The Jordan Harbinger Show - 215: How to Invest Wisely and Crush Student Debt | Feedback Friday

Episode Date: June 21, 2019

There's lots of stuff in this one about investing wisely and eradicating debt -- especially student debt -- thanks to some professional help from our all-star, money-ninja accountant Matt Rzepka, along with the usual questions about everything else we get here on Feedback Friday. 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 [e-mail]. Now let's dive in! Full show notes and resources can be found here: https://jordanharbinger.com/215. On This Week's Feedback Friday, We Discuss: You judge people quickly, won't suck up to authority, and have a reputation as being unapproachable. What's really going on, and are you stuck this way? You're a frugally living 37-year-old doctor swimming in med school debt. Should you put all your money into saving and investments or toward extra loan repayment? For someone with student loan debt just starting out in their career, what is the best move for financial freedom? Should you pay off debt, invest, build savings, or acquire assets? Early in med school with many years of debt ahead, is it still worth it to be locking your money up and committing to your monthly index fund? Your network connection is great at opening doors, but lackluster in work ethic. Is there a way to inoffensively compensate them for opening those doors without involving them in the actual job that results? Are you really offended when an entertainer (say, a podcaster) openly expresses their political views, or are you just offended when their political views seem to differ from yours? How can you stop giving in to your need for instant gratification and become a productive member of society when you lack discipline and think the world's ending anyway? Life Pro Tip: If you volunteer to give up your seat on an overbooked flight, don't just take the first offer. Tell the gate agent, "Toss in another $200+/- and I'll go for it." They'll almost always agree, because a willing volunteer is worth it. And if they offer you a meal voucher, ask for a day pass to their first class club instead. It will have food plus other amenities! Recommendation of the Week: The Dawn Wall A quick shoutout to Malak Firaas from (the nation of) Jordan! 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. Connect with Jason on Twitter at @jpdef... See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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 Levar Burton, that's right, the Reading Rainbow guy, talking about education, learning, and of course about reading, and about being, well, the black Mr. Rogers, actually. And we also had Gabriel Weinberg talking about mental models. And that episode was chock full of new ways to think about problems. and Gabriel's just such an intelligent guy, which really comes through in this episode as well. There's a lot of practical application in that one.

I also write every so often on the blog. The latest post is a deep dive about confidence, and it's not remedial, actually. And a version of this was published on Success.com as a pillar post about confidence. It's pretty long. It's a beast. Why confidence matters, how to get it.

And we really go into a lot of it. And this is like a 15-page article. It's a good read. Gabriel and I worked a lot on that. So you can find that at Jordan, harbinger.com slash articles. And it's worth the read. Even if you don't struggle with confidence, it's worth the read to understand more about confidence and help others. And if you do struggle with confidence in work or in your personal life, it's just going to be a beast and hopefully

help you out quite a bit. So make sure you've had a look and a listen to everything we created here this week. Of course, our primary mission is to pass along our guest's insights and our experiences and insights along to you. In other words, the real purpose of the show is to have conversations more or less directly with you, and that's what we're going to do today and every Friday here on Feedback Friday. You can reach us at Friday at Jordan Harbinger.com if you want to get your question here answered on the air. And if you can make it concise, a couple paragraphs, that should do. It does increase the chance your question will get answered on the air if we don't have to cut out three pages from it. We actually had a few financial questions in this one later in the

episode. And I had our All-Star Money Ninja accountant Matt Zepka come and pinch hit for us this week. There's a lot of stuff in this episode about investing, getting rid of debt, student loans, credit card stuff, along with the usual questions about everything else that we get here on Feedback Friday. Jason, what's the first thing we got this week? Hi, all. I tend to judge people very quickly, often before I've ever actually spoken with them. After seeing them interact with other people or observe the way they carry themselves, I quickly form opinions that affect my further interactions with them, unless it's for my own personal gain, for example, from a sales or networking perspective. Additionally, I can't or won't suck up to people and stroke their egos to be seen as worthy of their time in an interaction.

This has hurt me professionally in the past by coming off as standoffish, superior, better than others when that's far from the truth. Overall, in many instances, I can be seen as unapproachable, but that's far from the truth. I will engage anyone in conversation and in networking type environments. I welcome it. It all seems a little messed up. Any suggestions? Thanks, Judge Superior. Well, there's a couple things in here. One, we all judge. It is normal. So evolutionary psychology shows a security-based need for us to judge others.

And sometimes it's healthy enough, sometimes it's not. So if you're walking down the street and you see someone, you're like, oh, attractive, another person, oh, scary. Maybe I should cross the street. Or, oh, this person doesn't look right in the head. I'm going to move along. Or tall, short, fat, athletic, not athletic. We all do that. That's a security-based process.

You can't shut it off, nor should you even try. I think what this writer here, Judge Superior, are saying is he or she judges to the point where it then clouds your judgment of the other person when you get new information about them when you interact with them. So what we know about that, I think we talked about that with Gabriel Weinberg as well, but Charlie Munger, Warren Buffett's investing partner over at Berkshire Hathaway, he wrote an article about how quickly you have to change your mind and how changing your mind quickly in the face. of new information is actually a massive advantage because cognitive bias says oh well I'm going to decide this isn't a good person and then even though they're doing all these good things it's going to take a while for me more more time more information for me to then change my first impression of this person that's a disadvantage you should be able to change your mind pretty quickly when you get new information about a person that is a massive or

any idea for that manner so the advantage is taking a new info changing your opinion quickly. And as for the sucking up part, I get not wanting to do that, but reading between the lines here, it also sounds like maybe you resent people who you think are the type of person that you're supposed to suck up to. So they're not saying suck up to me on the boss. I'm important. You're getting triggered by something and you think, oh, well, this person thinks they have authority over me. I'm not going to suck up to them. And then you overcompensate and that's not good. So you overcompensate and deliberately or maybe unconsciously you act aloof, which then confuses them is they've actually not done anything to earn your ire.

Your insecurity gets triggered. You go so far in the other direction that you're just kind of being a jerk or you're being cold. And I think what you say is sucking up is likely just turning you into a bit of a grouch and you tend to treat people as less than because you're overcompensating. And the reason I'm reading between the lines here is I totally used to do that. So if I'm way off, this is based on my own experience of doing the exact same thing. So I'm not judging you.

I'm telling you, I get it. I get it. It's kind of like a rebellious teenager thing. Oh, you're going to be in charge of me? I'm going to deliberately not do what you say to do, even though I already wanted to do that. Now I have to think of another thing that I didn't want to do and do that instead, because I don't want you to think that I'm doing what you said because you're the boss of me. It's a very human thing that we all kind of have to manually shake off, I would say, in our 20s maybe. Some of us never get over it.

The quicker we get over this, the better, honestly. The key here is to be aware of when you're doing this, at least at first, and then ignore someone else's perceived status, especially if you feel it triggering you somehow. So this problem, as you seem to realize by including both in your letter here, is really two sides of the same coin. You see some people is not worth your time, and you see other people as higher status than you, and one group triggers your insecurity, and so you marginalize them or ignore them,

and the other group triggers your insecurity, and you overcompensate and treat them in a way that, honestly, they probably don't deserve to be treated because you don't want to seem like you're sucking up. All of this stems from some of your own insecurity about where you are on the social hierarchy. Again, very normal, especially if you feel like the new guy in the office, the low man on the totem pole, whatever,

this is a very normal reaction. It's just not going to serve you very well. But kudos to you for even being aware of it at all. And then having the guts to write in and ask about it. Because when I was in this situation, I think I thought, I'm just right about this. And screw everyone. I don't need help with this. Even though I went, geez, you know, this isn't really getting me the result I want.

if you can start by treating people the same way and ignoring as best you can the triggers you feel in yourself you'll learn more about other people and you'll begin to control your emotional reaction to others instead of having your emotions control you instead now to clarify if you get a gut reaction you're if you're at a bar and you get a gut reaction that somebody's being creepy pay good attention to that i'm just talking about someone new comes to the office to work with your group and you go well i don't like this guy's good looking screw him you want to to ignore that. That's your insecurity getting triggered. Oh, this person thinks they're going to be my boss. They think they're so smart. I've been here for two years. Ignore that instinct,

that's not serving you well. But if you're walking down the road and someone's mean mugging you and it's 9 p.m. and you're the only one there along with them, then yeah, listen to that good instinct. Your gut will serve you well a lot of the time. It just sounds like in the office or wherever you're doing this particular knee-jerk stuff, sales or networking perspective, type of type of business stuff, that's where you've got a chip on your shoulder and you can get rid of that chip by ignoring your gut at first and taking in new information without this chip, this issue, tainting all of the incoming information that you're getting. And eventually you'll learn that you're better served by doing this and hopefully you'll be able to ditch the old habit. That's what I

did. I got rid of it. It was really, really helpful. Jason, what's next? Hey, Triple J. I'm a doctor who's been practicing for six years and can only afford income-driven repayment for my student loans. I went to reapply for income-driven repayment and saw that they had added another $30,000 to my student loans over the last three years. I worked and got my MBA while in medical school, which added another $13,500 to my med school tuition. I also ended up having too much money and income from working well in med school, so I didn't qualify to have the interest rates on my loans deferred while I was in school. My undergrad is in physical therapy, and my friend opened his own business and needed my help with his super busy practice. I now know working during

med school was the stupidest financial decision I've made. Just during residency, another $100,000 was added to my loans while I was making $30,000 a year as a resident. I'm up to about $300,000 in student loans at $6.8% interest and make $150,000 a year. I would need to make over $400,000 a year to be able to repay my loans at 15% of my income. There's a loan forgiveness program after having income-driven repayment for 25 years, which is 19 years away. Do I try to add any extra income I can to the principal of my loans, which seems like a lost cause at this point, or do I just keep paying the income-driven amount and hope to get the loan forgiven after another 19 years? I currently have a 10-year-old car, have a roommate, and only pay $800 a month in rent, don't have the newest iPhone,

etc. I don't live the fancy doctor lifestyle. I'm 37 years old already. Med school and residency takes so long and I'm single and don't have any kids. I would like to have a family in the future and don't know if I should put all my money into saving and investments or toward extra loan repayment. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you, sincerely, the drowning doc. P.S., anyone thinking about medical school, please realize the crazy student debt you'll be getting into. Insurance doesn't pay doctors like it used to, and now med school costs are outrageous. It's a broken system. This question makes me feel bad because I get it. Student loans are insane. This is criminal, like, criminals is an overuse word.

This is extreme. And, man, if you can't pay your student loans as a doctor, what hope is there for the rest of us? Seriously, and starting at 37 now with 19 years to go, oh, man, that's just a slog. I mean, doing the math on that, yeah, that's, you, that's, you're basically looking at another 10 years before you retire, I guess maybe a little more in today's day and age, before they get forgiven, which to me is bananas. Like, this just sort of dominates your whole life. Learning and getting there in the first place and then paying these long. I mean, I don't know. It's a shame.

It's definitely a broken system. That's crazy to me. So the income-based repayment, I don't know if a lot of people know what this is. I had to look it up. It didn't exist when I went to school, but, or at least I don't think it did. But basically, if you make more money, your payments will go up. And I opted out of this because I just thought, screw it. I'm just going to keep paying my student loan.

You know, I just, I'm just going to deal with it. But if you have to live, you can't really do that. I was lucky in a way because I was doing the entrepreneur thing. So I just lived like a college student in a way anyway. I was making like no money. And so I just diverted a ton of money to student loans because what's the difference? I didn't have a car. You know, I wasn't doing anything.

I was reinvesting all the money in my business. I was barely getting paid. I basically took a salary just to pay these loans. And 6.8% isn't horrible, but it's also not great. and investments that you make will be equal or better to that rate of return. So I got Matt Zepka, our Ninja Money accountant here, to opine on this. What Matt said was that you want to maintain a position of control. In other words, investing, you can control the money, and then you write one check later

to pay it all off. So instead of funneling, like I did, let's say, $2,000 a month to your student loans, You funneled these $2,000 to an investment that has a pretty static or relatively predictable rate of return like an index fund, for example. So if you keep the money in the index fund and it grows, let's say, at 6%, and your loan is 6.8, yes, you're losing 0.8% on that return per year because your interest is accruing faster than your investment is. chances are the index fund will actually grow faster than 6.8%. And so you control the money, you save it all, and then when you have the full amount or close to it, you pay off that loan. And the reason that this is important is because if you do pay a loan,

and then the loan's not gone, and then let's say you lose your job or you become disabled, then you're still in debt. That loan still has interest. It's still accruing. There's all this stuff happening to you, and you have no money. but if you control this, if the money's in an index fund, then your money should be accessible. So let's say you keep investing in index funds and we have all these crazy returns, you just made a bunch of money on top of this, or let's see you have an opportunity to buy a house,

or you get sick, God forbid, and you need the money. You have it at your disposal. Yeah, that loan will then come and smash you because the interest will be going up. You know, you're making your minimum mandated payments or something like that or no payments if you can get away with it. Your money is still accessible, though. You just never know. And so control is worth a certain amount of money as well.

So even if it returns less than 6.8, you're paying for the option to do whatever you want with the money later. So if the loan costs 6.8, even if you invest the rest of the money into something with, let's say, 2% interest, like a CD, you're netting out at 4.8%. Then if you improve your cash flow by starting a side hustle or you start your own practice, and that starts to take off, then you can pay it down quicker. Also, if you're refinancing, if you decide to refinance this loan, let's say the market gets really competitive and you can take a private loan at less than 6.8,

you can walk into a bank with money, with cash, and they can loan you money and use the cash as collateral. Cash collateral is a real thing. I didn't even really think about this, but it is true. You can walk into a bank with a bunch of money and say, I want to borrow more money against this. you can sit on this cash for a while knowing that you at least have that and they'll give you a deal. If you don't have anything like a house, other property, they can't loan you any money.

If you have cash, they can. And so if you walk in with nothing, you know, a bank really can't do much to help you. There are other ways to generate cash flow. For example, let's say you saved up a bunch of money that would have gone towards a loan, but that now you can sort of go in on a rental property that's owned by, let's say, you start a corporate entity. This way, you've got access to the money from that rental property that's owned by a corporate entity that you control. But it doesn't have to go towards your income-based repayment because it's not your income.

It's a corporate entity's income. So they don't go, oh, you made a bunch of rental money. We want a piece of that. They don't touch it. It's not yours. It belongs to the company. You just happen to control the company. That's a pretty cool tactic that Matt Zepka thought of here.

I would never have thought of this. This way, if you increase your salary or income, your loan payment goes up, you can't get ahead. The corporation shields you from this a little bit. And this keeps your income lower while allowing you to invest the other money that you might have. Let's say you get an inheritance. They're going to go, oh, good, give us a bunch of that. No, you can use that and build your life without the loan payment increasing with your income and essentially just keeping you underwater for two more decades.

then wait out that 19 more years, the loan balances get forgiven and you can actually invest in something and go for retirement. Because right now, what I worry about right now for him, Jason, is he can pay off these loans for 20 years. And then what? He starts saving for retirement and finally doesn't have roommates and he's like 58 years old. That makes me, that angers me that that might be the situation. That makes me angry that a doctor or anybody.

with a career would have to do that. That really, I'm getting triggered here. It's a BS. It's BS that people are that underwater. Look, I get it if you borrowed a bunch because you wanted fancy cars and you overspent when you were in your 20s and now you're digging out.

Like, okay, we all have learned hard lessons. This is the guy who did everything right. Now he's screwed. That pisses me off. Yeah, it's a really sad situation. So I think that he should definitely try and game the system any way he possibly can. Yeah, it's not even a game.

Look, system is set up for this. There's a reason corporate entities that you control are set up in certain ways, and it's so that you can do more creative things with your money. Look, that bank, it's not like you're going to go, huh, I never had to pay them back. You're paying them back. They're getting interest on the money. You are profitable for them. It's just that you're not profitable for them at the expense of ever being able to own a house, a car, and, like, you know, not live with roommates and share a freaking bathroom, doctor. Yeah. Come on. It's ridiculous. So, it's not a weird trick that the IRS is going to go, oh, you're using a loophole. This isn't a loophole.

It's a strategy. There's a difference. Yeah, there's definitely a difference. Yeah. So power to you. And by the way, if you're going, cool, I want to do a corporate entity and do this, but I don't want to go to jail if the IRS catches up with me. Yes, get an accountant to do that. I'm happy to refer people to Matt Zepka, by the way. He's not free because this is his job, but he's also not ridiculously expensive. He's actually up in Kalamazoo, Michigan. So it's not some sort of like fancy Manhattan accountant that bills $600 an hour. You know, his team is very reasonable. So if you're interested in retaining Matt, if you're in the similar situation,

I'm happy to refer you to him. Just please be serious because I don't want to refer a bunch of people to him who are tire kicking. And then he's like, ugh, I regret ever helping you on Feedback Friday. This is Feedback Friday. We'll be right back after the... When it's time to scale your business,

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All right, what's next? What's up, Jays? For someone like me who has student loan debt and is just starting out in their career, what's the best move for financial freedom? Should I pay off debt, invest, build savings, or acquire assets? Since graduating a year ago, I've built a savings of $30,000. I've really enjoyed watching my savings grow and the feeling of security from knowing that if I needed money or I lost my job, I would have cash available to live. However, I have a lot of student loan debt.

I'm recently starting to learn more about finances and realize that if I wait until my student loans are paid off to start investing, I'll be missing out on the time factor for increasing my returns. I like building my savings and would like to be able to put a down payment on a house sometime soon. What should I do with my money so that it works best for me? I make $4,644 a month. I pay $1,344 a month as my student loan payments. Car payment and insurance, $380, rent, $500, currently, but would like to move to a nicer place or buy property eventually. I appreciate you pointing me in the right direction, signed to save or not to save.

Wow, you're such a great saver. So pat yourself on the back for that. That is really impressive. I don't know how much I saved my first few years out. graduating a year and building a savings of 30 grand during that time, wow. If your student loan debt isn't too high, you can start putting cash into retirement and savings accounts, and you should, in my opinion, what's that old? As you pay yourself first, I agree with that. And what that means is max out those Roth IRAs or those IRAs. Just do that. It's going to build tax-free. There's maybe

different strategies right now since taxes are so low, but you'd want to consult your accountant on that one if you have one and I suggest getting one. You're so young, somebody might even throw you some advice for free just to get you as a customer in five years. So I wouldn't worry about it too much. Divert savings into an accessible capital source. And again, this comes from Matt Zepka. Divert your savings into an accessible capital source. So that means something like a CD versus an index fund or a home because it's harder to borrow against an index fund or a home. And you're probably only going to get 50% of the value because the lender always has to their risk against the market going down.

And you might even get like 25% of what your home is worth, say, if you bought one. So let's say you got 10% on your student loans. That's pretty high. Pay it off because nothing's really going to compete with that. But what if your student loans are 5%? Well, you can get more than 5% return elsewhere. So pay the loan minimums and put your money into a vehicle that returns more than 5%. And that's not going to be too hard to find.

financial freedom is your goal, you said. So you need to generate income, quote unquote, passively. I hate that term because it's abused, but you need to generate income that you don't have to work to earn to pay the majority of your income or half your income. So let's say you have a rental property or something like that. That's sort of financial freedom sounding. Paying loans depletes the assets that you can use to purchase assets that will then give you financial freedom or give you that other income source. So unless the interest is high, you want to pay the minimum here because of the opportunity cost. So let's say you've got 30 grand, you want to buy a car. If you finance an interest is 5%, then you invest the 30K and you get 5%.

Your cost is the same, except you have control of your money if you invested in some sort of financial vehicle that returns 5% instead of just giving the dealership a check every month. If you pay them 30K outright, you have the asset and you saved the interest on financing, but then you don't have any money, although you have the car. But borrowing against the car, you get less because of depreciation and because of risk, like we mentioned before. So the key here is to always remember opportunity cost, which here is compound interest. That's what I think what she means when she says, I'm going to miss out on the time factor. Compound interest is what she means. So it's efficient and important to control your money and let the returns grow quicker and faster and have flexibility in what you do

with them unless your interest rates are just so stinking high that they're drowning you. So if you have student loans that are 10%, try to refinance those if you can because that's extremely high. If you go and you get a car, negotiate the crap out of that financing interest rate, you should be able to get it pretty low. It shouldn't be 5%. Maybe since you're young, it will be, but see if there's anything that can be done about that.

And frankly, what people don't realize, you can shop around for financing. just like you shop around for the car. What I think a lot of people don't get is they'll go to a dealership, they'll get a good price on a car, and they'll go, oh, yeah, you know, I really like this dealer, and this guy's really nice, and they gave me $2,000 off, and it's really great. And then you go to the financing department,

and they're like, here's the 7.5% loan. Well, what you don't realize is the dealership down the street that couldn't match the price of the car, they might give you a 6% loan. You're saving a ton of money on lower interest rates, even though you're paying a higher price for the car. Does that make sense, Jason? So a lot of people don't realize they can shop around for financing just like they shop around for them throwing in an AC or a stereo in the car.

Totally makes sense. And you got to do that because what happens are people, there's a reason that finance department is a different department. One, it's a different set of skills. But also because they figure as soon as you buy the car, you just sort of stroll into financing and they go, all right, so it's a 7.5% long compounded it da da da da da da here. And you're like, well, I'm done because I just decided where I was going to buy the car. and the rest of this is just a formality. No, that's what they want you to think. They want you to think that the rest of it

is just signing some documents and they're all the same. It is not. It is part of the sales process. They're just pretending like you have no leverage because they make a lot of money on financing. You have all the leverage you want. The salesman's going to buy.

The salesman wants that deal. He's going to walk into the financing department and go, you can't go down half a percent, you dick. You know, you actually have more power to negotiate at that point. So make sure you're negotiating. that too. That's just a little side note for people shopping for cars. I didn't realize you could negotiate with the finance department. I found this out because my dad worked for Ford for so long and

I got these pin numbers where Jason, you used one of these where you could get a good deal on a car that even the dealer couldn't get. And then I remember going to the financing department and the guy goes, well, there's not anything we can really do here because financing guidelines are set because you use the pin number. So I have to give you the lowest rate. And I was like, wait, you have to give me the lowest rate, I didn't know that there was different, there were different rates. And he's like, oh, yeah, there's different rates. Depends on who you are, your credit. It also depends on kind of like what the dealer or the underwriter can get away with.

And I was like, wow, you are really candid. And he's like, yeah, somebody walks in and we know that they're not a credit risk, but we can still give them a pretty high rate. If they don't negotiate it, we'll give them that. I was shocked. They will take you to the cleaners because why not? They're making money off of it. It's part of the sales process.

I really had no idea. Oh, absolutely. My dad did my first negotiation with Ford Credit finances long, long ago, and I saw how the sausage was made because, you know, they saw me as a lifelong customer because my dad was a Ford customer for his entire life. So they, like my dad talked this guy down to like a 0.1% finance rate when it said clearly, like, you know, a couple percent on the, on the sticker. And he's like, no, you can do better.

You can do better. And he just kept saying that until they did better. So there's always room to wiggle. Yeah, it's, look, if you have bad credit or you're really young, they probably have a cutoff where they go, look, man, we got no background on you. This is all the underwriter is going to do. But if you walk in there and you're 26 or 27 and you've been paying your credit cards off on time and all that stuff, they're going to give you the retail, quote unquote, interest rate unless you say something. Because why not? You're safe. They're going to make that money no matter what. So they might as well jack it up until you walk away. And so, And they already know that you're going to buy the car if they don't screw with you. So they're balancing that. So, yeah, you can at least negotiate a half percent or more. Anyway, what's next?

Hi, Jordan. I just finished listening to your interview with Ramit Satie and was absolutely blown away with the conversation. So many interesting points in valuable content that we can apply immediately to make considerable changes in our lives for tomorrow and for 30 or 40 years down the road. I wanted to get your take when it comes to automated banking in hitting that exponential phase of compound interest as soon as possible. I'm 23 years old and just finished my first year of medical school in Arizona. I understand that I'm going to be fiercely in debt by the time it's over, around $225,000, and I'm wondering if it's still in my best interest to deposit $100 a month

into an index fund per Rameet's recommendation. I know I need to start as soon as I can, and have done a fair amount of research into what online resources I can use for this transaction. What I really want to know is, with the immense financial strain I'll be under through school and for years after paying back my loans, is it still worth it to be locking my money up and committing to this monthly index fund? Any advice you have would be greatly appreciated. Thanks for your time and keep up the great work on the podcast.

Signed, who should get my cash? And tell the guy to hopefully he listened to the previous doctor and gets the hell out of the doctor business. I know. A lot of doctors looking to invest if they can. A lot of people want to chase return early. And as Matt Zepka also said, we consulted him on a lot of his finance stuff.

so that I'm not just talking out of my behind. For younger people, it's all about accumulation. If you're cool not touching the money until you're 60, index or retirement funds is fine. But if you need to withdraw money early, you get a penalty for this. It usually also means that there's a bad economy or a bad market. So what you don't want to do is like in 2009,

people lost their jobs, the market was down because of the crash. A lot of people had to liquidate their IRA right at the bottom and sell at a loss. and that's really, really bad. Because you pay a penalty, and then you sell everything that you bought at a loss because you don't have any cash. That's not good.

You're losing money after you just lost your job. It's not a good situation. I was in that situation, and it sucked. Yeah, that's horrible. Yeah, I had to liquidate all of my savings and my IRAs, and I got penalized for everything, and it's like you just watch that money drip off into the ether and your soul sags when it happened. So you don't want that to happen.

Yeah, because you're basically broke and you're looking. at your portfolio and it's in the toilet and then you go, well, I guess I'll sell everything at 50 cents on the dollar because I need to eat tomorrow. Yeah. It's just not good. So the question is, can I access the money without a penalty or selling in a down market? And yes, keep putting in the $100 because you're not going to miss $1,200 a year as a doctor. As far as paying off the loan, well, that depends on the interest. A single check is always the best way to pay off a liability because you have control of the money until you cut the check. And we kind of discussed that in the previous questions here, you want to control. That's sort of the theme of this, is control the money,

control the money, control the money. So if the interest is going to be, bank the money in something that gets interest at or above the interest of the loan if possible, then cut one check for that alone when you've got enough money. If you can't find those returns, you have to value how much it's worth to control your funds. It's worth a couple percent at most to control your funds and avoid even bigger problems down the road. So it's worth like a percent or two, even if you're paying more in interest that you are in getting in savings, so that you have control of the funds. That's really the bottom line here. And I know that this is a similar question to the other ones, but I think it's worth highlighting because what you want to make sure you're doing is not

handing over all of your disposable income to somebody who, because if you pay off that loan and then you go, man, I am in dire straits, hey, I need to get that loan money back out. They're going to go, well, good luck. Good luck with that. We're not going to hand your money back. Now that we know you need money, that's a big risk for us. Not only that, we might even accelerate what you owe us at this point. And then you've paid off half the loan and your interest rate doubles. And then your money's going down the toilet faster than you can make it. You don't know what's going to happen. So it's always, always, always good to have control. And so that's what you want to do. That's what you want to make damn sure you're doing. And so thanks to Matt Zepka for this.

as well. I like the idea of control. I hadn't really thought about the idea that we need to control our money. I hadn't thought about that before. And Matt really kind of delivered that to me when I was going over this. And that for me is new and it's something I'm going to keep in mind. I highly suggest everyone else do the same. All right, that's enough financial stuff for now. Jason, what else do we have? Hey, gang, I have a person in my network that I think could be beneficial to my fledgling company. They'd be a good connection to get my foot in the door with potential clients and I have no issue with compensating them for making these connections. My concern is that they'll want to participate in the work as a condition for making the connections. One of their personality traits I've observed

is that they're used to getting their way when they want it. I've worked with them on similar projects and I'm not thrilled with their performance. Essentially, they can't produce but can open doors. What are some tips to emphasize I only want to use them for their networking and opening doors ability without damaging the relationship? Thanks, networking with no strings. You'd need to frame this as a sales job on his part, I think, with him getting a commission for helping close the deal. So you also have to be clear that you want to handle the deal internally after he does this. So you can tell him he's great at networking and sales, leaving out the fact that he can't actually produce and is a hindrance once the deal is actually closed. You can make a company policy, if you want, that actually prohibits you from working with contractors when the work could be done internally.

And then you can refer to that policy when he asks why he can't work. on the deal. He might not care though. He might go, make an exception for me, you know, be pushy. Make sure you then negotiate with him on what he will earn from closing the business. This way, you could keep him focused on getting business and maintaining relationships and let him feel the value for that. So you basically would say, look, I'll give you 10% if you bring us a deal, and then if you want to work on the deal, that's fine, but you don't get paid anything additional for that. And he'll be like, no, I want to get 15%. And you say, all right, well, if you want 15%, we're still going to pay you that,

but we don't, that's what you get for bringing in the deal, but not for working on it. You know, you got to just structure it so that the money is for a commission for him bringing in business and he doesn't get anything additional from working on the deal, and you incentivize him properly. Make sure you then negotiate with him on what he will earn from closing the business. This way, you can keep him focused on getting business and maintaining relationships and let him feel the value for that.

And it sounds like he craves that value. He needs a win, so he wants to do the work because he gets validation there. Or he really enjoys the work. But if he's doing a bad job, that seems unlikely. So instead, you want to give him validation and that ego boost, you know, the Mr. I get whatever I want. You want to give him that validation from finding and closing the business, not from working on the deal itself. If he keeps asking to do the work, you can continue bringing the conversation back to a sales and lead job. and roll and just not budge on it. In the end, if you're compensating him for this and he's getting

validation from it, he probably will not actually want to take part in the work. He probably knows that he's not good at it, but he doesn't want to admit this because he's getting value and validation from being a part of the deals. He doesn't want to leave money on the table. He doesn't want to leave ego points on the table. So you have to provide that value and validation elsewhere, turning him essentially into an all-star salesman and lead generator whose time is, quote-unquote, better spend outside the office generating business than inside the office pushing paper. In fact, you can literally use that phrase to convince him that generating business for you is a higher status role than him coming in and working on the deals.

A lot of salesmen actually love sales because they don't want to do the pencil pushing. They want to be out crushing business. Salesmen are kind of like athletes in the corporate world, and you've got to treat them as such. And it doesn't mean that they really view everyone else's unimportant. It's just that they know that what they do is very unique. And so get them focused on. It's actually inefficient to have a salesman who's good working on a deal most of the time in any industry. Anybody who can generate and close business should not also be drafting deal memos.

It's just not a good use of their time until they've maxed out the amount of business that they can bring in. Lawyers, even lawyers do this. If you got a lawyer that goes out and generates a lot of business, you want them out generating business. even if they're fantastic at structuring deals, that might be like 5, 10% of their time. There are definitely attorneys who never go to the office and they just go to the country club and golf and do jujitsu and go to charity gala. That was like the guy who hired me back when I worked on Wall Street. I barely ever saw him.

And I thought he was working from home and it turned out he was just out crushing business and bringing it in, bringing in millions of dollars for the firm. So they paid him a commission on everything he brought in and he didn't get an hourly billable hours bonus. He didn't hit it. He didn't hit his billable hours, but he didn't care because that was 30 grand a year. And bringing in deals in him getting a chunk of those is probably 300,000 a year. So you want to incentivize him properly.

And someone who's insecure and craving validation like this guy sounds like he is, he will almost certainly jump at the chance to take a role that he views his higher status and is equal or higher compensation as long as he doesn't get in your way. because he's going to rationalize that he's doing the most important work. And for you, he might actually be, especially if he's not stepping on everybody's toes and pissing off everybody else that you work with. So it's all about incentives and digging in your heels on that and making sure that he views this as something that is essentially a promotion and not you keeping him away from the deal

because he's not good at it. We'll be back with more feedback Friday right after this. Thanks for listening and supporting the show. Your support of our advertisers keeps us on the air. to learn more and get links to all the great discounts you just heard, visit Jordan Harbinger.com slash deals. Now back to the show for the conclusion of Feedback Friday. Okay, next. Hi, Jordan. I'm a conservative truck driver who's just discovering podcasts. I have a few I really enjoy. It's good entertainment and sometimes very informative. My problem is when the podcaster

shows their liberal bias and takes shots at conservatives, I really believe an entertainer should not show their political leanings and try to keep the biggest audience possible. I'm not sure what to do. Should I stop listening? Should I send them a polite email expressing my thoughts? I'm pretty sure you won't read this on Feedback Friday, but thanks for your time. Sincerely, conservative who doesn't like being kicked in the nuts. This to me sounds like a passive-aggressive letter.

And I actually wrote this guy back. And so I was like, hey, what's going on in your life? And it turned out not a whole lot of good stuff going wrong. And so I thought at first, what the heck is the deal here? I hope I'm wrong. You're actually asking me a question. You're not just shooting an arrow at me over email. But it turned out it was a little bit of, it was a little bit of both. So this might not be the best question, but this is a good opportunity for me to express my reasoning. I don't express political leanings on the Jordan Harbinger show. We really don't. It's actually wiser to keep an open mind and not avoid listening to other people's perspectives just because it's against my own. So we don't have a political message on the show. You'll have Chelsea Handler in one episode who's a very liberal, if you haven't known. and then conservative Arthur Brooks in another episode. It's funny because I get along fine with those people. There are just a bunch of listeners that go,

I can't believe you're siding with. And that's just not the case. I think that this goes along with what you were saying earlier about being able to change your mind in the face of new information. If you block, if you close your ears and go la la la la when you hear new information because it doesn't match your political beliefs, that's a problem for you. And I think when people feel attacked, politically especially,

it's often rooted in their own insecurities. For example, you'd have to try pretty hard to read political bias into this show and then let it affect you emotionally. So I suggest taking the same advice that most conservatives seem to recommend here, which is realizing that not everything someone says about you, especially political commentary, is about you. And realize that dialogue and differing ideas is what America is founded upon. We talked about that with Arthur Brooks this week. and I recommend all perspectives and stay as far away from actual politics as I can here on the show most of the time. For those that have listened for a while, you'll know I'm mostly libertarian, not liberal, lefty, libertarian. And I lean in all sorts of different ways politically, depending on whether it's fiscal or social policy that we're discussing.

Would you be as, let me ask you this, would you be as offended if a podcaster had a bunch of conservative views that they were pushing on other people or that were not well hidden? or is it just opinions that you disagree with that trigger and offend you? That's always the question here. I have a feeling I would not have gotten this email if I was a little bit more conservative because he would agree with me. But since he disagrees with something that he thinks I said or thinks that I believe, now he's angry. So that's something that you should explore yourself.

And I will also say there is a distinct irony in the amount of email I actually get from really conservative folks saying, everyone on the left is a snowflake. And then two paragraphs later, they talk about how their feelings are hurt by a random podcaster who unintentionally offended them somehow, completely by accident, while talking about something else. So who's the snowflake in this scenario? And thankfully, most people on the left and the right are not doing this. And I think a lot of conservatives I tend to agree with a lot of what is said there.

And I do think the left in many ways eats its own tail. And that's another subject for another time. But that said, I'm very glad that you listen to this show. I sleep very well, knowing that 99% of the time, this show is a very reasoned conversation with people from all over the political spectrum. I would go so far as to say that anyone who gets offended by what is on this show here is reaching pretty far. And hopefully you're talking about other podcasts and not this one, although I did email him back to get clarification. And it turned out that it was this one, but there was no example he could point to. It was just a quote unquote general feeling that he got about this.

but look, if you're offended by this show, and I don't mean him, I just mean in general. If you're offended by what we talk about in this show, I'm scared for how you will react to something that is actually offensive. So thanks to everyone who is a fan of this, no matter where you fall politically. And I like hearing about this because I do get insight into how people think. But Jason, I got to say, there's not a week goes by where we don't get an email from somebody on the left who says, I can't believe how conservative you are, you bastard. And then someone else on the right who goes, I can't believe how liberal you are, you snowflake, lib-tard.

And I'm like, wow, there's so much bias and coloration going on here that these people will hear the exact same thing from me. And one will go, oh, he's a left-wing, wing-nut idiot. And then somebody on the right, or somebody on the left will go, I can't believe this guy's a douchebag, right-wing, turd. You know, there's just all kinds of interpretation going on here that isn't really present in the opinions expressed on the show. It's kind of funny.

I just it makes me worried about the discourse because it's almost like these people can't hear anything That's not through their own lens and that's you got to be careful with that people You got to be careful about filtering things in that you think you're hearing that are not there You're gonna start to generate enemies and ire all over the place and it's not gonna do you any good Fortunately in this case it turned out that the writers actually having a tough time in life so he's angry about Everything and I get that I feel you and I feel bad for you if you're having a time time in life and you're taking it out on political pundits, it's not completely misplaced. Arthur Brooks and us discussed how those people are deliberately trying to divide America and build

tribes so that they can make money. We are deliberately not doing that. Our tribe here is people that want to get better at whatever they're doing, left or right, grow a career, get a great group of friends and be emotionally healthy. That's our tribe. If you're in that tribe, I don't care who you vote for. All right, what's next? Hello, Jordan, Jason, and Jen. I'm going to be 25 next month, and from listening to your show, I realize the best way to spend the second half of my 20s would be to build skills and build my network. My problem is that I spend almost all of my free time on things that will give me instant gratification and won't add any real value in my life, like playing video games, watching YouTube or the office for the millionth time,

endlessly scrolling on Facebook, watching porn, etc. Activities that instantly fill my brain with dopamine, but add no real value in my life. And yeah, I smoke weed almost every day. I know, I'm a stereotype. It's like I'll be actively doing them and enjoying them, but have this feeling of guilt in the back of my mind because I'm not doing what really needs to get done. I've read the seven habits of highly effective people by Stephen Covey, and I know that I should be spending time focusing on activities in the first and second quadrants, but I just seem to be perpetually trapped in the fourth quadrant. I think I'm just not disciplined enough to make myself do the hard things, but I don't know how to build that discipline. Also, on the

rare occasion when I'm doing the hard things, there's a part of me that's constantly thinking, what's the point? By the time I'll see the results from this, climate change or a nuclear war will have ended the world as we know it. So why am I not enjoying the little time I have left? I don't know. I want to be a productive person and actually get somewhere in my life, but there's something about my lazy personality that's holding me back. I was hoping that you could give me tips or courses on how to not give into instant gratification so I can actually be productive and find fulfillment in my life. Once again, thanks for all the amazing work that you guys do. Sincerely, dopamine fiend. Well, I hear you in a way, but let me dispense of a couple of this year.

Climate change and nuclear war are creative rationalizations. That's all they are here. There's no real truth here. You're using these as excuses. I think you know that. There's not going to be a nuclear holocaust. Climate change isn't going to kill you. It's going to kill your grandkids, most likely.

You're just going to screw up your life in the meantime, not building what you want and be miserable. And then you're going to be rooting for nuclear war in climate change because you're not going to have invested in yourself. Now, I'm being, I'm catastrophizing here just like you are. But look, you're 25. You're fine. I think when I was 25, I was a low rent nihilist too, thinking the same things, you know? Yeah. I mean, what he's lacking is purpose.

It's so clear. Yep. What he's lacking is purpose. He's 25 and he's going, what's the point? This is all a bunch of BS. I don't know. If he found something that you really wanted to do, he'd be doing that. You would, yeah, you'd still watch porn because you're a dude and you're 24, but at 25,

your sex drives through the roof. But yeah, you're going to watch the office at night. You're going to use too much social media. You're going to check out YouTube, but you're also going to be driven to do something. Right now, I think that drive is missing. And also, look, I'm not anti-canabas. Far from it, actually. But if you're feeling demotivated, stop smoking weed.

I'm not saying weed makes you lazy. What I'm saying is it's that much harder to motivate yourself when you're super relaxed because you just inhaled a bunch of freaking indica and you're taking. a bunch of naps. You know, get your butt to bed early. Don't look at your phone. Use blackout curtains. Get a.m. Get a. You will wake up at 6 a.m. if you go to bed at 9 or 10. Then go to the gym. Use the techniques from atomic habits with James Clear. That's episode 108, by the way, of this show, and get to the gym four plus days a week. This is going to hard reset your body, the sleep in the gym, into feeling more energetic. You won't want to eat crap food. You won't want to go on Facebook.

and sit there and waste your time. You probably won't even want to smoke as much weed. You'll feel more motivated to do other things. This sounds like a funk induced or at least maintained by self-medicating. You know, you're getting dopamine from weed, then you're sleeping, then you're getting up, you're feeling guilty, you're procrastinating doing what you need to do on social media, then you'd fire up porn hub, then you'd smoke weed and you'd take an app. That's not a good cycle.

It's going to make you feel depressed. There's a lot more you can do, but rather than attack the symptoms, you need to stop the negative habit loop before you go any further. When I needed to stop drinking too much and go to the gym and work harder, all I did was get more sleep, which made me able to go work out, which made me want to eat well, which made me want to drink less. Positive feedback loops like this, a few months later, I was kicking butt at school, I was on the way to a good career. Not having discipline, that is BS. You create discipline. Sure, some people might have had it younger than others, but read atomic habits if you need to and go from there. It's not a matter of discipline. It's a matter

of putting systems in place so that the path of least resistance is a path that's actually good for you. So if you're waking up naturally at six and you have a bunch of weights downstairs instead of having to get in the car and drive to the gym, you can work out at home. And then, so the path of least resistance is the path that's good for you. Oh, well, you don't have any junk food in the house because you only bought healthy food? Good. The path of least resistance is going downstairs and getting a protein bar instead of eating a fricking cupcake, right? Once you do this, you'll start skill stacking and building relationships that will further your career later down the line. If you're addicted to Facebook, Jason, Jason, you quit Facebook, right? You stopped it.

I completely quit Facebook. It was the best thing I've ever done. I've quit almost all social media. I only use Twitter occasionally when I need to find some funny news articles for my friends. But getting off of social media almost altogether has been one of the greatest things I've ever done. And we've talked about this before. You're watching other people's highlight reels, and your blooper reel is all around you all day long. And that is a demotivator. That is one of the greatest demotivators in the world. You know, listen to more podcasts if you need to kill some time.

Get the hell off of Facebook. Get off of Instagram. Get off of Twitter. Get off of all that crap. And you will find you'll have more time and you'll be more motivated to actually see your friends in real life and have conversations. And that is going to motivate you because you're going to see the good stuff that they're doing. That's, I mean, social media is just a waste. And especially when you're sitting there, wanking one out every five hours on Pornhub, hitting the bong, and not doing anything except watching TV.

Yeah, you're going to get in this downward cycle. So, you know, I think everything Jordan said plus just destroy your social media accounts. Yeah. And besides, look, if there's a nuclear war, we're going to be picking who gets to come into the compound bunker based on how useful you are, not how many bong rips you can handle or how good you are at jamming on the Xbox. So build a skill. learn how to bow hunt man I don't know I'm just kidding but you know that those aren't real skills

and that's what's depressing I don't mean to say that pro gamers or something don't have real skills those guys are amazing those guys and gals are amazing but you aren't doing that as a career you're doing it to waste time there's a huge difference Jason do you know any pro gamers

those guys are intense they're working out they're training they're doing stuff that's not necessarily fun at all it's like a sport Oh, it is a sport. And it is just like actual sports where only like one-tenth of one percent actually even get to play. And out of that one-tenth of one percent, one-tenth of one percent of that are the ones that actually make the money. I actually got to hang out with fatality back in the day and got to play some games with him. And he'll train over a weekend. He'll train like 20 hours when he's coming up for a tournament. He goes to the gym, which is surprising. Yeah, that is surprising. For an esports athlete to keep his mind focused. But these guys train hard. That makes sense because if you're, if you feel like crap and your back hurts, you're not

going to want to sit there and you're going to be distracted, right? You've got to sit there and focus. You don't want jitters too, and working out, we'll get rid of that. Gaming is so interesting, man. My buddy Mick is a DJ and he sent me a photo of a huge arena. And I go, whoa, man, you're playing a show. What is that? And he goes, no, this is the Overwatch World Championships or something in Brooklyn.

And he's like, there's 20,000 people here. It's Taiwan versus Philadelphia or something like that. And I was just in awe. They had uniforms on. It was a co-ed team. It was so cool to see. And they were playing some game that I hadn't seen Overwatch. I know it's huge.

It's just not my cup of tea, I guess. But these people were amazing at this. The moves that take me, when I play Xbox, I'm like, okay, L trigger pulls the bow back. and then I push and then I aim and then I push our right trigger like that's me playing they're like they can do it so fast it's insane

yeah it's really is it really is a skill I want my dad to see it because he used to be like you're playing this damn video games now I'm looking and I go okay you're really this is a real it's like if golf is a sport video games esports are real sports yeah there's no way they're not breaking a sweat and thinking super super fast I don't

did you know I was a semi-pro Quake player back in the day? No, no, I didn't know that. Yeah, Quake 3 back in the day. I was in a couple clans that were pretty highly ranked. And I would go home, I would leave work at 5 p.m. on Friday, and I'd show back up at work on Monday at 9 in the morning. In that, like, you know, time span, I would have played at least 24 hours straight.

Every weekend for years. I bought, like, the highest, like the best computer that I could get. and I would just play all the time and I got into a couple really good clans and it is a massive amount of work and even with all the work that I put in I still wasn't even that good compared to like the really high end players when you meet the high end players in a match it it is mind-boggling how fast their brain works they know where you're going to be you know 20 seconds before you're even going to get there and when you come around the corner there's a rocket in your face because they just know where you're going to go it's insane that's too much that's

That's why I tried playing Halo once, multiplayer, and it was like, spawn, die, spawn, die, spawn, die, spawn, die, spawn, die, spawn, die, spawn, and I'm like, who are these kids in there, all 14? Yeah. If that. Now, like I said, I played against Fatality, who back in the day, this is like the early 2000s, was the highest paid gamer in the world, and we played Halo at my friend's house, and it was ridiculous. We were playing four on him, or, like, three on him. There's a four-person game, and all we tried to do was kill him. and he got killed once in the middle of this match before he killed us all like 20 times. And he got so mad when he got killed once that he was just like, okay, then he like shrugged it off and like really started to play.

Because he was only playing like half ass and killing everybody. But when he got killed once, he turned it on and we could not get a shot on him. It is insane how good these guys are when they get it to the top. But that is the top of the top of the top. And you're not going to be doing that sitting there, wanking on porn. Hitting the bong. Yeah, exactly. Life Pro Tip of the Week, if you decide to give up your seat on an overbook flight,

now they go, we need volunteers, you're going to get a $200 voucher. Sometimes people run up there. Other times they don't. And if you go up to the gate agent, if there's not a huge line of people waiting to do that, you can say, hey, toss in another 200 or more or less, depending on your best judgment. And I'll go for it. If you tell them, hey, can you up this by $100 and I'll do it? they almost always will say, okay, because a willing volunteer is more worth it than having to bump someone who then gets angry and is pissed off and they're dealing with it.

It's not their money. So a lot of times it's negotiable, the amount that you can get for this. And if they say, oh, we'll give you a meal voucher, instead say, actually, can I get a day pass to your first class club or whatever those things are called your lounge? there's better food there, or at least there's food there anyway, not necessarily better, but there's food there anyway in the lounge. And they've got nice seating. They usually have Wi-Fi. They've got televisions.

You can put your stuff down and use a cleaner bathroom. It's better. And they have the option a lot of times to give you one of those two if they have a lounge in that terminal, or at least near the airport. So if you're stuck somewhere for like eight more hours, don't just get a Burger King, a $15 burger king voucher. Ask for a day pass. You can sit there and eat and have some drinks the whole time.

And you can negotiate the amount of the voucher. It's worth it. Try it. I've done it before. And it's a good idea. In the old days, they used to give you a free round trip ticket anywhere in the continental United States. And I've done this a couple times when, because it was when they would come through the cabin. Remember when they used to do that and say, is anybody willing to give up their seat?

And if nobody raised their hand, I would raise my hand and say, yes, but make it two round trips and I'm off. And I did that three or four times. and I always got two free round trip tickets anywhere in the continental United States. That's awesome. I didn't know. I'd never been on a plane where they're like, who's going to get off the plane right now? Oh, really? That used to happen to me all the time.

I don't fly that much anymore, but I've had that happen a lot. Is that like before they had the scanning of the boarding passes? Because how do they not know that they've oversold the flight before they've oversold the flight? Like, now they know before anybody gets on that it's oversold and that there's somebody that they need to get on the flight. Yeah, it could have been, could have been, because it was a while ago. Because I was young and I could get off the plane because I had nowhere to be. So I was probably in my, you know, 20s or early 30s. So, yeah, it was probably before everything was so automated.

Yeah, this is paper ticket time. Yeah. Has to be. Yeah. Yeah. So somebody would show up at the gate with their tickets and there'd be like, you know, a family of three trying to get on. And they needed to find three spots on the plane to get them on. Mm-hmm.

So. But, yeah, you can still negotiate. They are definitely open in negotiation because, yeah, like you said, it's not their money. They just want to get the freaking plane in the air. Exactly. They just don't want somebody throwing a fit who's got diamond status or whatever. Recommendation of the week, Dawn Wall. Have you seen this, Jason?

No, I have not. What's it about? So you've seen that free solo movie, right, where the guy climbs up? I refuse to watch that movie. I can't do it. You love nightmares? Yeah. So this is about a climb and it's a climber.

And it's also, but he doesn't do it with like no ropes. but he is free climbing this mountain and inventing new. It's a really interesting story. I mean, he ends up getting kidnapped in another country, which is near and dear to my heart. So I thought that was interesting. It's just a really, really well done movie. It's on Netflix.

It's called The Dawn Wall. And if you like those crazy rock climbing movies, or just an interesting story, I highly recommend The Dawn Wall. It's on Netflix. And it's with Tommy Caldwell, who is also in Free Solo. He's just not the main guy in Free Solo.

Yeah, you know how you can't watch those videos of like that I pointed out where like people are getting trapped under the ocean. Yeah, no. That's how I feel about people climbing big things. Yeah. Yeah, I hear you. No, I don't like people drowning in underwater caves. I just, I can't even play video games where you have to swim in an underwater cave.

It just makes me, I can, but it just makes me nervous. Yeah. Sweaty palms. Yeah. 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'll always keep you anonymous.

Got some live events coming up soon. Well, we will. Right now we're doing corporate training, and that's always fun and exciting. And a link to the show notes for this episode can be found at Jordan Harbinger.com. And if you join six-minute networking over at Jordan Harbinger.com slash course

or you sign up for our newsletter, you will find out about our live events when we announce them, because we'll do it on the email list, not on the show, most likely. Simply because by the time you hear about it on the show, it'll be sold out. Our last one sold out in four hours.

So I'm very cognizant of the fact. that there's no point announcing it on the show because it'll just be fielding emails about there's no seats left. Shout out to, I don't know if this is the name, Malak Firas, but he found the show. This is ironic. He said my story of how I found the show

was I was missing my home country, Jordan, which is Jordan. And I was curious about what people on the internet said about the country. So I typed in Jordan and there was the podcast on Google. He clicked on it and Feedback Friday was the best conversation he had ever heard since then he's been recommending the show

to all his family and friends and he's listened to all the episodes. That's amazing. It's so funny. Someone Googled Jordan looking for the country found our show and was like, yeah, I'll dive into this. That's kind of random.

Yeah, totally. Never heard anything like that. I never heard anything like that. Go back and check out the guests, LeVar Burton and Gabriel Weinberg if you haven't yet. And if you want to know how we managed to create

amazing networks for ourselves, well, check out six-minute networking. I just talked about where you can find that. Jordan Harbinger.com slash course. Don't do it later. The mistake people make is not digging the well before they get thirsty. If you need those relationships and you haven't made them, well, you're out of luck. The drills take five, six minutes a day, hence the name.

Ignore this at your own peril. I wish I'd known this stuff 20 years ago. It's crucial to business and personal success network. It's all about who you know, they say. You can find that 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. and videos of our interviews are at Jordan Harbinger.com slash YouTube.

Jason? My personal website's over at jpd.me, where you can find links to the few socials that I'm still on. And you can check out my tech podcast, grumpy old geeks over at gog. dot show or your podcast player of choice. And like I always say, keep the kids out of the room because we do get a bit adulty on that show. Yes. This show is produced in association with podcast one.

This episode was co-produced by Jen Harbinger. And show notes for the episodes are by Robert Fogarty. Keep sending in those questions to Friday at Jordan Harbinger. And remember, we rise by lifting others. So share the show with those you love and even those you don't. Lots more in the pipeline. Very excited to bring it to you. In the meantime, do your best to apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you

listen. And we'll see you next time. This episode is sponsored in part by Something You Should Know podcast. Finding a new great podcast shouldn't be this hard, so let me save you some time. If you like the Jordan Harbinger show, you'll probably like something you should know with Mike Carruthers. It's one of those shows that makes you smarter in a practical, useful way. Same curiosity vibe we go for here, just in a fast,

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