Jocko Underground: Look In The Mirror. How Are You Representing Yourself?

This is the Jocko Underground podcast number 107. Sitting here with Echo, Charles and me, Jocko Willink. I heard this idea or this procedure or this protocol, I guess restaurants and stores use this idea. They put a mirror.

Behind the register or behind the bar. Have you ever heard of this before? You work in the bar? Yeah. You ever heard of this?

I know that there is a mirror back there.

Okay, sure. Well, in a bar situation, like, there's reasons for it that the bartender can turn his back to the bar and he can see, like, still what's happening, right? See customers, someone stealing or whatever. But then. Then I heard there's another reason why they do that in certain places, and it's because it has a tendency to prevent people.

From.

Yelling or getting angry or being rude or acting irrational.

And the reason is because they can see themselves.

And look, I don't know. It kind of makes sense, though. You know what I mean? You ever seen someone that's doing something really stupid and they notice there's a security camera there?

Here's the thing. When people see themselves.

When people see themselves.

They tend to kind of clean up the way they're acting, right? When you see yourselves on the outside, you don't. When you don't see, you don't have any perspective of what you look like to everyone else. And then all of a sudden, you see yourself acting like a idiot or being rude or being angry or flying off the handle or yelling at people, and you see it. That mirror is like a form of detachment. That's what it is. It's a form of detachment. Well, the thing that I'm always trying to explain to people how to do.

Is to say, hey, take a step back, take a breath, look around, make sure you're having a. Make sure you're not letting your emotions get out of control. Make sure you're not letting your ego get out of control. Like, all these things that I talk about all the time, if you think about it, a mirror, if you have to see yourself.

It might keep you in check. So the reason I bring this up, it is just a good thing to think about, in my opinion, that.

If you can imagine what you look like, keep that in your mind. How are you behaving right now? How is it being perceived? What do you look like right now? Are you being a jerk? Hey, you know what? One I used to think of is like, am I being a right now? Like in the tames, right? Am I being a wimp? Am I being soft? Like, have you ever heard me Say I'm cold.

No, I haven't.

You know what I mean?

I've never heard you admit that you're cold. No.

Yeah, exactly. So, like, sure have. I have. You and I've been in situations where we came in here and it was winter time and the freaking temp and the podcast zone was freaking 57 or whatever. We got to sit in here for four hours and you got chicken skin and I'm only allowed to wear a T shirt because that's how. And meanwhile, you throw on that freaking origin heavy hoodie, get all toasty over there, and I can't say anything. Why? Because I understand how that would look. Oh, are you insecure? No, I'm not insecure, but I am also not a wimp.

But I think about that. And in the teams, you definitely think about that. And the teams you're like, yo, if I say right now, you know, Sarge, he used to have a great way of saying this. He'd be like, oh, you're putting, you're putting yourself on rapport for being a Sally.

Sally.

Yeah, I'm sure you know what I mean? Yeah, he didn't quite use the word Sally, but that's what he would say. And it's a great thing. Like someone comes to you and says like, hey, why do we have to do this? Oh, this is sucks. Oh, you're putting yourself on report for beat him.

Right? Yeah, it's true. And that's also a good thing to keep in your back pocket. And listen, listen, it's a hostile way of saying it, but let's face it, Sarge is a hostile dude, right? He's coming at dudes, like, if they're, if they're being weak, he's gonna let them know, you know, he's going full on.

So listen, we don't want to have to have that happen to us. We don't want to put ourselves on report for acting, like, irrational, for yelling, for screaming, for being soft, for being weak. We don't want to do that.

So take a look at yourself. Imagine that. You got to look at yourself in the mirror.

And see yourself and what you're doing and how it's perceived. That right there is called detaching.

And it might possibly, just possibly prevent you.

From behaving in a negative way. And there are a multitude of negative ways that we as a crew can behave. So don't let it happen. Think about what you look like from the other side. Understand the perspective some people. And look, that might sound like the most petty thing I could possibly say. Right. Is this kind of petty? Like, oh, because people say, I don't care what I look like. I don't care what people think. I get that. I get it. I get it.

But there's so many people that are unaware of what they appear like. And it would really help them if they knew.

Yeah.

It would really help them out if they understand stood what they look like. Yeah. From the outside. And they think they're getting away with it, and they're not. So I'm just telling you, you know, you might go around all night, out to dinner, freaking, walking around. When you were young, single guy, and you got a big freaking booger hanging out of your nose. Right.

Yeah, sure.

You're walking around, trying to talk to girls, they're laughing and walking away. Yep. That's what's happening. So all you. What you need to do. You think you're cool. You don't know. You're unaware of this booger. Go look in the mirror, see what you look like. That can happen with your attitude. Yeah, that can happen with your behavior. That's. Why do you notice before social media, there was no such thing as a Karen.

Karen.

Oh, Karen. Yeah, a Karen. Right.

Yeah. That makes sense.

Before social media, there was no such thing.

Mm.

It wasn't until you had video and someone would V. You ever seen two Karen's videoing each other? This is how wild it gets. They're both trying to show each other what each other looks like. Yeah. They both need to go home and review both sets of videos. Let's put them side by side. You both lose. You're right. That's the whole. This mirror idea is the whole idea of when something happens these days and someone flips out their phone is like. Starts recording the other person. I don't care if you record and it's like, that's what's happening.

So that's my attitude. Don't, you know, free your mind, get out of your head and get some perspective by imagining that you actually have to look at yourself in the mirror when you're saying this right now. Whatever dumb thing you're saying. You ever heard that trick where you can be like. Let's say you say something rude to me.

And I say, I didn't hear. I'm sorry, what did you say? Yeah. And you make them say it again. Yeah.

Wait, is that my trick or your. Did you come up with that?

I definitely didn't come up with it, but it's one. It's like some tactic, by the way.

I Think I did.

You told me about it. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, yeah. Just make them say it again. Yeah. So and so. And says, this is ridiculous. I can't believe you. You know, I can't believe you even. Whatever. And you say, what's that? I couldn't hear you. So now they got to say it again. Yeah. And it was an emotional off the cuff thing and all of a sudden they got to repeat their dumb shit.

Anyways.

Or. Yeah. So the rubber. And I remember it's coming back to me now, so I forget if I got that from you or just told you or whatever because that was a while ago where. So it works too. And I was thinking of it in terms originally was in terms of when someone makes a joke, you know, like, you know me and you, like, you'll, you'll try to like say something, you know, like, you'll rib or you'll rib me and then all have to come back with something appropriate, you know, like, that's the game. It's like, you know, whatever. So a big one, which is. It's kind of a trump card, but it's kind of on the meaner side as far as the game goes is to. Yeah. Act like you don't hear them. So. And you do kind of like a version of this sometimes, like in real life where you'll just like ignore it. Like literally act like you don't hear and just ignore. Not even act like, oh, could you say that again? Not that you just ignore it and change the subject or whatever. So it's kind of like a version of that, but more in the game kind of a version of that.

You know, I was watching some analytical debate or some analytics of a debate. It was like a Trump versus whoever debate. And one of the credits where people would lose points is like, and this just leads to a disaster on. That's why debates suck. And our politicians are all a bunch of freaking idiots. But one thing is they get told is like, hey, if you're talking and someone cut you off, you just keep talking. Yeah. You know, you can't let them stop. And they show like part of the debate where one of the, one of the debaters would get interrupted, then they'd stop.

Right.

And that's like a sign of weakness.

Yeah.

And like Trump would get interrupted and just sit there and just keep talking. Doesn't even care and just keep talking. And it's a way to win debates. Yeah, of course. Then, you know, the other side gets the same thing and they start doing the same thing. So now I just have people talking over each other and it just sucked. But that is another way someone's trying to interject. You just keep talking. Yeah. Again, my recommendation is imagine what that looks like from that side. Because there's also. Here. I've done the complete opposite as well. Like, get interrupted. It's like someone interrupts you and just be quiet and just don't say anything.

Yeah.

And you let them make their point.

Yeah.

You don't look, you can say like, are you done now? Which is now you're an asshole. But you just let them talk. Yeah. Okay. And then you make your point. I think that's either one of those. It's like the two extremes, right?

Yeah.

You don't want to, like, be interrupted and then be like, act like you're offended. Nice. Oh, you got something to say. It's real important. Go ahead. Right, good.

Funny enough, I noticed that you do that and you add a little at the end or in there. That's very effective that I've recently incorporated into my tactics is you'll let them talk, and then when they're done talking, you'll just keep looking at them as if to say anything else. You don't say it. Yeah, it's just the look. So it's like this awkward pause, you know, and then you do it. Then it's like, I'm like, I feel that it's a good one. It's a really good one.

What is this game we're talking about? Just interaction with humans.

Oh, well, the one. The one I was really originally talking is like, you know, the whole friends insult game.

Okay.

And that's different. But I'm just saying what you would do to, like, people when they're, like, talking.

Yep. And you know what? It takes a certain level of confidence, if you have it, to get interrupted and just be quiet and listen to what they say. That takes confidence. Yeah, it shows your confidence, shows you're secure in your ideas. If someone cuts you off and you just let them finish and then look at them like, are you done?

Yeah.

Okay. If you're done, your idea is meaningless. Let me go on with mine. Which actually makes sense.

Yeah. That's the feeling.

As opposed to if someone could, you know, and you say, don't interrupt me. Now, look, you go watch the news freaking channels with all these idiots on them, all these donkeys.

Seems common.

It's just common. That's how they roll. They're just barking and screaming and talking over each other. It's. It's pathetic. That's One thing that's pretty cool about podcasts, generally speaking, and I think the headphones brings that element. Yeah, because with headphones on, you can hear yourself more. This. It's. You know what headphones are? They're like a mirror because you can hear yourself. And so if you're talking and I'm talking, it gets projected into my ear that both of us are talking, and I know how bad it sounds, and it's just a bunch of ju. Nonsense. So people stop and they listen. When you have people that are on a podcast, that is a little excerpt of what we are doing on the Jocko Underground podcast. So if you want to continue to listen, go to jockounderground.com and subscribe. And we're doing this to mitigate our reliance on external platforms so we are not subject to their control. And we are doing this so that we can support the Jocko podcast, which will remain as is free for all as long as we can keep it that way. But we are doing this so we don't have to be under the control of sponsors. And we're doing it so we can give you more control, more interaction, more direct connections, better communications with us. And to do that, we are. We're building a website right now where we'll be able to utilize to strengthen this legion of troopers that are in the game with us. So thank you. It's Jocko underground.com it cost $8.18 a month. And if you can't afford to support us, we can still support you. Just email assistance@jockounderground.com and we'll get you taken care of. Until then, we will see you mobilized. Underground.