← The Futur with Chris Do
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- [00:00]
A
Is the question, who's the real enemy? Is it the AI companies? Is it the billionaires? Is it the education system? Is it the government? Who is the actual enemy?
- [00:11]
B
If you are born into wealth, it's a lot easier to use your money to make money.
- [00:14]
A
How much you believe that you are in control of your own destiny and you can affect your own situation.
- [00:23]
B
There's a popular idea that's going on right now, given the global economic condition that we're in, with the parties moving far right. And it seems like we're headed towards a recession or much worse. And there's this conversation that's happening out in the ethos about entrepreneurship. It's this dream that's being sold to people to keep people poor. And recently I watched this episode. There was a hot debate on Stephen Barlett's show, the Diary of a CEO between Gary and our friend, mutual friend, Daniel Priestley. And they're, they're kind of going at it kind of at each other a little bit, a little hard. And Gary was going much harder than Daniel. And I was a little surprised when I scrolled down to read all the comments at how one sided the support was. On one hand, Gary was saying that rich people should be taxed, but he doesn't call that as the redistribution of wealth. He's not exactly sure how, how to implement this because I wasn't clear. And Daniel kept asking him about this, whereas Daniel is saying, you know, I grew up relatively poor. I was able to make something of myself and I want to help other people do the same. And Gary's like, that's a pipe dream that doesn't happen anymore, that cannot exist. And he goes on and on about this kind of stuff. So I thought, I know another entrepreneur. I know someone who's kind of built themselves up and has and is in a position to help people. Now, I do want to say this to our audience who's listening, that all strategy is autobiographical. This is a line I learned from Blair ends. So we, we're going to talk about the things that we've done naturally and the things that we believe in naturally, because otherwise we'd be kind of a hypocrite. So I just want to put it out there. Now, I'm not how familiar, I'm not sure how familiar you are with that specific episode or the arguments on both sides. But let's just, let's just begin the conversation there, Jodi.
- [02:11]
A
Yeah, let's do it.
- [02:13]
B
Is that okay?
- [02:13]
A
So, yeah, yeah, absolutely.
- [02:16]
B
Okay.
- [02:16]
A
I think, yeah. I mean, you go for It. How do you all start?
- [02:21]
B
I think Gary's background, he's an economist, and according to his own biography, he's very bright, top percentile, goes to one of the best schools and does this thing where he's trading or leveraging things. And he's made a fortune, according to him, betting on the economy doing poorly. And he's done well. I think it's called short selling. And so the reason why I mentioned that is because, okay, I'm going to put it out there. I don't have a lot of love for people who are academics, people who make money on other people's money both ways. Betting on things going well and betting on things when they go poorly because they don't actually make anything in the world. And I have a lot of love, respect for people, small mom and pop people or multimillionaire or billionaires who craft something, who provide jobs for people who make life a little bit better. Because one of those things that we talk about is we're always looking for some kind of transformation to go from a desired state to desired future state. And the one thing I don't understand is why there's so much money involved in trading and moving money around, because none of them actually do anything. But what they do is they profit from people who, who do do things. And I was a little shocked and I was reading all the comments and how popular Gary's sentiments are, and it felt like he was saying to me, to the audience, everything's effed up. The world conspires against you and let's rage against the machine, but really nothing practical about it. That's my take.
- [03:54]
A
I think that overall it's kind of a scary thought to me to make rich people the enemy and to make. To kind of demonize the wealthy, like that fundamentally really scares me because I think it's almost like you create an enemy out of something like rich people, and then you put them in a certain place where you have a certain set of beliefs around them. Like, rich people are greedy. Rich people have cheated to get there. Rich people, they're not like us. And you kind of create this us and them. But then it means that the people who want to then get out of a bad financial situation and then trying to do the thing, trying to achieve the thing that they're also demonizing. So it's like, well, which is it? Do you want to. Do you want to demonize the wealthy and then not try and be wealthy, or do you want to demonize the wealthy and still work to do it, in which case you're never really going to do it because you're always going to create arbitrary, arbitrary ceilings. Because fundamentally you believe that rich equals bad. And that, to me, is terrifying as a thing to teach people.
- [04:58]
B
I think so. I think it's not a great idea to label somebody something that's not you and then demonize it. Like, poor people aren't bad, rich people aren't bad, middle class people aren't bad. It's just we're in different states. I do want to acknowledge this before people go super crazy on me and angry in the comments because Simon Squibb started talking about this and he had some really bad blowback on this. And I want to try to have a more nuanced conversation about this, more tempered. And I just want to say this. I want the game to be fair. And I want to acknowledge that the game isn't fair. Because if you are born into wealth, it's a lot easier to use your money to make money. You get access to the very best teachers and schools and programs and neighborhoods. You don't have to worry about food shortage. And most of the times you have parents or people to look after you. You're not concerned about those same kind of basic necessities in life and how very wealthy people pay very little tax. That bothers me. I believe in fairness and I'm for things that level the playing field, not to punish people for doing well enough to punish people for doing poorly. And one very specific topic that is hot on everybody's mind because it's so controversial is AI and how AI is going to be disruptive force to displace working people, especially artists and creatives, people in my community, people near and dear to my heart. And one of the things that is trending right now is the Studio Ghibli filter that's being put on everything right now. And Miyazaki has been on record saying he's really against AI. Granted that that same was made eight years ago, so it wasn't like reaction to what's going on right now. But the engines are trained on people's artwork. And so there does feel to be something like unfair about this. So my thought, my proposal to this is, you know what? The AI companies get a lot of money and they're using, according to the last thing I saw, 10% of the world's energy in processing power right now. Just that is a staggering amount. And it's only going to get higher. So my thought is we need some kind of universal basic income and these AI companies that are profiting on ideas should have to pay a fairly hefty tax because they have very low overhead or people working for them. And so they can help to contribute their fair share in displacing jobs, but also profiting from ideas that aren't their own. Why don't we start there, Jodi? Because I know you have perspective on AI.
- [07:16]
A
AI is stealing your content. 100% is stealing all of our content. It's so scary. We might have talked about this before, Chris, but the first time I ever used ChatGPT, I typed into it. Actually, this has kind of linked it up. So I. I typed into ChatGPT, write me an article called how to Raise Entrepreneurial Kids. Because I'd written an article and then wrote that book with Daniel Priestley, who was in that episode. And actually, let me just go on a tiny tangent. When we. When Daniel and I released the book Cat Ra Entrepreneurial Kids, we were sharing about it on Twitter, and we got a message back from someone who said, look, this just isn't fair. You can't teach people that they can just go and be anything they want, that they can have big dreams, that they can make something of themselves. You just can't do it. And they shared this really long message. And I was like, I don't know, what do I. Like, what do I say? Do I get involved? And Daniel just responded, why don't we call our next book how to Raise Kids with Low Expectations? As a. Just as a response. But, yeah, so the first thing I put into ChatGPT was write this article, how to Raise Entrepreneurial Kids. And it. And it came out. ChatGPT came out with my exact article that I'd already written. And it was like, this is literally my content. It's in there. But now someone else can type a few prompts in and few questions in and get the exact same article. Like, it's so unbelievably didn't sound right. But I feel like where I am with so much of this is that, yes, the system's rigged. Yes, it's not fair. Yes, it's really, really, really annoying. But I do kind of think that I would so much rather see what I can do and take personal agency rather than the entire system. I feel like, for me, that's the difference between business entrepreneurship being a bit scrappy, making pirate moves, going, yeah, that's not fair, but I'm gonna succeed against the odds versus, I guess, going into politics, because really, that's what it is. You take this Fundamental, institutional, like inequality, and you try and attack that. So it's. I feel like it's very different ways of approaching the same problem, because I fundamentally believe that we are all on the same page with this.
- [09:19]
B
Yeah, I think so, too, Jodi, but I don't think we're approaching it like we're on the same team. I think it's. You're in Team A or Team B, and I think that's also part of, like, how government and society is set up so that we're busy squabbling with each other while the Barons take everything. And I think that's a problem.
- [09:35]
A
I feel like it would be really nice if Daniel and Gary could agree that ultimately they're fighting for the same thing, which is equality, which is prosperity, which is people being happy. And they're just approaching it in very, very different ways. They're not really. I feel like the argument isn't actually with each other.
- [09:54]
B
No. And they try. So there's a couple of things that were kind of strange about how that conversation unfolded. I think Stephen was brilliant in setting up the debate, and he was fairly neutral about this. But what he didn't do, which bothered me a lot, was he wasn't moderating the conversation at all. Gary was allowed to talk for as long as you want and just be as interruptive as he wanted to be. And Daniel, bless him, stayed cool the entire time. I would have lost it at some point. I would have said, gary, can we just agree to one rule? I won't cut you off, and please don't cut me off. And if you ask me a question, I'll do my best to answer it. And if I ask you a question, you'll do your best to answer it. And we can just agree to disagree when we don't agree. But let's just have some decorum when we're speaking. And oftentimes he would just hammer Priestley with some questions, like, let him finish. And I don't know how Daniel does this, but he has the patience of an angel. And my patience would have been tested at that point. So I would have appreciated a little bit more moderation from Stephen on that. But Daniel came in to fight on economics, whereas anytime it came up with the issue of entrepreneurship, Gary was like, that's not my thing. He would just say, that's not my thing. And so I was thinking, so we just only can debate about the things that you know about, and we can't talk about the things that I can bring to the table. And if Daniel said Well, that's not my thing about economics and academics. I don't want to debate that either. So it was kind of a weird setup for the two of them to go at it. So I think there was something fundamentally kind of not balanced in terms of like giving each person an opportunity to speak. Whether you agree or disagree with anybody, I think it's important to let the other side speak.
- [11:34]
A
I would quite like it if debates had some kind of electric shock system where if someone talks for too long, they just get. And that's it. So there's no need for moderation. Maybe this could be done with AI in the future. You won't even need panel hosts, you won't need facilitators. It's just like when someone's spoken for too long, they get a little electric shock. When someone hasn't answered the question, they get a little electric shock. And then we just run our debates like that.
- [12:00]
B
I think that's some kind of dystopian future. And I think there was a movie in a book written about this somewhere.
- [12:06]
A
Yeah, yeah, there's probably many.
- [12:08]
B
The Hunger Games, 1984. Who knows? We have to use physical punishment. But I was just thinking, out of mutual respect, this. Let's have a conversation about this. So on the one side, it's like, I think Gary's an activist and he may or may not run for politics. I don't know. And it's a very populous sentiment. And I do want to address some of the things he's talking about because I do agree with a lot, but I just don't agree that we have to shut down the other side. To say, like, that's silly. So Gary's story is that his mom and dad are working class blue collar people and he grew up in a time when they could afford to buy a home. And being able to own a home is part of the dream to kind of make it. And he goes, today no one can buy a home because all the barons and the tycoons have taken all the property from you and have raised the rate so much so that you can't afford to live where you live. I think that's a real problem. But I also kind of think, like, I'm growing up in this time or maybe that time is over. Maybe in the 30 years in which I've been working, the, the real estate market, the political climate, the economic climate has changed so much so that people who are new in business today or new in life can, can afford to buy a home anymore. I don't know I don't know. But I know my parents worked a really long time 50 years ago to be able to afford a home for us. And the time in which it took me to buy a home was much less. Here's. Here's point of reference. I think my parents bought. I think it's called a Ponderosa home, which for them was like, a big deal. I don't know if that really means. And I think the house was like, a $250,000 house, which back then is a lot of money. And then I remember, like, within five years of graduating from school, starting my business, my wife and I, we bought our first home together. And that house was $510,000, and I was able to pay it off pretty quickly. And so, like, for me, relative to my parents coming to America and my ability to buy a home that is may not adjusted for inflation, but twice as much as their home in less than five years of just being an art school student, that says, like, we're moving the right direction, but maybe not so much today anymore. And I'm not professing to be any kind of real estate or economics expert here. I'm just kind of using anecdotal stories here.
- [14:24]
A
Have you seen who moved my cheese? Or have you heard that phrase?
- [14:27]
B
I've actually read the book.
- [14:29]
A
Yes, the book. And then, oh, man, I. So I've read. I've seen the. I haven't read the book. I've seen the YouTube video that's a tiny video version of it, where you have these mice running around the maze, and they're like, who moved my cheese? He moved my cheese. And I feel like, as marketers, we're so used to that, because it's like, oh, I used to run these ads and to this audience, and now it doesn't work. Someone's moved my cheese, and you go find the new cheese, and then someone else has moved my cheese. And then you think everything that you think that works in marketing at some point runs its course. And then you have to find the new cheese, and it's just a thing that you keep constantly having to do it. And even though I think so many marketers, business owners have this vision and this dream of this one marketing channel that just works every single time, forever and ever and ever, and they never have to touch it ever again. It's like, it's not going to happen. There's no point even thinking like that. But if you think that the cheese is always moving, then what it makes me think is, what are people going to Say about this time in the future, if we're looking back at the 70s, 80s, 90s and going, oh my God, you could buy a house for this much and you could do this for this much and you had all these opportunities that you don't have anymore, what are people going to say about 2025 in the future? And they'll say things like, oh my goodness, this technology was brand new, it was moving everything. These people could come out of nowhere and they could make huge businesses with just one person. We could have the first billion dollar company with one per one employee or no employees. And oh my God, you could buy AI domain name because they were available and now there's none available. And it's like, I feel like you just have it every single year and it repeats again and again and again. And there are going to be things that people look back at 2025 and say that if you think in a certain way, you will miss at the time when it's happening, which is just as dangerous as demonizing the wealthy. It's like thinking there's no opportunities around right now when they're so unbelievably are. So I feel like I so much prefer believing what's helpful rather than believing what's true. It's almost like, yep, sure, there's all these bad things that could happen and there's all these bad things going on and there's all these unfairnesses, but if you just think, but I can make it anyway, then you probably will find a way somehow.
- [16:42]
B
Okay, so how do we attack this so that we're contributing to the dialogue here? How do we take on one of the. Pull on one of the threads so that we can have a meaningful deep dive conversation about it that maybe wasn't present in that conversation where two people weren't seemingly talking on the same wavelength.
- [17:00]
A
Is the question who's the real enemy? Is it the AI companies? Is it the billionaires? Is it the education system? Is it the government? Who is the actual enemy in that conversation?
- [17:13]
B
Or how do, who do we want to identify as enemy? Or is that the conversation altogether? Who do you want to blame?
- [17:19]
A
Yeah, kind of. Who do you want to blame? Because I think it's, it's just an age old thing that. Well, it's populism, like you said. It's. Yes, if you, you. There's lots of people who are not, who represent normal people and they are all against this group of elites and it's so, it's so standard and we do it in, we do it in copywriting we make an enemy, but when the enemy is the elites and the normal people are the normal people, it's like they have to, they have to represent something. And in this debate the elites are the rich people, but in the AI conversation the elites are the AI companies and we're the normal people. So it's like, which is the real enemy? We got all the enemies.
- [18:02]
B
I have an idea. So while, while Gary was talking about the, the ills of the economic situation that exists, I was thinking, is there somewhere in the world where it actually is more ideal, where it's working much better than where you have it right now? And if there such a place, why don't we model ourselves after that place? So I kept thinking, and so as I zoom out, I think there's basically, as far as I know, three kind of major ways of governance or kind of economic systems. There's capitalism, socialism and communism. And they kind of run that spectrum, right? Or we all understand the free market system, that's capitalism. And then we all understand like communism, everybody's equal, everybody makes the same amount of money, which in practice isn't real at all. And there's socialism, which is some kind of blended version of that, where there's some state run things and there's some free enterprise and capitalism. And that seems to be like where most of the world is not pure capitalism, not pure communism. But is there a place in the world that you can think of where everyone has an equal shot, that rich people pay their taxes, there's universal basic income, everything is kind of working really well. You travel a lot. Okay, you're shaking your head. So for people on the podcast, Jody's.
- [19:18]
A
Like, no, I feel like everywhere has its problems. I feel like you just have to choose your, you go somewhere knowing that there's certain things that are wrong with the system and then believing that you can just find the place with the problems that you're okay to deal with. And not even necessarily in, in politics, but because I, I think I've lived in about 35 different countries, sorry, 35 different cities. And not to do with politics, but they all have different weather, they all have different walkability, they all have different friendliness to women and different safety and all of these different things. And I have not yet found somewhere that is the absolute perfect year round sunshine, amazing walkability, perfect for gyms, perfect Internet access and high air quality. The closest is Hawaii probably, but then you've got that whole time zone thing, so there's always something wrong. But I feel like that's exactly the same with this. And. And even if there isn't something wrong, you've always got someone who's going to disagree with that way of running things, depending on whether they're the person who makes the rules or the person who breaks the rules, or the person who wants to live there and work, or the people who wants. The person who wants to live there and be retired. So I don't think. I don't think I've had anywhere perfect. Have you?
- [20:35]
B
No, but I've only lived mostly one place in California. I've visited many places. But maybe the model isn't about perfect, but like mostly perfect, where there's a place that they seem to have most of it done right. When there's equality and there's an ability to move up the social economic ladder, there is a healthy tax, but the tax money is being used for things to take care of the people.
- [20:59]
A
I feel like it's always somewhere in Scandinavia. They're the people and the places who get it the most. Right, because they tax a lot, they charge a lot, they look after people a lot. But it's cold.
- [21:11]
B
It's cold. But we're not talking about that though. I'm just talking about forms of governance, because we can use the same form of governance in a more moderate climate, I think. But then the people in, say, I have friends in Sweden, they're like, we pay a lot of taxes. It's a lot. And there's also the culturally where they. They don't seem. There's the. The law of Yanta and there's this lagom and these things that there's. They don't celebrate exceptionalism. It, like the way that the. Maybe in America that we do. So there. There's some kind of inner conflict that I. I feel when I'm talking to people from those areas. Right?
- [21:52]
A
Yeah. Because if you fundamentally believe that people should be taxed less and they should make their own money, then you're not going to like it. But if the taxation is higher and that means that the streets are cleaner and there's less crime, then that's gonna suit people, suit some people at the same. At the same time, I really think it depends on personal preference, which is so strange because maybe we're not that similar underneath and we all do actually want different things. But then does it come back to the fundamental belief of how much you believe that you are in control of your own destiny and you can affect your own situation? Because what is. Is it a Noel Gallagher quote? Is it something about the left don't care about the aspirational, and the right don't care about the poor? Something like that. It's some kind of phrase like that said by someone in Oasis. I don't know what he knows about it at all, but I quite like the idea that it's like, choose your. Choose the thing that you decide to care about and then work back from there.
- [22:50]
B
Yes, well, I'll. I'll state what I care about, and then maybe you can state what you care about. And let's see where we agree or disagree. Jodi?
- [22:58]
A
Yep.
- [22:58]
B
I like paying taxes. I know it's weird. I like paying taxes, but I don't like how my taxes are being used because our streets are dirty, the roads are unpaved, and there's a lot of homeless people in California, and there aren't a lot of social welfare programs that help support people when they're falling down. And so when you lose your job or certain things happen to you, economic crisis, the social network here is not very strong in terms of supporting you. Or, I'm sorry, the social net, not the social network, isn't very strong in supporting you when you fall down. And when I visit countries where the streets are really clean and they look after people and there aren't as many homeless people, I feel really good about being there, and I don't mind paying taxes. The other part to it is I think rich people have many more loopholes and ways of hiding their wealth, about moving the money around so they're not paying their fair share. Fair share meaning a percentage of the income that they make relative to everyone else. And I think that's a problem. I think there's a Warren Buffett quote that said something like, the top nine richest people in America pay their share of taxes. The rest would not have to pay at all, or the 9% or something like that. The rest of the 91% won't have to pay. And so we know this, and it's shocking because when we get into politics and they start auditing people's tax returns, they're saying, that person who made X amount of money a hundred, a thousand times more than you paid zero taxes. That does bother me. In a place where we try to have some equality, that's a problem. So that's my take on it.
- [24:34]
A
I also like paying taxes. I also like living in clean and safe places. I feel like my favorite places to live or to be are places where doing cool stuff is celebrated, where the goal is for you to be as successful as possible, and where there's never any sense of Tall Poppy syndrome, or like, oh, why are you getting above your station? Or anything like that. Because I just like the idea of, yes, go for it. Why wouldn't you? I think my enemy is not the government or anything other than, like, your own limiting beliefs or what you get told is not possible. So I heard. I overheard a conversation yesterday, and it was this little boy, and he was doing. He was trying to. He was trying to ride his bike. It was like a standard situation. He had stabilizers, and it's his first bike. And his. I guess it was his nanny. She was just so good. She was so patient. She had infinite patience with this guy, with this little tiny kid trying to get on his bike. And she's just like, no, you can do it. No, keep doing it. No, no, no. You're going to work it out. And it's like, everyone needs that person in their life. Everyone needs that person going. Keep going. I know. Yes. It's not fair. Yes. Gravity is there, and you had never done this before. I get it, I get it. But keep going. And I feel like that's my fundamental belief for just the whole of society. And maybe I just live in a. In a fairyland where I believe that that could be possible for everyone, but that's definitely the world that I feel like I want to live in.
- [26:04]
B
Well, let's do this, then. Let's acknowledge that both of us have some form of privilege, because we wouldn't be where we are without some of that. Now. There are things that you're just born with, and there's the things that we've earned and worked for. So we can't be accountable for what we're born into. You're born poor, you're born rich. You're born white, black, Asian, whatever it is. Tall, short, you can play basketball, you can't play. Whatever it is. I can't sing. Right. So we're just born with that. So when we map out two scenarios and you have to ask yourself, which would you prefer to live in if one of them was true? Where on one side, it's like everything's f. There's nothing you can do about it. The system's all broken. And let's just be angry because we're powerless to do anything, whereas the other one says, the system might be broken, but there's something that you can do about it individually, and you'll be rewarded for the kind of risk that you take in the world. And it may not be True. But I personally would prefer to believe that I actually have some level of agency where my actions have consequences. The amount of risk that I take has a reward. And I'm going to choose to continue to believe that that's possible, even if it's not. Because the alternative is just to resign and say nothing. I can't do anything. It doesn't matter if I show up to work or if I don't work or if I take care of myself or don't, because the outcome is the same, because one is more of a fatalist point of view and the other one is kind of, we have more free will and agency. What are your thoughts on that?
- [27:35]
A
I also want the same outcome as you do. I think that something I thought of a lot about is it's like everyone who has kids wants the best for their kids. They want to. They want to earn as much as possible, they want to pass on as much as possible. They want to give their kids the best start ever. But when you've got a kid with a rich parent, you're like, oh, you've got a rich parent. You had a massive head start. Like, that's not cool. So it's almost like, which is it? Do we want to provide lots of people so they never have to think about anything? Or do we want people to always start from zero because then they've got where they are without having any help? I don't. I don't know what the right answer is in that. And then it almost feels like if you have come from a, like, very privileged, privileged position, which both, most of us have, it's then like, do you play down your kind of ace cards because you didn't earn them, they just were given to you by parents or by situation? Or do you say, do you use them or do you play them down? And which is the right thing to do? Because there are so many. I think about this a lot. Like there are so many people born with less than me who've made so much more of it, but then there are so many people born with way more than me who've made less of it. So then which is it? How do you decide which way you're going to choose? And I don't totally know the answer for that. And I've probably played things down before because you were almost like, oh, well, yeah, okay, I had this head start, but no, I got there on my own as well. And you almost have to sometimes feel like you have to prove yourself more to kind of prove that you didn't use the Ace card. But then I also believe in using your ace cards. I think it's very, very confusing. Confusing? Just life in general.
- [29:16]
B
Yes, but let's, let's just kind of look at, let's abstract some of these things and see how we feel because it's easier to understand. If you were 6 foot 1, model esque with beautiful cheekbones and eye structure and all that kind of stuff and you became a model, would I be mad at you that you were born with good genetics? No. And we show up to the cinema to watch really good looking people pretend to be somebody and we celebrate that. Or someone can hit that super high dolphin note on the microphone. I'm a net at, you know, the gifts that they were given. No, I mean a lot of work went into refining that instrument that they play, their vocal cords and a lot of dedication and focus and possibly just risking a lot to be able to say, I can, I can make it in this career in this industry where the percentage of success is very, very low. So I would get mad at anybody doing that. And also in, in business when, when I, when I'm coaching folks, I say, how do you get a really big client? Well, you work with a small client and you trade up and you keep trading up until you get to the bigger client. And so if you have resources to use, it'd be foolish not to use the resources. And if you were born into access and privilege and money and capital and investment and mentorship, it would be foolish for you not to use that later on. How you use that wealth that you acquire is really important and that's on you. But if you're given a head start, would you run backwards? Do you wait? I don't think so. That wouldn't be very smart.
- [30:48]
A
It wouldn't be very smart. But I think people do it. I think people play down their advantages because they believe that it should be hard. There's a friend who I've been going for walks with here, she's called Anya. She's a model. She's absolutely beautiful. But it took her a while to almost accept it, to be like, no, I'm going to be a model. It's cool. Because before then she was pursuing other different careers and then she was always kind of resisting it. Maybe because it felt like the easy thing to do. It felt like, oh, well, I like, I've got these looks, I match the people in the magazines, therefore that's what I'm going to do. It was like, no, I'm going to do this other Stuff, because I think we arbitrarily make stuff harder for ourselves, because I almost think it's actually not that trendy to use all your race cards or to acknowledge your privilege or the stuff that you were born with and then to. And then to play that. I think there's kind of an underdog. There's like a sexy underdog thing that sometimes means that we ignore them.
- [31:40]
B
Yeah, I don't know anybody like that. And I've always been pushing people to use all of the gifts that you were given. The way that you look, the way you sound, your brain, how you see the world, your talent. If you have great hand eye coordination, use as much of the gifts you were given as possible. Because as long as I've been able to say this part, I think we're all designed to do something very remarkable in this lifetime, and most of us struggle to find what that thing is. Many of us go to the grave not knowing what it is. And those of us who can find it are happier, healthier, wealthier because of it. And so I don't. I'm not quite sure, like, if you're a beautiful person, you're like, well, I'm not gonna do that. Well, that's on you, and I don't really care. And you. You don't have to use that if you don't want to. Like, there's a guy, I. I saw this on a news report. He's called a man with a golden voice. So he's standing out there homeless, and he's holding up a sign, you know, please help out. And somebody discovered him and discovered that he had this really beautiful radio voice and could do on that voiceovers, but he got mixed up in drugs and wound up on the street. And they cleaned him up and got him an opportunity, and he does. He has the most amazing voice. And since then, he's. He's done well. He's battled with his drug addiction, whatever, alcohol abuse, whatever. But he's done really well because he was able to use that voice. And if you have such a voice, why wouldn't you use it? And it's almost like you're taking a gift and you're throwing in the trash. I don't understand that. But, Jodi, it seems like you do understand this perspective.
- [33:10]
A
So one story that spring to mind is when I was running my agency, maybe about 10 or so years ago, I went to an interview to join the board of a charity, and there are a few different people being interviewed to be on this board, because it was a Cool company. And when I was there, I was being interviewed by two people. One of them was an accountant. The other one was an HR lawyer. And the accountant said to me, oh, you stand a really good chance of getting a place on this board because we're looking for a young female. And the HR lawyer just put her head in her hands, was like, don't say that. And there was an element of, I don't want to. I think I might have actually said to them, like, well, can I. Can I apply for this position as, like, an old male then? Because I don't want the token gesture seat. I don't want the seat that's like, oh, this is the seat. That. That means that we're going to give people concessions. It's like, no, I want to be there on merit. I don't want to be there just because I'm young. I don't want to be there just because I'm a woman. I want to be there because I would contribute a lot to this board, and I have some good things to say, and I know about this topic. So there's. I definitely think there's an element of. I don't want to feel like I'm just in this room because of that one thing that I couldn't even control. There's something more that's like, I want to be there because I've worked really hard and I've earned it, that feels like it means more.
- [34:34]
B
The person who said that to you, was their intention to say that? To patronize you?
- [34:38]
A
No, not at all. He was being really.
- [34:40]
B
What do you think their intention was?
- [34:42]
A
He was being really sweet. He was telling me that I. I stood a really good chance and I should be really excited. And I was like, yeah, but I'm not excited because I want to get the position because I'm the best person for the job, not because I'm like, I don't.
- [34:56]
B
So when. When we stand by, I guess you and I were. We're minorities, right?
- [35:04]
A
Yeah. In that you and I were part.
- [35:06]
B
Of a protected class. I'm a person of color, Asian, and you're female. So we're part of a protected class. And we say oftentimes. And I'll just say this out there, and I'm not saying this with any kind of hate or venom, that when we see a panel of speakers, generally speaking, they're heterosexual, older white men, generally speaking. And that's the thing. And we say to ourselves, like, how come they're not. More diversity. So when they actually bring on people Diversity. It's like, no, you need to bring me on because of my merit, because I deserve to be here. It's like we're fighting the machine that we wanted to change, which I don't totally get. Now. If he said in a patronizing way like, oh, you have a good shot, like toots, you know, like, what F you, you mother effer. But it's like, no, we're actually looking for young, smart, brilliant women just like you do. Yeah. Do we take offense?
- [35:53]
A
Firstly, I would love it if I heard a British people say toots, because that would be awesome. I would have been like, how I.
- [36:01]
B
Said that, by the way. I was like, that could come out really wrong.
- [36:04]
A
But you know, is it an Oprah quote? Just be excellent. Just the, the kind of antidote to any ism, sexism, racism, any ism is just, just be excellent. And I feel like if you, if you just believe that you are doing everything you can to be excellent and then you get that seat that you think that you shouldn't need. Yeah, I don't, it doesn't sit right that right with me. But maybe that's, maybe that's wrong. Maybe, maybe I've ignored kind of pirate moves that I could have made because I'm like, no, I want to go against the petrosat old white men who are on this panel right now.
- [36:41]
B
Well, let me ask you this question since you, you reminded me of that. Have you had to play something down?
- [36:47]
A
I for sure played things down, so too many things I played down. One of them is I used to run a social media agency and I got a Forbes column about halfway into running that social media agency. And Now I write three articles a day. And one of them is about LinkedIn because as we discussed in the last episode, LinkedIn is life. And when I had my social media agency, I posted zero times about LinkedIn. I didn't talk about LinkedIn at all. Even though that was literally my topic. It was literally what I had. What, what I, what I had was doing client doing for clients. And I just completely played down an ace card that I had, partly because I just didn't see it. And I wonder if it's partly because I was looking for the difficult way of doing stuff. I was like firmly on the struggle bus, ignoring the turn off to Easy street and ignoring it and not using it whatsoever. So I don't know if I've done it intentionally, but I've definitely done it accidentally. And there's probably stuff now where I'm not, I'm not I've got. I've got the ace card, and I'm not using it because I. There's something that tells me to struggle. Is there any. Is there any ace cards that you're not playing on purpose?
- [37:59]
B
No, I'm trying to play all my ace cards all the time. If I have cards, I play them all the time. I think the time in which I struggled with this was probably through junior high and high school, not wanting to stand out. But now the last thing I want to do is to blend in. So I play all my cards, whatever cards I got. That is the episode. Thanks again for listening to an episode of Jody and Chris Don't Know Anything.