If you want to pump your body and expand your mind, there's only one place to go. Mind pump, mind pump with your hosts. Sal DeStefano, Adam Schaefer, and Justin Andrews. Jordan Harbinger has to be one of my favorite people. Oh, he's a great man. One of my absolute favorite people. Well, I have, like, there's a, he holds a little special part in my heart because of the way he treated us so early on when we first started podcasting. So I have so much respect, admiration for the guy. I'm... He's one of the best podcasters in the podcast world. Like, one of the best, one of the best interviewers. At the time when we first met him, he was hosting the Art of Charm. He has now split off from them and has his own podcast, but he was so gracious to us way back when he was massive and we were small and just always been nice to us. Yeah, that stuff goes a long way. It's the Jordan Harbinger show now and there's no doubt in my mind the guy's gonna, you know, be huge. Oh, he's gonna be great. Yeah, he's got a very loyal fan base. If you never listened to Jordan interview people or podcast, you are missing out. Like, he is a... Bro, Tony Hawk, Larry King, Shaquille O'Neal.  We get to talk about that in this episode. I mean, what he's going through right now and what I love about Jordan is that he was open enough to be vulnerable on the show. Because what he's going through is extremely stressful. Could you imagine building a multi... I mean, I can. Obviously, this is something that could technically happen to us, right?  Yeah, right. It would never happen, right? We all got too much love for each other. But to have built something as big as Art of Charm, I mean, this is a huge business. They have a ton of employees. They got a ton of different revenue streams and for it all to literally be pretty much ripped from out from underneath him. I mean, I couldn't... That's got to be so fucking... I mean, he says it in the episode. It's the most stressful, scariest. He's never experienced anything like this. Oh, multiple times, he almost cried in the episode. I don't know if you guys looked over at him. We got into some topics that hit him that was just like, you could tell, he's very emotional and vulnerable. No, and you just feel that off the road. And there's a lot of useful information in this episode if you are going through a stressful time. Or building a business. Building a business, like, if you want to know about the skills about podcasting, about how to, you know, ameliorate stress, like we talk about a lot of that in this episode. And it's extremely entertaining. We are interviewing a great podcaster, which means the conversation is awesome. Always. And he's always got great stories, great energy. So it was a fun podcast, even though it was over like pretty serious topics.  Go to the Jordan Harbinger show. That's his podcast. Check it out. If you'd like it, subscribe.  He's got a great show. We think he brings a lot of value, but he's also a good friend of ours. So go check it out. We also mentioned one of our sponsors, because there was a time in the episode where Sal Start was talking about different types of herbs that you can use and you got into some of the four-sigmatic products. Yeah, so, well, four-sigmatic is one of our sponsors. Some of the things that you could use for stress are the chaga and the cordyceps may actually help you as well. Now, we are sponsored, so it's foursigmatic.com, four slash Mind Pump, and then enter the code Mind Pump and you get a discount. Also, check out Jordan Harbinger on his show, the Jordan Harbinger show, and you can find him on Instagram at Jordan, and his last name is spelled H-A-R-B-I-N-G-E-R. So without any further ado, here we are talking to our good friend, Jordan Harbinger. I'm trying to remember when the last time that we were all together was. It's been a while. You stopped by at night. What were we doing that night when you came by here? That was the last time I think you came by here, right? You guys were either... We had dinner or something? Oh, that was before. That was the first time. Yeah, when we met the first time, we had dinner with Ben Greenfield. Oh, right. And am I allowed to say that you guys were on a journey that evening? Okay. What's that mean? You're allowed to say whatever you want. Yeah, you can say, yeah, that's a... You were on a journey that evening.  So normal was you guys like that. And you were already like this, so it was kind of... My wife was like, these guys are so funny, man. You guys usually hang out with these guys more. And I remember not hanging out with you guys enough because I was going through so much stress, which is kind of coming to a head now, which is one of the reasons that we're in this room again. Right, right. Dude, the first time we met, I was, you know, first we hit it off with Ben first. Ben was the one who introduced us to you. We all had dinner, you know. And I don't know if we all consider ourselves people, people people or what it is, but when you meet somebody, you can just, I have a really good judge of their character. And I remember after we all hung out, like all of us said like, dude, that's a really cool dude. A very secure dude too, because something that I have found in this space, much like every other space that I've been a part of in business, people become very like territorial or insecure about giving it information. Scarcity mindset. Yeah, very scarcity mindset. And you were actually one of the first people that was in this space and had been doing it for a long time, been very successful at it. That was like just an open book. Yeah, open about your business and everything, giving us insights. We haven't got that from a lot of people. You helped us out a lot and you answered questions for us and you were very honest. So we will always be indebted to you. Absolutely. Because that was early on, how long ago was it? Oh, bro, this was before we never had a sponsor.  We never looked into potentially doing networks with each other. We didn't know what would be considered good downloads or not down like so many questions that I remember having for you and you just literally kind of laid everything out. And I believe that we're like that.  You ask me anything about the business. I'll share it. We were talking just the other day and I'm real quick to tell you all that information because I think it's really funny and unfortunate when people kind of hoard, hoard info like that, you know? Yeah, I found that when I first started the business, my old business, The Art of Charm before all of this drama went down that we'll get into I guess in a bit, that people were, there were some people that were really open about everything but a lot of folks were kind of cagey or secretly competitive. And I realized like, oh, these people aren't really, they're not really cheering for us. They're kind of like, oh yeah, here's this opportunity that I might give you that sort of like does this other thing for me. This introduction that makes me look good but really, you know, it's, there was always sort of this like frenemy or caiginess and I always thought this is so uncomfortable because now I don't know who I can believe or trust or open up to. So I just decided early on, like a decade ago, maybe slightly less that the best thing to do is to be open and vulnerable wherever you can. And then some people will be really uncomfortable with that and you just kind of won't click with them. And other people will be like, oh good, we can have real talk. And those people become your friends. That's right. The way I look at it is we have two choices that we make in life and business or whatever and the two choices are be truthful, honest and open. And the other one is to be calculated and sneaky and not honest. And I think sometimes, not always, but sometimes being sneaky might protect you. But I also believe that more often than not the being truthful and honest one is gonna result in a better circumstance or better results. I think that that's more often than not the case. And so I'm gonna choose that. Plus, you remember when you were a kid and you would have a friend and you'd make up a little story and then a couple days later, you gotta make up another story to back up that story.  Like everything's a lie and it's a terrible way to live and I never wanna do that. I learned my lesson a couple times when I was a kid doing that with friends where they come over to my house and like, hey, where's that motorcycle you ride all the time? And I'm like, oh. Show me those karate moves. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.   This carries over into lots of things. It carries over and it ends up and I don't do this because I know it's gonna pay me back but it has every single time. And now you're in your situation now and now you can call upon friends like us and we'll fucking jump at the opportunity to have you on the show and talk about certain things and help you out. Yeah, I can't even tell you guys. First of all, thank you for the opportunity to come back, of course. But I gotta tell you, one of the, there's been a lot of gifts that have come out of this particularly stressful situation but I feel like maybe we should give a brief overview of what they all were doing. Yeah, I mean, I know right now everyone's sitting on pins and needles because if you were an Art of Charm fan, we have a lot of mind public listeners that are also big Art of Charm fans and everyone has been, that's why I reached out to you. I said, bro, what's going on with you over there? And you told me a couple- Someone on our forum made a post about it. Him and I were talking maybe a couple months ago and Jordan's like, yeah, we gotta get caught up. I got so much going on, bro.  And so I just kind of gave him a space because I know he's going through a ton. And then all of a sudden it started, my forum started talking about Art of Charm and like, what the fuck's going on there? And I'm like, and then so I sent a message to you like, dude, what's up? This is my forum is talking about your business now. You know what I'm saying?  So I, I'm splitting from the Art of Charm and we're still in the middle of this whole split. And it's, so I can say very little about that without, I don't wanna do any derailing of whatever might happen, but- You're in legal issues, right? Like, so people gotta understand that right now. So you're in a tight rope.  I am, there's legal stuff. I can't, I just don't wanna, I don't wanna damage the Art of Charm as a business. But I gotta be careful with that stuff. But what happened was I separated from the company and it did not, it was more sudden for me than I would have liked. I'll put it that way. And so I am in a situation now where I don't know what's gonna shake out from that particular split. I do have the Jordan Harbinger show where I interview people and I continue largely what I learned through interviewing hundreds and hundreds of people and I wanna keep doing a show because I love doing shows and I love talking with people and it's all about the conversation. But yeah, I'm going through the most stressful time of my life right now as a result of the way that this is going. And I'm in a situation where I built with the, I built the show, the Art of Charm podcast, the old show, I built that over 11 years. And now I'm looking and our business was killing it. It was doing so well, everything was working really great. And now I'm looking at starting over from scratch with the show and it's so intimidating. It's daunting, it's scary and- What are your biggest fears about it?   And I'm like, no, okay, yeah, I know that.  I'm like, okay, definitely, I got that. And so it's not really, I don't have the same fears that a lot of these other people are suggesting, I guess like the fears they would have. I'm so much less worried about income paying the mortgage. Like those are concerns, but I'm not like, oh my God, you know, I've got that Bitcoin. But I also, maybe now that's not a really thing. I was gonna say, a month ago I was like, I'm like, I got Bitcoin.  So, no, but I mean, I've got, you know, I have like an emergency fund and stuff like that. So I'm less worried about that. But I look and I just think, how the hell am I gonna reach all of those old AOC fans and all of the people that would like to listen to the Jordan Harbinger show?  I don't know how to do that. So my, and I remember, I've gone in hundreds of other shows to get those people to find us. The word of mouth was going for a decade on that show.  It's like looking at a mountain. You might be, so you're comparing, I think what you're doing is you're thinking about all the hard work and effort and time it took to build your first show and you're thinking to yourself, I gotta have to do that all again. But it's not the same at all. It's not the same at all. First off, now people know who you are, the audience is gonna hear that you're not on that show anymore. So they're gonna be looking for you. So it's a completely, you're starting from a completely, you know what it reminds me of in fitness? There's this term called muscle memory. And muscle memory is when, let's say I gained 20 pounds of muscle and I do it through, you know, six years of hard lifting and diet and dedicated training. Everything's just perfect. And then all of a sudden I have a major injury or something and I'm just, I just can't work out. I can't work out at all for six months. I'm a perfect example of this right now. Like I went from being a professional men's physique athlete to back to some of the worst shape I've ever been in my life right now. And I think what have- And how fast can you gain it back now though? Because of muscle memory, right? So that's part of why I don't stress. But I think going back to what he said, what Jordan said was that, I think what I have to do, like I was battling some sort of depression right now with what I'm going through. Totally different situation but similar in this aspect that really what it is that we're battling is our ego. And it's challenging that.   And now it's been ripped away from you and you're thinking I gotta start off. What you're probably gonna build now is probably gonna be totally different. Who knows? It'll be different. And you're right about the ego thing. I'll tell you right now. The show quality, I was talking with my marketer, my producer and the other members of the team that are coming with me. And they're like, this is an opportunity. They're all excited. I'm like the only one that's freaking freaking great. They're all, producer Jason's like, this is great. You know, the marketing team. Everybody is jazzed. My wife is like, this is great. You can do whatever you want. You're not constrained by the format. You can do these different types of interviews.  We had it down to like a science. And you're exactly. Like now I have all of the skills that I developed over the last 11 years. I got a lot of relationships that I've developed over time. Like this, that'll help. So you're right. I don't have to do what I did in 11 years in a year or two to get back. I have to do the highest leverage activities that have worked over the last two or three years. And I have to condense those down and do those in a way that get people to come through. Like losing the back catalog and all those old art of charm episodes is so tragic for me in a way.  I won't say losing a kid. That's obviously way worse. But it's like losing a beloved pet, right? But at the end of the day, what a lot of people have said, which has helped me with this, is that those all, those exist. Those happened, those guests, the experiences, the conversations that I had with those people, they don't evaporate just because they're not in my RSS feed right now. Right, right. But to your point, Sal, it's, yes, it's ego, to all of your points, it's ego in that there's a part of my identity that was so caught up, that is that I am the host of the show, the Jordan Harbinger show now. But I interview these types of people. I have this audience and they're one of the best audiences in iTunes. They're most affluent. They're the most smartest educated audience in iTunes, which was actually true. I mean, we compared our demographic to NPR and the art of charm Jordan Harbinger show audience was more educated, more affluent than NPR. And I was like, look at all these smart people that come to listen to these other smart people that I get to talk to and I'm in the middle of this, this is so great. So my identity was just so linked with that. So to start over, it's like, did I lose a piece of who I am? And I feel like anybody who gets fired from any company or loses a job or gets uprooted and has to move or something like that, probably feels that sense of loss that's intangible that has to do with, especially like an athlete. You retire and it's like, am I an athlete anymore? Was I this? And now I'm just a retired overweight dude who used to play basketball. So there's two things you just highlighted something very interesting, what you're going through, the specifics are very specific to you, but the general, what you're going through is an existential issue. This is an issue that people go through. And so knowing that sometimes makes, I know it makes me feel better when I've gone through certain things. It's like, okay, I have my own specific set of situations, but what I'm feeling the suffering of shedding my old self or am I this person who I thought I identified with? This is a human issue.  Who are those people?  You named your wife, the people you work with who've come with you, do they know you pretty well? Oh yeah, sure. And they're all excited. They are. Now what does that tell you? Everyone has said, and I mean, non-cliché speaking people who aren't just like patting me on that, everyone has said, this is going to be the best thing that's ever happened to you because you're going to be free of the constraints that you had at the old company. You're going to do the Jordan Harbinger show which you have ownership over. You're going to be able to do things the way that you want. Everybody is excited. I seem to be the only one who's like, I'm like the last guy to get the memo. And in fact, my producer sent me an email this morning because he was like, hey, how you doing? And I was like, I don't know. I woke up at 3.45 and I had a sleep watch and he goes, okay, I know I've told you this before. We give tough love every week on the show on feedback Friday. And when people write in and we like give advice and stuff. And he goes, this is your tough love time.  And I was just like, he's right.  And I get it, but like, your fans want to tune into the show. We got a call this morning. I don't even know, like how did he get her phone number? So someone just called and was like, yeah, I found this number in an email that I had and it happened to just be my wife's mobile number. And he was just like, I heard what happened and I'm really sorry and I loved you guys and I've got this girlfriend because of you and I've got this job because of you. And I was just like, it was incredible for me to hear that.  But for me it's, I have to like process this stuff. But I also have to be a leader in the company and I also have to get my game face on because you can only mope around the house for so long before people are like, are we doing this or are you gonna freaking Netflix on this? The people closest to you believe in you, brother. You know what I'm saying? That's an awesome feeling. This reminds me of some advice that I just gave a good friend, an old client of mine that was trying to get back in shape and she was really depressed and down because she competed before so she's in great shape and then she got so caught up in work and put on all the weight and she was just like kind of crying to me saying like, man, I'm just so frustrated. I set my alarm five times this week and I didn't get up for it for any time. And I said, you know, I'm gonna give you some advice that now that is totally different than what I would have gave 10, 15 years ago. And that's just because of my experience with people with motivation and self-belief. I said, what you need right now is just some small wins.  And you're looking all the way at this huge goal.  That's just a time, right? It doesn't matter time before you're there again and beyond that. So right now, like focus on the small wins. So I tell her, I said, why are you so concerned about getting back to like where you were in shape and doing all these things and running this program and just training every day, getting up extra early? I'm like, how about go for a walk for an hour? Like how about just go do one thing and then have you done that since months? And she's like, no. And I'm like, okay. Well, set a very small, obtainable goal for you and get yourself some wins. Get some wins that are heading you in the right direction to get where you need to be. And I feel like this is the same thing.  This, yeah, of course. Right. If you were, if you were, you know, the old, you know, Jordan Harbinger who didn't have any followers, any listeners, anything like that. And you're hanging out with the mind pump guys, bro, this would be a huge win. But it doesn't seem like that because it's like, I've been so much bigger and better. But so you got to kind of remind yourself of that.  It's so true. Yeah. Of course.  And I know this sounds like woo woo or cliche, but if they're so real. I was watching this show called Dirty Money on Netflix, which is really good by the way. And they were telling, have you seen that? Do you see the payday loans guy?  But he was facing a life sentence and his brother who he'd started the business with, he ended up committing suicide and stuff. And I felt like real compassion for this guy.  He's a terrible person.  And I was like, oh man, I have real compassion. When I see stories and when I hear other people tell me things, you know what someone says like, oh, you know, I went through a divorce earlier, so I understand, if they told me that a month ago, I'd be like, oh yeah, sorry to hear that. But now I'm like, I feel it in my, deep in, deep in my, yeah, it's empathy. It feels like I feel it viscerally in my body when someone's like, yeah, I know you're going through a tough time. My wife's sister passed away suddenly. And I'm like, wow, I have no real problems. Like, oh my God, you know, and I feel almost selfish for feeling negatively when other people have real, real problems. But I also feel the sense of empathy, the sense of compassion that I've never felt before. And I appreciate every single person that writes into, by the way, my email is new. It's Jordan at JordanHarbinger.com because I'm no longer reachable at The Art of Charm. And people are writing in and they're like, oh yeah, immediately found your new show. Like, I can't believe I'm sticking with you. And I just, I appreciate that stuff. Whereas before I would go through my email inbox and I'd be like, I'll read that later. I'll read that later. And I'll be like, cool. Yeah, Jen, can you help respond to some fans? Cause there's a lot of like fan mail in there. Now when I read that, I'm like, you know what?  It's awesome.  And I can't see cause it's dark and I'm trying to collect all of them. Like that's what I'm looking at right now. It's like, where are those show fans? Cause some of them aren't going to care. They're going to go, what happened to this? Our charm feed, nothing. There's no new shows. They're like, who are these random people doing it? And they're just going to not care. But there's thousands, tens of thousands, hopefully or hundreds of thousands even better of people that are like going to go back into iTunes or their podcast app and search for the Jordan Harbinger show and go, oh good, this is still going. And I've been getting notes from those people constantly. And it's really something that gets, it literally gets me out of bed in the morning at this point. So since you're a great person, ask a question like this too, because we have a lot of people that listen. I mean, fuck, since we've started, we must know 10 or 15 fans that have created a podcast now and trying to build a business. So we definitely have a lot of entrepreneurs and people very interested in this process. And you're a great guy who's built something up to something as big as Art of Charm and is now literally starting over in a sense and doing that. What are some of the things when you look back now that you did really well in Art of Charm and that you think, and then things that you're gonna do differently now with your show? With building the show, right? Cause of course, if we get into everything business-wise, I'm like, oh my God, we don't have enough time to list all my mistakes. With the show, I gotta tell you, man, I did hundreds of interviews where I was being interviewed by somebody else. And the first like 30 to 50 taught me how to be interviewed by somebody else, which is an experience that I think is underrated. Dude, let's talk about that. I think that's a big deal. Sal and I talk about this a lot because we do a lot of individual interviews right now. And it's a different skill set. Talk about that. It's a different skill set.  But you all know people that are really good at something like a bodybuilder, and then you get them in front of a microphone and they're like, you just have to be consistent and work out every day and make sure you're getting your macros in. Can't tell a story. Good God, like get this guy out of here. But that could be you.  And you're like, oh my God. And then you have to carry it. You have to run the show. You just take over the show. So you have to, but you have to build that skill set and that confidence to go, oh, this person's done 10 podcasts. I've done a thousand and 10. I literally have to start being more entertaining now or people are gonna tune out. And it's not their fault. They're inexperienced or whatever who cares. Or you get another host that's talking over you and you're not telling your own story, which is probably what I'm doing to you guys right now. No, no, no. And you've gotta figure out how to modulate that. So I look back and I think, okay, what I did right was I went on every show that I could and I learned how to be interviewed. But what I did wrong was I did it for years and there was a point at which I would be interviewed by somebody and I would fricking just phone it in, man, because I knew that it was gonna, the show has 200 listeners and I would be like, all right, that means like 20 people are gonna actually download and play this. So I would just be like checking my email and stuff.   So now when I'm redoing, when I'm restarting, I'm gonna lean into the shows that matter and have a lot of overlap. I'm still gonna do smaller shows, of course, because I like that experience, but I'm gonna make damn sure that I'm doing things that protect my sanity and my energy levels, because there were days where I would do five or six interviews on other people's shows and I would look at the needle and not move at all on the art of charm downloads. And now that I'm doing the Jordan Harbinger show, I'm just like, okay, I can't do volume. I have to go on like the 50 to 100 shows in the next year or so that actually have audience that's going to go, well, there's that Jordan guy. I used to listen to his show. He's got a new one.  And I'm like, sorry, my voice hurts because I just did 40 shows last week and the total combined listenership of that was like less than one tweet from an influencer. You know? So you have to be careful with that. And there's countless things like that that I think I'm gonna have to redo in a different way. But it's hard to your point earlier Sal, like you look at everything you did. I look at everything I did for 11 years and I go, oh my God, I got to redo that.  So I have to do a lot of 2020 hindsight, figure out what worked and re-magnetize the audience to come find the new show. But also it's hard in your mind to go, hmm, out of the last 11 years, how much of that was like throw a spaghetti at the wall and see what sticks and develop skills and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah versus how much, if we condense everything and we have a real plan and we're doing real stuff and the shows are really good, how long is that gonna take? And I can't do that math in my head and that's part of what's making me feel the overwhelm is everyone goes- It's the unknown. It's the unknown. They're like, you're not gonna take 11 years to build it up again.   It's always about the unknown so what I would say is focus on the known.  And you're also a black belt now. Like you've been doing this for a while. You're compelling on a podcast. I mean, we love having you on because it's gonna be a great episode and you're right, it's a skill. I mean, I learned a lot from our guests. Joe Decina was a guest that we had on. The guy is such a great storyteller and after he left, I was like, okay, I totally am gonna change the way I do interviews because that was compelling.  I want to talk about this, your show now, the Jordan Harbinger show plug. What are you, now that you're free, okay?  What are you gonna do different? Yeah, it's an interesting situation because I'd never had to think about it until like very suddenly and very recently. So what I'm looking at is I still want to stay true to the core demographic of like intelligent conversation with high performers. I think that's very important.  But what I'm looking forward to doing is not having to sell products and training that have nothing to do with my interest and also that have nothing to do with my conversations because the show and the business really did grow apart in that I would have somebody on the show who's like a street preacher or a comedian who's breaking down nonverbal communication from stage. Now he reads an audience or I'd have like Shaq on. And then it's like, oh, by the way, come to this thing where you learn dating and skills or whatever. And it just, it started to become more and more incongruous with what I really wanted to do. And that always kind of weighed on me psychologically. The other thing is the brand always had a little twinge of, I don't want to say embarrassment because it was something we built together but it didn't make sense for me anymore. And I was having a lot of problems booking certain caliber of guests because I would have to say the name is the art of charm but it's not about what you think and I would get rejected a lot from like, I remember Ashton Kutcher was like, I would love to do your show. And then his people were like, what's it called? Oh, we looked at your website and we don't think it's a good fit.  I heard you saying. So now I get really a chance to, like you said, spread my wings and do a lot of things differently. And so I get to, the exciting part is I really do get to keep everything that I really loved, unfortunately, aside from the audience, which I have to rebuild. But I get to keep the conversations, I get to keep delivering awesome stuff and I get to do it in a way that doesn't have this requirement that I like kind of plug stuff that I don't necessarily feel as much a part of anymore. So rather than thinking about, or excuse me, rather than the theme being charm or whatever in the name, it's interview show. It's like me interviewing people, really interesting people having great conversations so you don't have to worry about that other. Yeah, I mean, what I want to do is pull wisdom out of amazing folks. I want to pull wisdom out of like Adam Corolla and Dr. Drew, and I want to pull wisdom out of the guys that I had on the show before, like Shaquille O'Neal and General Stanley McChrystal. Like I love talking with those types of folks and I love delivering these kernels of experience that they've just distilled into awesome rock, solid stuff and teaching that to the Jordan Harbinger Show listener base because that's making people better. That's making people better. Not like tips and tricks to amp up your game or whatever. Like I don't like that stuff and I'm glad that I don't have to do that. And I'm glad that I get to sort of change direction. And there's a million little things that we get to do that probably make less sense to broadcast on here, but like my producer's excited at just about making different types of tweaks that we probably wouldn't be able to do before. But the branding really is the change that we're most excited about because we just had so much trouble. And there were show fans that were like, I can't tell my friends about this because they just get insulted when I tell them they need to listen to a podcast called The Art of Charm. And so now that I have the Jordan Harbinger Show, if you can get a lot of email that's like, hey, I can finally recommend this to tons of people that were totally not gonna listen before. And that's exciting and has me hopeful. Oh, that's really cool, man.  I appreciate that, man. And I think everybody around you that knows you way better than I do feels the same way. So that's good, man. I appreciate it. It feels like it's really gonna bring the passion out again. Now you can pursue guests and certain people that you are actually interested in. And it's not like you're worried about this fitting in with your brand and how that can all kind of coordinate. But now people, you're gonna actually look out for, pursue and just extract all that awesome information from them. That sounds exciting. You do really well, Jordan. I'd love for you to kind of expand on it because I think this is something that you probably developed. Because what I have not done, I've never gone back and listened to really old episodes of you. Yeah, I don't do that. Yeah. So let's talk a little bit about the evolution of you as an interviewer. Because that's a skill. It's a major skill. And a lot of people, even if you have a decent conversation, don't know how to pull those nuggets out of people.  Yeah, so the first thing that I recommend, and this has nothing, this is not specific just to interviewing people. The first thing that I've learned is vulnerability. And I know that sounds cliche, but I'll tell you how this works. Because even before I hit record on the Jordan Harbinger show or on any interview, before I hit record, I always say, hey, just now you're doing, and the person's, you know, the guest is like, oh, you know, I'm good. How are you? And I'll actually tell them the truth. I'll say, yeah, actually, I woke up this morning and I had this weird stomach ache. And I realized it was because I didn't eat dinner last night because I was worried about this thing.  And we'll get into a real conversation right away because I'm not going, oh, how are you this morning? Well, thank you. Thanks for having me on the show. Fake, fake, fake, fake. Yeah, it's fake. And then you say, sell, sell. Where do you shop for clothes? And you're like, well, I'm glad you asked me that, right? Like it just turns into a fake interview. But if I start off by saying, man, you know, what did you eat for breakfast?  And I go, is that a normal thing for you? And they go, no, I just was in a hurry. And I feel a little hungry.  And then when I say, so when you were in the trenches, literally in Afghanistan and Iraq, you can't eat whenever you want. There must have been days that went by where you didn't get food. And I remember having this conversation with General McChrystal. And he was like, I ate one meal a day if I was lucky. And I said, what was that by design or what? And he's like, no, you gotta let your troops eat first. And you can't be eating hot soup and bacon in front of them when they haven't eaten in 17 hours and they're eating an MRE maybe if they're lucky in three hours if we don't get shelled or what. I'm like, this is the beginning of a real conversation. So if you can avoid pleasantries and just get into it, you can cut off the beginning where you're talking about breakfast. And then suddenly you're already in the middle of a real conversation. When I first started interviewing and having conversations with people on the podcast, I didn't do that. So when I go back and listen brutally, brutally painful to old, old, old episodes of The Art of Charm before, you know, like from years ago, the first half of the show is effing fluff, man. It's just garbage. That's what we run into.  Yeah. So we let him down the path and now he's just doing it. He's phoning it in. These are the sound bites. So I spent a lot of time trying to work through the sound bite thing by exhausting the guest and letting them go through their sound bites and then getting into real conversation.  Like when I walked in the door here, you guys said, hey, what's going on, man? You guys had heard a little through the texting and everything, but I didn't say, I'm great. What about you?  And then we just immediately started talking about it. We didn't have to spend 20 minutes. So how's the new car? How's the wife? You bought a house, that's exciting.  It's not real. Something that I found that we are getting better at, that was really difficult at first was when we have a guest and we disagree with them or we want to call them out in their bullshit, but we refrain from doing it because it's this weird like, you know when you have a guest in your home and you want to be polite, so you have that same kind of feeling and you don't want to offend somebody.  This is something that my listeners are thinking and I'm thinking it too, but it's hard. Like how do you get through that? And maybe can you give us an example of a time where you were just calling someone out and it turned into like- Or scared to ask a question or call someone out like a big name person, you know? Yeah, it happens a lot and I'm trying to think of an example, but I'm drawing a blank right now but I'll tell you, yes, there's been tons of times where somebody would say something and the person's like your friend and or they're a well-known person in their field and you're going, oh, shit, what do I do right now? And I realized that, and it took me probably 10 years to realize this too, my duty is to the person who is listening. And so if somebody comes in and goes, if you buy my water bottle, I'll send a bottle of our herbal weight loss stuff for free.     So maybe they're into it. So maybe it's like a tacit endorsement or something like that. So you have to say, no, you have to go, wait a minute. I don't know if that's real, or you go, wait a minute. You have an herbal weight loss thing. Come on, man, what's the deal? And even worst case scenario, and this has never happened, they could go, how dare you?  And yeah, and they'll appreciate you for it. But I'll tell you what has happened. Oh, here's an example. My friend Christine, Christine Hassler, she's a great person, awesome sort of therapist and coach.  She said something like, well, you know, everything is energy, right? And I was like, wait a minute. If you mean in like that physics dictate that, I don't know, it's like there's a formula that shows that matter is potential. And if that's what you mean, then sure, maybe, but I'm not a physicist. But if you're talking about like the universe provides and the energy that flows throughout the, everything, then I'm like, no, no, if it can't be measured on a machine, there's no energy here, you know, what are you talking about? And I made her explain it.  And that's what people expect. Because that's what they're thinking. That's what they're thinking. They're thinking the same that we just had an interview just last week with Aubrey Marcus. I don't know if you know who that is. Yeah, I love Aubrey. I just talked to him yesterday. Right, so, and we were interviewing him and the first half hour was exactly what we just gave an example of. He's plugging his book, a lot of surface bullshit, all the questions I was asking him, very canned answers. And then it finally, it takes about 45 minutes. So I just get tired of it.   Right. Like, come on, dude.  And so, man- Maybe the interview changed and it became way more entertaining. Yeah, of course. But it's kind of scary. I'll be the first to, we interviewed him over a year and a half ago and we were nowhere near the size. It was a big deal that we were in their house and we were interviewing him. So I remember not being afraid to do that. And I remember telling myself going to this interview like, don't let this happen, Adam. And I remember listening. We come right out the gates. Sal kind of asked him a generic question about his book and stuff like that. And I'm like, fuck, here we go. Here we go again. And I'm like, and I'm in my head. I'm listening to the answer. I'm like, I'm not going to let this happen. Right.  And then the interview turned really good. So, I mean, it's definitely an art and it's one that I think even ourselves, we're getting better at that skill set. And I think what you said is so true.   And that's such a great, and I will use that now that you've said that, I'll go into interviews. I'm like, you know what? I want to hire you for as a podcast coach. Yeah. I am recently available. No figure. I'm available to do that. There might be a market for that, actually. I'm sure that there is. I just don't know if I have to create it or if people are like, wait a minute, I hadn't thought about that. I have coaches for interviews. I still work with coaches for interviews. Do you really? They're hard to find because I had this interview coach named Steve Couch, he's a Canadian broadcaster and he was awesome. And then after, I don't know, we worked together for like a year. He told my producer Jason and I goes, hey, this is not really a good sales job that I'm gonna do here but I can't really teach you guys much more so I'm not gonna keep taking your money because you've done everything that I've suggested and you're doing it well. And I was like, thanks, that's high praise, well, crap, now we don't have a coach. So I reach out to this guy named Frank Cesno and he's worked at CNN and he's a journalism professor and I have a dialogue going back and forth with him. And there's other people in my pipeline that are like the talk show host coach for NPR and I'm like, look, I don't work for NPR but are you available? And she's like, I haven't really done this but I would consider it if you wanna come to one of my workshops, maybe I can like ask NPR if you can just join us or something. So you have to create those opportunities. At this level, I feel like I have to create those opportunities because whenever I ask professional journalists for help often they'll just listen to the show and they'll go, oh no, you're fine. And I'm like, no, I don't wanna hear that I'm fine. I wanna learn something. Or they'll go, oh, yeah, you know, you might wanna work on just story arcing. And I'm like, okay, that sounds like weeks of work that I don't know how to do. Somebody's gotta teach me this stuff.  I got nothing to do. What am I even gonna do today? Adam does that. Yeah, he might. I do not, no, absolutely.   And I don't, I mean, we practice by doing it but we have yet to hire somebody to coach us and help us. And I think that's absolutely brilliant. I don't know why we didn't relieve her. Well, I think when you're self-aware, if you recognize that about, I think we're all super critical of ourselves. I think we all recognize even when we turn the podcast on that, these three assholes have no experience podcasting.  But what I do have is the ability to continue to grow and learn.  A normal listener listens to it and they're like, interesting to guests.  I'm actually paying attention to the way the conversation flows, how you direct the guest. That's what I'm paying attention to. So in a sense, you are kind of coaching me or giving advice that way by paying attention to that. And this is the same advice that I give to younger people that are getting involved in this and they wanna learn as a, listen, there's some really good talented people out there that do interviews, listen to the way they interview and pay attention to how they evolve that because I think there's plenty of that within a good podcast. So with the art of charm, one of the ways you guys monetize is you guys have an academy or whatever, right? Yeah. And I'm assuming now you don't have that anymore. Have you thought about how you're going to monetize besides sponsorships? Sure, yeah, the Jordan Harbinger show will be monetized with of course sponsorships that's naturally one of the things that was easiest for us. I don't like having too many ads, of course, but I do have to keep the lights on and pay the team. Even if I live off my own sort of savings for the year while we rebuild, I can't expect the same of my team. So I'm gonna monetize that way. We're definitely going to be branching into, well, it depends on what shakes out with the split, right? Because there's gonna be some sort of non-compete, I would imagine, because I don't even wanna speculate because I feel like that's improper. But there's gonna be something where I have to design whatever income we have around whatever is of course agreeable or agreed to by the particular split. But there's always things that you can do. I'm not as interested, I'm not at all interested, frankly, in live training per se, because it's super time consuming, it requires a sales team, you've gotta get people to fly out to you or you've gotta run events elsewhere. It's not that I won't ever have events or that I won't participate in events, but I'm certainly not gonna have a week long residential program or anything like that. And I will be teaching courses online in areas that I find myself to be qualified to teach and I will also be having, hopefully, some show guests and things like that, also co-creating, collaborating on content as well. Because if we can get these guests in the door, it's kind of senseless not to try to do more with them if the audience is really going bananas over the content. Right, absolutely, for sure. So how are you handling the stress of it right now? Because when you came in, you talked about like not sleeping, sleep and like, what do you do, do you have a strategy? What do you do? Because that will, I mean, I told you all fair that I went through a divorce while we were, I mean, while we were starting Mind Pump, I went through a divorce after 15 years of marriage and I quickly learned that if I didn't put things in place to handle the baseline stress, nothing else would work. It was like I needed the baseline. You know, it's like I needed food and water if you're gonna do this other stuff. Like no matter what you're gonna do, you need these baseline things. Do you have a strategy or you're looking at, you know, things you can start to... Yeah, I do have a strategy, but it's also not necessarily working that great or at least it's not complete, I should say. It's working but it's not complete. I've never had the level of anxiety that I'm dealing with. Now, I'm totally unfamiliar with it and it goes back to what I was saying earlier about compassion when people say, before when somebody said, yeah, you know, I deal with anxiety or people will write in and say, I have crippling anxiety. I'm like, okay, you're shy, I get it. And now I'm like, now I'm like, wait a minute. If this person means that they feel the way I felt this morning when I woke up.   I want to give him a hug, man, because that's a terrible feeling.  Yeah, you don't want to eat.   And it's so weird because you feel like a crazy person, man. Is there nothing in your life that you can even come close to comparing to the feeling you're going through right now? Do you, can you reach back and think like, man, I remember this one time that I went to this, or is this that crazy different? This is the crazy unknown anxiety. This is, I can't think of anything that compares to this.  Because he's got like, I don't have a, I don't have a death in the family, I'm healthy. Yeah, but don't lessen what you're feeling, man. It's okay.  That's what you're feeling right now. And if you compare it to other people that will start to, what happens, you end up adding a layer on top of it because now you feel bad for feeling bad.   Well, you got to understand that we spend years building up and protecting this ego of ours by becoming more successful and people knowing who we are and you build it, build it, build it, build it, build it. And then all of a sudden something like this happens and it's never been challenged at this level. It's never been challenged at this level.  And is it that I'm identifying with this false thing that's not even real? Like it's, these aren't tangible things. It's this false ego that we've built up and it is, you're not injured. You can still go back to work. You still can build something. You could do some greater things. So what is it that really causes us to be this way? And I always try and reflect on like, this is me, man. Like I shouldn't be, last night I just got into it with my girl and I was really hard on her. It's just not like me to be like this. And I do have the whereabouts that right after the conversation, I apologized and I said, I'm sorry, I'm sorry I got upset at you like that because it's not you, it's totally me.  Everything that we're at right now is because of you. I respect you so much. So now I'm like, about, I'm like getting emotional.  And I know what it is. I've got to like get it out, but my body's like, what are you doing? There's liquid forming around your eye. And I'm like, uh, I don't know. And then I'm like, oh, think of something else. Yeah, exactly. And it's happening though. Like I have this thing, I'm telling you right now and I didn't mean to stop your story, but I'll tell you right now. I'm going to be in a movie theater and I'm going to see a commercial where it's like, adopt a pet and I'm going to be like, I got to go. Right.  It's only matter of time. You should have seen the text that I was sending that I was sending these guys while I was going through my divorce. I was doing a mind pump and it wasn't, my texts weren't, hey, I feel terrible, feel bad for me. I feel so sorry for me. It was like, hey man, I apologize. I'm like 20% of my normal capacity. I love you guys. Thanks for having my back. It is, and looking back, it's a superpower. We have, humans have the ability to empathize way differently than other animals do on a whole different level. It is a superpower. It is extremely valuable. And what you're doing is you're tapping into it and it is something that's valuable. And right now you're just overwhelmed with it. But moving forward, it will make you, it has made me a totally different and better human being. And that's what it's going to make you. And you're just tapping into something that was always there. You just didn't. It was under a stone freaking cap though, man. That's it, dude. That's it. That's absolutely it. What's crazy is how it could spiral down though if you don't get your hands on it, right? If you're not aware of it, it could turn into this very toxic thing where you then start like how I felt. Like I allowed outside stresses, something that had nothing really to do with her to affect our conversation when it's like, fuck, this is not your fault. If anything, you're part of the reason why I'm here right now.  This is me and my insecurities that I'm dealing with myself right now because I have these expectations of where we should be in the business, what should be happening, what should be going on.   I can't believe I did it. Oh man. You're just human, man. No, but you know, and it's a testament to also the incredible relationship and partnership that I have with Katrina because, you know, we kind of just went boom, our separate ways for the night. You know, and she's like, I can't talk to you. I literally made her cry. It was so bad. Oh man. And she kind of went her separate way and then I kind of sat there in my own like, and I'm sitting there and I'm like kind of angry and stuff. And it wasn't, and I'm like, I'm not really angry. How can I be angry at her? Everything that she's done. It's not her. This is me and what I'm doing. So I'm just sitting there kind of processing like why I feel this way. And when I really unpack all of it, it's all my ego and it's all my own insecurities. It's that I expect for me to be at a certain place right here. I thought we'd be more successful than this. I thought this would be accomplished. I thought this would have been done by now. And it's all things that I'm really upset about myself and I'm projecting that on her.  Like I apologize. Like I love you. Like this isn't you. This is 100% me. And she right away, she goes, I know hun. I love you too. And I know that. So I think that's, that to me is the important piece when you go through these things is it's very, very difficult to pull yourself out and then try and look at like your emotions, your feelings and your reactions that you're having. And then, and then really try and validate them for like, is this really, is this true? What I'm, what I'm starting to conjure up in my mind. Like, is it not really that, this isn't reality. Like. And before you get there, you have to let yourself be there. Like you talked about crippling anxiety or crippling. It's, it literally is.  Like imagine how you, how you would feel if you knew you were about to cross a murky river with alligators in it, but you had to cross it. Now imagine that feeling. That's what people feel when they feel crippling anxiety, except it's general and it's, maybe there's not a specific thing, but like what the fuck, I feel, I can't even get up to brush my teeth because I feel so scared. Yeah. Yeah. I don't have, I thank God it's not at that level, but it's, it's some nights it's damn close. Where I'll just be like, I was laying in bed the other day and my Apple watch was like, breathe. And I was like, Oh, that pops up when you're like, you know, not, you're the heart rate too high. So I was like, I'll check my heart rate, 113. I wasn't thinking about anything. I didn't wake up from a nightmare. I was laying down and I wasn't watching the news, nothing. And I was just like, that's weird. I'm not sleepy.  You know, this, this sort of like fight or flight thing is happening.  It's what it, what it is is I look and I go, wow, I've had like a thousand shows and or more probably. And I built this back catalog and I built it over years and all that this big audience of people that were listening to me. And now I have to start over, have I lost a part of myself, you know, because I was so attached to that and I'm like, this is one of those, it's almost like a zen thing where it's like, Oh, is this you? Are you your work? Is your body of work you? Or is it something that you take with you? And if so, then maybe you need to like feel that in a way that's more unique to you. Cause right now you were talking about looking at the mountain and trying to reset and everything. I'm in your friend who was the, the fitness competitor. I know exactly what she's feeling because, and as guys I think we're probably even worse with this stuff, we go, crap, I was building from level 10, trying to get to level 11. Now I'm at level one and I want to build to level 11. And it's like, no, you literally have to, so I'm looking at this mountain thinking it doesn't, thinking the race doesn't even start until I'm back to where I was. Exactly.  Right. Instead of just trying to build it piece by piece and do this new thing and do it right and do it different and keep going and doing what I do best, I'm thinking like, I'm thinking subconsciously, I have to literally rebuild everything that I did over 11 years before I, before I matter again. Have you snapped on anybody yet? No. Oh, okay. Is that a thing that happens? Well, so this is- I think everybody's different. No, exactly. I think there's really two types of people that get in these stressful positions and I actually think if you're not the person that snaps, I actually am more concerned because the other type is the type that will hole up and get quiet and depressed and go and bury it all inside. That's probably me, yeah. Although I haven't experienced that either. Right, like there tends to be like this. I either been, you're either the type of person where all this pressure stress and then you lash out, which is I think someone like me, I project it onto somebody else and then that opens my eyes. Oh yeah, no, I do that, I'm good. I'm sorry, Jen. No, yeah. My wife's like, what are you talking about? Of course you do that. Right. No, I do that. Yeah, so I think that's the thing that you just gotta be aware of those moments because those are probably either already happening or going to happen and then where the spiraling down happens is you can really start to damage all those that are around you that really are part of your support system. Right. Well, look at it this way. If you knew right now that you were about to go climb a literal physical mountain and it's something you've never done before or whatever, it's something new, it's just a big physical challenge. Okay, I got a 30 mile or 40 mile climb on this mountain. I need to prepare for that or I need to strengthen myself to be able to do that. Think of it this way. You are going through some new challenges, a lot of uncertainties, some chaos going on.  If you don't do that and your body starts to fail, then it becomes almost impossible. So that's why I ask you, like what are the things, are there things that you're doing or maybe we can talk about? Yeah, let's talk about it. Okay, so here's what I got. Cause I figured out early that self-care was gonna be huge because I was like staying up all night and talking with people on the phone or like, I mean trying to like have a couple of drinks to like wind down and that didn't work because I was so wound up. So then I was like, oh, I need to like drink the whole bottle of wine but I don't like doing that.  And I'm like, I don't even want to do that, right? So I would start doing, but I would start doing other stuff like just unhealthy stuff and not even worth mentioning really, but I started to then eat right and I've always loved walking and I make my phone calls when I walk and I do the audio books in preparation for shows when I'm walking. I looked at my Steps app the past like couple of weeks. I've walked like a hundred miles and I'm not exaggerating. I mean, normally I try to do like 10,000 steps a day and now it's like 35,000 steps.  I'm moving around. Awesome. And I've lost 30 pounds, not in the last month, thank God, that would be really bad. But in the past probably year, I've lost 30 pounds. You look good. Thank you, yeah. And I'm definitely losing more weight recently because of the fact that I'm walking so much and my appetite ain't what it used to be. So I'm doing like green juice in the morning because I'm waking up so hungry, which is unusual for me. Usually I skip breakfast, but I am dying by like eight or nine a.m. probably because I'm waking up at like four. You're also burning a lot of calories too though. And I'm burning a lot of calories. I hadn't thought about that. Yeah, I'm burning a lot of calories and I'm also eating a lot of like home cooked food instead of going out to eat because I started to realize that any, even the healthy restaurant, they have to make that should taste good. So they're gonna put butter in there or they're gonna put a lot of salt in there or something. So I just go to my in-laws house to eat, which is really close. And this is why this is important.   You know, having other people take care of you like that is great and it's easy on me, it's easy on my wife. And so the other thing that we're adding to this is I have a gym membership. The gym is right across the street. It's a big box gym, but it's still there. It's right there. And I'm like, hey, Jen, to my wife, I'm like, hey, Jen, why don't we just, since we're up at 6 a.m. fretting or like checking email, why don't you just sign up for the gym? We'll just go over there every morning and do like a light workout to get the blood flowing because I noticed that when I go to the gym, the rest of the day, I'm like, I can do this. What was I even upset about? But then the next day, I'm like, shit, my life is over, right? So I just need to keep doing it. Of everyone knows that working out makes you feel good. This is different. This is like working out is keeping me sane. And that's different. It's totally different. I had a family member about six years ago who I'm very close with, got diagnosed with terminal cancer, went through a year and a half process and I had always worked out. I had worked out for, you know, I've been lifting weights since I was 14 years old or training since I was 14. And my goals were no longer at that time where there wasn't trying to build muscle. I wasn't trying to get stronger. I wasn't trying to improve my performance. It was literally, I am taking care of myself right now. And it was a different attitude when I went to the gym. I unplugged everything, did my training, went in my zone and it wasn't to improve my fitness.  Like of everybody around that situation, I stayed the healthiest and that's 100% one of the reasons. The other thing that I found, which I recently discovered through my divorce was nature. And what I mean by nature is not just every once in a while going on a hike. It was literally, let's go somewhere where there's no one and nothing, take my shoes and socks off and feel the dirt or feel the sand and schedule it. Make it a regular weekly thing that I do. And if I can, make it a daily thing. And boy, did that make it, because when you're out in nature, if you don't have reception or you leave your phone in the car, there's nothing, there's no one. It's quiet. I feel like it's less of the nature and it's more about learning how to just completely be alone with yourself. It is, but it's changing. You have to change the scenery because it's so hard to do that. I know, I agree with that. It's possibly that, it's also being small. And for me, it's definitely, because I live in the Redwoods and the Redwoods are just so grandiose. They're huge and you look up and you just have this different perspective about it. There's something to it. I mean, it's somewhat like mystical or like woo woo, whatever, but just being able to kind of look around and understand how small you are in the world, it really impacts you in a different way. It's just, it's detachment and perspective.  We have distractions around us all the time.  It's like, you're so disconnected from yourself. It's so crazy. And I think walking on a beach or going up in the Redwoods or doing these things like that. I think the real magic behind the woo woo-ness of it is simply that is, how often do you honestly just sit alone in silence by yourself or just really be, when do you do that? You just, we just don't do that that often anymore. And it's great when you're in nature because it's the awe of it. And it's a different environment. I'm always in the city. I'm always in, you know, or my house or at work. So I changed environments and I started doing that. And it was just incredible. Spending time with people who are important to you. That was another one that was extremely powerful for me. Avoiding processed foods always. Cause even when I feel good, if I eat processed foods, I notice a higher level of stress. So that wasn't, it just, and it's mainly because of- It's the inflammation. Yeah. Inflammation goes up from processed foods, which means cortisol goes up cause cortisol is a response to inflammation.   And so the way I looked at my diet and exercise was I have to be more perfect with these controllables so that I can handle more of these uncontrollables better. Like all, here's all my controllables. I'm just gonna really clamp down on those and dial those in because so I can make myself more resilient.  And usually when I read books, it's books that are informational, that are, you know, that are nonfiction, that are very- Dense, yeah. Very dense. What I did was is I started to, so one book, I don't know, are you from with Eckhart Tolle? Yeah, of course. Okay, so A New Earth. Great book. I listened to that and he talks all about the ego on that and it really helped me separate things and stop identifying with certain things and it helped me move forward. That was another thing that I went through. But you have all these controllables that you know, like if you dial those in, man, you'll make yourself so much more bulletproof with all this other, because there's already, look, what you're going through, a lot, like there's a lot of uncontrollables, there's a lot of chaos. Yes. That's the stress.  A long time ago I did. And I was like, oh, it didn't work. And then my friends were like, oh, really? It didn't work. You know, for me it was really good. And I was like, yeah, I just kept hearing toilets flushing across the street. And I kept hearing like all of these different things in the float tank and the guy who was working there, who was the owner was like, no, you definitely didn't hear anything. Those are like auditory hallucinations.  But my mind was going through some thing where I was literally like, no, I could hear people talking.  And I'm like, oh, that's totally terrifying.  You can't hear, see anything. Your brain just starts to do weird stuff.  You start to get a little tiny bit of that, which hopefully is a benefit in a float tank. But yeah. It's cool.  It has to create its own reality. Have you got the one over here in Campbell? Have you been to that? I haven't. I saw that though, it looks really cool.  Yeah, yeah, we have a few times. I mean, we went in there for two hours. I did a two hour session, which was kind of cool. Are you taking any adaptogenic herbs or things that have been, cause there are certain herbs that have been used for thousands of years. Chinese and Ayurvedic medicine have some really good advice in regards to allowing the body or helping the body handle stress. That's what adaptogens do. Are you gonna get them on that four-sigmatic chakra right now? Well, no, I mean, they are one of our sponsors. I wasn't even gonna mention them actually. I wasn't even trying to do a plug, but you could try Ashwagandha. It's a very, very good adaptogenic herb. It's actually got clinical science to support how it helps the body handle stress. So that's a good one. It's not acute, so it's not like you take it and you notice right away, some people say that they do, but really if you take it every day after about four or five days, you'll notice you just have a lower level of stress, or at least your body doesn't feel so amped. And then for acute stress, you can try passion flower. And passion flower is not to be used super, super regularly, but more when you have kind of that acute like you did the other day when you were laying down and you noticed your heart rate was a little high. Passion flower increases GABA in the brain, which is a inhibitory neurotransmitter.  It's much more subtle and it doesn't have those other side effects. So those are the two things I would recommend. So passion flower for acute, ashwagandha regularly, and then you do the exercise diet stuff and then hopefully that'll help you with your sleep because I think your sleep is just, that's really a side effect of everything else. If you start to handle some things and you might be able to do it. Some granddaddy purple or OG Kush should help that too. Yeah, you know, it's funny because I am so not a marijuana guy and like we live in California, we're in North California, everyone's like, dude, just get the buds out and blah, blah, blah. And a friend of mine has fibromyalgia and it's funny because I talked to him and I go, that's funny. I thought crippling anxiety was for people who were kind of just maybe crazy. And he's like, yeah, I thought fibromyalgia was for people who had like psychosomatic disorder. And he's like, so we both have these like things that we didn't think were real.  And so he started to experiment a little with edibles and stuff. And he was like, try it. I'm like, come on, man. He's like, no, it's the only thing that works.  I got to protect my voice. But I went to a dispensary and I grabbed some CBD like chews. And I'm like, all right, I'll try this because at worst case, it's just like some non-psychoactive CBD with a little bit of sugar and chocolate. I'll give it a shot. Is it the chiba chews? The purple one?  You probably want to stay in place I go to. Yeah, probably. Yeah, down in the, well, whatever. We're not sponsored by the air place. Yes, exactly. Oh, is it that place? Yeah, yeah.  We know, we know. We'll go there afterwards. Yeah, we're all gonna make a trip. So I'm like, okay, these aren't cheap, but I'm like, how much is it worth for me to get a good night's sleep and just relax? And it's like, this is not a chemical compound that's manufactured by Pfizer. This is something that some dude grew right around here and baked it into a little brownie and it doesn't have a psychoactive effect. So I'm not like, hey guys, what's going on, man? Right. It's just this lower level of. Does it work for you? It does. And I'll tell you, it's weird because before I thought this doesn't really do anything. Now I realize it because if I think of something now, some sort of stressful thing, I could feel like my heart do this thing where there's like an adrenaline, it feels like it's taking a bath in adrenaline or something like that. And it'll happen all the time. And I'll do a little bit of the chews or I'll go to the gym and then like, you know, if I do really good self care routine that day, I'll think of something a little stressful and it'll be like more mild or it'll be like, nah, whatever. But if I'm really high strung, I'll think of a thing or I'll see an email coming in and I'll be like, oh my God, oh my God, you know?  The days on which I wake up and I've had a full night's rest are I am a totally different person than if I've had half a night's rest.  When I was a young trainer and I was training clients that were in their, you know, 30, 40, 50 years old, successful businessmen and women, I would like hammer home like the programming and the cardio and the macros and your diet and everything like that. Fast forward 15 years later, how long I've been doing this and all the hundreds and potentially thousands of people that I've trained that are like that. My advice is so different now. It's like sun, water, walk, sleep. That's true. I'm doing it right except for sleep part. Those are like literally like master those four then get back to me and we can get it.  Sun, water, walking and sleep. Those are the most important. They're the biggest rocks. They're the biggest rocks. And breathing, so two things. This is very important now. Breathing involves a lot of muscles.  Now a pattern is something that can become your default pattern. For example, when you walk, you don't think about how you walk but muscles fire in a particular way and you have a unique pattern to how you walk versus somebody else who says, who say is taller or maybe always wear high heels or whatever, right? You have this pattern. You don't have to think about it. When you're stressed out, you change the way you breathe and if you don't stop that patterning, it will become your new default pattern. And here's the second part to it. Stress is an anxiety or part of what's called a positive feedback loop. So let me explain what that means. But it sounds so negative. Right, right. So a negative feedback loop is like, here's a classic example, our audience are fitness people so they'll know this. A classic negative feedback loop is, I take testosterone, my body recognizes it and slows down or stops its own production of testosterone. That's bad. To balance me out, right? Well, it's just the way your body balances out. Sure, okay. Now a positive feedback loop amplifies as you go through it. So here's a classic example. I know where you're going with this. So here's a classic example. I'm sitting here and I start thinking about something stressful so my heart starts to beat fast. I start to feel my heart beat fast. I start to think about my heart beating fast. I start to worry about my heart beating fast. So now I get more anxiety which then makes it beat faster which then makes me more anxious and it starts to compound. And this is how people have anxiety attacks. It's literally this positive feedback loop. So one of the most important things you could do with stress and anxiety is to interrupt that cycle. And one of the, and so you were talking about CBD, that's one way is where I'm taking something that is minimizing the physical effects of anxiety. So it's not taking away your problems but it is minimizing the physical sensation of anxiety which helps interrupt that positive feedback loop. Very similar to what you're talking about with the going out in nature too. When you take those, your feet hit the sand. 100% And your barefoot, you interrupt that. All of a sudden I'm thinking about, and this is what, we love to talk about this on the show because for so many years when people would explain this to me in the past it would sound so woo-woo. Yeah, like earthing. That was one of the things where I had somebody on, that's to your earlier, earlier question, something I had to call somebody out on was that earthing stuff.  Well, it's the way they explain it. Yeah. Ions and stuff. They explain it in a very non-scientific way. And to be quite frankly, we still don't fully understand it.  One of the easiest ways to do that is to put yourself in your feet all of a sudden touching the sand because now you're not thinking about that stress. All of a sudden, oh, well, you're feeling the sand and you're moving that. It's quiet around you.  It's just interrupting that loop and stopping what can potentially become a recruitment pattern. And this is how people develop these disorders with anxiety or stress where even though things may be working out for you, all of a sudden you're like, why am I still feeling shitty or what's going on? Or, you know, it starts to get out of control and breathing is part of it. So one of the things that you might wanna do is try practicing belly breathing throughout the day. And belly breathing literally is you stop what's going on.  So you feel your belly fill up. You hold that, you hold that breath. You get in as deep as you possibly can. You hold it for about five seconds.  Then you hold again for five seconds as your breath is out. And then you repeat that cycle. And what it does is it interrupts the cycle and it prevents you from creating this, or from feeding this positive feedback loop and from creating this recruitment pattern because what'll happen over time, and I know this, my girlfriend experienced this, where she has trouble breathing and it's because she developed this recruitment pattern from when she went through a very stressful period in her life and now shit's not stressful. And yet, why do I feel like I'm short of breath? This is actually quite common.  And Adam's completely right. What ends up happening is, and I'll use another example, we'll talk about fasting. Not that this necessarily is what you do for stress, but this is just a great way to illustrate what I'm talking about. Fasting has existed for thousands and thousands of years across cultures and in all major religions. So what that tells you right there is, let's see, if all these ancient cultures recommend fasting for health, and if all these religions from Buddhism to Islam to Christianity to Judaism to Hinduism, I mean, every religion advocates fasting for health, there's probably something to it. Now, the problem comes from people trying to explain it in their own words, which sounds like detoxify your body and it's good for the spirit.  Like that's not how it works.   We just don't know how to explain it yet, but there's something to it. Same thing with grounding, same thing with breathing, same thing with sunlight, same thing with chewing your food, same thing with meditating. All these little things, you might not know how they work, but they've existed for a long time. If you start implementing what you know how to control. Dude, game changer. It makes you so much more comfortable. Game changer for you, Jordan.  So I've struggled with this for a very long time. I was never a good sleeper ever. I've never been a great sleeper.  Oh man. And it's, I'm very cerebral. I can't stop thinking. I'm always thinking about stuff that's going on and most a lot of route centered around business, right? And so Katrina can feel me like breathing differently when I'm laying in bed. And I'll be dead silent, lights are out. We've been laying, I've been laying there for an hour and she'll kind of roll over and like elbow me and she'll be like, stop it. And I'm like, what are you talking about? And she can tell just by the way I'm breathing that I'm thinking so hard. Yeah. And so what she's, what we've started as a practice now when she catches that, because I still have these bad habits.  I'm still, I still fall in these bad patterns. It's a pattern. It's a pattern. And, but we've learned to recognize it. When she recognizes it, she'll roll over and she'll be half asleep and she'll elbow me and she'll go, let's, let's breathe together. And we'll literally do 10 deep, real deep breaths, five second holds, five, just box breathing, right? We'll box breathe for literally like 10 reps and it's a trip, dude. I can feel my body go. Bro, you'll feel some, you'll feel tingly sometimes in your hands. I do get that. I do get the tingle thing. And there was a point at which I was practicing. I learned, I took this class where they, at the end of the class, they, they kidnap you and throw you in the back of the, have you guys, have you guys heard about this? No.  You signed up for this? Yes. Oh man, this class was dope as hell. Okay. So this is an, it's called urban escape and evasion. And what happens is you sit in a hotel room or whatever and you talk for a few days and they teach you like how to stash things in a city, how to hide stuff, how to like make, improvise, like web, whatever. Oh my God. And then they also teach you like how people track you and how to like do some basic disguise stuff.  And it's like you're being kidnapped. They throw, and while they're driving, they're like throwing water on you and stuff, like not water boarding, but they're throwing water. How much did you pay for this? I was calm. So it's okay. But they leave you in the back of this van and it's like starting to get hot. And what you do is you take out a bobby pin, they tell you like stash a bobby pin in a place where you can reach it when you're handcuffed and you should like always have this on you or whatever if you're paranoid.  And all along the way, there's all these people tracking you that have already taken the class and a lot of them are like detectives, private investigators, cops and stuff. And so I'm walking along the LA river and I'm like, they're never gonna find me here.     And I was like, damn it.   Oh, box breathing.  And you need to like do this box breathing. And I remember learning the box breathing thing and feeling like a little lightheaded, which is not how you do it. But then my hands and fingers would be tingling and stuff. And I just thought like, this is weird. How come my body feels this? And it's like the oxygenation and you're just not used to it. Yes. And it's really, again, it's a technique to bring the level down, stop the positive feedback loop, interrupt it. And now you can have your wits about you because when you're in that state, it isn't the frontal lobe that's processing things. It's not the smart party or the conscious party.  It ain't going to happen. Well, think of it like an evolutionary, right? Going back to like the young boy hunting for his first kill or what like that and like how scary that had it been and probably how shitty his first throw was. And it's like, after you've done this a hundred times and stuff like that, like that fear starts to settle down. It's not so much that the threat is no longer there. The threat is still there. It's that you've learned how to mentally control that and calm your nerves, pay attention to what you're doing, aim, we've ready to aim, shoot fire type of deal.   And it's great. Every time I've learned to do that, like things start to unfold in front of me.  It's a secret. Right.  Don't give me a story about it too. That's not our thing. I hate that. What's Jordan, what is your, do you have a higher purpose?  Yeah. Cause I feel like you do. But I don't wanna hear what you think. Yeah, it sounds cheesy whenever I talk about this stuff. But I'll tell you, yeah. I mean, my kind of goal in life here is to be able to have, be able to convey wisdom to people that I feel like is a little bit hidden. And I don't mean that teaching people secret knowledge, but I mean like learning real stuff is actually quite hard.  Most of it is not useful. We grow up, we take a job, we start training. We learn a bunch of stuff that maybe works in one situation, but it's not necessarily useful. So as humans, we don't grow that much unless we're like reading self-help books all the time. And then you're kind of like reading stuff like the secret where it's like just envision it as a manifestation and it's like, you know, no. So I'm getting, I love getting the people that I do for the show, for example, getting them together, creating products or creating articles or creating content, especially conversations where someone can listen in and go, wow, I just learned something from a general. I would never have had access to this person. Even if I did, I wouldn't know what to ask them. And now I've got this. And I feel like helping people grow like that is something that has driven me for such a long time. And it's so important because otherwise there's all these people with really awesome potential and they're just kind of going through life thinking, yeah, I've got my job and I've got my hobbies and stuff, but they don't think about how they're gonna be able to level up without looking at the stack of self-help books and going, man, I don't have time to read all this stuff. So I wanna make it entertaining. I wanna make it fun. I wanna make it easily digestible. And I want people to be able to listen and go, okay, cool, I learned something from the show. I like this or I learned something from this guy in this video and in this product or whatever. And that for me is really important because I think that there's so many people out there that have learned awesome, amazing things from, you know, Shaquille O'Neal or the General McChrystal or like somebody I've had recently on the show, even like lawyers and these crisis management people or even investors and their wisdom is just off limits unless they write a book and then you buy that book and you read that and then you get that piece out. And I'm like, no, I'll do that. And then I'll talk to this person and I'll have them tell this stuff in a way that's entertaining and then you can apply it right away. So instead of spending 10 hours, you spent 45 minutes with me. And that for me is that's what I love doing that. I would have guessed that because you did that right now on this podcast. You did, you just served it. I wanna be respectful of your time. I know that you have another meeting at 12 o'clock and we're coming up on that already right now. So this will not be the last time we do this. Hopefully we'll see your face around here a little bit more. We got your back, dude. Thank you. We got your back, bro. So excited to see things go forward. We'll make sure we do a nice little commercial and direct people where to go find the podcast and everything, man, excited to see you. You look great, man. And I look forward to this next year for you. Thank you very much. Yeah, the Jordan Harbinger show, I need all the help I can get from show fans from before or people that are willing to try something new. I love the Mind Pump audience. Great audience, really cool people. And I hear from your peeps all the time and I need the support more than ever now. Excellent, right on, brother. Thanks guys. Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. If your goal is to build and shape your body, dramatically improve your health and energy and maximize your overall performance, check out our discounted RGB Superbundle at mindpumpmedia.com. The RGB Superbundle includes Maps Anabolic, Maps Performance, and Maps Aesthetic. Nine months of phased expert exercise programming designed by Sal Adam and Justin to systematically transform the way your body looks, feels, and performs. With detailed workout blueprints and over 200 videos, the RGB Superbundle is like having Sal Adam and Justin as your own personal trainers, but at a fraction of the price. The RGB Superbundle has a full 30-day money-back guarantee and you can get it now plus other valuable free resources at mindpumpmedia.com. If you enjoy this show, please share the love by leaving us a five-star rating and review on iTunes and by introducing Mind Pump to your friends and family. We thank you for your support and until next time, this is Mind Pump.