SPEAKER_01 0:02

The person that announces their goal before they even get started has a 50% probability of not even accomplishing their goal. So if you announce everything you do before you even get started, one out of every two things you start will not get done because you've destroyed half of your ambition by announcing it. Be careful when you announce your successes before you actually achieve them, because if you do that, you're probably not going to achieve them. Failures podcast. Today we're talking about the crisis and the issue with oversharing. What if I told you that sharing your weight loss goals, the 5k race you signed up for, your realtor's license? Everybody loves a good realtor's license story. On social media, what if you shared everything on social media? Every single thing you did. Social media, family group chat, friend group chat, you're just constantly sharing everything that you're working on. If you do that, it's literally one of the worst things you could do for yourself. Honestly, whatever goals you have, it's probably the worst thing to share it up front. I'm not making this up. We did the research. APA and NYU did a study on New Year's resolutions, and they found that oversharing information before you actually do it, it decreases your probability of accomplishing the goal. Hear me out. Not only does the research support this, me and Rich have stories, real life stories, that we're gonna get into today about oversharing. And the math is definitely not in your favor. I know it sounds backwards because we've been told all of our lives, especially us, raised in the social media era. Be open, man. Share your dreams, hold yourself accountable. You should be proud of yourself. You signed up, you did the thing. But the truth is that same advice could be burning your dreams to the ground. And Rich and I will unpack that with stories about our family and sharing too much, friends and sharing too much, and coworkers. That's the tricky one. Coworkers and oversharing. Rich, I know you have a crazy story you wanted to start the show off with, but my question to you is why do young men feel so compelled to share their goals before they even get it done? Is it ego? Is it validation seeking? What do you think it is?

SPEAKER_00 2:32

Yeah, I think it's certainly validation seeking, right? We're in the age of social media where cloud chasing is like a real thing and people just want to seem like they're doing more than what they're actually doing, or they want validation from the things that they actually are doing, just to see if they're sort of trending in the right direction. And, you know, to me, every time you post on social media, it's a heat check to see if like you're still popping, you're still cool, if people still like your posts, if people are commenting under your posts, if you're still relevant amongst different social groups. But you know, there's a lot of reasons why people end up oversharing. And I'm excited about this one because I know we have some stories to share with our viewers today.

SPEAKER_01 3:17

Yeah, I mean, I think you hit the the nail dead on the head. The idea of talking about doing something and the reality about doing something and getting it done, the labor that goes into sharing something you started or an idea you had, and the amount of labor that comes with actually doing it, it's like a world of a difference. I think failures as a platform is a good example. And I noticed that you haven't shared anything on your personal feed about the company that we started, and I haven't shared anything on my personal feed about the company we started. But yet we're what 40 plus episodes in? We are a hundred plus pieces of content in, and God knows how many ass whoopings we done got trying to learn how to build this business. We never spoke about it. What prevented us from making the big announcement online versus just sitting tight and hoping that we hit a milestone and maybe someday we'll talk about it with our friends and family?

SPEAKER_00 4:21

Yeah, I think it's just not letting any outside forces influence our decision making or our strategic approach to building this business. There's a lot of different people that say, Hey, you're almost in your 40s, and building a business from scratch is really hard. Are you sure you want to do that? Right. Great point. And for me, it's like, bro, I'm not trying to hear that. I'm trying to climb the highest mountain and I have all the equipment ready to do so. And I'm not trying to be talked down the ledge. I'm ready to climb this mountain. So I think for both of us, is that's what it's been. It's just like, we know we've built a media company before. Uh, we know we have the skill sets to do so, and here we are at it again.

SPEAKER_01 5:04

Rich, I don't want to get into the research too early, but involuntarily, you mentioned something that came up in our NYU package of research that they did on people and their New Year's resolutions. And it's called the limitations, insecurities. It's called the insecurity mirror. The insecurity mirror is you sharing your goals with other people, and those people project their limitations onto your ambitions. And they say it happens most with your closest friends, your significant other, your family. Why is that? That people projecting their limitations onto your ambitions comes from the people closest to you. What do you think the insecurity mirror is about?

SPEAKER_00 5:52

I think they're just projecting their own fears upon you, right? I think most people involuntarily have set limitations for themselves. So whenever they see anyone around them, even people that they care about trying to go after something, they can't really see it them accomplish that for themselves. So they don't see it for the people around them. Yep. Um, and that's the dangerous poison about oversharing. And I could jump into one story just that I remember very vividly in my early 20s. I had this strange habit of telling people in certain social circles, man, you know, I'm gonna work really hard, and but I'm I'm destined to be a millionaire. Like, I'm going to be a millionaire. I had so much ambition and so much drive to want to be a millionaire. And I would share that with people. And most of the time, 95% of the time, people would look at me like I was crazy. They're like, what is this kid talking about? Like, how is he planning to be a millionaire? What is he, what steps is he taking towards becoming a millionaire? And why is he saying this at 21 years old? Like, this kid seems so naive. And I think uh reflecting back on that time, I think people just thought I was a joke and I and I wasn't being taken serious. So be cautious about what you share, even as a young man, because if you overshare too much early on, people don't take you serious.

SPEAKER_01 7:13

Yeah, and that is something that I definitely want to get into up front. I have two stories that I thought about for this episode, because I can identify with a young man that feels the need to share everything online or share everything with their friends. Because, in my opinion, from my experience, the reason why I overshared everything online when I was younger is because I didn't think very highly of myself and I wasn't very proud of the place I came from. I saw myself as someone that was insignificant. I've said this on many episodes. That's where a lot of my drive came from. So a part of me not thinking very highly of myself and knowing that I was an underdog, I would share everything almost as a signal to the world that was saying, hey, look at me, I'm important. Hey, look at me, I'm I'm achieving my goals. Hey, I need validation while I'm running this marathon. But if you ever ran a long race, you'll notice that the people that give out the water, it's usually a little later in the race. They don't give out cups of water the minute you start the race. That usually happens as you're running further. And the further you go, there's more tables with people holding up signs and cheering you on and passing you Gatorade or anything you need in order to finish the race. I think my biggest mistake growing up was this yearning for wanting to feel important, wanting to be seen, wanting to feel significant. And I'm not gonna lie, I did like that the pretty girls that followed me also got to see that I was accomplishing my goals because every now and then you might fuck around and catch a DM. So I really understand and I empathize deeply with the young man that is an oversharer, someone that's asking themselves while they're watching this episode. Like, oh, I didn't realize I was doing that. But you get what I'm saying, Rich. A lot of the oversharing comes from feeling insignificant and not feeling like you're enough. And maybe just signing up for the race is enough for you to share it. And the validation you get, that dopamine you get, makes you excited, makes you felt feel like you actually did something. And you telling people you're gonna be rich was probably half of your battle.

SPEAKER_00 9:22

Yeah, you just said it, bro. It's the dopamine hit of you saying that you want to do something or you're going to do something, but not actually doing it, right? And then there's this weird thing where your subconscious thinks that because you said it and you shared it with people, that it's going to happen, but there's a lot of steps that need to happen for that said goal to happen, right? So, yeah, that that's what we're here to unpack.

SPEAKER_01 9:48

So I know I said a story on an older episode about the uh modeling agency that I used to work for, and it was a very janky agency. They would solicit people in the shopping malls to see if they were interested in having their kids or themselves sign up for photos, and it was basically like this crazy Ponzi scheme. And I worked in the sales side. That's where I got a lot of my uh sales on the phone skills from, is just having people sign these packages and whatnot. So I shared a story on a previous set previous episode about how I overshared my financial situation with my manager, and my manager wound up making me work more hours because he knew I was broke. I made a lot of mistakes at that agency because I was very young. I was very naive. I was still learning about the vulnerabilities of oversharing, and I was thinking about stories that wound up fucking my bag up because I overshared. And I remembered that at that same agency, I overshared so much information with my boss's assistant, who was really attractive. Beautiful, beautiful girl. And I thought we were flirting. I thought that I was making progress with getting with this girl. But what wound up happening is that I shared so much information with her that when it came an opportunity for me to either get more money or get a promotion at this job, my boss was telling me shit that I was telling his assistant and I had never shared with him. So, in my opinion, it was the oversharing with someone with the goal of impressing her that wound up being my demise. Because I was telling her, Oh, I don't have another job opportunity. I'm just gonna tell your boss that, you know, I got another opportunity and I want I'm gonna use it as leverage so I can get this promotion. And I remember him playing chicken with me and being like, Well, if you have another job, you should go and get it. Because the last time I checked, and he said two or three things that I never told him, and I had told his assistant. And I remember at that moment thinking to myself, like, damn, I feel like a fucking idiot because I shared so much information with this girl thinking that we were gonna go on a date, and she played me. She was basically getting information for her boss. I don't even know if she was or was not, but needless to say, the lesson was learned not well enough, but enough for that moment to be like, I gotta learn to shut the fuck up and stop sharing everything with people because it's not gonna work in your favor.

SPEAKER_00 12:12

Yeah. And listen, in the world of sales, what do they tell salespeople? It's like, hey, you're not here to sell them the car, you're here to listen to their story and just package whatever they told you in a way that makes them want to purchase the car, right? So the customer ends up oversharing. You take that information, you package it in a way where, like, hey, I could help you solve your problems, right? But you tie the car sale to whatever information they've just provided for you. And that's part of the oversharing that happens, right? Yeah, and it's about leverage.

SPEAKER_01 12:44

We've we've discussed this on many episodes on failures, but leverage is important when you're talking about wanting to get something, even as something as simple as buying a car, buying a house, shit, anything. When you give up too much information and you overshare, it gives other people leverage on you later. Now, I want to be clear, we're not one of those shows that is telling young men to be cynical and not trust anybody. That's not where we're coming from. We're coming from the other side. We're saying oversharing can be your demise. Sharing is fine, but oversharing is something like a boomerang of regret. When you throw it out, it feels good. It's going into the sky, it has momentum. You feel good when you share. But when time comes back and that boomerang comes back to you, you may be talking to somebody you love, a romantic partner, a family member. And that motherfucking moment of vulnerability comes back to hit you dead in your face. And you're thinking to yourself, fuck, why did I share that? What was I on that day? And you don't know why until you get to learn the lesson of life. And one of those big lessons for Rich and I, and we have a lot more stories to share, is oversharing. When you overshare, it doesn't work out nine times out of ten.

SPEAKER_00 13:58

Just that leads me to my next story, bro. And I'm almost embarrassed to share this, but I feel the need to share it because it's right in line with what you just said. So I used to work at a bank, and in this particular day, we had a former FBI cyber intelligence officer come in and speak to different employees about cyber fraud, about the internet, about how malicious actors can potentially try to uh hack the bank or whatever, right? So this FBI officer stands up and says, has in a conference room full of people has says, Has anyone been to the dark web? No one raises their hands but me, right?

SPEAKER_02 14:39

No, this is going.

SPEAKER_00 14:40

So he goes, Oh, one person has been in the dark web. He goes, Well, this is where criminals and pedophiles live.

SPEAKER_02 14:50

I literally spent one.

SPEAKER_00 14:53

All right, go ahead. Keep going, criminal. He said, Well, this is where criminals and pedophiles live. Hold on, you raise your hand, bold as hell. Bold as hell. The only person in the room, right? He goes, This is where criminals and pedophiles live. The whole room just started laughing hysterically. And I'm over here like an idiot with my hands raised, right?

SPEAKER_02 15:18

Pedophile is crazy. Yeah, that's a crazy thing to say.

SPEAKER_00 15:22

Yeah, and I just remember thinking in that moment, like, I didn't even get the opportunity to share context as to like why I was going on the dark web. Like, I was learning about different technologies as like a young IT professional. So I was, you know, learning about the tour network and and different things in the dark web. But long story short, bro, I became known as dark web rich at my job for at least three and a half years straight. I kid you not. And that story to this day still gets brought up in my like inner circle. And bro, I I just look back on that moment. And it's funny to share now, but I just remember feeling the shame in that moment of like, why did I feel the need to overshare that I've accessed the dark web before? Right. In my mind, I thought I was just showing that I was knowledgeable, but it was perceived that I was in an illicit market side of the internet.

SPEAKER_01 16:23

Yo, that really makes me feel like I would never want to raise my hand in any public setting and voluntarily share information because it can go bad. What was the lesson? I guess what's the lesson that you extract from that? If a young man is thinking, like, oh, that's why I don't talk to anybody. That's why I don't share information. That's why I don't participate.

SPEAKER_00 16:43

Nah, I mean, listen, time and place, know your setting, right? And bro, I was new to the workplace. I just felt like I needed to show my value and I needed to show that I was knowledgeable and that I knew everything about IT, even the dark side of the internet, right? So I thought that was my opportunity to show my colleagues and my peers that I was a bit smarter than like the average information technology professional. But that shit backfired, bro. Like I looked like I was somebody who was accessing the dark web doing illicit activities.

SPEAKER_01 17:15

You know what oversharing really exposes? It exposes the pick me's. And if you don't know what the pick me's are, I was at a bar. Ironically, I'm wearing a Knicks jersey. Knicks are in the playoffs, we're fighting for a championship. I was at a bar, and a coworker of mine points at a group of girls that are wearing jerseys that are not of the teams that are playing. They're just wearing different jerseys. And that coworker says, Oh, those are pick me girls. And this is the first time I ever heard of this phrase. So I'm like, what is a pick me girl? And she's like, These are people in life that go out of their way to try and be a part of something that they have no business being a part of and they have no interest being a part of. They just want to be liked. They just want people to acknowledge that they exist so they do things so they can be chosen. And they're called pick me's. So when I think about the overshare in your story and in my story, Rich, I was basically confessing my entire life stories to a girl that I thought was gonna go on a date with me because I wanted her to pick me. And you in your scenario, you're oversharing shit at work about things that you shouldn't be sharing because you were hoping that your boss would you literally raise your hand. You're hoping that he picked you. And what we don't realize is you think you're connecting, but all they're really doing is collecting data on you, and they're learning shit about you that could come back to haunt you. So when you're being a pick me, be mindful. That oversharing could come back to haunt you. You think you're connecting, they're collecting data on you, and they're gonna use it against you at some point. So again, caution. We're not saying to share, we're not saying sharing is bad. What we're saying is oversharing to be liked is not the best formula for being liked. Yeah, and then you end up with nicknames like dark web rich. By the way, dark web rich is them not being able to use the P word at work, but they were basically fucking, you know, you're tied to something you don't want to be tied to. You're like, damn, I fucked up. Yeah, absolutely not. If you could go in a time machine, what would you have done in that moment? Not raise my fucking hand. Not raise my hand, Rich. Better to be silent rich than dark web rich.

SPEAKER_00 19:39

Yeah, for sure. But you know what? That that taught me a valuable lesson. And now that I reflect on that moment, I definitely operate differently when I'm in different work settings or or in conference rooms, right? Like since that moment over the years, I've become more of a listener and more of a person who absorbs information. And the modification that I've made to myself, instead of being that oversharer, is that I pause for a second and I read the room, I listen to what people have to say, and I let every single person speak. I'm usually the last to speak, but what that has done for me is it's allowed me to gather the information that I need to collect a well-thought-out response and opinion or suggestion about something that is well packaged and crafted for that said audience, right? So I feel like I've I've garnered the respect that when Rich speaks, we have to listen because it's something thoughtful, methodical, and it's usually a good suggestion that we should take into consideration.

SPEAKER_01 20:48

A very simple trick that I've learned about posting online and oversharing is I imagine when I'm curating my post, and you can go on my Instagram. I am a sharing motherfucker. I love to post me a good carousel of me living my best life. But the very, very simple trick that I've learned, and it helps me out a lot when I'm about to hit publish, is I think to myself, what if the girl I thought was the most attractive on my feed DM'd me with this post that I posted and just put LOL. Will I be embarrassed by the level of tryhard and oversharing that I put into this post? Because that is the biggest fear is that your stomach will drop because someone that you wanted to see you in this high regard and looking cool and looking awesome and looking like a good father or looking like a good friend, or look at this picture. I'm taking care of my grandmother. I came to my grandmother's house to make her a meal. Aren't I so great? Look at me, I'm oversharing. If the girl you like most DMs you and puts LOL or does a cringe face emoji, imagine that before you hit publish. That is Heat check for you to understand maybe I'm oversharing too much. Here's another example, something very easy that I've done to make sure that I'm not oversharing. I just imagine my worst enemy posting this same post and me seeing it on my feed and being like, man, fuck this guy. This dude will do anything for likes. That's how you also know you're oversharing. It's just put yourself in different scenarios before you hit publish. And rule of thumb, you shouldn't be posting four or five times a day. This shit is just obnoxious. No one cares. Unless you're a musician, unless you're selling a product, and you have to really be selling a product, not like no customer selling a product. You shouldn't be sharing four or five times a day. It doesn't make sense.

SPEAKER_00 22:42

Yeah. And just you know how inauthentic someone comes across when they're oversharing certain things. Like one of my absolute pet peeves online is when I see people recording themselves giving the homeless food or money. That shit drives me insane because now I feel like you're doing it for the likes. You're doing it for the payoff of comments or of making people feel like you're a good Samaritan. Oh, look, John is a good person. He's feeding the homeless. He's giving money to the homeless. Bro, turn that camera off. Stop doing things to be perceived like you're a good person when all you really want is the validation of being a good person.

SPEAKER_01 23:26

Yeah, I mean, there's so many buckets in this conversation, but we're getting to the one that I think I hope, Rich, you and I have aged out of a little bit. I find myself doing it because I have a social media platform for all platforms. I have an X account, I have an Instagram account, I have a LinkedIn account. Every time you post, obviously you're doing some form of performance. That is not what we're attacking. Again, the whole theme to this episode is over-sharing, not sharing. Oversharing, to your point, Rich, is the guy that is giving back or the guy that's taking care of his kids. And he's like telling his baby moms, hey, can you do a video of me picking up the kid? He's telling his younger son to take a video of him having a good time with his older daughter, and the son is now working for you, so you can package yourself online as if you're a good father. If you're a good person, if you're a good son, if you're a good father, if you're a good friend, you don't always have to post about it. That is when you creep into the territory of oversharing because now you look like you're performing the thing that you should be doing. And again, this is a very modern day issue. This didn't exist in the past. In order for you to be seen as a good person in the past, you had to be a good person. The word got around. Now everybody does a PR campaign, a press release, they got headshots for every singular moment in their lives. Everyone is doing the same thing. We can see through the cap. Everybody can see through it because we're all doing it. So if I lent you$100 last week, but you posted that you're this close to closing on your first house the next week, the signal versus the reality is two very different things. And it's unfortunate, I know a lot of people like that, Rich. They can't throw in on the tip for the meal that you got together a few days ago when you went to dinner, but they're bragging about their lifestyle and all these trips they're on in their social media. We know the truth. You know the truth. That is the core problem of oversharing. Something is off about your self-esteem. You can't lie to yourself at the end of the day. And that's where a lot of the anxiety and a lot of the friction comes from because you're promoting yourself as one person, because you want the world to see you as one person, but you're living in your truth, which is not that person. That's where a lot of conflict comes in, especially in today's age. That's where a lot of people get depression. A lot of people get anxiety. A lot of people see themselves as less of a person because they're promoting themselves as somebody that's way, way bigger than who they are in real life. And there's nothing wrong with living your truth because no one is obligating you to post everything. My advice to you is very easy advice, stop hitting publish. Take four months off of social media, get your life back in order, and then get back out there and promote yourself as much as you can. But I think the burden of responsibility that you're feeling is because you keep promoting yourself as someone when you're really not that person. And that is that truth versus that reality is what got you feeling away. And most people can see it. Your family can see it. Your mom can see all the shit you're posting on Instagram and you still live in her house. You're not tricking nobody. We all know you live at home. Stop oversharing and start getting your life together.

SPEAKER_00 26:58

Jess social media is to me is the land of make-believe. It's where all your wonderful dreams can come true, and you can package anything you want to be perceived any type of way that you want to be. Quick story. I remember uh not too long ago, a couple years back, you and I were looking at different investments, and one of the investments we were looking into was production studios. So um I was in LA looking at different studios, and this one space had really big, nice green screens, and it was a beautiful space. So I took a picture of this space, I put it on Instagram, and as a joke, I wrote Netflix series coming soon, right? Bro, everybody from back home hit me up, like, oh shit, what are you, an executive producer? What are you working on? When is it coming out? And I just found it hilarious that I just posted something as a joke, and people really thought I was making films or making a TV series just by one image that appeared to be like I was in an official production studio, right? So, like I said, bro, social media is really the land of make-believe. Oversharing can really make people believe that you are anything that you want them to believe. And it's all marketing and performance at the end of the day.

SPEAKER_01 28:17

Listen, I love that you shared that story because that trapdoor has happened to me so many times where I've overshared. I mean, I work in entertainment, Rich. All I do is fucking cap all day. All people around me do is cap all day because planning, pre-planning, setup, best case scenarios, painting the picture. You see my hands? This is the whole optical illusion of the music business. This is the optical illusion of the film business. This is the optical illusion of entertainment. In the entertainment business, we get paid to paint a picture of what can be. But the reality is not a lot of people succeed. That's just the laws of physics when it comes to being successful in entertainment. How do I know that? Because this is literally my entire life. This is my business. So I'd be a hypocrite to sit here and tell people to stop promoting themselves, stop oversharing. That's not what we're saying here. What we're saying is that if you overshare everything, you put yourself at a deficit. This isn't about hiding who you are, it's about protecting who you're becoming. Anything that is sacred to you that you really want to accomplish, my advice to you, and this is coming from personal experience. My advice to you is don't overshare it online. Build it in the background, build it in silence, build it behind the curtain, and you'll see it's a lot easier to get the validation you want once the thing is built, and it's not in a PowerPoint presentation, it's not in this dreamer's post that you posted where you're getting all this dopamine from people cheering you on. Good luck, man. I hope the company goes well. I love the logo. When you know, when you log off Instagram and you take your punk ass to sleep that night, you're thinking to yourself, damn, I got 2,000 likes and all I built was a logo. I don't have no business, I got no customers, I got no motion. You have to live with that truth. So I'm gonna say it again for the dumb people in the back. This isn't about hiding who you are, it's about protecting who you're becoming. Don't put yourself in a deficit by oversharing. Because once you overshare, now you got to deliver. And if you can't deliver, you feel bad about yourself. But why do you feel bad about yourself? Nobody created these expectations. You created them on your own. You get what I'm saying, Rich? You built the expectations you live in. So back to square one of the episode. This is not about sharing. It's okay to share. It's almost impossible not to share in 2026 and beyond. What we're saying is don't overshare and don't create expectations for things that you don't even know if you could deliver on.

SPEAKER_00 31:17

I think that's great advice, Just. And you know where this creeps up a lot in the dating world and relationships, right? So one of the things, this is also something I'm embarrassed to share, but I'm gonna share it anyway. But one of the things that I was infamous for was I thought with women in my twin early in my twenties that if I shared a little bit about who I was personally.

SPEAKER_01 31:40

Vulnerability. Let's I want to get into vulnerability. This is good.

SPEAKER_00 31:43

Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. We're definitely gonna unpack vulnerability. But I thought that if I would share a little bit more personal things about me and my interests, that it would intrigue women more, or it would like I would I would be more connected with them. So some of the things that I would share was like, hey, I want to be, you know, a world traveler, like I want to visit all these places. Um, and I would share that like I was really big into like astrology and space and the universe, and I was big into like aliens and extraterrestrials, and bro, that's a great episode. I didn't know any of this, bro. And in my mind, I'm thinking that I'm being interesting. And in their mind, they're like, what is this weirdo talking about? Right. So there's this disconnect where sometimes you're oversharing things because you you think you're being interesting, but you're not sharing the context or the foundation of who you are first, and then adding the layers of who you are second, right? So I think it caught women off guard because it was confusing them about me, you know, and they didn't know how to make sense of like my personality type or who I was or what type of things I was interested in.

SPEAKER_01 33:02

Yeah, uh, I mean, I try to stay away from that bucket of this episode of oversharing, because I'd be honest, I think vulnerability is the one I still struggle with the most today. I'm 39 years old, I'm going to be 40 very soon. I still struggle with the idea of oversharing my vulnerabilities because somewhere in my past, I had to deal with the reality of a lot of the trauma that I grew up with. And for whatever reason, I started identifying with the trauma as a part of my story. I'm almost like a rapper that can't stop talking about his come up. It's like J. Cole still rapping about coming up, but he's on his 12th album, and he is a fucking multimillionaire. He identifies so much with the story of his past that he lives in that story of his past. So every time he meets someone, he's like, hey, my name is struggle. I come from the struggle. I have a lot of trauma. What's your name? And I, Justin Duran, I struggle with that too. I always see myself through the lens of coming from the hood, trauma, struggle. And that is the vulnerability that has been something that has never worked in my favor on the second half of my life. Post 30, people see me in a way that is the way I am today. Whatever that may mean to that person. Whether I'm an executive, whether I'm a grown-ass man, whether I'm fit, whether I'm taking care of my life in a responsible way, people meet me that way now. But for whatever reason, I still see myself as a younger, chubbier, broke, irresponsible, degenerate young kid from West New York. What is it about that vulnerability that you know you want to share with the world, but the world is looking at you like, why are you sharing all this? I don't see you that way. And I have a very embarrassing story that I want to share, Rich, with this girl that I was dating when I first came to LA. But I do want to hear your take on vulnerability because I feel like that is a more nuanced bucket in the oversharing episode. Because when you think oversharing, you think about social media. But we're talking about you sharing like life trauma, deep shit with people.

SPEAKER_00 35:20

Yeah, listen, I mean, I I think when you share your vulnerabilities, it's a way for you to connect with another individual at its most rawest, intimate level, right? And and I do encourage you to do that with people you trust, right? Because it builds this camaraderie and this bond that ends up being unbreakable, right? Where I think young men go wrong is sharing vulnerabilities with the wrong person. Perfect, right? With someone who is going to take that information, register it, process it, and then use it to weaponize it against you at a later point in time. That's where sharing your vulnerabilities becomes a poison. And that is the warning sign that I would share with other young men as well.

SPEAKER_01 36:09

I want to stay right there, Rich. I want to hear more about what you have to say about that. Because one note that I read when combing through our stack of research and going on Reddit and trying to find other perspectives, because I don't believe what we're saying is always the truth. I just think what we say is what we have lived through and we want to share with younger guys. But one note that came from a woman on Reddit about men oversharing, she was saying, I think it's incredible when men overshare their vulnerabilities. Something like telling guys not to be vulnerable sounds like you're preaching toxic masculinity and you're saying, don't be open, be closed. And I think what you said addressed that, but I want you to unpack a little bit more. What would be your response to somebody who said that?

SPEAKER_00 36:55

Listen, I think there's a fine line between everything, right? I've had moments where I've overshared with a woman about very deep personal things. And I know for a fact, based on her response to me and her behavior thereafter, that she never saw me the same, right? And that's the reality of things, right? I think when you find that balance as a young man, when you find the ability to be poised, to carry a bit of a mystique to you, I think naturally there's curiosity about you as an individual, right? And people will inquire more as they see you a bit sort of closed off and a bit reserved. And to me, that's a safer way to operate than being the type who overshares, spills out their guts with every conversation. And ultimately, bro, you are susceptible to be very, very manipulated when you overshare everything about yourself because everyone knows everything about you.

SPEAKER_01 37:57

Yeah, yeah. And that's the other side of the coin of this episode of oversharing.

SPEAKER_00 38:02

Yes. If vulnerabilities exist, they will be exploited.

SPEAKER_01 38:06

Damn. Now you sound like someone that is telling people not to share anything. No, listen, by the way, I work in cybersecurity.

SPEAKER_00 38:14

Yes, and this ties into like my technical field of cybersecurity, right? Like all I do all day is prevent vulnerabilities. Why? Because all vulnerabilities can be exploited. And that's the cautionary toe we're sharing with young men today.

SPEAKER_01 38:29

So it's about it's an offense and defense thing. It's like if you're going to share, make sure the person you're being vulnerable with is somebody you've already built trust with. And that's what I'm saying. I love that you gave a precursor to this segment of vulnerability, Rich. And I don't want this to go over anybody's head. A loving and caring mom who is allowing their son to listen to our show is probably sitting in the car with them right now thinking, why the fuck do I let my son listen to this show? This is not good advice. Well, listen, ma'am, we want to share something with you. What Rich said earlier is important. Don't let it go over your head. This is about nuance. You wouldn't share your life story with the woman at the cash register when you buy groceries for your family. You wouldn't let her know that your husband is in debt and he has erectile dysfunction, and some nights go to bed not pleased. You wouldn't share that with a random stranger. So, nuance is important in what we're saying. We're saying your son is not gonna benefit if he's a young single man looking for a beautiful young lady to be a part of his world. With time comes trust, and with trust comes connection. And with connection comes samples of vulnerability. And vulnerability with the right person at the right time builds real connection. I've been in long-term relationships. I've shared things with people that I've never shared with no other person on the planet. And yeah, those stories of me died when the relationship ended, but I felt comfortable sharing those vulnerabilities with somebody that I have real ties with. We done done some dirt together. We done put some time in together. And I feel like even me and Rich, I feel comfortable sharing a lot of my stories with Rich on this platform because I know him. Unfortunately, we're recording it and now the world can hear it. So it's a bit crazy that we're sharing these stories, but I've healed from a lot of them, so I don't have a problem sharing them. But the nuance of every relationship and the degree of trust you have comes with how much you share, how vulnerable you are.

SPEAKER_00 40:35

Yeah. And you know, just when you think about how people overshare, think about the receiving end of that exchange, right? Like you're sharing things, you're being vulnerable, but everyone's sort of classifying everyone. Everyone is putting labels on everyone. It's human nature. It's human nature. And what you share will ultimately create an identity and a label about you to someone else. So, like you stated, right? If the woman at work shared that her husband has uh erectile dysfunction, then she classifies that woman as like, well, she's not a satisfied woman, right? And everything she does is seen through that lens. Yeah. Everything she does is seen through that lens, right? And so on and so forth, right? So if you share vulnerabilities to the point where people start to view you as a victim, then you're always viewed as the person with the past trauma that just carries that victim mentality everywhere and you're treated as such. And it's unfortunate, right? Because people treat you according to the labels that they have given you.

SPEAKER_01 41:44

Yes. Or you gave them that they're giving back to you. Yeah. Rich, I have a great story. I've said this before, but it's worth saying again. When I first moved to LA, I took the job at the company I'm at currently with literally zero family and maybe 2.5 friends in Los Angeles. Yeah, I'm in the entertainment business. Yeah, I know a lot of people, but these are not my friends. These are people I know through entertainment and my job. So when I got out here, dating for me was rough. I was a single man. Pandemic had just was still finishing, and I was meeting a lot of people for the first time. And with that said, I felt like I was meeting myself for the first time because I was in a whole nother region of the United States telling the same sad ass story that I used to tell girls when I was in the East Coast. But for whatever reason, the rags to riches, hustle and bustle. I grinded my way here. I come from the hood. That story resonated a lot better in New York than it did in LA. And I didn't realize that until I was on date number three with an incredible human that I met out here. And by incredible, I mean insanely attractive. And I was trying to do everything possible to make sure that I locked in with this girl because I thought she could be a long-term girlfriend. And very similar to your story, Rich, I started switching up the formula and I was like, you know what? I've been told that I'm not vulnerable enough. I'm a bit shelled off. I could be standoffish. I'm gonna tell this woman about my life story tonight because I want to be in a long-term relationship with her. So in my old apartment, I had this nice little fireplace, sitting out there with her. She's having a drink. I don't drink, but I'm just chilling. And I'm like, man, you know, I've I've done a lot to get to where I'm at. You know, this is something that happened to me when I was really young. I went through this trauma with my mom. I went through this trauma with my brother, my father. I'm bro, I'm venting. And she wasn't saying much. She was just quiet, listening. But I could almost feel her body language be less engaged. Long story short, me and that girl didn't really work out. Date five, day six didn't go too well. And we just naturally split apart. But there was something that she wanted from me that I had never given her that was at my apartment and I just kind of blew her off. Like this was being kind of mean to her because we didn't have any more relationship. Long story short, she left me a voice note and it was an eight-minute voice note. And in that voice note, Rich, this woman told me everything that I vented to her about my personal life. And she packaged it into a few words that I swear, if my cousins were out here, my girl cousins were out here, I would have had somebody come see her because she disrespected my whole life. She called me a charity case. She called me a mama's boy. She said, You're someone that lives in your past. One of the biggest issues we had is she wanted me to go to museums with her. And I told her I don't do museums. She told me, You're a boss, but you're still acting like a kid. Let me know when you start bossing up your life. Needless to say, the reason why I learned that valuable lesson of not oversharing with someone early that I didn't build trust with was that all my insecurities that I shared with her, she threw back in my face because she saw me as someone else when I met her. But the more I got to share with her, the more she learned about me and she used it against me. So when we talk about oversharing on this relationship, that's what we're talking about. You won't know that everything will be used against you until it's used against you. And the same goes for what you just said, Rich, a coworker, whoever. You won't know until it happens. And that's when you learn the lesson. You don't know why you need elbow pads and a helmet when you're on a motorcycle until you fall off a motherfucking motorcycle. So be cautious. Drive at the speed limit when it comes to sharing personal information with people you don't know that well. Because the story never ends well. It never ends well.

SPEAKER_00 45:48

Damn. That's a deep story, bro. And I'm glad you shared that because that's a very deep story.

SPEAKER_01 45:54

Rich, can I just say something? Do I occasionally check her Instagram? Yeah, of course. She's very attractive. But you know what? You know what? Goes back to our old rule from an old episode. If she's a 10, you gotta bring the rules.

SPEAKER_00 46:06

Yeah. Listen, I think it's so crazy how you are perceived based on the labels that people place upon you, right? So think of like you and I having the same suit on, right? And we're in the same venue, but I shared it to someone that I make$50,000 a year. Naturally, that person is gonna look at me different. We both look clean cut, we both got the same suit on, but I've just divulged a piece of information about me that makes me appear less than what I actually am. And now I'm perceived as less of a person or or or having less, right? So I think that's an interesting dynamic.

SPEAKER_01 46:47

Perception is reality. How you frame something is how you approach something. 100% organic and farm grown is very different than my mom made this. You could charge somebody five times extra if you say organic imported from Italy. Framing is everything. It's funny, when you were saying that story about the suit, I was thinking, oh, if that dude makes$50,000 a year, that suit can't be a good suit. Instantly. If I see a girl watching his wrist, like that's not a good watch. He probably, that's a bullshit watch. Why does that affect it so much? And how does it relate to oversharing?

SPEAKER_00 47:21

Listen, I'm so glad you mentioned that, Just, because this is now we're getting into a nuanced topic that I didn't think we were gonna get to, but sometimes oversharing cannot always mean that you overshared something vocally with what you said. Sometimes it's your appearance, right? If you have three chains on and you look like a rapper, right? People are going to place a label upon you. I know I remember you had a great story about like the Jesus Peace chain you had in high school and how like you were perceived a certain way based on the chain, but based on where you were at the time. When you moved locations and you brought the chain with you, that chain didn't seem so glamorous and it appeared to be almost costume jewelry to some people, right? So oversharing can also be how you present yourself, right? The the clothes you're wearing, the jewelry you're wearing, um, how you're coming outside to the world.

SPEAKER_01 48:21

Yeah. And not everything is going to hit the same way when you share it with somebody you don't know. And that I think that is the cautionary tale here. I do want to go through these five pillars that Rich and I discussed in our pre-show. Rich, you tell me which one stands out the most to you when the topic of oversharing comes up. Vulnerabilities and past trauma, insecurities, projecting and oversharing plans to do something, insecurities, goals. When I go through that list, what jumps out to you the most when you think about oversharing?

SPEAKER_00 48:59

I think vulnerabilities is a huge one, bro. One of the things that I used to do just that fortunately I adjusted and I was able to um, you know, date my my current girlfriend and have a child and have a like good relationship. But prior to this relationship, I would always share like my past trauma with like my first baby mom, how that didn't work out, how I had a child at 24. And I remember you mean past relationship. Past relationship, but the trauma that I carried because of past relationship. So I think women in the dating scene saw me as the guy with past trauma, the guy who had a kid at 24, which you'll see from my failures resume shortly. And just this guy that appeared to bring baggage to a potentially a new situation, a new relationship. And I feel like women vet for these things when they're on a date with you. Like they want to know things about you, but you can also be in a situation where you overshare and now you appear as the person who just who's very toxic, who just has too much baggage for her, and you quickly get written off by some of these women.

SPEAKER_01 50:12

Yeah. Yeah. I I love that one because I have so many stories about that. I just shared one, but that's a tough one because you, like I said, men want to be more vulnerable, but you won't learn how much it hurts to fall off a motorcycle until you fall off of a motorcycle. So this whole episode is gonna fall under the category of, all right, bro, you're gonna have to learn on your own. You're gonna have to learn through your own bumps and bruises. Because I almost can feel 21-year-old Justin listening to this episode and being like, these fucking losers, these dudes, bro, get the fuck out of here. Like, they don't live in our generation. We have to share everything. You know, like being a vulnerable man is important. That's the way it's done now. You know, women want vulnerable men. And we have social media. Of course we're gonna share that. And you know, I don't think Rich and I give a fuck whether you do or don't share. We're just saying, slow down, my boy. Slow down.

SPEAKER_00 51:08

Do you know? Let me pause you for a second there. Do you know how potentially predatory certain women can be? How predatory the job market could be, how competitive a work situation can be when like you're competing with a promotion with somebody else, and someone tries to get information about you from a different person in order to have a leg up and get the promotion over you, right? Or women are just collecting information about you to see what they can get about you. Like, we can't pretend that the world is this really nice kumbaya place that you will never get played. So you should just be comfortable oversharing everything about yourself because the world is very blissful and everyone has good intentions in the world, and you'll never have to deal with pain from oversharing. Like, bro, there's bad shit out there. There's predatory women, there's bad people at work, there's some bosses that are terrible bosses, right? Like, I feel like we can't glance over that. So that's my combat to the guy who says, like, nah, we live in a world where we have to share, and women are looking for this emotionally available man. It's like, yeah, that's fine, bro. But what we're saying too is that there's a balance. You have to know who to be comfortable in sharing things with because there are some predatory people out there that will take advantage of things that you overshare.

SPEAKER_01 52:37

Yeah, yeah. I have so many stories. I I I really can't, I really can't share them because of all the sensitivity of the artist and people in it. But it just made me think of a story that, yeah, I can't really go into it. But I remember working with one of the biggest artists in the world and sharing with a beautiful young lady a lot of information that I should have shared. And I remember hearing from the manager of that artist something that I said, and it almost ruined my career. And I I just randomly thought of that. And I still that shit pissed me off while I was thinking about it, because I was thinking about the girl that I had, you know, I had just pillow talked my way into saying a little bit too much, and it almost compromised my career. And needless to say, five years, that was probably like five or seven years ago in that area. I don't even speak to that person no more. That girl does not exist. I haven't seen that girl in fucking years. But being a thought-ass Justin, I'm over here fucking pillow talking, and I almost ruined my career because I was oversharing. And I just thought of it and it made me tight because I was like, man, what would my life be if that would have gone the wrong way? Again, you don't know how much it hurts to fall off a bike until you fall off a bike. So maybe this is one of those episodes we're gonna be like, come back to this episode after it happens and your fucking elbows are bruised and you have scrapes on your face and your elbows. One thing that I definitely wanted to get into, and I will let you finish that thought. The difference between building in public, because we have a lot of younger, ambitious guys here that have their own businesses. The difference between building in public and seeking validation. I don't want to get into that for our last segment, but go ahead.

SPEAKER_00 54:13

No, I mean, in that vein, uh, I highly encourage people to build in stealth. I think that's like the new hot thing is people are building startups or they're building, you know, brick and mortar businesses in stealth, building out the whole business plan, um, having their marketing up to date and just having everything ready for a release to the world. But I feel like when you overshare those plans too early and you tell people that you're gonna potentially work on something, that's where outside influences try to manipulate what you're working on, or even worse, they try to insert themselves into a business that you had no business of incorporating them in, right? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 54:58

When you said that, I thought to myself immediately about a whole bunch of mutual friends that we have. You motherfuckers think you're slick. You think building in public is a way for you to just share shit online that makes you look good. So you're using the phrase, oh, I'm building in public. You're not low. You're not low. You're seeking validation in public because if you have a press photo, you have a logo, a company name that you posted online, but you don't have one motherfucking customer or one legal piece of paper that shows that you have an operating business, you're not building in public. You're capping in public. You're full of shit. You're just seeking validation from other people and you're hoping that people could see you as somebody that you're not. And again, that doesn't do anything for me and Rich to shoot down anybody that's building in public or capping in public. All we're saying is in a year from now, no one is gonna check in on that post that you posted about this crazy thing that you started, except for you. You gotta live with the lie that you put out into the universe. So just keep in mind that when you hit publish on something you haven't even started, that is the ultimate kiss of death that you're probably not gonna finish it. There is legitimate research from NYU and other real deep dive research and analysis that says the person that announces their goal before they even get started has a 50% probability of not even accomplishing their goal. So if you announce everything you do before you even get started, one out of every two things you start will not get done because the validation you get and the dopamine you get of people cheering you on, people sending you text messages, DMs, sending you emojis, keep going, man. You got this. You've destroyed half of your ambition by announcing it. That's why we're policing and telling you be careful when you announce your successes before you actually achieve them, because if you do that, you're probably not going to achieve them.

SPEAKER_00 57:06

Yeah. And just I want to end on this one, but I feel like one of the things that we need to quickly discuss too is just sharing your failures, right? And this is an interesting one because this is the name of our brand. It's called Failures Podcast.

SPEAKER_01 57:21

I didn't see that. I was like, damn, that's kind of fucked up. You sent me your notes, and I'm like, we're shitting on our own company.

SPEAKER_00 57:26

No, not really, because I think there's a fine line, right? I think the way that we share our failures is we package our failures in a way where we tell you what we did wrong so you know what to do right, right? But in different audiences, if you share your failures and don't share what you learned from those failures, you're perceived as someone that is a failure that can never do something right and just continues to fail and doesn't learn from their mistakes. So I think failures is an interesting topic because there are two ways that you could be viewed based on how you share your failures to the world.

SPEAKER_01 58:07

Yeah. Uh I mean, if we if we were to get big enough as a platform, I think what we could call our podcast and our media platform in Spanish is Los Golpes. And when you hear an older man or an older woman say los golpes, they mean like this is just the ass whoopers that life has in front of anybody who is ambitious, anybody who desires that they want more. But there's always going to be pain that comes with any goal that you set for yourself. Those are Los Golpes. Like they that that's already in the plan. You're going to fail. And like you said, Rich, we're saying we're extracting from life lessons and sharing them. But that doesn't mean that you don't have to go through them too. You should go through them. Oversharing, to your point, it just stacks more pressure. It stacks more responsibility and accountability. You're creating a facade of a world that now you have to live in. And we've mentioned this in other episodes. I personally believe that is what ruins your self-esteem because the relationship you have with yourself is I present myself as this way online, but I know I'm full of shit. I always go to the gym, post the gym photo in the gym, but I know that I leave the gym 10 minutes later, I get a giant 20-ounce smoothie, I don't do no workout, and I come back home. And then I spend 20 minutes in front of my house working on the post of me in the gym. If it takes you longer to cook up a fire post and a fire caption of you in the gym than it does the time you actually spent in the gym, you are oversharing and you're full of shit. And only you know that. That's what we're saying. The self-esteem that you have with yourself is the only score that matters. And if you know that truth is full of shit, then you gotta live with yourself. And not to mention, anyone posting photos of doing something all the time, and when I see them in person, that thing is not happening. I now know you're full of shit too. So you can't hide from the truth. I think that's the moral of the story. As much as you share, that doesn't change reality. As much as you share, it's not going to change your reality.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:27

Just I think I almost like your point earlier. We could probably end on this. It's just this is one of those nuanced topics where you're just gonna have to go out there and experience this shit for yourself, right? Because only when you're in a position of oversharing and feeling the embarrassment that you've received from life from oversharing, can you only then understand why you shouldn't be oversharing everything?

SPEAKER_01 1:00:54

Embarrassment, great word. The fact that we haven't used that word the whole episode, the Bed It Winsot, the embarrassment, the shame of the world throwing something back at you that you put out into it. It's like, hey, listen, nobody would have known that if you didn't share it, right? I think that's what that's what we're saying. It's sad that we're 58 minutes into the episode and we're coming to this moment of clarity. And I have to share this story before we leave, Rich. When I was in middle school, no, it wasn't middle school, I think it was about sixth or seventh grade. There was a beautiful young lady named O'Dallis. I hope she doesn't see this, but Odallas used to call me cookie. I had the craziest crush on O'Dallas when I was younger. And have you never seen pictures of me when I was really young? I was always very chubby. Not like obese, but pleasantly plump. And I told Odallis one time while we were out for lunch, and I had the biggest crush on this girl, and I was definitely in the friend zone. But I remember telling her my biggest insecurity was that I had big ears and that I was chubby. And I felt embarrassed that I was chubby and I always wanted to lose weight. And that motherfucking woman literally called me cookie one time during lunch, and the name stuck, bro. I remember I had to fight two kids for calling me cookie because I was living in hell and I was embarrassed that the thing that I shared with this beautiful young lady that wanted nothing to do with me came back as a nickname, the cookie. Bro, that shit. I just remembered being called cookie for two months, and I had to square up every lunchtime until that name went away. Because if you was calling me cookie, a fight definitely was coming with that. But I could have avoided all that embarrassment and pain if I wouldn't have overshared with a girl that wanted nothing to do with me.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:42

Chess, I like the nickname cookie better than dark web rich. I'll take cookie over dark web rich any day.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:50

If O'Dallas is out there, do you think your co-workers that you were working with at that time they would know that story?

SPEAKER_00 1:02:55

Oh, yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:58

Dark Web Rich.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:59

Yeah, man. There you have it, bro. Oversharing.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:03

Yeah, the irony that we made an episode about oversharing, and all we did was share our personal stories. Are we hypocrites?

SPEAKER_00 1:03:10

Did we overshare? Are we hypocrites? Yeah, maybe we are. Share this episode. Don't share it. Do what you want.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:18

Yeah, do what the fuck you want. We're not your parents.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:22

We out.