Welcome to this special masterclass. We've brought some of the top experts in the world to help you unlock the power of your life through this specific theme today. It's going to be powerful, so let's go ahead and dive in.

Secret to gaining the upper hand in negotiation is giving the other side the illusion of control. Now, I'm coming at you as a very control-oriented negotiator. As soon as you don't struggle with me over control, you actually begin to gain an advantage. Negotiators who want to talk all the time, they feel out of control when they're not talking. So you want to get them to the where they don't talk, but they don't talk because they're relaxed, not because they're trying to seize control. The nicer you are, the more movable you could be. You don't have to give up that much assertion. You don't want to be that mean. A lot of times, you won't tell me stuff if I ask. Hostice negotiators trigger information without asking questions. The nicer you are, the more movable you could be. The style of being, you can be very aggressive or very assertive without being aggressive. You don't have to give up that much assertion. You don't want to be that mean. You don't want to be that hard on people.

For example, what do you mean?

Like, how? Well, we're in LA. Yes. There's a great guy here in town. His name is Tom Girardi, voted top trial attorney in California several years in a row by the Bar Association. He gets a vote of top trial attorney so many times that when they put it on the front page, they say, Again. Wow. He comes in and he's a guest in my class at USC. I know he's a top trial attorney, but I don't know his style. I figured he's going to be an attack dog. Because I spent so much time in New York, you know what I mean? It's the attack dog attorneys. Tom walks into the class and he says, The key to negotiation is being nice and gentle. Now, what Tom does by being nice is get you to drop your guard. Tom is an immovable, unrelenting opponent. That's why he's so successful, and he's He's ridiculously nice about it. He smiles and he chats with people, and he always talks about how we'll collaborate with each other in the future. You get into an argument with him, and immediately he'll bend it, where he's talking with you about how you and I are going to be successful together 10 years from now or in the future, which is the same thing a hostage negotiator does.

If you're barricading a bank, I'm going to say, My first goal is to get you out of there alive. Well, I picked a point of that we can collaborate on. Tom Girardi does this instinctively, and he's just super nice about it. I mean, either you're going to cooperate with him because you like him so much, he's never going to let up on you, or more than likely, you're going to say something accidentally. He gets people saying stuff accidentally, and then he doesn't jump on you if you say something accidentally. He lets you say so many things accidentally.What do you mean accidentally?Well, So he loves to get people on uncovered emails that they never should have written. If you send Tom an email saying, Tom, let's go have lunch together. He will not email you back saying, okay, because he doesn't put anything in emails because that's the downfall of almost every single lawsuit. Somebody who's done something wrong is going to put it in an email. Tom knows if he's nice to the other side long enough, he's going to figure out where those emails are. That's what people do all the time. Lawsuits are uncovered.

People get into trouble with what they put in emails when they send an email to somebody else and say, Hey, we shouldn't be doing this. And a person sends an email back saying, Yeah, it's okay. No, we're still not going to find out. Oh, my gosh. In today's day and age, people put stuff in emails. Tom knows he's just relentlessly nice, relentless, and the most charming guy you've ever met in your life. You don't have to be aggressive. Secret to gaining the your hand in a negotiation is giving the other side the illusion of control. Now, I'm coming at you as a very control-oriented negotiator. As soon as you don't struggle with me over control, you actually begin to gain an advantage. Because then you feel like you're in control. You don't have to try to gain it anymore. Right. I'm more than likely going to start dropping my... If I'm a control-freak guy, if I want to talk all the time, I'm a control-freak guy. Control-freak negotiators who want to talk all the time, they feel out of control when they're not talking. You want to get them to the point where they don't talk, but they don't talk because they're relaxed, not because they're trying to seize control.

The nicer you are, the more movable you could be. You don't have to give up that much assertion. You don't want to be that mean. A lot of times, you won't tell me stuff if I ask Hostage negotiators trigger information without asking questions. The nicer you are, the more movable you could be. The style of being... You can be very aggressive without... Or very assertive without being aggressive. You don't have to give up that much assertion. You don't want to be that mean. You don't want to be that hard on people. For example, what do you mean? How? Well, we're in LA. Yes. There's a great guy here in town. His name is Tom Girardi, voted top trial attorney in California several years in a row by the Bar Association. He gets a vote of top trial attorney so many times that when they put it on the front page, they say, Again. So he comes in and he's a guest in my class at USC. I know he's a top trial attorney, but I don't know his style. I figured he's going to be an attack dog. Because I spent so much time in New York, you know what I mean?

It's the attack dog attorneys. Tom walks into the class and he says, The key to negotiation is being nice and gentle. Now, what Tom does by being nice is get you to drop your guard. Tom is an immovable, unrelenting opponent. That's why he's so successful, and he's ridiculously nice about it. Like, he smiles and he chats with people, and he always talks about how we'll collaborate with each other in the future. You get into an argument with him, and immediately he'll bend it, He's talking with you about how you and I are going to be successful together 10 years from now or in the future, which is the same thing a hostage negotiator does. If you're barricading a bank, I'm going to say, My first goal is to get you out of there alive. Well, I picked a point in the future that we can collaborate on. Tom Girardi does this instinctively, and he's just super nice about it. I mean, either you're going to cooperate with him because you like him so much, he's never going to let up on you, or more than likely, going to say something accidentally. And he gets people saying stuff accidentally.

And then he doesn't jump on you if you say something accidentally. He lets you say so many things accidentally.What do you mean accidentally?He loves to get people on uncovered emails that they never should have written. If you send Tom an email saying, Tom, let's go have lunch together. He will not email you back saying, okay, because he doesn't put anything in emails. Because that's the downfall of almost every single lawsuit. Somebody who's done something wrong is going to put it in an email. Tom knows if he's nice to the other side long enough, he's going to figure out where those emails are. That's what people do all the time. Lawsuits are uncovered. People get into trouble with what they put in an email. When they send an email to somebody else, they say, Hey, we shouldn't be doing this. A person sends an email back saying, Yeah, it's okay. No, we're just not going to find Oh, my gosh. In today's day and age, people put stuff in emails. Tom knows he's just relentlessly nice, relentless, and the most charming guy you've ever met in your life. You don't have to be aggressive. Secret to gaining the upper hand in a negotiation is given the other side the illusion of control.

Now, I'm coming at you as a very control-oriented negotiator. As soon as you don't struggle with me over control, you actually begin to gain an advantage.

Because then you feel like you're in control You don't have to try to gain it anymore.

Right. I'm more than likely going to start dropping my... If I'm a control freak guy, if I want to talk all the time, I'm a control freak guy. Control freak negotiators who want to talk all the time, they feel out of control when they're not talking. You want to get them to the point where they don't talk, but they don't talk because they're relaxed, not because they're trying to seize control. You did a real nice job with that. Now, the only thing, another thing that we teach is See, you're not going to give me a car. You're trying to make it sound like you were going to. Now, I teach how to say no. Then you want to feel other ways of saying it because the real answer to that, just like at the very beginning of my book, you're supposed to look at me and say, How am I supposed to do that?

So poise it back to a question. Right.

A how question.

An open-ended question.

Well, not just open-ended. How. How is the key to life. Yes is nothing without how. You could also start talking about how without talking about yes.

So just say, would I even say- You could say, How would I do that? Would I say, I'd love to get you what you need. How would I do that?

Just, How would I do that?

How would I do that? Give them the control to figure out the solution.

Right. How am I supposed to get you the car in that time frame? Because that's what you're trying to express. There actually is a time problem here. Right.

In 60 seconds, how am I supposed to get you a car?

Right. That's different than, We can get a car, we just need 60 more seconds. Right.

We need more time.

Because now I think you're ducking me. But if instead you say, How am I Of course, the cars are out here right away. But first of all, I got to tell everybody what we're going to do. I don't need anybody to get surprised. Let's talk through the details of how this is going to get done. In the meantime, we What got you here in the first place? How do you find yourself in this a situation? How do I make sure I get you out of there alive? The succession of how questions. How am I supposed to promise to get you a car if I don't know that she's going to come out alive? You take what you want and make it the path to what I want. How am I supposed to get you in here if it doesn't benefit me also? Right. As soon as in any negotiation, what I want is now a means of getting what you want, then that changes the dynamic right away.

How do you deal in a negotiation with the person who has to win, who has to get everything they want. They're very controlling alpha, and it's their way or no way.

Well, getting everything they want is actually third on their list. First of all, being in control is number one on their list, and that's emotionally satisfying. The second thing is the alpha type, which is, we refer to that as the assertive. The one thing that's more important to them than actually getting what they want is being respected and making sure that you know everything about what they're coming from. It's a classic guy who's working for his boss and said, You know what? My boss didn't do what I wanted him to do, but he heard me out, or she heard me out. I can live with the direction we're going as long as I know that my boss knows my opinion. The assertive type of negotiator, it's really more important to them that they They felt that they conducted themselves respectably, that you respected them, and that you knew what they were coming from. Once they know those things, they'll actually soften up on what they want.

If they feel disrespected, they'll probably be more frustrated, angry, and demanding.

Because when they're very demanding, what they're really saying to you subtly is, I want you to know how important this is to me. I want you to know how important I am.

How do you meet that person? Just come to them with respect or with calm?

You could say, Look, you're impressive. You're phenomenal.

You've thought it's all out.

This is very-Yeah. Clearly, you know where you're coming from, you know what you want. I'm lucky to be talking to you at all.

Right.

I mean, were I to sit down with Donald Trump, I would, in fact, be lucky to be in the same room with him. That'd be the first thing I'd say to him. I'd say, You're an American icon. You're A symbol of American business, certainly in New York City. Yeah, stroke and their ego, it's not a bad thing. It's a version of empathy because that's how they see themselves. The Emotional recognition. Emotional currency is not going to solve every deal. I just don't want to try to solve any deal with money when I could have solved it with emotional currency. I'm saving my money.

With emotional empathy, currency, intelligence. Right.

My money is too important to me to waste it when I could buy something with satisfaction. I like that. I'm enormously tight with my knowledge.

So many people, especially men in business deals, I feel like there's a lot of alpha men who are trying to get what they want. And so somehow they'll lose money because they're not able to have empathy or they're not able to whatever. They're not able to drop their ego.

Yeah. A lot of money is left on the table over stuff like that or what they value themselves out. Price is the most emotional term in a negotiation because you value yourself based on price. But if I can get you to value yourself in another way, put you on a magazine cover. Stroke D, going some other way. It used to be you get Donald Trump in any magazine you wanted to if you put him on a cover. Imagine a matter of time, and that used to be his deal. If you wanted to do an article on Donald Trump, the deal was he made the cover. Then he would knock himself out for the people doing the articles on access, answering questions. Imagine how valuable his time was. They got a cover to the magazine anyway. I got to put somebody on it. Now they're trading something that costs them nothing. He's given them dynamic interviews.

He's promoting them hard, and he's sharing them with everyone. He's framing it everywhere.

Interesting. You're buying Donald Trump with emotional recognition.

What are the characteristics that make a great negotiator in your field? Also, how do those translate into the business and relationship world, just in general, outside of-Well, let the other side go first.

Most people are burning with their argument. Here's why you should make this deal. They've got that memorized. They're not going to listen to a word you say until they it out. So trying to talk to them is really like trying to talk to a paranoid schizophrenic. Because they're rehearsing their speech in their head and their logic. And so you just can't get through to them. So you let them go first. And another guy, Ned Kaletty, former GM of the Dodgers, friend of mine here in town, phenomenal negotiator. He's lectured in my class at USC also. And Ned always likes to let the other side go first. He did the Barry Bonds deal. He's done a ton of deals across the board. Ned says, Well, in a two-hour phone call, there's going to be 90 seconds of solid gold, where the person I'm talking to, based on changes that they made in their tone of voice and the adjectives that they used, he's got an instinct for it. He couldn't identify. He just always said, There's 90 seconds of solid gold. I'd say, What is that? And we talk it through. He says, Well, yeah, it's going to be a change in the tone of voice.

It's going to be a different adjective. So Ned wants you to go first because he wants to know what it's going to take to make the deal.What.

They want.Right..

What they're burning for or how they characterize what they have.

Or what they're not saying, too, maybe.

Exactly right. What someone has failed to say is often a lot more important than what they have said, which is why I give it a little thought in advance. What are they going to say if they've got this? I actually like to look for more of what they haven't said, what's glaringly missing. I'm going to need you to walk through it a couple of times before that jumps out of me. Okay.

Who are the most difficult people to work with then? Would you say it's the alpha people, or would you say it's the uncertain people, or what type of people are hard to work in negotiation with?

You're talking about a little bit of a tight match that has a tendency. It's a little bit based on how bad I want to make the deal. I don't like liars. Or I don't like... The most difficult people to work with in the long run are people who haven't thought anything through, which is as bad as a liar, only their heart's not in the wrong place.

They don't know what they want, specifically.

Or they don't know how they're going to make... They don't know how they're going to get this done, which is, again, we go over and over again. I go over and over again. Yes is nothing without how. And the person who thinks, yes is going to make a deal. Well, yes is not going to make a deal because you got to have how. How are we going to put this together? Someone that doesn't think things through, a lot of times, they're actually dysfunctional on their own side. They make promises they can't keep, and they have no idea they can't keep those promises. When they take your deal, you think you've done a deal with them, they take it back to their company. Their company goes like, No, we're not doing this. It's a stupid idea. We can't do this. Sure. That happens a lot. I think in a private sector, I've heard from a number of companies that fully 50% of the deals that they make that don't go through get killed internally because somebody cut a deal for them and they took it back to the company. The company says, No, that violates our terms and conditions.

We can't deliver on that basis. You're dealing with someone who just doesn't have a clue as to what's going on on their side. A lot of people like that.

When you're making a business deal, what do you recommend as the amount of time to consider the deal before saying, Yes, let's do it? Here's the deal points, here's what you want, here's what I want. Okay, should we sign it right away? Should we give it 24 hours? Should we take it to our team? Should it be a week? What's a standard, you think?

Unless you've got something in line ahead of time. The company name is the Black Swan Group because we believe there's black swans in every negotiation, which is something you didn't know that as soon as you found out, it's going to change all the parameters. The deal. Got you. You sit down at the table to find out the unknowns. It's impossible to research all the unknowns. Plus, a lot of the unknowns, I'll find them a lot faster if I just ask you. I could research for two weeks, something that I may be able to get you to tell me about in 10 minutes.

For example, what do you mean something you'd want to ask?

I'm speaking for a long-time client, and they have another firm that I've been affiliated with doing a different block. When I found out they were doing that block, I could suddenly reach back through my network to find out what the competing/partnership I'm firm of mine is, what they're charging, or I could just flat out ask them. Well, I need to get the information. A lot of information you got to get by not asking. You got to trigger it. The phrase ask good questions It's really get good information. A lot of times, you won't tell me stuff if I ask. But if I act like I already know, or if there are other ways, hostage negotiators trigger information without asking questions.

When people feel too comfortable with you, they will challenge you more. In what ways? They will test you more. They will push back more. The more comfortable people feel with you. Think of it, the people that know you the best in life, they push you back. They push back the most. They'll call you out the most. Sometimes not in a healthy way, in an unpleasant way. But if there's something powerful with keeping some things about you to you, you don't have to be an open book. I know this It goes against a lot of be vulnerable, be vulnerable. I'm not telling you to be a jerk, and I'm not telling you to conceal everything about you. But what I'm telling you is you need to have a filter. People don't need to know everything about you. Keep that stuff to yourself.

When you were doing your interviews or interrogations, would you ever or did you ever become too vulnerable as a, I guess, strategy to try to get the other person to open up and share their vulnerabilities and reveal that they did the thing they did?

I think what I just did is I empathized the most. Because in truth, can I-I can see how you feel about this.

I had an experience, I had a feeling here.

Well, if it's a I'm on a investigation, hopefully not. Oh, you killed her. Well, I could see why.

Why I felt this in my life or whatever it may be.

No, because that would be disingenuous. I'll give you an example. There's a difference between potentially I understand an understanding. Empathy is, I've been there with you. When I came in, I said, Louis, I'm really sorry about your dad. I've also lost my dad. If I said to you, Louis, I'm sorry about your dad. I understand how that feels. Can I say that to you? Do I understand? Because I lost my dad. You would say, She lost her father, too, so she understands. Now, if I never lost my father…

You can't say that.

I said that to you, you be like, You don't really know. You still have your dad. When you empathize with someone in a scenario where, let's say, you had just lost your dad and I didn't, I would try to empathize. That must be very difficult. I'm sorry to hear that.

But not relating it to yourself.

Not relating to myself. The only way you can relate it to yourself and it be genuine is if you experience the exact same thing the other person did. In this scenario, yes, you lost your dad. I I lost my dad. So then you would feel genuine. So it would be the same thing when you speak to people. It's how you say it. So if you're not experienced the exact same thing, the best thing to do is say, I'm sorry to hear that. That must be so difficult. I can't imagine. I'm here for you if you need anything. You would do something along those lines instead of saying, I know how you feel. And this is what you don't want to do. Because when you first told me, actually, I didn't say to you, I lost my dad. Because I would take away from what I was sharing with you, I made it now about me. Oh, you lost your dad? Let me tell you about my dad. My dad died, too. He died of cancer and all this stuff. I'll go into that story. It takes away. So it's your story, your narrative, and I'm going to let you just talk to me about it.

Then if later, mine comes up, fine. Sure. You don't want to make it about you. This is that me, me, me, me syndrome. When people are speaking to you, allow them to own their story. Don't feel that you have to be, Oh, yeah, I do the same thing. Oh, yeah, this. One, they don't typically care. Unless you've been through the exact same thing and you feel that by bringing that up, that person needs that, fine. But don't do it. You don't even need to, yeah. If you don't need to, don't bring it in. Don't bring in the noise. Let that person's story be their story because what you're doing is you're bringing in your own stuff.

Give them that moment.

Let them have that moment.

I want to go back to something you mentioned briefly that I thought be interesting for people. When you're asking someone, when you want to get information out of someone, boyfriend, girlfriend, whatever, interrogating a criminal, whatever it might be, is it more-Employee. Employee, yes. Is it more effective to ask direct question, Did you do this? Or, You did this? Or is it better to ask an open-ended question and see what happens next?

Direct questions are not good, and this is why. Most people do this. You're going for the kill, so to speak, and they get garbage.

You get nothing. What do people say?

They shut you down. Especially if it's a sensitive topic, they're not going to want to tell you. It's like, Did you do it? Yeah, I did. Let me tell you, sit down. You want to let people adjust dust. It's almost like you put their feet in the water, in the pool. When you go into the ocean, you acclimate to the water. Some people dive in.

Sometimes I jump in because it's too cold to just go in.

But for the most part, the idea is you acclimate, and then by the time you get in, you're the same temperature. When you speak to people, then that's the way to do it. You don't have to get the information in that moment. You want to work on people over time. You want to get admissions, which is pieces of information. If we make it about a crime per se, right? Rather than going, Did you do this? Did you do this to this person? Did you rape this person? Kill this person? Steal this thing. Steal this thing. I would never say steal. Sounds ugly. You take Did you take this? Rape sounds ugly, too. I would never say rape or kill. I would say, Did you hurt this person? Did you lose yourself? I would use different terms. Interesting. Sounds nicer. Even if somebody lies, Hey, man, you're lying to me. It Louis is like, No. Louis, there's something you're missing. There's something you didn't tell me. I feel there's a part of the story I'm missing here. I want you to be comfortable enough to tell me.

So you would say that? Yeah.

Sounds different. That's one. Think about the words coming out of your mouth. What do I sound like? Then more importantly, what do they hear when I speak? Not what do I think I'm saying because everyone's like, Oh, I just said this. What did I say? It doesn't matter what you think you said. What matters is what they hear when you speak based off of their viewpoint, their biases, their DNA, their genetic makeup, their drama, their trauma, all their stuff, because they bring that in when they communicate. You You have to keep that in mind.

Are you also thinking about... Are you trying to learn about the background of the person before you have a conversation with them and get as much information on them before? Where they're from, who they are.

Depends what you want.Yeah. What is your goal? What are you looking to get? Obviously, sometimes time's a factor. If you're hiring somebody, I think... Here's some tips. When you're doing your job interviews or you're bringing people on or you're working with people, you want to sit them down. You don't You want to sit the way we are here with a table between you and the person. You want an open space so you've got two chairs, put them on the sofas, sit down. That's openness. This is a barrier. It causes a break between us. There's also formality with the table. I feel like I'm being interviewed.

It's more professional that as opposed to relaxed.

The thing is this, if you want to know who you're hiring, let's say, or who you're dealing with, or who you're bringing into your space, you want openness, and you want them to speak to you in an open way. Freely. So you can get all the information. Tell me about yourself. How did you grow up? Where are you from? No kidding. What's about this? What about that? Now you get them, and then you flow into the other questions. But if people feel like they're being interviewed, then they're going to bring that. You want to get people to feel comfortable, and you want to have that openness. Also, when you have a table, it cuts off the lower body. You can't see their triggers. There's tells. There's tells.

I could be-She crossed their legs, they're fidgety.

They're fidgety. Maybe you ask a question about, Have you ever get fired from a job? And then I cross my legs as soon as you ask me that question. You're not going to say anything. You're going to take a mental note. Have you just crossed your legs right when I asked her that question? Why? I need to I need to... Sorry, I'm sorry.

I need to pay attention to that.

You want to just take notice. The whole goal is to be curious. If we can give it a term, maybe, you need to Lewis house yourself. There you go. When people come in, you are super curious about them.

Is there another line of communication that you use, maybe even unknowingly, that you use consistently that seems to just help you enroll people in more of what you want.

I do. I absolutely use the what's the chance? Really? Yeah. I use that when it feels like a Like a stalemate between the other attorney? And look, what's the chance that your client is going to be able to do X, Y, and Z? Also, I will try to separate the attorney from the client. Same way I do with the reception clerk versus the hotel. I make sure that I acknowledge them as the person because I acknowledge their struggle of what they're going through. Right. If I talk to the attorney of, Look, I can only imagine all the updates you're having to do or all the work you're putting through. I know that this is how you're doing the best thing you can for your client. Between me and you, what's the chance that we can do X, Y, and Z? Or If I were to do, or if I were to say, or if my client were, if I were to encourage my client to do this, is that something that I should do? It gives them something to think about. The same way When you look at, let's say, at a hotel or something like that, I can only imagine you just been, How long is your shift?

Yeah, seven hours. Oh, my gosh. Yeah, that's going to be... You create that connection with them that says, I'm talking to you individually as a person rather than seeing you as the whole, because that's who they are.

Yeah, exactly. That's powerful. I wanted to go back to the panic attacks for a moment. Because it sounds like you really studied and researched a lot on how you could manage and and have a better relationship with the anxiety or the stress that you were having for those eight days. Have you had more panic attacks since the moment?

They've gotten less and less and less.

Less and less. They've had 5, 10 minutes at a time or something.

Yeah. Well, I probably haven't had a panic attack. I've gotten very close, probably in the last three weeks. But what it is, is a sense of boiling water. I can feel the water boiling, and I can feel it in my body. I can feel in my fingers. It tingly. Yeah, or I'm typically never somebody to shake my leg. But if all of a sudden my leg is shaking, then I'm like, Okay, something's up. That'll tell me right away of, All right, we'll What are we doing? What's going on? Be able to check in with myself and how that's been. But it's progress much better. It really has. Therapy helps. That was really the source, was not feeling alone in this ecosystem that I didn't ask for. This is never my goal of if I can only get so many followers. I was like, let's just go. I don't know. I got a few minutes. I'll go talk to on the phone.

What has the relationship been like with your wife and your kids since experiencing the rise of your audience, but also the stress and panic you've experienced over the last six months? How has your wife shown up for you? How has it made you relate to your family differently?

Well, having kids has made me much more just empathetic as a person. I'll tell you that it is a way that we relate to each other is when I see them start to get really emotional, I can see myself in it. My son looks a lot like me. It's very much this weird inner child-like dialog. I'm telling them things that I wish I could have... Oh, man. I would have been told, Hey, man, it's okay to cry. Just let it out. I was never told that, but I'm not going to make that mistake. My son is extremely waterworks all the time, and I love it. I mean, he's emotional in movies. I love it. To see that where I go, No, I've had that mistake of trying to put on this Jefferson's got it all together. His mask. Yeah, I got it all together. You were, Just let it out, man. It's It's all good. It's all good. He will. He'll just cry. He'll say, I can't help it. I'll say, You don't need to. He's good, man. You're good. Both of my kids are extremely empathetic with movies. I shared something before of this was not that long ago.

My son says, How your day was, dad? It was good, buddy. It was good. He was like, What did you do? I was like, Well, it was just good. It was a good day. It was fine. Truthfully, it was not good. It was a really horrible... It was a rough day. It was a rough day. I was tired. Later on that evening, he came me again. He said, Why did you tell me your day was good when it wasn't? I said, What? He said, You said it was good, but you didn't say it like it was good. I was like, How did you know? He's like, You said it like it wasn't good. You said it like it was bad.

They feel everything.

Yes. I was like, How are you this young? He had already sensed that he told me he was good, he wasn't.

Wow.

That aspect of it, when you say, How's my wife showing up for me? She's allowed me to have the time to explore. Hey, you need to make sure you're taking care of yourself. She's awesome at supporting anything that I'm after, and we support both of our careers. She has a full-time career as her doing her thing in school, in school law, my legal career. In terms of the social media stuff, it doesn't affect anything. You could call it finsegram. Nobody at my house. It doesn't exist at my house. It's just your dad, mom, kids, mayhem. That's all it is. Now, she's very supportive of it, and they know that every once in a while, dad will make a video. Sure. Because they want to make videos.

I'm curious, with your upbringing, which sounds like you had a great upbringing, but also things that maybe you wish you would have had or experienced in certain ways from parents or life, and with what you're experiencing now from building your career, getting married at a young age in today's society, and now having this following and presence, what are three lessons? If you could only teach three lessons to your kids right now, what would those three lessons be that you wish you would have known growing up or that you did know and you want them to know?

One would be always be authentic to who you are, personally. Don't ever try to be anybody else than who you are. I can tell you that anytime I felt like I've needed to be somebody else, it was the wrong call every time that I tried to be either more or less than just exactly who I am. I see it as just a floor in an elevator. It doesn't mean it's a better floor or not. It's just you need to be exactly where you're meant to be. Two is it's okay to feel like there are... It's okay to make mistakes. I grew up in house where it was very... There was a lot of it, I'll admit, let's put on myself, expectations of being the best at everything you can be whatever it was. I just enjoyed it. But the understanding that they don't have to put that pressure on themselves. Number three is be kind to everybody. Kindness never changes. People value it now. They always have.

We could talk for hours, man, but I want to wrap things up here in a few minutes. Jefferson_fisher on Instagram. All over social media, you can find you. I'll have everything linked up there.

Oh, cool. Thanks.

You got a book you're working on that we'll probably have you back on in the future when that comes out. But I want people to follow you on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, all the places. Hopefully, we'll get you on YouTube soon. You do a daily video, man. I mean, almost every day it seems like. It's like every day you're given wisdom, you're given inspiration from daily lessons in law and your experience in life. It's really inspiring to see you create from a place of generosity, from a place of service. I want to acknowledge you for the consistency. I also want to acknowledge you for opening up about the panics that you've experienced. That was hard. Being vulnerable with your community and saying, Hey, listen, guys, this is something I've never experienced. I love having this community, but also I feel this sense of pressure and this overwhelm that I've never experienced in my life. I think it's powerful to be talking about it because what we keep hidden and we hide continues to manifest and hurt us and stress us. The fact that you're talking about it is probably allowing you to release some.

It really is.

And relax some. I'm not saying it's going to solve every issue you have mentally or emotionally, but it's allowing you to set yourself free. I acknowledge you for not having it all put together, not saying the perfect thing every time, and allowing yourself to express how you feel, which sounds like is what your body needs.

Yeah, thank you very much. That's very well put.

Yeah, so I acknowledge you for that. It's interesting. There's a question I ask a lot of people. I've got two final questions for you, but before I ask those, there's a question I ask a lot of people on here who rise to to success or audience growth quickly within a period of time, of seeming overnight or months or a year, where they get this big audience. I'm going to ask this question. I'm just curious because I want people to listen and hear the response. If you could go back before you posted your first Instagram video, a year and a half ago, or whenever it was, or when you did it and you didn't have that many followers, if you could go back and ask yourself on a scale of 1-10, how much inner peace and self-love you had for yourself? Ten being a very high level in a humble way, one being zero peace, all chaos and stress inside of you. Where were you on a scale of 1-10 before the rise of social media success? Ten being very peaceful internally and calm and confident and less stress and one being chaos.

I would probably say I was a solid eight. There was a sense of, You sure you want to put yourself on a phone in your car? You know friends are going to see this, right? I'm not worried about strangers. You're worried about your friends. Sure. It's easy. You could have all these followers who you really care about. Sometimes they, Wait, my friend saw this and they didn't like it.

What do they think about me?

It's much easier to get in your head about the people that are in your circle. Sure. Than the people that are outside.

You were a solid eight before you started doing all this. Then where would you say you currently are in the last few months consistently?

How I've been, I would say my nine right now.

You have more peace and more self-love. I have more peace. Really? Yeah.

Well, it had it not been for what I went through at the beginning of this year with the anxiety. Okay. Interesting. Because it's really made me hug myself in a way. Oh, interesting. Because I would get myself in a place of... I've always been pretty good at, okay, I'll do a video, and they'll either like it or they won't, I guess. You just go into the house and you live life. But It is a different aspect here of I very much feel that I am cultivating a community of like-minded people that... When I posted that video of explaining about my anxiety, that was a very difficult video for me to even get out. It's a very difficult video for me to even watch. But the outpouring of love that came from that was just... Now it feels like I have a lot It's weird. I feel more connected in a way than I did before.

Well, vulnerability breeds connection. You were opening it in a different way. Where were you on that scale in the beginning of the year when you were experiencing that month of panic I was a two.

It was not good. From when it first started to about the time right before the panic attack, I had fallen far.

This is what I want people to understand because a lot of people that want to have more success, more followers, more financial opportunities, more things coming their way. I don't know anyone, maybe one person, was happier and more peaceful a year or two after the big success came quickly. They were always a couple below what they were right before the press came, the opportunities came. Because they hadn't learned yet how to manage and navigate it. It sounds like you're learning now how to navigate it, where you feel peaceful, confident, calm.

But had I not, I'd be right there with them.

Just trying to keep your head above water. It always shocks me. I guess it shouldn't shock me anymore now, but most of us are not prepared, emotionally or psychologically, for audience growth that quickly, for financial growth that quickly. Although we think we want certain things, but we may not be emotionally, mentally, physically ready for this psychological pressure, which is what it sounds like you had this pressure of this, now I have this audience, I have to make sure I deliver and don't give them the wrong information. What if I let them down? This pressure Which you can't really get away from unless you stop posting.

Unless you just stop. Yeah. This was not something I sought out to do. It was like, I'm going to be an influencer, doggone it. No, I was like, I'm just going to make a video and let's see how it works.

Trying to help a few people.

Yeah, let's try. What do I like talking about? That was the thing was I did it because I like talking about it. If they like listening, I guess they'll listen. Then I asked people to follow me. At the end of the day, it turns out they did it. Then it was just like a whole different game where all of a sudden you look around and go, Wait. If I compare this to the size of my current city and my town that I'm in.

This is like 50 times the size of that.

It's not even close. That becomes And then I had a buddy of mine who was like, Oh, you have X amount of followers. That's X amount of Dallas Cowboy Stadium or something. I was like, Why would you tell me that? It was the first thing that came in. Sure. But Like you said, absolutely. I was not emotionally prepared on that level for that amount of eyes, that amount of pressure. And it wasn't until that my body literally shut down. Wow. That said, Now, we got to wake up and make sure you're taking care of yourself, because that two you were at was quickly starting to go into the negative.

Exactly. That's where real bad stuff happens. Big time. If you don't address it. I acknowledge you, man, for doing the work and for continually doing it because healing is a journey. Yeah, fair enough. I'm glad you're on that journey. Feel free to reach out anytime you want some support.

Yeah, absolutely. It's meant so much that you've been here. For sure. That means a lot to me.

For sure, man. This is a question I ask everyone towards the end called the Three Truths. Imagine you get to live as long as you want, but it's your last day on Earth. You get to accomplish all the dreams and experiences you want to have. But for whatever reason, all your material, your content, your videos, the books you make, all these things, they have to go to the next place with you, or they're no longer in this world. This conversation is gone. But it's your last day on Earth, and you get to leave behind three truths, three lessons you would share with the world. This is all we have to remember your wisdom by. What would be those three truths or lessons for you?

Number one is the best piece of advice I received from my grandfather, who was an old East Texas attorney. He said, Boy, you can't look back and plan a straight row. That's always stuck with me, meaning encouraging people to be in the moment, in the present. If you look at what you're doing rather than looking for the next worry, your head's always going to be in the right place. Number two is you treat people how you want to be treated. It's that very basic golden rule that we've all heard, but sometimes it's the we've heard the most that we really have soaked up the least. Too many times that we skip over it. Number three would be that at any time that you can show person kindness because you'll never regret it. There's so many things that I feel like generationally in our existence that we just got wrong. It wasn't our fault. We just weren't ready. We thought medicine was something different versus what we think medicine is now, or you look at how we handle punishment or entertainment versus now. But kindness is not affected from Inflation or recession. It doesn't depreciate. A little kindness can be invaluable.

I love it. It was a great truce, man. Final question, Jefferson, what's your definition of greatness?

Greatness is being able to show up for who you are in every level and every stage that you're meant to be in a way that spreads joy.

If someone wants to get a better price on something. So that was, I think that, first off, before I asked that question, that was the second, I think, mistake. Was there another big mistake people make in negotiation? The extreme price anchoring, using too much leverage to try to club someone. Was there another big one?

What a lot of people do that's actually taught out there a lot, which is really bad, is continue to ask for stuff after you made a deal. Like ask for free stuff.

That's the worst, right? We made a good deal.People hate it. Here's a win-win, and now you're asking more and more.

Now you're asking for extra.

It's going to leave a sour taste in someone's mouth.

Every time. And that's taught out there regular. Really? It was a negotiation guru from the '80s, and I can't remember what he called it, but he gave the example, you go out and you get a custom made suit. And you made the deal for the suit, and one of the guys measuring you You say, So how many free ties do I get with that? And he said, That's a great way to get free things, free little things, after they made the deal.

Throw a pocket square, throw a couple of ties, throw a couple of legs.

Whatever it is. And what that does is make the person you did it to hate you, which they're going to resent it. And if they have the opportunity to fail to comply with any term, they will do that. Now, unfortunately, that's taught really extensively, and it's done a business all the time. People call it scope creep, feature creep. Interesting. It drives every single business person crazy because they don't know how to deal with it. Now, the Black Swan method You might say, if you were good at how questions, you might say, How can I give you free ties and continue to want to do business with you? How can I be a great tailor for you if you ask me for free stuff and it cuts my margin.

Right.

Make what they ask for the obstacle to what they want. Either what you want as a path or if what they want is bad, it's the obstacle. How can I serve the needs of your family if you're getting into my profit margins? There's got to be a way to wake somebody up to it because a lot of people have been taught that they don't know any better. If I had stuck to that training that I from this guy back in the 1980s, I'd have thought it was okay because I'm getting free ties all over the place. A lot of people, if they don't know any better, how do you wake them up so that if they only knew, they'd change? Now, there's some people that are doing it on purpose. If you do something like that to me because you didn't know any better, let me see if I could wake you up. If I can wake you up, awesome. We got a great long-term relationship. If I can't wake you up, I now know. I'm probably like, Okay, cool. This is the last deal I make with this guy.One.

And done.This.

Is a one and done. I'm out. But I need to know, if you just did it by accident, I got a job negotiation, recently brought somebody onto my company. Thought we had the deal settled.

And the new employee.New employee.

Because employment contracts like any other. And this person brings up a bunch of other stuff after we've laid We got the terms, we've written the offer letter, we sent the offer letter. Offer letter doesn't get signed. Silence. Not a good sign. My director of operations, who knows no oriented questions, She's this person in an email. Have you given up on signing the offer letter? Immediately comes back with a bunch of not ridiculous More benefits.

More asks.

More asks, which are not on a plate. Some of them are like, Wow, that was interesting. I never thought of that one. Now we can't do that. Not in a million years. This is stuff I aspire to.

But not now.

We can't do it now, but no, I like this one. It's just not in the package now. But my director of operations is like, I never had somebody come back. And I'm like, Okay, first I got to do is I got to find out, did this person just not know any better? So I engaged in the conversation and I said, All right, so however this goes, I want you to understand two things. First of all, I'm glad it came up now as opposed to six months from now. But secondly, this is a bad habit to bring stuff up after the deal has been cut. So I'm guessing you just didn't know any better, and you were uncomfortable bringing it up. But if you come on board first, you got to understand we don't do this to people, and you got to learn We work all the little stuff out before we think we have an agreement instead of going for little stuff after the agreement. And this person was like, Hey, I didn't know, and my intention is to help build the company, and I appreciate you let me know. And I understand where you're coming from.They.

Were genuine about it.They.

Were very genuine. I needed to know that. Was this person advised to do this? Did they do it by accident? Or did they do that because this is going to be the predictor of future behavior, which now we have a real problem. Because if this is a habit that you're born with, you are not going to last and you can't represent me because the people that work on my team are also my ambassadors. I got to find out what was going on it is. I go back and we talk it through and we settle everything out. I got a list of things to aspire to for employee benefits because these are great things. Sure.

To finish that up, one of the worst things you can do is ask for more and more things after the negotiation has been agreed on. Do that before the final agreement is what I'm hearing you say. Yes. If If someone's looking to...Nice paraphrase, by the way. You want to make sure I capture that. If someone is looking to buy, wanting to buy something, acquire something, whether they're buying a business, a car, a house, some potential expensive item, a jewelry, something of more value than $1,000. And they might be able to negotiate a lower price. You mentioned the extreme price anchoring, how that is a mistake. There's a house for a million dollars. I'll give you 200 grand for it. But you want to get a better deal. Maybe it's a Rolex, maybe it's a car, maybe it's a house, maybe you want to acquire a business, whatever it is, something of higher value, an engagement ring You're going to marry someone. Right.

Let them make their profit off somebody else. Yeah.

What should be the lower percentage on a higher item of value? What should the initial offer be? You want to get a better deal. You don't want to pay a million dollars for a home, but you really want the home. You don't want to pay 3,000 for the diamond ring, the engagement ring, but you really want that ring.

Right.

How low of a percentage should you go to anchor in order for you to feel like, Oh, I got a great deal, and I got the thing I wanted, and they didn't get screwed over? You know what I mean?

Well, it depends upon the context. I mean, 30% is a good rule of thumb.

To start at.

Well, for a target. Again, very context-driven. Sure. For example, I'm in Macy's one time, and picking up this jacket, girl I'm with really likes it. She searches this thing extensively. She finds a thread out of place. She was like, Watch me get 10% off on this check.

I'm like, Threat out of place.

I can get 30% by being nice.

No way. Tell me more.

Well, in every transaction, I look at it as there's an aggravation tax. Now, the person you're dealing with has already built in the aggravation tax because of all the aggravating people that have come through the door ahead of them. There's There's an aggravation penalty, there's an annoyance tax, there's an aggravation tax that's already there on a price. Now, if you're not aggravating, you don't need to pay the aggravation tax. Interesting. Let somebody else pay that aggravation tax.

You benefit from them actually paying that tax.

Yeah, let's somebody else pay it. If I'm not aggravating, why should I pay the aggravating tax? So this young lady, she's getting 10% off on a regular basis. I will be demanding 10% of the annoyance tax when there's another 20% to be gained. Interesting. So many people don't realize how much money they're leaving on the table. Really? Massive amounts of money. On any given, the difference between 10% off and 30% off. They got a way to give you a better deal if they feel like it.

How do you get them to feel like it?

Well, they There you go. Exactly. Again, the approach, very similar to the hotel thing. There's a strategy where we bundle the skills in a black swan method. We call it the accusations audit.

The accusations audit.

Accusations audit. Let me do an audit of all the names you would call me if I'm going to do this.

You say this?

You say it to yourself. Okay, not to them. Because I need to come up with a list. So again, it's like, look, you get annoying people come through here all day long, every day, want something for nothing. I'm going to look like another one of these annoying jerks. It's really demanding and rubbed you the wrong way. Don't appreciate how hard it is for you to work in this jewelry store, this car dealership, wherever you are. You are knocking yourself out. That's a tough sales job. You're trying to feed your family. People are coming here trying to take food out of your mouth because how do they see it? It's not about you. It's really not sympathy. The difference between sympathy and empathy. I feel your pain. I've been there, too. I'm a regular guy like you. Don't give me that regular guy stuff. But you look at people like me, he wants something for nothing, who come walking in all the time. You look at us as wanting discounts, and you're trying to feed your family. Now, suddenly, this person is like, Oh, wow.

They get it.

This is not the other annoying jerk that came in here. Now they're starting to open up. And then you talked before about being playful. Being playful about this can be a really big deal.

I've gotten so many things for free for being playful or upgrades or discounts just by, let me just say a friendly joke or just something funny. Let me just be goofy and dance in front of them and be like, What is this guy doing?

Yeah, you don't got to pay the aggravation tax. Yeah. And then plus, see, Sean says you're 31% smart in a positive frame of mind. Not only have you put the person in a better mood, you now got them thinking about options. What can they do? How can they help you? What can they get away with? How can they shortcut the TSA line? What's the code for the employee discount? In the same place where I'm trying to get this 30% or so off, and I'm joking around with this guy. Sure. One of the things, get him to see as a human being. I'm like, Well, I'm Chris. Is there a Chris discount? What Chris discount is there? And they laugh at that. I'm still not getting enough of a discount. Finally, I go like, Look, give me the employee discount. I've been joking around. I smile when I say this. This guy goes like, If I give you the employee discount, I got to pay for this thing myself. I go, I'll pay it back. I'm laughing, and he laughs. He looks at the machine and I says, Wait right here. He walks around and I see him and I walked up to a person and I perceived to be the manager.

He's whispering in the manager's ear. I see this manager standard going like, No.

No, really? No.

He comes walking back and another employee intercepts him whispers in his ear, and I see his eyes light up, and he walks over and he plugs in a discount for me, and we get the 30% off. But I was joking with him. I was showing I knew what it looked like from his perspective. I'm getting myself out of this aggravation tax thing. Let somebody else pay the demanding, aggressive, annoying tax. You go in there and you brighten somebody else's day up. You leave the world a better place. You get some practice in because you want that confidence for the big negotiation. Right. And all these work for you. You end up feeling better about the day yourself.

Yes. You got a fun interaction. You got a discount. Exactly. What are the social cues or psychological behaviors, body language responses that people have before you take the polygraph test to know whether or not they're actually telling the truth.

Everybody would assume that the polygraph was the lie detector. You just ask the question, Come on in, have a seat, Louis. Let's hook you up. Did you steal when you were a kid? Did you steal that gum? Or did you steal that? And then it just tells me everything. It doesn't really How can you work that way? Typically, the lie detector is the person. So you sit across from a person, you have a conversation. And as we're discussing something, let's say you're applying the US Secret Service, we'll make you a recruit.

Okay, give it to me.

And so we're asking you all these questions about your education, your background, drugs, whatever it is. And let's say we get to, I say to you, Louis, did you ever steal anything? And so now I look at, are there any shifts? Are there any changes? Do you change the direction? No. People are usually not that obvious. But you can see something. You can feel it. It's also feeling people. I think that gets dismissed quite a bit that it's not just see, hear. It's also you can feel another human being. The energy, yeah. You can, and it's intuitive, and we should allow that and listen to that more rather than shut that down. But it would be, if I would ask you that, I would hear the way you responded. Did you respond similarly to all the other questions the same way? Let's say if I said, Louis, did you ever... I asked you all these other historical questions, and you're like, No, no, no. Then I say, Louis, have you ever stolen Absolutely not. Now, something like that, as small as that, I may mark that. I was like, Okay. He said no, no, no for everything else.

But here he said, Absolutely not. Interesting. Why is it a bit more emphatic?

He cares more about either protecting something or that it actually isn't the truth. Maybe.

He doesn't want that to be out of the loop. But I will notice that it's different, that you did something different. Even if you… No. It could be a very subtle thing. Or you might not give me anything. There are some people, and I've had those people where it's just like…

Poker face all the way through.

Some people… But they'll… I don't want to say they're professional liars, but some people would come in, especially if it was a criminal case. And they're guarding the truth really hard, and you have to try to figure out what that is. Or some people come in and it's, I swear to God, God knows I would never do such a thing.

On my mom, on my grave.

Those are usually red flags, unless it's a culture or a person who typically does it. If they always say, I swear to God, I swear to my mom, then it would be like, Look, this is part of this person's natural language. Or maybe in their culture, they refer to God quite a bit. But if it's not, and then you start If you start doing that, then again, that's a red flag. So that's what you're really looking for rather than we have some of these cookie cutter things. It's like, Everybody does this. Everybody does that. Now, are these things I'm talking about indicators? They are. But You may do them and I may not. I may do something else.

What do you do when you lie?

What do I do when I lie?

Because we all lie at something, right?We do.

I do.Small or big. My husband's like, Did you have a donut this morning?

No, I didn't have a donut. What do you lie about the most? Professional or personal? And what in each category?

Maybe if I'm mad. Because I have a pretty bad temper, so it's like, Oh, no, I'm fine. Because sometimes I'll know. I'm like, I have a temper, and sometimes I know I'm being irrational, and I don't want to open up a whole conversation. So I'll just be like, No, I'm okay. I'll leave it because I'll know it's me. I'm trying to think, what do I lie about? Maybe work, if it's a project I don't want to do. But that's what you have agents and managers for because they do it for you. Sure. They shut it down for you. I'm trying to think. I mean, we all lie, but I try to keep it like… Usually for me, it's like… Because I'm like a… I like donuts, and I like things, cookies. I like things. So my husband's like a health fanatic. So he'll be like, How did you eat today? I was like, Oh, it was okay. I was pretty solid. Oh, okay. So he'll know what I'm trying to say, for example.

Is there such a thing as person being radically honest all the time?

No, I've not come across that. But I think here's the thing. It's okay to lie Why? Because have you ever been very, very, very honest, maybe with a person and then felt afterward, you feel a bit exposed and you feel like, I wish I didn't share this much with this person. Afterward, you have that remorse because we feel like it's a protection mechanism. I don't want to tell you everything about me. I don't want to be an open book. It may not be a lie. So by omission, so in a meeting, if Somebody's pitching me a project or I'm talking about something, I don't like it or I don't like the direction it's going, I may not say, I don't like this. I may say, Thank you. Let me think about that. Meanwhile, I want to say, No way. I'm not doing it. That's terrible. So That technically would be a lie. I'm like, You know what? Thank you. Let me think about that. But I know I can't respond the first way. Shuts people down. That's why I feel like we hear people say, Say no. Being able to say no to people, more so because a lot of us have-To protect your time, your space, your energy.

Yes, and that's wonderful. But don't say no. Find other ways to say no. No is ugly, no is mean, no is hurtful. I can say, Thank you so much. I'll let you know. I'm not really sure if I'm able to. Let me think on that. Find alternative ways to let people down.

Why is that?

To preserve the relationship.

Because when you say no to someone, even if it's a friend, they might take it personally. It stinks.

Why are you saying no to me? Why do you have to say like that? You can say, you can reject people in a thoughtful way, in a professional way. It just depends. Do you care about the relationship? If you do, your no, your hard no, can hurt people's feelings. People become sensitive because you're rejecting them. I'm going to think of a different way to say no that's not going to impact you as much. It's really using language thoughtfully. For example, you brought up lying. I love that. You said, When I was a kid, I lied. I would never say to you, Louis, you're a liar, or Louis, no. Louis, you're lying to me. I would say, Louis, I know you're not being truthful with me. Louis, you're holding something back for me. Sounds different. It's the same way with language. We throw our words out and we don't realize that they land on someone. Then we scratch our heads wondering, why did this conversation not go well? It's this That person's the problem. When we don't have the ability to think about, how did I deliver this? If it's a business relationship that's important to you, but you want to say no to this, you want to think of a great way to say no.

We want to think about how How do we let people down without hurting their identity? Going back to identity.

Was there ever a time when you were interviewing or interrogating someone and you didn't believe them ever, but they were telling 100% the truth?

Oh, my God. You just reminded me of this case.

You're just like, I know this person is lying to me, but at the end of the day, everything said was pretty true or almost 100% true.

I've never… It was such a simple case, and it was not even for a lot of money. It was an ATM scam. This man was going to ATMs, and he was stealing money. Somebody would go in, use their credit card, he'd come from behind, take money. Very simple. On the ATM.Like.

Put him up with a gun or something?

No, no, no, no, Just follow them in. There's these little skimmers that they put on top of the machine. So when you scan your card, that it would pick up your information as well, and then you could go. There's all these different scams. But when you go to the ATM, there's a camera there. It's got your full picture. So I have a picture of this guy, my perpetrator. It's a picture of him. I see him, his face. He's wearing a hat. He's wearing a New York Knicks hat. And I was like, Here's my guy. All right, I've got it. All I got to do is lay the picture on. So he shows up for his interview wearing the same New York Knicks hat. So I start speaking to him. I don't take out my evidence because I'm saving that because that's my-You knew this is a slam dunk? This is a slam dunk. I was like, He didn't even steal a lot. $500? It was something small. I don't know how it landed in my lap, but it did. And, Sir, you took the money. No, no, miss. I swear to God, I would never do that.

Sir, we have this. So I'm doing this with him for 15 minutes. And this was a mistake on my part.

We have proof.

We have video footage of you at the scene. I'm giving them everything. No, never me, never me. I think I'm being slick, and I pull out my photo of him. Boom, right on the table. Who's that, sir? Right? I'm sitting there, I'm all smug. I'm like, I got this guy. And he takes it and he looks at it. He's like, Looks like me. Yeah, he looks like me. He's not me. I was like, What? That's you. He's like, It looks like me. That's not me. Same hat, New York mix hat.

You're wearing the hat right now.

Yeah, no. It was a creative interview, and I remember it was for money. It was not for a lot of money. In fact, when it came to financial crimes, crimes that had to do with money, it was actually harder to get people to confess to those. Why? Less guilt.

Less guilt. They didn't hurt someone physically. Yes. They might have hurt them financially.

Yes. I'm at home, I'm sitting behind my computer, I'm in my fuzzy slippers, or even if I'm doing it at the ATM, I'm not stealing from you, I'm stealing from the bank. But it's different when I walk by you and I actually put my hand in your pocket. It's different when I go into your home and I assault you. There's that level of guilt when it's money, and especially if you steal it from an institution, zero guilt. Those were the hardest to get. But yeah, that was my guy. I will never forget him. That's why I started laughing.

Was it him or was it not him?

It was him. We arrested him anyway because we had the proof. But it's always great to get... It's always helpful to have a confession because it really just seals everything. You've got the evidence, you've got this, the person's He said it.

But he never agreed to it.

No.

He said, It looks like me, but it's not me.

No, same New York's neck hat. Yeah, I don't know. I guess he's from New York. Who doesn't like the knicks? He just nothing. You could see his face. Looks like me. I got nothing from him.

Really? Yeah. So We never actually told the truth, but it was in fact, him.

Who was him? I mean, we had evidence, we had prints, we had all that stuff. But yeah, no. To the end, no, not me.

Could you tell?

I couldn't tell.

You couldn't tell he was lying or not?

I couldn't tell. No, he was so believable. But I knew going in that he was my guy. That's why I was like, I know it's him, but it was just stoic. There's a moment I'm like, Is it not him? They're so good. You're like, Am I seeing this right Turn the photo around. I'm like, No, it's him. It's him. It's him. No, this is you. So some people are that good. Some people are that good. They will... I think this is... Look, this was also somebody who committed a lot of crimes. He was used to it. He knew how to get out of it. Certain people who lie a lot, usually become better at it, or they don't feel bad. It becomes become better at masking it. You obviously have a great conscience, and so it bothered you. And so all Your towels were shown. You couldn't conceal it.

It's like your heart is bumping, like your chest is tight, your throat is clenching, you're like…

It bothered you. Which is a healthy thing. It's actually a healthy thing when it bothers you. We tend to see in people who have sociopathic tendencies or antisocial tendencies, those people don't tend to be bothered. And so they can lie and can be quite calm about it because don't feel that guilt. The majority of people will feel guilt. So the majority of people will feel the way you feel because you know it's wrong, you feel it. Whereas those individuals with those tendencies, they don't care.

What about a situation that you lied your way through, where someone believed you? Is there a situation like that in the last 3-5 years where you lied about something you're not proud of, maybe, or that people believe people believed you? More than just, Oh, I'm having a good day, lie?

You know what I did? I could probably confess to this. This was just so long ago. When I got, it was back in the day, I got a money order from...

Western Union?

The post office.

Post office.

I was young. I was a kid. I wasn't making a lot of money. I was in college. I asked for a money order for like, 3.99. I pay, I get it. Then as I'm leaving, I see $4.99..

I'm like, Oh,100 bucks.100.

Bucks, and I took it. To this day, I remember it. It bothered me.

Really?

Yeah, it bothered me.

Did it bother you that you didn't tell the truth right then and say, Hey, you guys gave me too much?

No, I took the money.

Yeah. I took the money. It bothered you that you lied about it?

Statute of limitations, I think I'm okay. I took the money. It bothered me afterwards because I knew it was wrong. I will tell you this one story. We went…

Did that come up in the Secret Service interview? Did you ever steal something, money, when you were younger?

You know what I did lie about and did come up in my secret service interview? I'll tell you that. When I applied for the job, when I went to college, my parents, and I love my family, they weren't very supportive. They weren't very supportive of my decisions. My dad was a bit difficult. They didn't really want me to go. When you apply for college, you need their paperwork, their tax paperwork. I needed aid. They couldn't afford it. My dad was so upset with me. He wouldn't give me his tax paperwork.

To go to college?

Yeah. He didn't agree with my decisions because I was going to private school that they could not afford. I was like, I'll figure it out on my own. But either way. When I went to the school, I said, I can't get this tax paperwork. The main person was there is like, Well, you think you can't get aid? I went back to the school later on and I said, I'm not living at home. I'm alone. Can I get aid? I can't get access to this tax paperwork. And then I got aid. So I flat out, I, Yup, I lied. And I spilled the beans in my polygraph. I was like-You told them this is what happened. I said, I lied to get financial aid because I couldn't qualify for aid. And so I was like, They didn't care that. I was like, Look, my dad, my mom, they won't give me their tax paperwork. They're so upset with me. They don't agree with my decision to go to this school to do this. And they're like, No, unless you don't have your parents in your life. I was just I was like, bing. I was like, I'm going to college.

I lied. But in my polygraph, I was like, I have to tell you something. Actually, I said it before they hooked me up. I said, Look, I lied about this. I did this. Why did you do it? I was like, I wanted to go to college. I couldn't get money to go to school. So I was okay. I got the job.

Wow. How many things did you tell, did you confess to before you took the polygraph?

That was my biggest thing. That was my thing. Drugs, I never had. Despite growing up in New York, I never had any issues. I always stayed away from it, I think, because I saw so much of that around me. The more people put it in my face, the more I was like, I'm not doing that. But probably it would have been the opposite. If nobody did it, I'd be the one to be like, Oh, I'm going to try this. I think that was the biggest thing. It weighed the heaviest with me because I was like, I did this bad thing. I lied on my financial aid paperwork to get aid. I'm hoping the statute of limitations has expired on that as well. I paid back all my loans.I'm.

Sure it's fine.

I paid back all my loans.

When you're in an interrogation or an interview, or you're on a first date, or you're at a job interview in your career, or any type of first interview with any situation, What's the best way to build command, authority, and credibility?

You can do very simple things. When you greet someone, Hi, how are you? Come on in. Why don't you use the bathroom before we get started? I'm not asking you, Would you like to use the bathroom? I'm telling you, Why don't you go use the bathroom? Why don't you have something to drink? What can I bring you? In this subtle way, I'm telling you to go to the bathroom, and you're going to go because of the way I said, Why don't you go to the bathroom? No, no, go before we get started. You just said authority. Why don't you have something to drink? Oh, no, I'm good. No, have something to drink.

We're going to be here for a little bit.

Have something. Now I'm planting Having these little seeds telling you, I'm in control. I'm not telling you, but I'm doing it subtly. Have a seat there. You can show me where to sit. Or on the flip side, you could also practice something called autonomy, where you let somebody choose their own seat. That's a different tactic. There's two tactics here.

Where would you like to sit?

Where would you like to sit? You may use that on me if you want to talk about a topic that I don't want to talk about. And so autonomy makes me feel I have a choice. You let me choose where I'm going to sit because you're going to let me have it later. You're going to try to push me on something later.

I give you something now. The law of reciprocity means you give me something later.

Exactly. But also autonomy, though, it's actually also not reciprocity. It's actually more of I feel in control because we don't like to feel like we're not in control. If you want to talk about something where I'm really uncomfortable, I don't feel like I'm in control, I will give you control elsewhere. So I will give you control in picking where you want to meet. I will give you control in what time. I will give you control in where you want to sit. Little things like that you can do where that person has autonomy to choose. We can do it here. We can talk about this or we can talk about this. Which would you prefer?

I hope you enjoyed today's episode and it inspired you on your journey towards greatness. Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a full rundown of today's episode with all the important links. And if you want weekly exclusive bonus episodes with me personally, as well as ad-free listening, then make sure to subscribe to our Greatness Plus channel exclusively on Apple podcast. Share this with a friend on social media and leave us a review on Apple podcast as well. Let me know what you enjoyed about this episode in that review. I really love hearing feedback from you, and it helps us figure out how we can support and serve you moving forward. And I want to remind you, if no one has told you lately, that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter. And now it's time to go out there and do something great.

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