The Jordan Harbinger Show - 495: Jon Acuff | The Surprising Solution to Overthinking

Episode Date: April 15, 2021

Jon Acuff (@jonacuff) is an Inc. Magazine Top 100 Leadership speaker, host of the All It Takes Is a Goal podcast, and author of multiple bestsellers. His latest book is Soundtracks: The Surprising Solution to Overthinking. What We Discuss with Jon Acuff: Jon defines a soundtrack as those repetitive thoughts that play automatically in your head that shape more of your choices than you know -- and this is why you need to curate your soundtrack. Three questions to ask yourself if you want to identify a broken soundtrack that derails your ambitions -- and change it into one that goads you into action. How you can flip a worry-inducing soundtrack into one that instills confidence. Being prepared always leads to an action; overthinking always leads to more overthinking. Something better to tell yourself than "Fake it 'til you make it" from the son of the guy who coined that phrase. And much more... Full show notes and resources can be found here: jordanharbinger.com/495 Sign up for Six-Minute Networking -- our free networking and relationship development mini course -- at jordanharbinger.com/course! Like this show? Please leave us a review here -- even one sentence helps! Consider including your Twitter handle so we can thank you personally!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This episode is sponsored in part by Conspiruality Podcast. You know how I'm always talking about critical thinking and spotting manipulation? Well, there's a podcast that's all about dismantling new age cults, wellness grifters, and conspiracy mad yogis, basically the wild overlap of spirituality and misinformation. It's called the Conspiruality Podcast. The hosts, a journalist, cult researcher, and a philosophical skeptic, dive deep into how this stuff spreads, from Project 2025 and the Heritage Foundation's dystopian vision of the future to how former leftists get pulled into far-right conspiracies.

An interesting episode to check out is called Speaking Truth to Goop, where Jen Gunter breaks down the pseudoscience behind the wellness industry in a way that is super entertaining and eye-opening. It's sharp, funny, and makes you a lot harder to fool, which, if you listen to this show, you know I'm all about that. From exploring cults to analyzing our cultural and political landscape, the Conspiratuality Podcast will help you stay informed against misinformation and resist fear tactics.

Find Conspirality on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and wherever you get your podcasts. Coming up on the Jordan Harbinger show. That's where the brain comes in with confirmation bias. The brain likes to believe stuff it already believed. So, like, my kind of metaphor of that is like, it's like surrounding yourself with bear traps. Every bad experience is a bear trap,

and you're just waiting for somebody to lightly graze one of them, set it off so you can go, I knew it. That's exactly how the world works. That's how business works. I always tell people, if you want to figure out a broken soundtrack, write down something you want to do. Like a really simple thing to do is just write down something you want to do. I want to start a podcast.

I want to ask for a raise, and then listen to the first reaction you have, because every reaction is an education. Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On the Jordan Harbinger show, we decode the stories, secrets and skills are the world's most fascinating people. We have in-depth conversations with people at the top of their game, astronauts, entrepreneurs, spies, psychologists, even the occasional journalist-turned poker champion Russian spy or money laundering expert. You get the idea. Each episode turns our guest's wisdom into practical advice that you can use to build a deeper understanding of how the world works and become a better critical thinker. If you're new to the show or you want to tell some friends about it, please tell some friends

about it. That's how we keep the lights on around here. We've got episode starter packs. These are collections of your favorite episodes, or at least popular episodes, organized by topic that'll help you or new listeners, or maybe you are a new listener, get a taste of everything we do here on the show. Just visit Jordan Harbinger.com slash start. That'll get you started. You can also help somebody else get started, and of course, you know how I love when you do that. Today, we're talking about overthinking. Almost everyone does it, and a lot of those people, they think they're the only one who does. I'm not an overthinker in general, but I know a ton of people struggle with this. I could probably do with some overthinking, how did I think about it a little. I don't know.

See what I did there by accident? But for those of us that are chronic overthinkers, it can be debilitating. It can keep us from moving ahead in our careers. It can sabotage our relationships. It can really keep us in our head. Sometimes it's nearly impossible to break free from the cycle, or at least it seems that way, and today's guest and former chronic overthinker and friend of mine, John Acuff, he will deliver some strategies to help us decide whether our thinking is productive or not, and help us break free from the cycle of overthinking so we can develop better soundtracks for our personal and professional lives. Y'all know me, I'm not into cheesy self-help stuff, but John Acuff is the real deal.

All right, maybe I'm overthinking this intro, so I'm going to cut it right here. By the way, if you're wondering how I managed to book all these great authors, thinkers, and creators, it's because of my network. I'm teaching you how to do it, how to build your network for free, and dig that well. Before you get thirsty, there's a free course called six-minute networking. Five-minute networking was taken. Go to Jordan Harbinger.com slash course. It takes just a few minutes a day, and most of the guests on the show, they subscribe to the course already.

They contribute. Come join us. You'll be in smart company. Now, here's John Aikoff. I want to talk about, well, I have to do the obligatory. Thanks for coming on the show. wise people go, how do you never thank your gifts for coming on the show? Like, I don't say anything to you before the show starts, right? Exactly. Or like, why are you so hateful? You didn't thank John.

Yeah. That's funny. Like, what are you so entitled? This person just shows up and does the show. I want to talk about overthinking because everyone does it, but I think a lot of people who do it, think that they're the only people who do it. And I know that because I used to overthink everything, especially back in my law school days, and I was like, you don't understand. I'm thinking about all these things. And I remember being in a study group at law school and it was like a bunch of like, you know, Russian Jewish kids and me and they're like, oh, we understand overthinking. How do you think we got in to this law school in the first place? That's so funny. That's so funny. It's true. I think it's one of those things that everybody thinks are the only one. And then you look at the

data and you go, what turns out everybody is. And then 2020 was catnip for overthinking. So if you weren't overthinking before, like a phrase I've been telling people is everything's a thing. So like somebody tried to shake my hand recently. And I was like, right before I did, I was like, should I give him the elbow? Should I say no? Should I give him a fist bump? What if I shake it? And then I put my hand in a vat of hand sanitizer right away to go, hey, I'm just trying to scrub off the deadly pandemic. You just tried to murder me with, no offense. And then I looked around. I was like, is this a handshaking event? Is that a political statement? Dude, two years ago, you know what I thought before I shook somebody's hand? Nothing. I shook their hand. Overthinking, in my opinion,

an epidemic, we're all doing it to some degree. Yeah, well, now, you're right. Now you shake someone's hand, and it's like, geez, this is a handshaker. He probably thinks I'm weird for wearing a mask now. Like, what, you know? Yeah, exactly. What did we vote?

Like, what does this say about my life and who I am as a person and how I raise my kids? And you're like, all I did was shake his hand. And now I'm carrying around like a million thoughts. Now, someone who reaches out for a handshake, you're like, you know what? That guy's probably a racist. I was like, what?

Yeah. How did I get that? How did I get the? Yeah, that's quite a leap. You're like, I feel like Twitter would be proud of that. Twitter would be like, I should hashtag this handshake. Oh, man, man, hashtag it. So what is overthinking?

I mean, we kind of gave a good example, but you in the book, you give a really good, is it a metaphor? You say, overthinking is when what you think gets in the way of what you want. And the metaphor you use was soundtrack. And I thought that was pretty clever because if there's anything overthinkers do, it's play crap over and over and over in their heads. Yeah, and for me, I've heard people say, you know, a thought is like a, a leaf on a river or it's a car on a highway, a cloud in the sky. But for me, it's a soundtrack, which is just a repetitive thought that tends to play automatically. And it plays in the

background, but it's changing everything. In the same way that if you opened up a movie scene and there was a peaceful neighborhood and a white picket fence and you played an ominous song, then that would change it. You don't go in there. It's too quiet. There's probably a clown in the sewer. But if you played a happy song, you'd go, oh, this is a rom-com. This is going to be okay. And so soundtrack was my phrase to describe, okay, repetitive thoughts that play automatically that are shaping more of your choices and actions than you might know. These thoughts that are in our head, again, I love the term soundtrack because I probably play, well, when I'm under stress, I play a negative thought.

Now I'm probably a lot better about it now. Now I'm overthinking in real time. I'm better about it now, but especially when I'm under stress, I play the same, what if this happens, what if this happens, what if this happens? And I remember like three, well, more than three years ago now when I had to read start my show and start the Jordan Harbinger show and leave my coaching business, I had thoughts that were in my head more than any Backstreet Boys, InSink, you know, Baby Shark song has ever stayed in my brain. Those thoughts were there. They were there at 4 o'clock in the morning.

They were there, you know, before I went to bed when I got up in the morning, they were there when I got up to whiz in the middle of the night, right? They just immediately, as soon as your consciousness boots up, it's like, there it is. So we do need to curate that soundtrack. because left to our own devices, if we're an overthinker, maybe this isn't true for everyone, but left to our own devices, it's just nonstop baby shark, negative, you know, negative catastrophe, baby shark. Well, that's a funny thing. During the research, we didn't find a single person whose problem was the overthought compliments.

No one was like, I just think I'm too good of a mom all the time. Like, it's a real issue. Like, everybody would go, okay, I've got these negative thoughts. And that's what's fascinating. The way I say it is kind of like fear comes free, hope takes work. Like the negative thoughts will find you. You know, Roy Ballmeister did a study where they found that there's not even an opposite word in the English language for trauma. There's not an opposite where an overwhelming joy hits you while you're at the grocery store from four years ago.

Or you wake up in the middle of the night and go, remember that time I won that thing in that meeting and it was a home run? Like the opposite tends to happen. So I think the flip side is once you recognize that you can start to go, okay, I don't want to listen to these anymore. They're taking my time. They're taking my creativity, my productivity, whatever. I need to write some new ones. How do I do that? And that's when it gets kind of fun to me

and it gets practical. Mindfulness, overthinking, it could be a really fuzzy topic. That's one of the things I love about conversations with you is that we both look at this and go, okay, well, what does that mean? How do we make it practical?

What does that look like on a Tuesday? How do I actually do that? And I think if you can apply that to overthinking, you can start to change things. That's a really good point that you have about the, no one ever says spontaneous joy has suddenly hit me.

If I'm listening to a keynote speech And someone says, and then I was hit by an overwhelming sense of dread. Everyone goes, oh, no, we've all been there. But if somebody goes, and I was hit by an overwhelming sense of joy, I just go, this freaking fruitcake's probably doing a bunch of psychedelics. I don't need to listen to this shit. They freed their mind with psychedelics. I carved a new path in my brain.

It's like skiing down a hill. And you go, I don't know if that's the, I don't want to have to involve a cactus in my next. Let's beat the line for lunch, folks. Let me get that chicken. Let me get that sad chicken first. Yeah, exactly. The persistent, repetitive thoughts are never really positive. And you, is that what a broken soundtrack is? So essentially, are all soundtracks usually broken, at least in the beginning? I think they start broken and then we have the choice to change them and then go, okay, I'm going to flip that. I'm going to rewrite that. I'm going to create something new. And sometimes they happen from life events.

So, you know, for me, there's been times where I've been taking advantage of in business situations. Yeah. And it's really easy for me to then carry that soundtrack into a next business conversation of, okay, remember, they're trying to take advantage. Remember, like, look for the angle. And then I bring this attitude into the meeting that's kind of a gotcha attitude where I'm just looking for them to try to screw me. and I miss out on opportunities, I miss out on relationships, I miss out on second chances. And so yeah, I think they can be really sticky and they tend to start negative

and then we get to go, okay, that's not what I want in my life. And I enjoy building a podcast, writing a book, having a family, whatever, I'm gonna guide that with new soundtracks. It's interesting. I just did a deal with a really well-known YouTube channel, but I've known the guys for like a decade,

not super well, but I've known them for a while. And I go, hey, so do you want, me to write something up because I don't really want to, but I'm, you know, I will if you want. And they go, no, actually, we're really cool just kind of being like, does this make sense for everyone and doing a handshake deal? Because if we have to think about it too much, it's not really going to make sense for us because this is, it was a small deal for them and a decent deal for me. Because they're basically, I just handed off my YouTube channel to these like superstar YouTubers to run it for me. I still own it technically, but that's, they're doing everything.

And then I thought, this is so refreshing because if it doesn't work, I could always take it from them, but I have no incentive to take it from them because if they do a good job, then I'll want them to keep it. And if they do a bad job, then it won't really earn any money, and therefore they will have no reason to keep it, and I'll just take it back. And then I remember negotiating contracts, and I'm sure you've done this before, too, you negotiate a contract with somebody, and like, like you said, they've been screwed over before. And they're like, there's no section on what happens if the car runs over the computer while it's running our program that we created, and then who owns all the fragments? And you're like, okay, you're trying to shore up

every possible universal scenario here, every time I leave town for a week and you call me and I don't respond within 30 minutes, you're going to be like, he ran off with the money. And I'm like, I don't want to do it. We knew it. Like, I don't want to do this. You don't want to be in a relationship with somebody,

like a romantic relationship. You don't want to be in a relationship with somebody who goes, everybody in my whole life is cheated on me. And if you don't answer the phone, you know, while you're on an airplane overnight to Taiwan, it's probably because you're leaving me. You know, you don't want to deal with somebody like that. and nobody ever would, generally, but in business, a lot of us guys who've been around for a while

we're like, I'm not getting that, I'm not getting screwed again. I'm going to put everything into that contract, 17 pages long. And that's where the brain comes in with confirmation bias. The brain likes to believe stuff it already believes. So like my kind of metaphor of that is like, it's like surrounding yourself with bear traps. Every bad experience is a bear trap and you're just waiting for somebody to lightly graze one of them, set it off so you can go, I knew it. That's exactly how the world works. That's how business works. And again, you'd miss out on the YouTube situation. You'd miss out on so many opportunities, so many dating situations. And so I think, you know, I always tell people, if you want to figure out a broken soundtrack, write down something

you want to do. Like a really simple thing to do is just write down something you want to do. I want to start a podcast. I want to ask for a raise. I want to start a business. And then listen to the first reaction you have because every reaction is an education. So what is that thing? Was it, okay, you don't get to write a book or you don't get to start a business or you're too late. You're not old enough. You're too old. Like listen to the. that reaction because that's going to educate you on, okay, wow, I do have a broken soundtrack. I want to deal with that. And if you want to, the three questions I always say to ask are simple. It's, is it true? Is this thing I'm listening to true? Number two, is it helpful? Does it push me

forward? Does it pull me back? Number three, is it kind? Is it kind to me? Is it encouraging? Does it make me want to lean into it? And if it's not, if you can't say yes to those three easy questions, why are you still listening to it? And let's do something about that. We'll get into that in a little bit. I want to talk about flat, well, first of all, I want to talk about why these are dangerous in general, because of course people go, well, yeah, I have those thoughts, but then I just kind of ignore them and it's not a big deal. But when I'm running a program in the back of my brain that says, you know, last time you did this, it failed. Last time you did this, you lost a bunch of money. Last time you did this, it didn't work and you were really disappointed. Even if you're able to push all those

things out, it still saps your energy, it saps your focus. And honestly, it saps your motivation. Like if someone says, I've got a great idea for a marketing thing, it's going to require this, and then we're going to do that. If all I'm thinking is that's probably not going to work because nothing else in my past has really worked out because I'm not somebody who does experiments that are successful, I don't know. I mean, how much fun are you really having in your new business venture with your friends marketing this thing when you're sort of default, even if you're pushing it out,

your sort of default is, well, it's probably not really going to work. But at least I'm working with my friends. I mean, that's not a great way to live. No, and you're going to play it safe. Like even if you push it away, it's going to impact the decisions you make. Like there's some residue. There's some limiting there. And even if you don't, it's taking up time.

I talked to somebody the other day that said, you know, I got fired 12 years ago. And every time I see a meeting I'm not invited to and a door close, I think that's going to happen again. And let's say he only spends 20 minutes a day doing that. But how many meetings is he not invited to multiplied by 20 minutes? And then you go, that's a gigantic time suck. Like even if he's not, you know, you could say, well, it doesn't change his day. It changes his day because he's losing 20 minutes, you know, every day, every week, all year. And so, like, I always say like overthinking steals time, creativity and productivity.

And that's a practical example of, well, I gave that thing 20 minutes that didn't deserve 20 minutes that I could have done a million other great things with. One of my friends' mothers told me, because I used to be such a worry work, she said something like, what if you did the opposite of worrying? And every time you thought something was going to go terribly, you thought something was going to go really well. And I was like, that's so stupid, but it actually worked out pretty well for a few years. Like, yes, your mind still goes crazy sometimes, but it is kind of nice to go, like, imagine the door closes and it's a meeting you're not invited to. And it's like, they must know that I'm really productive. And I don't need to be in that meeting because it has nothing to do with me.

And I am better left to my own devices because that's where I really shine. They trust me to get my stuff done or they're, you know, they're working on a project that might have bored me. Like, think of all the meetings you've been to and thought, oh, why did they invite me? Right. This is the worst. So then you're on the outside of when you're going, man, that's the one I need to be in. That's the end you got like, you don't get to play at both sides.

So yeah, I'd call that like flipping. Like how do you flip a broken soundtrack to a good one? That's a really easy example of, okay, what would the opposite of this be? Like, what would the positive be? It reminds me of the, I had Moby on the show a few years ago. And, you know, he was a big deal. He still is a big deal, but he was a real big deal, like the big deal at one point in his career. And he was also a serious alcoholic.

and he said he was having like three to four hundred drinks a month when he was drinking. Can you, like, first of all, wrap your mind around that. He would go to this bar or any bar and he'd see like the VIP door and he'd walk in there. And then one day he noticed in his regular bar that a bunch of people went into a door. And he's like, that door is hidden because it was like one of those wooden panels or something. So he barges in there and they're like, hey man, you can't be in here. And he's drunk. And he goes, you know who I am?

And they're like, Moby. We're counting credit card receipts. This is an office. you can't be in here. And he's like, told me, he goes, I thought they were trying to exclude me because I'm so used to being the nerdy guy who gets excluded from everything.

And meanwhile, they were literally just counting credit card receipts because it was like four o'clock in the morning. And I barged into the office. But see, that's like he took those soundtracks of you're a nerdy, unwanted guy and no matter the size of the stage, no matter like porcelain crushes,

play crushes, like he was referenced in an M&M song. Like, there was no degree. The result wouldn't change the soundtrack. He had to do the work of going, okay, like, the better VIP won't make me feel a certain way. Like, I need to deal with the soundtrack that's not telling me the truth. That soundtrack lied to him and said, there's a special secret room you've never known about. And they've all been going in there. And I love that he barged into an office.

That's a perfect example. And they're like, no, we do know who you are. But literally, we're doing like boring accounting. We're doing the bookkeeping. We didn't think Moby should be invited to that. Yeah, drunk Moby. Nobody was like, hey, we're doing the bookkeeping. Get drunk Moby in here, ASAP.

No kidding, exactly. He, man, that guy, he's an interesting dude. People should, we'll link to that episode in the show notes, but I remember now, he actually showed, you know, him and Eminem had this beef, and I can't even remember what it was. I don't even know if he knows what it was, but Eminem hated him, right, and talked about, like, Nobody listens to techno. I remember that was the line. It's over, let it go.

Nobody listens to techno, right? So, Moby said that he was at VMA's video, maybe is the VMAs or something, and Eminem was sitting behind him and he was like, oh, God, people go, hey, Eminem's behind you. So he turned around and looked at him and Eminem just sat there stonefaced and he's like, oh, I guess he doesn't like me. And then later on, he said Eminem tapped him on the shoulder and handed him a napkin and he showed me this drawing. He opens up the napkin or the paper and it's a picture of Eminem that he drew himself grabbing Moby by the neck and squeezing it, choking him. So he's like getting bullied at the VMA is by Eminem.

I thought you were going to say it was an apology. I know you thought I was going to say that, but it definitely wasn't. Can you ever imagine sitting there thinking, you know what I should do right now? I should draw a picture of me choking Moby. Yeah. Like, and then sliding that, like, or did he ask for the napkin? I have all the questions about this story. Was Eminem like, Drake, get me a napkin?

I need a cocktail napkin. And one of those pens that doesn't bleed when what you're writing on is really sad. Oh my gosh. And how did he know when it was done? Was he like, I need more detail around the neck? Like, how does he finish that piece of art? He probably put it down to go up and get like a VMA and then came back and was like,

eh, I'm not in the mood to finish this and hands it off. Like, here you go. This is me killing you. Just in case you're confused about our relationship. No kidding. I told him he should sell it and donate the money to charity because there's probably not a ton of Eminem inspired or Eminem created drawings. It's probably pretty rare.

Yeah. But here's the thing. What if there is? What if there's actually a hundred. hundred of those notes and we just don't know. And like Julia Roberts has one right now and is like, yeah, I was at the Vanity Fair Awards. I think that's an award. And like Eminem was beside me and he handed me this really weird note.

Like maybe he's like Basquey. Like we just don't know. I'm not into the art scene and that's Eminem's thing. Right. Just everyone who sits in front of him, he's like, hold on. This is me killing you. Here you go. Enjoy.

And he can't do it until he sees your neck. Right. Like he'd love to draw you earlier. But until he's in that exact moment, he's not in spite. I mean, this is a really good story I'm telling. This is possibly a tangent into what we were going to originally discuss on here. Let's go back to flashbulb memories and how these relate to broken soundtracks. This is kind of a unique idea that I think a lot of folks have in their head.

A phenomenon. I don't know if it's an idea. It's more a phenomenon. Yeah, so a flashbulb memory is a really big, really dramatic moment that your brain tends to retell in different ways that aren't true. So the example I used in the book was from Malcolm Gladwell talking about Brian Williams, who said to David Letterman, yeah, I was on this Chinook helicopter that was fired on by a rocket propelled grenade. And it turned out not to be true. And it's really easy to go, you don't remember that you weren't fired on by a rocket propelled grenade. Like right now, Jordan, I guarantee you're aware, like, you know what? I don't think that's happened to me in my life. Yeah, I was never in Afghanistan. Yeah, exactly. And he said he was. And so there's this all these studies about your brain will start to distort it. It's not. going to tell you accurately. And so they've studied, for instance, like the Challenger explosion, where they'll go 10 years after the Challenger explosion? Where were you when it happened? And people

who had written down in their own handwriting, this is where I was, will tell the exact opposite story. And they'll go, this is your handwriting. And they'll go, I know I wrote that, but I don't know why I lied then. Now I'm telling the truth. And so that's part of where, you know, you have a bad moment and you touch it again and again and again. And every time you touch it, it gets a little more distorted. It gets a little more curvy. It gets a little more detail. to where you're no longer telling yourself the truth about that moment. And then again, like cognitive bias comes in and finds additional bad moments that prove that one. Your brain confuses fake trauma with real trauma.

They've done all these studies where even if participants knew the trauma in the study was fake, their bodies release the same opioids as if they've been through real trauma. So there's all these things where your brain doesn't set you up necessarily for the greatest thinking success. And the good news is, though your brain, you know, I'm sure you've had so many people on here talk about neuroplasticity where we know you can change your brain. And if you know that, you can start to take some deliberate steps to go, okay, I'm going to rewire the soundtracks I listen to. How do we know if we have broken soundtracks? Right. I mean, I think most of us have something somewhere. Example would be, why didn't somebody text me back? You know, why are my downloads

down a little bit this week. Those are the things that I might have in my head in the last decade or so. But how do we know if we have them? Because I think if most people think in the moment, they're like, oh, I don't do that. Yeah, I think the one easy way to think about it is people will say to me, okay, well, how do I know

if I'm an overthinker or if I'm just, I like being prepared? Right. Like maybe I'm just, I'm analytical in detail. The easiest way to tell that is being prepared always leads to an action. Overtinking always leads to more overthinking. So if you say to me, I meet people at times

say, John, okay, you wrote a book, I've been writing a book for 10 years and I know, well, then you're stuck with that book. Like, there's a chance that you're overthinking that book. You're overthinking that. But if you say to me, I'm prepared, here's what I did with this. I contacted a publisher. I've written five chapters. I've started my podcast. If I can see action, you're not stuck in overthinking. So a lot of times with a thought, you can say, okay, is it negative? Is it a broken soundtrack? Well, does it lead you to actions that you're trying to take or does it get in the way of those? And then when we studied, like we asked 10,000 people if they struggle with overthinking,

and the largest responses on feelings where it left me feeling drained or inadequate. So after you think about that thought for a period of time, are you energized to do the thing you've been thinking about or do you feel drained and inadequate? Do you feel more confident to do the thing or do you feel less confident? So usually you can tell pretty quickly that's not a thought that's actually encouraging. That's not a thought that's leading me to action. What do I want to do with that? That's interesting. So we can kind of identify these, maybe not quite in real time, but at least after we have the thought and maybe before we have the thought for three straight years about why we can't leave our current career.

Yeah, like I always say pull the thread. Like, what's the thought behind that thought? Say, like, let's use an example from where you say, you know, Matt is the worst. You hate Matt. I'd go, well, let's pull the thought. What does that mean? That's really a statement. It's not a soundtrack.

And if you said, well, Matt got the promotion I wanted. I would go, okay, well, let's talk about that. Because there might be a broken soundtrack behind you going there'll never be another promotion. Never, like in all the company and all the history, but like that broken soundtrack has told you something that's just not true. Or you go, Matt's unqualified, and that frustrates me. And we go, okay, well, what's behind that? Well, maybe what's behind that is he does more with less. And maybe you wish you were braver.

Like maybe what you're saying is, I wish I was confident like that and could lean into opportunities. And so unless you pull the thread on some of these things, they just get to spin and spin and spin and spin. And you listen to them for a year, for two years. Like, for me, I started my first blog in 2001, which was super hard because it was Dreamweaver and it was clunky. Right. Like every photo was distorted and I was terrible at it.

But I could have kept going, but I kept listening to soundtracks. Like, I don't have a plan. What am I doing? They're going to find out. I'm an imposter. And so I took seven years off of blogging. Like I just didn't write for seven years. I look back at that and go, what could I have accomplished if I hadn't listened to those broken

soundtrack? So you're right. You joke about three years, but like it can be seven years. It can be 10 years. You know, the guy who sees the door close is 12 years. You know, the time stacks up and I don't want broken soundtracks. be the one driving that. We have a tendency to believe that since thoughts, I can't remember where I read this, since thoughts are in our head, we tend to believe that they're true, right? Because it's like,

well, if this is something that is in my brain, it must be the reality. But that's ridiculous, because people believe all kinds of ridiculous crap all the time, except we're maybe sometimes we're questioning that. We just think like, okay, well, if I just had that thought, then it's probably the case, but really it has no bearing in reality at all. So if we think this is dangerous, or this is scary or this might not work or I'm not cut out for this. Since it's not coming from an external source, it's coming from an internal source, we're like, all right, well, I can't really argue with that. Well, yeah, I think the funny thing is we don't admit how wrong we've been.

A lot of my thoughts are like, oh, for 400,000 on accuracy. But I'm always like, this could be the time. This could be the like, you know, you're going to walk into a situation. You're like, oh, man, this is going to go terribly. I know it's going to be the worst. And then it goes the opposite. And I'd never go, I should not listen to that thought next. time. Like, you weren't right on that one. Like, I'm going to trust you half as many times. I just go,

I'm going to pretend that didn't just happen. I'm going to trust the next time you tell me something that's absolutely crazy. And then I'm going to, you know, I'm still going to listen. So yeah, I think that's, you know, again, those three questions. Is it true? Is it helpful? Is it kind? Are good pause for the loud ones? I would never tell somebody ask every thought. We have too many thoughts. But I'm saying like the big loud thoughts, the ones that you hear all the time, you know, if somebody who's listening to this in there, stay-at-home mom, and maybe they, five minutes late to the car rider pickup line, and they said, I'm the worst mom.

I would go, wait a second. Like, didn't you get the kids out the door? Didn't you, maybe you're an executive and you do, you work and take care of the kids and you did a million things, but one five minutes erased the entire half of the day. Is that true? Like, are you the worst mom? And that one, I always say, you're not.

It was Hitler's mom, probably. Like, that one feels very solvable. Like, we can fix that one pretty quickly. But I think if we don't ask those questions, then these thoughts just get to, kind of run ramp it. And then the cool thing is when we do ask them and when we discover, we get to choose what we think. Like I always say, your thoughts happen with choice or chance. And like, choice is so much better. And if you know you have the permission to do it and then

you figure out how to do it, you can do just about anything. And I don't mean that in a like, you're going to say these words and it's going to manifest. I mean, like, you can figure out the actions that'll turn into the results you want. So is it helpful? So does it generate action or or apathy and is it kind, which sounds a little bit drum-circally, right? It does, dude, but then, like, I 100%, like, that sounds like we're going to, I'm going to light sage and we're going to clear the spirits, Kyrie Irving style. Right. But, like, Google studied that.

Google said to their company, what are the most successful teams we have here have in common? And they studied 180 teams on 35 different statistical models, hundreds of variables, and what they found was the greatest thing they all had in common was psychological safety. And psychological safety is the ability to ask questions and make a mistake without being judged in an unkind way. So the ability to say like, hey, what if we did this or hey, I made a mistake or admit you were wrong. And I would say that a lot of times your team of one, like your internal team, if you can't do that, you don't have psychological safety with yourself. Like how many of your listeners have had an idea before they even wrote it down? Before it even made it a paper, they said, no, it's dumb.

That's dumb. That's a broken soundtrack. Like every idea is at least worth 30 seconds of ink and a piece of paper. But that's a broken soundtrack that tells you, no, it's stupid. Nobody ever believed that. Don't even waste your time. And so, yeah, I think the Is It Kind has the feel of like a little woo-woo. But the reality to me is there's so much science behind how you speak in kindness to yourself and to others actually has tangible benefits.

And the third one is what? Or maybe it's the first one? Is it true and what evidence do I have? Yeah, true. Yeah. Is there evidence? Like, okay, if it's true, there will be evidence. You know, one of my favorite examples in the book, there's a guy named Sal St.

Germain, and he was at a company in Hawaii, and they were waiting for the mothership kind of organization to tell them what to do. He thought they were handcuffed. And finally, he went to their manager and like, hey, we think we need to do these five things. Why haven't you guys told us what to do? And they said, well, we were waiting on you to tell us what to do. Like, you have the power. Like, but they were believing something that wasn't true.

They were believing, we have a big brother company. We're inhibited. And once he realized that, they were able to build. that they wanted to build, and they ended up saving $14 million. So that's the fun thing to me is like you can go, because he spent 30 seconds and asked his manager, hey, we believe this. Like our whole team is listening to this soundtrack? Is that true?

And the manager was able to go, actually, it's just the opposite. Like, go. Like, we're waiting for you to sprint. It changed everything. So that's, you know, an example of, okay, when you find something that isn't true, the reverse could be true and could actually save you a ton of money. You're listening to the Jordan Harbinger show with our guest, John Acuff. We'll be right back. Now back to John Acuff on the Jordan Harbinger show.

If we're looking for evidence that something is true, won't that or could that just prime our brain to look for or even fabricate evidence to say that which we already believe is indeed true? In other words, if I'm looking for like, hmm, is that true? Let me look for evidence. Aren't I just going to invent evidence about why I'm the worst mom because that's what I already believe? Yeah, I mean, and that's the cognitive bias. You're going to find examples and exaggerate examples and tell your, you know, that's the potential. But then there's this other part of it where it's helpful to have this conversation with other people. You're not meant to do this alone. Like this being like being an adult living on the planet. And so sometimes it's really helpful to say to a

friend, hey, here's a situation I keep bumping into. What do you think? Like, and I don't mean 50 people. Like anytime I talk about community, I get pushed back. People say, boy, you act like I have a hundred friends. That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying like a small handful of people that you can go like, because you like when you've gone through challenges, you were helped by people that you said, hey, here's this thing. I don't know if I'm seeing it right because I'm in the middle of it. I've got crisis vision right now. What am I not seeing that you're seeing? Then you have the humility to listen to that and let them speak into that. Another example that might be somebody in your life that can say, oh yeah, I don't, I don't think that's true. That is true. And here's why. I do love like,

I interviewed Tom Ziegler's son for the book. And I asked him like, do you, believe and fake it to you make it because that's a lot something that a lot of people that are kind in the motivational space saying he was like no I don't believe in that at all and the example he gave me was like if you're really out of shape and somebody goes you should tell yourself every day I'm in the best shape of my life best shape of my life yeah that triggers cognitive dissonance where your brain goes no you're not like you're lying to yourself he said instead say I'm getting fitter and fitter every day and every way because that's a progress forward like that's a true statement you're working on like every day I'm working a little harder every day I'm like I'm making a little harder every day I'm like I'm

some progress versus I'm already there because your brain knows you're not there and adding more lies to the conversation never helps. Yeah, that's what the problem I have with a lot of like the positive affirmation type of stuff because there are so many people that will say, the joke on Saturday Night Live or from Saturday Night Live is I'm good enough,

I'm smart enough and doggone it people like me, right? Like I'm healthy, I eat healthy every day and I exercise every day and it's like, this is just bullshit that like you said, it creates cognitive dissonance in your mind because you know that you're lying to your And that would make things even worse because then you just know that this is you lying to yourself as you always do. And it kind of seems demoralizing in a lot of ways.

Well, same with serenity now. Serenity, like I didn't want to talk about or write about positive thinking because I'm skeptical. Like I grew up with Serenity now. I grew up with, you know, I'm good enough and smart enough. I grew up in that same space. But I started to talk to a bunch of successful people that I admired. And if you'd get them off the mic, get them off camera and say, hey, what do you think about positive thinking? They'd all say, well, I do this little pep talk or hey, like they all had something they were doing. And so that's where I got curious to go, okay, I'm going to try it. I'm going to investigate it.

I'm going to try it with, you know, a thousand people so that we can actually see, does some of this work? Are there things you should do differently depending on who you are? So, but for me, I was kind of, I wanted to avoid writing about positive thinking, but I kept bumping into it in the context of overthinking. And that gave me the chance to go, okay, let me look under the hood and see what's really going on. Being harder on yourself is not necessarily a virtue, but a lot of people look at it like that, right? Especially, maybe it's just the United States thing or a Western thing, but especially among probably our mutual circle. There was this whole thing where everybody was so busy that you could never get a hold of them at all for anything. And then there was this whole thing where

people now pretend like they never do anything because it's no longer like trendy to be super busy? I don't know. It's kind of, but either way, it's the same, it's like two sides of the same coin. Being harder on yourself is like this virtue that we're teaching ourselves like, oh, I work 18 hours a day, but I only sleep for three hours a night because I also do the miracle meditation stuff and like work out every day. No, that sounds miserable, dude. Like, my, like, I saw somebody that was like, you should take an ice cold shower every morning to prepare yourself for tough things later that day. And I was like, why would I start the day sucking? Yeah. Like, why would I, like, I have access to hot water.

Like, can you imagine telling somebody who doesn't? Like, no, man, I just do ice cold every day because I want to remind myself like, well, you could do tough stuff. That just sounds miserable to me. No, my, I mean, I've never met somebody like, because one of the phrases that people say is like, I've got to get my stuff together. I've got to get my stuff together. I've never met somebody in the opposite side a year later.

And I go, wow, you look so different. Your business. Everything's working. And they go, yeah, I just yelled at myself constantly. I told myself to get my stuff together. And then I got it together. I think anger. I think shame.

I think trying to prove somebody wrong is a good temporary fuel for short bursts. I think it burns you out eventually. Like it's not a good long-term fuel. And for me, like I went through a crisis with a business and I had to kind of save the day by doing a bunch of extra work. And so I learned in that moment, I can function in a crisis. And that was a good lesson. But then it mutated into I need a crisis to function.

And so then I became the guy that in periods of peace was like, everything's falling apart. it's ruined because I had to generate this fake adrenaline and stress to get motivated. And that was a really talk like it made me miserable to live with. Like my wife was like, she said this like three years ago, you're a jerk for the two years when you write a book and then you're a jerk for the two years when you sell it. And so this isn't working. Like that ain't it, dude. Like you need a different soundtrack. You need a different, you know, fuel for where you had it. And I think that sometimes high performing people are using old fuels that have burned them out a long time ago. And you go, like, there's no joy in that. And there's no, there's just a thinness to that. And you want to say, but there's a

better way. Like, you don't have to hate yourself to perform. And you can tell that somebody's in that space if they can't celebrate. Like, if they're unable to celebrate, like if that feels super foreign, because they're already on to the next thing, like the next thing, the next thing, the next thing, it's a dangerous spot to be. I'm kind of like that, too. I try to let myself celebrate, but I'm definitely that guy who's like, oh, we got in the New York Times. All right, don't get too excited. Doesn't really mean anything.

Dude, my, like, the launch day of my book, I scheduled like a three-hour car like appointment. And my wife was like, why did you do that? I was like, just business as usual, babe. Just a book came out. I got to do other stuff. Like, got to stay in the zone. She was like, no, it's okay to like be excited that day.

Like, you should. So I'm not good at that. I'm just recognizing it in my mid-40s and going, okay, I don't want to postpone and, enjoying the thing, like, I want to be able to enjoy it. I need a fuel that allows me to enjoy it versus, you know, the broken soundtrack is if you enjoy it, you'll lose your edge. Like, and that's not true. That's not true. That is interesting. We all kind of have these negative soundtrack, or many of us have these negative soundtracks. You mentioned in the book about

turning down the volume, exercising, organizing, making lists. I go for walks or exercise, and the walks help me think, but they also help me turn down the volume because I can kind of process things a little bit and there's less distraction, but also I'm working off probably some nervous or anxious energy by getting some sun and being outside and walking around, burning some calories. I think that's useful. And I also, this doesn't really apply to a lot of other people, but I read fan mail from the Jordan Harbinger show because it's really hard to feel shitty when you're reading like 30 nice letters from people about your work. That's amazing. Like people ask me, I don't get recognized a lot because I'm, you know, I'm not famous by any means. But in my own town,

people occasionally come up to me and people go, is that annoying? I'm like, no, like, strangers give me compliments at unexpected times. It's amazing. Like, they come up to me at the airport and go, I read your book and I started a business. I go, oh, that's so cool. Like, why would I not enjoy that? So yeah, the reading fan, like, a hundred percent, because the opposite is true. We tend to have a perfect memory for the people that didn't like what we did, that, you know, we're not. excited, the one-star reviews. And so, no, I have to actively say, okay, let me listen to the stuff that's working to remind myself it's working versus I only have vision for the things that are broken. If soundtracks can induce fear and anxiety, can they introduce or induce positive traits as well?

A hundred percent. I mean, that's really how I got my start doing what I'm currently doing. It was 2008. I was stuck at a day job. I was like a technical writer at a software company. and I had to talk myself into the building every morning. Like I would listen to Jimmy E. World song The Middle, which is really about a high school sophomore girl, but I was like, this is close enough. And I just felt stuck and I'd hit this plateau with my career.

And I started this blog on the side of life. And a speaker, an event planner emailed me. It was like, hey, do you want to come speak at an art event? And I didn't even know that was a thing. I didn't know you got paid for that. I didn't know. I had no evidence I could do it. All I had was a single soundtrack,

like this tiny, fragile soundtrack that was like, I think I could be a public speaker. Like, I think I can do that. And then I added what I call overwhelming action to that. Like, I did the work. I did the reps. I kept believing that, even when it didn't work. Like, I kept believing that.

And it moved me to Nashville. It helped me at the New York Times, the sellers list. Like, it changed my life. So for me, that's a big part of why I wrote this book, is that I've been doing that since 2008. And I thought, I wonder if other people, one, struggle with overthinking. Two, can this help them too? So, yeah, I 100% believe that a thought that you. you turn into action that turns into results can change your life.

Why is it so easy for us to repeat negative soundtracks internally, but so difficult for us to play positive soundtracks consistently? Well, sometimes it's because positive are so cheesy. We have examples of the serenity now, or like we think about the person who's like super shiny, super fake, but like really sat offline. Like you know, like, we all know people who like their platform doesn't match their life experience. Like, and you go, but that person's miserable.

I was at the event they were at. They were miserable and the photo looked amazing. It's not true. So I think sometimes it's, we have a bad taste in her mouth of positivity. But also sometimes it's just repetition. We've listened to that soundtrack so often and haven't listened to a positive one that it's,

I kind of like think about it like, every time you touch a negative soundtrack, it's like you're putting a handle on it. So it's even easier to pick up next time. You know, your bad moment has a thousand handles on it. The new one, which is brand new, you just started. And because we want quick results,

we often don't give it time to grow. So it's same with like a diet. Somebody says to me, my diet's not working. My exercise isn't work. And I'll go, well, how long have you been doing it? And I'll say,

10 days. I'll say, well, how long did it take you to gain away? 10 years. So you gave yourself 10 years to gain and only 10 days. Like, that's part of that kindness. Like, what if you said,

okay, I'm going to be kind to myself and give myself longer than 10 days because 10 days probably isn't long enough to have a new soundtrack take root. And I need to be deliberate about it and repeat it, you know, as many times as we repeated the negative one in positive ways. How do we go about replacing the soundtrack, or is that not the idea here?

Right, we probably have to collect some new tracks, right? Some new bits for the soundtrack. Yeah, for me, I tell people, like, be a student of it. Gather as many as you can. Like, a soundtrack doesn't have to be perfect. It doesn't have to rhyme. It doesn't have to be catchy. Like, don't feel this pressure of, like, I have to come up with a next, just do it.

Like, I have to recreate Nike just for my own. life. For me, I always say, like, start by borrowing other people's soundtracks. I'll give you an example. One of the ones from the book, Patsy Claremont is this author who's written 40 books, really successful public speaker. And I had lunch with maybe about a year ago, and there were two soundtracks I walked away with. The first was I said, how do you best write? And I thought she'd say, in the morning with a cup of coffee and I can see the ocean. And she said, under obligation. And I loved that because I'm the same way. But I can feel guilty going, I need a book contract to write. Like if I was a real writer, I would just write all day. just because then maybe it would turn into a book and I'd run through a field.

She said, no, under obligation, I need the obligation of a publisher. And so that was a great soundtrack. The second one, she said her first book that she ever wrote, the editor sent her back feedback with red ink all over it. And she said, it crushed me. It felt like the page was dying. So she asked the editor, hey, next time, use a different color. The editor used green the next time.

And she said, this time when the page came back, it felt like I was growing, not dying. So I took away from that. What if the next time I get feedback, it's a chance for growth. it doesn't mean I failed. And so, like, I tell people, like, be aware. Like, once you plug into the idea of soundtracks, you'll see them in businesses, you'll see them in individuals,

you'll see them in couples, families have soundtracks. And so, yeah, the first thing is just starting to pay attention to the soundtracks around you versus I would never tell somebody, just sit down with a blank piece of paper and good luck with your brain. Like, have at it. Like, no, like take a bunch of friends' ideas, take a bunch of stuff to the party. I don't believe in writers block. I believe in idea bankrupt.

So I'd much rather you gather some ideas so that you have something to build with. Gather ideas so you have something to build with. That makes sense. Can you give some examples of what we can borrow? You mentioned some in the book, like pick ROI, not EGO, which I like. Yeah, so I mean, for me, another one, like I have a card that's on my wall and all it says is ask for more because I realized in negotiations on August 27th, apparently in 2020, I was undervaluing my work.

everyone who has a side hustle that's listening to you right now, like tends to undervalue their work. We all do that. We as a humanity overvalue the talents of other people and tend to undervalue our own. And so I needed a reminder. So I wrote down, ask for more. So that's one that I just wrote,

okay, that's simple, that'll help me. But I mean, it can be something like a song lyric that inspires you. It can be a conversation you, you know, had with a friend, a friend asks you a question. I mean, I had a friend ask me, we were on a walk, and I'd miss this opportunity. And he said, what's going on? How are you doing? I said, I feel sad that I missed this opportunity. Like, it was a big opportunity. I feel afraid like I'll never have another opportunity. I feel dumb.

Like everyone else would have known how to handle the opportunity. And I feel jealous because I can see the person who got the opportunity. And he said, well, if you had taken that opportunity, what would you have more of that you don't have now? I thought that's a really good question. And then he said, his second question was, would you have gone deeper into your ego or deeper into your heart? And I didn't need to wait a second to answer that one. I would have gone deeper into my ego with this particular. opportunity, he said, well, then that makes me sad because I don't think you would have valued this relationship in these walks and I would have missed out on this. So, like, that becomes a soundtrack for me, ego or heart. Like, I face decisions just like you do, opportunities just like you do, where you go, yeah, that thing, like that thing is awesome and would fill me up. Like that thing, like, I wouldn't

have to not be Jordan. I'd get to be more Jordan if I take this opportunity. This other thing, like, oh, it's shiny. Like, it's got a lot of stuff, but like, I can feel the ego is like going to be crazy on that one. It's going to put me in relationships with people I already don't like. I'm like, it's not going to be worth it. So, like, that's what I mean. Like, I borrowed that from my friend.

But I have to be willing to go, yeah, I'm scared about this. I feel anxious about this. Like, I don't get to receive that gift of that unless I'm honest in the relationship. So I like the idea of collecting actual evidence that we can do something or achieve something as opposed to like choosing to believe it, right? Which is a sort of cheeseball modern day

or not, what is this? the next version of the live, laugh, love tattoo on your wrist, right? We'll put it on Drifflet. Right, yes. This is, you have this concept of the pocket jury. And I dig this because it, well, it sort of gives us an invisible imaginary panel to bounce things off of. So the pocket jury is this phrase I use to describe kind of this negative collection of people, ideas that the second you try to do something, chirp up and go, no, no, no, it's not going to work. It's not going to work. And so gathering evidence is to say, okay, no, I have proof. Like, I've done something similar to this or, you know, like even Strava, like the Strava running app, I didn't feel

like a runner for years. I would tell, if people ask me this question, they go, are you a runner? My answer, which is a broken soundtrack was always, I'm not a runner. I run. Like, so I had this definition of what a real runner was. And I'd go, I'm not a runner. I run. And the Strava app gave me evidence that was the opposite. The Strava app said, well, actually, like, you ran 50 miles last month. Like, that feels like a runner. Like the Strava app would say, you ran like five half marathons. I don't know. Is it the sixth that you become a real runner? It's like Pinocchio. You're going to be a real boy once you get the sixth. And so I love the idea of going, no, here's evidence I have. Here's proof I have. Here's little things I've done that are related to that. Because it's so easy to forget those good things and to miss. You know, I think one of the most important things you can do when you gather evidence is when something goes well, tell somebody else. Let them hold that to. Because sometimes we're afraid to do the thing. We do the thing and it works. And then we don't. don't put that good thing anywhere. And it just dissipates as we kind of build the next thing, the next thing, the next thing.

But I think whether it's writing it down in your, you know, bullet journal, whether it's telling a friend like, hey, this thing that I was worried about, actually, it crushed. And it was really encouraging. And then the other thing is like the internet kind of does the opposite because we have this humble brag culture where it's easier to share your bad moments and kind of like the victimization and all this kind of like because then people won't criticize. Right. commiserate. And so, I mean, it's hard to have, like, even having friends that you can say,

I tried this thing and it went really well and it was really successful. And they go, I'm so proud of you. That's awesome versus wondering, are they judging me? Are they thinking I'm money hungry? Are they thinking, you know, like, there's not a space for that. So I think you have to cultivate spaces where you gather evidence in a real way. Dude, 2020 was tough for that, man. And 2021 is well because, for example, we built a new house that we've been planning for a long time, right? And Jen posted some picture of like the frame of the house. Not like a ball. It's not a ball or pad.

It's a regular house. And this was the frame, right? It's just wooden planks with no walls. They're not carved of ivy. It's not tusks. Right. Like there's nothing. You can't even tell how big the house was from it.

Nothing. Yeah. And she took the post down because a couple people were like, you know, a lot of people lost their jobs. Not a great time to be bragging about spending lots of money on a new house that you don't even need. Like, what are we supposed to do? Live in her parents' couch?

Come on, we have a kid now. Like, what are you talking about? We don't even need. You decided we don't need the house. Thanks for your input, A-Hull. That's my, one of the broken soundtracks they talk about in the book is the must be nice. Must be nice, which is this passive-aggressive, like, I must be nice to have a house like that.

I mean, like, a guy you don't know in Ohio lost his job. But no, no, that's fine. That's fine. Like, maybe if he gets a job, then you can talk about your house. Like, none of that makes any sort of sense. Right. But again, it conditions us that we can't talk about the stuff that works. We can't share about stuff that works.

And it's so, so broken. So I think we do need to, one, talk to ourselves about the stuff that works. Like, I wrote it down. I did really well at that. That's great. So the next time that I try something and fear or doubt or insecurity goes, you've never done anything like this. I mean, actually, it's right here on paper.

Like, I've got it right here. And you can, you know, with a spouse, with a friend, they'll go, no, remember when you crushed that? Like, it was really good. And I think you'll crush this bigger one too. But yeah, the internet for that, it was interesting. And in 2020, so I've done about 40 virtual speaking events for companies. And companies either did well and felt a shame they did well or they did poorly and they felt a shame they did poorly.

Like shame won both sides. That's sex. Yeah. I mean, we almost feel bad for how like we had a great. And so like I would always encourage them like, no, that's awesome. Like build on that. Like build a foundation. Like you can share it in a smart way and your company.

So there's different branding involved. But like you shouldn't feel ashamed that things worked well because you really like. It's not that you took advantage of the year. You've been working for 20 years on systems that were ready to go when things got sideways. This is the Jordan Harbinger show with our guest, John Acuff. We'll be right back back. Thanks so much for listening. I love doing shows like this.

I love the fact that I don't have to freaking bug you guys for money all the time because you're so generous and you buy things from our sponsors. That's what keeps the lights on. All those codes, all those URLs, all those discounts. They're all at Jordan Harbinger.com slash deals. that's in one place, real easy place to find anything. Jordan Harbinger.com slash deals, please consider supporting those who support us. And don't forget, we've got worksheets for today's episode. If you want some of the drills, the exercises, the takeaways that we talked about here during

the show, they're all in one easy place. And the link to the worksheets is in the show notes at Jordan Harbinger.com slash podcast. Now for the conclusion of our episode with John Acuff. Imagine writing bonus checks to all your salespeople and be like, everyone killed it. Our new product line is killing it. Everyone gets a bonus. Don't tell anyone and don't spend it conspicuously because other people will think you're a terrible person for doing a great job this year. All right, everybody. Yeah, exactly. All right. Hide this somewhere. Here's your check and some shame that's going to keep you up awake nine months, you know.

And then the next time you're about to do well, you're going to pull back because you don't want to feel that again. Right. And then we go, where does the fear of success comes from? It comes from moments like that. Cognitive bias automatically collects evidence of negatives all the time, right? So it does make sense that we need to consciously collect evidence of positive things. Well, think about your lawyer. I mean, you're a lawyer. Like, if you went to trial and the other team had had 10 years to prepare and had boxes and boxes of cognitive bias of all the mistakes you've made.

And then you were like, I'm just going to wing it. I hope it goes. Like, I haven't prepared it. I hope it goes well. And then you walked out and you like, man, I still feel negative. Like I feel like I lost that case. You'd be like, yeah, you did because they had 10 years to prepare. What if you just spent five minutes going, hey, here's things that worked.

Here's things that I'm excited about. Here's things I'm looking forward to to give it even a fighting chance. How do we make it a habit? Because a lot of these platitude type of things, not that this is platitudes, but a lot of platitude self-help advice falls apart when you try to apply it. You have a plan to have a better attitude when things are going down. But then in the moment, how do you actually do it? Because I can see myself thinking, oh, I need to be more positive and replace my criticism with curiosity. And then tomorrow, I'm going to forget all that shit and go back to being an old.

old carmudge in and be like, oh, you want me to be positive? Fine, I'm positive your idea. This is garbage. And I'm like, you know, that's enough of this. Yeah, I mean, again, that's why I love these conversations. I mean, I pulled a note off the wall that said, asked for more that I've had up there since last August. So I just try to make it as practical as possible. Like, my goal is it's actionable. So if somebody said to me, okay, I got this new thing I want to believe, what do I do with it? I'd go, okay, well, you know, how do you make it visible? Like, how do you make sure you see it? How do you, you know, repeat it? How do you, share it with other people. How do you look for examples of it? I think there's a thousand actions.

One of the chapters is about how do you make a soundtrack stick with a symbol? And I think a symbol is really powerful. And the best brands in the world have known that forever. Like the swoosh mark isn't just a logo. It's a symbol. Like the reason people put a sticker for Yeti on their car is because it's a symbol like in the 1990s, dude, nobody put an igloo sticker on their car to be like, I want to make sure you guys know how it refrigerates stuff. Just want to make sure everybody in the highway knows. I keep stuff cold. But like, it's now a symbol. And so like, I always tell people, if you want a symbol that relates to your soundtrack, to make it personal, make it visible, then make it simple. One of my favorite examples is the Nike Livestrong bracelet because it wasn't gray. They made it

bright yellow. It was visible. It was always personal. No one you met was like, I just wear it because I don't like cancer, the disease. Like, I have a psoriasis necklace too. I just wear jewelry related to diseases. Like they always said my uncle had cancer. My mom had cancer. And the last thing, it was simple. Nobody was like, hey, how do you put on one of these bracelet things? Like the arm goes in the whole part. So whether it's a coin that's tied to something, whether it's something you keep on your desk, whether it's, you know, a quote, a song, a playlist, or whatever, my whole belief is like,

add as many things as possible. It's kind of one of the techniques I teach is about a motivation portfolio. So, like, I do a bunch of stuff around goals. And people think motivation is like you find one. Like they misinterpret to start with why, like Simon Sinek, start. with why and they go, I got to find one vision quest, perfect form of motivation and one that delays them forever. Sure.

And then they find one. And the minute that one doesn't show up, the whole thing falls apart. I like to have a motivation portfolio where I have 20 reasons because, dude, some days, 10 of them won't even work for me. Like, it's easy as a dad. I could say, as a dad, I got two teenage daughters. I'm going to work my butt off so I can send them to college. Dude, some days, I'm like, you know what, they'll get good ACT scores.

Like, I don't need to work. These two ungratefuls. Yeah, exactly. I'm not paying for anything. So, like, that's not going to cut it. I better have more than one thing in my motivation portfolio. I think it's the same way when you create a new soundtrack. Like, you should have as many actions as it takes for you to actually turn it into something that helps.

That makes a ton of sense. I saw in the book, and I loved the way you explain this, right? You have a soundtrack for many people in your life as well, and that is so true, right? We have a lot of good soundtracks for people in our life, hopefully. But there's also, like, the soundtrack for when are. Our old boss, or our current boss comes into play, or like our business partner comes into play. Or if you're maybe have somebody in your family and you're like, yeah, here comes my mom's bullshit again. My parents are great, just for the record.

But I know a lot. I see my feedback Friday inbox is full of people who have soundtracks about my family's going to ruin this holiday. I just know it's coming. What am I going to do about it? Should I even show up to Christmas? You know, I get those kind of letters. And I think, like, not that these people don't have perfectly valid reasons. Some of them have crazy as families, but that is a soundtrack, and it probably hinders a lot of things in their life, especially if they can't get rid of that person's influence in their life.

Yeah, I mean, I always say, like, everyone has that person in their phone that the minute they see the text notification. You don't even have to read the text. You're like, here we go again. Oh, yeah. He's going to ask me for a favor. This guy only reaches that. Like, and it fires that up. And then you react in the moment in a way you might not have reacted if you hadn't been listening to that soundtrack.

So if you said, okay, like with a family and a holiday, like let's get practical, I would say, okay, well, what's the soundtrack? And maybe some of it is true. Like maybe that's why you ask three questions. Like one question isn't enough. If you said, my mom always criticizes my politics and makes me feel 12 years old again. Like I'm 35 and I feel 12, and I feel 25 and I feel 12, and I feel 25 and I feel 25. That I feel 12. That's the next question is, Is it helpful? Does believing that and listening to that all October before you even get to Thanksgiving, is that helpful or is it hurtful? You probably go, you know what? It's not that helpful. Is it kind to yourself to listen to that over and over again? Before you've even been in front of your mom, you've criticized yourself for a month.

And so like every nerve is exposed. Like you've already, like you've flayed yourself before you even walked through there. So even the smallest comment sets you off because you're so exposed. So I'd go, okay, well, what do we want to do with that? Like, well, what is that? Like, what do we actually want to do with that? Is it okay? We set different boundaries. Is it worth having the conversation? My mom's a safe person. I can tell her the truth and we can work on our relationship. Maybe to go, you know what? She's not a safe person. If I tell her that she's just going to add that fuel, I'm going to be at Thanksgiving. She's going to go,

you're not going to believe what she called me about two weeks ago and opened her heart about politics. Like, that's just like a liberal. That's just like a conservative. So like you then get to make that decision versus every Thanksgiving, driving away with the same thought. And a now. even more reinforced soundtrack. Like that's the thing. Every spin, it gets easier to listen to. So in that situation like that, I'd go, is it true? Is it helpful?

Is it kind? And if it's not, what do we want to do about it? Because you get to choose that. Like, you get to do that. I don't like when people say ignore the haters. Because when you apply that to people you can't cut out of your life, it's really disingenuous. Yeah. So like, go like, just ignore the haters, Jordan.

You're like, well, it's family member. And like, we have a history and I want to be part of their life. And so it's not as easy as an internet troll. I can ignore an internet. trolls all day. Like Mark, Dragonheart 47, no problem. I don't bring him to dinner in my thoughts now. I used to. I used to get real hyped about everybody who hated anything I did. But if it's a family member, it's a different ballgame altogether. Yeah. Also, ignoring the haters when it comes to your family is kind of like saying, I'm going to do nothing to ever repair this relationship. And in 30 years

when crazy uncle Frank dies, I'm going to be the person at his funeral who's like, oh good, he voted for Clinton. Yeah, yeah. Like that's the end of that. He finally got what was coming to him. You know, like, that is that the way you want to live your life? Where is your Clinton now? Where is you, like, yeah, you've held on to that. And that's the other thing is like, has that helped you? Like, that's the other thing. Like, you never feel better on the other side of that.

Like, I've never walked away from encouraging someone and been like, oh, that was gross. Like, if it's genuine encouragement, I always feel better from doing that. So I'd much rather you have better moments with your family, but it does take time. It does take work. It does take new soundtracks. Like, it does take you investing. Like, that stuff costs. So I don't like when somebody says like, oh, just do these three things.

It'll fix it all. I'm not saying that at all. I think it does take time. I think it does take work, but it's worth it. You give a funny example of this blister you got in Portugal about how, and it illustrates how negative thought patterns can ruin larger positive experiences. And when I read this, I was like, guilty, right? Like, totally me.

Yeah, so we're on the coast of Portugal at this speaking event for this awesome entrepreneurs organization called EO. It's amazing. I go out for a run along this beach path that Columbus probably walked before he sailed to America. And people are frolicing and like it's crystal blue water. And I'm there for a week. And I'm there paying me to be there. Like I found a way to get somebody to pay me to go.

Like it was amazing. And I got this tiny blister on the back of my heel. And when I came in, my wife was like, how is the run? And I was like, whew, you know, I got this blister. And the whole everything amazing disappeared in the space of this blister. And I think that's sometimes what happens. We have this laser focus on the little things that aren't going right or the negativity. And we miss and it makes everything else invisible in the same way that like if you get a thousand reviews and two that aren't good, it's so easy to go.

Man, those two, right? And you miss 998 that were really positive, which is why it's a healthy thing for you to go, I'm going to stay connected to the fan mail. Because those are the people you're trying to serve. Like that's not an ego play, by the way. Like that's connecting you to the people you're trying to serve. Like, that's my audience. This is who I do this for. This is who I serve.

The problem is the negative is so shiny and so easy. And our kind of outrage culture encourages that that you have to actively work to go, no, I look at fan mail because I want to make sure I'm serving those people. What I started doing was I look at the email that comes in from people, but I won't look at, unless somebody sends it to me from my team, I won't look at the YouTube comments. Because YouTube comments are people that are like, boring, right? Because it's so easy to leave a YouTube comment. But in email, even if it's negative, an email will come in and go, Jordan, I've delayed writing this letter for two weeks. I have some feedback for you. You might not like it.

I'm a big fan of the show, but, da, da, da, and then they'll list a few things that they think could be improved on. Those are, like, the worst letters I get, right? Yeah. The rest of them are really, really super nice. And even the ones with negative feedback are usually super nice.

But, man, you look at a YouTube comment or something like that, and it's just too easy for somebody who's like a 14-year-old, angsty teen, to write, like, your hair is lame and you're probably a loser and you're fat. And it's like, why would you do that to yourself,

you know? Look at the stuff where the boss, is high enough that somebody had to expend effort to send it to you. And yes, once a year or twice a year, there will be a crazy person in there. And you can safely discard it because you've gotten 10,000 sometimes literally about that number of other emails that were not that. Yeah, the thing my wife says to me is feedback that cost you nothing is worth nothing. So a comment on YouTube cost you nothing. It's worth nothing. So an email that I wrote and thought and found your email and and was able to, I put my email address to associate with,

like, that has a worth. Like, that's worth something. But a lot of the feedback we get costs the person nothing and should be treated as nothing. That's interesting. Yeah, I like that. Feedback from somebody you work with that has known you for years

is worth far more than the person who came in to, you know, if you work at Starbucks, the person who came in that day is having a bed day and is like, you are slow, you're all idiots and storms out. It's like, that might not be actionable for you. That was a four-minute relationship that they based their judgment of mind higher life on. So I'm probably going to put that in the four-minute category. You're right.

Like, this person who's known me for five years who was brave enough to give me difficult feedback because that, like, that takes bravery. Like, they want, like, there's a level of bravery there. So, yeah, that has different. And so, like, not all feedback is created equally. That's another thing that you have to, if you create anything in the world, if you will allow, not all feedback is equal. As we wrap up here, I'm curious, what are some of the most common problematic soundtracks that you see in other people? For example, avoiding confrontation or feeling like something's going to be too hard or not possible. One big one is this is taking too long.

This is taking too long. The results should be faster. I started a podcast. I should have more downloads. The results should be faster. I started a diet. The results should be faster. I'm trying to date.

The result should be faster. The expectation that the speed of which things are going is an indication of your failure versus going. Let me get some evidence. Oh, wow. Every, like, based on podcast growth, I'm right where I need to be. Or like, here's what's actually going. So this should be happening faster is a big one. Who am I to do that?

Like, who am I to do that? Like, I always joke, the worst place to write a book is the library because you're surrounded by thousands of books that and you just, it's really easy to get discouraged there. Right, that have stood the test of time. Yeah, exactly. And you're like, who am I to do this? And so that sense of like, I don't have what it takes to write a book or, you know, start a business.

I think that's a big one. Somebody asked me the other day, how do you get over imposter syndrome? And I said, well, I think the word over is a broken soundtrack. I think you need to trade it for through. So it's how do I go through imposter syndrome? Because over is a word of perfectionism. You climbed a wall and you're over it and you're done with it. I've written seven books, a couple New York Times of Sellers.

I still feel like not a real writer some days. I go through imposter syndrome. I go through fear. I go through stress. And so I think that's one where people feel like, I think every adult on some level, if they're honest, feel some days like everyone else has a rule book on how to be an adult and you're the only one that didn't get one. You're like, I don't know how to raise this kid. Like, I don't know how to do this.

Like, everybody seems like they got it together. So that thought of you're going to be found out and kind of that imposter syndrome of they're going to know I don't have it all together. I think that's a really common one too. We covered that a lot on the show because as I found, it's like, I'll have a Navy SEAL on or like somebody, like Oliver North or something would come on and be like, yeah, sometimes I just feel like I didn't belong in that position. And all high performers have it because we're all overthinkers and or overachievers. And people who don't have imposter syndrome. I say this all the time, so I'll spare the audience. But people who don't have it are like high school juniors because they see and know everything and they've seen it all.

Yeah, or like a college sophomore who had one philosophy class and then calls his parents to be like, let me tell you how the world works. And like, oh, great, you discovered Socrates. Tell me how the world works. Like, we're still paying all your bills, but give me that feedback. Exactly. Yeah. So it's a good, I say, look, if you have this, it's probably a good sign that you're in that sweet spot of being challenged in your career or you're in an area where, you're in an area where, where yes, you're uncomfortable, but it's good. I mean, if you're constantly getting reamed out by your boss about how your work sucks and they're having performance reviews

for you every 90 days, maybe you are. Maybe you do have a little bit of imposterism and there's a gap between your skill set and we need to go. But if you're just feeling like you're the only person in the room who doesn't belong there like I did when I worked on Wall Street, and then you get everyone drunk at a bar night and they're all like, so you guys all feel the same way, right? And everyone's like, yes, of course.

And then the fifth year or associates are like, yeah, still feel that way. It doesn't go away. It's like, yeah, I love when I meet somebody 65 and they're still working on stuff because initially I'm like, oh, dang it. Like I thought by like 55, I'd be like, that's a good, I got it all figured out. And you meet somebody who's honest and 20 years ahead of you. And they go, yeah, there's a couple things that I know how to do and I do them better than I used to do them when I was in my 20s. Like, I like being 45 more than I did 25. Like there were so many mistakes I made in my 20s,

but I don't have it figured out at 45 and I have a sneaking suspicion. I won't have it all figured out at 55. I love your thought about imposter syndrome. My version of that is whenever somebody says you can be fearless, I think that's nonsense. Because my thing is, every time you do something new or at a bigger level, there's new fear there. So when I spoke to 10 people the first time, I was afraid of 10 people,

but I worked on it. I got over at 100 people, 100 person fear, 1,000 people, 1,000 person fear. So I think if you're always growing and always stretching, fear's going to be there. But one of the soundtracks that helps me is fear gets a voice, not a vote. It's going to have a voice.

Like, it's going to be there because I'm trying new stuff. And it's actually an indication I'm stretching myself, but it doesn't get a vote. It doesn't get to sit at the table and go, you're not going to do that. You're not going to do that. So for me, fear gets a voice, not a vote is something I remember as I head into new stuff. Because the broken soundtrack is you shouldn't have any fear, and I don't think that's true. John Aikov, thank you very much, man. The book title is Soundtracks.

What's the subtitle? The surprising solution to overthinking. Great. And you can find that linked up in the show notes. Thanks again, man. It's always good to see your face and hear your wisdom. Appreciate it, man. Live, Love, Love.

There you go. There you go. Yeah, nice. I've got some thoughts on this episode. But before I get into that, here's a trailer of my interview with Thomas Erickson on how to spot a psychopath. Some people tell me, do they have to be psychopaths?

Couldn't it just be they are evil? But hey, for me, same thing. They are out there regardless that we are talking about it or not. The stupid psychopath, he would go up to you on the street and see, hey, you got a nice watch. And then you will bang you in the... head and take to watch. The intelligent psychopath, he will see your beautiful watch and he says, that's a nice watch and then he will talk you into giving him the watch. That's the difference.

All narcissists are not psychopaths, but every psychopath is a narcissist. They think it is their right. They are entitled to act in this way. It is their birthright to use you and me and anybody else. The more you present yourself to the psychopath, the more understanding he has about you, The more dangerous he becomes. Love bombing is one of the most dangerous manipulation techniques that they can use. If you haven't experienced, let's say true love, let's call it. And then you think you have it within your reach. You're done.

I get shivers down my spine. Psychopathy is not an illness. It's a personality disorder. It starts at the moment in the woman's womb, actually. You can never change us. psychopath, how much value would you put in yourself? How much do you think you deserve in life? Do you deserve a good relationship? For more on how to protect yourself from psychopaths, check out episode 465 with Thomas Erickson on the Jordan Harbinger show.

John Inkoff's a lot of fun. I've known that guy for a really long time. He is definitely an overthinker, but also a pretty smart guy. There are a lot of exercises and things in the book, if you really are a chronic overthinker, so you might want to think, but not too hard, about grabbing it, maybe just do it. One of the things that stuck out to me was using absolutes in our thinking or in our words are sure signs

that we have been overthinking. Words like, always, never, impossible, inevitable, et cetera. I've tried to minimize my use of these types of words, both in my own head, as well as in my relationships and conversations with others. There's nothing that's going to start a fight better than saying, you always do this or you never do that.

Just a word to the wise. I've only been married for a few years. My kid's only 20 months old, but if I've learned anything, it's not to say that ever. So use it in good health. Big thank you to John Aikoff. The book is called Soundtracks, The Surprising Solution to Overtinking.

And you know what? There's going to be a godsend for those of us that are chronic overthinkers. Links to everything will be in the website, in the show notes. Please use our website links if you buy the book or any book from any guest, because that does help support the show. Yes, they work in Canada.

The links. They work in the UK. They work all over. They're supposed to anyway. if they don't email me, Jordan at Jordan Harbinger.com, because I've got to fix something. Worksheets for the episode are in the show notes. Transcripts for the episode are in the show notes. There's a video of this interview going up on our YouTube channel at Jordan Harbinger.com

slash YouTube. I'm also at Jordan Harbinger on both Twitter and Instagram, or you can hit me right on LinkedIn. I love connecting with you all online. I'm teaching you how to connect with great people and manage relationships using systems, software, and tiny habits. That six-minute networking course takes five minutes a day. Like I said, five-minute networking was taken. The course is free. It's over at Jordan Harbinger.com slash course. Dig that well before you get thirsty.

Most of the guests you're hearing on the show, they subscribe to the course and they contribute to the course. So come join us. You'll be in smart company. This show is created in association with Podcast 1. My team is Jen Harbinger, J. Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Millie Ocampo, Ian Baird, Josh Ballard, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember, we rise by lifting others. The fee for this show is that you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting. You know somebody who's an overthinker, share this episode with him. Just stop thinking about it and do it. Hopefully you find something great in every episode of this show. Please share the show with those you care about. In the meantime, do your best to apply what you hear on the show

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