0:06 - Job Search Struggles
9:32 - Networking Opportunities
15:44 - Family Background Insights
31:02 - Alumni Associations and Resources
37:33 - Degree Choices and Career Paths
46:54 - Considering Further Education
55:44 - Leveraging AI in Job Search
1:07:16 - Overcoming Self-Doubt and Enthusiasm
1:10:46 - Understanding Impediments
1:17:15 - Exploring AI Opportunities
1:30:44 - Navigating Emotional Barriers
1:39:37 - The Role of Credentialism
1:45:14 - Recognizing Personal Responsibility
1:55:35 - Authority and Resistance
2:07:18 - Unpacking Parental Influence
2:13:47 - Embracing Coaching and Enthusiasm
In this episode, I engage with a caller who shares his struggles since graduating with a degree in sociology and anthropology, focusing primarily on criminal justice. The caller describes a year of disappointments and setbacks in his job search, marked by feeling directionless after a lucky lead turned sour when a professor, who initially expressed interest in hiring him, suddenly stopped responding to his inquiries. This unexpected ghosting left the caller feeling abandoned and disoriented as he navigated a tough job market.
As the discussion unfolds, we explore the caller’s tumultuous journey through various low-wage jobs, as well as an underwhelming stint in door-to-door sales that lasted only four months. His lack of fulfillment is palpable as he describes the demotivating nature of jobs that do not align with his aspirations in the criminal justice field. Despite his qualifications, he faces constant rejections, which deepens his feelings of inadequacy. We analyze how his experienced setbacks have created a pervasive resentment toward authority figures and subsequently hindered his confidence and assertiveness.
The conversation delves into the caller's upbringing, revealing a well-meaning but ultimately rigid upbringing where accountability and negotiation were sidelined in favor of authoritative parenting. The caller's admission that his childhood, while stable, failed to foster an understanding of self-advocacy or connection with authority leads us to discuss the implications of these experiences on his current psyche. His reluctance to embrace coaching and solutions is intertwined with a visceral fear of failure, born from a lack of empathy shown by his parents during formative years.
We pivot our focus towards solutions, discussing the importance of overcoming negativity and resistance to coaching. I emphasize the transformative potential of enthusiasm and finding joy in the process of learning, especially in the context of newly emerging technologies like AI. By fostering a mindset open to growth and learning, instead of one fixated on rejection, the caller can begin to reclaim agency in his career path.
Our conversation wraps up with practical advice on embracing AI skills, assessing potential courses, and recognizing the value of both self-education and formal training in evolving job markets. It becomes clear that the key to unlocking the caller's potential lies in dismantling the barriers of self-doubt, engaging with the necessary skill set, and reaffirming his self-worth, ultimately paving the way towards a more fulfilling career.
[0:00] I graduated about pretty much exactly a year ago at this point.
[0:07] I felt that I was doing the right thing. I reached out to a professor I had who worked in the line of work that I thought that I would be able to get into. I had been communicating with him for probably about four months through email. And it really seemed like that was going to go somewhere. And then I get kind of ghosted a little after like a month after graduation by the guy. He just stopped returning my emails after, you know, sending me like a link to actually apply for the job. He told me the job was coming. He gave me a link. I applied for it. He sent me a link to a different job. I applied for it. I spent a lot of time kind of bouncing around looking for jobs in my major. Applying, getting denied over and over and over again.
[1:04] So eventually I go and work kind of part-time for minimum wage for a while. And at the place I was working, a lot of the guys there had been ex-law enforcement. And that was kind of something I majored in was criminal justice. And they told me that, you know, you're a young guy, you're a fit guy, you should look at getting into law enforcement. And I went through that process kind of begrudgingly. I always thought that wasn't something for me, but I just didn't feel that there was any other options. So I start going through it, start going through it. And I'm kind of like getting up to the point where I would have been admitted into the police academy before I talked to some friends of mine that were in the police academy and was really honest with myself and i was like this is not for me so i withdraw my application and uh i start a career in door-to-door sales and.
[2:13] Um that did not go very well that was not something for me it only lasted about four months and the company ended up letting me go so now i'm back working i mean i get full-time hours but i work for minimum wage and uh it's very very difficult to see a path forward from here it seems like every time i try to, I work retail, so every time I try to work for a company or anything like this where it's kind of like a straightforward career that gives you a decent living wage and you'd see a path forward with promotions, it never works out. I never get calls back. I don't even get interviews. And I genuinely have no idea how to go forward in life right now. I just make enough to get by. And I don't have anybody close to me that's giving me what I feel is any good advice. And I'm just very, very lost and directionless.
[3:30] I'm sorry to hear that. And I'm sure that there's some stuff we can do. There's some stuff that is uh you know i'm the sort of dei stuff there's some stuff that's a little harder to alter for you and i but i'm sure there's some stuff we can do and what was your uh you got an undergraduate degree what was that in.
[3:48] Yeah so my my degree is in um sociology and anthropology those are kind of bubbled together but the uh the way that that kind of works is you like kind of picked like a path under that bubble so my path was criminal justice but that's not all my actual um like diploma if that makes sense it says sociology slash anthropology okay.
[4:14] And what was your goal with that.
[4:19] So I ended up picking criminal justice because I took like an intro to criminology class. And we start learning about these like kind of crime statistics that you would see with like the FBI. So if you go to the FBI's website, you can find like the exact number of like murders, whatever kind of crime you're looking for. And that data that gets reported to the FBI is done by local departments. So that's essentially what I wanted to do. And that's called an intelligence analyst. And that job does pay fairly well. So that was my end goal.
[4:57] Oh, and that's the one that the professor you were working with to try and get the job, right?
[5:03] Yeah, he was the head of the analytics department at the local police department.
[5:09] Right. Okay. Okay. And you had a good relationship with him. And of course, you don't know what happened with the ghosting, right?
[5:17] No idea what happened. Yeah. I had a good relationship with him.
[5:20] Hmm. And, um, did you try contacting him in person or did you try, uh, you know, if he's got office hours going in and saying, you know, what's, what's going on or how did that sort of go?
[5:33] Um, so he didn't have office hours because he was a part-time professor and full time. Um, I forget what his actual rank within the police department was, but he was full time there. So he was only ever at the school on Friday is when he taught his class and I took his class like fall of my senior year and then in the spring of senior year like the first, week of the spring semester I reached out and contacted him through email and we ended up doing a, I ended up like giving him my number at one point and so he called my personal phone at one point as well.
[6:15] Right. So, but sorry, go ahead.
[6:19] Never in person. No, not after the class.
[6:22] I mean, but you knew when he was teaching, right?
[6:25] I did. And that was definitely a mistake that I made.
[6:28] Well, I mean, I'm not trying to nag you or anything like that, but I'm trying to sort of map, you know, when when life gets tough. Uh how assertive are you or to put it another way how assertive were you taught to be, with regards to that kind of stuff especially as things get tougher particularly for males, the differentiator is going to have something to do with how direct and assertive we can be and if you're raised that way it's easy if you're not raised that way as i suspect you weren't and i certainly wasn't it's a hard habit to uh to get into okay so you just did you did you just traded emails and then he just kind of vaporized right.
[7:14] Yeah so we traded emails and uh like the first email he's like i'm actually the head of this department now which he wasn't when i took his class i would love to have you on the team this is what we do uh at some point i even want to get she in and look at and kind of like walk around our department and meet some of the people and it seemed very promising he said i will reach back out when the job gets posted and then the emails would kind of come from me at that point i'd be like all right it's been like two weeks where's the job been a month where's the job job is coming job is coming job is coming it comes around like april so like a month out from graduation he's like job is finally here emails it to me and i I didn't have to bug him for that one. I hadn't had contact with him in a couple of weeks from email. I was just was kind of trusting that the application would come. Once the application came and he said, like, email me back after you apply. I kind of just thought that I was set.
[8:14] Yeah, and that's tough, of course, because if you think you're set, then you're not pursuing other avenues, right?
[8:21] Right. I did throw some other applications out there, but we're talking like I might have thrown three to five more applications out to people I had no affiliation with. Whereas if I didn't think that this avenue was set, I probably would have grown 10 to 20 at least.
[8:40] Right. Okay. So how long has it been since you graduated?
[8:45] I think about a year exactly at this point okay.
[8:48] Got it and how many people were in your class at the this particular law for law focus the law data oh sorry the crime data focus.
[8:58] Oh um well that wasn't that the degree itself it was criminal justice uh and i would say, that's that's pretty tough to it's pretty tough to say but i mean we're talking i would say 50 to 100 Okay.
[9:14] And were you part of a frat at all at the university?
[9:18] No, I wasn't in any organizations.
[9:21] Okay. And did you socialize much with fellow students? Was it a four-year degree? Is that right?
[9:28] It was a four-year degree. And yeah, there was some socialization.
[9:33] Okay, so how many people would you say you know well enough if you contacted them and said, I'm really looking for work, that they would pound the pavement a little bit in their mind for you?
[9:51] I think I know a guy that might be able to help me out, but that would probably be only like part-time work.
[9:58] So you graduated from university with only one guy you're comfortable asking for help getting a job?
[10:09] I'm a bit... Yes, and I kind of want to say that the reason for that is most of the people that I befriended, um, were either younger than me or had, uh, changed majors to the point where they had to do extra years. So I only, I'm only like fairly close with maybe one other guy who's graduated.
[10:35] Okay. I mean, and so, you know, if, if I were your dad and you were in university, I would be saying, so university is fun. Uh, and you know, it's, it's, it's great for sports and, and meeting people and going to parties, but you have to network. You have to network and this is why i asked about the frat thing is that you know i mean, i was asked to join a frat in university i didn't um but i you know as i get older i can certainly see like you know you you move to atlanta or whatever right and and there's a chapter then you automatically get people that you can socialize with otherwise you kind of got to burrow you in from the outside, which is really tough to do. Okay, so you socialized with the intention of, it sounds like more having fun, and listen, none of this is a criticism or an egg or anything like that. I'm just trying to sort of map the process here. So you socialized not with really of the view of focusing on career goals, but you socialized more for fun and enjoyment, right?
[11:42] Yeah yeah yeah i i don't yeah i don't want to point the finger or anything at the end of the point.
[11:49] The finger this.
[11:50] Is your call man.
[11:51] Whatever you want whatever you want to talk about maybe be as honest and direct as you want as you can be.
[11:54] I have to take that one on the chin but i was uh, you've probably heard this before but i was one of the people who was kind of told like just go to college and get a degree and the rest will take care of itself.
[12:12] And who told you that?
[12:16] Parents, grandparents, everybody that, you know, family members pretty much is kind of, you know, go get a degree. It doesn't matter what it's in. That will open doors for you.
[12:28] Ah, so it's like you're taking dating advice from boomers who've never been on Tinder, right?
[12:34] Yes.
[12:35] Okay. I mean, that's a real dice roll, right? It's going to open doors for you. Everything will work out. I mean, your parents and grandparents grew up in an entirely different economy. With entirely different legal requirements and parameters and restrictions and so on. So it seems a bit odd to me that your parents would assume that the world you were going to graduate into was just copy pasted from their world when they've seen how much has changed in society, right?
[13:13] Yeah, that was always something that bugged me. But I mean, I will say that my parents were also, at least one of my parents was like a first generation college student. And so that was like the advice that he was told is like, you got to go get to college, get the degree, and then it'll take care of itself. And so it kind of almost makes sense that that's what gets passed down to me when that was like from a first generation college student who can attribute their degree to being successful in the world.
[13:45] Yeah, but I mean, that's like 30 years ago, right?
[13:50] Yes, yes, yeah.
[13:51] I mean, did they not think that things have changed a little? I mean, are they still using a rotary dial telephone? Things have changed a little in the last 30 years, and they've changed a lot, especially the job market, right?
[14:03] Okay.
[14:04] All right. So tell me a little bit about your upbringing, and I know that this sounds like a bit of a non sequitur. I promise you it's not. So tell me a little bit about how you were raised and your relationship with your parents and.
[14:20] Oh, it's actually probably a lot better than most of the call-ins that I've heard that you've had. So nothing too juicy, unfortunately. I'm fortunate enough that my folks are still together. I don't have any history of divorce in my family, actually. So grandparents together forever, both sets of grandparents together forever. Like no divorces, aunts and uncles, no divorce between my parents. And then I was raised upper middle class. My mom was able to be a stay at home mom for myself, my brother, my sister. So three kids and my dad had a good enough job to be able to provide for, you know, the family of five in nice house. We live in a nice neighborhood and a pretty good part of the country. All my brother and sister and I all were able to go to university and not have to pay our own way through it. My parents were able to budget for that. And my brother and I also went to private school. So, as far as, you know, that kind of goes, not a lot more that you can ask for.
[15:44] No, that's great to hear. I mean, it's very fortunate that that was your upbringing. And what industry does your father work in?
[15:54] Um he he's kind of he's bounced around uh the economy hasn't been quite too kind to him either so he's unfortunately also between jobs at the moment um but he made his money doing um, data analytics for for uh private businesses okay.
[16:18] So similar with what you would be doing that you would be more i assume in the public sector.
[16:21] It would be in the public sector if that's what I got into. Yeah.
[16:26] Okay. Got it. And you said the economy is not being kind to him. He's between jobs at the moment, but again, he was able to put kids through college and private school and a family of five, as you say. So I assume he did fairly well for the most part.
[16:40] Definitely. Definitely.
[16:42] And how is your brother's job hunt or if he's still in college? I don't know if he's older or younger, but how's that going for him? Is anything similar to what you're going through or is he in a different phase of life.
[16:52] Uh my brother and sister are both still they're the same age they're both still in school um the one who's kind of done the best out of the three of us is my sister she has a paid internship and uh so that's the best that any of us have well and the.
[17:12] Facts that i mean there was a study recently where they sent out a bunch of resumes to um i think it with scientific labs and the women were overwhelmingly chosen. Whether it's a formal sort of diversity thing or just to make up for the patriarchy general mind stuff, it does seem to have an effect. And I'm not saying that she didn't work hard or anything like that, but I think there are more factors than just merit. I mean, we know that there's more factors than just meritocracy at the moment, but sorry, you were going to say?
[17:41] There is. She definitely has worked very, very hard, though. I would definitely, you definitely could attribute some of that to it. I know that she did also get denied from an overwhelming number of what she applied for, but she has a really, really great opportunity coming to her. So, like, nothing that she could anger at all.
[18:00] Okay. Good, good. All right. And tell me a little bit about your work history from sort of first job on.
[18:11] Um... Like, I mean, I started, I started working in, in, um, in high school. Is that all relevant?
[18:19] Oh yeah. Yeah. Go for it.
[18:20] Okay. Absolutely. Yeah. So I, I worked, um, part time, usually in retail all through high school. I would normally, uh, it was normally, well, my first job was just a summer job. I didn't want to work during the school year, um.
[18:38] Second job, I worked during the school year as much as I could. Third job was at a fast food restaurant. I worked there up until the pandemic started, and my mom kind of freaked out about the pandemic and didn't really want me working. So I took, uh, extended time off before, um, coming back and, and moving on at that point, I was at university, but I was doing it remote. So I delivered pizzas kind of like my first year of university. Um, and then, and from there on out, it was, uh, summer jobs in retail, summer jobs in retail. Um, and then after I graduated, it was a part-time job working full-time hours for minimum wage on a golf course. And then as I mentioned, it was the door-to-door sales job. And now once again, full-time hours for minimum wage and retail, that's where I'm at. So pretty much almost entirely retail.
[19:55] Got it. And how has your father been in terms of coaching for your career and getting you prepared and so on?
[20:07] He's been, I mean, he's been trying. Now he's kind of pivoted toward like the most important thing for me to do is try to network, but that's far easier for him to say than for myself to do. I don't have a lot of networking strings to pull, so he tries to help me out. He tries to introduce me to some friends in different industries and reach out to friends in industries about me um you know i have a underemployed son he's a smart guy with you know skills and x y and z anything you might be able to help help him out with and his coaching at this point has basically been like uh just, put an overwhelming amount of resumes and applications out there and talk to some of his friends and see what opens up. I guess you can just boil that down to just throw the kitchen sink at it. Just volume over everything, one door will open.
[21:26] And so you're throwing a bunch of resumes out in the data analytics field that you trained in, is that right? Or is it a wider net?
[21:37] I try to cast a wider net than that. It's very, very difficult to find those kind of jobs. Because of what that field requires me to learn, I took a course in geographic information systems. I know you have experience with computers, I'm sure you know what that is. So a lot of times I just look for jobs under that and throw resumes out for that. I'll throw resumes out for, I mean, pretty much anything that I can find. I'm constantly on Indeed looking for anything that I might be remotely qualified for and just give it a shot.
[22:25] And how many resumes would you say or how many jobs have you applied to over the last year?
[22:36] I think we're probably talking, minimum 75 but, I don't apply to a job every single day but when I do take some time to apply for jobs I'm applying for 3-4 so 75 is probably an understatement I think we're pushing 100 plus.
[22:59] So that's two jobs a week.
[23:04] Yeah I don't yeah probably two jobs a week does.
[23:08] That seem low or average or high to you.
[23:15] Well that's probably not probably not enough um, I don't know. You'd think that if you cast a wide net of 100 jobs, you'd get something a little bit better than door-to-door sales having been the best career-based job to even get an interview for, right?
[23:41] Okay, so of the 75 to 100 jobs that you've applied for, what's your sort of ratio of emails returned or job interviews or things like that?
[23:59] So counting the jobs that I've actually been hired at, like the minimum wage hourly ones.
[24:09] No no i don't i don't want to count those because those you don't want to count i mean in terms of like something that you would not be calling me about right because you're calling me because you're underemployed right so uh i so so of the 75 to 100 jobs how many of those would you can would you not consider underemployed in terms of the applications.
[24:28] Okay yeah i'd still say probably 75 to 100 okay.
[24:33] So of those 75 to 100 um what's your i mean i don't know how it is these days but usually you get an email back maybe there's a phone interview uh there's maybe an in-person interview so how many of those have resulted in emails back phone calls or interviews.
[24:52] I've been emailed by two jobs saying you've made it through our first round you might hear back from us and have not heard back from those, I was able to get an interview and get hired for the door-to-door job and then I got.
[25:17] No, but that's under employment too, right? It's not related to your, education, right?
[25:26] Yeah, yeah It's not related to my education Okay.
[25:29] So let's not count that one. So you've had two jobs where they say you passed the first round, you might hear from us, and you never have, right?
[25:38] Yeah, so I mean, if we're talking like purely what's related to my education, that's the best that I've gotten.
[25:44] Okay, now I'm still trying to understand of the jobs that you've applied to, some of them have been, I just need a job, right? Like the retail or the door-to-door stuff. So what percentage of the jobs that you've applied to have been unrelated to your education and you would not consider them to be career-based?
[25:59] Uh... Probably, there's probably 20 to 30 that have just been, I see that it's like kind of a full-time job for more than minimum wage, but unrelated to my degree.
[26:30] Okay, so that drops it down to about a job a week that you're applying to within your educational fields, right?
[26:40] Yes.
[26:41] And help me understand I mean that seems low to me I've been a hiring manager so whatever right but help me understand how it's one a week, because that's kind of like I try to match with one woman a week on a dating app and I'm not married yet.
[27:08] Right yeah i see what you're saying so and.
[27:11] Again it's not some big net or criticism i'm just trying to understand your process that you apply for one job a week.
[27:20] Well at this point it's kind of uh paralysis by analysis um since i lost the, i'll say this when i was at the door-to-door job i saw that that had the potential of leading to a career so applying for other jobs was not uh probably critical oh and that was a couple of months right.
[27:45] And you lost a month or two.
[27:46] Waiting for the.
[27:46] Job from the guy who said you're a shoe in right.
[27:48] Right i was still so i do want to say like when once his responses got pretty slow i was like i can't bank on this anymore so um i was already throwing out like several applications at that time and then uh like yeah during the door-to-door there's a good you know if you kill it at door-to-door you can make good money doing door-to-door and then you can get uh promoted into doing you know stuff like in-home sales or transferring to another sales field in general that pays well so when you're looking at that it's like this is still a very good opportunity so i wasn't taking much time to apply for jobs it wasn't until i started to see that that job wasn't for me and probably you know after about two and a half to three months of doing it then I actively started looking for for more jobs and then okay since that's my.
[28:41] Kick you go back up to like two a week okay and I'm I'm not trying to nickel and dime your data to death I just sort of want to get a general sense and did you really dislike I mean door-to-door salesman is notoriously a tough gig and did you really dislike it did you dislike the product or the whole process or what was it that that you didn't like about it?
[28:59] Uh the product was was totally fine um we're talking home improvement so i don't have anything against that that industry um it was kind of the process like when i first started it didn't seem like it was going too bad and uh i remember i was actually doing pretty well when i was first allowed to you know kind of go at it on my own or i would just have like a manager watching over my shoulder. And there was like one day where we go to a.
[29:34] Bad kind of lower class neighborhood and I'm on my own and I had, you know, several doors I knocked in that neighborhood where the people came to the door and were very, very nasty with me. And to an extent, I understand it, but that really, really like, that's a job that's all about confidence and charisma and uh kind of after that i was like you know it was a big shot to my confidence you're cold knocking somebody's door and then it started to kind of get to the point where i wasn't able to ignore her non-verbal cues that this person doesn't really want to talk to me or i'm annoying this person and i could not uh, push through that and kind of you know try to push to generate leads.
[30:31] Right okay and that's so you you think you said he would let go after four months is that right.
[30:35] Just let go after four months yeah okay.
[30:40] So your father of course says that it's important for you to network now but he didn't really mentioned it so much when you were in school, when you had obviously a much greater chance to network.
[30:53] Yeah.
[30:55] Okay. I mean, that's a bit of a mismatch there in terms of what's important, but I mean, what's done is done. So we can't go back in time.
[31:03] Now, is there any kind of alumni association? And listen, I'm not trying to solve your problems here. I'm just curious what you've explored. Is there any kind of alumni association that's part of your college that might be helpful for networking in terms of you join some group, maybe they meet up and you could sort of pitch your potential there?
[31:27] Not that I've ever been made aware of. No, I've never seen such a thing.
[31:31] I mean, you don't have to tell me where you went to university, but most universities have, alumni associations where you might find it helpful to be part of that and to talk to people who've graduated. Because, of course, people who've graduated, and particularly if they graduated a while ago, they might have jobs, right? They might have contacts or whatever, right? So that might be something to look into. And you said that your sister got this unpaid internship and paid internship. Was there any kind of work-study stuff that was going on in your university when you were going through it? I mean, that's a pretty good place to normally to get contacts and jobs?
[32:18] So actually, I did an internship. I did an internship for my local police department.
[32:25] Okay. And how did that go?
[32:29] I thought that it went well. I would because they weren't paying me, they wouldn't really ask us to do too much. It would just be coming for a few hours on the days where you can. And I was working at the same time. So I would work like five days a week and then I'd go in on the two days a week that I had off for a few hours and do kind of busy work tasks just to kind of, you know, to be honest, it was just kind of like go in and what files can I sort today? What needs to be scanned, what needs to be faxed, whatever.
[33:22] So there was nothing really there that you got to shine at that people would remember or want you back for in any particularly vivid fashion. Is that right?
[33:33] Yeah, no, not really. Okay.
[33:36] And that was the only internship you had, right?
[33:39] That was the only internship I did, that's correct. Okay.
[33:43] And do you know if your university has any kind of job placement program for graduates?
[33:52] It wasn't very good. It wasn't a job placement program. It was like a, it's basically like Indeed, but for, you know, you use like your university login to login and it never really helped me out too much.
[34:11] Okay. So there is such a thing, but it's just not very helpful. Is that just because there aren't jobs in your field or?
[34:17] It, yeah, that's probably, it's perfect. But I'm not feeling that that's probably like the best field to go forward. And it's really tough because you're familiar with ArcGIS, right?
[34:32] Uh-huh.
[34:33] So you can actually major in that. I have a liberal arts degree with courses in that. So when it comes down to like throwing the resume out there and applying for like a job to be in, uh, you know, entry level GIS work, they're going to pick somebody who actually has a major and had, you know, spent like, you know, four years worth of credits on learning about the software than somebody with an unrelated major, but courses in that software.
[35:07] Well, I mean, not necessarily. I mean, it depends whether there's any overlap with your other skills, and it also depends how much they want to pay. I mean, they would pay less trained people, lower salaries. And if they had less of a requirement for that expertise, they would do that, right?
[35:25] I suppose, yeah.
[35:27] And I assume you, I think you've mentioned that you've tried applying for GIS jobs and no luck, right?
[35:34] But I've had more luck at finding GIS jobs than I have with intelligence analyst or crime analyst roles and not very much luck at ever. No luck at all at ever getting called back.
[35:50] And when you were choosing your degree with, I assume your father was paying. So I assume you haven't graduated with debt, which is obviously a good thing. But when you were choosing your degree, were you pitched or did you or your father look at employment opportunities, like what percentage of graduates are working in the field, that kind of stuff?
[36:18] I did not. And to be honest with you, I will like the biggest mistake that I've made is I don't think my degree is very useful. And I was kind of cautioned about getting a liberal arts degree, but I was told that since it's still BS, it's probably pretty good.
[36:44] Sorry, who questioned you on that?
[36:47] My father cautioned me on on getting a liberal arts degree but since it was still a bs he was like yeah you know that could work out and pitching him on the job that i had been i'd figured out kind of uh he was like yeah it seems like a good idea but i'll be honest at the same time um i majored in several different things before kind of landing on on sociology and criminal justice.
[37:14] Yeah. I mean, it seems interesting that your father is paying for it, which I assume was like, you know, 50, 70, 80, 100 grand for four years. Your father's paying for it. Your father's a data analyst, but doesn't bother to look up the employment rates for graduates within the field.
[37:34] I never really looked at employment rates in graduates in that field.
[37:38] Yeah that's that's an odd investment to me because i mean that would be that would be the first thing it's okay well so you're spending four years of your life you know which is a lot and uh you know tens or maybe more thousands of dollars and to not even find out what the employment opportunities are after you graduate seems odd now i mean you know you went in at what 18 or whatever so um it would be more on your father's shoulders for for that right but, uh that that didn't happen and again i'm just sort of pointing it out because, we obviously we can't go back in time and fix bad decisions or decisions which could have been better but what we can do is figure out where we went wrong so that we don't do it again if that make sense?
[38:28] Yes. Yeah, absolutely. And I mean, you know, like I told you before, uh, when the advice from my parents and grandparents have been, you know, go to school, get a degree and doors are going to open. It doesn't matter what the degree's in. Uh, that, uh, is it, is it, I don't know that that's too surprising that, you know, the focus on what I majored in and the employment rates of that specific major wasn't really dug into and that's kind of the general problem. I don't know what the word I'm looking for is. The general understanding is that the fact that you have, you know, BS is the most important thing, right?
[39:21] Well, okay. So, I mean, just very briefly, I mean, when your grandparents went to university, or I guess you said your father was the first, right? But when university was around at your grandparents' day, probably fewer than 10% of people went to university. And as a result, it was usually the top 10% of the cognitive elites. And as a result, the educational standards and requirements were very high, right? Now, like 40, 50% of people go to college. And in order to accommodate more people, I mean, college doesn't make you smarter anymore than playing basketball makes you taller. And so now the standards have cratered in order to accommodate people who just don't have the same intellectual abilities, right?
[40:14] Absolutely. And also, let me add another important piece of information here that I think is quite relevant. My father's line of work is not in what his degree was at, like even remotely close. So this kind of adds to that kind of fuel that the degree.
[40:33] Matters more than what the degree is sorry the degree used to be i mean i've mentioned this case on the show before so i'll just keep it brief so i mean ideally you should just give people an iq test because smart people can master just about anything but generally you're not allowed to give people iq tests anymore, and so it used to be that college was just like this very extended very expensive IQ test. And so, it proved that you were in sort of the top 10 or 15% of intelligence or, you know, and other, it's not just intelligence, right? I mean, the ability to make a plan, the ability to meet deadlines, the ability to please your professors or whatever, right? So, I mean, that's all gone. Now, nobody can look at a degree and figure out whether you're a smart person or just someone who's there because the university lacks money.
[41:30] Yes, I 100% agree with you. I'm just trying to kind of add that context to it. And exactly what you just said is still is how my father pitched getting a degree to me my entire life. I gave pushback on going to school. I can quite vividly remember I pitched the idea to my mom and then my dad. I was like, this is not the key to going anywhere in life. I said, what about trade school? And I was told that not getting the degree is going to permanently close doors. When you apply for a job and you have a degree, that's telling a hiring manager, a potential boss, that you have accomplished something in life. And without the degree, they're going to think less of you. They're going to think that you're not very smart. And by the way, you have a degree. Now you have unlimited potential in earnings. And if you go to trade school, you're going to cap out at $20 an hour. And I still think about that conversation. It's not it's not remotely true it maybe your dad's.
[42:43] A data guy i mean just look that shit up.
[42:46] Right that really i'm i'm telling you this because that conversation really pissed me off and i went to college to get a degree to make 15 an hour right so that's been the biggest piece of irony from that conversation it's like oh you're always going to earn more because you have a degree. I went to college and graduated and I've never made more than $15 an hour in any of the three jobs I've had since.
[43:10] Well, unfortunately, it's much worse than that. Because of the cost of your degree and the foregone earnings because of that degree, it's much worse than that. Sorry, I hate to pile on, but...
[43:24] Oh, no, no, no. Yeah, I've thought about that as well.
[43:28] I mean, and just, I used to hire, I won't get into details, but I used to hire out of one of the, I used to hire students out of one of the top computer science universities in Canada. And I would go down and I would interview people and so on. And we definitely got some very smart people and we got some very not smart people because the net was too wide.
[43:58] Right.
[43:59] And I really had to find other ways to figure out who was good to hire other than they have a degree from a top tier university or they're finishing up their degree at a top tier university. And I had to devise my own ways to figure out who to hire, because I just couldn't rely on the intelligence and creativity of people just because they had a degree. Now, of course, in the past, it wasn't perfect, but it was much more reliable.
[44:32] Yeah, I've been very vocally frustrated to those close to me for pretty much exactly what you're saying there. is what I constantly say is I'm not even getting interviews. If I was getting interviews consistently and not getting hired, then at least I would know that it's on me. But I know that I'm a smart guy. I know that I'm a capable guy. I'm not incompetent and I'm not dumb. And there's nothing wrong with working retail if that's truly the best you can do. But I know that for me, it's not truly the best I can do. And that I have skills. My job is very monotonous. I don't use a lot of brainpower. During an eight-hour shift, I have one earphone in, and I'm listening to your show while I'm moving stuff on the shelves. That's not a good use of the skills I have. I'm a fairly smart guy, and I'm a competent guy. I know that I can do more, and I'm worth more than that. And not getting interviews or having anything to show for it, but allegedly a liberal arts degree and the fact that I consistently made dean's list, that's the best I have to show for, what I feel that my potential is. And even then, I'm not getting to show what my potential is. And that's just what is frustrating me more than anything.
[45:59] Yes. And not to add fuel to the fire, but it could be the case that as you get further and further away from your graduation date, your degree becomes slightly less valuable.
[46:11] Yes, I would. I would agree.
[46:14] People are going to say, well, what you've been doing for the last year or two. And again, I'm not trying to sort of make you an easier panic, but that's a potential issue.
[46:23] Right well um i don't know if you wanted to pivot to something else but i did want to ask this uh one thing that i've thought about is the the company that i work for they're a large company so they give a lot of benefits to their employees and i believe one of their things that they'll do is uh is education compensation so one thing that i've kind of thought about is, possibly going back and getting a master's degree.
[46:54] Now, like I said, your show is what gets me through the workday. I've heard a lot of, you know, you do quite a bit of research on employment rates with people with master's degree and their earning potential. I don't feel that you think too highly of it, but kind of considering the position that I'm in, what would you think about that?
[47:18] Well a master's in.
[47:23] Okay so that's been kind of a thing um i would not be going back to get another uh liberal arts degree so i've kind of narrowed it down to two possible paths um i think that i would like to go into the business world um so one is when i was in high school I took a business course on marketing and I remember really enjoying that class but I had a family member and a distant relative who had graduated with a marketing degree and she.
[48:02] Was in my position, underemployed, working for minimum wage. I was like, oh, I don't know that a marketing degree is going to help me out. For some reason, I landed on how about we go one worse and go liberal arts instead. I was to turn away from the marketing degree. I feel that that was a bad decision. That's something that interests me is marketing. Another thing that possibly interests me is economics. I'm very, very interested in politics. So one thing that I didn't know very much about until recently was economics. I spent a lot of time reading articles online, especially from like the Mises Institute, for example, on economic theory, Austrian economics and that's something that I just find very very fascinating and you know going to school to study such things you have kind of an umbrella of uh potential jobs with uh with an economics degree you can work in finance things like this that that that pay very well and it's something yeah but I don't know if I don't know maybe.
[49:14] You can but I don't know if you can just jump into a master's in economics with your undergraduate again.
[49:21] So that's been that's been the thing uh i have talked about it with some people that i know and uh i think i think it was my mom was telling me that she has a friend who got a uh no not my mom uh my girlfriend, knows somebody who got like a liberal arts degree and that went back and got a master's in something under business. It was either my girlfriend or my mom. I can't remember who, but I don't think it actually matters.
[49:53] You can go liberal arts to business. I just don't know that you can go liberal arts to economist or economics. And again, you just have to look that up. I don't have any answer to that, but it seems like a bit more of a stretch. Okay. All right.
[50:09] So that's on that.
[50:10] Well let me ask you this have you tried to reproduce your skill set using ai because that seems like a pretty essential thing these days is to figure out how valuable is your skill set relative to ai because of course if you're talking about sort of the fbi crime stats i'm going to assume that at least the less propagandized and censored ais, have access to all that data, right? So whatever analysis you would do that might take you a week or two or a month or two, have you tried reproducing what you did in university using an AI to figure out what demand there may or may not be for your skill set? Because that's sort of the dark horse, variable that has come into play over the last couple of years.
[51:03] Sure. Uh, I, that's not something that I've tried to do. Uh, I know that the reason why GIS goes hand in hand with, um, you know, taking the crime data is they do crime mapping. So they'll kind of like, you know, split up the city and the blocks or beats or something like this. And then they'll, uh, map it out, you know, uh, crimes in this area are low. So that's like, uh, like we're talking making like a color-coded map um.
[51:38] Oh yeah no i'm aware of all of that so so can ai can so so can can ai do that kind of work i mean again i know it hallucinates and blah blah blah but you know there's prompts that you can you can make to to reduce or minimize that and again i also know that you know crime data demographic data is all kinds of contentious when it comes to real estate and so on but so if you haven't i would recommend you know sit down with the least censored ai that you can find which i guess up until recently may may have been on the grok side or whatever right so if you can work with the least censored the least woke the least manipulative AI.
[52:23] And I mean, it won't be perfect, but I would say it's worth spending an hour or two or more trying to figure out like, why are there no jobs in your field? Could it be that people have mastered AI to the point where, you know, one guy replaces 20 guys or 10 guys or five guys or something like that, right? So I think you might want to figure out whether AI has eaten near lunch, which it's doing to a lot of people increasingly. And there's two reasons for that. One is you can figure out what the demand might be if it's low because of AI. The other thing, of course, is if you become good at using AI plus all of your data analytical and, crime analytical skills, that might differentiate you to the point where if you put that sort of stuff on a resume along with, you know, here's a website of, you know, here's me live working on prompts to produce data that would have taken somebody a week, took me an hour. I don't know, like whatever. This is the kind of stuff that I would be doing if I were in your shoes is just trying to leverage technology that might be replacing some of your skill sets in order to become more valuable to people. Everybody plus AI is, I assume, just significantly more valuable. So it's just a thought. What do you think?
[53:50] Yeah, I can definitely give that a shot. I would not be surprised if even very weak AI programs are able to make maps on GIS faster than humans can. I know because I've seen my brother and sister run SQL on AI programs. And that's, I think, a little bit more complicated.
[54:23] Yeah, like I tried, just out of curiosity, because I'm working on a new book, and I tried using AI to generate a plot. And I, you know, it generated a plot, but the ages of the kids were all wrong. And, you know, there was just, so I had to tell it, okay, well, adjust all of this to make sure the ages are correct. And, you know, after sort of five or 10 adjustments to the prompt, it produced a fairly decent plot. Now, I didn't end up using it because I just preferred, but I was just kind of curious how it would do it. And I sort of remember years ago when I was starting Peaceful Parenting, I was, I think I posted about this. I was kind of curious and said to AI, you know, create a table of contents for a Peaceful Parenting book and so on. And again, it was not terrible, not fantastic, and I didn't end up using it because, again, I just sort of prefer doing it myself, but...
[55:20] I think everybody, and this is sort of general advice, right? It's good. This is a public call, right? This is general advice to everyone. If, you know, I mean, obviously AI, at least yet, is not going to replace your retail job, but anything that is mental labor, anything that is language or math or programming based, anything that's conceptual based, anything that's white collar, my gosh, I mean, it would be, and I did this, right?
[55:45] So, I mean, what was it, a year or two ago, we loaded up all of my books and articles and a whole bunch of podcasts and so on into AI and tweaked and worked with it because I needed to figure out what was AI capable of.
[56:06] That reproduced or replaced what it is that I do. And so all of that is really important because as maybe what's happening in your field. And, you know, I don't think marketing would have been the solution because AI is fantastic at creating marketing plans. I mean, are they, you know, top 1% of genius? No, they're not like I'd like to teach the world to sing or whatever, right? But, you know, the top 1% is the top 1%. There's still 99% of people that AI can do a pretty good job on. So this is a general advice to everyone. If you're, I mean, if you're a plumber, okay, AI is not going to eat your lunch. Although there are certain aspects of your job that AI can definitely make easier in terms of scheduling or marketing plans or logos or things like that. But I think it's well worth sitting down and you could take, like one of the things that I would do if I were in your shoes, I'm sure you still have some of your old assignments from university, right? So what I would do is I would take a day and I would say, okay, so here's an assignment I had at university, it took me a week. I'm going to try and reproduce it through AI. How long is that going to take me?
[57:23] And if it's like, it was a week, now it's an hour, you know, that's a 40 to 1. Efficiency boost, which, you know, I mean, obviously this is real thumbnail sketch mathematics, but if it's a 40 to 1 productivity boost to use AI, where you needed 40 jobs, you now need one. Which maybe explains why you're not getting the callbacks. The impact of AI on intellectual labor can scarcely be over-exaggerated. And everybody needs to test how replaceable they are. Now, that doesn't mean that you can't get a job in your field, but it means that the jobs in your field are going to be leveraging skills plus AI.
[58:15] I mean, I'm sure you've seen this, I think on X, it was a month or two ago or three. Some guy created a flight simulator just through prompts. I don't think he really touched the line of code at all. And he basically said to the AI, add multiplayer and boom. Right. And I've worked with some code with multiplayer. The fact that you can just say to a computer, add multiplayer, and it kind of happens is like, I can't tell you how freaky that is, right? So everybody is either replaced, everybody in these kinds of fields, you're either going to get replaced by AI, or you're going to leverage AI. But I don't know that there's much in between. Because even if you've got some boomer who doesn't want to leverage AI, he's going to lose out to people who do.
[59:09] Right. It's just more efficient.
[59:11] Yeah. I mean, imagine how many you got. I mean, even to create a flight simulator and then, you know, to add multiplayer would be, you know, weeks of an experienced programmer as opposed to just saying add multiplayer and it kind of happens. Right now, I'm sure there were some tweaks and this and that and the other, but that is a whole different thing. So in the economy, you have to figure out how to leverage the technology to maximize your productivity. And if you are sending out resumes, and I'm just guessing, I mean, this may be completely inapplicable, right? But I think it's well worth looking into. If you're sending out resumes saying, I can do this or that or the other data manipulation by hand, well, I mean, it's like sending out a resume saying, here's all the math I can do longhand on paper when everybody's getting a calculator for free, so to speak, right?
[1:00:05] So, you just, you know, here, I'm really fast with a slide rule. It's like, well, we don't need slide rules anymore. And so I think that to merge with AI is important to take some tasks that took you a while in the past and see how quickly you can do it using AI become good at AI prompting and and all of that I mean that to me would be a a huge step forward and and the reason for that is either a it might help you get a job because you're good at AI or b which is sort of the point that I'm really working towards here, it might, if you want to become an entrepreneur and you're really good at leveraging AI and you already understand the data, well, how many people, I mean, there's really nothing more satisfying than putting people out of business who wouldn't give you a job.
[1:00:57] How many people can you replace? How many businesses can you replace if you learn to leverage this new technology along with the very technical skill set that you already have? Because the technical skill set is important because you'll know when the AI has gotten it wrong. Because you'll just have that sort of instinct based upon your experience and training and so on. right? I mean, it's, you know, what I was talking about with my daughter, like, why do I need to learn how to multiply numbers so I can just punch it into the calculator? And it's like, well, sure, but you kind of need to know what the calculator is doing in case you fat finger something, slip a digit, you need to know that it looks wrong, because that can happen. And this is even more true, it's infinitely more true almost with AI than it is with calculators, because AIs hallucinate a lot and so you need to have the technical skills to know.
[1:01:54] When it's gotten it wrong or when things just kind of look off and then you can refine it and so on right so if you can leverage AI with your skills you become much more valuable to people as a whole, And also, if that still doesn't bust you through, then you can leverage AI plus your skill sets in order to produce things, you know, cheaper, faster than your competitors or than other people in the field. And maybe that's an entrepreneurial opportunity, if that makes any sense.
[1:02:29] Yes. Yes, that makes sense. I just don't know how I'd market that skill. It'd be the only thing.
[1:02:35] Sorry, hang on, slow down. Market which skill? Because we talked about a bunch of different things.
[1:02:40] Right. The ability to use AI, how does one even market that skill on something like, if you're trying to pitch that ability to a company?
[1:02:50] Oh, no, I already mentioned that. But I mean, I talked about a lot of things. So maybe that one slip past you. So if I were in your shoes, what I would do is get a screen recorder software. There's one, I think that's built into Windows now called Snipping Tool or something like that. So get a screen recording software with your audio and say, okay, you know, here's an assignment that I had in university that took me a week and here's me doing it in 20 minutes in AI. And you can even, you know, speed it up so that it's, you know, they don't have to sit there for 20 minutes and so on. And, you know, I estimate that's a 80 to 1 productivity or 120 to 1 productivity tool, if it's 20 minutes versus 40 hours or something like that. So you would show yourself live and doing that, right? And so on your resume, you'd say, I'm also an expert in AI. If you'd like to see an example of how I saved, you know, 40, 80, 120 times worth of labor, you know you can look at this very quick video and and uh so on right so you would show yourself, working these prompts to get the desired output and that would that would help does that make sense yeah.
[1:04:02] It actually does make sense.
[1:04:03] And of course you could also um you know you could take a couple of ai courses and put them down on you know your resume and for people who didn't necessarily want to go and watch a video, you could simply have screenshots and saying, you know, here's what took me a week in college. Here's how I did it in an hour. And you would just make sure that people understood you have that skill, you have that ability. And, And here's how I deal with hallucinations, and here's how, you know, you just, that's the skill that I would be working on if I were in your shoes. And again, I'm not saying this is some magic solution, but it would certainly explain why you're not getting callbacks. Because if you're competing either with people who are producing wild productivity gains in-house with AI or people who have AI as their expertise, then you're like horse and buggy guy trying to enter the Indy 500, right? Like you're the Amish guy with a U-shaped horse trying to compete against some 12 billion horsepower car driven by, I don't know, Paul Newman or the guy from 90210 or Frankie Munz. So that may be why you're not getting traction.
[1:05:20] Yeah, yeah, yeah. That makes a lot of sense. That was the thing, though, is marketing it on a resume as somebody who doesn't have the time to look at it. But yeah, now we've touched on that.
[1:05:32] Sorry, I didn't quite catch that. You said marketing on a resume with somebody who doesn't have what?
[1:05:37] Somebody who doesn't have the time or desire to act. I see what you mean, like posting videos and stuff but uh like kind of like giving that that promotion and like a job application to somebody who's like i don't i don't you know doesn't want to watch the video or doesn't want to look at that now that we've touched on that i understand what you're saying wait.
[1:05:57] So sorry your first response is to say people aren't going to be interested.
[1:06:04] That not my first response necessarily but i also do know that uh a lot of these uh hiring departments allegedly kind of like use ai to weed people out so that's just something that you have to you know if you are able to throw that onto like a skills section or somewhere in the job application i have experience in this that's uh like programming chat gpt grok whatever, that's the thing that I don't know if you understand what I'm trying to say here No.
[1:06:36] You're giving me a yes but, You're automatically discounting and listen, I'm not mad or anything I'm just pointing it out that you're automatically discounting You're giving me the objections, when you haven't even tried the solution, And that's a yes, but approach. Well, you could try this, yeah, but, you know, they use a lot of AI to weed things out and people might want to watch the videos. So you're talking yourself out of enthusiasm or, right?
[1:07:15] That's what you're saying, yeah.
[1:07:16] So is that coming from the bad neighborhood door slam in the face when you were door to door? Like, where's the yes, but stuff coming from? because if you've got the yes but stuff and it's a tough job market, man it's going to be tough to get hired because you're competing with people who are mad enthusiastic now maybe maybe the solution that i'm offering you for whatever reason doesn't work but i don't think either of us knows that yet right.
[1:07:44] Yes i wasn't trying to say that it's it's not gonna work i've just all i was trying to to get that was the best way to market that to a perspective.
[1:07:56] No, that's not what you were doing. Because, sorry, to be blunt, right? So what I was saying was, here's a possible solution. And then the first thing you did was not say, I'm excited to try that. But here are the reasons it won't work. Or here's the reasons why it's less likely to work. If that makes sense. And it's not some big criticism, but that's what you were doing. And that's the part that we need to figure out, if that makes sense. That's the part of what's going on in your heart and mind that we need to figure out, because that's probably your biggest impediment. So, let me give you an example sort of to let you know what I mean. So, you know, 2005, I get an article published, 2006, so 2005, I start podcasting. And was there any business plan or any way to monetize or make money podcasting in 2005?
[1:09:06] Not foreseeably.
[1:09:07] Well, there wasn't at the time, and there didn't seem to be anything imminent, if that makes sense. Right there was no monetization uh there was no um subscription i don't there was no paypal i think back then uh and so uh if if somebody said to me hey you know you love philosophy, here's what you should do man you should, you should make it a job right i'd be like well hang on i mean bandwidth was crazy expensive back then, which is why the early shows were like 40k audio quality, right? So would I have a lot of, reasons to say to people, well, this can't work, or at least it can't work in any, I mean, particularly people don't even know about podcasts. How am I going to get people to even listen uh you know i mean i don't have a phd in philosophy from a ivy league university like there could have been tons of objections right.
[1:10:17] That i right make regarding that right, but if somebody said to me you should try this the first thing that i would do and i know this because that's what i did is trying to figure out how to make it work not list off the reasons why it couldn't work or was unlikely to work.
[1:10:41] So that's the reaction I need to understand.
[1:10:47] So where's that coming from?
[1:10:56] The heaviness, the weight, the negativity, the yes, but here's why it won't work. Here's why it can't work. As opposed to, well, that's a really interesting thing. Maybe it'll work with it. Because I gave you two things, right? And you only focused on the one, right? So I gave you two things. One is that maybe it'll help you get a job in your field. And also, I talked a bit about, quite a bit about, you could use this if you get good at this kind of stuff. You could take your skills, combine it with AI and start a business that would be much more productive than other people's businesses, right? So if other people in your field, for whatever reason, don't understand the value of AI, then you can out-compete them by starting your own company. If they do understand the value of AI, then you getting good at AI in your field will be a big boost to getting a job. Does that sort of make sense?
[1:11:47] Yes, that makes sense.
[1:11:48] So, I mean, that's the sort of decision tree. And your response was, yeah, but they're just going to filter it out and it's not going to work, right? They use AI and blah, blah, blah, right? And so, it's not going to work stuff. I mean, I'm not the worst businessman in the world. I've been an entrepreneur for almost 30 years. I've started two or three successful businesses. I mean, you know, I survived deplatforming and like, I'm not the worst guy at this stuff, right? I mean, I may have some, something of value to offer and your response. And again, this is not a criticism or anything that I'm nagging you about, but to me, it was interesting that your response was, yes, but Here's why it won't work.
[1:12:37] Right, yeah, I get what you're saying. So the first one, the first answer I would say is, I don't have a whole lot of experience with AI to the point where I believe that it's truly marketable yet. So I would have to self-train. Not something I'm opposed to doing.
[1:13:05] That is an annoying non-answer. well no it is it is okay how long do you think it takes to get a master's degree in economics.
[1:13:16] Right right no no.
[1:13:17] You're talking about going back to school for two years straight incurring another fifty thousand dollars or twenty five thousand dollars in liabilities and lost income right right.
[1:13:29] Right no no i get what you're saying i.
[1:13:31] I don't think what i'm getting No, I don't think you did. Because you're saying, I'm going to spend two years, get a master's or whatever it is going to be, right? Not work or work little, spend a lot of money, right? Go into debt. I'm willing to do that for maybe, maybe a job, maybe. But man, learning how to become good at AI, even though I'm already good at data analytics and know something about programming, well, that's just a bridge too far. So that's a non-answer.
[1:14:00] Well i'm not saying no no i'm not saying that's a bridge too far my fear is that that is the, the self-educated aspect of it i fear will not, there's an also an.
[1:14:25] Annoying non-answer do you know why, you listen to me in one ear at your job right.
[1:14:35] Right.
[1:14:35] How much of the value that i provide to philosophy was i taught.
[1:14:42] Yes, sir. I understand that you, that you are self-taught.
[1:14:45] I mean, I did take some courses in university, but my focus was on history. So if you're going to say, well, but you know, it's a self-taught aspect of things. That's the problem. And it's like, you're literally calling a guy who's largely self-taught saying that if it's self-taught, it has less value.
[1:15:04] No, no, no, no, no. I don't believe that has less value. I, Listen, just as an example, I'm very big into strength training. I'm completely self-taught. I've read a couple books. I've watched a lot of videos. And then a lot of it is just evidence of what I've done to myself. So I know a lot more about training than your average kinesiology or exercise science student. I don't look down on the self-training aspect of it at all. I just have a fear that when it comes to, okay, time to market, time to put myself out there, time to apply for jobs, that the fact that a big skill of mine being completely self-taught is not going to look good.
[1:15:57] And also a non-answer. Also a non-answer. If you remember, I also said that you could take some AI courses.
[1:16:04] Right, right, right. Yes, yes.
[1:16:06] So then that would, so you are coming up with objections that I've already dealt with. And that means that you have a negative view of the solution. And it means that you are, because I already said that, said, you know, if it comes to credibility, you could take some AI courses, right? Do you remember me saying that.
[1:16:27] Yes yes yes.
[1:16:28] So now when you say when you say that's what being entirely self-taught is a problem yeah when i'd already dealt with that means that you are looking for problems not solutions and again i'm not i'm this is not some big critical nag or but it's a fact.
[1:16:48] Yes, I.
[1:16:51] So why? Now, you're trying to give me reasons as to why you're negative about these things prior to trying them, right? You're trying to give me reasons, but your reasons don't hold up to scrutiny, which means that your reasons are covering an emotional issue. And what's the emotional issue?
[1:17:16] The emotional issue is is fear really, I obviously haven't had a lot of success in the job market at all and when it seems that the, I don't really I'm having trouble trying to put it into words I'm just fearful that.
[1:18:16] At the end of the day, uh, courses in AI and self education will hold up to a hiring, um, manager in the same way that the formal education will. And that I'm, not going to, it won't help to give me the opportunity that I yearn for.
[1:18:52] Okay. Do you use Apple or Mac or Windows?
[1:18:57] Apple.
[1:18:59] Okay. Did Steve Jobs have an advanced degree?
[1:19:08] I don't believe so, right?
[1:19:11] Certainly not when he started, right? I mean, in fact, I think Steve Jobs started by giving people illegal free long distance, if I remember rightly. Of course, you know, Bill Gates dropped out of university to pursue Microsoft and so on, right? And if you kind of look around, credentialism is the issue, right? Do you have confidence in the absence of something that tells people you're good? That's the challenge, right? Now, I mean, I have a graduate degree. My graduate thesis was in the history of philosophy. But very little of what I've ever talked about on this show comes from my formal education. And of course, I've never said to people, well, I'm right because I have a graduate degree or I'm right because I have a high IQ or I'm right, like, I just make the arguments. So help me understand this credentialism thing where well i mean i mean i don't know can you get a phd in ai it's such a new field i don't think so.
[1:20:31] No you cannot.
[1:20:33] Right right so in in sort of the very newest field which which is constantly changing and even if you got a degree in ai whatever that might mean even if you had a whole bunch of education in an ai and you graduated a year ago, well, the AI parameters changing, the AI abilities are changing, there's constantly new AIs, right? So how would that mean that you were skilled at the newest AIs or the best AIs or the more specialized or niche AIs or whatever it is, right? Or maybe you figured out how to get around censorship in Western AIs and then you get access to some Chinese AI where you can't criticize communism, but you can do all of the other stuff that you'd get barred for in a lot of Western AIs, right? So with regards to AI, help me understand where this credentialism stuff is coming in. You say, well, I'm afraid that I might not be taken seriously without, I don't know what, some sort of credentialism or something like that. But there's two kinds of people in the world, Right. I mean, one of the people who look at results and one of the people who look at credentials. And that's why I said, you know, you would show a video of you, a sped up video of you doing the prompts and getting the app so that people could see that you actually did it. Because that's empiricism, right?
[1:21:55] Yes, sir. And I actually am quite disdainful for credentialism, but I feel that my liberal arts degree in sociology has been what has been keeping me out of the workforce for so long. That's always what I charted up to is like, when I never get a callback for these jobs, you can go.
[1:22:32] And try to take blame off of yourself and you can say the economy is bad, the hiring manager is stupid, whatever you want, or you can kind of try to own your problem. And my version of owning the problem has been like, I made a poor degree choice and that was getting a sociology degree. That's my credential. And it's barred me from the workforce. And if I had, uh, degree that was more meaningful like engineering or something like this people know what your credentials are and i wouldn't have such an issue getting into the workforce so if you want to know where that's coming from it's my assessment of my entire issue is my lack there of credentials and, to not have credentials and still try to force your way into the workforce like, when i'm seeing that as the issue force your way if.
[1:23:39] Sorry force your way into the workforce what does that mean.
[1:23:41] Well okay um ramps i didn't describe i don't.
[1:23:48] Know what you mean like.
[1:23:50] Yeah i didn't think the negative.
[1:23:52] Most negative possible way like if you're going to go up and ask a girl uh go go up and talk to a girl at a coffee shop you're forcing your way into her personal space it's like a mansplaining assault. I mean, phrasing things in the most negative possible, force your way into the workspace. It's like, I never mentioned anything like that.
[1:24:12] Right, yeah. That wasn't the right word to describe it.
[1:24:16] No, it's the right words if you're negative.
[1:24:18] Yeah. Which, I mean, my point's still standing. My lack thereof credentials is what I see as my issue. And to not go get credentials the quote-unquote right way through a university, I wouldn't say that I'm skeptical of because most people that are actually uber successful don't have those quote-unquote credentials the right way through university. Most people, not so much, but it's just kind of hard to vision that reality for myself.
[1:25:05] I'm not sure what you mean.
[1:25:10] Um, well, it's like.
[1:25:18] Are you saying that you're saying you need more, you need more and better credentials?
[1:25:24] I mean, that's as it stands right now to go apply for more jobs. Yes. I need more and better credentials. And that would have to kind of be from a university because I don't have anything else to show for it. I don't have a good job experience. So the experience comes down to what did you do at university? And that's all I'm saying is my fear of trying to do something without the credentials from university and be successful is hard to imagine for myself for whatever reason. I guess it's just because what I'd always been taught is go to school, get your degree and go to work that that is the end-all be-all so to imagine myself being successful in absence of the relevant degree is hard to imagine.
[1:26:17] All right so then i guess if that's your hypothesis then you should go and get more credentials.
[1:26:27] I'm not sure why you'd need me for that and i'm i know this sounds like uh i don't know like petty or blowback i'm genuinely like if if if your basic thesis is you lack the right credentials and if you go and get the right credentials you can have a great career then, i'm not sure why you'd call someone who's had great success with little to no credentials, saying that the road to success is credentials like i mean i i didn't take computer science courses, but I was a very good programmer and actually head of research and development for a small to medium-sized company. And, you know, the value that I've provided in philosophy has not been because of credentials, but because of original thought and reasoning from first principles. So I'm not sure. I mean, if you'd sent me an email saying, Stef, I'm not doing well in my career, so I need to get more credentials. I'd be like, okay, well, if that's what you believe, you should go do it. But I'm not sure why you'd call someone who lacks credentials to make the case that you need credentials. And again, I'm just, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not trying to, trying to be mean or anything. I'm just, if your argument is, well, Stef, I just lack credentials, then I guess if that's your belief and you know, you feel better than I do, then I guess you should go get the credentials, but I'm not sure what our conversation is about that.
[1:27:54] Yes sir i i sorry i was trying to explain my i i you've kind of chewed the argument back up and and spit it in my face and to the point where that's.
[1:28:05] That's i've not hang on bro this language you use is really inflammatory are you aware of that, You think I've spat something in your face?
[1:28:14] No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
[1:28:15] That's what you said. You said you chewed up my argument and spat it back in my face. Like, that's really escalating in aggressive language, right?
[1:28:22] Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. No, no, no. I've made a poor argument. You've made a far better case for what you're saying than I did. And I, like, I'm trying to say that I think that you're right.
[1:28:36] Right about what?
[1:28:39] That my hold on to credentialism is foolish, I was simply trying to explain where it's coming from but everything you've said so far has made far more sense what I've like I don't think my argument in defense of the.
[1:28:58] Credentialism is correct credentialism is another cover for the emotional issue, and what's the emotional issue, when i say you know maybe take your skills run them through ai maybe that'll help you get a better job or you can compete with people who are resisting ai like either ai is a value in the industry or it's not and if it's if it is a value then you having some ai experience and perhaps some credentials will help and if it's not but could be then you can start a business and out compete everyone else i mean that doesn't seem to be much of a downside to it um so, yeah help me understand help me understand the yes but yes sir um.
[1:29:49] Um so my truth, it's a lack of confidence to to be completely honest with you I feel that I have kind of failed at pretty much everything that I've thrown my hat into the ring with. And it's not that I, what you're saying does make perfect sense to me. And I do believe is worth trying and is good advice, but I just don't have a whole lot of confidence in myself because I don't have any history of being successful with just about anything.
[1:30:44] So the emotional response is like a lack of confidence.
[1:30:50] Okay. I appreciate that. That's very honest and direct and courageous. Just so, why do you think, or what is your perception of your lack of ability? Why do you have that perception?
[1:31:12] I don't know that I would quite describe it as a lack of ability. I just have a track record of doing poorly at everything I've really tried at in my life. I played sports as a kid. My first passion was lacrosse. And when I was a young kid, my dream was to go play at the collegiate level and do very well. I get to high school and I get cut from my JV team twice. So the lacrosse career is a failure.
[1:31:57] And sorry, why do you think you got cut?
[1:32:04] I got cut because I didn't, I believe that I didn't work hard enough at what I should have worked hard at.
[1:32:19] Okay so why didn't you why didn't you train harder yeah why didn't you train harder and practice more and it's not a criticism again just genuine curiosity why didn't you train hard harder and practice more?
[1:32:34] I wasn't a leader. I was a follower.
[1:32:37] That's fine. No, that's not a reason. I mean, there's quarterbacks and then there's people who run around. There's the captain of the hockey team and then there's the not captains. They're all in the NHL, right? Or NFL.
[1:32:52] Yes, sir.
[1:32:53] So the leader-follower thing is not the answer. Why do you think you didn't work harder and practice more.
[1:33:02] The friends of mine who were very good didn't do a whole lot of practicing. And that was because they were likely very naturally talented and athletic. And I did not do as much. I thought that I could, they're not going that hard. You know, why should I have to go? I just show up on game day, on practice day, and I'll make it happen just like they do. and uh you know bad attitude it's not.
[1:33:31] The right attitude maybe they had practiced harder and trained more when they were younger yes absolutely so they would have inherited a bunch of skills that you didn't necessarily inherit right right.
[1:33:43] Yep and i never did anything to address that like uh.
[1:33:47] Okay so hang on so so hang on so if something is a dream you work real hard to achieve it right Yes. So if you don't work very hard to achieve something, by that definition, it cannot be a dream, or at least not a very passionate one.
[1:34:12] Right. I mean, it's something that I really, really wanted to happen, but I did not work.
[1:34:17] No, no, you didn't really, really want it to happen. Otherwise, you would have made it happen.
[1:34:24] Well, I thought that I really wanted it to happen.
[1:34:25] Well, I don't care what you thought. I care about the empiricism. Empirically, was it your biggest dream that you would move heaven and earth to achieve?
[1:34:40] I did not.
[1:34:42] Yeah, I mean, Maria Callas is a sort of famous soprano opera singer, and she studied, you know, four different languages. She was always practicing like crazy. She took endless singing lessons. She studied stagecraft. I mean, it was her kind of obsession to be a big star, and she became a big star because she worked, you know, 60, 70, 80 hours a week to achieve it, right? The Beatles obviously wanted to be a band and a successful band. And, you know, they spent two years playing four to six hours a day at a Munich nightclub, right? And so rather than imagining what your motives are in the past, look at the empiricism of your actions. And that's where the truth is.
[1:35:35] I understand.
[1:35:36] So empirically, was it a big passionate dream of yours if you weren't willing to put in the extra work to achieve it?
[1:35:50] Uh, well, in that case, no.
[1:35:53] Right. Right.
[1:35:54] I was absolutely devastated when I did not realize what I had hoped for. I'll say that. Like, it's not like I got cut from the JV team. That's like, ah, man, that sucks. Like I went and bawled my eyes out in the back of my dad's car on the way home.
[1:36:10] Okay. Now, your father, was he involved in anything to do with your sports? And I don't mean necessarily a coach, but I mean, was he following all this?
[1:36:18] Yeah, following all this.
[1:36:19] Okay. So, your father, was he aware that you were not doing the necessary practice and training to be really good at the sport?
[1:36:35] Here's kind of like the caveat to that is I would go and like shoot around and pass with my brother in the yard all the time. But what I really need to be… That's not training. Right. That's not training. No. I wouldn't go run laps I wouldn't go run sprints I wouldn't go, work on the more athletic side of the things it was just like, playing for enjoyment and I guess that I was pushed to do more of that and then I would go do it for like a day and then, just be like, I'll do a play pass with my brother and shoot her out of the yard that'll count as working hard, Okay.
[1:37:19] So, was your father aware that you weren't doing the necessary training to succeed at the sport?
[1:37:26] Probably a bit, yeah. He had an idea.
[1:37:28] Okay. And did he say, if you don't do this training and this practice, the likelihood is you're going to get cut from the team?
[1:37:44] Um, yeah, a little bit.
[1:37:48] Okay so i'm not sure what a little bit means like he said that occasionally.
[1:37:55] Yeah i mean he thought that i more so had like confidence issues and wasn't playing as well as i as i could have been but i don't think it was quite that i think i was getting swallowed up by better athletes than myself because i wasn't working hard enough.
[1:38:09] Okay so your father told you if you don't work hard you're most likely going to get cut from the team right great now did your father ever try and figure out why you weren't working hard if this was a very big dream of yours, And why do you think he didn't? I mean, it is a parent's job to try and facilitate and encourage their children to achieve their dreams, right?
[1:38:41] Right. I mean, perhaps he didn't realize the gravity of how much I was setting myself back by not doing that.
[1:38:52] I mean, it's kind of his job.
[1:38:53] A little bit of a setback. Maybe not, you know, play, you know, go division one college ball level, but, you know, maybe like division two, division three college ball level, but they'll still fare out.
[1:39:10] So he did not help you or give you the facts that you needed to facilitate your dream, right? Which is you've got to practice and some of it's going to be unpleasant. Some of it's going to be really boring.
[1:39:24] Yes, I agree.
[1:39:26] Okay. And is this the case in his life that he doesn't do the necessary work to achieve significant success?
[1:39:38] I mean, I would have to disagree because I would say that objectively he's obtained significant success.
[1:39:44] Okay. So if he knows how to achieve significant success, why do you feel like a failure? Why hasn't your father transferred his knowledge and his skills in those areas to you?
[1:40:06] I mean, he tries to give me advice like we went over toward the beginning of the call. I just don't believe that it's been the right advice. Like I said, he's just like, yeah, just keep applying for jobs. I'll talk to some of my friends. I'll help you network, and eventually a door is going to open for you. And I don't have a degree that's in my job line either. I spent a while being underemployed. You're going to be fine. That's kind of the message I always get.
[1:40:39] Okay, but it's not a message that you believe?
[1:40:42] No.
[1:40:43] And your feelings of insecurity regarding your abilities or your willpower go back to childhood, right?
[1:40:53] Yeah, and I would say, again, it's like the kind of lacrosse thing that I've spelled out. And additionally, I would say as well with schoolers, I also underachieved my way through high school. Like I got good enough grades to get by, get myself into university, but I've never truly like pushed myself to do well in the classroom. So I kind of consider that a fail. You did worse than you should have done.
[1:41:19] Okay. But empirically, you didn't particularly care about what was being taught in high school, right?
[1:41:28] No.
[1:41:29] I mean, you listen to what I do because I assume you care and find value in what it is that I do. So you listen to it when you're at work or other places. So you didn't particularly care about what was being taught in high school. Is that right?
[1:41:44] No, I, I, a class here and there, sure. But overall, no.
[1:41:50] Right. Okay. So if you're not interested in a subject, does it make a lot of sense to apply yourself like crazy to mastering that subject?
[1:42:07] No, but obviously a lot of people do. A lot of people go through high school and get straight A's and stuff without necessarily being interested, right?
[1:42:20] We're talking about you, though.
[1:42:22] Right. Yes.
[1:42:23] Like, I don't particularly care to learn Japanese. Right. It doesn't add much value to me, and I don't have really any interest in it. So I'm not going to spend 10,000 hours learning Japanese, right? Because that comes at the expense of other things, and it would be boring for me. And because it's boring for me, I wouldn't do well at it either, right?
[1:42:44] Sure.
[1:42:45] Okay. So, if you lack interest in something, it is not irrational to do the bare minimum to get by.
[1:42:58] Okay.
[1:42:59] But you view it as a failure. Okay.
[1:43:06] A little bit, yes.
[1:43:08] Okay, so, because we're spending half an hour on this topic, are you telling me now that you don't feel like a failure, it's only just a little bit?
[1:43:15] No, no, no.
[1:43:16] Because it's also, like, you keep moving the goalposts here, it's kind of annoying.
[1:43:20] Yeah, I apologize.
[1:43:20] Like, I thought we were trying to deal with foundational insecurity you have, and then you're saying, ah, it's just a little bit.
[1:43:25] Yes.
[1:43:26] Okay, so, what are we doing?
[1:43:28] Yes, sir, I get what you're saying.
[1:43:30] But you see, that's the negativity. That's the negativity. Right there. We're trying to solve a problem for you trying to get to the root of a problem you say it's not really a problem.
[1:43:39] No it certainly is a problem I'm not trying to say that it's not a problem I, I yes I see I get what you are spelling out here with like you weren't exactly interested in what was being taught in school so why, you know why it's not exactly hard to see that you wouldn't necessarily apply yourself to it but it. I feel that I was capable of doing better than I did. So it's kind of hard to not see that as failing, right?
[1:44:17] Capable of doing better than you did.
[1:44:20] Yes.
[1:44:20] Okay. So it's hard not to see that as failing.
[1:44:24] Right.
[1:44:26] But you didn't want to do better than you did. So if you had forced yourself to do better than you did, you would have been denying your own feelings and your own preferences, which would have been just a different kind of failure. I mean, the people who get straight A's, not all of them, but a lot of them, are just NPCs who like jumping through hoops.
[1:44:48] Right. Yeah.
[1:44:53] I mean, they're like the people who say, I can get along with anybody. It's like, well, that's not, I don't think that's a good thing. I have no standards, right? So, I mean, I'm a big fan of Nietzsche's Don't Leave Your Actions in the Lurch, right? Which is to be curious rather than condemn your past choices.
[1:45:15] Could you have done better in high school? Sure, I'm sure you could have. But that would have come at the expense of other things.
[1:45:23] Right.
[1:45:26] And it was certainly good enough to get you through college, right?
[1:45:32] I did a lot. Yes, I did a lot better in university than I did in high school. So that's also a place where it's going.
[1:45:40] Yeah, because you had more choice. And it mattered to you more. Okay, so what is your father or mother's perspective on you not getting straight A's in high school or getting kicked off the lacrosse team twice? Was it twice? Did I have that right?
[1:45:54] Twice.
[1:45:54] Okay. So even the first time wasn't enough to get you to change, right?
[1:46:00] Right. so.
[1:46:01] What are your parents perspective on you underachieving so to speak.
[1:46:09] Okay so i would say this with their grades um, my i am honest with this and i think both my parents would be honest with this i would get in trouble if i brought home anything less than than a b so i would just go get straight bees so that I wouldn't get privileges taken on. So my report card was always bees, just bees.
[1:46:34] Okay. So did your parents ever inquire as to why your motivation was low with regards to sports and academics?
[1:46:44] Um, No, not really.
[1:46:56] Okay, I don't know what not really means. There's so much fog in this conversation, man.
[1:47:00] Yeah, yeah, yeah, I see. I see. I apologize. Okay.
[1:47:07] Did they have conversations that sit you down and say, without judgment, right? Without, oh, if effort matched ability, you'd be an A+, right? But saying, hey, so tell me, I mean, are you not motivated? Do you not particularly care about these courses? Like, why do you think that you are underperforming relative to your potential, right? And without being like finger wagging, like, how dare you not achieve your potential, right? But your parents have a curious about your level of motivation and your judgment of the sports and academics and so on.
[1:47:45] No, I never had that conversation. um we i had been like kind of diagnosed with adhd in middle school so i feel like they always kind of chalked it up to that oh.
[1:47:59] And did you go on the meds.
[1:48:00] Briefly i i fought very hard to get off.
[1:48:08] Okay all right so your parents did chalked it up to what brain chemistry, yeah okay now did they give you the impression i mean where did this impression come from that you were bad or wrong for not doing better.
[1:48:32] I think it it comes from myself nope.
[1:48:38] Nope no i mean in our childhood generally it comes from our surroundings not 100 but that's the first place to look.
[1:48:50] Okay um, i don't i don't know that i thought it came from myself because you know all this time they're like man you're getting a's in university that in harder courses if you just tried in in high school you would have done much better right so that's okay what would it have what what.
[1:49:09] Would it have gotten you to do better in high school.
[1:49:15] Probably not much more than i can just say that i've done better in high school maybe i could have uh i i got denied from some bigger universities maybe i could have gone to a bigger university but again i really wasn't too interested in doing that so that's kind of like a you know so.
[1:49:31] You didn't put more effort into something that didn't give you more benefit i mean.
[1:49:35] You read me this you understand.
[1:49:37] By communism one of the main reasons communism doesn't work is it separates effort from reward.
[1:49:43] Right yes so.
[1:49:45] Are you saying that you should have had a communist approach to your grades in high school.
[1:49:49] No i'm serious no no no i see i see what you're saying um i.
[1:49:54] Should have worked harder for no extra.
[1:49:57] Pay yeah yeah that's stupid i don't know it's just the way that i look at it is like you know that was kind of your job you you were a student. I wasn't working. I was just going to school.
[1:50:09] Your job. School is not your job. School is forced upon you and you get very little choice.
[1:50:17] Yeah, that's true.
[1:50:18] That's like saying that some guy who's assigned under Stalin to be a janitor should take pride in his job because it's his job. It's like, no, that's just his prison sentences to empty toilets, right? So to speak.
[1:50:30] Sure, sure, sure. Yeah.
[1:50:32] Okay.
[1:50:32] Well, you know, that's kind of the way that I looked at it while I was in university, but if you want to be really honest, I didn't have much choice over going to university. I went to private school. That was part of that conversation when I said, maybe university isn't for me. Well, you're going to have to pay me back for private school if you don't go to university. I put you in private school with the idea that you're going to go to university.
[1:50:52] Sorry. Hang on, hang on. Your father said, you'll have to pay me back for private school if you don't go to university. And how much money would that have been?
[1:51:01] Oh man, I went to private school since I was in eighth grade all the way up through my senior year of high school. I did change schools once. And when I went to the Catholic school, it was a bit cheaper. But we're talking like probably, that's probably $100,000 worth.
[1:51:23] So your father said, you have to pay me $100,000 if you don't go to university. What do you think of that?
[1:51:37] I didn't like it in the moment, and I don't like it now.
[1:51:41] Why is it funny?
[1:51:44] I'm just trying to laugh it off, really.
[1:51:47] Why are you trying to laugh it off? Hang on. Why are you trying to laugh it off? I mean, you're more negative about my business suggestions and more positive about your father trying to restore a hundred grand out of you. It's like a complete inversal or inversion of values here. You didn't laugh or show any positivity to my potential solutions for your career issues, but you're laughing and chuckling about your dad threatening you for a hundred thou.
[1:52:32] Yeah, I get your point.
[1:52:39] I mean, I'm shocked. I'm honestly, I'm shocked that this amount of financial, I mean, catastrophic financial bullying, right, $100,000 US is a staggering amount of money, particularly for a young person, right?
[1:52:56] Yes, sir. I don't know that it might have been an idle threat. I didn't test it.
[1:53:04] So we're minimizing again you're just taking me around and around no no no no i'm.
[1:53:07] Sorry i'm not yeah no no i'm not i'm not trying to minimize that at all uh but.
[1:53:12] Yes you are just saying you are you are you said it might not have been a serious threat, i mean but a threat is a threat and it certainly wasn't make as a joke right.
[1:53:26] Right and i did not take it as a joke in the moment.
[1:53:28] Right so that's a threat right Yes.
[1:53:31] Sir.
[1:53:33] You know, if some guy threatens to set fire to some guy's house, he doesn't get to say, I was only joking.
[1:53:43] Correct.
[1:53:45] It was real for you, right?
[1:53:47] Correct.
[1:53:48] Was your mother aware of this threat? And what does she say about it?
[1:53:58] Never been able to get a good answer. sorry, it's a good answer on that one. Uh, I think I talked to her about it once after the fact, um, but then like a recent conversation that I can think of. And, um, I, if I recall correctly, she both made light of it and defended it.
[1:54:23] Okay. So you were not raised with negotiation, with negotiation skills.
[1:54:35] No.
[1:54:37] You were raised with top-down kind of bullying stuff, weren't you? I mean, if I'm wrong, obviously correct me.
[1:54:44] Yeah you know uh this is a let's talk about it this way there's a to quote my grandmother, my father's mother and uh to i don't remember the conversation that brought it up but i remember her saying to me at one point the way that she raised my dad was this is not a democracy this as a dictatorship and i was raised the same way so yes your point 100 on the mark.
[1:55:15] Okay so you were bullied you weren't reasoned with.
[1:55:21] No no no no i was never reasoned but i was always bullied yes so.
[1:55:27] Are we going back to revisit what you said about your childhood earlier.
[1:55:34] Uh which part sir well.
[1:55:36] I asked you about your childhood you said it was good.
[1:55:43] I remember.
[1:55:44] The whole thing my parents.
[1:55:45] Are together my grandparents are together my uncles are.
[1:55:47] All together and.
[1:55:48] That's the way that it was uh.
[1:55:50] It was a very positive thing yes i don't have it like your other calling.
[1:55:54] Yes sir this person you gave me quite a sales pitch there yes sir i've heard some very dark stuff from some of your other call and listen so um i was.
[1:56:07] Yeah but they know it's dark.
[1:56:09] Right i okay so i want to, i want to be clear that there's a lot of people in this world that would kill for, the childhood that i had um and so i don't want to minimize or make light of that at all there were a lot of things that um my parents did that i absolutely disagree with though, okay does that make sense, i i just feel that i mean that's a zoom out perspective.
[1:56:42] That has no emotional content you know i i had a better childhood than some starving kid in.
[1:56:49] Africa okay yeah.
[1:56:51] So so what.
[1:56:56] Yes, sir. I am what you're saying, but, uh, forgive, I have a hard time, you know, trying to call it a, uh, I wouldn't call it a, I would, I still would not call it a bad childhood. Um, but I know that, you know, you've gone into detail about yours, for example. And, you know, if I say, well, no, but I knew mine was bad.
[1:57:23] I knew mine was bad.
[1:57:28] Well okay um how do i what's about how do i say this if i came on here and i said it was bad because of x y and z and you're like okay but your parents are still together you are upper middle class like you know how can you even call it bad when i know that the guy i'm talking to had it far worse you see what i'm saying well.
[1:57:53] You you're just honest about your experiences you don't compare them to others.
[1:57:57] Okay um all right because.
[1:58:02] You have this comparison thing right well compared to my friends compared to the guys who had more natural ability in lacrosse compared to all the people who got straight a's compared to this right it's compared to Stef my childhood blah blah blah right but that's all comparison stuff.
[1:58:14] Yes sir that's.
[1:58:16] Not authentic genuine experience that's just data analytics.
[1:58:24] Yes, sir.
[1:58:25] Because right now, you're, I don't want to say crippled, right? Because that's a very strong statement. But right now, you're calling me because you don't know how to move forward in your life.
[1:58:38] Correct.
[1:58:39] Right? And then I start talking about solutions, and I get a lot of negativity and pushback. And I'm trying to figure out where that comes from.
[1:58:52] Yes, sir.
[1:58:53] Now, when you talked about going into the trades, you got from your father a lot of negativity, hostility, and pushback, right?
[1:59:01] Yes, sir.
[1:59:02] So does your father, and don't have to call me sir, it's a little discombobulating. So with your father, is that his response to things? No, because he crosses, he's basically saying, cross your fingers, I'll keep working my contacts, you keep sending out resumes, and some door's going to open. Right? So he thinks the problem is you just have to roll the right number on the dice, but he doesn't recognize that one of the issues I think as to why you're not getting work is your negativity.
[1:59:39] Okay.
[1:59:42] I mean, I'm sure you've worked with negative people in the various jobs that you've had since you were in high school, right?
[1:59:49] Absolutely.
[1:59:50] And how do you find working with negative people? people who don't have any solutions, only problems and resist solutions and, uh, just kind of push back on, on everything.
[2:00:02] That's very unpleasant.
[2:00:04] Right. Do you want to work with those kinds of people?
[2:00:09] Not at all.
[2:00:10] Right. If you have those characteristics, I'm not saying to the same degree, do people want to really want to work with you?
[2:00:17] No, of course not.
[2:00:18] Right. So that's Probably the biggest challenge to overcome is the negativity.
[2:00:29] That would make sense.
[2:00:30] If the first time you get any kind of solution, the first thing you introduce is why it won't work and why it's a problem, even when, I mean, this is back to the coaching, right? You couldn't be coached in lacrosse either, right? I'm sure your lacrosse coach didn't just say, hack around things in the backyard with your brother, but gave you specific drills that you didn't follow, right? And you're in your early 20s, right? yes right so i'm almost 59 i've run a bunch of successful businesses i'm trying to give you some feedback and you're telling me all the ways in which i'm wrong right.
[2:01:13] That was not my goal but yes.
[2:01:15] Well see you say things like that like you already know i'm an empiricist right yes and i think that's i think that's the challenge is to figure out why, you are not coachable, or why you resist coaching. And I would assume it's because your father was pretty aggressive and maybe bullying at times, so you just resisted. Your father's solutions were top-down and probably erased your preferences. And so when people try to give you solutions, just as your father did, and your mother did, I think you just push back and resist because that's what you're used to, because your father did not engage with you with curiosity to figure out what was the roadblock to your motivations, but simply, in a sense, ordered you. He ordered you to do better, wanted you to do better. You did the bare minimum, B for bare minimum, right? And then you had doubt about the value of university. And he said, well, you owe me $100,000 if you don't go to university. And that was a real threat to you. And your father, it doesn't sound like he's taken ownership for his failures in coaching. So, how old were you when you were cut for the first time from the lacrosse team?
[2:02:36] I was 14.
[2:02:37] 14. Okay. And how long had you been playing lacrosse for?
[2:02:41] 10 years.
[2:02:42] Right. So, if you get cut from a lacrosse team, whose primary responsibility is that?
[2:02:50] It's mine.
[2:02:51] I'm sorry?
[2:02:52] That would be mine.
[2:02:53] No, false. Because if you were capable of primary responsibilities, you'd be out of the house. You'd be an adult. So the primary responsibility for you being cut from the team is your parents. Because they need to figure out why you resist being coached. Because if you resist being coached, you're going to get cut from the team because a coach doesn't want an uncoachable player, right? So then it's your parents' job if, you know, they meet with your coach or, you know, whatever they find out what your drills are. And if you don't do them, then the challenge for your parents is to figure out what is the block in your motivation so that you'll do the drills, right?
[2:03:47] Correct.
[2:03:48] They did not do that. They let you fail when it was completely predictable that you were going to fail. And then, because they took no responsibility themselves, who takes the blame? Yeah, that's right. So you blame yourself. So then you're like, well, I'm a failure, right? And I don't get straight A's. And I can't stay on the lacrosse team. And, you know, I chose the wrong major in university, right? So you blame yourself. Because your parents aren't taking responsibility.
[2:04:35] I've never thought about it that way. So you're kind of blowing my mind at the moment.
[2:04:40] If you blame yourself for going to university when you faced a $100,000 bill for not going to university when you're making a cozy 15 bucks an hour, right?
[2:04:53] Yeah.
[2:04:54] I mean, that's not rational, is it?
[2:05:06] Yeah, it's correct.
[2:05:09] I mean, I'm doing this math right now. All right, so let's say he doesn't even charge you interest, right? So we got a hundred thousand dollars divided by well it's 15 bucks an hour but you got taxes and stuff like that right right so let's say what is it 12 bucks an hour.
[2:05:35] Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. After taxes, yeah, probably.
[2:05:37] Okay, so $12 an hour. All right. So then you owed your father 8,333 hours of labor, right?
[2:05:46] Okay.
[2:05:47] So let's divide that by, let's say, 40 hours. Just keep the math simple. So you owed your father 208 weeks of work, right?
[2:06:00] Without any other expenses.
[2:06:02] Yeah, of course, of course. So that's four years. Assuming that every single penny of your paycheck went directly to your father, you did nothing else. You owed him four years of labor. So you might as well go to university.
[2:06:25] Right.
[2:06:26] It's more fun than working minimum wage and handing over your entire paycheck, right?
[2:06:31] Right, yep.
[2:06:34] And it also would have wrecked your relationship with your father.
[2:06:40] Yes, it would have.
[2:06:41] Right. So, it's time to stop blaming yourself. You're blaming yourself because your parents don't take responsibility. And listen, I'm not trying to throw them under the bus. I'm with you. They did some good stuff. They did some positive and helpful stuff, right? But in terms of your confidence, your father, by not negotiating with you and by not trying to help you figure out your own motivations, your father was setting you up for failure.
[2:07:18] And then he said, you're to blame for your failure, which shreds your self-confidence.
[2:07:32] Yeah. Yeah. I can definitely see that. I've never really even thought about anything close to this, but I can definitely see that as you're spelling it out for me.
[2:07:40] Yeah. So you're, you're angry at the lack of coaching that you received. And in fact, one could almost say, although I'm not saying it would be conscious, one could almost say sabotage. Right. So you're angry at the lack of coaching you received. And what that means is that when you get coaching, you get passive aggressive negative because you're angry. So you said fear. I don't think it's fear. I think it's anger. You're angry at having been bullied, you're angry at your parents not taking responsibility. And so when you get coached, that anger comes out and you resist the coaching and you make it very unpleasant for the coach because you're mad at your parents for not giving you the proper coaching and the proper coaching isn't telling you what to do. The proper coaching is trying to figure out your block, your blocks, right? I mean, there's no point telling you to run a bunch of wind sprints if you just, first thing you'll do is not run the wind sprints because you resent them, right? You have to figure out the resentment. I mean, that's what coaching really is. Coaching is not telling people what to do. Coaching is fundamentally removing the barriers to what common sense tells them to do.
[2:09:01] And if you have that lack of self-confidence, that's going to come across in how you communicate to people. It's going to come across in your resume. I mean, it's just going to come across. And when you first start out in a professional career, you need a lot of coaching, right?
[2:09:18] Absolutely.
[2:09:19] And if bosses or managers or team leads or project leads or whoever, if they sense that you are going to be resistant to coaching and hostile towards it, they will not hire you.
[2:09:34] Absolutely. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.
[2:09:36] I mean, when I got my first programming job, it was in a language I didn't know in an operating system I'd never even heard of. It was COBOL 74 on a tandem operating system. And it was in an industry, which is stocks and bonds trading, that I did not know. I mean, I had some general economic understanding, but not that, right? So I needed a lot of coaching.
[2:09:59] And I was thrilled to get the coaching. I was happy to get the coaching. I really worked hard to reward, because people like to coach, right? Because it's, I mean, it's one of the things I'm doing on this call, right? People like to coach. It's good to help people overcome their resistances to their own potential. It's a productive and positive thing in the world. So I needed a lot of coaching. I was very thankful for the coaching. And there are times when I was annoyed by it too. Um but that's natural right because most of us are pushed around it wasn't like you know i'm not saying it's all at home right it's not like you said there were a couple of teachers or classes that you enjoyed but for the most part it was not fun right because that's what you said it's like a job it's like no high school is just ideology being imposed upon you and maybe it was slightly better in private school but still they still have to follow the curriculum as a whole for the most part so you had teachers who were just telling you what to do um and not trying to figure out your resistance to it and teachers in schools they can't figure out your resistance because your resistance is to being forced to do stuff but that's school right i mean it's like trying to figure out why is somebody not enjoying their job in prison it's like because they're in prison can they get out of prison nope not for a long time so there's not much point trying to figure out motivation because it's understood, right?
[2:11:18] So, I think that it's frustration, anger at not having people try and figure out what your resistance is, not being empathetic as to why you don't want to do things, but they just keep telling you to do things and then they blame you when you don't do them.
[2:11:39] Yeah. So now that you're saying this, I can definitely, I can definitely see that.
[2:11:46] Yeah. So tell me, tell me about what you think of what I'm saying.
[2:11:51] Yeah. I think it totally makes a lot of sense. And it's also at the same time, um, being somebody who's like definitely, um, resistant to authority, that kind of helps to explain why I'm so resistant to authority as well. I mean, while somehow being raised with an iron fist of sorts, I also grew up constantly, believing that all authority need be questioned and i don't know how those two things came true at once but that that kind of makes sense now that i uh, have gone into this with you.
[2:12:46] Good good yeah and i think that's the stuff uh to to figure out within yourself that that you know if you're bullied and threatened you're just gonna resist that's uh nature of the beast and of course you know the adhd stuff i mean you know my view on it in the general adhd is smart kids in a boring school environment and uh you know but it's just chalked up to a completely untestable, unproven biochemical theory, right? Brain chemistry imbalance or whatever, right? So yeah, I think trying to figure out what your resistance is to being coached is once you figure that out and can learn to really genuinely embrace coaching, then people would really want to coach you. And when people sense that you're coachable, they'll hire you into entry-level positions if they sense you're not coachable uh they won't and and i doubt you would either right.
[2:13:43] Yeah i wouldn't blame anybody for not doing that.
[2:13:47] All right um yeah i mean it might be worth having a conversation with your parents about you know lack of negotiation or lack of, curiosity about your motivations when you were a kid might be worth something like that um and and see how that plays out but uh whether that happens or not i think definitely you know some journaling and some i'm a big fan of therapy though i know money's tight of course at the moment so but you know you can get books um with journaling and sentence completion stuff john gray has them nathaniel brandon has them and so on and there you can get them secondhand and they're both working through but i think once you can learn to really embrace the joys of being coached um i think your career will open up in in one direction or another.
[2:14:33] Do you think that's like uh there's also almost like a fake it so you make it aspect of that.
[2:14:42] What do you mean uh.
[2:14:52] To, uh, maybe that's not really fake it till you make it, but like go out of my way to try to be coached and embrace it as much as possible and like almost forcing myself into, uh, does that make sense?
[2:15:10] Well, I wouldn't work on actions at the moment. I would work on internals, you know, because everybody, when they get an insight on these shows, what do they always say? Well, what do I do about it? How do I act on it? It's like, well, just figure out what's going on with your resistance. Now, the fake it till you make it stuff. I mean, obviously, you don't want to completely fake things because that would be fraudulent. But it is fair to say I'm a smart person. I'm going to work hard at this. I will figure it out. That's confidence, right? I didn't fake UPB, but I did sit down saying I'm going to figure out secular ethics.
[2:15:47] I've been doing philosophy for 30 years I'm going to figure this out and but I didn't say I have a proof before I had the proof but I had the confidence to figure it out that I was going to figure it out to know that I was going to figure it out and it's the same thing you know when I was a programmer there'd be some new big challenge and I'd be like okay I don't know how to solve it but I'm confident I will be able to solve it and most times I could so I think with regards to all of that. It's not fake it till you make it, but it is recognizing that with enthusiasm, you can solve almost anything. Without enthusiasm, I mean, people who are enthusiastic climb to the top of Mount Everest. People who aren't enthusiastic can't go up three flights of stairs, right? So enthusiasm is the fundamental way that things get achieved in this world and if you have this undertow of resentment and resistance then it's going to be very hard to achieve anything if not impossible but once you uncork that and you take that damn away and the enthusiasm right i mean i've talked to some people you know i'm again i'm not saying the ai thing is some magical solution but it's certainly worth exploring and it gives you good skills who would be like jumping up and down it's like oh my god what a great idea i'm oh my god let me make a note to this. I'm going to spend all weekend on this.
[2:17:08] That can happen, right? And then maybe after the end of the weekend or the week or the two weeks or whatever, you find out it doesn't really do much. Okay. But it's worth, the enthusiasm is what counts. Whereas if you're like, oh yeah, but they're going to filter it out and I don't have credentials, then you're just not going to work at it.
[2:17:28] And then people aren't going to want to coach you because they give you solutions and you tell them how those solutions aren't going to work prior to even trying. Whereas if you're enthusiastic for the solutions, you give it your all. And look, I guarantee you, I guarantee you, getting AI skills is essential for everyone these days.
[2:17:50] I have no disagreement.
[2:17:52] Right. So if you hadn't thought of that, and that's something that we are talking about, then the enthusiasm for that should have you dive in and find a way to make it work. And so, yeah, I think the enthusiasm is key. And it's not any personal flaw that you lack enthusiasm, or you have this resentment or the yes, but thing, trying to uncork that, trying to take that dam away. So the waters of enthusiasm can flow unimpeded, I think is the key to getting your career off the ground in whatever direction it's going to. gonna go yeah.
[2:18:24] Absolutely that makes sense do you know of any good uh like courses off the top of your head have you seen have you worked with him before.
[2:18:32] You mean sort of ai courses yeah.
[2:18:35] I mean obviously i can type it in.
[2:18:37] And yeah you should you should look into it because it's going to be more specific to you yeah it's going to be more specific yeah.
[2:18:41] I didn't know if you knew anything.
[2:18:42] No i uh you.
[2:18:44] Personally work with.
[2:18:45] No i mean i've i've worked with ai quite a bit but uh not because I don't need to be credentialed for it because I'm just plugging my own stuff into it. All right, brother. Well, I'm going to stop here, but I really do appreciate your time today, and I hope you'll keep me posted about how it's going.
[2:19:00] Yeah, absolutely. And I feel that I kind of like bugged you and annoyed you a bit throughout the conversation. I really do apologize for that.
[2:19:08] No, no, that's fine. Honestly, that's, I mean, I appreciate the honesty, and without you being direct about that kind of stuff, we wouldn't have got to the solution. So don't worry about that at all. That's no problem at all.
[2:19:19] Yes, sir. I just didn't want to. I apologize for calling you that again. I was just trying to show some respect. There's respect with that one.
[2:19:25] All right. Thanks, Mel, brother. Keep me posted.
[2:19:27] All right. Absolutely.
Support the show, using a variety of donation methods
Support the show
