The Jordan Harbinger Show - 188: How to Get out of Credit Card Debt | Feedback Friday
Episode Date: April 19, 2019If you've gotten yourself into credit card debt, it's hard to see a way out. Minimum payments can be as much as rent and won't always whittle down the debt because your interest rates are pro...bably too high. With thanks again to Ramit Sethi (@ramit) of I Will Teach You to Be Rich, we'll show you how get out of credit card debt more easily than you probably think possible. And in case you didn't already know it, Jordan Harbinger (@JordanHarbinger) and Jason DeFillippo (@jpdef) banter and take your comments and questions for Feedback Friday right here every week! 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 friday@jordanharbinger.com. Now let's dive in! Full show notes and resources can be found here: https://jordanharbinger.com/188. On This Week's Feedback Friday, We Discuss: You're in more credit card debt than you'd like. Should you tell your family about it so you don't feel like you're hiding something from them? While we're on the topic of credit card debt, we share some tips from Ramit Sethi for getting that debt under control (Script found here). After surgery, monitoring, and an almost clean bill of health, how can you encourage your spouse that every pain experienced now isn't cancer? How do you deal with blame and taking responsibility after the breakup of a long-term relationship and the fallout of shared property? When visiting another country, we've advised hiring a local to hang out with and guide you around. But where can you find such a guide? How can you find a suitable, non-nuclear solution for you and your long-time partner to travel together, given different work circumstances? Going from employee to entrepreneur in an industry where name equals credibility, how do you keep your name safe if your business fails? So you want to get involved in politics or some other high-profile career? You might want to scrub those old social media posts; here's how. Your timing for knowing when to interject in a conversation could be better. How do you improve it? Life Pro Tip: Keep a $100 bill folded in a side compartment of your wallet in a doggie poop bag. The money is for emergencies. The bag is for protecting your valuables if you're caught out in the rain. Recommendation of the Week: You Vs. Wild Quick shoutout to Melissa! Have any questions, comments, or stories you'd like to share with us? Drop us a line at friday@jordanharbinger.com! Connect with Jordan on Twitter at @JordanHarbinger and Instagram at @jordanharbinger. Connect with Jason... See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Transcript
Discussion (0)
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger, and I'm here with producer Jason DeFilippo.
Here on the Jordan Harbinger show, we love having conversations with our fascinating guests, and this week we had David Smalley talking about his quest to rid the world of bad thinking. He's actually an atheist and a super sharp guy when it comes to rhetorical arguments and logic.
We also had my friend Hal Elrod talking about the magic of consistent effort over time and his amazing recovery from dying twice, dying twice, and recovering from.
from a super rare form of leukemia.
I also write every so often on the blog.
The latest post is 10 important things I've learned
from interviewing over a thousand people.
I basically went through with Gabriel
and went through all of these older episodes
and tried to find some patterns
in the thinking of successful people
that I've had on the show over the past 12 years
and probably tried and failed,
but at least tried and put forth a great effort
to distill that into 10 discrete ideas.
That's at Jordan Harbinger.com slash articles.
So make sure you've had a look at that article
and a listen to the earlier episodes from this week.
Of course, our primary mission is to pass along
our guests' experiences and insights to you,
as well as our experiences and insights to you.
In other words, the real purpose of the show
is to have conversations directly with you.
That's what we do every Friday here on Feedback Friday.
You can reach us at Friday atjordanharbinger.com.
So how's it coming with prepping for the baby?
You getting everything in order?
Is your studio dismantled for the new crib that's going to go where your microphone used to be?
No way.
I'm not moving anything.
Baby Shemabe.
Baby Shemabie.
No, that thing is sleeping probably in our bedroom for several months, right?
Isn't that how it works?
And then you do some sleep training, which I know nothing about.
And that's going to go in the office area.
And I'm just going to always work from either downstairs or in my studio.
And Jen will probably work right next to the baby as the baby sleeps.
and poops and cries and whatever babies do.
And I think we're safe.
Poor Jen.
Yeah, poor Jen.
She'll love it.
I think we're safe for a minute on that.
I have a feeling she's going to be doing, she's going to be pretty busy, you know.
So I'm letting her dictate this, but no, I've got at least one room in the house where I can do whatever the hell I want.
It's a little small because it's the studio, but I'm like, okay, I need to put a chair in here where I can put like my Xbox or something, you know.
I don't know.
I need some place where I can decompress.
You need your man cave.
I need a man cave.
Yeah, exactly.
And we may even move now, not now, but, you know, we may be moving soon, buying another house,
which is always really fun and easy here in Silicon Valley.
You know, just throw a couple of billion dollars down and pick up a new pad that you have to then tear down and rebuild.
So, yeah, there's a, we like to pile it on all at once here at the Harbinger household.
Moving, having kids, building a business, you know, what else can we throw in there?
I think you might want to go back and re-listen to our podcast with the minimalists because you definitely like to pile it on.
That's right. That's right. Jason, what's the first thing out of the mailbag?
Triple J, I've been thinking about telling my family about my debt issues for the last few months.
I'm currently carrying about $13,000 in credit debt that's barely going down with every month's payment.
It got bad during the time when my wife was in graduate school and wasn't working, so my credit card took the hit.
She's helping, but it still isn't totally manageable. I don't expect my family to step up and get.
me money, but the peace of mind knowing that I'm not hiding my problems seems it may take
some weight off our shoulders.
We seem to be in an unmotivated funk because this debt is crippling our newlywed lifestyle.
Thanks for your show and can't wait to hear your thoughts.
Signed indebted debtor.
So debt is always so stressful.
It really limits your freedom.
It's a huge pain.
I totally get it.
I feel your pain here.
I would say telling your family really depends on the family.
Will they add to the stress or,
will they be understanding? And it seems like they'll be understanding or you wouldn't even be tempted
to tell them because I feel like people whose family is not understanding, it's like, I can't tell them.
It's got to be horrible. Yeah, I've got, you know, probably $80,000 in debt. And if I told my family,
they would be on me every second of every day. Get it paid down, get it done, get it taken care of it.
It would add so much to my stress. So it definitely depends on the support structure of the family.
You have $80,000 in debt?
Yeah, yeah.
Stupid decisions when I was a contractor and the IRS really just likes to hate me right now.
So what are you going to do?
That is crazy.
Wow, that's a whole subject for not on the show.
Yeah, well, if you ever want to talk about how to get out of under from the IRS, I can tell you how not to do it.
I've got 20 years of experience on that one.
On how not to get away with it?
Exactly.
Oh, my God.
I have very little debt.
I have not to rub it in your face.
Yeah.
But, you know, I don't know.
anybody no I have I have a mortgage and things like that but I don't have any credit card
did and I never have I just was always so afraid of it but I understand his situation
here because your wife wasn't working and she was in school and you had to survive I
mean I don't want to rationalize or justify anything but sometimes people have a decent
reason for going into it I would share with the people who care that's always good
if they're supportive and who knows your family might give you a loan to pay it
down over time you might have somebody who says hey look you know you're going to
inherit this anyways here you go
oh, pay me back $1,000 a month or whatever you can do.
You never know.
It's also possible that they'll just lend an ear,
which makes things less stressful and more manageable.
And many of us have our own debt stories.
Jason, obviously.
I used to have, I think, like $168,000 in student loans
in my 20s and early 30s, which obviously that took a lot of effort to pay off.
And on a tactical side,
I'm wondering if you've called the credit card companies
to ask them to lower the interest rate and waive fees
with the idea that you are repaying them.
As often we can simply tell them we're trying our best,
sending regular payments,
and any help you can get in making this more manageable.
It would be amazing.
You'd be really surprised how often you can turn
or they can turn 22% into 14 or 15%
just because you asked and you told them you were drowning in it.
Because credit card companies like to retain their customers
because we customers are actually pretty expensive to acquire.
And that's something we don't think about.
We think banks have all the leverage.
Credit card companies have all the leverage.
have all the leverage. They have leverage, but really they want to keep you around because it can
cost them like $500 plus to get a qualified customer that stays with them for 10, 20, 30, whatever
years. They've calculated all of this, and they figure that into what they're going to give you. That's
why places like American Express will be like, oh, you lost a thing and it was $3,000, well,
you're a platinum member, so we're going to write it off. You know, that is cheaper for them to do. And
frankly, you need a plan of attack to get rid of this debt.
One, figure out which card, if you have more than one, has the highest interest rate.
And Ramit Satie, a good friend of mine from I Will Teach You to Be Rich.com,
he says, don't use your cards.
Literally put them in a plastic bowl of water and then shove the bowl in the freezer.
So you won't be tempted to use your cards.
And if you are, you'll have plenty of time to think about why you want to use them
when you're chipping them out of an ice block.
Look, I'm sure there are less dramatic ways to do this.
This is obviously the funnest, so I implore you.
Freeze those cards.
Freeze your credit.
Literally.
Literally freeze your credit.
This is also my favorite part.
I've got a script here.
This is also from Ramit Zeti.
Follow this script to negotiate a lower interest rate.
It can save you thousands of dollars.
Not many people realize this.
You can actually save thousands of dollars in interest with a single five-minute phone call.
You essentially are lowering the APR on your credit card, which puts a lot of dough back into your pocket.
because $13,000, if you do the minimum payment over time, you could pay 30 grand on that easily.
Easily, yeah.
Yeah, you could pay 20K in interest on that over time.
I like negotiating interest rates wherever possible, and it's crazy simple.
So here's a word-for-word script, courtesy of Rameet.
So, Jason, let's put on our Shakespeare hats and this out.
Let us act some for Rameet Citi.
Of course, act one.
Hi, I'm going to be paying off my credit card debt more aggressively beginning next week,
and I'd like to lower my credit card's interest rate.
Uh, why?
Well, I've decided to be more aggressive about paying off my debt,
and that's why I'd like to lower the interest rate I'm paying.
Other cards are offering me rates at half of what you are offering.
Can you lower my rate by 50% or 40%?
Hmm, after reviewing your account, I'm afraid we can't offer you a lower interest rate.
Sorry.
Well, as I mentioned before, other credit cards from your competitor,
are offering me 0% introductory rates for 12 to 18 months, as well as APRs that are maybe half of what
you're offering. I've been a customer for three years, or however many years, and I'd prefer
not to switch all of my balance over to a lower interest card with a competing bank. Can you
match the other credit card rates, or can you go any lower? Hmm, I see. Let me pull something up
here. Fortunately, the system is suddenly letting me offer you a reduced APR that is effective
immediately. How about that? Yeah, how about that, right? I know we're dramatizing this,
but here's the thing. They have a note in their system or some supervisor knows that if you call
and you go, cool, what I'm doing is leaving because they think you don't know that you can leave.
They think you think, and you might, that since you owe them money, you don't have a choice
because you can't leave, you owe them money. You can pay them off by taking a loan from somebody else
that offers you a better interest rate and somebody else is probably going to be a competing bank
that would rather have you as a customer. That's why they do 0% API cards. They know that if they
loan you money for free, they could have made X dollars on that money, but it's cheaper than paying
to acquire you as a customer in another way. So that's why they offer these offers. You can take
the same balance and transfer it over to another card. They have to let you do that. They cannot
force you to stay a customer. They have to, they force you to pay the money back, but how they get
that money back, whether it's from a competitor or whether it's your hard-earned dollars coming in
over time, they don't have a choice in that. That is, that it's not legal for them to inhibit or
control in any way. So they know that when you call and you say, I've got another offer in my
hand that allows me to transfer that balance that I owe you for zero percent interest for
18 months. Can you lower the rate? They'll go, oh, crap, we're going to lose this guy. And that's
how you go from 22% to 11% or whatever in five minutes. Well, plus your 25 minute hold time, right?
Exactly. Yeah, your 60, 90 minute hold time. I've actually done this. When Rebbe's book came out,
I followed this script. His book, I will teach you to be rich. I used to have a 37.5% APR on my
Amex cards because I missed a few payments. Dang, bro. Yeah. So I called him up. I'm like,
look, I've got an offer from another card, 0% APR with a balance transfer. What can you do for
me because I like having my Amex card. It's great for my points. And they went from 37.5% to 14% with a phone
call. Boom. Easy enough. That's really impressive. And think about this. Yeah, it's annoying. Yeah,
you've got to figure out how to get to the right person and you've got to stay on hold and there's
social pressure and you've got to use this negotiation script. Think about the hourly payment though.
Like, let's say that you're nervous about this for a full hour while you prepare your shaky mess or even a whole day, right?
It's ruining your day.
You just saved like 20 grand.
You could let it ruin two months of your life.
It's still worth it.
It's so worth it.
So go and do it, just suck it up and do it.
Because worst thing, here's the worst case scenario.
They say no.
And then you go online.
They can't raise your interest rate.
They can't do anything worse to you.
So then you go online and you just look for 0% APR credit card.
offer and you call them and you go, can I do a balance transfer?
I'm getting hosed by this card.
And they'll be like, yep.
Yeah, they'll be like welcoming you with open arms.
They'll be like, come on over, buddy.
Oh, you got zero percent APR for 12 month offer?
Can I have 18 months?
Hold on.
Let me see if I can ask my supervisor.
Oh, gee, look, we can do 18 months.
Yep.
You know, you'll be surprised.
You should pay that you should be able to pay this off theoretically with not really any more interest
or at least a significant reduction.
What I don't recommend doing, because I know what some of you creative mofos are thinking,
what if I just do a balance transfer to one, pay a little bit of it off, do a balance transfer
to another, pay a little bit of it off.
You don't want to do that because you pay a fee for balance transfers and it's certain
percentage.
I can't remember off the top of my head what it is, but it's certainly cheaper than
22% compounded over time.
It's cheaper by thousands of dollars, tens of thousands, potentially.
So you don't want to keep paying money on, you don't want to keep paying fees on the money
that you've borrowed, you want to get rid of the debt, especially because it does damage your credit
score to have outstanding debt for that long. But you certainly don't want to be freaking bailing
water out of a boat that's taking on more water every single day and compounding. That's just,
now you're just treading water while adding weights, and that's not a good way to live. It's going to
stress you out. Hope that helps. All right, what's next? Dear Triple J, my wife recently had surgery
for the removal of a seven-pound ovarian tumor and hysterectomy. The doctors,
have found no additional signs of cancer after her follow-up, but even going into the follow-up,
she was convinced she had stage four cancer throughout her body. The doctor finally diagnosed her
was stage one and is continuing to monitor her on a quarterly basis. Now, every other pain
has been diagnosed by her as cancer. None of the other doctors have found anything wrong with her,
except for a 14-pound weight loss identified post-surgery, seven pounds of which probably was the tumor.
How can I encourage my wife that every pain she has isn't cancer?
I've recommended therapy, but she refuses to go, and I can't take the stress of her feeling pain everywhere,
and no doctor finding anything even after extensive testing.
Any ideas on how to get her to think more positively about aging pains?
Thank you, living with a hypochondriac.
P.S. for Jason, Deliveroo!
Trying to end on a positive note.
Why is that so ridiculous and funny every time?
All right.
It's just one of those things.
Deliveroo was the name of that company where the driver got attacked.
Yeah, so Deliveroo is a British delivery company for food.
They have bike messengers driving around London.
And Benedict Cumberbatch, who plays Sherlock Holmes, was on his way to an award ceremony
where he saw four guys beating up a Deliveroo driver.
And he jumped out of the car, beat off the drivers, and saved the Deliveroo driver.
And ever since that, every time we say Deliveroo on Grumpy Old Geeks,
I always have to say it in a British accent.
So, oh, sir, I would like some deliveroo.
Yeah.
That's where it comes from.
It's true because it does sound ridiculous objectively.
Like, there's no scenario in which deliverer, Deliveroo can't be said ridiculously and doesn't also sound completely British and silly at the same time.
But how badass is it that Benedict Cumberbatch, who plays Sherlock Holmes, jumps out of a, I don't know, a London taxi?
I think he was in an Uber on his way to an award ceremony, like dressed to the nine.
And it was right around the corner from 221B Baker Street.
And so everybody that saw it's like, Sherlock Holmes is out here kicking some guy's ass right
around the corner from his house.
How cool is that?
Yeah, where are the cameras?
It looks so real.
Yeah, exactly.
Are they doing a new episode?
What's going on here?
Who casts the deliveroo driver?
He's not really playing his party.
He's just cowering on the ground.
Yeah.
Is that really good looking blood that they've got going on there?
Looks so real.
Yeah, I can imagine like just being our.
around that is so, but what a badass? I try to think, like, what would I do if I saw somebody
getting assaulted? And I don't know if I'd be like, well, what I would do is jump out of my car and my
tuxedo and get in the mix of the, you know, take on two assailants. Like, I'm not so sure about that.
Well, since he's British, he says, I might have to resort to fisticuffs, so? Yeah, right.
They get that whole, like, lepricon-looking fighting stance with their fists faced upward, their palms up.
Yeah, knuckles front.
Yeah, knuckles front.
Yeah, exactly.
Anyway, on that, we just turned that darkness into light for a second.
He did say he wanted to end on a positive note, so he did.
Nailed it.
Yeah, this is a shame, though.
I totally understand.
I empathize why she feels like her body has betrayed her.
Every little pain could be cancer.
Think about almost dying or thinking about being under the knife and going through all that.
That's seven pounds is a massive tumor.
It's huge.
It's huge.
So I can understand maybe she ignored pain before she had cancer and then she blames herself for that.
So every little pain is like, are you sure I'm not sick?
Are you sure I'm not sick?
I understand that 100%.
Why does she refuse to go to therapy is what I'm wondering.
I think maybe she doesn't want to admit that she might be overreacting.
She doesn't want to be talked out of her anxiety on this because it's comforting to her.
She's probably also had enough doctors and waiting rooms and all that other BS and doesn't
want to be told that she's crazy on top of being sick. I get that. What I would do is recommend
something like BetterHelp, and they are a sponsor, but they did not compensate us for this.
If you use the code, which I believe is BetterHelp.com slash Jordan. If you use the code,
they do like me more, so please do that. And you do get something for free. Do we know what they get,
Jason, for free? You get 10% off your first month. Okay, you get 10% off your first month. I do
recommend using it. It's convenient. She can do it from home. There's no more waiting rooms. There's no
doctor visit type stuff. It's more like a chat with a super qualified friend. And that's recommended
because she does need to get this handled. It's a tough one. And Jason, you use better help,
didn't you? Yeah, I've got my personal anxiety issues. I've got like generalized anxiety disorder,
which I've talked to my therapist through better help with. And I do the phone consultations.
and we've chatted a few times on text just to set up the calls,
and then we just talk on the phone,
and he's really helped me work through a lot of my issues
without having to go anywhere,
without having to drive and sit in traffic and sit in the waiting room.
And the waiting room for me is my kryptonite.
Sitting there with other people who are waiting to see the therapist
is just like, you're all looking at each other's side-eyed
and going, what's wrong with you, what's wrong with you?
You don't have that with better help.
You can just make a phone call and talk to a super qualified therapist
that is really good at your problem.
That's why they have a little, they have a survey at the beginning of the process where they match you with somebody who is qualified in what you want to talk about. And it for me, it's been fantastic. I have, you know, my anxiety is melting away with every call that I have with my, my therapist. And I really, really can't recommend it enough. It has been fantastic for me personally. So if she doesn't want to like have the stigma of going to a therapist, she can do it herself in her own time and nobody even has to know, but it's going.
to help her get past that hypochondria, that thinking that every little ache and pain is cancer.
And, you know, I think what you said before, Jordan, like, you know, she may have ignored
those aches and pains. And then she has gone to the other side of the spectrum after she did have
this tumor and have it removed. It's like, okay, I ignored this my whole life. You know,
I was a tough cookie. Nothing's ever going to bother me. Oh, it turns out, well, something was wrong.
And now every little ache and pain is turning into catastrophizing the situation where it might not be
warranted.
Exactly.
Yeah, I think it's tough.
It will potentially solve itself over time as she begins to trust her body more and is less
traumatized by the cancer, which comes through therapy.
Because waiting it out is like waiting for a broken leg to heal without getting a cast.
And a lot of people are afraid to take care of their mental health.
And for me, doing that is one of the best things that I've ever done for myself.
You need to stay sane.
You know, we're going through a tough time.
Get therapy.
I get people not wanting to go to doctors and waiting rooms, but now you don't have to do
that anymore. So please keep us posted on how that goes and definitely try better help. I think they
must have some sort of guarantee. I don't know if they do, but BetterHelp.com slash Jordan. We've gotten
nothing but good feedback on this. And also, you might want to try it yourself because you're having to
deal with this and you might need a therapist as well just to like talk you through the entire process
of what she's going through. So it might help you as well. That's a good point. You know, you could both
use it, I would imagine. Especially. And if you do it, she might be like, oh, well,
if you're doing it, then maybe it doesn't mean I'm crazy.
You're not looking at me and judging me.
You're doing it yourself, that kind of thing.
This is Feedback Friday.
We'll be right back after this.
Thanks for listening and supporting the show.
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Now let's hear some more of your questions here on Feedback Friday.
All right, next step.
Hi, guys. Four months ago, I got dumped.
My ex was battling depression the last six months of our relationship.
He's had episodes before and dealt with him by either waiting it out or seeing a therapist.
I did what I could to be there for him and his kids from a previous relationship through that whole process.
It was hard on all of us.
I went to a psychologist to cope with his depression while simultaneously being in a challenging job situation myself.
I felt like I had failed him when he dumped him.
me. I was embarrassed to talk about it to others and developed social anxiety because I couldn't
deal with people bringing it up without me bursting into tears, which heavily affected my work
performance and still is, although it's getting better. We own a house together that we're
renovating. Although I chose to keep it, I'm mad at him for leaving me in this mess. The house
needs so much renovation still, and the whole project is just overwhelming, especially since I don't
really have anyone to help me out. We're also fighting over how to manage this whole process of me
taking over the house and buying him out, which also makes me feel bad. But again, I don't want to be
nice when he's asking me to buy him out for more than the house's worth, since it's literally an
unfinished mess. I assume there's no right answer for this, but it feels like I've painted myself
into a corner. I'm ridden by feelings of wanting to blame him, blaming myself for not being good
enough, and struggling to see what I can learn from the situation. I feel like I've wasted years of
my life and that I'm failing on managing my life in general. How do you deal with blame and taking
responsibility after a breakup. Any advice on how to move on is very much appreciated. Kind
regards, breakup blame. This is a big mess. You are correct. Wowza. It's important to realize,
though, that depression isn't something we can fix in other people, just as we can't fix it
if they get any other disease. Even if this was fixable, it wasn't your responsibility.
And this might seem callous, but what I mean is that you're shifting all the blame for his
condition onto yourself.
And I actually wrote an article about blame specifically at Jordanharbinger.com
slash articles is where you can find the articles.
I think I mentioned that earlier in the episode.
The article is called How to Stop Blaming Other People When Things Go Wrong.
And we'll link to that in the show notes.
But it's all about the idea of balancing accountability slash blame.
The idea, of course, is to achieve that balance in a proper way.
And I detail that in the article.
This piece was really helpful to a lot of people.
We got a lot of great feedback on it.
So I do recommend that you read it.
It'll help you realize what type and amount of blame you can accept,
as well as how much you should accept so that you can move on in a healthy way.
As for the trauma and anxiety, seek therapy.
I'm not going to go into the whole betterhelp.com slash Jordan thing because we did discuss it.
But again, try better help and at least have someone who can start you working towards balance.
Now, what you're feeling is pretty normal, and it makes sense that people asking about it would trigger you and get you upset.
I would make it clear that you don't want to talk about that with certain people.
You can literally say, I really don't want to talk about this.
It's really upsetting.
I'm still upset about it.
You can say that.
It's fine.
You can lean on your friends as well.
It might actually help to get some of that off your chest.
Like, hey, look, I know you've been asking me about this.
We've got to talk about this, but in private, it's really upsetting.
I'm going to cry.
You know, you will know which friends can handle that.
Nobody should be making small talk about it.
And if they do, you can just change the subject and they should get the hint.
But you might want to get some of that off.
your chest with your close friends.
It is healthy to do that.
As for the house, that is really a cluster.
Whose name is on the house?
That's the first thing.
The first thing, if both your names are on the house,
stop putting money into it immediately
and consult an attorney.
If your name is on the house,
stop putting money into it and consult an attorney anyway,
because if there's any sort of like,
well, it's half his and da-da-da,
you could lose the investment.
You need to have someone mediate this dispute
before it gets out of hand.
If what he's asking for is unreasonable, then stop building the mutually owned asset, ASAP.
This could really escalate.
You could lose the investment.
You could end up having it tied up in some sort of mess legally.
I know you're worried about being nice or being too nice, but one, this is a business transaction.
Time to put on your cold-hearted bish hat and get a deal done.
And if you need to have an attorney do the talking for you because you're non-confrontational or something, then do it.
That's fine.
Also, remodels are a pain.
I get it.
Tell the contractor your situation, see if slowing things down is even possible and would be helpful and advisable in terms of managing this.
You know, they might say, hey, if you want to not do the bathroom right away or you want to stop doing that or start doing this, they should understand.
And I know you might have deposits in and stuff.
So talk to them and tell them what's going on and talk to an attorney at the same time.
You need people in your corner on this, not in the dark.
Last but not least, are you taking care of yourself?
Like, are you working out?
You need to be.
When I hit the wall early last year with the split from the last business, which was totally
surprising in a lot of ways and super unfair, still continues to be like super unfair and
ridiculous.
I took walks.
I talked to friends.
I hit the gym.
I got as much sleep as my body needed slash could get.
And sleep is harder to control.
I know you're busy, but you need to at least hit the gym for 20 minutes and take a walk
each day.
Trust me.
It'll improve your mood.
that'll make dealing with everything else a ton easier.
And you might want to talk to your boss about this.
This way she sort of knows what's going on if you seem out of it or you seem distracted.
Most people are sympathetic.
And now is the time to rally your support network.
Make it a point to do therapy, get exercise, and talk to a friend at least even five minutes a day if you can.
You've got this.
It's a trying time, but you've got this.
And if you're going to buy him out, you need to do it properly and make sure that you're not building up the asset in the meantime.
because there might be a situation which you need the house appraised,
and then you're like, oh, well, I already paid for this renovation,
and they're like, yeah, it's going into the appraisal.
Because you just did that.
You're like, yeah, but I paid for that.
And they're like, yeah, but it's still going to be this.
And then you've got to take that to him and go, well, it's worth this much,
except for I paid for this renovation.
So you've got to subtract that.
It's just making it more complex.
So talk to professionals on this.
You can do this.
And look, it sounds kind of rough, but you're better.
I know you said, no one's there to help me.
If he's that depressed, he's not going to help you anyway.
You are better off in this situation without him.
You know, you can't be responsible for him and you and the house and everything else.
You just can't do it.
You're taking on too much.
Read that article.
I'll link it in the show notes.
Next up.
Hey, Jordan.
I remember on an episode you mentioned a cool way to visit another country was to hire a local to hang out with you and show you around.
Please remind me how you found someone to take you around.
Was it a specific website or some other way?
Thanks in advance, looking for a local.
Cool.
Yeah.
So what I do, what I've done in the past, I went on couchsurfing.org.
It is a non-profit website, nonprofit organization.
And you make friends with people, tell them you're coming to their area.
A lot of them will either let you stay there and or you simply say, hey, actually, I want to just meet up for a coffee or a drink.
And you could say something like, you know, honestly, I'm looking for.
for somebody who can take me around and I'm willing to pay for the privilege because I know that
you have to work or you're a student, you have other things to do. I would love to be able to pay a
daily rate to go around with a local. And, you know, I would try to maybe at least start with
you could either pay a couple, which would be really cool or, you know, like a husband-wife
type situation or two students. You could pay them. You'll get twice as much fun out of it. Or hire
someone of the same sex. The reason I tell you that is, look, I know how nice it might be to,
like, go around with somebody exotic from another country. It's possible that could happen.
What's more likely is they assume you're trying to get it in, and they're like, uh, okay,
I don't know about this, and or are they checking out at the last minute because they think
you might want something and their friends are telling them not to do it. You could hire a group
of people to take you out. It doesn't really matter. You can also hire freelancers on a site like
Upwork and you can post the job on Upwork and say, look, this is an unusual freelancer requirement.
I'm going to be in this country.
I want somebody who can show me around, help plan activities and things like that.
Most of the people on there are like, I'll fix your XML feed for, you know, I'm Microsoft
certified, whatever.
But you should check the terms of service because there are occasional gigs like that.
I would choose something like Upwork over something like, say, Fiverr, which is much more sort of
random guy in Bangladesh type situation.
Never try and find a guide in Fiverr.
The cool thing about Upwork is you can find somebody in your field.
So you have like a common vocabulary.
And like they might be looking to fix your XML feed.
But if that's what you do for a living, you can say, hey, I don't need my XML feed fixed.
But I'm guessing that we're kind of like the same kind of person.
So can you take me around and show me the sites?
and with, you know, your favorite restaurants and things like that, because you can find somebody
that has, like, a cultural fit to your, your vocation.
That's actually a really good idea.
It sort of depends on where we're going, of course, because some of these people are freelancing
professionals.
But if you're going to a developing country, like, if you're going to the Philippines, you can
pay someone their full hourly rate because it won't be that expensive.
Yeah.
But if you're going to Germany, yeah, you don't want to pay somebody who's like a MySQL or
whatever it's called, you know, certification.
and computer engineer and pay them $125.
You're not going to pay an $85 DBA to take you around and show you like the sites.
Right, right.
But you can also say I'm open to other referrals.
You know, once you're getting in communication with them, you can say something like, look, you might not be a fit.
Do you know any students?
And other options for this are calling language schools in that country and saying, here's what I'm doing.
I'd like an immersion program.
but I really want more sort of cultural stuff rather than language stuff.
And again, works a little bit better and more affordably in developing countries, but works
everywhere.
You know, I've gone to a lot of places and they'll say, oh, yeah, we have a family or, you know,
your teacher this, or yeah, you can have a one-on-one teacher that takes you around and teaches
you language.
They have this for Chinese.
There's a program with my Chinese school.
And they'll take you around and they focus on teaching you things in the city.
and if you're not really that interested
or you're a beginner in that language,
you can say, look,
I'm not trying to become fluent in Mandarin
or Tagalog or whatever,
but I do want to go around
with somebody who knows the area
and has taken foreigners around
in certain places.
They will set this up for you.
They'll structure it like an immersion language program,
but really it'll be somebody
taking you around all over the place.
And I've done that a few times.
Really, really nice.
It's sure be showing up at a hotel,
going to the concierge and finding out
that you don't know about
anything and they're not telling you about the cool places because they're far away slash shady
slash you can't get in without local that thing all right next up hi triple j how can i find a suitable
non-nuclear solution for me and my long-time partner to travel together given our different work
circumstances i'm a full-time remote employee and she's a veterinarian in the bay area my job
affords a lot of flexibility so i've been traveling four to five times a year twoish weeks
at a time with plans to travel for longer periods of time
Travel includes conferences abroad, working remotely, and doing my hobbies such as Brazilian
Jiu-Jitsu and snowboarding internationally.
This is contrasted with my partner's job, which only offers seven days of a crude vacation
per year with enough work to keep her busy beyond the normal working hours every day.
She's fulfilled by her job, but I feel that she's increasingly getting burnt out.
Because of her schedule in the past three to four years, we've only taken one two-week
vacation and have another one planned in 2019 for another two weeks, but as you can tell, the
cadence is very low. I feel somewhat guilty about traveling to do fun things without her.
Although she understands, and we've communicated to each other, that just because her circumstances
don't work, it doesn't mean I should put my life on hold. Lately, I've been feeling like traveling
more often, and don't wish to dance around my guilt while traveling and settle for the cadence
to once a year only traveling with my wonderful partner.
I want to experience these new locations with her.
We've been together for six years.
I'm 29.
She's 30, and our relationship is stable, mature,
and I would consider it to be pretty good,
aside from the not-so-great travel situation.
We have no debt due to amazing supportive family members
throughout our education,
and have great financial discipline and savings.
No kids, no mortgage, not much responsibility besides rent and living in the Bay Area.
Between the two of us,
we have maybe $50,000 or $60,000 of discretion.
discretionary emergency funds that can be used for travel on top of our retirement and all of our other
savings. Sincerely, grand, not guilt, trip. There are multiple issues that I see here. Obviously,
I can't help figure out some solution so that she can travel more, most likely. She could do something
career limiting like work part time or seasonally, but that might not even help and would
certainly be damaging to her long-term career prospects. She might not even want to do that. What I think
she could potentially do is negotiate more time off in her compensation package. And she can do this
by foregoing a raise. So here's kind of what I'm picturing here. She should value the vacation time
by looking at potential salary negotiation like we teach with Alex Kutz, then figure out what the cash
value is per day of time off and then forego a raise of that same amount and replace it with time off. So for
example, if she's supposed to get a $5,000 raise or if she was going to negotiate a $5,000
raise this year, find out if that's like seven working days or something like that worth
of time, whatever. Now, this won't be super easy, but if she's a star and they want to retain
her, she can explain that she needs more time because she's burning out, but she does not
want to leave. And this is kind of the play I see here. So instead of getting a raise in cash,
she'll say, all right, I want seven more days off of paid time off.
It's kind of the same thing to the company, right?
Like they have less help, but they end up losing the productivity,
but they might be okay with that if it means retaining a key or a great employee.
It's also possible that your lifestyles just don't match.
But you know this already.
You specifically said non-nuclear, so I'm leaving a breakup off the table,
but, you know, that's kind of maybe the obvious solution.
that isn't great for anyone.
Congrats to you on the financial stability and everything, though.
It's really great to hear.
I wish more people were like this.
Spending properly and budgeting for retirement and emergency funds doesn't sound fun,
but it allows for greater options and freedom in life.
And it seems like you're really a case study for this.
You know, low debt, good savings, flexibility.
So pat yourself on the back here.
You deserve it.
And I think hopefully with some skills, she can negotiate more time off.
And I think that would be a really cool experiment.
I'm curious how this plays out if she tries to do that
because I might add that to some negotiation skills of myself here.
I feel like that's a really interesting idea.
We'll be right back with more feedback Friday right after this.
Thanks for listening and supporting the show.
Your support of our advertisers keeps us going and keeps us on the air.
And to learn more and get links to all the great discounts you just heard,
visit jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
We have a list of all of our sponsors that show
up on all of the episodes so you can get links to all of those deals right there in one convenient
spot. Now back to the show for the conclusion of Feedback Friday. This question is sponsored
by our friend at the Hartford. Hey, as a career employee, I'm ready to start pursuing freelance and
consulting work more seriously. I often do sidework by referral and have gotten to the point where I
want to set up a small business and some funnels, which would theoretically provide side work more
consistently, the goal being to eventually transition into entrepreneurship and quit being an
employee. The problem is I work in an industry adjacent to software design. Online portfolios
are a requirement and my current web presence is tied to my name. I'd like to use my name for my
freelance work, as I feel it gives me some additional credibility, but I fear that if the side
business doesn't take off, that I would be compromising my prospects as an employee moving forward.
My initial solution was to simply name my side business something else to avoid the scenario,
but the type of work that I do makes it pretty clear it's a one-man shop.
Creating a corporate presence feels like a waste of time at best, inauthentic at worst.
You think you're hiring an agency, but it turns out to be just a guy.
I've had some career success, and I feel that it will be seen as a pretty big red flag at my current job,
and certainly would hamper other job prospects I'd have moving forward.
In entry-level roles, it's typically seen as a sign of a hard worker, but at the level I've achieved, it's seen as a distraction from the job.
I realize most of my hang-ups are likely psychological, but I've been unable to successfully reframe the situation.
Honestly, I'm scared and embarrassed to admit it.
Even writing this email makes my concern seem kind of ridiculous, hoping a trusted third party in a similar situation, you all, would be able to provide insight or advice.
Thank you for everything you all do.
I love listening each week.
Signed employee to entrepreneur.
All right.
Well, this is not that weird.
I totally get it.
When I was a lawyer on Wall Street, I was also running every Friday down to another building in Midtown Manhattan or up to another building in Midtown Manhattan.
And I would jump into serious XM satellite radio.
And I was really worried, like, okay, I've got this other show.
I'm sort of building this other brand.
and HR was a little bit like, what's going on with that?
And I was like, oh, nothing.
And the partners knew about it because they would listen to the show.
But I wasn't super keen because I had heard from other law friends like, well, we don't like this.
And I was like, yeah, cool, I'm going to stop doing it.
It's just a hobby, whatever, you know, thinking like none of your business.
I totally get why, though.
I understand it.
And so what I did was I decided, look, you know, I'm going to use my middle name.
and you're not lying about your name if you use your middle name.
And if people call you that on the phone or in person,
you know why they're calling you on the phone,
in email, et cetera.
My dad did that for a long time.
He had one name, first name at work, middle name at home and with friends.
And he had been called his middle name at home and with friends as a kid.
And he just brought, when he went to work,
he just started being called by his first name.
And it turned out to be super convenient.
because it was like call during dinner time, oh, who is it?
Who's it for?
Right?
If it's for one name, nope, because that's the name on your mail.
But if it's for the other name, oh, well, this person must know me personally, I'll take the call.
It was really convenient.
Now, of course, we have cell phones and all that stuff.
But it's very, very useful for being one person online in your freelance work and another person in your professional life without lying.
That's a really clever hack.
I really like that.
Except I hate my middle name, but that's a really clever hack.
What's your middle name?
Peter.
You don't look like a Peter to me at all.
Nope, I don't.
And I was teased as a kid with the middle name Peter, so I just don't, I can't use that one.
But maybe I'll change my middle name to something more exotic.
Change it to whatever you want.
It's your middle name.
It's completely irrelevant in the scheme of things, right?
True, true.
If you're like, oh, I hate my middle name, you could be like, cool.
It's now, my middle name is Asgard now.
Mielner.
I'll just go with Mielner.
Mielner, so that nobody can spell it.
Right, but like, go for it, you know, name yourself Thundercrotch.
I mean, who cares?
Maybe that's not good for your freelance career or your professional.
Not good for the business.
That's it.
For the personal branding Thundercrotch probably isn't what I'm going for.
It depends on what industry you're in.
But yeah, you can.
True, true, that is true.
You could just kind of go with whatever.
But yeah, go ahead.
And you can, look, if you don't want to legally change your middle name and you don't
like your middle name, you can choose a different first name.
And it doesn't really matter too much, right?
As long as you're not being like, hi, I'm Michael Stanton, and your name is Bart Johnson.
Like, it's totally different.
If anybody ever finds you in one situation and sees you in another, people are going to be like,
what are you talking about?
It's just creepy if it's too different.
But otherwise, yeah, use your middle name.
You're not lying.
If people call you that, you know why they're calling.
It's authentic.
It's convenient.
And look, with the freelance thing, you're testing the waters here, and it's okay if you do so.
I agree.
I don't want your current.
an employer to think you're distracted, you might be leaving, you've got this other thing going on
that you care about more. If you quit freelancing, you also don't want your other professional
name being floated all over the place by Google scraping it in the Times of India and all those
other weird websites that scrape sites. You don't want that name floating around. Or if you get some
press for what you're doing freelance-wise or from work, you know, then you've got these names being
floated around. Once something's on the internet, it's not going anywhere. It's going everywhere,
I should say. It's all over the place. It's almost impossible to get rid of it.
So you're going to want to make sure that you have that separated.
And you don't want your name being floated around all over the place when you're focused on another job or another career for sure.
What's next?
Hi, Jordan, Jen, and Jason. One of my best friends just told me he wants to get involved in local politics and ask me to be a character witness.
My issue is there have been various points in his past when he was the hard clubbing party animal, as well as others, a responsible single dad.
and some of his social media posts from yesteryear reflect this.
I've heard a few stories about people being embarrassed about posts they made six plus years ago
and wouldn't want him to go the same way.
Are there any companies you can recommend who can tidy up old social media posts
so that he's less likely to be embarrassed by people scrolling back through the years of social media?
No clue what he's getting into.
Thanks in kind regards asking for a friend.
Jason, what do you got?
Well, here's the deal.
Everyone should be using tweet delete.
It's a service on a website.
It's free.
You can sign up for it.
And it basically you set a threshold of time for when your older tweets are deleted.
There's another product that I recommend called Social Book Post Manager because they can't
use the Facebook trademark, obviously.
So they go with Social Book Post Manager.
It's another, that one is a Chrome extension where you can go back and in mass delete certain
types of posts from your past from Facebook without having to click through every single one.
Personally, I use tweet delete to make sure there are no tweets of mine older than two weeks.
Since Twitter is an ephemeral medium, it lacks context when you get outside of a few days' time horizon.
So people can, for example, take what you said about a current meme and warp its meaning to advance their agenda.
So it's an easy way to go back and kill those old tweets because they become out of context so fast.
Because a lot of people can't see what your friends are posting.
And that's what your context is.
Other people are just going to see what you're saying in the moment.
So they can take that out of context very easily.
And since he's going to be a politician, other politicians can take those tweets and they can warp it to their agenda.
So I hands down recommend everybody kill old tweets.
It's just a way to keep yourself safe.
Even if you're not doing anything, a new employer can go back and look at your Twitter feed and say, what was he talking about there?
Even though you were talking about a cat meme, it can be taken out of context.
You see what I'm saying?
Yeah, that's weird because you could be ban-trans.
with your friends and being like, oh yeah, whatever you do, make sure you don't vaccinate your kid,
L.O.L. You know, like some joking thing. And then it's like, oh, he's an anti-vax guy now.
Or, you know, something about vaccination. He's in the pocket of big pharma. Like you just.
Yeah. And meanwhile, they ignore, of course, the reply that you're sending to some joke that your
buddy posted or something. Exactly. A year and a half ago.
Irony does not work long term on Twitter, you know.
Because you could be doing wink, wink, wink, nudge, and you just come off as an anti-vaxxer, and nobody wants to deal with those people.
No.
Yeah.
And as far as his Facebook posts go and the photos, he can surgically remove the embarrassing ones.
That's easy.
But there's still going to be a record out there somewhere.
Somebody's going to have this stuff.
I think he should definitely have an analysis done on his outstanding posts that are searchable by the public to determine his fit for candidacy.
you know, there are, there are many services out there that will do social media like introspection to find out if you're, if you're X for B, you know, kind of thing, trying to figure out where you need to be and have your social media profile for what you're trying to do in the future.
If you're trying to get a job, like say with the government, there are services that will say, hey, you might want to remove this post, this post, and that post because you're never going to get in with, you know, you doing a keg stand in your 20s.
But really there's a service for that?
There are plenty of services.
I will dig some up and put them in the show notes for sure.
That's crazy.
I never knew that there was a service that would do that.
Oh yeah, there are plenty of them.
You know, it's kind of like if you want to have your credit cleaned, you know, they'll go back and clean up your credit.
This is the same with social media.
Huh.
Yeah.
I might consider doing that too.
I have stuff.
There's so much old stuff in there where I'm like, wait, what?
I can't even remember.
I was looking for like a photo of me doing something interesting.
I was like, oh, let me go back in Facebook.
There are pictures of me with, like,
girls I met at some club in London
in, like, 2004.
Yeah.
And I've got, like, a freaking,
I'm, like, sweating and, like,
gross and, like, wearing dushy clothes
that were cool in 2004 when I was 24 years old.
Yep.
You know, and I've got, like, a freaking half-mohawk type.
It's just stupid, you know?
It's kid stuff.
I would keep the photo, but I don't want,
there have been so many weird cases
where like I would say something
and then some blogger who's like,
I hate Jordan Harbinger will go on some forum
or 4chan or whatever
and they dug up a 15 year old picture of me
or even more.
I don't know,
however long I've been on Facebook
and they'll post that.
And it's like, oh, look at this guy.
I hit 2005 called and I'm like,
dude, it was 2005 or 2003.
Yeah, exactly.
So yeah, go ahead.
Pogue fun all you want.
This person deliberately scrolled as far
back on my Facebook profile as they could actually go and picked like a photo of me and Tucker
Max drinking beer or something was like, look at this idiot bro. It's like, yeah, 15 years old.
So imagine that times 100 because somebody has it out for you and isn't just a turd on an internet
troll forum. Yeah, and a lot of these services, what they'll do is they'll just put in a lot of new
posts and give you a lot more stuff that shows up on Google before the old stuff and just pushes it
way down the stack. That's what some of them do, but some of them will go through and
surgically remove them. And you can go through in your Facebook account and anybody that's tagged
you on a photo, you can remove that tag. They still posted the photo. It's still there, but you can,
you can remove anything that you're tagged on. So it doesn't come back on a search for that.
I would love to find out what that service is because I should audit my social media,
because I think about this a lot. I lost my Twitter account when I split from the last company
and I built that up a bunch. And I was disappointed, but now I'm like, oh, good.
because there were 11 years of tweets from me in there.
Yeah.
And I was like, God, dude, every argument or like weird, funny, off-color thing that I'd ever said on Twitter was in there.
Well, here's the upside.
Now it's attributed to the guys who kicked you out.
Exactly.
They're the ones that are going to look bad.
Good luck.
Now I'm like, oh, that almost racist thing that I said back then, that looks like you said it now, idiot.
Yeah, so it's funny.
Karma's a bitch.
Yeah, exactly.
Hopefully I was decent on there.
But yeah, there's all kinds of stuff booked in there that now I've got like a clean history.
I wouldn't mind that for Facebook as well, especially because I've got a verified profile on there.
I should probably clean it up.
All right.
Just remember, party is not a crime, you know.
It might endear him to his younger demographic.
And I mean, even right now, we've got a potential candidate for the presidency who was a member of the cult of the dead cow hacker group.
You know, up and coming politicians are going to have to deal with this stuff like, you know, growing up in social media.
everyone's figuring this stuff out and dealing with the fallout.
So I wouldn't really get too worked up about it unless he did some really bad stuff.
And then maybe he's not a good candidate.
But he can, in the worst case, you know, he goes nuclear, deletes all of his social accounts and starts from scratch.
But that is, I don't think that's recommended.
Yeah, you shouldn't do that.
Then it just looks like you have something to hide.
Yeah.
And people go fishing because they're like, wait a minute.
He just deleted everything or deleted all of his old accounts.
What's on there?
that we need to know about.
And then there'll be a picture of you having a wine cooler from 10 years ago.
And they're like, see, he's an alcoholic.
He's standing next to a child.
There must be something weird about it.
Why did he remove it?
You know, maybe he's a pedophile.
Like, you just don't want any kind of nonsense.
Because once there's nothing, it becomes like, well, wait a minute.
This person's fake.
Exactly.
Yeah.
Yeah, that old picture of him with a Zima.
I just wouldn't vote for him because he liked Zima.
But, you know, that's the way things can be taken out of context.
You take what you can get, right?
Exactly, exactly.
All right, last but not least.
Hi, Jen, Jason, and Jordan.
When hanging out with two more people,
I don't have that gene that lets me know
when is the perfect millisecond to interject a thought
after someone said something,
and before someone else responds,
but after it seems like I'm cutting them off.
In fact, I suck at this.
What generally happens is someone says something interesting,
someone else responds right away,
and sometimes I'll be around people that respond for 10 minutes,
at which point the subject often veers off
the original and it feels weird to say, so back to what you said about X. Oftentimes I will miss out
on the few subjects and play a passive role in the conversation. The issue seems like I'm not
assertive enough in responding, but at times I may respond too early and it seems to throw off
the speaker. Also, it may seem like I'm trying too hard. My default is to wait for a proper pause,
but that pause sometimes doesn't come for half an hour. I also don't have a very projecting voice,
so it's easy to talk over me, which may be part of the issue.
Thanks for all you do.
Les Pry de Les Galleé is my spirit animal.
I've heard this before.
What I would do is take improv classes.
It's really nice.
It's fun.
It'll teach you to be more assertive.
You can take some speaking classes if you want,
but improv and speaking together will make you faster,
more assertive.
It's really helpful.
And in the meantime, just put your hand palm forward
in the middle of the circle
or between you and the other person
to show that you want to interject.
You have to do it quickly or anything weird.
But second nature, people will look your way and you can go ahead.
It's almost like raising your hand, but people know that you want to jump in,
and they will naturally feel pressure to slow down and stop.
But that said, you don't always want to do that every time you want to talk.
It'll look a little mechanical, so I recommend honing this skill set by taking improv.
Improv's great for learning how to associate freely and quickly.
It's used by comedians.
It's one of the reasons that I'm quick on my feet, practice being on my feet.
practice being on live radio, doing a podcast, free association.
I wish I could do more of it, but a lot of the improv classes around here, they focus on performance.
So level one is always really good.
I might just take level one again because level one, they just teach you out of freely associate.
You play these really funny games.
It's really good.
Level two, three, four, they're all like, okay, and when you're doing a show and I'm like, hey, man, I'm not trying to be on whose line is it anyway.
I just want to get the skills.
but a lot of people who do comedy improv, they want to perform.
But I would take these really simple classes.
They're taught all over the place, and they will make you a better, faster, quicker, thinker.
So go for it.
That's an easy solution.
Trust me, really useful skill set, especially if you consider yourself shy or quiet.
Life pro tip, Jason, you got it this week.
Yes, I do.
I got two little quick, helpful tips here.
The first one is always keep a $100 bill in your business.
your wallet or your purse, somewhere that is out of sight, out of mind, and only keep it there
for emergencies. I've been in so many situations back in the days when I would go clubbing or
traveling where, like, I ran out of money, the ATMs, there's none around, and I need to get
somewhere. I need a cab. I need, you know, to pay somebody to just give me a lift. That $100 bill
comes in so handy just as an emergency fallback when credit cards don't work. Cash is king,
still, believe it or not. And I keep that $100 bill very tightly folded in a doggy poop bag.
And the reason I do that is because if you get stuck out in weather somewhere, like a rainstorm hits,
you pull out that poop bag and it is like a little raincoat for all of your stuff, your wallet,
which you don't want to get drenched, your cell phone, your watch, anything that can get like,
ruined or soaked if you have an old Apple watch that wasn't waterproof, which I had back in the day,
those two things will get you out of so many jams.
It's just like, you know, it's insurance.
It's just insurance to be able to have the power to get something done with just a little bit of cash that you forget about.
You don't pull it out when you're at the bar and the ATM's closed and you're just like, oh, I just need this to have a few more drinks.
No, it's not what it's for.
It's only for emergencies.
You get that mindset and you never touch it unless you're in the ish, as the kids say.
And it will definitely like, you know, save your bacon when you need.
need it. I mean, I also carry a lock picking set and handcuff keys in my wallet, but that's probably
not relevant for most of the audience. No, that is some nerd shit right there, JPD, for sure.
Oh, you've taken the survival classes with me. You know what the deal is with those.
Mm-hmm. I do. Yeah. If you ever need a handcuff key, it's always like, yes. Finally.
All right. Recommendation of the week. This is kind of funny. It's a new Netflix interactive series,
which I'm surprised they haven't done this earlier because you can basically play
a show as a game in a way.
You make key decisions to help bear grills survive on you versus wild.
So he's completing missions in like jungles and deserts and stuff.
It's fun to watch with kids or a date.
And there are eight episodes.
They're about 20 minutes each.
And it's like, should I go around the alligator or distract it with a stone?
Or should I like jump down the mountain with this vine?
Or should I try to cross it with a log?
It's really kind of fun.
I feel like I'm 12 when I play that.
that game or that show.
And it's quick.
It's kind of a funny party thing.
It's unique and novel.
And I have a feeling a lot of TV and movies
are going to go this direction at some point.
This sounds like the technology
that they developed for Bandersnatch,
The Black Mirror, Choose Your Own Adventure.
Totally.
Oh, very cool.
I can't wait to check this out
because I love Bear Grills.
This will be fun.
Yeah, it's what they did with Bander Snatch
where you get to pick different outcome.
Like, what kind of cereal do you want for breakfast
and you pick?
choose your own adventure style.
This, I have a feeling,
has a little bit of minimal replay value
because there are only two choices.
Probably the same thing with Bander Snatch,
but it's longer.
But it seems like a fun
idea in theory.
It might get annoying
with everybody trying to do it,
but Bear Grills does a good job with it.
He's kind of a fun watch.
And like I said,
any kid sort of ten and up
is going to love this.
Very cool.
Again, it's called You versus Wild.
It's on Netflix,
and we'll link to it in the show notes.
Hope you all enjoyed that.
I want to thank everyone
that wrote in this week, don't forget you can email us Friday at Jordan Harbinger.com to get your
questions answered on the air. We always keep you anonymous, of course. And a link to the show
notes for this episode can be found at Jordan Harbinger.com. Quick shoutouts to Melissa, she loves
the show. When a new episode comes out, she downloads it without even looking to see who
we're interviewing, which is great. I wish everyone did that, of course, and I really appreciate that
vote of confidence because I don't, people go, oh, I don't recognize any of the names on here. The idea is
I and Jason, me, Jen, the whole team, we find people through you, honestly, listeners oftentimes
that are going to be amazing that don't have to be famous.
You know, maybe somebody who got stuck in a Pakistani prison is more interesting than somebody
who's a famous athlete.
And I see a lot of podcasters just trying to interview famous people or YouTubers and
honestly, snore city.
These are not intelligent conversations.
They're not interesting or fun.
They're just kind of, hey, look, I have search engine results for me.
me and this person. It's just kind of, we try to find better content, and I appreciate the
vote of confidence that you know every episode's going to peak your interest at some level.
So thanks, Melissa.
All right, go back and listen to the guest, David Smalley and Hal Elrod, if you haven't yet,
and if you want to know why my network is full of amazing people, it's because I do
deliberate, consistent systems and tiny habits.
I'm teaching you how to do that for free in six-minute networking, and you can find that
at Jordan Harbinger.com slash course.
This course six minute networking replaces the old course that was called level one.
It's got a bunch of upgraded drills, a bunch of tech, a bunch of new systems.
I left advanced human dynamics.
I'm no longer doing level one at all.
So people are like, hey, I had a problem with this thing.
Don't email me about level one.
I have nothing to do with it.
Go join six minute networking at Jordan Harbinger.com slash course.
I'm on Instagram and Twitter at Jordan Harbinger.
It's a great way to engage with the show.
Jason.
My personal website is at jpd.m.
and you can check out my tech podcast, grumpy old geeks at gog.
Show or your podcast player of choice and deliveroo!
Yes.
This show is produced in association with Podcast One.
This episode was co-produced by Jen Harbinger.
Show notes for the episode are by Robert Fogarty.
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So share the show with those you love and even those you don't.
Lots more in the pipeline.
A lot of great stuff coming up in the next coming.
months here. In the meantime, do your best to apply what you hear on the show so you can live what
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