You know, I talk about in the book how he got to the idea of, that, like by being inspired by watching the movie Kill Bill. And that's where that kind of, it was the qualities of the Black Mamba, where I talk about another client who there, alter ego, is a wild buck, like a deer. Like an actual animal? Like an actual animal, right? Because it's not that

it's not that they're going to act like a wild, but it's, it's the, it's the qualities that that animal represents. And so for you, is there anyone that you just look at and you're like, I just like the way that that person just naturally just shows up? You know, Mike Roe is a good example. Yeah. He's a different, it's an entirely different show. Totally. But when he, he'll be doing something ridiculous, like, waiting through fish poop in a tank, yeah. Among other literal dirty jobs. And he'll say something like, he'll just say something off the cuff that you know wasn't scripted that is absolutely hilarious. And the producer's like, oh, we're leaving that in. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Like, it's just awesome. Everything about it is so funny. Yeah. He's not even an interviewer. He's just walking around. But you can, you can.

you know just by looking at him that when he walks into the coffee shop in the morning before filming anything, before looking at anything, he's probably the exact same guy. You just get that feeling, right? I talk about him in the book as one of the people who inspires a couple of other folks's alter ego. Oh, really? Yeah, yeah. For that exact reason. That's great. That exact reason. And I think that's a perfect example for you, too. You know, so I'm not saying that that is the alter ego. No, it's going to be a blend, right? Because it's going to be a blend. possibly but it's like that's a good place to start and when you think about all this conversation that you and i're having right now really the place that i'm ultimately trying to get anyone that i'm

working with or just the listener of them right here right now is to this place of trust when you just like for you it's like when you get to a place where you just trust you know what you know like you've been doing this since the beginning of podcasting 12 years this month yeah there should be you've got you've got muscles you don't even know that you've built up on this you know that you've built up on this and um and that's actually just this this this is a perfect example of uh your dedication to the craft because you're still getting coached oh yeah better right i'm getting more coaching now than i ever got yeah the whole time yeah and and and and but the only purpose of all that coaching should be for one purpose and one purpose only when i'm working with an athlete and they're

pointing their skis down the slope that looks like the the side of a wall because it looks so steep. If they don't 100% trust themselves, trust their skills, trust their training, trust their routines and their practice, and there's just a little, they trust themselves like 90%

that is 2% that leaves a massive gap for their performance and possibly not trusting and they catch an edge and they fall or whatever. So my point is, is the whole point of all this coaching that you'd be getting or developing yourself or showing up is to just trust yourself, right?

Easier said than done, of course. Easier, but, well, yeah, easier said than done. If you face something, again, I'm going to willpower it, right? No, that's why we use the idea of micro, like, I'm going to step into my inner micro where I'm just like, I'm going with the flow. I don't care if I say the wrong word, when I hear something in my head that sounds funny, I'm going to say it. Like, you know, just having that ability, because,

I've been around you. I know that that's exactly who you are. That is for sure true. And so, so now you're getting to that point of, okay, so if Mike Roe is one of those things, it's like, okay, well, it's because I'm stepping into that, I'm a, you know, relaxed self. Because that's what I said when I went, remember when I go home to my kids, I say I go step into that playful, fun version of myself that's definitely inside of me because we're all just bundles of possibility. We didn't grow up being, we weren't born angry.

I wasn't born not playful, right? But the gentle self is that self that I'm really trying to get to so that I can combat that challenge yourself that's in business. So I can bring a gentle self. And that's where my kids, it's more valuable to them.

My middle daughter, Sophie, has this fantastic emotional bandwidth with where she can have super highs and then like, man, like fantastic tantrums. And when that force of having a child's tantrum go off, what you think that the best way to meet that is with your, your adult parent force of like, I'm bigger than you. I can dominate and you get to your room or I'm going to yell at you louder. That does not sound like it's going to. Yeah.

And so I could, I could easily bring that. And so my, I'm inspired by that alter ego idea of Mr. Rogers. Mr. Rogers is like the perfect embodiment of being gentle. And his entire documentary, not entire, but a large portion of the documentary talks about his alter ego. His wife talks about Daniel Tiger, his hand puppet, which he made famous, which is now a cartoon. And she says, when he puts on Daniel Tiger, the hand puppet, that was his alter ego, which was more of an expression of who he really was than anything else. It's so interesting. Have you seen kidding with Jim King?

Gary? No. He, Jim Carrey basically is playing Mr. Rogers, except for his real life is just like that. Mm-hmm. But it's, there's all these, he is serious problems. So he starts to crack. Yeah. Because he doesn't have an alter ego. He's just the same guy on and on. Well, Robin Williams struggled with it. Oh, there you go. Robin Williams is another kind of that, it's that context, right? Like, always having to feel like he was on. Um, and it's tough. But so for myself, uh, I, I'm like, oh, I'm, I'm, I'm stepping into that gentle self, that Mr. Rogers' self when I'm home so that when she's having that tantrum, I don't meet her with the force that I've naturally developed of challenging. Instead, I get down on one knee just like Mr. Rogers would, and I, and I'll reach out and I'll

give her a hug. And the first time I did it felt I'm, I'm like raging inside because I'm so angry at Sophie for going off. I just want to snap you. Oh, I know. And instead, I embraced her. And she melted in a few seconds, melted. and what would have been a tantrum that goes on for 12 minutes was done in 12 seconds. Wow.

And so that was me showing up. And that's the more heroic self. It is. I end my day, put my head on my pillow, and I go, yeah, I chocked that one up. I did good there. How do we practice this other than just trying to remember to do it in the moment? Yeah. Right.

I know there's some things in the book about answering questions as your alter ego, among other practices. Yeah. Yeah, so, I mean, lots of those things. But, again, this is... So we choose a, because we're choosing a person that we admire, or an animal, or a cartoon, I guess. Or an inanimate, like, you know, a lot of people in sport use, like, the idea of a train or a bus. It could be a robot. Like, I mean, there's all sorts of things, because some people are so, you know, like, all over the place scattered with their emotion that the idea of, like, bringing more of a kind of, like, analog robot to the situation is, like, really going to help serve them.

Yeah. And battle that. Okay. So we have an emotional connection with the thing that we're choosing, even if it's a painting. That's why I was highlighting Mike Rowe with you, because the moment you said it, I knew that you connect with that history that or that way that he shows up. Super relatable and fun. Super relatable. And so the moment you're, the more you're trying to force this, it's harder to kind of get that thing.

I'm relatable and funny now. Yeah. Not going to work for me. Not going to work for anybody. Yeah. Yeah. Totally. And so, okay.

So then... So we choose those things. Then we choose those things. And then we go, all right. What is something that I can use as a totem or an artifact to activate that self? So I use those glasses, right? I put on my glasses and those glasses meant that I was confident, articulate, and decisive. And when I put those things on, I was stepping into Richard.

And the more and more I put those glasses on, because the arms of the glasses are going past my temples, it's like a switch that's getting flicked. Right? So it's the reason we need the totem, because one of my things is, ah, do I need that or can I just like envision it? But it's, you got to have that tangible holding the glasses, feeling the glasses go on. Yeah, yeah. Again, folks, like, or, you know, whoever's listening, don't complicate this.

All I'm doing is I'm simply leveraging existing psychological phenomena that we already have inside of us. What this leverages is something called enclosed cognition. We all have this meaning and story that we will, attribute and attach to articles of clothing and items. And I talk about in the book, the study that was done at the Kellogg School of Management, where they brought a group of students into a room, and they had this kind of like 25 box grid, I think it was, where in each box was the word of a color.

And then the word of the word was colored in a different color. So green is yellow, red is blue, right? It's hard to do this. hard to do it because your brain process is the color first, not the word. And so what you have to do is go through it as quickly as you can and say the words. So it's like green, blue. And then so what they're doing is they're tracking people's mistakes, attention to detail and their accuracy. So you come in, you do it. They track all the data. You leave next person, next person, next person. Then they bring in another group of students and they hand them a white coat. And except this time they tell them that it's a painter's. coat. And so they put on the painter's coat and they do it. Track the information. They leave, bring in another group individually and they put on the same white coat as the other group, except this time they're told it's a lab coat or a doctor's coat. Okay. And then they do it. Track all the information. Then, so what's the difference between the people who had the painter's

coat on and regular plain clothes? Nothing. Nothing. Oh, the actual difference. Nothing. The actual difference in their results was nothing. Why? The results were nothing. The results were zero. No, they didn't do any better. They made the same amount of mistakes. They did it in the same amount of time. Why is that? Because when you're in clothing yourself in a painter's coat, you're taking on the creative qualities. Creativity doesn't help you do that specific task. It seems mechanical, yeah. But when you had the lab coat on or the doctor's coat, you completed it in less than half the time and you made less than half the mistakes. Oh, that's so interesting. So just like we're in the coat, you take on the qualities of the people that we imagine that we stereotype. Yeah, because lab coat or doctor's code is methodical, careful, studious,

detailed. So then you did it, you brought those qualities to that moment. Okay. Now, was that you being fake? No, of course not. You're just, you're, you're turning some dimmer switches up and lowering some different ones. Exactly. That was a crap. That's what elements of the alter ego. All it does is you're just dialing up qualities that are going to help you help serve you out on that field. And so, when I'm putting on the glasses, I'm simply dialing things up that are going to help me perform out there the way that I know that I want to. And you're naming them as a group, right? You said you become Richard. Yeah. So I get myself name. And I talk on the book, like just tons of fun, playful ways that

you can actually be giving your alter ego a name. Yeah. What's the process like? Just in brief. Yeah. So it's, it could be using your name. So, you know, Jordan, Mikey Roe, Harbinger. Or like just something like, or it could be something, or Jordan, Jordan, or you can be going with just the quality that you're trying to exhibit. Jordan, Mr. Relaxed, Harbinger, right? I'll work on that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, or Mr. Relax. Again, you're not telling other people. This is an.

So we keep it to ourselves. No, give it to yourself. Okay. That makes it easy. Going and broadcasting it. Totally. No. It's like, you know, I'm starting up as Mr. Relaxed.

What's the most ridiculous one that you've heard from any of your clients or people that have done this? Most ridiculous. I don't, I actually don't judge them because it's just, again, it's like personal. I mean, you don't judge it in front of them, but I'm sure that you thought, that's weird. Well, there's ones where I know that they need to work on them. Okay. How about the most ridiculous instead of the weirdest or negative one? The funniest one.

How's that? Well, I mean, Bo Jackson's goes down as one of the, I think, the most iconic. For me, that's like the most one of the most iconic ones I've ever come across, just because it's, it is a real mindbender for people when they, hear it. But, oh man, you've really caught me on this one. That's all right. We'll, we'll throw that in later as a bonus. So basically, okay, so we pick something we have a strong emotional attachment to. We create the totem. Yeah. The totem is kind of like something simple, I would imagine, because you don't want to get on a whole uniform, you know, yeah, like one of my equestrian riders. Her alter ego was one room and she really wanted to step into that because she was highly

emotional, which then when you're riding a horse, what does that, what does a horse do? Transmutes exactly what you're doing inside. That's why it's the most difficult sport from a mental game standpoint. And so she wanted to, because Wonder Woman was like calm, always in control. And so she went and got a bracelet just like Wonder Woman's. And the way that I tell people is, if you can actually, something else you can add to your totem is if there's a sound that goes along with it, because... That's very Darren Brown, play the little sound and trigger the process. Yeah, because auditory is one of the most powerful triggers that we all have. People think vision, but really auditory is just incredible.

And so that snap that she had, that's when Wonder Woman would get activated. That's good. Yeah. So any glasses that make a sound. Yeah. Or, again, anything could be a hat. That's what I actually think you should do. A hat?

I'm going to give you one. Yeah. I got to wear headphones all the time, though. And the hat is, it messes with lighting for film. So hat has a lot of the top of the top of the box. You know I'm wearing up the whole video. Look, I don't care how you look. It's only about me.

I got to look good. You can look however you want. Oh, George. You're here once. I'm here every day. Every day. I'm here all week, gang. Yeah, so then you've got that.

And then it's that activating trigger, like really being very, again, this is tapping into the power of our ability as human beings to choose how we want to respond to things and being very intentional about that self that we're bringing to the equation. And so the moment I started feeling insecure, boom, those glasses came off. it was because Richard would never think that way. Oh, so you, you want to be able to turn it off if you start going down a bad rabbit hole? Yeah, that's, that's a, that's not a must,

because there's some, there's some totems that people use where it can't be done, but it is, you need some sort of reset for yourself, just to say, hey, well, it couldn't be just in your mind. Again,

where it's like, hey, get to the sidelines, because this ain't your court, this ain't your field, this ain't your interview. Hey, like, be that, like,

don't forget at your core, you're a relaxed, cool cat kind of thing. And so Mike Roe could say that, but maybe Jordan couldn't, right? Like, again, it's this power of suspension of disbelief. But, yeah, just that ability to then activate with intention of like, hey, this is who I'm showing up as, right? Like, even me, like, so everyone can't see it, but I, or you can't hear it, or you can hear

it what I'm saying, but I've got, I've got this, you know, replica Darth Vader helmet. Behind me here. Behind you. and I use that when I sit down and have to write any sort of like marketing copy for my company. You put that on your head? I literally put it on because it's fun to me. You type with that on? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I've got video that, like, people have captured it. And it's just me, again, why can't we be playful? I just feel like it's hard to see out of that thing. I'm not judging. Oh, no, no, no, it's gold. It's like wearing, like, just cool, dark glasses with that thing on. But, um, and it's, do I wear it for like three hours straight? No, but it's just there because,

like, Darth Vader would care two shits about whether or not people are judging, whether or not this program or opportunity, like, whatever the thing is that I'm going to be writing about. And whereas I could, because I'm not a natural marketer by any stretch, I'm a product, I like just working with people and I'm building my system to help people. But there's elements of my role as a business owner and entrepreneur that I've got to do some things that I'm not naturally gifted at. So those are the, those are typically the places where doubt and criticism and worry and stuff creep in.

And so because I teach this and taught this for a long time, I'm like, screw that. I'm bringing out Darth Vader. Yeah. Vader's going to be my boy who writes copy for me. That would be a tougher thing for me in an interview setting. All right. I need to do every interview now with a helmet on in the Darth Vader voice. It's worked for dead now.

Yeah, yeah, that's right. It does work for him. I don't know. You'd have some entertaining interviews if there's, like a, yeah, the breathing sound? Oh my gosh. I'd lose some listeners, but I'd probably gain other ones. You'd probably some game. Yeah. We have to reinforce and program ourselves to do this, right? So one of the drills in the book that I thought was interesting is answer questions as if you're the alter ego. Go to coffee shop in your alter ego, maybe not the Darth Vader head, but maybe

the glasses. Or why not? Or why not? It's New York, you know, just... Exactly. Very lucky to live here. Put the helmet on after you get in so that people don't think you're robbing the place. Yeah, yeah. The other thing that you recommended that I thought was gold was reading and watching interviews, things that you're, if the alter ego is a real person, getting more and more exposure to that, right? Because you're kind of using it as a role model. Yeah. So maybe if you did choose a buck, you'd want to watch a lot of Nat Geo footage of a buck.

That's the one thing about, like, say, a wild buck. Every single national geographic thing shows a bear, a grizzly bear or a cougar taking down the buck. it's actually a lot more rare. The buck stands its ground and fights off like hardcore predators and wins a lot of time. Stomps them to death or something like that. Well, uses his antlers to keep them away. That too. And that's why they're there.

And so, yeah, watching that stuff. I talk about one of my clients in the book, a young 13-year-old kid in the New York area here, literally one of my favorite clients of all time. I think if he could bottle his own personal leadership skills and sell it, he would be just making a mint in corporate. He was just this, he was such a great kid. But he was hitting his growth spurt really late. And so he's in sport and all these other kids are starting to get mustaches and they're getting a lot bigger. And he would start going to the batters box and feeling so intimidated by this six foot tall kid who was on the mound while he's still five foot two.

And it started getting in his head. And he was a naturally very, not naturally. he worked really hard at it, but he was a very good baseball player, like very good. But he started to hit a major slump. And anyways, we're talking. I kind of unpacked this. And I said, hey, do you know who the big lumberjack from back in the day? Paul Bunyan.

Paul Bunyan, thank you. So do you know, do you remember, do you know who Paul Bunyan is? And he said, no. Of course not. Yeah. And I was like, even you didn't know. And I said, okay, okay, great. Our little coaching sessions over.

I want you to go learn as much as you can about Paul Bunyan. Call me tomorrow at four. Oh. Because he was, he always, we talked after school. So he called me at four. and he was like, oh man, like he's amazing. He was this like 100 foot tall or 96 foot foot, whatever the actual size he was. And he was like super helpful for the settlers.

He always protected them. And he could take down a massive, you know, tree in one swing of his axe or whatever. Anyways, long story with it short is that's who we built out to be his alter ego. When he stepped up to the plate, he was going up as Paul Bunyan. And Paul Bunyan would be like, what is, what is this six foot tall dude? throwing a ball at me for i'm gonna he went he went 23 for 23 at the plate wow that's next 23 at bats and he was smacking home runs constantly his dad was like this doesn't make any sense and i'm like what makes sense about human beings yeah um so yeah but to your point so because we want to reinforce right

what how this the more you know about that those qualities the more just resonates and connects with you that's why we love stories and movies so much because we're there's tapping into something you know unknown in us the more you know about that other character or that, you know, black mama for Kobe Bryant, that's exactly what he did. He knows more about black mamas than probably most biologists do. Because we want to reinforce what our alter ego believes about themselves and how they relate to the world. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. By kind of by default. Yeah. Okay. And the origin story is also important, which I thought that was interesting because I thought,

oh, you can just become this thing, but you actually need the back story. Yeah, yeah, yeah. What's going on there? Again, this is the same thing as like the Paul Bunyan thing. More and more, again, human beings. the way our brains are structured, we think in story and narrative, right? There's been, you know, multiple scientific studies that show that when you disconnect the connection between your frontal lobe and your decision-making engine and your limbic system

or the emotional system, someone, it becomes impossible for someone to take any action. So there's the thinking mind, the emotional mind, and then the action and behavior. Well, if you get rid of the emotion, then you're thinking and your actions don't match up. They won't happen. So the origin story is that bridge between what you're building in your mind, the thinking, and those actions that you want to create on the field of play, the behavior that you want. And so the origin story, the more you get connected to that, creates a strong narrative and a strong and emotion, uses the creative imagination now that you're tapping into, which helps you move past resistance and get yourself out there. That's why

being inspired by existing characters, movie characters, superheroes, um, um, uh, animals, or even people from your past, could be an aunt and uncle, a nana or a papa or a grandma, like whatever the case is, those origin stories of where your alter ego came from are really powerful and why they're doing the thing that they're doing, that powerful mission,

like, you know, Bo Jackson's like, I was on a mission to destroy everything that was going to get it my way. Well, why is that? Well, because the origin story of Jason is to just be cold, calculating methodical, not care. This is great.

Why did you get into this in the first place? I know that we sort of left that off the table. Yeah. I got into this and like doing mental toughness and out of just pure survival for myself. So I had a really tough experience when I was 12 years old at a church camp where I was sexually assaulted over the course of a couple of days

by two men. And it like just ruined me inside. Actually when I got home, I was 12 and I tried to drown myself in our family pool because there was just no way that I wanted my family to know what happened. So you didn't tell anybody. I didn't tell anyone until literally less than a year and a half ago. Carried it with me for 31 years.

Your family never knew until. They only found out exactly a month ago when I wrote out a post to myself so that I could call all of my family members individually and I could tell them the same kind of thing and not leave anything off. So yeah, it was December 31st, 2018. I told everybody, and that was after a year and a half of really finally facing it, telling my wife. In 2017. 2017 was when I first told someone with September 4th, 2017.

I told my wife and a good friend of mine because I just couldn't handle it anymore. It would basically bubble to the surface, and there was no way I could keep it under anymore. Otherwise, it was going to end badly. And for me, and I didn't want to carry it anymore. But that didn't make it easy. I had to face, you know, and kind of work my way through it. But it worked out, you know, amazing in the end. Because I just, I said, I didn't want to have, I didn't want to give my kids secondhand trauma.

Like that's, it's like secondhand smoke, right? The person doesn't deserve to get it. And my kids didn't deserve to get this really angry person that had developed inside of me. It wasn't expressing itself onto other people, but it was really, really hard to keep it bottled up. and it was just wearing me, wearing me out. And I knew that on the other side of this would be a way, you know, better version of myself. But just to your early question. So I got into this along with any other kind of mental game strategies that I had to use out of just sheer necessity.

In order for me to survive, I had to like find other ways to navigate this. And so, you know, using an alter ego help me be a little bit more playful, not take myself so seriously, in some ways, forget that trauma. So I'm not, and I actually say to people, like, don't do what I did. Like, don't, don't wait so long to get help and reach out for help. But along the way, despite the fact that I was dealing with all that, I was able to accomplish some pretty good things in life. Sure.

But it was really, you know, using these concepts, help me do that. You can't live your whole life as your alter ego. No. Right. No, that's a, that creates a fractured person for sure. Like, again, that's why that power of context matters. Like, no, I'm building this for, I'm, Mr. Rogers shows up at home, you know, that's kind of that version of myself, which I know is inside me. It's inside of everybody. There's everyone has a gentle self. Of course, they do. That was very Mr. Rogers thing to say. Yeah.

It's inside of you. It's inside of me. Yeah. Yeah. It is. This has been really interesting. I want to give people homework. Of course, the homework will be on the worksheets, which are in every episode, which we link. to the show notes, but I want people to maybe, even if you think you don't need one, just pick a context, create a little alter ego, doesn't have to be anything complex, figure out something that you have an emotional attachment to, and go to a coffee shop with your alter ego if you have no other use for it. I found it impossible to believe that this wouldn't be useful at work and at home, which everyone has that context.

Yeah, absolutely. Even if you're not a performer or an athlete. Yeah, but again, even though you're not a performer, but we're all trying to perform, context of performance is we're just trying to get a result. That's performing. Like right now, like you're performing the act of being an interviewer. We want to have the best version of that interviewer show up. And really the best version of that is that relaxed Jordan Harbinger because he's funny.

He asks interesting questions. You know, all those, that's what we want. What do we do if our alter ego fails? It kind of touched on this earlier. I want to wrap with this. because sometimes you're going to have self-doubt or I'm going to be like, oh, you know what, I've been hyper-focused on the notes or this book is really confusing, so I had to read a bunch of stuff or I didn't adequately prepare for some interview, and it's screwing me up. How do I reset? How do I wipe a slate clean and try to start over? Okay, so A, we're not looking for perfection out of the gate.

Okay. It's evolving, right? So it's like practicing anything. You need to get used to it. me, it's very easy for me because I've been using this stuff for, you know, 40 years of my life that I can step into it really fast because I've been honoring my creative imagination for such a long time. So for other people, they think, oh, well, I'm not creative. You're 100% creative because you're acting creative every single day of your life.

Everyone just has adopted this belief that creativity means being an artist or a writer or painting. Yeah, I suffered from that for a while. Like, oh, I'm not a creative person because I don't paint things on canvas or draw. yet I would probably tell people out of the top five people that are my friends. Jordan is probably one of the most creative people. That's right. Meanwhile, stick figures, not my fortune. Yeah.

Yeah. So A, just understand that we're practicing it. You're going to get better. And then also know that a lot of times the first alter ego that you choose isn't the one that you end up with. They evolve. That's interesting. They evolve.

So this isn't something where you should be like, oh, I know exactly who I want to be because I like the, I liked the comic as a kid. Well, you can. Some people, they know right away. They're like, I know exactly who it is. Other people are like, I know who it's going to be.

And then they're like, oh, it's not quite working. Typically, it's because they don't have a strong enough resonant emotion with it. There hasn't been, there's no good connection to the origin yet. And so keep on evolving with it. That's something I hadn't thought of. So if it's not working for us, chances are maybe we're just not really. You haven't connected with it. Yeah.

Yeah, you haven't connected with it. How do we know if it's something we've really connected with? You're going to, you'll feel it? Intuitively, you're going to, it's like striking oil. The gusher just hits. You're just going to be like, oh, yeah, that feels right. That's good. Because I don't really have one thing.

Like, I don't want, I'm not trying to be Mike Roe. No. I just like certain qualities and characteristics. Then take that. Yeah. Then, and that can be enough again. This has been great. And probably won't way too long, but that's all right.

It was worth the trip, I think. Thanks, buddy. Yeah, thank you. Absolutely. Great big thank you to Todd Herman. The book title is the Alter ego effect. And if you want to know how I have all of these amazing friends that do all of this amazing stuff, well, I'm nothing special. It's about the systems, the tiny habits that I do every

day to keep in touch and reach out to amazing people like Todd. And I'm teaching you that for free. Six-minute networking is the course I developed on this. It was called Level 1. I've upgraded it. I've re-recorded it. It's new, improve, better, everything. And that's at Jordan Harbinger.com slash course. So if you've already taken Level 1, go grab six-minute networking. You'll enjoy that. You'll get a refresher and some new stuff. And don't procrastinate. Come on. You know, people are like, oh, I don't have time to dig this well, but I need this thing now. You had time before. You certainly seem to have time to email now. You got to dig the well before you're thirsty. When you need the relationships, you're too late. It takes a few minutes per day, hence the rename to six minute

networking. And besides, five minute, you know, networking was taken. So here we are. That's at Jordan Harbinger.com slash course. Speaking of building relationships, tell me your number one takeaway here today from Todd Herman. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on both Twitter and Instagram. There's a video of this interview on our YouTube channel at Jordan Harbinger.com slash YouTube. This show was produced in association with podcast one, and this episode was co-produced by Jason the Leveler, DePhilippo, and Jen Harbinger. Show notes and worksheets are by Robert Fogarty, and I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. The fee for the show is that you share it with friends when you find something useful, which is definitely this episode for sure counts as that. So share the show with those who need a little soon.

superpower in their life, a little alter ego action. In the meantime, do your best to apply the alter ego effect for yourself and everything else that you've learned on the show so you can live what you listen. And we'll see you next time. This episode is sponsored in part by Something You Should Know podcast. Finding a new great podcast shouldn't be this hard, so let me save you some time. If you like the Jordan Harbinger show, you'll probably like something you should know with

Mike Carruthers. It's one of those shows that makes you smarter in a practical, useful way. Same curiosity vibe we go for here, just in a fast-focused format. Mike brings on top experts and asks the exact questions that you'd want to ask, and the topics are all over the place in the best way. Recently, they've covered things like why we care so much what other people think, the benefits of laughter, why sports fans get so invested, and what makes people like you or not. The through line is always the same. Smart ideas you can actually use in real life. Something you should know has been featured in Apple's shows we love, and it's got thousands of five-star reviews because it's consistently interesting.

So if you want another show that scratches that I want to understand how people in the world, really work itch search for something you should know wherever you get your podcasts look for the bright yellow light bulb and start listening you can thank me later