STOP Trying To Unf*ck Your Life & Use This Brainwashing Technique Instead

0:00 So you work with you work with people high performers, athletes, entrepreneurs.

0:05 What are some of like the tenets of things that you

0:08 like really use to help guide people to their own optimal performance?

0:15 You know, cuz I've obviously I haven't had a lot of training,

0:18 but I understand basics of psychology and I also

0:21 understand through my own experience being a competitive athlete.

0:24 Like I know when I get super hard on myself after I

0:28 miss a shot or do something like that, my performance goes down.

0:31 So you learn like one, you know,

0:34 don't ever show your opponent that you're doing

0:36 that because that gives them extra juice, right?

0:38 So they're fired up and also it doesn't help your own.

0:40 So you learn certain things like all right, you can't I can't do this.

0:44 You know, I got to I can't like I can't allow

0:46 myself to do this unless I want my performance to suffer.

0:49 But for you who's had not only experience but also training like

0:55 where do you where do you start in helping someone's mental architecture?

1:00 Uh so there's the there's the marketing answer and then there's the real answer

1:05 right I'll start with the real answer

1:06 because you'll understand the marketing answer right away.

1:08 The real answer is that I I start

1:11 the moment that I meet them because what they say,

1:15 how they say it, how they communicate, it's all data.

1:19 It's all information that helps you understand the person as they really are.

1:25 The marketing answer is that we start by getting people

1:29 to recognize that they aren't as bad as they think they are, right?

1:36 And that's the true reality of all high performers.

1:39 Every high performer thinks that they're a[ __] show.

1:41 Every high performer thinks that they're[ __] up.

1:43 Every high performer thinks they're an[ __]

1:46 Every high performer thinks that they're alone and that they

1:50 would be happier if they were not a high performer.

1:52 Right?

1:52 They all think these horrible things about themselves.

1:55 That's just the hallmark of a of a high ambition person.

1:59 That's why you have so much ambition because no matter how good,

2:02 how successful, how how accomplished you are,

2:05 you're not as accomplished as you could have been.

2:08 Right.

2:07 Right.

2:08 So it's that voice of our parents

2:09 or our our professors in our head all the time.

2:12 So in between those two is where the real

2:16 first step happens because how someone talks to you,

2:19 how they how they define their own problem statement,

2:22 whether they prefer to email or text or phone

2:25 call or video call or meet in person,

2:27 all of these are data points that help you understand the person.

2:30 Are they an introvert?

2:31 Are they an extrovert?

2:32 Are they uh organized?

2:34 Are they disorganized?

2:35 Efficient, inefficient, right?

2:36 Are they a people person?

2:38 Are they a are they guarded?

2:40 And then it just evolves from there.

2:42 But when it comes to the tenants that we try to get people to teach,

2:45 one of the most important tenants that I try to get anybody

2:48 to understand is that we whether you're a high performer or a non-performer,

2:54 we are all wired for survival,

3:01 mentally, behaviorally, biologically.

3:02 The first most uh imminent issue facing

3:09 us is the issue of surviving not thriving.

3:16 So when it comes to how we identify and how we prioritize our resources,

3:19 we're all prioritizing our resources towards survival first,

3:23 not towards thriving first.

3:26 So even if we are risk tolerant,

3:27 even if we are people who like to be on the leading edge,

3:30 even if you are a con man and you

3:32 have the courage to try to keep pushing forward,

3:35 what's haunting your thoughts is survival.

3:41 Mhm.

3:39 It it takes up so many calories.

3:42 There's been multiple cognitive um studies done that show

3:46 how much negative thought goes through a person's head.

3:49 Do you know the number of how many

3:50 negative thoughts the average person has in a day?

3:53 No.

3:53 48,000 negative thoughts.

3:58 Whoa.

3:58 48,000 negative thoughts in and approximately 65ish,000 thoughts a day.

4:03 And of those 48,000 negative thoughts,

4:06 between 85 and 90% of them are repetitive.

4:10 Repetitive in the day, repetitive day after day,

4:13 repetitive hour after hour, minute after minute.

4:17 Right?

4:18 I'm not good enough.

4:20 I'm I need to lose weight.

4:21 Um, I'm gonna forget this.

4:24 Uh, this person doesn't like me.

4:26 Um, I'm a jerk.

4:28 Thoughts a day after day after day after day after day, right?

4:31 Just constantly playing in our heads.

4:33 That gets amplified for high performers because

4:36 now high performers are adding to their list

4:38 of uh of I don't like my beer belly and I'm never going to get a date.

4:43 Yeah.

4:43 It's amplified to also I'm never going to hit that goal.

4:47 Yeah.

4:46 Uh that's too ambitious.

4:48 That's not realistic enough.

4:49 Right.

4:50 I'm not spending enough time with my kids.

4:51 I'm not spending enough time with my spouse.

4:53 Who knows what, right?

4:55 I'm getting grayer in my beard.

4:56 I'm getting grayer in my hair.

4:58 The the the amount of negative thoughts is just incredible.

5:02 Empirically, all the effort that goes

5:04 into those negative thoughts is actual caloric effort.

5:08 Yeah.

5:08 Because the brain consumes an enormous amount of energy.

5:11 I think like the numbers are like 40%

5:12 of all available energy is utilized by the brain.

5:15 So that means the banana you're eating is to fuel those negative thoughts.

5:20 How[ __] up is that?

5:21 Right.

5:21 Yeah, for sure.

5:23 So, a big part of it is understanding like,

5:24 hey, your survival is not at risk here.

5:27 And once you show people like, hey,

5:29 your survival is not not at not imminently being threatened, right?

5:35 If you are an athlete and you don't perform multiple games for multiple weeks,

5:41 then your survival might be at risk.

5:43 But if you have a bad game,

5:45 if you are called in like the like professional footballers,

5:50 uh, American footballers,

5:51 you're called in to kick the field goal in the final minute.

5:54 Yes, you are paid to score the field goal,

5:56 but if you miss it, that doesn't mean it's the end of your career.

6:00 Right.

6:00 Right.

6:00 You miss it a few times, it's a different story.

6:02 Right.

6:02 So, it's about getting people to take

6:05 the energy that they're investing into all the negativity,

6:09 the anxiety, the fear, the worry, the self-doubt, the self-criticism.

6:13 If you can take that same energy

6:15 and redirect it into something positive or progressive,

6:19 increasing your risk tolerance is something that we can actually measure.

6:23 Improving your bio optimization, your heart rate, your your lung capacity,

6:26 your V2, etiologics that we can actually measure.

6:29 When you start to change those things, it transforms your entire outcome.

6:33 It starts to make it so you're not putting your effort into survival,

6:37 you're putting your effort into thriving instead.

6:40 Yeah.

6:41 This draws me back to that issue of faith as well.

6:44 Because if you know that your success or failure in this personal

6:50 avatar is relative and subject to the world and sometimes random chance,

6:55 sometimes you get lucky, sometimes you don't,

6:57 sometimes you do your best and it's not good enough.

6:59 and etc.

7:00 But if you actually have a relationship

7:01 with God where you know like actually I'm

7:03 right with God and no matter what happens

7:06 like that's the thing that matters the most.

7:08 You see a lot of people in a in a deeper state of peace.

7:11 Especially when that religion doesn't have a lot of fear imprinted where

7:14 it's like I might just be I might be sinning right now.

7:17 This thought that I just had as this woman crossed the street.

7:20 I'm a sinner now and I got to go.

7:21 There's there's obviously negativity that can be associated with religion.

7:25 But a lot of people of faith, they have this kind of mental resiliency that you

7:31 see because it's like win or lose the game.

7:33 Like as long as your relationship with God is is in the right place,

7:38 you actually feel okay.

7:39 Let me give you a case study on exactly what you're saying.

7:41 Do you know what state in the United States

7:44 has the most effective uh what are they called?

7:49 Um telemarketers.

7:51 What state in the United States has the most effective telemarketers?

7:54 Tele sales teams.

7:56 No idea.

7:58 Utah

7:58 the Mormons and they are Mormon.

8:01 Now this case study is so powerful because what is

8:05 the biggest challenge for most new entrepreneurs and most business owners?

8:09 Selling.

8:10 Because even though they believe in their product,

8:12 even though they believe that it can deliver the outcome,

8:15 they still feel slimy making the sale.

8:20 Right?

8:20 Sales is not an easy skill to just be born with.

8:22 The idea of having a conversation where you

8:25 know that the end goal of this conversation is

8:26 for them to give you money and you

8:28 have to eventually ask them to give you money.

8:30 That's a hard thing.

8:32 And I can't tell you how many entrepreneurs,

8:34 even seasoned CEOs, still feel guilty about selling.

8:41 Yeah.

8:41 Right.

8:41 So we always go back to this case study of the Mormons in Utah.

8:44 Well, what makes them so effective?

8:48 There is a tenant in the Christian faith where God gives people spiritual

8:54 gifts and various spiritual gifts have different

8:58 elements of of human value to them.

9:00 Some spiritual gifts make you good at caring for people.

9:04 Some spiritual gifts make you good at connecting with people etc.

9:06 But the idea is if you have something that you believe in, something

9:11 that you believe would make the better the world a better place,

9:14 something that you believe would expand the kingdom.

9:16 Mhm.

9:17 How could you not do everything in your power

9:20 to get that product out to as many people as possible?

9:24 Right.

9:24 And if you get the product out to those people and they buy it,

9:28 how could you possibly feel guilty about it?

9:31 Sure.

9:30 Because clearly it's ordained that that person

9:33 should have that product just like you have been ordained to be the person

9:37 who carries forward and proitizes that product.

9:41 So that whole concept of it being spiritual in nature is what makes these telea

9:48 marketing and teles sales teams in Utah superpowered

9:50 because they don't carry any of the guilt.

9:53 They don't spend any calories feeling bad about what they say what they sell.

9:57 They don't spend any calories about the person who doesn't give them a chance

10:00 to sell on the phone about the person who hangs up on them right away.

10:02 If you haven't discovered your naturalb born spy skills

10:05 then somebody else might be using theirs against you.

10:09 CIA teaches us that there are only three types of people in the world.

10:13 Those who motivate, those who manipulate,

10:15 and those who are being controlled by one of the other two.

10:18 I created a threeinut CIA style quiz to help you

10:22 unlock your secret psychological advantage and identify your hidden blind spot.

10:27 This test was developed to help you weaponize your naturalb born gifts

10:31 and use them to get ahead of 99% of people in power, wealth, and purpose.

10:35 It was also designed to make sure that you can

10:37 protect yourself against those who would use their skills against you.

10:41 All you have to do is click on the first link in the description

10:43 below or scan the QR code on your screen to start your spy quiz now.

10:47 I want you to discover your secret spy superpower and use

10:50 it for good before somebody else uses their power against you.

10:54 Because in instead they're focused exclusively on well

10:57 that person wasn't ordained to have it.

10:58 That person wasn't ordained to have it.

11:00 That person wasn't.

11:00 My job is to find the ordained person out there

11:04 and it completely transforms the name of the game for them.

11:06 Now is it possible for people to change for those like

11:10 you talk you know you hear about like plasticity

11:12 brain plasticity you can like you can change things physical

11:15 things about yourself cognitive things the way your brain functions um

11:21 is it possible for somebody's personality to change over time if they really try

11:25 so you're yeah you're talking about neuroplasticity which is a very

11:28 real thing right being able to change the way you think right

11:32 there are different arguments out there about whether personality can

11:34 change I am of the camp that personality can change, but it changes by shades.

11:39 It changes by degrees.

11:40 It doesn't change like a switch.

11:43 You don't you're not born by default an extrovert and then you

11:46 can train yourself through neuroplasticity over

11:49 time to suddenly become an introvert.

11:51 I'm never going to be happy being alone.

11:53 I will never get energy by being alone for long periods of time.

11:59 It's just not going to happen.

12:00 I can try and train myself that way all I want.

12:02 The agency tries to train us all to increase our capacity

12:05 for being alone because it's a very lonely job, right?

12:08 But they never expect us to flip the switch.

12:10 Like you can't train yourself to change your default nature.

12:14 So it's a whole separate conversation that we can either jump into now or later,

12:19 but there's there's an actual cognitive developmental process

12:22 that your kids and my kids or your kid

12:24 and my kids are going through right now that shape who we are as adults, right?

12:29 And that lays the whole foundation to who you become as an 18-year-old adult,

12:35 how your brain is basically wired at that point.

12:38 And then you can engage in neuroplastic neuroplastic exercises to change

12:42 the way you think and to change the way your brain works.

12:45 But when it comes to that default personality

12:47 that was built in those first 18 years,

12:49 it's it's wired too deep to change anything

12:52 more than just a few degrees left or right.

12:57 Really?

12:55 Yeah.

12:56 So what's what that means is going back to our original

13:00 conversation when you tag someone's personality type and you tag

13:03 it correctly you you know you know now and you know

13:08 for the next 40 years that they are going to be

13:11 the way they are that under stress under pressure

13:14 with resources drained they are going to be a certain way

13:17 and that's important because most people 99% of people out there

13:22 will do not have excess resources they're drained all the time.

13:27 You I mean, how often have you met somebody who is like,

13:29 I don't need more money.

13:31 I don't need more time.

13:32 I don't need more energy.

13:33 Like, I am awesome.

13:35 Life is great.

13:36 You never meet people like that.

13:37 Everybody's drained.

13:38 So, if they're all 98% drained, if they're all running on empty,

13:42 that core default personality is what they live on.

13:45 If you can figure that out,

13:46 you basically now have a whole board of chess pieces, right?

13:50 I need an extrovert.

13:51 I need an introvert.

13:52 I need a sensor.

13:53 I need a perceiver.

13:53 I need a judger.

13:54 I need a feeler.

13:55 And you can just move them around on the board.

13:57 Ask them to do things with other people

13:59 that you know they're going to get along with.

14:01 Bring them in for projects where you know that they're going to benefit you.

14:04 Take them out of projects where you know they're going to be a drain.

14:07 It's a powerful thing to understand.

14:09 And this is all wired into them at a super young age.

14:12 Yeah.

14:13 It's wired into them and it has nothing to do with you and it

14:16 has nothing to do with them and it has everything to do with their environment.

14:18 The environment that they're raised in.

14:20 Right.

14:21 You mean it has nothing to do with their parents?

14:23 No.

14:23 No.

14:23 It has nothing to do with them.

14:25 It has nothing to do with you.

14:26 It has everything with their environment.

14:28 So parents are a part of environment.

14:29 Teachers are a part of environment.

14:31 The physical location where you live,

14:33 the environment, the physical environment that you live in, right?

14:36 Whether it's cold, whether it's hot, are you an indoor child, an outdoor child,

14:40 right?

14:40 How much exposure do you get to sunlight?

14:41 All of that factors into those first core fundamental.

14:47 I mean, it's like it's really 13 years

14:49 of fundamental development before your brain is essentially shaped.

14:54 The last bit, the last bit from 13 to like 21,

14:58 that isn't shaping your brain as much as it's kind

15:02 of ironing the wrinkles into your brain that you've already built, right?

15:07 So then if we use the whole ironing example,

15:09 we all know what it's like to iron a wrinkle into something.

15:12 So, you spend like 5 years ironing

15:14 these thoughts into your head because you're 14,

15:16 you're 15, your parents don't know anything.

15:19 You know, the man sucks, whatever else.

15:21 You're ironing, ironing, ironing.

15:22 And then you're like 24 and you try to take the ironing.

15:25 You try to take the wrinkle out.

15:26 That's neuroplasticity.

15:27 You're like, "Ah, shit." Like,

15:29 you're pushing and you're pushing and it's really hard.

15:31 Eventually, it will come out, but it takes time.

15:33 Right.

15:33 Right.

15:34 That's the That's the difference.

15:35 And you're never going to iron out the wrinkle that is how you get your energy.

15:39 You're never going to iron out the wrinkle that tells

15:41 you how you interpret data or how you collect data.

15:43 You're never going to iron out the wrinkle

15:45 that dictates how you make your decisions.

15:47 Those are just fundamental core aspects of who you are

15:51 that when you have resources and when you have time

15:55 when you have energy, you can apply extra resources to use

15:58 the opposite unnatural side of your personality.

16:03 But that makes sense.

16:03 But when you're drained, you're not going to do that.

16:05 So when you were in different countries meeting with these people

16:10 on whatever operations you were you were a part of, what

16:16 types of people were they were sort of like deciphering

16:20 what their personalities were and trying to get information from them?

16:23 Like are these people that are like wealthy people that are a part

16:28 of big organizations or are these just like everyday bluecollar type people?

16:33 So I I would change you're you're kind of you you kind

16:37 of lumped wealthy people and blue collar people into two separate categories.

16:40 What I would actually do is I would

16:42 say there's everyday people and then there's exceptional people.

16:46 Exceptional people can be blue collar just

16:48 like exceptional people can be super wealthy, right?

16:51 And everyday people can be super wealthy just

16:53 as much as everyday people can be bluecollar.

16:56 So I'm going to separate the two and you've

16:57 got your exceptional people and you've got your everyday people.

17:00 Okay.

17:00 Our goal in espionage is to find everyday

17:04 people who are actually exceptional and don't know it.

17:08 That's the whole goal.

17:10 To approach an exceptional person,

17:11 they've already kind of identified that they are exceptional.

17:15 They are they've got high status.

17:17 They've got high uh social um capital, what we call social capital.

17:22 They have high attention, high net worth.

17:25 They are they have lots to lose.

17:27 So they identify what they could lose

17:29 as a risk that they're not willing to take.

17:31 Right?

17:32 There are some exceptional people who will take exceptional risks,

17:35 but for the most part, like they're not the kind of people who are

17:38 going to be susceptible to, hey, I'm a spy.

17:40 Why don't you come spy with me?

17:42 That's not going to work on most really exceptional people.

17:45 Bluecollar or white collar or super wealthy, right?

17:49 They are they have identified their value in themselves.

17:52 No spy is going to convince them otherwise.

17:54 M then you got this huge pool of everyday people

17:58 who have not yet identified what their true value is,

18:01 who are seeking or searching or hoping for more.

18:04 Right?

18:04 That's your that's your primary target set for all all people

18:08 in the world who are susceptible

18:10 to espionage whether it's becoming spies, right?

18:15 That's why you don't see like famous musicians and famous

18:18 actors who then go on to become CIA agents.

18:20 You'll see CIA agents who leave CIA and go on to do something else.

18:24 But it doesn't go the other way around.

18:25 They're already exceptional.

18:27 All of the appeal of espionage does not appeal to them.

18:30 But your everyday person who just the guy who works I can't tell you how many

18:35 people at CIA start their start their working

18:38 lives as like bus boys and like barbacks

18:41 just you know at their local in their local

18:44 neighborhood or their local uh uh restaurant or bar, right?

18:47 right?

18:47 And they just work their way up

18:48 and they like all of their exceptional tendencies

18:51 kind of go overlooked until somehow CIA

18:54 finds them because they're looking for something specific.

18:57 And then all of a sudden you go through

18:58 the application process that we talked about I think last time

19:01 and that just filters you out and they're like, "Oh, nope.

19:03 He he or she continues to meet this criteria of exceptional." Boom.

19:08 Now we have them.

19:09 And then and the reason that works

19:10 is because exceptional people can identify exceptional people.

19:13 So you go out there and you're like, "Oh, here's somebody that we've cultivated.

19:17 The agency has created an asset or created an officer

19:19 who can cultivate other people to to give secrets

19:22 or give knowledge and they send them out in the world

19:25 unsupervised." You can imagine like that's how spying works.

19:29 Go forth, steal secrets,

19:31 make spies come back with intel secrets

19:33 from other countries that nobody knows about.

19:35 That's basically like that's the list.

19:38 That's the the honeydew list that CIA gives you.

19:40 They don't tell you how to do it.

19:42 They just say do these things.

19:44 So a big part of your job was recruiting spies.

19:47 Correct.

19:47 That is the job in human recruiting spies to continuously give you secrets.

19:53 So would you tell these people that you work for the CIA?

19:55 Sometimes.

19:56 Sometimes if that's what they wanted to hear, if that's what they needed to hear

19:59 for you to really drive that relationship home,

20:02 you would tell them that.

20:03 You wouldn't tell them in the beginning.

20:04 You would tell them at much later in the process, right?

20:07 Like when you're really when you're at a place, we call it recruitment.

20:10 When you're at a place where you want them to commit to you,

20:14 and more importantly,

20:14 you want them to commit to spying for the United States,

20:18 you'll have that conversation.

20:20 Some people can't handle that conversation.

20:23 You know them.

20:24 You know them better than they know themselves

20:25 because you've been spending so much time with them.

20:27 You know their core personality.

20:29 You know what they're like at their core

20:30 at at the default when all resources are drained.

20:33 And you just, you know, and you look at that person,

20:35 you say, "This person can't handle that much truth.

20:38 So, I'm going to let them keep believing

20:39 that I am whatever my cover might be, right?

20:43 Going to let them continue to believe that I am this business

20:45 person or I am this consultant or I am this whatever international speaker,

20:49 environmental engineer, whatever it might be.

20:52 Yeah.

20:52 Don't you ever get scared that they could compromise you if you did tell them

20:55 you were from CIA and if you if you were just in a different country,

20:59 say you were in Russia or China and you told them like,

21:01 "Okay, I work for the CIA." Don't you worry about them exposing you?

21:04 You do.

21:05 There's a very real risk there.

21:06 So there's there's two outcomes that we're

21:09 always aware of as intelligence officers.

21:13 One is an outcome where an individual might self-destruct,

21:17 and I'll explain that in a second.

21:18 The other outcome is where they'll self-destruct.

21:22 So self-destruct.

21:23 Self-distract.

21:24 We call it a big red button on their chest, right?

21:27 And that's that's our that's our terminology.

21:28 We just joke about it.

21:30 Self-destruct means you have been meeting with this person.

21:33 You think you have them figured out.

21:34 You're ready to take them the next step.

21:36 and you think that they're ready to hear that you're from CIA,

21:39 you go forward and you're like, "Hey,

21:41 you know, Danny, it's been awesome sitting with you.

21:43 It's been great talking.

21:45 I want you to keep telling me this powerful information that's going to change

21:49 the the face of your country and give your family the future they deserve.

21:52 I want you to not just talk to me.

21:54 I want you to understand that when when you talk to me,

21:56 you're talking to CIA." And then you might be like, "Wait, wait, wait.

21:59 I thought we were just friends.

22:01 You're telling me you work for CIA?" And I'll be like, "Yes, Danny.

22:03 I work for CIA.

22:05 you can trust me.

22:06 I've kept you safe this whole time.

22:07 You know, we're in this together.

22:08 We're going to change the world.

22:10 Hopefully, you'll be like, "That's awesome.

22:12 I I suspected that and I want to learn more

22:16 from you and I want to be around you even more.

22:18 So, let's do this thing."

22:19 Some people probably feel like that's super cool

22:20 and they want to be a part of it.

22:22 And then there's other people who are like, "Whoa, dear in the headlights.

22:26 That's not what I was expecting.

22:28 Like, you just you just took off

22:30 your clothes and you're actually a man under there,

22:31 right?" like and then they hit this big

22:33 red self-destruct button and they're like, "I gotta go.

22:35 I gotta leave." Right?

22:36 And you know that as soon as they leave, they're going to go tell their wife.

22:39 They're going to go tell the cops.

22:40 They're going to go tell somebody because they're going

22:42 to be thinking that that's going to help them, right?

22:44 They're like, "I got to get away from this guy.

22:46 This guy CIA, this guy's dangerous, right?

22:48 They're going to go tell the the head

22:49 of their terrorist group or their terrorist

22:51 cell." That's a self-destruct button because we

22:54 know they're not in their right mind.

22:55 They're freaking out.

22:57 They're going to go basically get themselves killed or get themselves arrested.

23:01 and the blowback is going to come back to me.

23:03 So then we would start an evac process to get out of the place to get out

23:06 of wherever we were operating to make sure

23:08 that we don't go down with the ship essentially.

23:12 Wow.

23:12 Yeah.

23:12 But you don't you have you never have to eliminate the target when that happens.

23:16 So that's that's the movies talking right there, right?

23:18 If you're going to if you're going to eliminate a target,

23:20 if you're going to neutralize a target,

23:23 then they're not worth the time and the effort for you

23:26 to put all the human resources into cultivating them as an information source.

23:29 you're just going to drop a bomb on them, right?

23:32 A a kinetic bomb cost a couple million dollars, right?

23:35 Let's say two or three million.

23:37 To put a human intelligence,

23:39 a human intelligence operation against an individual,

23:41 that costs tens of millions of dollars easily.

23:45 You've got technical collection human beings flying all over the country,

23:49 multiple people working on just one individual.

23:52 It's not just the person meeting them in the field.

23:54 Wow.

23:54 It's like all the supervisors and all the participants who are going up

23:57 the chain plus all the analysts back in headquarters plus you know you

24:01 might have uh foreign partners like

24:03 the Brits or the Canadians or the Australians

24:05 who are helping you like you're talking about a huge network of people

24:09 and you're the one point of contact to that information source correct

24:12 and there's literally just a team of people that are behind the curtain

24:15 and they have no idea that information source thinks that you're their friend.

24:18 That's the power of the relationship, right?

24:20 We we talked about that too.

24:21 When you have a relationship that's that strong,

24:23 they will convince themselves that it's just personal.

24:26 Like, this is my friend.

24:26 He cares about me.

24:28 They don't realize like, well, actually,

24:29 there's like 35 other people behind me who also care about you,

24:33 but they care about you as an information source, not as a human being.

24:37 How many times has it happened

24:38 to you and someone's hit the self-destruct button?

24:41 I've been fortunate.

24:42 I've been fortunate because in my history, nobody self-destructed.

24:46 Nobody self-destructed with me.

24:49 Right.

24:49 But the the other thing that we haven't quite talked about

24:52 is when you when somebody starts to report to an intelligence service,

24:56 when a human asset is created,

24:59 that relationship is no longer a personal relationship.

25:01 It's a professional relationship that they have with the organization.

25:06 So your mission changes like your first mission is to just meet the person.

25:11 Your second mission is convince them to give you secrets.

25:13 M

25:14 your third mission is convince them to give you secrets

25:16 and know that they're doing it in a secret relationship with CIA.

25:22 And then the fourth and most important mission

25:24 is be able to leave that operation and let

25:27 somebody new come in and have that that human

25:31 source continue to give information anyways, right?

25:35 Because once they're giving information to someone new,

25:37 they've become institutionalized.

25:40 It's like a fast food joint.

25:41 it.

25:41 Compare compare Starbucks to your favorite like artisan coffee shop.

25:48 You go to your favorite artisan coffee shop

25:51 because you like something specific about that place.

25:53 You like the owners.

25:54 You like the barista.

25:56 You like wherever they source their Colombian coffee,

25:58 whatever it might be, right?

26:00 You go to Starbucks for a completely different reason.

26:02 You go to Starbucks because you need something quick and efficient.

26:04 And you trust that no matter where you are in the world,

26:06 Starbucks is going to taste the same.

26:07 It's never going to taste great.

26:09 It's never going to taste totally terrible.

26:11 But you're going to get pretty much consistent stuff.

26:13 So if you're ever stuck, you'll go to Starbucks.

26:15 When you're in France,

26:17 you're not going to have your artisan coffee that you have

26:19 down the street because it only exists down the street from you.

26:22 That's institutionalization.

26:24 As long as you go to that coffee shop here, you're not institutionalized.

26:27 You're going there because of something special.

26:29 As soon as you start buying from Starbucks, you've been institutionalized.

26:32 And they know and that's what

26:33 they're counting on, institutionalized customers who will

26:36 go to any Starbucks anywhere at any time because they believe in Starbucks.

26:41 Even though there will be differences from the cups of coffee, right?

26:44 Like I've been to multiple Starbuckses myself.

26:46 They never taste exactly the same,

26:48 but you still kind of accept that Starbucks

26:50 is the leader in in convenient coffee.

26:55 Right.

26:55 That makes sense.

26:56 But why do you have to let them know that you are CIA?

26:59 Why can't you just keep them in the in the dark?

27:02 That's a awesome question, man.

27:03 So, everything in intelligence boils down to the question of control, right?

27:08 Even what we're talking even when we start talking about personality,

27:11 what we're really talking about isn't personality.

27:14 What what I'm talking about is control,

27:17 being in control of what's happening around you.

27:20 Part of what's happening around you are the people who are around you.

27:24 I would argue and CIA would argue the biggest

27:27 part of what's happening around you is the other people.

27:30 So CIA officers look at everything as a question of control.

27:34 Who's in control of the situation?

27:37 There's always three answers to that.

27:39 You're in control or the other person's

27:42 in control or control is still unidentified.

27:47 Nobody.

27:48 There's never a situation where nobody's in control.

27:50 There's just a situation where control hasn't been established yet.

27:54 There's like a competition for control.

27:57 Right.

27:56 Right.

27:56 In a in an interview like this, you are in control.

27:59 You're asking questions.

28:00 You're steering the conversation.

28:02 You open the door.

28:03 Right.

28:04 You can turn this stuff off at any time.

28:06 Like you are in control.

28:08 But in the conversation, I might take control, right?

28:11 I might choose what I share.

28:13 I might choose uh to give you compliments at a certain time and challenge

28:17 you at other times just to see how you respond or how you react.

28:20 Right?

28:21 That's what it's all about.

28:22 It's all about control.

28:24 So when an officer in the field chooses to reveal their true affiliation,

28:29 they're doing it because they believe it will further their control

28:34 over the individual and further their control of the situation.

28:38 Simple example, if you're my human asset, Yeah.

28:41 And you and I are just friends.

28:43 You don't know I work for CIA.

28:45 Where are the kind of places we're going to meet?

28:49 Do you have any ideas?

28:50 Where would we meet?

28:51 We're just friends.

28:53 Each other's houses.

28:55 Sure.

28:56 Restaurants?

28:57 Yeah.

28:57 Coffee shops.

28:57 You might go to the park together.

28:58 Like we're going to meet anywhere cuz we're just friends.

29:01 Yeah.

29:01 Soon as I tell you I work for CIA and we're going to change the world together,

29:08 are you still going to meet with me in public places like

29:10 restaurants and parks or is that going to make you feel uncomfortable?

29:14 Right.

29:14 If if especially if I have compromising information I'm giving up,

29:17 I won't want to meet in public.

29:18 Exactly.

29:18 So now all of a sudden we're going to meet in safe houses.

29:21 We're going to meet in private places that are under my control, right?

29:25 Highly secure venues.

29:26 We might meet in mobile venues, right?

29:29 Everything changes.

29:30 If I want to be in control,

29:32 if I want to take our relationship to that level of advancement,

29:36 right, then I'm going to project on you,

29:38 hey, let's let me push Danny a step further.

29:42 Tell him I'm CIA.

29:43 I think he can handle it.

29:45 And that's going to put me in a more control of the relationship

29:48 and put me in a better position so that we stop meeting in public,

29:50 we start meeting in private.

29:51 Hm.

29:53 That's just one example.

29:54 But telling somebody that you work for CIA, man,

29:57 there's all sorts of elements of control that open up.

30:00 That's the big advantage.

30:02 Yeah.

30:01 As long as I don't tell you that,

30:04 I'm I I can still be in control, but my control is less than if you knew, right?

30:10 Because now I can tell you, hey, we're talking about sensitive stuff.

30:13 Hey, we're talking about secrets.

30:14 Hey, we don't want to be in public.

30:16 Hey, you know, shouldn't we be more careful?

30:19 But that's not the same as saying, "I'm CIA.

30:21 You're giving away government secrets.

30:24 Let's take this into a secure safe house." Right?

30:27 So, how do you manage to keep your calm or composure under stress?

30:32 Are there certain techniques you use when you're in a stressful situation?

30:38 It's a stressful situation for everybody.

30:39 There's nobody who's calm naturally under stress.

30:44 What they're doing is they they are practicing

30:46 some sort of mechanism to cope with the stress.

30:49 And if you don't have something that you're trained in, then

30:53 you cope with the stress in whatever your natural way is.

30:57 And you've heard of the sympathetic responses, right?

31:00 The four sympathetic responses, fight, flight, freeze, and fawn.

31:05 That's how most of us deal with external trauma with stress naturally.

31:08 Yeah.

31:09 But there are techniques that you can be trained

31:11 in that give you an alternative to your sympathetic responses.

31:15 So a big tool that we're that we're all given is breathing techniques.

31:20 Box breathing is a phenomenal technique to lower

31:24 your sympathetic response because you control your heart rate,

31:28 you control your breathing,

31:29 you control your blood pressure all through box breathing.

31:31 And if anybody doesn't know what box breathing is,

31:33 you basically breathe in, hold your breath,

31:37 breathe out, hold your breath, and then repeat.

31:41 Mhm.

31:41 And whether that's 3 seconds or 5 seconds,

31:43 7 seconds or 15 seconds, you can decide for yourself.

31:46 But it's that pattern of breathing in, holding, breathing out, holding.

31:52 And that is proven time and time again to to help reduce stress.

31:56 Another tool, another breathing tool that we

31:58 use is actually very similar to hyperventilating.

32:01 It's called back breathing.

32:03 Back breathing is when you take a a rapid breath in and then you give yourself

32:09 back pressure when you exhale because on the exhale

32:14 is when your heart rate actually drops.

32:16 So back breathing looks a little bit like this.

32:18 A big breath in and then a long hissing breath out.

32:22 So That tongue between your teeth creates back pressure in your lungs.

32:33 Yeah.

32:32 And that back pressure in your lungs literally lowers your heart rate.

32:39 Yeah.

32:37 So you can you can actually touch your your body anywhere

32:43 your throat or your wrist where you can take a a pulse

32:46 while you do that breathing and you will watch your pulse literally slow down.

32:51 It's an amazing thing.

32:52 So back breathing is a great tool that we that we use.

32:55 We're also taught visualization.

32:58 Visualization is another great tool to be able

33:00 to um mentally put you in a more comfortable scenario.

33:04 So whether you're um visualizing yourself

33:07 on a beach or visualizing yourself on the street,

33:10 visualizing yourself completing the job interview or finishing the race,

33:14 whatever it is, if you know that you are responsive to what you visualize,

33:20 you can completely transform your stress.

33:22 And it's not it doesn't work for everybody because visualization is

33:25 really the most powerful for people who who have strong visual cortexes.

33:31 People who can really imagine clearly.

33:35 I am not one of those people.

33:36 When I use my imagination, it's all like it's like indiscre it's uh unclear.

33:43 It's foggy.

33:44 Clear images.

33:45 Yeah.

33:45 I'm the same.

33:46 But there are some people who when you tell

33:47 them to visualize a beach, they're on a beach.

33:51 Yeah.

33:50 I am not that way.

33:51 So, I need physical tools more than I need visualization tools.

33:54 But from the people that that use visualization tools, like my wife,

33:57 my wife can visualize very clearly and and she can close her eyes and you

34:01 can tell her that she's somewhere cold and you will watch her skin goose pimple.

34:07 You can you can tell her that she's eating

34:10 oranges and you can watch her like start to swallow more often.

34:13 Right.

34:14 There's people who are very very powerful visualizers.

34:16 That's so interesting.

34:17 You also mentioned emotional suppression techniques in the book.

34:21 What are those?

34:23 We all have emotional reactions and things like fear or anger or injustice.

34:29 They just they jump out at us and if we don't know how to control our emotions,

34:34 suppress our emotions, then they become the dominant emotion.

34:39 Emotions emotional suppression isn't what it sounds like.

34:42 It's actually kind of funny.

34:43 It's a bit of a misnomer.

34:45 You would think that when you're suppressing an emotion,

34:47 it means that you know you're going to get angry, so you hide your anger.

34:50 You press it down, right?

34:52 Like Spock in Star Wars or Star Trek.

34:55 In reality, emotional suppression,

34:58 the we the way to handle strong emotions is to let them run their course.

35:03 But you let them run their course understanding

35:05 that physiologically you can't actually stop your emotions.

35:10 Mhm.

35:10 If I say something to you that makes you feel angry,

35:13 there is nothing you or I can do to keep you from feeling angry.

35:19 Mhm.

35:19 So what has to happen is you have to go through that whole cycle.

35:24 Mhm.

35:23 And the cycle of an emotion is actually very quick.

35:26 It's very fast.

35:27 Remember we were talking about left brain and right brain.

35:29 All of your emotions center from your right brain,

35:32 from your creative brain, which is the faster processing of your two brains.

35:39 Yeah.

35:38 When when you uh ask somebody a question that's a logical question,

35:44 which is generally how we test if somebody is smart or not, right?

35:48 We ask them a logical knowledgebased question.

35:50 Well, some people answer quickly and some people answer slowly.

35:53 That's their processing speed.

35:55 But that's not their right brain speed.

35:58 That's their left brain speed because that's

36:00 the logical rational part of your brain.

36:03 So, if you're somebody who thinks slowly, answers slowly,

36:08 if you're the person who doesn't know a math answer right away,

36:11 it takes you a few seconds, you might process slowly on your left brain,

36:16 but that's not how you process on your right brain.

36:19 On your right brain, you process very quickly.

36:21 Mhm.

36:22 Now, there's a funny inversion that happens where very smart people,

36:27 people who are very leftbrain oriented

36:31 will actually have emotional cycles that are slower.

36:34 That's why if you've ever talked to somebody who's very smart about emotions,

36:38 they're they don't sound so smart anymore.

36:41 No, it's so true.

36:42 Yeah.

36:43 So, the faster they process on the left brain, generally speaking,

36:46 rule of thumb, the slower they process on the right brain.

36:50 M so that's why it's sometimes it feels like smart people don't even

36:53 get mad or they don't get offended or they don't get sad.

36:57 They do but it takes so long for them to process

37:00 that that it takes it's a while before it actually sits through.

37:04 The same thing happens in reverse where people who are

37:07 very slow to process facts can process emotions very fast.

37:11 So people who are not necessarily gifted

37:14 at at academics are usually very sensitive emotionally.

37:20 So then they get angry and they they get sad and they

37:23 they have these huge spikes and we call them Latina, right?

37:26 So there's all these there's all these stereotypes,

37:29 but it really just boils down to left brain, right?

37:32 And if you want to control your emotions,

37:33 it's not about pushing them down, it's about letting them work.

37:38 So if you get angry, get angry.

37:40 Yeah.

37:40 That doesn't mean start yelling and breaking[ __]

37:42 It means I'm going to be angry now.

37:44 And then you just kind of sit there and you

37:46 keep your face neutral and you let your anger come.

37:49 Yeah.

37:49 And the cycle will finish.

37:50 And is there a certain time it takes, you know, as a rule of thumb?

37:55 Because I've heard some people say maybe it's 90 seconds or it's fast.

37:59 So, um I can't say that I have a rule of thumb for all people,

38:05 but what I will say is it's not hours, it's seconds.

38:10 Just like you said, you can count it in seconds.

38:12 And that's I it doesn't mean that they go from from not

38:16 being angry all the way around to being not angry again.

38:19 It just means you have to get over the peak.

38:22 Yeah.

38:21 Because the peak happens very very fast.

38:24 For somebody who processes emotions very quickly,

38:26 they might reach the peak in 5 to 7 seconds.

38:29 M and then they might be in the peak for another 5 to 7 seconds.

38:32 So you could theoretically be on the declining side within

38:36 15 or 20 seconds if you just let them get angry.

38:39 That's so powerful actually.

38:41 And I think it's not just for you know CIA spies

38:44 but just for like everyday people like let yourself feel the emotion.

38:48 Absolutely.

38:48 And it will just go away you know

38:51 consume itself because most people tend to suppress them.

38:54 So that's actually such a good psychological sort of technique.

38:57 I remember when I was in uh when I was in the military,

39:00 I had a boss who told me to never write an an email when you're angry.

39:05 And we've probably all heard that before, right?

39:07 Never respond when you're angry.

39:10 Yeah.

39:09 I would actually I would change that and I would say,

39:13 don't respond when you're in your peak anger.

39:16 Because what happens is if you if you read an email that's triggering,

39:20 if you get a phone call that's triggering,

39:21 if you're in the middle of a conversation that's triggering, Yeah.

39:24 What happens is the longer it goes on, it keeps you in the peak.

39:31 Yeah.

39:30 of your feelings.

39:31 So that's why that's why people argue

39:33 at all is because we're having a conversation,

39:35 it's a very nice conversation, and then I say something and you get hurt,

39:39 and then you say something, and then I get hurt,

39:41 and then I say something again that continues your pain,

39:43 and you say something that continues my pain.

39:45 All of a sudden, we're holding this peak emotion.

39:50 M whereas if we were to just pause for a second,

39:53 take a couple of deep breaths and be like,

39:55 "Just give me a second before I talk about this."

39:59 So now when we start to talk again, we're not at the peak.

40:03 We're on the decline.

40:05 And I guarantee you, everybody listening knows what it's like to be

40:08 on the decline and then it goes back up again.

40:12 Yeah.

40:12 Well, you do the same thing again.

40:13 Just give me a second.

40:17 Yeah.

40:17 That's And then you Right.

40:18 There's the decline again.

40:19 It's a super powerful tool.

40:22 Yeah, it's a powerful tool for positivity.

40:24 It's also a very powerful tool when you're trying to manipulate somebody.

40:29 Because when you're trying to manipulate somebody,

40:31 you want them to stay in their peak.

40:35 So, when they try to slow it down, you have to speed it up.

40:40 So, when you want to keep somebody sad, they might want to slow it down.

40:44 And this is we've we've already admitted that espionage is dark.

40:50 Yeah.

40:49 Life is dark, too.

40:51 And for anybody who's been in a relationship that's abusive or if anybody's

40:55 been in a relationship that's manipulative or if you think you're in one now,

41:00 if your partner does the things I'm talking about,

41:03 you know for sure they are manipulating you.

41:06 You know for sure they are abusing you.

41:09 They may not realize that's what

41:10 they're doing because they haven't been trained.

41:12 They're not aware of it.

41:14 most likely because it was also done to them.

41:16 Their parents did it to them or a previous spouse or partner did it to them.

41:20 So now they're just replicating what they saw.

41:23 But when someone wants you to feel bad about yourself,

41:26 they will sit there and let you talk[ __] about yourself.

41:30 And then when you try to pause, when you try to slow it down,

41:34 they will interrupt and then they will start making you

41:36 they will say things that also make you feel bad.

41:39 Yeah.

41:39 or if you try to debate them, they will keep tearing you down.

41:43 And they'll let it sit and they'll let it fester because they know

41:46 that that sadness is going peak after peak after peak after peak, right?

41:53 You never answer my phone calls.

41:54 You don't answer my text messages.

41:56 You must not think about me.

41:57 You must not care about me.

41:59 And then, you know, you try to defend yourself and you're like,

42:01 I'm just really busy and and work is what it is and I promise you it's not.

42:05 No, don't even make excuses.

42:06 Now you're just making excuses.

42:07 And you're making excuses because I can tell that

42:10 and all of a sudden like it just they keep pinging that peak emotion

42:14 and that really makes that really makes you malleable to their will.