SPEAKER_02 0:00

I just said, fuck everybody else's life path. Fuck the American dream, the American roadmap. I'm gonna do what I think is gonna work for me. And I'm gonna keep stacking small wins until I see some horizon that fulfills me, not anybody else. But I remember thinking to myself, damn, if I would have followed the path that other people set for me, I wouldn't be feeling this feeling right now. And that is my pushback on the perfect life script and these outdated roadmaps that other people give you to live your life. Failures Podcast. Today we're talking about the death of the American dream and the death of the perfect life script. You know those white lies that your parents and society tells you, oh, don't worry about it. Find a career, go to college, you're guaranteed happiness, you're guaranteed success. I can't wait till I see your house. You and your girlfriend make such a good couple. I can't wait until you guys are married. Yeah, that was something that existed a very long time ago. This episode is dealing with the harsh realities of society today and what a lot of people are calling young men and their failure to launch. This episode is for the young guy who did every single thing right, and he still feels locked out of the American dream. Your grandparents and your parents told you about their glory days, how they met when they were teenagers, how they bought a house when they were in their 20s. Follow the script. School, find your passion, get a degree, you get a job, you buy a house, you live the happy life. Easy peasy. One, two, three, four, five. You check off all the boxes. Meanwhile, in reality, you're 20. You're in your early 30s, you're living in your childhood home. You see your friends thriving on social media. You're working a bullshit job, just trying to bridge the gap. You're just trying not to quit on your dream. You have a degree, you have loans, you don't know what to do. You checked off all the boxes. You're playing the game of life in the mode that they told you to play it in. You're following the perfect life script, but you're slowly losing hope for the American dream. Maybe it's just not in my cards to succeed. That's just some shit you start telling yourself when you start doubting yourself. Maybe I'm just destined to not be successful. That is the psychology of the young man that we're speaking to today. Because that is where a lot of young men are today, because the stats prove it. A lot of things are not going in the favor of a young man right now. And that American dream that we were talking about earlier doesn't exist as much as it used to exist. And life's a little bit more difficult for young men today. Rich, when you graduated college and you finally got your first IT job, did you feel like you made it? Or was there a moment where you were like, I can't believe I worked so hard for this bullshit?

SPEAKER_00 3:08

Yeah, bro. I definitely felt like I made it, right? No one in my family had gone to college, let alone graduated. And bro, shortly after, I was fortunate enough to find a job in my field of IT, information technology at a commercial lending bank. I was there for seven years. But for the first six months of that job, just I was crawling under desk, plugging in monitors, plugging in keyboards, plugging in mice, and feeling like, damn, this is what I went to college for. I spent four years of my life getting an education, getting a degree, to be crawling under desk and getting dust all over my damn slacks and my shirt and my tie. And I just remember thinking to myself, I'm like, man, this can't be life, right? Like, this is not what I've worked so hard for. And I think the reframe for a lot of young guys is really you need to understand that the starting line starts now, right? It starts post-graduation. I think what happens is you naturally you graduate, you throw the cap up in the air, and you're excited and you're happy, and your whole family thinks you made it, but really that's where the struggle begins. This is the starting line of where you need to figure things out and figure out how you want to maneuver and navigate throughout your personal life and your professional life, right? But I think it really starts there. And to your point, just the pain point for a lot of these guys is a lot different than what it was when we graduated. I think these guys have to play a different game in this year of 2026-2027. And we're gonna certainly unpack a lot of those hopeful tips that will help these young guys out.

SPEAKER_02 4:45

Yeah, Rich, I mean, listen, the subject is built around this idea that if you do A, you're guaranteed B. Why do you think there's a gap between that reality, between a young man who is in college taking all these classes, getting their degree, and then this idea of what's supposed to happen versus the reality of what actually happens after they graduate?

SPEAKER_00 5:08

Just I don't think anyone has the plan. I think your parents believe that college is the plan, right? Like go to college, get a good paying job, and life will just sort itself out. And once upon a time, that used to be the reality of things, but that's no longer the case anymore. Nothing is guaranteed post-college degree, right? Like just because you have a degree, just because you might even have certifications, shit, you might even be the most qualified, you might be the most intelligent in the room, you might have the best looking resume, and that still doesn't guarantee that you're gonna get the high-paying job or the job of your dreams, right? So I think it's weird how these young guys have to maneuver the workforce of today, especially with the integrations of AI, and they're trying to find their place in the world, bro. It's like, how do I succeed when I feel like I've been dealt the wrong hand, right? Yeah, why would you say they're being dealt the wrong hat of cards? Well, because our generation really didn't have to worry about AI. Like, you know what I mean? Like, we didn't have that fear-mongering narrative of like, yo, the robots are coming, they're gonna take over your job. Before it was just like, bro, if you're the most, if you're the best coder, if you're the best mechanic, right? Like if you're just the best in your field, you will succeed. It really used to be A and B, right? It used to be do the best work, get the high-paying job. That's no longer the case anymore. And I think with AI and automation, young guys are feeling priced out. They're feeling like, what's the point of me learning a trade, learning a skill that five, 10 years from now, AI is just going to take and do for me much more effectively than I could. And then what would I be doing? Right. So I think that's certainly the fear that I think a lot of young guys are feeling today.

SPEAKER_02 6:59

Yeah, Rich, a phrase that I heard a lot, and I think it's worth bringing up here. I I'd like to get your feedback is this idea of the death of the American dream, what once was available to all young men 30 or 40 years ago, and something that a lot of parents and grandparents still push on their kids as if these opportunities are still available. It comes down to college loans, how expensive it is to go to college, how difficult and expensive it is to buy a home in a major city, and how expensive it is to get married and start a family. And I want you to speak to the death of the American dream and why young men are a little bit justified in saying that because it's not what it was 40 or 30 years ago.

SPEAKER_00 7:42

Bro, the economy is crazy, right? Like buying a house, like I think the national average to buy a house is at least half a million dollars, right? In order to buy a half a million dollar house, you have to have at least 60, 80, close to 100 grand saved up, right? For closing calls, furniture, moving, etc. Bro, who who the hell has 80, 100 grand just lying around, especially post-graduation, right? Like it's not that easy for these young guys anymore. And I think it makes you almost feel like, what's the point of trying, right? If I can't get the house because I'm being priced out by the economy and by mortgage rates and by the cost of living, why even try? If I get the degree, get the certifications, have the best resume, and I still don't get the job, why should I even apply? You know, and they start applying these things, right? The dating market, right? Like I'm swiping hundreds of times a day on this dating app and I'm not getting one match. What's the point? And I think that is the central thesis of the pain point that a lot of these young guys are feeling. It's like everything that I'm trying to do in my life is not working, and I'm putting the ultimate effort in with not very much return back.

SPEAKER_02 9:02

Yeah, I think one I hear the phrase, the death of the American dream, and how young men are unsubscribing from all of these classic box-checking moments of a young man's life that no longer exist or the barrier to entry is higher. I can relate to these guys. I get it. Because the American dream for me wasn't always what other people told me it was. It was a lot harder to get a job than I imagined, or get a job that was turned into a career where I can make assistant money. It was a lot harder for me to get my college degree. It didn't take me four years, it took me six years. It was a lot harder for me to pay off the loans after I took loans to go to college because college was so expensive. I meet people that are older than me that tell me, man, when I went to Ruckers, when I went to a four-year school, it was only $30,000 all in. And I was able to get a grant and it cut that in half. And I was done paying my loans five years after I finished college. I can't imagine that if I graduated 15, 20 years ago, I was still paying my loans until about 20 years after I graduated. And from what I understand, college is getting more expensive. The loans are getting easier to get. So the gap between you being even as a grown man, even with debt, in order to go into the workforce and start saving money, well, you can't save money if you got to pay back loans. So I get the trap that a lot of these young guys are in, and I feel for them because the American dream is no longer what it used to be. It's changed a lot. And I think a lot of these young guys are playing life in a different mode, a hard mode. Meanwhile, they're getting advice from older people who were playing life when life was a lot easier, and the entry points and the barriers to entry were a lot lower. Now, I typically wouldn't jump out the window and give someone who's complaining the benefit of the doubt, but the numbers are so undeniable, Rich. The amount of entry-level jobs keep decreasing more and more year over year in the past five years, and the cost of living is increasing, and the amount of loans to get through college is increasing. So if the debt you're in is higher, but the money you get and the opportunities you get are lower, how long does it take before you cover that gap? I think you have experience with that. And I know you wanted to share a story when you came out of college. You didn't catch your stride right out of college. Not to mention you graduated college late.

SPEAKER_00 11:40

Yeah, I graduated at 24 and built up my skill set for over seven years at a commercial lending bank. And I wanted to make a pivot, bro. And about seven or eight years into my career, I vividly remember applying for a cybersecurity job at Bloomberg. And I was like, yo, I have seven, eight years of experience. I have all these certifications, right? Like, I should be exactly what these guys are looking for. Just I did five rounds of interviews and I didn't get the job. But not getting the job was not the issue. They fucking ghosted me. No rejection email. No, hey, sorry, we picked another candidate. No, like, hey, here's some feedback, here's some pointers. We went, we decided to go a different route. Nothing, bro. I didn't hear back from anyone. And I'm emailing some of the people that I interviewed, and I'm emailing the recruiter. No one got back to me. And then it dawned on me. I'm like, shit, I can no longer tie my self-worth, my professional value to what an employer is looking for. And I think I was doing that for quite a while when I was searching for a job. So it's this weird thing where I think you have to peel back how you evaluate yourself in the open market, right? And not let so much of your personal self-worth be tied to getting the job, getting the girl, like being able to afford different things. I think that's a pivotal reframe that I gave myself, bro, because I really started to feel like, man, tying so much of my identity and my self-worth to external things that I have no control over is not serving me. And that moment, bro, when I applied for that job that I thought I was very well qualified for and I didn't get the job and I got ghosted, I'm like, nah, bro, I need to play this game in a different setting because this shit is not working out.

SPEAKER_02 13:39

Yeah, uh, I really feel for the young guy that's sitting in his childhood bedroom and he is in debt from a college degree. He doesn't have a girlfriend, and he keeps trying to fix his life. He keeps trying to follow the perfect life script that was given to him by another generation. Do these things and you're gonna get these things. Do A and you'll get B. That's what we're talking about in this episode. And that young guy is trying A over and over and over again, and he continues to get rejected. He's sending out resumes, no one's responding to him. He does one interview, he doesn't make it to the next round, he's on dating apps, he's swiping, he's sending messages, he's trying, and he keeps getting rejected on all levels of his life. And quickly you go from the young guy who just graduated that everybody's celebrating, and then you turn 23, and you turn 24, and then you turn 25, and you just look up one day and you're in the same exact spot you were in three or four years ago. Your ambition didn't change, your appetite didn't change. You know you're trying hard, so you know you're not lazy. You weren't wrong for wanting a better future for yourself. You just followed a plan and a life script and a roadmap that is outdated. That's really what's happening. The video game and the controller they gave you doesn't work, it's defunct, it's outdated. Throw it out. You need to create a new map based on the situation and the circumstances and what's available to you today. I think that is the mental pivot that the young man has to make today. If you're tired of being rejected, if you're tired of being told no, every time you send in a resume, you get denied. You don't even make it to the next round of interviews. It's not a sign that you're lazy, it's a sign that the game has changed and you have to change with it. I think that is the first mental reframe we have to discuss, Rich, because that was something you were able to do, and that was something I was able to do. Because I didn't hit my stride until I got into my early 30s. So that means from 23 all the way to 30 years old, I was bouncing around like a fucking pinball in a pinball machine. I had no direction. And I really thought this life shit was going to be easy after I graduated. Joke's on me. The whole game changed.

SPEAKER_00 16:11

Yeah, no, you're absolutely right, bro. And listen, just nothing is guaranteed, bro. I think that idea of graduating and getting a degree and believing that you're entitled to things, you're entitled to the high-paying job or the appropriate title, right? Or however many vacation days you were dreaming about getting for your first role, like, bro, throw that shit all out the window, bro. You have to relieve yourself of all expectations. Because to your point, this is a different game that you need to be playing in 2026-2027, bro. It's a completely different arena. And I think just holding on to paper value, a degree, certifications, a resume, that shit is no longer it. That is not the cheat code anymore. And if I had to give you know actionable advice early, I think you really need to understand what are some of the things that employers are valuing. I think employers are valuing creativity, bro. Your network. Who do you know? Right. Like, bro, I remember my first role out of high school. I got it because my childhood friend was already working there. And he phoned a friend and he vouched for me. And he was like, yo, this kid Rich, he's smart. Like, I think you guys might want to talk to him. And it worked out. But prior to that moment, I had applied to 20, 30 different places and not gotten one call. And I thought that was such a valuable cheat code. And it's strange to say just, but who you know, who you're plugged into, who can make an intro for you is such a valuable thing to have. And I would tell a young guy in 2026, 2027, like, bro, invest in that, bro. Like, like invest in friends, invest in your network, invest in people that could plug you into opportunities and situations that you wouldn't have had otherwise. Sometimes that shit will take you a lot further than the resume will.

SPEAKER_02 18:15

Yeah. I mean, I think that's great actionable advice. And I wanted to point out one thing. Well, I'm in my 40s. I just turned 40. You're 38. I think we have hit our professional stride maybe in the past five or six years, where we're getting a good enough amount of money to justify the college degree we got a long time ago and justify all the bullshit odd jobs and the left turn, right turn, U-turns that we had to take in order to get to where we're at currently. I oversee marketing strategy for a lot of musicians and entertainers. And I'm a project manager for a lot of the projects that I work. Those are two very heavy, highly technical, highly nuanced. You need a lot of work experience, jobs, and roles for a corporation that I manage. And when I put those two together and I add my own personality, my own uh outlook, my own taste, my own judgment, it makes me a qualified executive that a company can bet on and pay me what they pay me. But it really took me 35 years to figure that out. That I just couldn't come out of college with no real work experience and just expect somebody to drop $200,000 a year on the table and say, hey man, I see your potential. We're gonna give you this, even though you have no real work experience or no proof that tells me I'm gonna give 20% of my company's salary to you and I know you're gonna get it back from me. You got to remember these are corporations. They have to make money. And I know that that's not the perfect angle to take on a show where people are looking for empathy and sympathy, but you got to remember these are businesses. If they're gonna put money in your pocket, they have to guarantee that you're gonna deliver at the very least 10x value back so they can justify what they're paying you. And if you don't have a sales job where your output is correlated one-to-one with what you're bringing back to the company, they gotta over-believe that you're gonna bring them their money back by what you deliver in service. These are hard jobs to try and nail down. And the last thing a company wants to do is take a risk on somebody they're unsure of. So I like the actionable advice you gave, Rich. But more importantly, part of the long game with building your career has to do with the fact that you're like, you know what? I just need to build more proof, more real life proof with real life success stories that I solve expensive problems for other people. And I've done it more than one time. Not just on a college project. Nobody gives a fuck about your thesis paper, no one cares about your TikTok account. If you don't have real proof that you've solved these problems, no corporation or company is gonna hand you a bag of money for some shit you believe you can do. Because in middle school, I thought I was the best football player on my middle school football team. Turns out when I got to college, there was motherfuckers who was six foot two, benching 280, that I had no business being on the field with. Those guys had proof that they could play on the next level. I didn't have that proof. So I want to be clear to the young man that thinks the world is against him. Just slow down a little bit. Sure, the job market is fucked up. The world is working against you. It's not a conspiracy. It just so happens that it's way more competitive now than it was before. You're not wrong for believing that. But that doesn't mean you can't continue to march forward, stack your resume, and take whatever opportunities are in front of you for less of the rate that you think you deserve because you're gonna need that in order to add it to your resume to show a company hey, you know what? I am capable. Here's my resume, here's all the expensive problems that I've solved for other people, and here's what I'll do it for. At this price for you. Now that is real resume advice, Rich, and I'm sure you can identify because your career wasn't a one-line to where you're at today.

SPEAKER_00 22:09

I think you hit the nail right on the head, right? If the young guy is asking himself in this episode, like, all right, so what's the solution, right? If the cards are stacked against me, what's the solution? And I think this is sort of step one is like, if you're fortunate enough to make it to the interviews, right? Because your resume was polished enough and they asked you to come in and do an interview. One of the biggest mistakes that I've seen these young guys do is like you start selling yourself, right? You're marketing yourself. I did this in college, this is what I'm good at, like these are my interests. And it's like that shit used to work a long time ago, but that does not work anymore. The reverse psychology is tell me more about the company. Tell me more about the culture. What sort of problems are you guys facing today? Is there anyone in the current role that I'm going to be working or that I'm applying for? Do they need more help solving this problem? Like, why are you guys looking to fill this role? Right. Like, really digest and unpack what it is that the company is struggling with. And then you insert your skills, how you can potentially solve that problem. Like it's really that simple. But I think coming at it from an angle of like, hey, tell me your problems, and now align my skill set to how to solve those problems is how you separate yourself amongst the pack and amongst the hundreds of people that are probably applying for that one job. So I think that's fantastic advice. And my other piece of advice is bro, understand the culture. I don't think young guys really understand how important it is for you to be personable. Like I've literally seen just guys be neck and neck, right? Two candidates. They're both good. We know they both could do the job, but we knew one guy would fit in the best with the group, with the IT guys, right? Like, damn, his personality will definitely mesh well with the team. And guess who we went with? That guy with the personality that meshed with the team, right? So understanding the culture and seeing how you could fit in with that culture, I think, is a super cheat code.

SPEAKER_02 24:15

Yeah, Rich. You know, one thing that I read before we went into this episode, and it really, it really fucked me up because if I would have known the numbers of the job market before I fought to get into the music business, I probably would have not even tried. Yeah. The percentages were so stacked against me that if somebody would have showed me real math, I would have been uninspired. I would have been like, there's no way I'm gonna make it. But sometimes when you look at the numbers, it kind of fucks you up because if you look at the Federal Reserve's most recent job study, it shows that basically the job market is frozen right now. The entry-level job market is absolutely frozen right now. And if you're a young man who can't get hired with the no resume, no experience having resume, you have all these little bullshit internships and a college degree, and you were the head of the whatever, whatever program in your college and high school, entry-level jobs are frozen right now. And it's not a reflection of your worth, it's just a reflection of the market currently. 42% of graduates, recent graduates, are currently underemployed. Meaning these guys with $80,000 in loans and bachelor's degrees in certain fields are stuck in jobs that don't even require the degree they work for. And even worse than that, they're in jobs that don't even require a degree because they're competing over jobs that don't require a college degree. So we understand how frustrating it can be. But what Rich and I are saying is you have to play the long game. Because over time, you have to take what's in front of you, and whatever's in front of you, you have to master that. You have to like attack it and add to your resume, and eventually these opportunities will come. Rich, we discussed off-air a lot of the younger executives that we work with, and this idea, this misconception that they have, that if they just showed up, they did all the right things, that they were gonna get what was expected way quicker than it took anyone else. And I think that is a reflection of the education system. Education system says read this chapter. The exam is gonna be about these five sections. If you study these five sections, you're gonna answer these 20 questions. If you get 80% of them right, you get a passing grade. Good for you. That's not how the real world works. That's not how the real world works. That's not how the job market works. That's not what happens when you have a 60-year-old man that has been clinging on to his fucking role for the last 10 years because technology, AI, and job promotions are whipping his ass. So he's trying to learn how to stay competitive in his field. And here comes you, bright-eyed, bushy-tailed, one-ninth of his salary. And you just show up with no experience, expecting to take that man's job. That's not how this works. The competitive job market is one thing that you're not listening to. It's not just a job market, it's competitive. And in order to be competitive, you have to compete. And in order to compete, you gotta know that you don't just check off boxes to get the job. Because getting the job is not the job. Keeping the job is the job. Showing you can perform with pressure in that job is the job. That is what we're trying to distinguish here. We do understand that the market is frozen right now. But when you do get your opportunity, it may not be ideal. If it looks like an opportunity and there's a crack in the door of hope, you gotta attack it. You gotta put your best foot forward because if not, you might never get another opportunity given what the situation is now.

SPEAKER_00 27:58

Joe's the game is rigged, bro. The game is rigged, but the solution is not to give up. It's not to quit, right? It's not to stop trying. Bro, I remember at 30 years old, I implanted an idea in my brain that I was going to purchase a house, right? And I was making six figures, Jess, but those six figures were not enough for me to save for a down payment on a house. So what did I have to do? I used some of my skill sets to create side hustles. I started building websites for people at $500 a pop. I started flipping computer equipment on eBay, right? Fixing them up, buying hard drives, swapping them out. I was doing PC repair for people, for coworkers, and making money on the side like that as well. And I just started saving, bro, saving, saving, saving until ultimately I was able to save up for the down payment on my house. But one would have assumed that my six-figure salary should have been enough for me to save up for a house. And that is not the reality, bro. And that's not the reality of today. This is why Justin is saying you have to get crafty about this shit. You have to find that little gap of opportunity somewhere to your point, just build a skill set, shit, build a side household. Bro, I'm okay if you fucking work at Burger King post-college if you have to just to bring some income in. But you gotta do something. You can't just quit and stay at home in your parents' house and say, the economy's bad, there's no jobs, I can't get a girl, I'm just gonna sulk in this pain. That's not a viable solution, bro.

SPEAKER_02 29:40

Yeah. And I don't know many professions that are hiring entry-level employees and have a guaranteed path that from year one to year seven, you have guaranteed check marks, guaranteed promotions, guaranteed job reviews, guaranteed vacation, everything guaranteed. That is one of the whitest lies in all of adulting, is that everything after college is guaranteed. What happens with a lot of younger men is that they listen to a lot of older guys that like to summarize their lives in a way that is in very neat packaging. And you're talking to somebody that is 30 years older than you, and when they reverse their life, they just kind of do it in the way that you watch, like a documentary. They just yada yada yada the hardest parts of their life, and they're like, Yeah, and then I met this guy and he gave me this opportunity, and I just showed up every day. And by me showing up every day, I was able to show them that, you know, I was ready, willing, and able, and then I got my next promotion. It's crazy. If you zoom out far enough, every line looks like it's going up and to the right perfectly with no zigzag. But if you zoom into every day of a month and every month of a year in any successful person's trajectory from where they started to where they went, it's a whole bunch of fucking chaotic lines that looks like somebody with Tourette's was drawing the line. It's up and down, up and down. Day over day, life is chaotic. Nobody that gets the most out of their life experience is gonna draw a perfect line from the bottom to the top. That's just not how any of this works. I know for a fact it's not how it happened for you, Rich. I know it's not how it happened for me. And I have so many stories in my life that I was, if I was able to zoom into just six months of a year, when that year started off shitty and I thought I was scum of the universe, and then I look back at the end of the year and I'm like, damn, I made progress, but I don't feel great about myself because I want to learn and I want to earn and I want to grow more. That's normal. That's normal. But you're not just gonna leave college and then automatically have a fucking guaranteed corporate card, guaranteed corner office, guaranteed everything, guaranteed assistant. You get to be the guy that goes to all the award shows. That is only in the movies and on your Instagram stories. Everybody's full of shit and lying on social media, and you're believing that it's true. You don't know what a grind it is just to get one promotion. You definitely don't know what a grind it is to go from 40,000 to 120,000. Then from 120,000 to 250,000. Now you're negotiating a bonus. Now you're negotiating travel. This shit takes time, but with that time, the only real leverage you have is proof. You have to have proof that you've done it before. And if you've never done it before, people just gotta hope you're good at what you say. That's not how this shit works, man. It's really difficult. And the trajectory from beginning to end is never a straight line. I just wanted to make that super clear. And my career is definitely a version of that, Rich. I'm not sure if you have any stories or examples that you could share on it not being easy just from going to A to B. Everybody wants to walk right in the front door, but sometimes you got to kick in the side door.

SPEAKER_00 33:14

Bro, I'll give you the best example that I could think of of today's reality, right, in the job market. Ten years ago, even when you do get the job, right? Ten years ago, every raise period bonus, I was already spending that money. Oh, I'm gonna get XYZ, I'm gonna go on vacation. Or on the next bonus next year, I'm gonna save up for a house. On the next bonus, I'm gonna save up for other things, right? Now, just every time that I'm going to get a raise or a bonus, I think, how much is this going to last me in case I get laid off? That's the mindset, bro. It's no longer planning for the future. It's like if shit went south, if I was part of a layoff, could this extra money, income tax money, bonus check money, could this extend my layoff period so that I could still live comfortably while I look for other employment? That is the reality of today's job market. And that's sort of like the mental reframe that you gotta make, bro. This shit is like a is really fucking a survivalist story, right? Like it's a cautionary tale, and I don't want to be pessimistic, but I just want to highlight that even when you do get the job, even when you are inside the building, like nothing is still guaranteed, bro. You could be six months in, ten months in, and still be part of a layoff. Like, this shit is crazy out here. So I think you really need to just plan accordingly, bro. Plan that nothing is guaranteed, and things might not always work out the way you you think they will.

SPEAKER_02 34:54

Rish, you are speaking to my soul and my spirit and every insecurity in my body with what you just said. And I think that's the other edge of the sword of not building your own company and not being in control of your own destiny, but constantly looking at an employer to employ you so you can have security in your life. That is what we're talking about in this episode. We got young men following the classic American dream system where you go to a college, you learn a trade, that trade and that skill has guaranteed employment once you graduate. That guaranteed employment will keep you at Ford Motors for the next 40 years, and then you're guaranteed a pension, and that pension is going to take you to retirement, it's over. It's over. That's not what the job market is anymore. You have one in every three young men that are in college, even in high school, but definitely in college, pursuing a side hustle while they're getting their degree. You have this barbell strategy of I'm gonna hokey poke my way into my professional career, but I'm gonna keep this side hustle going just in case this bet that I placed on the side takes off, and I can get at least half of what I would get in a salary in my personal business. And I can be an entrepreneur and make my own money, and now I'm betting on myself. People tend to romanticize all options, but all options are like roses, they all come with thorns. Nothing in this world that sounds easy is easy. The safe path of a job right after college, not easy. You want to know why? Because it's the easier path than self-employment or being an entrepreneur. Why is it the easier path? Because you take away all risk. You just ask for a job, somebody pays you out of their budget, and now you took the easy path. The easy path is the most crowded path. That's why you're having trouble getting a response on your resume because you're competing with 32-year-old men that got laid off from other companies, and you're 22 years old trying to convince an employer that at the same salary, you deserve the job. That's not how it works. These things of paths are very important to pay attention to. Because when I was in college, luckily, a few friends of mine and my good friend Rich, co-host of this show, we started a media company. That media company was my side hustle. That side hustle, despite me having a marketing degree and a communications degree out of Rutgers University, I was able to combine my hobby/slash side hustle with my degree. And I begged every record label to give me an internship. Fuck a job. I'm talking about an unpaid internship. And with those unpaid internships, came a lot of dollar slices, a lot of begging, borrowing, finessing, just to get access to people so I can build some sort of case study for me eventually getting a job. It took so long, Rich, after I graduated college to get my first job in the music business. I had a lot of odd jobs. And a lot of those odd jobs came from my girlfriend's father, who was might have been the most successful man that I ever met, white collar, owned three properties, was kind of a mentor to me at that time, but he was hitting me with the old American dream. And he was telling me, like, hey, get there early, show up on time, make sure you marry my daughter, make sure you move in with her. You got to show people you're serious. These are the ways you show your coworkers you're serious. You wear a wedding band, you got the home, you show up ready, you know, you tell them you'll take any work. And I remember trying to apply his 1970s life philosophy, his outdated life script, his outdated American dream script, and trying to apply it to a world that that map wasn't the same map that was in real life in my life. That terrain was different. And I remember I tried it for so long. I remember I moved in with my girl. I remember I took odd jobs, bullshit jobs that paid pretty well, but they had nothing to do with music. I was swimming in a part of the fucking lake that I hated. But as long as I was swimming, I thought I was doing the right thing. And I abandoned my dreams, Rich. I never forget it. I abandoned all my dreams to live someone else's life script. And I felt like shit. Every day I would get to work, I would take the sixth train to work, and the sixth train was probably seven stops away from my home. And I would get into that train and I would count the stops down and think to myself, damn, I'm about to get off the train, go to a job I hate, and hopefully I can get the appraisal and the approval and the validation from my girl's father because he told me this is the way you gotta do it. A real man does these things. And I could feel my music business dreams slipping out of my hands. And I'll never forget it, man. One day I took the train from my home, seven stops to my job, and by the fifth stop, I was just sitting on the train thinking to myself, like, I'm not gonna get out. I'm gonna stay seated right here. And I rode the train uptown all the way to the Bronx. And I ended up in the Bronx because I just froze in the cart. I didn't want to get out of the train. And I remember the whole time I was in the train, I was writing an email to my boss saying I wasn't feeling well and I needed the day off. I was feeling very sick. And I kept thinking to myself, damn, is this a sign that I hate what I'm doing to make money? Is this a sign that like I'm not happy? I thought I was guaranteed happiness and I followed this path that was put in front of me by other people. And I'm very happy that I had that realization, Rich, because I quit that job at some point and I got back to getting paid a very small amount of money to be back in music. And eventually that opportunity led me to my first real big boy job at a record label. And that big boy job at a record label led me to meeting the first client that I ever had that was life-changing for me. If you look behind me, I'm not a fan of saying who my artists are, but that plaque that's behind me is one of my most important trophies of my life because it was the first time I felt freedom. And I felt like, wow, it was all worth it. I'm 30 years old and I've worked my entire adult life to get to this point, and it wasn't about money, it was about me finally validating to myself that I just said, fuck everybody else's life path, fuck the American dream, the American roadmap. I'm gonna do what I think is gonna work for me, and I'm gonna keep stacking small wins until I see some horizon that fulfills me, not anybody else. I was happy for me because it's what I wanted for me. And that plaque that's behind me, the day it came in the mail, I remember opening it, Rich, and looking at it, and I can't describe it. It was a crazy feeling. But I remember thinking to myself, damn, if I would have followed the path that other people set for me, I wouldn't be feeling this feeling right now. And that is my pushback on the perfect life script and these outdated roadmaps that other people give you to live your life. I'm not saying risk it all. I'm not saying be crazy, don't wall out. You gotta put money in your pocket, you gotta provide, but don't give up on what you think is your truth because once you get there, if you're living somebody else's life, you're gonna resent everything about that life. And that's a whole other episode. But I just wanted to share that because that was so important to me when I was, damn, where would I be if I didn't push through and if I would have just listened to other people what they wanted for me?

SPEAKER_00 43:21

Yeah, just listen, that's a great story. And I think if we derive at any solution to this episode is exactly what you just said, bro. You have to follow your own plan, you have to follow your gut, and you have to be willing to run your own race at the end of the day, right? Like you get to choose how you maneuver through your professional life, through your career, and how you're able to open doors for yourself. Even that means that you've got to face a little bit of embarrassment. I often think of like the Thanksgiving dinner table, right? Where everyone's like, hey, so how's work? Like, what are you working on? And it sucks, right? Because if you're at Thanksgiving, Giving and everyone expected you to be engaged and married with a high-paying career, and everyone was at your graduation, and now you you're still working a part-time as you know, a cashier somewhere. These expectations everyone had of you, you're not meeting, right? So you feel embarrassed and you feel like shit. But guess what, bro? You're building skills. There's no shame in that. You're building skills. Hey, yeah, I'm working as a cashier, I'm building my skill set, I'm working on things. I don't have all the solutions yet. I don't know how my career is going to unfold, but I'm working on it. But I think I could see the young guy getting pressure from family, relatives, the fucking media, right? Old life scripts of graduate college and everything will just work out fine. And feeling that pressure. And ultimately, the solution is exactly what you just said, Jess. You have to run your own race and believe in your gut that the decisions that you're making for yourself are the right ones with the information you have at hand. So I think that's incredible advice. And that's the biggest takeaway, I think, from this entire episode.

SPEAKER_02 45:10

Yeah. Rich, I have a few. Um, I want to play a little Russian roulette with you of um comments and steel man arguments I've gotten from this episode topic.

SPEAKER_00 45:20

Let's do it.

SPEAKER_02 45:21

I'm gonna say four of them and you pick the one that you want to respond to. Hypothetically, let's say like young guys are responding with these quotes, and you pick the one you want to respond to. Number one, so basically what you're saying is college is a scam. Number two, don't you think it's unfair to blame a kid who trusted the system and just got what the system had for him? Number three, I gotta be honest with you. I hear everything you're saying, but I literally can't afford a low-paying job out of college. Something has to change. Number five, my family just thinks I'm making excuses, but I'm really not.

SPEAKER_00 45:58

Listen, man, number two, bro, and I feel passionate about this, Jess, because motherfuckers love to blame the system. They love to blame their circumstances, they love to blame where they came from, they want to blame the economy, they want to blame dating apps, they want to blame women. Everything is blame on others. But this is not the platform for blame, bro. We're here to tell you to look from within and self-improve to be better for yourself so that you could present your value to the world. But this fucking putting blame on everyone else for your lack of progress is unacceptable. You have to look from within. You made it just. I mean, there's still more that you want to accomplish, but you've made it far enough to where you superseded where you came from. And so have I. So we're living proof that it's possible, right? We didn't put blame that we didn't come from a family with money. We didn't put blame that we didn't have the best upbringing or best circumstances. We navigated around that shit. So that idea, bro, of putting blame on others for your shortcomings to me is extremely unacceptable. And you need to stop doing that shit.

SPEAKER_02 47:12

I'm glad you said that. It made me think of a phrase I've heard and it's worth repeating here. A wise man once told me, you want to know if somebody's smart or not. It depends on how many times they touch a hot stove and they come back and touch that hot stove again. Meaning, how many times can you suffer the same fate and keep doing the same thing over and over and over again? That is usually a sign of stupidity, but if you want to flip it, it's really a sign of intelligence. If you keep banging your head, trying to push yourself through a door that is not opening, you got to find another path. You got to find a way around it. I followed the script that was given to me by another grown man and I suffered. I was not happy. I followed it into school debt, I followed it into a relationship that I was miserable in. I followed it into a beautiful loft apartment in midtown Manhattan where I was paying so much in rent that I barely had any money to eat. I followed other person's life script for me until I had a fucking job that I hated. I stood on a train, and when the doors of that train opened for me to get out and go to my job at 7:30 a.m., my body was like locked on the seat. I just didn't want to get up. I intuitively called out of work right before I had to get out of the train to go to work. And I wrote an email that said I felt sick. Think about that. Subconsciously, my body was telling me, man, you're following somebody else's script. How many times are you gonna touch the stove and touch the stove again without learning the lesson? Don't let other people live their lives through you. At some point, you gotta edit and make adjustments based on your reality. So I love what you just said, Rich, because complaining, blaming, quitting, deferring, playing the victim, these are all symptoms of somebody that genuinely doesn't want to solve their problem. They just wanna sleep on a pillow of comfort and blame it on somebody else. But if you truly wanted to change your situation, you wouldn't touch that stove again. You would learn that stove is hot. I'm not gonna do that again. Like I said, the phrase is supposed to imply somebody that does the same thing that gets them hurt multiple times is stupid. But the truth can be said about the opposite. A sign of intelligence is if you stop doing something that's causing you pain. So we're saying you know you're smart, you know you're smart, but you have to make adjustments, you have to pivot. That's the sign of someone that wants more for themselves and is truly willing to work until they get it.

SPEAKER_00 50:04

Yeah. What was the other question about the degree? I want to answer that one too.

SPEAKER_02 50:09

Oh uh, so so what you're telling me is college was a scam. Oh, and I can't afford to take a lower-paying job out of college. I just can't do it.

SPEAKER_00 50:18

So this is why I feel like we're saying that you can't have all the expectations just because you went to college and you got the degree. Your degree is a door to walk through, not the only fucking door. And I think that's the general misconception, right? So you have to understand that that is going to open a door for some profession, some job, but there's also more opportunities for you to fill in those gaps, especially if you got loans that are due, which, by the way, everyone's living that struggle of student loans, right? But this idea that, hey, if I just go to college and get the degree and get the job, I should be able to pay my loans off. Oh, and I can't take a lower paying job because then I won't be able to pay my bills, then obviously something about your equation is broken, bro. You're obviously living up above your means and you need to trim the fat. But I think a lot of guys just they don't want to strip away their ego of taking a lower-paying job because they are a college graduate. So you know what I mean? So you walk around with this ego of like, nah, bro, but I went to college, that job is beneath me. Why is it beneath you? Because if you're applying to jobs that you think you're well equipped for and they're not hiring you, then you're not beneath anything. You don't have a fucking job. You need money, you need income.

SPEAKER_02 51:48

Yes, you need money, you need income, and that's what we were saying earlier. The old American dream is dead. The idea of you just going to school, getting a 4.0 GPA, follow your passion, get a degree, get your dream job, buy the house, live the happy life, pick a fence, the beautiful dog. I don't know anybody that is truly living like that and isn't fucking going crazy on the low. These things all come with thorns. All these roses come with thorns, and the way it used to be set up is nothing like the way it is set up today. And Rich and I are not creating a platform so people could fucking just sit in a puddle of blood and lay back and just blame the world. What we're saying is you gotta adjust the game plan, my boy. You're playing a PS5 video game with a cartridge. These are two different systems, these are two different games, these are two different operating systems. You have to update with the map. The new map drops, you update your strategy. That's what we're saying. Rich and I are not graduating in 2022, we're not graduating in 2026. We graduated 10 plus years ago. The modern game is a little bit different. You have to adapt, you have to adjust. And a bridge job or a survival job or an odd job is something that everybody has to do in order to keep their dream alive, keep their vision alive. Shit, I sold certified pre-owned cars in Ironbound, Newark, New Jersey. Imagine sitting in Ironbound, Newark, which is next to the hood of Newark, and just sitting there for a whole, the whole time I was in community college selling cars. Meanwhile, I got to study for an exam. Meanwhile, I got to prep for a radio show. I was doing a 15 different side hustles at the same time. But these are odd jobs, these are survival jobs, these are bridge jobs. Think about the words that I'm saying. A bridge job. What is a bridge job? You're on one side, you're trying to get to the other side, but you need money. Think of it like Walter White. Walter White is a legendary character from a show Breaking Bad. Walter White's whole side hustle was I have cancer, I'm living through a life crisis, my son is handicapped, I'm down bad right now. And I am a genius inventor, and I have an idea for a side hustle and a bridge job. He took that side hustle and bridge job a little too serious and got a little too good at it and got stuck in his identity of the new bridge job. Walter White became Walter White, the chemist drug dealer, because he didn't get off the bridge. He stood on the bridge. He never got to the other side of his vision. We're telling you don't be Walter White. Do your side hustle, get your side money, do what you got to do to connect the dot, get across the bridge, and don't forget that you started this side hustle when you were 24 just to make a little bit of money to pay off your loans and get to your dream job. Get to the other side. That's what we're saying. The American dream is not what it used to be, and that's fine. But who said that was the dream for you? You have to paint your own picture. You have to do your own version of Norman Rockwell's painting. The old American dream is done, bro. You have to figure it out for yourself. And how do you do that? You got to figure it out as you move forward. As you walk forward, more things will become available to you. But start where you stand. That is crucial. You have to know that because sitting around and complaining is never going to work.

SPEAKER_00 55:38

Yeah, bro. And listen, you got to be comfortable with deviations to the plan, bro. I think at 18, you have all this life plan, and things were supposed to happen a certain way. And once you graduated, this was gonna happen and that was gonna happen. Guarantees.

SPEAKER_02 55:54

You said it earlier, Rich. Guarantees. These guys believe that guarantees are guaranteed.

SPEAKER_00 55:59

Yeah, bro. And you gotta be comfortable with taking different routes, with pivoting, with quitting something to be able to start something else, right? Like that is really what life is about. And that's the cautionary tale we're sharing with young men today, bro. It's just like things are not gonna go according to plan. Things are not gonna go according to your parents' plan for you. You have to be able to choose your own plan and pivot and iterate along the way.

SPEAKER_02 56:25

Rich, before we wrap, I do want to give you one last thing to respond to. So the young man listening to this, he has a very strong resume. He's two years out of college. He has the degree. He graduated top of his class. He did all the internships. He's currently in an odd job. He's in a bridge job. He's living with his parents. He's in his mid-20s. He's on social media. He can see that the kids he graduated with or went to high school with are already picking up speed in their lives. They're doing big things. They're going on vacations. They're getting married. They're buying homes. What is your advice to that guy?

SPEAKER_00 57:04

Listen, like I said, you have to follow your own race, bro. This happened to me in my life, Jess. I saw people excelling far more faster than me post-college than I was able to do for myself. And yeah, did it hurt seeing that? Of course, bro. You're not gonna tell me you don't go on social media and see somebody doing better than you and not feel some type of way. Then you're not a real fucking human. But at the end of the day, bro, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 57:30

Especially if he was an idiot.

SPEAKER_00 57:32

Yeah, exactly. But at the end of the day, bro, you have to look from within, you have to be comfortable, and ultimately, just you have to live with the life choices that you made, bro. None of those dudes that I felt in that moment were doing better than me were parents, so they're able to afford those lavish vacations and cool clothes, etc. etc. But none of them were parents. I chose to be a parent at 24. I was living a different reality. I can't compare apples to oranges. So you have to be comfortable in the decisions that you make and run your race because you'll fall into the comparison trap if you look at what everybody's doing around you and then applying it to your own internal scorecard metric.

SPEAKER_01 58:16

Rich, what is the most overrated thing about owning a home? Man, the chores, bro. Mowing the lawn, shoveling the snow, cleaning the gutters.

SPEAKER_02 58:28

Because you lived in a you live in an apartment complex. So any young man that's out there like, oh, I'm never gonna buy a house.

SPEAKER_01 58:35

Litter ain't always gold, my brother. All right, man. Failures podcast. We got it. All right, bro. Failures podcast, man. We out.