In Which I Get TROLLED! X Space

Stefan Molyneux

Stefan Molyneux fields calls on Freedomain that move seamlessly from the everyday mess of pet ownership to the tougher realities of business. One caller recounts the nonstop chaos at home—spilled bowls, escaped animals, the usual fur-covered disorder—and the laughter soon gives way to a more serious look at why people invest so much in pets, how they can ease a deeper sense of loneliness, and what that reveals about human connection. Another seeks marketing advice, and Stefan cuts straight to the essentials: forget gimmicks, concentrate on earning trust by consistently delivering real value, exceeding expectations when possible, and letting that reliability bring customers back. The shift between pet stories and business logic feels organic because both point to the same underlying need—for genuine, dependable bonds, whether with an animal that waits at the door or with people who return because they weren’t let down.  GET FREEDOMAIN MERCH! https://shop.freedomain.com/  SUBSCRIBE TO ME ON X! https://x.com/StefanMolyneux  Follow me on Youtube! https://www.youtube.com/@freedomain1  GET MY NEW BOOK 'PEACEFUL PARENTING', THE INTERACTIVE PEACEFUL PARENTING AI, AND THE FULL AUDIOBOOK! https://peacefulparenting.com/  Join the PREMIUM philosophy community on the web for free!  Subscribers get 12 HOURS on the "Truth About the French Revolution," multiple interactive multi-lingual philosophy AIs trained on thousands of hours of my material - as well as AIs for Real-Time Relationships, Bitcoin, Peaceful Parenting, and Call-In Shows!  You also receive private livestreams, HUNDREDS of exclusive premium shows, early release podcasts, the 22 Part History of Philosophers series and much more!  See you soon! https://freedomain.locals.com/support/promo/UPB2025

Transcript

00:00:00Good evening, everybody. Hope you're doing well. Stefan Molyneux from Freedomain at

00:00:03freedomain.com. Would love to get your help and support for the show, freedomain.com.

00:00:10To help out the show, really would appreciate that. I'd like to say thank you to the Scott Adams

00:00:15School with his lovely ex-wife and some other great people for a good chat this morning.

00:00:23It just went out for donors. It'll go out, I think, tomorrow. It was a very good conversation

00:00:29that had really, really good questions. And I hope to chat with them again soon. Yeah,

00:00:34I've got a bunch of stuff coming up. I have an in-studio show coming out with a fairly

00:00:40prominent fellow, whose name you would know. We'll keep it teaser, though. That's coming

00:00:45out hopefully in the next week or two. And don't forget, I will be in Atlantic City on

00:00:52the 11th of April for a rousing dinner debate combo. So I hope that you will be able to make

00:01:01it there. You can watch the live stream if you can't make it directly to Atlantic City. But

00:01:06wouldn't it be great? Wouldn't it be great to meet up face to face, chat, hug, perhaps hug it out

00:01:12a

00:01:12little, and do all of these kinds of lovely things face to face? We could break bread together. We

00:01:18can reason together. And that's something I kind of miss from being a studio band below these

00:01:26many moons. So I hope you will look at that. Wordwardebate. Wordwardebate.com is where you

00:01:33can go for more information on that. Of course, I'm very happy to take your questions this evening,

00:01:39questions, comments, issues, challenges, problems, criticisms, whatever is on your mind. I would be

00:01:47thrilled to help out with, I won't even, you know what, I'm not even going to say as best I

00:01:52can. I am

00:01:53going to say, I'm going to help out very well. All right, let's go straight to callers. Becky, what

00:02:03is on your mind? Hello, Becky. You're live with Dr. Frazier Crane. All right, if you're speaking,

00:02:13I can't hear you. This, of course, may... Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait! Okay, no need to yell. I'm

00:02:20just waiting. Go ahead. No, but wait, wait, wait, wait. There was a red microphone cut in the

00:02:26middle. I don't know why. Guys, I need your help. All right, I'm happy to help. Let's ignore

00:02:35politics, okay, tonight. For the first time in our lives, let's ignore politics. Yes. This

00:02:43week I had to replace a door because I had, well, I live with two bitches and a male dog

00:02:52and

00:02:53they had that problem. So the male dog decided to destroy the door. But wait a second, because

00:02:59the reason I wanted to hijack your space. I've got some cats which are pregnant and they're

00:03:08supposed to be, people not supposed to be, and they're going to be a factory of cats here.

00:03:14I need your help, please. I'm certainly, I'm willing to look at the potential philosophical

00:03:22angle of this. So you have a bunch of cats pregnant in your house? And dogs. And dogs

00:03:28pregnant? No, no, no. The dogs are not pregnant. The cats are pregnant. They're also bringing a

00:03:38lot of, I might have a bunch of mice in the house. Well, of course, if you have mice in

00:03:50the house and you have cats coming down the pipeline, isn't that a good combo? I mean,

00:03:56the cats can catch the mice, the mice can feed the cats, and it sounds like a pretty balanced

00:04:01ecosystem. No, no, no. The cats are bringing the live mice, and they let them go in the house.

00:04:08And then the cats go out, and they're taking the mice.

00:04:15So the cats are bringing the mice into the house, is that right?

00:04:20The live ones, yes. They play with them a little bit.

00:04:24Do you have, like, a whiteboard? Do you have something that, like, a marker and a whiteboard

00:04:30so you can try to instruct the cats that their purpose is really, essentially, to bring the

00:04:35mice out of the house rather than bring the mice into the house? Is there, like, I don't

00:04:39know if cats are good with arrows. You can do incentives. You can drop some whiskers on

00:04:44the ground. Is there any way that you can get these pussies to un-mice rather than re-mice

00:04:49your household? Men. I assume I'm allowed to call you men because we all, you know, men,

00:04:58I'm not a man, but I'm a strong, independent woman who's not getting off the fucking bed

00:05:05during the night because he's scared of the mice.

00:05:08You're scared of the mice that the cats are bringing in?

00:05:13No, I'm scared of the, well, see, that's the thing. The mice, they're

00:05:19bringing mice, the cats are bringing mice, they let them leave because, you know, you're

00:05:24supposed to, mice are supposed to be doing the thing that the bears are doing during the

00:05:29wintertime, right?

00:05:30Yes.

00:05:32Okay, now, apparently my cats got over that shit and they're bringing them in a life,

00:05:42semi-paralyzed, if I might say.

00:05:45Hmm.

00:05:47Okay, and then I shout at the cats and then the cats are coming and they're licking my

00:05:54hand and they're letting the mice run, roam free into my wardrobe where I know for sure

00:06:01that they have a beautiful nest there because it's been about a year since I haven't opened

00:06:06the wardrobe because I was scared to open it.

00:06:11Anyway, then the cats, the cats, the same kittens, they're bringing birds.

00:06:20Oh, so they're bringing mice and birds?

00:06:24Live mice and semi-dead birds.

00:06:31Right.

00:06:32So I live everywhere in my house, I have feathers.

00:06:36It's not like the angels came to see me.

00:06:40Very small angels, obviously.

00:06:42Now, do you live alone?

00:06:46Three dogs, five cats.

00:06:49No, no, I'm talking about like another two-legged, like a biped, a human being.

00:06:54Yeah, no.

00:06:55No?

00:06:55And when was the last time that you, hang on, hang on, hang on, hang on, hang on.

00:06:59When was the last time you lived with someone?

00:07:03It was about two months ago.

00:07:06It was only one night when I slept into a jail cell.

00:07:13I don't know that that's technically living with someone if you get arrested.

00:07:16I mean, when was the last time that you had someone live in your environment for a consistent

00:07:21period of time?

00:07:25I'm pretty sure no one wants me with all of them around.

00:07:29And every time I'm trying to open a conversation, a decent, intelligent conversation with someone,

00:07:36listen, buddy, because I like to call them buddy because I love the buddy.

00:07:40Hey, buddy.

00:07:42Listen, buddy, I have, well, I don't have.

00:07:45They have me.

00:07:47Sure, no, I understand that.

00:07:48And how long have you had all these animals for?

00:07:57Well, the first one was 2014.

00:08:00The next one was 2019.

00:08:01The next one was 2020.

00:08:05Then guess what the stupid of me did?

00:08:09Let's left the door open.

00:08:11I have, it was the first cat that I had.

00:08:15It was chasing, chasing, chosen, chasing.

00:08:18Chasing, yeah.

00:08:20Yeah.

00:08:20Help me with the English because I'm a, I'm a Chinese.

00:08:27I'm not a Chinese.

00:08:28I have to say, I don't think that's a Chinese accent you've got going on there.

00:08:31But, okay, go ahead.

00:08:34Okay, so, the first time when, when the first cat came into my life, it was chasing by another mean,

00:08:43big, huge, fat, tomcat.

00:08:47Let's call them tomcats.

00:08:50That was 2021, I would say.

00:08:53I don't even remember because there's so many of them.

00:08:57I'm, I'm, I'm going in, you know what?

00:09:01I don't have money to buy drugs if I want to buy drugs.

00:09:06I don't have money to buy drugs because I have to keep the fucking cats happy.

00:09:11Sorry for the cats.

00:09:12No, no, I get that.

00:09:14I mean, I, I obviously would personally argue that drugs may not be the first thing on your shopping list

00:09:18if you want to make wise decisions.

00:09:21So, what do you, what do you live on?

00:09:23How do you, how do you pay your bills?

00:09:27I'm basically spending most of my days scratching cars.

00:09:34I'm working, obviously, I'm working.

00:09:36I'm sorry, did you say, sorry, sorry to interrupt.

00:09:38Did you say scratching cars?

00:09:42Cars, not cars.

00:09:45I'm sorry, you'll have to take another run at that.

00:09:48Cars, cars, C-A-R-S.

00:09:51Yeah, cars.

00:09:52And what are you doing to the cars?

00:09:57Exactly what you said, I'm scratching them.

00:10:01You're scratching the cars.

00:10:03Is that, is that a well-paid occupation in your neighborhood?

00:10:08No.

00:10:09Look, that's a passion of mine, if I may say it.

00:10:14It's a passion of yours, okay.

00:10:15So, it's like, like if you have cats, they like to scratch your furniture, and then when you get out,

00:10:19you like to scratch the cars.

00:10:21No, no, no, no, wait a second, wait a second.

00:10:24About the cars.

00:10:25Oh, sorry, did I get something wrong?

00:10:26Yes.

00:10:27Okay, go ahead.

00:10:28See, every time I'm trying to leave home to do my, what was the other words?

00:10:37Not the scratching.

00:10:39The other words.

00:10:41Is it something in Mandarin?

00:10:43No, no, okay, fine.

00:10:44Let's, let's just say I'm, I'm, I'm trying to leave home, okay.

00:10:50There are three tiny little pieces of shit who are always following me.

00:10:56So, every time I leave home, I need to spend about 10 minutes chasing down cats, bringing them back, either

00:11:07throwing them into the house through the window, or dealing with one of the motherfucking guys who's always...

00:11:22Okay, so, sorry, when you say that, that three pieces of shit are following you, this is a way that

00:11:28you're referring to your cats.

00:11:29You don't mean huge, actual Michelin man-sized pieces of shit with legs that are following you.

00:11:34This is the cats that are following you to get them back in the house.

00:11:37Buddy, I can deal with the fucking men.

00:11:40I can kill them.

00:11:40I can, I have showers.

00:11:42I have a space where I can bury them.

00:11:45Yeah.

00:11:45That's not the problem.

00:11:46Yeah, you can bury the men.

00:11:48Yeah, but down with the cats.

00:11:50Yeah, the cats are tough to deal with.

00:11:51I get that.

00:11:52I get that.

00:11:53No, no, no.

00:11:53I love them.

00:11:54I love the cats more than I love the other.

00:11:57Right.

00:11:58But then, I also have the dikes.

00:12:01The dikes, yes, absolutely.

00:12:03The dikes, and because I love, I live in, I live in Scotland, and I came here in, from China.

00:12:10Okay.

00:12:12I must say, I'm not picking up either much of a Chinese accent or a Scottish accent.

00:12:17But please, but please, go ahead.

00:12:22Maybe I'm just missing it in the subtlety of your performance.

00:12:25Wait, wait, wait.

00:12:26Give me a chance.

00:12:27Give me a chance.

00:12:28Please, go ahead.

00:12:28Yeah, take your time.

00:12:39You will have to give me some English at some point, if you don't mind.

00:12:43I'm not Scottish, buddy.

00:12:45You either accept it or you don't.

00:12:46No, I absolutely accept that you are somebody who's in both Eastern Europe and India, from

00:12:51China, living in Scotland.

00:12:53I'm down with that.

00:12:54No, no, no, no.

00:12:55I have a problem with Indians.

00:12:56But what I just told you was, my house is a little down the road.

00:13:02My house, my house is down the road.

00:13:08In Scottish language, you say, me, no, that's me casa, it's Italian, isn't it?

00:13:15Yeah, that's a little Italian, if you don't mind me saying so.

00:13:17We're really going on quite a tour here.

00:13:20I feel like we're on a bus tour around some wild neighborhoods.

00:13:26I can speak about five or six languages, I can read another three, and guess what?

00:13:32When I go to the fucking court, the fucking sheriff says, oh, I'm going to provide you

00:13:39with a free translator.

00:13:41Will you fuck now?

00:13:43Don't take me back with that.

00:13:46Sorry, you just faded out a little bit there.

00:13:48Something to do with the court and the translator, if you could revisit that one.

00:13:52Yes.

00:13:53You know how we call, in Scotland and in the UK, we call the judge a sheriff?

00:14:00Because that's what the law says.

00:14:02Yeah, like Nottingham.

00:14:03Yeah, yeah.

00:14:04Okay, so me, being able to speak five or six fucking languages, being able to read Latin

00:14:11and Greek, and I'm learning other fucking languages.

00:14:17I'm learning Egyptian.

00:14:21Sure, yeah, hieroglyphics are very important these days.

00:14:24Exactly.

00:14:25The sheriff said, oh, honey, trust me, you need a translator.

00:14:31Do I need a fucking translator?

00:14:35Well, if you're doing Egyptian, though, you'd need a mime, right?

00:14:38Because they need to act out the actual symbols, right?

00:14:40No, he was just a fucking...

00:14:43Oh, sorry, that would be crazy.

00:14:45Well, no, because I also told him, listen, buddy, I can draw everything, and you can find

00:14:52a painter to translate my painting.

00:14:57Right.

00:14:57Yeah, if you want it, you can paint the hieroglyphics, and he can be your translator.

00:15:02Yeah, like walk like an Egyptian, you can do little bangles and all kinds of cool stuff.

00:15:05I can do more than that.

00:15:07I can connect a bag of fertilizer with a bottle of diesel, and some...

00:15:17How do you call the sparkling sparkles?

00:15:21Sparklers?

00:15:22No.

00:15:23Fireworks?

00:15:24Yeah, no.

00:15:25The other things, that they set things on fire.

00:15:30Matches?

00:15:32I can do that.

00:15:34Flamethrowers?

00:15:35Airstrikes?

00:15:36Starpet bombing?

00:15:37I'm not sure what we're talking about at this point.

00:15:38Matches, but would you like to know...

00:15:41Would you like to know why I know that?

00:15:45I will tell you that I have a great deal of ambivalence about whether I do or do not want

00:15:51to know how you know that.

00:15:52Okay, let's say you say, I don't want to know how you know that, but I'm curious about

00:16:02what led you to that.

00:16:04Just to say.

00:16:05I'm curious and also more than a little alarmed, but if you would like to share, I suppose

00:16:11I could put myself into a crash helmet position.

00:16:14Buddy, are you working with the guys that sent me to the cell D35?

00:16:20I do not believe I am working with the people who sent you to the cell D35.

00:16:25Or, to be honest, any cell.

00:16:27No, they haven't sent me, per se, sent me.

00:16:31Okay, it was more likely I kind of asked if for...

00:16:38Okay, fine.

00:16:39Let's get over everything.

00:16:42I have a brother.

00:16:44Okay.

00:16:46He loves me.

00:16:48In his own way.

00:16:51Okay.

00:16:52Also feeling a little alarmed, but go ahead.

00:16:55The book.

00:16:56Okay.

00:16:57The books, the books that he gave me for Christmas and for Easter and for my birthday

00:17:04and for absolutely everything are chemistry number one, chemistry number two.

00:17:11Sure.

00:17:14Well, in studying three to five additional languages, you also definitely want to pick

00:17:19up some chemistry, because otherwise you're just knowledge deficient, right?

00:17:22No, because I have studied a lot of chemistry when I was, what, about 20 years ago when

00:17:29I was younger, and my teacher said, you're not supposed to touch these substances anymore.

00:17:37I don't know why.

00:17:39I've really seen it.

00:17:40Maybe they saw a particular gleam in your eye when you were studying chemistry, and maybe

00:17:46they were concerned about what you might brew up and how it might, in fact, take out a

00:17:50neighborhood block or something.

00:17:51Well, when I studied history, I also had the same gleam in my eyes when we were discussing

00:17:57about Vlad the Impaler, and that my history teacher was not so much.

00:18:04Right.

00:18:05Sure.

00:18:05I mean, if somebody has a big gleam in their eye, Vlad the Impaler, it may not be great

00:18:09to teach them a lot of chemistry, you know, for various COVID-related reasons.

00:18:13It was not like a Latvian painter, but what?

00:18:17Sorry.

00:18:18I'm sorry.

00:18:19A Latvian painter, I'm afraid.

00:18:21I've been following everything perfectly so far.

00:18:24I just got a bit of a hiccup in my mind on that last one.

00:18:26Mm-hmm.

00:18:27He was that.

00:18:29Oh, sorry.

00:18:30Your teacher was a Latvian painter?

00:18:33I wish.

00:18:34I would give half of...

00:18:35You wish.

00:18:36I think we all do, yeah.

00:18:37I would give half of my life to have the painter teaching me history lesson and chemistry lessons.

00:18:45And what else?

00:18:47I don't know.

00:18:48Now, was he, oh, sorry, a Latvian painter?

00:18:50Was he a painter from Latvia or was he a painter who liked painting Latvians?

00:18:54No, I'm absolutely sure you're absolutely wrong.

00:18:57He was a painter from Australia and he painted the mother of God with Jesus' baby.

00:19:03And if you really want to know, I can't say it because I'm on bail for two more months.

00:19:12And I was like...

00:19:12On bail?

00:19:13Is this for the car scratching or something else?

00:19:15Or something else.

00:19:17But I would rather stay on bail instead of in...

00:19:22I don't want to go.

00:19:25You want to know why I don't like to go to the sales?

00:19:29Because they give you expired sandwiches.

00:19:32They give you the seeds that grow on the grapes.

00:19:39Yes.

00:19:39And then when you keep, you know, there's a button for help.

00:19:47And then you do, when you're bored, obviously, because you don't have anything else.

00:19:50And you do...

00:19:55They cut you off and they let you die in the cell.

00:20:02In the perfectly government-constructed living facility.

00:20:16Just out of curiosity, have you listened to my show before?

00:20:20No, this is the first time.

00:20:21But you know why?

00:20:23And I'm going to put you on one of my lists.

00:20:26What?

00:20:26Are you going to talk about something else?

00:20:29Or have I hijacked?

00:20:31No, listen.

00:20:32Honestly, I think that you are...

00:20:36I'll say that afterwards.

00:20:38No, I mean, I'm happy to have had the conversation.

00:20:40And I obviously wish you the very best.

00:20:43Please try to refrain from breaking the law.

00:20:45And it may be worth trying to trade in some of the cats and dogs for an actual person.

00:20:50You're going to break up with me, aren't you?

00:20:51Because I'm not sure...

00:20:53I'm sorry, go ahead.

00:20:54You're going to break up with me?

00:20:56I'm not quite sure how to phrase that.

00:20:58You're just a voice on the internet.

00:20:59So I will.

00:21:01But I think I will move on to another caller.

00:21:04And I really do appreciate you calling in tonight.

00:21:08It certainly has been an experience.

00:21:10Well, at least we both had fun, haven't we?

00:21:12We did have fun.

00:21:14And I do appreciate the conversation.

00:21:15Thank you for having me.

00:21:16Thank you for having me.

00:21:18And hopefully next time will be better.

00:21:22All right.

00:21:22I appreciate it.

00:21:23Bye.

00:21:24Bye.

00:21:25Bye.

00:21:26Honestly, that was certainly interesting.

00:21:30You know, one of the things that I do enjoy about doing an open-ended philosophy show is sometimes you

00:21:35get calls that you wouldn't particularly expect.

00:21:38Now, I got to tell you, my experience of the call, I thought this was someone who was trolling.

00:21:45And I got that from the occasional breaking of character and giggles.

00:21:50And I, of course, have done a lot of improv and some trolling of my own because, as you may

00:21:56or may not know, I spent a couple of years at the National Theatre School studying acting.

00:22:01And we did a lot of improv, and we did a lot of improv, and we did a lot of

00:22:03improv, and I think that was an improv troll, and this is why I found it quite amusing.

00:22:08I don't think this is somebody with genuine mental health issues.

00:22:10I've been around that kind of stuff, too.

00:22:12And I think it was actually quite a delightful performance piece, and I really do appreciate it.

00:22:17I appreciate having the opportunity to roll with that.

00:22:20So, thank you for creating a very interesting and engaging opening to the show.

00:22:26All right.

00:22:27So, we have somebody who's been waiting.

00:22:29We have two people waiting.

00:22:31And let's start with Opa.

00:22:34I say this because my wife is Greek.

00:22:38Opa!

00:22:39Opa!

00:22:41If you can unmute.

00:22:42Yes, sir.

00:22:43Go ahead.

00:22:43Yes.

00:22:44So, I have a question about business.

00:22:47Since you've been in the business world and sales and everything.

00:22:51Sorry.

00:22:51Just before we start, was your opinion of the previous caller a real call or a troll call?

00:22:58I'm divided.

00:23:00I'm divided between being very entertained by, you know, the performance and being highly alarmed.

00:23:07I know.

00:23:08That's how good it was.

00:23:09Yeah.

00:23:10It was.

00:23:11I thought for sure it was just a troll performance until she seemed almost to cry at one point,

00:23:15in which case, she's either, like, kind of crazy or unstable or something, or she's really committed to the bit.

00:23:22I tend to go with the latter.

00:23:23But, anyway, I was just curious what your opinion was.

00:23:25I'm hoping for the performance, honestly.

00:23:30Yeah, yeah.

00:23:31Okay.

00:23:31So, sorry.

00:23:31Business.

00:23:32Yeah.

00:23:34So, like, imagine you're starting a new business, right?

00:23:37So, you've done that already.

00:23:39Very successfully.

00:23:41But my question is, how do you, like, in the business world, if you have a new product and you

00:23:47think it is good for your client,

00:23:48you think it's actually going to be valuable, but it's not something that is very common that many people are

00:23:53doing.

00:23:53It's a problem that exists in the market, and you've spoken with people in there, and they said that this

00:23:59would be a good product for them.

00:24:02But if it is new, how do you, like, if you don't have, like, empirical evidence of its application adding

00:24:10value to people, how do you convince them to use it?

00:24:13Sure.

00:24:13Is it a, sorry, is it a physical product?

00:24:15Is it like a software, it's like a software slash service that, like, it will optimize a certain process that

00:24:23today takes a long time in a certain industry that I've worked in for, since 2019.

00:24:29Oh, okay.

00:24:30All right.

00:24:31Okay.

00:24:32So, I'm going to just put out a bunch of ideas here.

00:24:34It's just a brainstorm.

00:24:35Some of them may fit.

00:24:36Some of them may not.

00:24:37So, if I were in your shoes, what I would do is I would talk to people in the industry

00:24:43that I'd ever worked with, no matter how tangentially, I would talk to the people I'd worked with in the

00:24:47business, and I would offer them to set them up with my software product for free.

00:24:53But in return, I have to be able to measure the data and do a case study.

00:24:58So, what that means is, of course, let's say that you have a product.

00:25:03I'll give you an example sort of from my own business experience.

00:25:07So, one of the things that I did when I co-founded the software company was we did what are

00:25:12called ESAs, or environmental site assessments.

00:25:15Like, every time that property changes hands in Canada here, you have to have an environmental site assessment to make

00:25:23sure that you're not selling land where there used to be some, or may still be, some rusty underground storage

00:25:28tank or where there was a battery plant or some crazy thing, a place where they did greasy cars and

00:25:35all of that stuff are sunk into the ground.

00:25:36Or, you know, that kind of stuff that is bad and would really lower the value of the land because

00:25:42you'd need to remediate and clean it all out.

00:25:45So, when you want to buy and sell land, generally, you'll have an environmental site assessment.

00:25:50Someone will go on site, take all these notes.

00:25:52They'll look up everything in City Hall, the sort of history of the site, and so on.

00:25:55And this process was all done by hand.

00:25:57And so, I wrote software that allowed people, this is way back early in the day before there were cell

00:26:04phones or tablets, but you could get these things called PDAs.

00:26:08So, I wrote software that you could go and get all of this information and put it down on a

00:26:14computer, and this was way faster and way more efficient.

00:26:17And you could also aggregate it so that you could have a whole history of this, and it was quite

00:26:23a good data repository.

00:26:24So, to get this going, I partnered with a company that I knew, and I said, I will provide you

00:26:31this software for free, but in return, and I'll let you have a license in perpetuity, but in return, what

00:26:39I need is I need you to track whether it's efficient or not,

00:26:44whether it saves money and time and effort and energy, and I also would like to, you know, meet with

00:26:50you for a couple of hours to just go over the numbers.

00:26:53And so, what you do is you build a business case, and I found that this cut the cost of

00:27:00doing one of these environmental site assessments by about 40%.

00:27:04And these things can be, you know, a couple of thousand dollars, but, you know, if you're a big property

00:27:10owner, you're going to have thousands of properties,

00:27:12so you're doing a whole bunch of these every year.

00:27:14So, there was a cost-benefit analysis, because, of course, you know when you're in the business world, you're not

00:27:20selling products.

00:27:21You are giving people time and money back, right?

00:27:24That's the general idea.

00:27:26Like, if somebody says, hey, man, you should dump your typewriter, and you should use a word processor, and you

00:27:30say, well, why?

00:27:31And they say, well, you know, it'll automatically center for you.

00:27:35You can edit all over the place.

00:27:37You just print out the final thing.

00:27:38Like, it saves you a lot of time, energy, effort, whiteout, you know, this sort of stuff.

00:27:42So, I would give the product away for free, but in return, have a validated business case.

00:27:50And then that person puts the software in, and you say, well, it saves you $10,000 a week to

00:27:58use my software, you know, because you have a time savings.

00:28:01That time is usually at some dollar value, and then what you do is you say, well, my software only

00:28:08costs $50,000, but it saves you, let's say, $10,000 a month, which means it pays for itself in

00:28:14five months.

00:28:15And after that, it's all gravy, and it's all profit.

00:28:19Now, you can just go and say that, but people won't really believe you because, well, you're in software, so

00:28:24everyone assumes you're a big, stinky old liar.

00:28:27So, what you do is you write up this business case and, you know, say, listen, I need, you know,

00:28:33I would hope that you would be a reference because I gave you this free software.

00:28:36Be a reference, you know, just to somebody calls up and says, did you really do this business case?

00:28:40You don't have to walk them through it, but just say yes, like a reference.

00:28:44And so, yeah, you give it away for free, and you measure the cost savings, and you put a presentation

00:28:51together, and then you do some research on people you want to sell your software to.

00:28:57And those people that you want to sell your software to will usually, if they're a publicly traded company, they

00:29:03will have lots of public information.

00:29:04So, we looked up, you know, big corporations in Canada and America and Europe, and we said, okay, here's how

00:29:12many properties they have.

00:29:13Here's how many change hands.

00:29:15Therefore, we know how many environmental site assessments they're going to be doing.

00:29:18And if they're doing, you know, we save $1,000 per site assessment, and they do, you know, $100,000

00:29:26a year, right?

00:29:27That's $100,000 we can save a year.

00:29:29We sell the software for $50,000.

00:29:31Then they save their money in six – they make their money back in six months.

00:29:34After that, it's all gravy.

00:29:36So, you just put together a case, but it has to be validated because you have to respect your customer's

00:29:42time to the point where you're not just saying, well, according to my made-up spreadsheet,

00:29:45this is the most valuable software since Windows, you actually have to have a validated business case with someone in

00:29:52the industry who's willing to say, yes, we did this.

00:29:54Yes, it actually did save this money, and so that would be your calling card.

00:29:58Sorry for the long answer.

00:29:59Does that make sense?

00:30:00It does make a lot of sense.

00:30:03So, you mentioned that you were partnering with a company when you started out the business.

00:30:09Is that, like, something that you would – if I have friends, let's say, in the industry or I have

00:30:14people that could be this reference, they could try to implement this product.

00:30:19Is this a good kind of strategy, especially if there's, like, they don't have my last name?

00:30:23It's not something that is going to be immediately conflictuous.

00:30:27But I assume that's –

00:30:28Sorry, sorry.

00:30:29I don't – sorry.

00:30:29Hang on, hang on.

00:30:30I'm not sure what you mean when you say they don't have my last name.

00:30:32It means that they're not, like, family, right?

00:30:34So, it won't be, like, I'm giving out a reference as somebody in the industry that has my last name.

00:30:38I mean, they're – if I am so-and-so Johnson, and then I give out the product to so

00:30:46-and-so Johnson, and then the reference would say, you know, you wouldn't be a bit suspicious.

00:30:51Well, I mean, ideally, you wouldn't give it to your dad.

00:30:53Yeah, yeah, yeah, of course.

00:30:55Right, you know?

00:30:55I mean, that's like saying, I should be a model because my mom thinks I'm handsome.

00:30:58Exactly, exactly.

00:30:59It's not really much to say.

00:31:00Yeah.

00:31:00Yeah, so – but, I mean, look, and – but if for some reason you can only do it with

00:31:05a family member or with somebody who shares your last name, that's not a – I mean, that's not –

00:31:09nothing in business is bad if you're upfront about it, right?

00:31:12So, then if you say, look, I know – like, I did this with my father-in-law.

00:31:16I did this with my dad, or, you know, so, you know, please understand.

00:31:19I recognize that seems a little sketchy, but I promise you the numbers are real.

00:31:23You can call them up, and you can walk them through all the numbers.

00:31:26And the good thing – I'm sorry, excuse me, the good thing – the good thing with having this kind

00:31:30of validated business case is you can go in with confidence.

00:31:35You know, there's a very intangible thing in sales, which is if you are truly confident in the product that

00:31:43you have, you're not begging, you're not asking, you're offering.

00:31:48You're offering something.

00:31:50It's like, I don't want you to pay me $10,000.

00:31:52I want to give you $50,000.

00:31:55Now, of course, it's kind of cheesy to say it that way, but if you're truly confident, and if you've

00:31:59ever been in the presence of a salesman who's truly confident in his product, it just comes dripping out.

00:32:05I was 100% confident that the software – this was just one small component of the general environmental and

00:32:13health and safety software that I designed and wrote, but I was completely confident in the value that I was

00:32:21offering to customers.

00:32:24And once you've done that validated business case, then you can go in, and if you have bought them one,

00:32:30even better, you can give discounts.

00:32:32So you give the first one free to get the first business case.

00:32:34You use the first business case to get the next two or three.

00:32:36You give them half price.

00:32:38You know, like the first time I sold my software, I sold it for $5,000, and then, you know,

00:32:44within a couple of years, it was selling for over a million dollars because you've just got to scale it

00:32:48up from there.

00:32:49And then the more you have these validated business cases, the less risk people are taking because you don't want

00:32:54people to have to trust you in business when you're selling.

00:32:57You want people to trust the numbers, right?

00:33:00Like, so if you go and buy a car and you say, you know, safety is a really, really important

00:33:04thing for me, then they don't just sit there and say, hey, man, trust me, this car is totally safe,

00:33:10dude.

00:33:11What they do is they say, you know, it's been crash tested by the safety board.

00:33:15You know, here's the results.

00:33:16Here's how it ranks to all these other cars.

00:33:18This car is a little bit higher, but it's twice the price.

00:33:21It's really not worth it.

00:33:22Inside airbags, you know, they give you all the facts.

00:33:25They don't just tell you to trust me, bro.

00:33:26And if you've got a new product, you need to get the facts about how you're going to make money

00:33:32for people or give them their money and time back.

00:33:35Once you have those facts, you're not calling people up and saying, please buy my software.

00:33:41I need to eat.

00:33:42What you're doing is you're saying, I can save you money.

00:33:46I can save you time.

00:33:48I can make sure that your life is better at a very reasonable price.

00:33:54And, you know, okay, some people, they'll say, no, they won't believe it.

00:33:57That's fine.

00:33:57You just bookmark them and you circle back when you have more data.

00:34:01And then eventually it's irresistible.

00:34:02So you've got to just, you know, build it step by step and case by case.

00:34:06Yeah, that sounds great.

00:34:08And also in my industry, because the cycle would repeat itself in terms of when you would need to use

00:34:14that software in a certain seasonal way, you could offer, let's say, a very high discount on the first time.

00:34:20And then it could like go down, so to speak, the discount as you go.

00:34:25Or you could offer a permanent discount on that, which would be sort of attractive since it's something you need

00:34:30to use every sort of season.

00:34:32That's very good.

00:34:34Yeah, and the other thing which you can do, it's a little bit more dicey, but it really can work,

00:34:38is you can say, I'll split the savings with you.

00:34:46Now, that could be a bit more tricky to paper, so it would be somebody ideally, paper, sorry, I mean,

00:34:51to have in a contract, but it would be someone ideally that you had a good relationship with and you

00:34:56trusted, right?

00:34:56So this is what they do in the movies all the time, right?

00:35:00So in movies they say, oh, we really want this star, but we can't afford him, so we'll give him

00:35:06five percentage points if the movie's gross.

00:35:09And so we'll share the profits, right?

00:35:12And so if you have someone who's really hesitant about it, then they say, look, I will do all the

00:35:18setup, I will do all the training for free, I will be available on call 24-7 if there are

00:35:24any problems, and all I'm going to ask you to do is keep track of the savings.

00:35:30And if you save $10,000, give me five.

00:35:32If you save $50,000, give me 25, you know, that kind of stuff.

00:35:36And if you don't save anything, then don't pay me a penny.

00:35:40Now, a good negotiator on the other side will say, oh, that's fine, but if it costs me money, you'll

00:35:46give me some.

00:35:47Like if it ends up costing me $10,000, are you going to give me $5,000?

00:35:51And if you're really confident, what will you say?

00:35:54100%, yeah.

00:35:55Duh.

00:35:56Absolutely.

00:35:57Now, that could wipe you out.

00:35:58This is why you've got to be with someone you really trust with that kind of stuff.

00:36:02But, yeah, I would say that if you're absolutely certain that you can save people money, make their lives easier

00:36:12and better, you know, the old, you know, wouldn't it be nice to get home every day at 5.30

00:36:17instead of 8 o'clock?

00:36:18You know, this software can help you do that and so on.

00:36:20But, yeah, I always appreciate it because I was a chief technical officer and director of marketing and so on.

00:36:27And so I was constantly getting products and services pitched at me and I could always, always, always, like you're

00:36:35dealing with very sophisticated people, I assume, in this business world.

00:36:39If they're buying software as a service and things like that, they're pretty sophisticated.

00:36:43So, when I would get these brochures and I would sometimes go to conferences in Vegas and so on, like

00:36:50where you try and get these vendors to sell you or these vendors want to sell you stuff.

00:36:54So, I would constantly get these brochures and you could, you just look at the buzzwords and you roll your

00:37:01eyes.

00:37:01You know, this is optimized for product learning algorithmic efficiency.

00:37:05And it's just like, yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:37:07Like, we just make up a bunch of buzzwords.

00:37:09And then if I saw these flow charts, you know, this is a mind map of the business optimized flow

00:37:16process of this efficiency matrix, you know, this kind of nonsense stuff, right?

00:37:20I didn't care about any of that.

00:37:22What I did care about was here's how much the software costs.

00:37:27Here's the time to get it implemented.

00:37:30I assume, like, if it takes, you know, 20 hours to get it implemented and somebody has to be paid

00:37:37$100 an hour, then that's $2,000 to get it implemented.

00:37:41You know, here's how much 10% support every year or whatever it is.

00:37:44So, this is your total cost year one.

00:37:48And here's your savings.

00:37:50I remember writing a very lengthy RFP.

00:37:55Actually, well, I wrote tons of them.

00:37:56But request for proposal is when somebody says, we need a solution.

00:38:02And you would offer up that solution.

00:38:04And I set up an entire database where I could pull in from publicly available databases, company metrics, and then

00:38:16I could plug in my software with the validated savings.

00:38:20And I could pump out all of these charts, which says, you know, here's your ROI.

00:38:25Your ROI is after 18 months.

00:38:27And this is based upon verified data.

00:38:30Here's the data, here's the reference that you can call to verify it and so on.

00:38:34And so, and I would really work to stick to that, obviously, as best as I could.

00:38:39There were sometimes variables outside of my control.

00:38:41Sometimes we'd be ahead.

00:38:42Sometimes we'd be behind.

00:38:43But in general, we tried to keep it pretty accurate.

00:38:46And so, if I got someone who said, rather than this optimized workflow nonsense, if they said, look, here's the

00:38:54money that you're going to give to me, and here's the money I'm going to give back to you.

00:38:58Now, that got my attention because that showed someone who was not trying to snowjob me and actually respected my

00:39:05time and respected my business acumen.

00:39:08Because, you know, obviously, everybody who pitches you wants to sell you something, and the benefit to them is very

00:39:14clear because, you know, you want to sell this software to people, and the benefit to you is very clear.

00:39:19And you also want to show very clearly the benefit to the customer, the clear material benefit to the customer.

00:39:30And the benefits are usually pretty simple, right?

00:39:33It's money and time.

00:39:34Now, if you're in marketing, it's like mindshare or, you know, whatever it is, reputational, whatever, right?

00:39:40But if you're in this kind of business, you say, okay, here's how much time it takes you now, here's

00:39:46how much time it's going to take you after I put my process in.

00:39:50You know, it's half the time, and it pays for itself in six months or a year or 18 months

00:39:54or whatever, and after that, it's all gravy and all of that.

00:39:58And so I used to say to people who'd send me these brochures and then call me up, and I'd

00:40:04say, listen, I'm happy to do a pilot project, but is it okay if I pay you in buzzwords?

00:40:11And they'd be like, what?

00:40:13What do you mean pay us in buzzwords?

00:40:14And I said, well, I've looked at your brochure, and all I see are buzzwords, so I assume that's what

00:40:18you're selling me.

00:40:20And they're like, no, no, no, we can save you money.

00:40:22And I'm like, well, if you can save me money, why isn't that in the brochure?

00:40:27And the fact that it isn't in the brochure means that you just have fingers crossed and a wish list

00:40:33and a dreamscape, and you need to meet your payroll, but you haven't respected my time enough to tell me

00:40:38when I'm getting my money back after I give you money.

00:40:41So if you put all of that stuff forward, then you have something that's accountable.

00:40:46You know, it will make your processes much more efficient.

00:40:49It's like, well, okay, so what does that mean?

00:40:52What does it translate to?

00:40:53That's all kind of goopy.

00:40:54And I'm a hard numbers kind of guy, and if you can tell me how much money you're putting back

00:41:00into my pocket, how much time you're putting back into my life, then we can talk.

00:41:05And so, yeah, but you've got to quantify that, and it can't just be, you know, a doctor with a

00:41:11flashlight tells you where these savings projections come from.

00:41:13It has to be something real world that can be validated, and that shows, I think, proper respect to your

00:41:19customers.

00:41:19And I think that they will appreciate that, if that makes sense.

00:41:22Yeah, I like the process, because my question was basically, how do I get from this currency?

00:41:28I have this cool idea that is always going to make the processes more efficient.

00:41:32It's all goopy.

00:41:33How can I get empirical, grounded, like real data, a real case study here?

00:41:41So I think you're, yeah, it does work.

00:41:44It does work this sort of pathway that you're laying out.

00:41:48Yeah, if you can't quantify it, you shouldn't be selling it.

00:41:53Now, this is, I mean, this is one of the reasons why, you know, when I do my show, I

00:41:58can't say to people, you know, if you invest 12 hours into listening to Free Domain, you'll be a millionaire.

00:42:06I don't know, maybe back in 2011 when I was talking about Bitcoin or whatever, but if you can't quantify

00:42:13it, you shouldn't be selling it.

00:42:15And, of course, some things you can say, oh, yes, but Coca-Cola doesn't offer you an ROI and all

00:42:20of that kind of stuff.

00:42:21Yeah, but everybody knows what Coke tastes like.

00:42:22They're just trying to make it slightly cooler than Pepsi, so you'll choose them or whatever, right?

00:42:27But if you're trying to break into a new area, then you have to just be manic, not about your

00:42:35product, because that's a given, right?

00:42:39You have to, it's like asking a girl out.

00:42:42Like, if you're going up to ask a girl out, the fact that you find her to be a value

00:42:48is already taken for granted, right?

00:42:52Because you're asking her out, right?

00:42:54The fact that, so you find her to be a value, so you're asking her out.

00:42:59But the way to get her to go out with you is to somehow convince her, and this could be

00:43:03any number of ways, even just by your demeanor, your posture, and your self-care regimen or whatever.

00:43:13The big challenge is to get her to find you valuable enough to go out with.

00:43:19So everybody is like, they're in love with their product, and they want to bring their product to the market,

00:43:23and they want everyone to love their product, and they want everyone to love what they've done.

00:43:28But the problem is, that's selfish.

00:43:32I'm not saying that's you.

00:43:32I'm just saying this is a common mistake that I and most other entrepreneurs have made.

00:43:36I've got this product.

00:43:37This is the greatest product.

00:43:38I love this product.

00:43:39You've got to try this product, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

00:43:41I was like, but no, no.

00:43:44What you have to do is say, here's how this product benefits you.

00:43:49I'm not selling you a product.

00:43:50I'm selling you a benefit, right?

00:43:54And usually it's saving time and saving money.

00:43:57It sounds like this is the case.

00:43:59So if you have something to offer, people will listen.

00:44:03If you have something to sell, then people generally won't.

00:44:07And if you have that approach to sales, which is, I'm here to make your life better.

00:44:13I'm here to make your life better.

00:44:15I remember years ago, my old red Volvo that I used to do my shows in like 20 years ago,

00:44:21it had a problem.

00:44:23The wheels were a little wobbly.

00:44:25When you drive and the wheels are just like blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

00:44:28And I took it to a mechanic.

00:44:32And the mechanic looked at it and called me up the next day.

00:44:36And he said, man, I'm sorry it took so long.

00:44:38Just one of your wheel rims was a little off.

00:44:40I just hammered it back into place.

00:44:42It's fine.

00:44:42I'm like, oh, what are you?

00:44:43He's like, it took me like three minutes.

00:44:45Don't worry about it, right?

00:44:46So, of course, every time I had anything to do with that car, I took it back to that same

00:44:51dealership because they've already established that they're honest and so on, right?

00:44:55So they have a benefit to sell me, which is I know for certain I'm not being ripped off, which

00:45:00is a huge thing if you're in a field where you don't really know much about like how cars run

00:45:04and that kind of stuff.

00:45:05So the reason I'm sort of hammering on this principle quite a bit is this is life as a whole.

00:45:10You know, we often approach people with our needs.

00:45:16I want you to go out with me.

00:45:17I want you to hire me.

00:45:19I want you to buy my product.

00:45:20I want you to be my friend.

00:45:21I want you to pay me attention.

00:45:23I want, I want, I want.

00:45:25And that's fine.

00:45:26I'm not saying you can be a needless robot or NPC, but you have to flip it to the other

00:45:32person.

00:45:32Because when you're trying to get people involved in your life, whether it's business, sex, romance, friendship, whatever it is,

00:45:39and you say, I want, I want, I want, that's great.

00:45:42That's why we interact with each other.

00:45:44I want to do a live stream tonight.

00:45:45I want to hopefully dispense some wisdom to the world.

00:45:49I want, I want, I want, I want.

00:45:52But I have to think about why would anyone want to listen to me, right?

00:45:56What do you get out of listening to me?

00:45:59So the I want is natural, and there's nothing wrong with that, but that can only be the very first

00:46:05step of interacting with people.

00:46:07It's not the I want, it's the you get.

00:46:10So when we were a baby, we just, I want, I want, I want.

00:46:13It's totally natural.

00:46:14It's how we operate.

00:46:16But as you age up in life, and please understand, I'm not lecturing you like you don't know this stuff.

00:46:20I just want to make it a wider principle, because not everyone is about to launch an entrepreneurial venture.

00:46:25But what I will say is that I want is fine.

00:46:30You get.

00:46:32You get.

00:46:34I tried an experiment, and I'll just keep this brief, and then I'll get your thoughts on it.

00:46:41I tried this experiment just out of curiosity, because I get a lot of complaints from women that men are

00:46:47just kind of duds, you know, like when men message them and so on.

00:46:50And so I tried creating a social media, it doesn't really matter which one or whatever it is, but I

00:46:55tried creating a social media account and set it to female and young.

00:47:02And I was just kind of curious, like, and people, the men, were like, hey, sup, what you doing?

00:47:13How old are you?

00:47:14You know, and like, absolutely.

00:47:16And these are men even without avatars, like, sorry, without pictures, just with some avatar.

00:47:20And there was one guy asked a joke, or tried to tell a joke, and then seemed, oh, I guess

00:47:28I'm not funny, right, if I didn't reply.

00:47:30Because I was just kind of curious, what are men's opening line?

00:47:34And the reason I did it male to female is it's much more common.

00:47:37What are men's opening line?

00:47:40And without exception, this was hundreds of men who were contacting this account.

00:47:45And not one of them said anything about anything that was in my bio, or anything about my picture, or

00:47:53it was just like, sup, what you doing?

00:47:55And a friend of mine, she's a younger woman, and she sort of mocks this, you know, bars like, hey,

00:48:02what you drinking?

00:48:02You know, she actually mimics this lumberjack accent, like, hey, what you drinking?

00:48:07Like, down to a tea.

00:48:10And that's people coming in with, I want, right?

00:48:13I want to be in contact with this account.

00:48:15But not, you get.

00:48:18And in business, you know, and it's perfectly natural, and there's nothing, the I want is perfectly healthy.

00:48:24There's nothing wrong with it.

00:48:26But you have a great desire and thirst to go out and to get people to buy your product, to

00:48:34set you up as an entrepreneur.

00:48:35And listen, good for you, man.

00:48:36That's great.

00:48:37I was just saying on the Scott Adams School today about how young men and women should get together, and

00:48:43rather than play Catan or Fortnite, they should brainstorm about how to make money, because that's what's kind of needed

00:48:48these days.

00:48:50So, life gets a whole lot better when you pivot from I want to you get, right?

00:48:55So, with this philosophy show, I want people to be interested in philosophy.

00:48:58So, I say, well, I want you to be interested in philosophy.

00:49:01I want to share philosophy.

00:49:03But what do you get out of it?

00:49:04Now, in this case, with you, hopefully you get the kind of business advice that normally people pay thousands and

00:49:12thousands of dollars in consultant fees for, and you get it for free, and everyone else who's listening to this

00:49:17gets it for free, and there are no ads, right?

00:49:20So, I'm not doing a table read for some VPN or anything like that.

00:49:24So, I should listen to what it is that I'm doing, because I will provide value, the you get stuff.

00:49:31So, that's just a general mindset thing for people.

00:49:35If you want someone to get them to understand what you have to offer and how they're going to benefit

00:49:44more than anyone else, because if, let's say, you want to sell your software for $5,000, that's $5,000

00:49:51they could give as a bonus to their best employee.

00:49:53That's $5,000 they could pay to themselves or reinvest in the business or upgrade their network or something like

00:49:59that.

00:49:59So, you're in competition for all of those dollars, and you have to say, if those $5,000, honestly, there's

00:50:04no better use than you can make of it than to trade it with me.

00:50:10And when you walk up to a woman, you want to date her, and you say, you have to have

00:50:13in your mind, here are the benefits that I have to offer, and you won't get them from anywhere else.

00:50:20I'm not just someone you should go out with.

00:50:22I'm the best person for you to go out with, and you need to be able to answer that question

00:50:25in your own mind.

00:50:26So, with an entrepreneur, the I want is very clear and very powerful and very healthy and very good.

00:50:32But the you get is absolutely key.

00:50:35You have to think about what it's like on the other side of the table, whether that table is a

00:50:39hiring table, a conference table, whether it is a dining table and you're on a date, what is the other

00:50:45person getting?

00:50:46And if you can really think about what the other people are getting, it's almost impossible to fail in life,

00:50:52if that makes sense.

00:50:54Yeah, it absolutely does.

00:50:55And I was thinking about what you said with the cost of the kind of consultancy fee that you'd get

00:51:00for this kind of advice.

00:51:02Yeah, donations have to follow accordingly as the business grows itself.

00:51:06What percent I owe you to that?

00:51:08Yeah, I mean, so, yeah, but that's the honor system that I like to work on, is that, you know,

00:51:14if people do find this valuable and helpful, yeah, sure, it's nice to get donations.

00:51:18And if they don't, that's fine.

00:51:21I mean, I know that it's incredibly helpful advice.

00:51:23And also, this is like, this is hard-won advice from 30 years as an entrepreneur, so this isn't something

00:51:28I was born with.

00:51:29It's something I learned quite painfully and difficultly, in a difficult way over time.

00:51:34But, yeah, just in life, think about how your interaction benefits the other person.

00:51:40Just think about, I mean, you know, in the morning, so my wife usually gets up a little bit before

00:51:45me because she doesn't want to face me without handing me a cup of coffee, which, you know, I can

00:51:50completely understand.

00:51:50And I don't either, but, you know, in the morning, it's like, okay, well, how can I make my wife

00:51:57and my daughter's day better?

00:51:59How can I make their lives happier?

00:52:01How can I make their lives more enjoyable?

00:52:05And if you're with the right people, then you get these wonderful overlapping circles in business or in romance or

00:52:15probably about as positive a situation as you can be.

00:52:18And because if you do a great job, then you get referrals and people are like, oh, my gosh, you

00:52:23know, they'll tell other people about your business.

00:52:25You get that word of mouth stuff.

00:52:26I mean, I can't tell you the number of people I said, this story, I took this car in, they

00:52:31had it for a day.

00:52:32I thought, you know, you get that phone call.

00:52:34Like, I don't know if you hear more the call from your oncologist or the call from your car mechanic.

00:52:38It's sort of a toss-up.

00:52:39But, you know, you go in, hey, and you go into the car mechanic and they say, how's your day?

00:52:46And they're like, I'm afraid you're going to have to tell me that because you got my car.

00:52:50And the fact that they fixed something for free, I mean, I told probably 20 people about that over time.

00:52:55Now, even more.

00:52:57So, yeah, just if you make other people happy and you get what you want, I mean, don't self-sacrifice

00:53:04yourself, of course, right?

00:53:05I mean, because it's got to be mutual.

00:53:07It's a universal principle.

00:53:08But if you work on not just I want, but here's what you get, people really, really understand that.

00:53:15And, you know, if you've ever been to buy a car and the salesman, you just know they want to

00:53:21sell you something.

00:53:22Well, how about this?

00:53:23Well, how about this?

00:53:24Well, how about this, right?

00:53:26But whereas if they spend, you know, 20 minutes looking, asking you exactly what you want, where do you drive

00:53:32to, what kind of safety features do you want, how old are your kids, what was your last car, what

00:53:36did you like about it, what did you not like about it, and that kind of stuff.

00:53:39Like, I mean, you've heard me probably a million times on call-in shows.

00:53:42I do a two-and-a-half-hour call-in show.

00:53:44So, sometimes I don't even give any advice until the last half hour because I just got so much information

00:53:49to gather.

00:53:50So, I'm not trying to push an agenda.

00:53:51I'm really trying to get information so that I can target what it is that I'm saying.

00:53:56And that is me very much, I want to provide value.

00:54:02And if you go through life saying, I want to provide value, yeah, there's times occasionally you'll be ripped off

00:54:08or there are times when you will be exploited or whatever, and that's fine, but that just gives you the

00:54:13immune system response, right?

00:54:15Then you get better at identifying those kinds of people.

00:54:17And it hasn't happened to me since I did that tour in Australia, and before that, it hadn't happened for

00:54:21many, many years.

00:54:23So, yeah, just that pivot, how can I provide value, how can I provide value, and imagine what it's like

00:54:28to be on the receiving end of your pitch.

00:54:31And if being on the receiving end of your pitch means you get hard numbers and real commitments, that is

00:54:36very attractive because that's something to hold people's performance to.

00:54:42I don't buy from people whose performance I cannot measure because how do I know if they're succeeding or not,

00:54:48and how do they know if they're succeeding or not?

00:54:50So, I hope that makes sense.

00:54:51Can I ask you about the app that you, or the profile that you made?

00:54:57Was it, like, geographically bound to some region, or was it, like, something that anybody from anywhere could send you

00:55:03a message?

00:55:04I'm just curious about that.

00:55:06It wasn't geographically bound, but I did put a country in it, obviously.

00:55:11So, no, but it wasn't geographically bound.

00:55:13And I get some of it could be bots and so on, right?

00:55:15I get that, but it's...

00:55:18Yeah, yeah, that makes sense.

00:55:18And I'm going to do a show.

00:55:20I'm going to show over the next little while about, like, if you're going to...

00:55:24Because I've done a lot of cold calling over the course of my life, which is where you don't have

00:55:29any contact, you don't have any information, you just know someone's phone number and what they do.

00:55:33And there's, you know, a lot of dating apps and internet reachouts are cold calls.

00:55:42And it's something that people have to get better at.

00:55:45It's just brutal.

00:55:46It's brutal being on the receiving end, I think, of these...

00:55:50I was just shocked that they are 100% figure.

00:55:52W-Y-D.

00:55:54I was just shocked that they were 100% figure of, like, 100% garbage.

00:56:00Oh, yeah.

00:56:01Well, again, one guy made one joke, but then...

00:56:04Because I didn't reply.

00:56:04I didn't want to catfish anyone.

00:56:06I didn't want to get into any conversations.

00:56:07I just kind of heard from people that men's cold approach was terrible.

00:56:14And I'm like, it really is.

00:56:17It really...

00:56:18You freaky girl.

00:56:19It's like, no, no, please, for the love of God.

00:56:22Like, so I'll...

00:56:23Look, I'm not saying that listeners to this fine show would be in that category, but I really do need

00:56:31to do a show on how to cold approach people, whether it's in business or online.

00:56:38Because there's a lot of dating app stuff.

00:56:40And, you know, I'm pretty good at this kind of stuff.

00:56:44I have my strengths and weaknesses, but certainly cold approaches I'm very strong at.

00:56:49I got a number of girlfriends from just walking up.

00:56:52And it's not like...

00:56:53I mean, I was pretty good looking when I was younger, but this is even after I sort of went

00:56:56balding and even after I'd been in the business world for a while and it punched out a tiny bit

00:57:01and wasn't exactly tanned because of all that fluorescent lighting.

00:57:05But, yeah, there's ways to approach people that put you out from the crowd.

00:57:08But, yeah, I mean, why on earth would you pick someone to respond to out of this, why, WD, what

00:57:14you doing?

00:57:16You know, it's like, good Lord.

00:57:19It's like an IQ test.

00:57:20This is the bottom of the barrel stuff.

00:57:22100%.

00:57:23Yeah, I get it.

00:57:24And also, cold approaches, like in real life, sometimes they're not like 100% cold.

00:57:29You can just say, imagine, like, you were in your volleyball team or I met my girlfriend, I met her

00:57:38at an event where we were with common friends there.

00:57:41So that wasn't 100% cold.

00:57:44You know, there's already some things that you can take away from the person that you're talking to immediately from

00:57:52the environment that you meet them.

00:57:55So I think that's something that's lacking.

00:57:57And so what was your, sorry, what was your approach to your girlfriend?

00:58:02What did you say?

00:58:05Let me try to remember exactly what, how he said.

00:58:09Hey, you freaky girl, how old are you?

00:58:11Just kidding, sorry, go on.

00:58:12We were, it wasn't an event that we had, like, with common friends, but it was at a party we

00:58:17were having.

00:58:18And so, I remember, I remember just asking, starting asking, like, the regular questions of, oh, what's your name?

00:58:29And so on, and we were doing some dancing.

00:58:32And so she knew some Hungarian dances.

00:58:35I'm not Hungarian, but now I'm guessing I'm learning a bit of the old Magyar.

00:58:40But, yeah, so we were going through those things.

00:58:44And she thought that I spoke very good.

00:58:48There's another language that we're talking, but she thought I was native from the language I wasn't.

00:58:53And so we started talking about that.

00:58:56Wait, it wasn't, it wasn't Spanish, sorry, it wasn't a Chinese-Scottish hieroglyphics.

00:59:02It was actually, it was actually ancient Sumerian that we were.

00:59:09Were you summoning a demon?

00:59:13Well, you know, that's a fine pentagram you go.

00:59:16I would use a little bit more goat's blood if I were you.

00:59:19But, you know, that's some pretty good rituals you got going on there.

00:59:21Maybe that explains the success of the relationship after all, doesn't it?

00:59:27That's right, baby.

00:59:28Do what that will shall be the whole of the law.

00:59:31All right.

00:59:32Yeah, that's, so, is that clear?

00:59:34Okay, so you danced.

00:59:36You said, what's your name and you danced.

00:59:37I mean, yeah, and we talked about, like, we started talking about, like, what she likes to do and what

00:59:42she's doing, why she's in the city.

00:59:45And then she, like, mentioned a bunch of her interests and really caught my attention that she liked history and

00:59:53she was doing this, talking about, like, literature.

00:59:57And I really found that pretty interesting.

00:59:59And I ended up, we ended up talking more and I set up a date with some, like, cultural event

01:00:05that I wanted to go to.

01:00:07And she came and then we kept, like, talking.

01:00:11And so that's the kind of, like, finding common interest was, I think, a big part of why I was

01:00:16interested in art.

01:00:17I wasn't immediately, like, looks 100% attracted.

01:00:20Like, it was above the threshold for me.

01:00:22But it wasn't like, oh, my goodness, this is the best looking girl in the party, you know.

01:00:27Well, and how long have you guys been going?

01:00:29That'll be four months.

01:00:32Ah, okay, good.

01:00:33And what decade of life?

01:00:34Early 20s.

01:00:36Early 20s, right?

01:00:37Entrepreneurial.

01:00:37I'm reaching mid-20s.

01:00:39I'm reaching for mid-20s, like, 35s.

01:00:43Ah, still, that's very good.

01:00:45Congratulations, Zai.

01:00:46I mean, entrepreneurial stuff in your 20s is absolutely the way to go.

01:00:50Absolutely the way to go.

01:00:52Because you can work two nights straight and just shake it off.

01:00:55And, you know, your energy, your brain is at peak creativity.

01:00:58Like, amazing stuff is happening.

01:01:00It's like parenting and entrepreneurship should all be done in the early to mid-20s, if at all possible.

01:01:04Because that's when you bounce back the most.

01:01:06So, I started 27 or so, 28.

01:01:09I was a little bit behind the curve as far as all of that stuff went.

01:01:12And it would have been beneficial to be slightly younger when all-nighters are no big deal.

01:01:17But, and the enthusiasm and the creativity and all of that are just tip-top.

01:01:21So, well, that's great.

01:01:22I certainly wish you guys the best.

01:01:24Is there anything else?

01:01:25No, there's nothing else.

01:01:25But I just wanted to mention that I can't take full credit for the decision because we did talk before

01:01:30and you told me to do, to follow business.

01:01:32So, I can't take full, full credit for having, you know, decided that.

01:01:37But it was something that I also wanted to do.

01:01:39And I think that's why I was attracted to your show, too.

01:01:41All the freedom stuff that you keep hammering on.

01:01:45So, I think I can't take 100% credit for that.

01:01:48But thank you very much.

01:01:49And I want to move on to the next caller and also take note of all that.

01:01:53All right.

01:01:53I appreciate that.

01:01:54And I hope you'll keep us posted about how things are going.

01:01:57And feel free to call back in if there's any other advice that would be handy.

01:02:03All right.

01:02:03Thanks, brother.

01:02:04And, you know, another thing that I kind of like about being able to do this kind of show is

01:02:11that I do get this really great opportunity to pass along to others what was not passed along to me.

01:02:20Like, there's this guy on YouTube who teaches fatherless children the basics of manhood, you know, like how to shave

01:02:27and how to choose a suit and, you know, things that your moms, your single moms can't really help you

01:02:32with.

01:02:32It's really, really nice stuff.

01:02:33And I remember, oh, yeah, my brother was gone for a couple of years in my early teens.

01:02:39And so when shaving hit, I didn't know how to shave.

01:02:45And I didn't have any male relatives around that could help me out.

01:02:48So my mom couldn't help me out.

01:02:50So I ended up going to the library and looking it up.

01:02:53It's a bizarre thing to look up because you had to use, like, index cards.

01:02:57And it's like there's a book called How to Shave.

01:02:59I ended up getting How to Shave from some old life magazine.

01:03:03I can't even remember why there was an article about it.

01:03:05But when I got into the business world, I had economics.

01:03:11I had self-knowledge.

01:03:13I'd read a lot of psychology, philosophy, and economics.

01:03:15So I had some of the basics down.

01:03:17But the general mindset of how to succeed in relationships, of course, I didn't grow up around relationships that were

01:03:26successful.

01:03:27There was one family I knew that had a good marriage.

01:03:29And unfortunately, the man died sadly young.

01:03:35But, of course, if you know a family with a good marriage, it's not like they're sitting down with you

01:03:44and saying,

01:03:44Well, kid, friend of our kids, this is how you have a good marriage.

01:03:50They're not doing any of that.

01:03:52And so, unfortunately, all those secrets went to the grave with them.

01:03:55But I'm trying sort of as best I can, you know, these sort of fairly brutally hard-won lessons from

01:04:02the world of dating and business and friendship and family and virtue and all of that.

01:04:09But I'm trying as best I can to get this information across because I've had this sort of general thought.

01:04:17It's really been growing in me over the last couple of months just because I'm, you know, in the process

01:04:24of winding up.

01:04:27I mean, it's actually been wound up for a while.

01:04:29But sort of the final touches on immediate parenting because my daughter is going to be 18 this year and

01:04:33all of that, right?

01:04:34So, it has been pretty wild for me over the process of parenting, and I think this is true for

01:04:41a lot of people, to just realize,

01:04:43holy crap, was I ever not parented, was I ever not tutored, I got no wisdom, I got no virtues,

01:04:56I got no values, I got no mindset training, I got no success training.

01:05:03My business training was like trying to build a plane while it's taking off from the runway, just frantic bolting

01:05:08and hyper work and focus and all that kind of stuff.

01:05:12And, wow, was I ever untutored.

01:05:17And did I ever have to invent things from the ground up?

01:05:20It's like this guy, there's a video, I think it's on YouTube or other places, where a guy decides to

01:05:25make a chicken sandwich from scratch, right?

01:05:27Like he grows, he hatches the egg, he grows the chicken, and he makes the wheat, and he grows the

01:05:33tomato and makes the mayo.

01:05:34And it takes him like six months to make one chicken sandwich.

01:05:38And I sort of feel like assembling my life was kind of similar in that I got no instruction.

01:05:48I didn't find religious instruction to be helpful to me at all, like not even a tiny bit.

01:05:53Not even a tiny, tiny bit.

01:05:57There's nothing that I got from years of religious instruction.

01:06:01And especially in boarding school, we went sometimes twice a week to church.

01:06:04I was in the choir, as I've mentioned, and we were in Sunday school, and I got nothing.

01:06:11I remember some stories, but nothing of practical value.

01:06:16I didn't have any exposure to business men who could teach me anything about business or entrepreneurship.

01:06:22Of course, the last place you're going to find an entrepreneur is as a teacher, because the two are complete

01:06:26opposites.

01:06:27One wants, you know, pigs now to the trough security.

01:06:32The other one wants dancing on the nebulae risk and excitement.

01:06:36It's really opposite mindsets.

01:06:38And I got no advice on relationships.

01:06:42And I got no advice, I mean, even on the basics.

01:06:46For me, unfortunately, it was even down to like basic personal hygiene.

01:06:48Like I had to have a friend of mine's father say, hey, man, you got to start using deodorant, blah,

01:06:53blah, blah.

01:06:54And I didn't get any instruction.

01:06:55You don't really smell yourself, right?

01:06:56So I just, I was like crazy untutored.

01:07:00I mean, which is good in a way, right?

01:07:03Because philosophy is about starting with a blank slate, right?

01:07:05You start with nothing.

01:07:06You start with nothing.

01:07:08Blank slate.

01:07:09Blank whiteboard.

01:07:10Nothing there.

01:07:11And you build up from nothing.

01:07:13So the fact that I was untutored gave me kind of a lot of blank space to start filling in.

01:07:19I mean, they tried to, I mean, everybody tried to indoctrinate me, but I never really.

01:07:24I mean, society and its teachers and its gods and its governments and its police and its principals and its

01:07:33guidance counselors had absolutely no credibility with me whatsoever.

01:07:37No credibility with me whatsoever.

01:07:41And because of my experiences as a child and other things too, but I just didn't believe that society knew

01:07:47anything about truth or virtue at all.

01:07:49I mean, it just seemed like a whole pompous pantomime of pretending to be good.

01:07:53So I had a, what seemed kind of a yawning chasm when I started out in life, but however difficult

01:08:05that was, I got to reason from first principles because there was nothing written.

01:08:11I mean, imagine trying to do equations when there are a bunch of equations already painted on the whiteboard, like

01:08:20painted.

01:08:20You can't wipe them off, right?

01:08:21Then you got to write around them and it's kind of confusing.

01:08:23You got to remember where you were and was that me or was that them?

01:08:26It gets all blended and messed up.

01:08:27I started with two plus two equals four.

01:08:30That's it.

01:08:30Everything after that was blank in my mind.

01:08:34So I did get to build up from, I didn't have to adapt an existing building.

01:08:43I didn't have to embellish an existing tune.

01:08:48I started with nothing and having built things up from nothing to something, it's given me a lot of detail

01:08:56and value that otherwise,

01:09:00otherwise wouldn't be there.

01:09:03And I just, boy, do I ever not want you guys to have to go through that whole process, starting

01:09:09from scratch.

01:09:09It would be like, it'd be like having to invent your own language every generation.

01:09:14You just couldn't really progress.

01:09:16And, you know, something, I don't know when the last generation was.

01:09:20So my parents were born in the 1930s.

01:09:24I was born in the 1960s.

01:09:27And I can't honestly remember, my friends, I cannot remember.

01:09:32Anybody who had anything really of value to offer me growing up, certainly in school, no, in church, no, among

01:09:41Christians, no, among parents, adults.

01:09:45Again, there was this one family that seemed pretty good, but they weren't telling me about all of these sorts

01:09:50of things that I needed to know.

01:09:52Not any big fault for them, but that's just sort of the reality of the situation.

01:09:57In university, there was a woman who taught me a full-year course on Aristotle.

01:10:01She was pretty good.

01:10:02I did a lot of voluntary papers, and we'd sit there in her office chatting away about them and all

01:10:06of that.

01:10:06So I appreciate that.

01:10:08That was good.

01:10:10Not really much of anything else.

01:10:12In theater school, some useful stuff, but it was too hostile and Marxist environment for me to relax and enjoy.

01:10:19And they hated me because of my capitalist economics and absolutist moral perspectives and so on, right?

01:10:27So, you know, we didn't get along at all.

01:10:29It was a very contentious and oppositional place, which is pretty tough for creativity as a whole.

01:10:33Well, in the business world, I mean, yeah, I got a little bit here and there, but not much.

01:10:38I really had to sort of just read endless books and articles and think, and, oh, my gosh, I was

01:10:43thinking until, like, blood is running out of my nose.

01:10:46And I don't know when it was that people gave up on teaching the young in the West, but they

01:10:50sure as hell did.

01:10:52They sure as hell did.

01:10:53They just, I think back like I took years and years and years of history.

01:10:57I remember nothing.

01:11:00British North America Act, 1867.

01:11:04Like, I remember almost nothing from years and years and years of history.

01:11:10I remember very little from math other than, of course, the basics.

01:11:14English, yeah, I got some value out of it, but mostly because it exposed me or had me read good

01:11:19books, really good books.

01:11:20And that's all gone now.

01:11:22Of course, now it's all Toni Morrison and Why Some Caged Bird Sings and Sylvia Plath writing herself continually out

01:11:29of suicide and then failing.

01:11:32So nothing.

01:11:33Man, I got nothing from society, and I had to invent everything from scratch.

01:11:38And I don't want you guys to have to go through that process, which is why I've spent, you know,

01:11:4220 years plus trying to squeeze all of the lessons that I had to brutally learn over the first 40

01:11:50years of my life so that you guys don't have to reinvent the wheel every time you need to get

01:11:56somewhere.

01:11:57All right.

01:11:57I think, do we have any other callers?

01:11:59Doesn't have to be a long call.

01:12:00We'll be talking tomorrow night on the video live stream.

01:12:04So I hope you will check that out.

01:12:06Wordforkdebate.com.

01:12:07Don't forget to check that out.

01:12:08And on X and YouTube, I think it's at Scott Adams Says.

01:12:14Scott Adams School, right?

01:12:16It's not Scott Adams, the live streamers.

01:12:18It used to be at Scott Adams School, which is by his request to continue things going.

01:12:23And so I hope you will check those out.

01:12:25Freedomain.com slash donate to help out the show.

01:12:27Lots of love, my friends.

01:12:29Take care.

01:12:30I really, really, really humbly and deeply and gratefully appreciate your interest, your support, your questions, and your curiosity.

01:12:39Please, please, please know that you are treasured by me every day that I do what I'm doing and probably

01:12:46for at least 12 minutes after I'm dead.

01:12:48All right.

01:12:48We'll see you tomorrow night, 7 p.m. Eastern Standard Time.

01:12:52Lots of love, my friends.

01:12:53Oh, and freedomain.com slash call if you want to set up a public or private call.

01:12:57It's funny because I've been doing these things for like 20 plus years, and I think next week I only

01:13:02have a couple.

01:13:03So if you want to, now's a good time if you want to get in there because it's rare for

01:13:07things to open up like this.

01:13:08So if you want to do that, and if you can't do it in the times that I have set

01:13:12up, just shoot me an email, support at freedomain.com, and we'll work something out.

01:13:16All right.

01:13:18Enough of the administrative.

01:13:19I will talk to you tomorrow night, and thank you so much for dropping by tonight.

01:13:23Bye.

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