The Jordan Harbinger Show - 17: Striking up First Conversations with the Last in Line | Feedback Friday

Episode Date: March 16, 2018

Jordan (@JordanHarbinger) and Jason (@jpdef) are back to banter every week and take your comments and questions for Feedback Friday on The Jordan Harbinger Show! If you want us to answer your question, register your feedback, or tell your story on one of our upcoming weekly Feedback Friday episodes, drop us a line at [e-mail]. Now, let's dive in! On This Week's Feedback Friday, We Discuss: You and your childhood friend's relationship has endured many trials. Will it survive the month he's spending on your couch quoting South Park catch phrases? Where's the line where loving what you do for a living crosses over into obsession? How do you make sure your voice doesn't get drowned out in a group conversation? Vocal demonstration: the cork technique. How do you move past the old boss defaming you among colleagues in your small industry's network? What's the best way to handle a friendship with someone who's become hostile and difficult to be around since receiving bad news? How can you get better at striking up first conversations? Recommendation of the Week: Dirty Money Quick shoutouts to Giuliana in South Africa and Maijid in Ghana! Have any questions, comments, or stories you'd like to share with us? Drop us a line at [e-mail]! Connect with Jordan on Twitter at @JordanHarbinger and Instagram at @jordanharbinger, and check out Jason's (@jpdef) other show: Grumpy Old Geeks. You can also find him on Instagram at JPD. 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 leaving 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.

All right, welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. I'm here with producer Jason DeFilippo. Here on the Jordan Harbinger show, we love having conversations with fascinating guests, of course. Our primary purpose, though, we pass along there and our experiences and insights along to you. In other words, the real purpose of this show is to have conversations directly with you wherever possible. And that's what we're going to do today here on Feedback Friday. We take a bunch of your questions, your queries, we dish out some advice, we dish out some bad advice and some good advice.

just so you guys know. Not deliberately bad advice, just occasional. And, you know, a lot of it, I feel like, Jason, sometimes on the show, half of what we do is tough love and the person's already answered their question, or at least in part, answered their question. And then the rest of it, I'm always sort of surprised that even, I'm often pleasantly surprised at the wisdom that comes out on this show. Not just mine, that would be a weird, self-serving comment, but.

I was going to say, that's kind of arrogant. I'm often surprised at how smart I am, Jason. And no, I just wanted this. Yes. Oh. But I am amazed myself some days. I really do. But I really am impressed by the amount of combined life experience that you and I have that

results in things that to me and you probably seem obvious, but to somebody who's never been through a certain situation are not. And what you just mentioned before about people answering their own questions, I think that is something that is kind of fascinating. When people talk through these questions when they send them to us, by the time they get to the end, they kind of understand what their problems. are. And so they look to us just kind of for verification. And I like that part. Because, you know, when you write things out, it really does come out in your head and you get to kind of chug through it.

So when you have a question for feedback Friday, start writing it down and see if you can kind of come to your own conclusions, but then send it to us and we'll tell you if you're right or wrong. Yeah, exactly. According to our unassailable opinion, naturally. Yes, the opinionometer. Yes. Is what we'll call it. Please send your questions to Friday at Jordan Harbinger. You can send anything else to me, Jordan at Jordan Harbinger.com. But if you send a question for feedback Friday to Jordan instead of Friday, it goes to the end of the line. You're the last in line.

Wow. Not a bad falsetto. Not a bad false settle. Thank you. Appreciate it. Before we begin a little unfortunate announcement, we're getting a lot of questions about, oh, I'm getting emails from you from Art of Charm. That's not from me.

That is from AJ. his emails are not from me. He uses the last name, Harbinger, but that's my last name. It's not his last name. We are not related. It's a branding thing. I'm not sure why that is still continuing.

I'm going to leave it at that. I'll let you draw your own conclusion from that, but those emails that you're getting from the Art of Charm are not from me. I have nothing to do with the company at all anymore. So if there's confusion about why you're getting emails from me, that's not from me. That's from somebody else.

who is using my last name. As always, we've got some fun ones and occasional duzies, so I can't wait to dive in. All right, what's the first thing out of this mailbag? Hey, Jordan and Jason, here's my situation. I've been lifelong friends with a guy who I've grown apart from. Growing up, we were inseparable and spent most of our free time together. At some point, through high school and into college, we began growing apart. I became very ambitious and interested in pushing outside of my comfort zone

and living a kick-ass life with kick-ass women. but he stagnated. A wedge further divided us when towards the end of college, he met a woman who was, and still is, manipulative and controlling. I struggled with what to do and ultimately decided to tell him my true feelings about their relationship. Oh, that's unfortunate, generally. He shut me down and stubbornly refused to hear me. I warned him that if they kept dating, she would pressure him into marrying her,

provide for her as a stay-at-home wife and eventually ensure that she got pregnant to lock in his support for her and her child's life. Oof, all right. We remain distant friends because our families are close, and I accepted that my best friend was lost. I watched helplessly as one by one each of my predictions came true. They've been married for two years and now have a child. Recently, he got a job in Chicago, where I live, and has to relocate from our native Detroit area. Shout out to Plymouth, Michigan. Go Blue. It's a good job at a large financial firm and has the opportunity to be life-changing for his family, bringing them out of poverty.

He had to start immediately within days of being offered the job and asked if it was okay to stay in the very small guest room of me and my girlfriend's apartment for a month. Wow. A whole, okay. All right. All right. If you're that close, it's cool. I emphasized for a month because he put it in all caps. Yes.

It's a long time. I agreed and it worked out with my girlfriend because he's practically family. There you go. He's here now and he's been wanting to spend more and more time with me, but to be honest, he's both uncomfortably awkward and a social liability. My girlfriend doesn't feel comfortable with him spending all his time at our apartment. He doesn't go out and make friends on his own, and when he's around, he's either asking for my feedback on his relationship or quoting South Park to me.

It's weird. Yeah, that sounds weird and annoying, actually. Yeah. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this. I'd like to be honest with him when he asks about his relationship or why it seems like my girlfriend doesn't want to be around him or why I'm always taking him out. But I know the answers will be things that he doesn't want to hear or hurtfully true. So, do I wash my hands of him after this?

Do I cut off my support if he asks to stay longer? If he gets really uncomfortable, should I ask him to leave even though I agreed he could stay? Is there any possibility of me getting my friend back at all? Thanks so much. over accommodating in Chicago. Oh man, this is a bummer because we kind of all have a guy or girl like this in our lives at some point. Yeah.

Not necessarily right now, but so he's made his mistakes. He's made his bed and now he's sleeping in it. And I would be as honest as possible without making him feel unwelcome. Because you don't want to make him feel unwelcome if he's not unwelcome. And I guess to a certain extent he is, but I would leave your girlfriend out of it. you got to make it about your feelings, not her feelings. And it's going to be really tempting to be like, look, man, we're cool, but, you know, Julia, she's just, like, uncomfortable with you.

Because then he's going to never forgive her. Yeah. Because he's going to be sort of mad at you, but he can't be mad at you because you guys are tight and he's never going to forgive her. And it's not her fault because she has a right. She has a right to feel this way. He might get mad at you and he'll probably forgive, but don't let him blame her. So, yeah, he's kind of kind of kind of take the bullet on this one.

He can't blame it on her. Yeah. Definitely. And if he has to stay longer, you can say that it's putting some strain on your relationship with your girlfriend. And again, you've got to make it about your feelings, not hers. This is not her fault. She's actually quite a saint for letting this random guy stay in her home. Because remember, she probably cares more about how clean your house is. She might even be keeping it clean. She's probably cleaning up a little bit after this guy. Yeah, I'm stereotyping a little bit here, but so sue me. And also, there's a safety concern. She doesn't

know this guy. You're gone and she's there alone with him. Like, I don't know. how comfortable that is. It's her house. And if it gets bad, look, you can help him find another place to stay. Is it really that bad? Yikes, I wouldn't even worry about trying to get your friend back at all. You've grown a ton. He's probably, from the sound of it, been the same guy since he got married to this controlling lady and got locked down with a kid.

So you can help him change only if he wants to. Otherwise, no. Just get through this situation. Help him see the light if possible. Otherwise, move on with your life. It's really tempted to think we have to rescue people that we've known for a long time. But the truth is that people grow apart, friends and family alike. And there's just not much that we can or should do about this, especially if it's just, you know, we got a lot of history, nostalgia, you know, that type of thing.

I think it's kind of the sunk cost fallacy when it comes to friendships with that. Totally. Yeah. Totally. And if he comes to you for help, that's one thing. If he seems receptive, great. If not, move on and worry about your relationship with your girlfriend. and prioritize her relationship with you over this one.

I know that's hard to say. I know people are going to be like, you said ditch your old friends. I'm not saying that at all. That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about you have a relationship in your life that is the real deal that's going to result in you having children and getting married. And if this guy and you have grown apart,

it's okay that you don't get along the way that you did when you were kids. It's fine. It's a fact of life. but you can't let it you can't let this become you, me, and Dupree. Did you ever see that movie, Jason? No, I remember the trailers, but yeah, I know what you're talking about.

Yeah, it's something like, I'll spare you. It's something like Owen Wilson comes and lives on this guy's couch for a long time. And I think he lights the house on fire. I mean, it's just, it's what you would expect if Owen Wilson came and slept on your couch and he wasn't a famous, funny actor, but was actually just a, well,

I'm not going to finish that sentence. Yeah. He's just a loser. Yeah. I'll finish it for you if a loser came to your house. But here's the deal. Overaccommodating. You have an awesome girlfriend who is willing to put up with this for you.

So definitely prioritize her over him. Exactly. All right. Next up. Hi, guys. After New Year's Eve, I realized I might have a problem. I do something most of my friends and family think is strange. I really, really, really enjoy working.

And I'm finding it harder to be present outside of work. Even when I'm doing something with friends that I'm, I truly enjoy. I'm 35 years old and I've been an entrepreneur all my life. I identify with being a hard worker, a life learner and enjoy the fact that colleagues consider me talented and technical skills that most people consider challenging. I've run a successful creative business for 17 years. I purchased another business two years ago and regularly dive into new ventures when they excite me. I have a supportive family, but after an hour laughing around the dinner table, I'm ready to get back to my laptop. I can enjoy a movie, but can't wait to go answer my email. I'm not going to hate. I'm the

exact same way. Maybe not with email, but yeah. I worry my daughter is starting to pick up on this habit, as she can get easily absorbed in her own kid tech and often makes nonchalant references to the fact she knows that I will be doing work when someone mentions an upcoming outing. It's like my fun meter doesn't know which mode to turn on. Like seriously, who sits around the bonfire on New Year's Eve, and envisions a new marketing piece. You're in good company here. You're surprised. Yeah, you're in good company.

My friends and family often do the, hello, is anyone there? Because I can tune out whole conversations when I'm in the zone. Where's the line where loving what you do crosses over into obsession? I love my family, but I love my work. Do those things have to be mutually exclusive?

Am I wrong that I don't feel bad about always wanting to be working? Or am I simply embodying the monochever? Love what you do and you won't work a day in your life. I guess I just don't want to be that one person on their deathbed who says, I regret that I didn't work enough. Thank you for your thoughts. Signed in the zone, Zelda.

Well, Zelda, welcome to the team. Yeah, this is totally me. You're a workaholic. Congratulations. It's fine until it messes with family relationships. So I totally get this. You're going to be super successful because of this work ethic. There's almost, you would have to sabotage yourself in so many other ways.

The problem, though, is that your daughter sounds like she might be resenting it a little bit, especially because it sounds like she's being passive, aggressive with you about not being able to do outings because you're working. That's what I got from that too, definitely. Yeah. I mean, kids don't say that when they're like, oh, I don't really mind. Yeah, oh, mommy's going to be working when we want to go to the zoo, you know? Yeah, yeah, exactly. So you need to schedule time to be with her and focus so that she doesn't.

doesn't resent you later on, that's a, you don't, you don't want to have that problem. And everyone else who isn't close family, they can go fly a kite. Do you. As long as your family's happy and as long as you are happy, I don't see the harm. You've got big dreams, you got big plans. Go do them. The work ethic is what separates you from the people who dream but never do. But I would say that now that you've got kids and they're starting to say, mommy's never her home. Mommy's never around. Mommy's never present. That's going to be something that you will regret later. Yeah. I mean, as far as family goes, yeah, you can tune out and think about your business. But when it comes to the kids, they need to take priority. So you definitely need to

put that as, you know, job number one, because down the line, you don't want to be a bad mom just because you want to check your email. Yeah. And look, my plan, I don't even have kids yet. I'm just going to have them learn how to edit audio, you know, then we can hang out all the time. Well, just don't teach him to be a producer, then I'm out of a job. Yeah, like, all right, little Jordy, read this book and create a summary for daddy. Oh, it's slave driver. Remember how I like my show notes formatted. Go ahead and check the Feedback Friday inbox.

All right, what's next? Hey there, I'm 19, and I'm a consistent listener of the show, and it's helped me in a lot of different areas. However, this being a more men-based show, there are a few areas where the tactics that you teach don't necessarily work for me as a woman. When it comes to being more charismatic and having an alpha-based vibe, I know vocal tonality plays a big part. Unfortunately, when I'm in a group of men, my voice tends to get drowned out. It's hard for me when I have to restart my sentence a few times, not to mention it's a little

discouraging to even continue talking at that point. Do you have any effective advice that doesn't just include asking people not to talk over me. Thanks, not a wallflower. So I hate to say it, but welcome to the world of being a woman in a man's world a lot of the time. I feel like we get this letter a lot. Yeah, we do. And the fact is, she's 19, this gal, so she is ahead of her time.

I feel like we get it from people 10 years older and they're like, I'm sick of this shit, you know? Yeah. So it's great. Here's a trick that I use. I'm not quiet, but this is what I use when I do. live interviews when I have to talk around people that are louder, that are just trying to dominate a conversation. I use a lot of nonverbal signals.

So I'll put my hand out with my fingers open because if you keep your fingers closed, it looks a little more aggressive. Keep your fingers open. Put your hand out in front of you. And that will pause a lot of what people are doing because it'll grab the attention of people standing in a circle or someone standing in front of you. That'll pause a conversation. It'll get people's attention.

Don't try to be louder or talk about. over people. That's a losing battle for you. And it comes across as try hard if you're a man or a woman. So don't try to be alpha. Guys will resent it. We resent it from guys too. We're going to resent it from anybody. And you're young enough where people are probably already going to be thinking, why are you trying to get attention in my grown-up conversation? So don't try to out alpha a bunch of dudes, especially guys your age are just not going to react well to that. Quick question. When you do the hands out with the finger spread, where should you? your concentration be kind of pinpointed when you do the hand gesture? Yeah, look at the person who's

talking. The other option, because generally that's going to be the person who's attention. You're trying to get to try to get them to stop talking. The other way to do it could be if someone else is finally talking and the other person who's dominating the conversation is stop talking, you can just do it to the person who's currently talking and then they'll stop as well and they'll give you a turn. But usually there's one person who's just not letting go of control of the conversation, and that's irritating with no matter what. So that's what I would do. I would look at the person right in their eye and hold a hand up just below eye level. You'd have to put it in their face.

But make sure they can see it and just have that hand out. Palm up or palm down? Palm down. So palm facing them, fingers open. Like you're saying five minutes, but you don't have to have your hand at a 90 degree angle. You can put it out. So, yeah, so palm down. Okay.

Here's open. Yeah, there we go. Good. You're going to have to fight harder for attention. That's just the way it is. And if you're a woman and you want to be one of the guys, you're going to have to get used to this and you will get used to this in no time, especially if you're working in a field where there's like all men, like some engineering

or something like that. Is it fair? No, that's how it goes right now. And hopefully one day that'll change. You'll work with people who are listening for your opinion. But you're young and that's always going to be. something you're going to have to fight for as long as you're 10 years younger than everybody else in your circle. All right. Next up. Jason and Jordan, congratulations on the new show. I hope that one day the

folks at the other show realized what they lost. I tried to listen to the show after your quote-unquote departure and it just isn't the same. Unsubscribe. One of your previous shows, it was a minisode Monday on that other podcast. You described some excellent vocal techniques. Can you be more specific about the cork technique. This is where you practice speaking with a cork held in your teeth. Perhaps an on-air demonstration and exact description would help so we can hear what the exercise sounds like in practice. I've been trying it a bit, but I want to make sure I'm not doing any jaw damage, as it is quite the workout to speak with a cork held in one's front teeth. Yes, it is. For those of us who cannot afford a vocal coach, this would be very helpful. Thanks again for

all that you do, signed putting a cork in it. Oh, that's funny. Yeah, I thought he was going to say, for those of us, they can't afford a bottle of wine. Oh, boy, yeah, definitely. Yes. This is how you do it. You talk like this for a bit. Yeah. Uh-huh.

Yeah. Yeah, this is really easy. Get a cork. Generally, one of the bigger ones, like a champagne cork. A champagne cork. Mine is from Corbel, by the way. Mine, I use Francis Ford Coppola winery because this cork is huge. I don't know what the deal is with this thing.

Darcy, my vocal coach mailed it. It's probably Sophia Coppola is probably that one because, yes, I know her champagne well. I enjoy it all the time. But here's the deal. You do it the short end. Not tall ways. You don't put the entire cork from top to bottom in your mouth because that would be really hard. You have to have your mouth open really wide.

You take the end of the cork and put it in your mouth because I can see where somebody could be confused by trying to put it long ways. And that's like almost two inches of cork in opening your mouth and trying to talk. No, it's about the inch side. Sorry, I dropped my cork. You've been drinking that champagne to get to the cork, right? That's right. That's right. Yeah, you got to make sure you put the cork in like you're smoking a short little cigar, not the other way.

If you want a referral to our vocal coach, just email Jordan at Jordan Harbinger.com. I'll happily refer you to Darcy. But yeah, you put the cork in your mouth and read a paragraph, and you do this onomatopoeia. So you do the super exaggerated read of whatever it is. So I think he said perhaps an on-air demonstration and exact description. would help. So you'd put the cork in your mouth and you would say, perhaps an on-air demonstration and exact description would help. And you really have to sort of lean in to each word, each pronunciation, and go through a whole paragraph. Don't read a

whole page. There's no need to do that. Just do a paragraph. This will warm you up in seconds. It's not a full warm up by any stretch, but it will help you become more dynamic in the way that you speak because when you first start talking, you know, you're talking like this, you're not really moving your mouth around, it kind of feels like you are. And then you do the cork and it's like, I've been trying this cork thing and man, is it great because it stretches out your jaw, you're fighting against the cork. Remember, you're not just reading something out loud with the cork. You're exaggerating all of the words in a ridiculous way that you would never actually do. So once you take the cork out, you're much more dynamic in the way that you speak.

All right, next up. Hi, Jordan and Jason. I'm so glad I found your new podcast. I was really missing hearing you guys every week. Thanks for starting up Feedback Friday. The other similarly named episodes on the show that shall not be mentioned were my favorite. Nice. I work in a pretty small industry in Melbourne, Australia, and I'm very new to the industry, where opportunities are often based on referrals and word of mouth. I joined a direct sales company about 14 months ago, but recently had my contract terminated because I questioned the ethics, of some business practices of the owner of the company. They've threatened me with an unfounded and unenforceable defamation lawsuit. But the real problem is that they are putting up Facebook posts referring to their claims, although they don't mention me by name. I've been told that they're privately telling people that I defamed them, and it's obviously making it difficult for me to get opportunities in my field,

although there's no way to prove that they're doing it. I've been directly asked by a couple of people that I respect, for my version of events, and when I tell them what actually happened, they can't believe how much it's all been twisted by my old boss. I'm not sure what to do. I know that I need to increase my network and I need to make sure that I don't stoop to their level, but they're really well-connected, and I feel like I'm being blocked at every turn. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks. Insert funny name here. P.S. Are you guys going to implement something like the social capital program? Because I feel like it's the kind of thing that I really need, but based on the hints you,

you guys have dropped. I don't want to support the quote-unquote other show. Yeah. Okay. So, yes, I'll address that first. We are going to be doing something along the lines of networking and relationship development. We have all new content. It's going to be great. It's going to be an event-based thing. So there's going to be a lot there for you if you want to learn how to develop relationships. We've got entirely new instructors, entirely new teachers, and entirely new content that is much better than, in my opinion, than what we had before because it's evolved, which is great. Now, as far as your problem here, you've got to find mentors and you've got to find champions.

I don't like the word mentors because it sounds very internet marketing. It's been co-opted by a lot of sort of shady people, but you need to find champions in your industry. Go to them for advice. Don't badmouth your old boss actually get advice from these folks. And you can ask them what to do. You can say, this is the situation. I find myself in.

I'm not sure what to do in this situation. Just like you've asked us, let them draw their own conclusions about what happened. Once they get to know you, they'll trust you, they'll fight for you. They also probably know that this person is dirty and fighting dirty. They're just not saying anything because they know how to play the role in this position. So your old boss might be well connected, but that means that their reputation has traveled as well. You can be well connected too. You just don't have to be connected from the top down if that makes sense.

So do great work and you'll stand out. You'll develop a great reputation as well, which will then speak for itself. This person's going to slip up again and has probably done some shady stuff in the past as well. And that will also catch up with them too. So meanwhile, your champions are going to help you cut through this and get work and grow and learn. The only thing you can really do now is be so good that they can't ignore you while having your champions fight for you. And really, you don't need a lot of champions in one particular industry. You just need a couple that people trust and people will gamble on you.

And I think that's fair. Again, anybody who really is unethical and also has done some shady stuff, people know about it or they highly suspect it. And when you start to ask for advice confirming their suspicions, that's something that's going to travel and you're not going to have to worry about it for very long. All right. Next up. Hello. I'm in somewhat of a predicament. I have a friend who is going through a difficult time.

And for the most part, I've tried to be a supportive friend, but there's one problem. I can't stand him anymore. He was already combative and insecure, but now that he's enduring a hardship, he's become nearly unbearable. He angers very easily, and he does his best to be right in every possible situation. He overreacts over everything,

and he actively attempts to make other people feel stupid when they pose different opinions. It's come to the point where I'm embarrassed to be seen with him due to how much he annoys other people. I know this, because I've heard others vocalize their distaste for him, so I'm taking steps to distance myself. He knows this, and though we haven't had a conversation, I'm sure if I brought it up, he would explode and deny any wrongdoings on his part.

I'm still consciously moving away from him. I feel somewhat guilty over this, seeing as how he's going through a rough time with a cancer diagnosis in the family, but I feel that he's going to drag me down if he doesn't majorly change his attitude. I've known him for a year and a half, so this is not a young relationship. Year and a half. What do you think, Jordan? Yeah, that seems like a pretty young relationship, frankly.

Kind of fresh, personally. Is it normal to feel little obligation towards him? Should I do my best to help him? Or would it be better to gain space and assist him from afar, so to speak? I probably know the answer deep down, but my patience is wearing thin and my resentment towards his hostile behavior are making it hard to think clearly about the situation. Sincerely, friend till probably not the end. So my opinion on this, honestly, one, that is a young relationship a year and a half.

Makes me think maybe these are young folks, but people deal with grief in weird ways, and it can amplify negative personality traits in people. It sounds to me like he's asserting control where he can because he probably feels the rest of his life is out of control. Right. So have the tough conversation with him. Look, he's probably going to get mad and then just call him later. Once he cools down, he may get mad again. Then you can let him know you're trying to help and you can set boundaries. You've got to set boundaries here.

You don't owe it to him to let him abuse you and abuse those around you and be a jerk to your friends. You just, you don't. You owe it to yourself to set boundaries for this and then stick to those boundaries. Just because somebody handles grief in a way that's unhealthy doesn't mean you should allow them to spread those unhealthy attitudes, habits, whatever, to you and your circle as well. That emotional contagion is very negative. If you're willing to let everybody's emotional stuff infect you in your circle, Think about this. You're choosing this person's negativity over the health and emotional well-being of you and all your friends. That's not really fair. This guy needs therapy. He might resist it, but he certainly needs it. So what you can do here is offer to help him figure out how to get it. He's going to decline, probably, but that's fine. Absolutely. But then check in on him by phone. You don't have to hang around someone like this in person. It's just too much. You're not responsible for him. You're not responsible.

Help him to see a therapist if he wants it, which he might not. Set the boundaries and stick to them. Check in on them by phone if you feel guilty about it. But really, having someone around you like this all the time, you're not doing them a favor either. They're miserable, no matter what, they can be miserable without making those around them miserable too. I have a theory on this. And it's something that I've actually experienced. It's this person might be just kind of hen packed and beaten down at home.

So everything they always say is wrong. So when they're out with their friends, they try and assert their rightness all the time. And I've lived with people who have done this to me. Everything I say is like, no, you're wrong. You're wrong. You're wrong. You're wrong. So every time they go out, they try and assert the fact that, no, I'm actually right most of the time.

But the person I'm with is telling me I'm wrong. So it's kind of an overcompensation for what they have at home. I think if you look at the situation with those eyes, you might. have a little more empathy towards what's happening to them and be able to just kind of step back and go, oh, they're just not being a jerk. It's their current situation makes them this way. So you can kind of have more feeling towards them and try and figure out what the problem is. And it's not that they're just, you know, an asshole all the time. It's they're overcompensating for what they have in their home situation. And then maybe you can kind of find middle ground and get that person back to

like kind of a normal state without having to dump them as a friend. You see what I'm saying? Yeah, yeah, that makes sense. It does make sense that maybe he's just acting out based on what's happening at home. So maybe there's somebody at home that's reacting to the cancer in this way, do the family member, and then he's just taking that stuff and sort of spreading it around town. And you just, you owe it to yourself to set boundaries. You've got to protect your mind from stuff like this, or it's going to drive you crazy.

And it's going to drive you down. And then you're not doing anybody any favors at all. All right. Next up. Hey, Jordan, I'm a 30-year-old professional accountant. My issue is not that I'm an introvert. It's just that I'm terrible at striking up that initial conversation to create a connection. Once I've made that first connection, things typically work out pretty well, and I believe

I'm generally seen as a fun person to be around and to talk to. In my field, there's a decent amount of personal marketing, but I always find it difficult to take the lead in conversations, as my main interest is politics, which is definitely not a good jumping off point, especially with clients. Do you have any advice on how to initiate conversations at networking events or even just social events in general and what kind of things to talk about? Thanks. Conversationally challenged.

All right. So this kind of goes to some of the earlier conference prep stuff that I talked about where you look people up on social media, you figure out some common interests and things like that, definitely steer clear of politics. It's really easy to find out what people are interested in looking at social media finding out hobbies, but you can also ask if people have anything going for the weekend. That usually indicates hobbies, family status, and things like that. It's usually not too personal, especially in the United States, to ask questions about that. Maybe it's different

in other places, but it's a really, really simple question here to ask what's going on in the weekend. It'll give you a good indicator. You can make some small talk around it. Ask people questions about things not related to work. I know that sounds maybe a little simple, but if you can ask for some sort of advice, people will love you. This is the Ben Franklin effect we've talked about here on the show before. So maybe you ask a client if they're married and for how long, and then you ask them how they knew they were ready to get married because you're wondering about that yourself or you're wondering, hey, how did you know when you were ready to have kids? People love talking about this stuff. This works especially well with people older than you,

with whom you might not have as much in common. So if you find out that their hobbies are things that are just totally outside your area of interest, you can ask them for wisdom instead, and yet this will lead to a deeper conversation that's interesting to everybody. And I like those kind of conversations the best because they don't end when someone's like, yeah, just doing a lot of errands. Awkward silence, awkward silence, right? You can really get into something substantive that people don't talk about all the time. All right, recommendation of the week, man, dirty money on Netflix.

Super interesting. Have you seen this, Jason? I've only seen the one about Trump. I haven't seen the rest of them, though. There's a bunch. There's the Volkswagen scandal. This is sort of a series of a few parts. There's the Volkswagen scandal, the emission scandal.

So they go and they sort of disassemble that and they show all of the investigations and the parts that led through it. It's really, really interesting. My personal favorite was there's a payday loan takedown where these guys ran this huge payday loan company and they show how the business works. And these guys were facing a life sentence. It was just insane. The amount of money they made was bananas. There's dirty money on Netflix. There is that.

There's the payday loan take down, the Volkswagen scandal, the Trump one, and then something about shorting. There's this gal. She shorts pharmaceutical companies. And the special is really about this company valiant pharmaceuticals, and I won't spoil it for you. But, man, this sort of inside look at really corruption and greed is a fascinating case study on the human condition to overuse that, cliche.

I will definitely check it out. I'm just kind of in the middle of Jessica Jones season two. So once that's done, I'll definitely check out dirty money because Jessica Jones trumps all. All right, fair enough. I haven't seen that. And I know you're going to be like, what? But you know me. Yeah.

If it ain't a nerdy documentary, I ain't interested. All right. Hope you all enjoyed that. I want to thank everyone that wrote in this week. And don't forget, you can email us Friday at Jordanharbinger.com. That's Friday at Jordanharbinger.com. If you have an older contact for me somewhere else, delete that. You get your questions to answer down.

the air. We're happy to keep you anonymous, of course. A link to the show notes for this episode can be found at Jordan Harbinger.com slash podcast. Quick shout out to Juliana in South Africa and Majid in Ghana. I just had a birthday. He's waiting for his U.S. visa and helping us out with some podcast tech behind the scenes. Thank you and happy birthday, Majid. I'm on Instagram and Twitter at Jordan Harbinger. It's a great way to engage with the show. I'm no longer at The Art of Charm on Twitter or any other social media, as you all probably know. And Jason, you're on social media as well, yeah? I'm on Instagram at JPD and I'm on Twitter at JPDF, JPDF, JPM, and you can check out my other podcast, Grumpy Old Geeks.

Don't forget if this is your first episode, subscribe so you don't miss any episodes. You can also leave us a nice little review in iTunes. That'll help us stand out from the crowd. You can go to jordanharbinger.com slash subscribe, and it will show you the foolproof way and how to do that. So keep sending in those questions to Friday at jordanharbinger.com. Share the show with those you love and even those you don't. We've got a lot more in the pipeline and we're excited to bring it to you.

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