Ep. 64-Marc Weinstein: Being a Voice Of Reason In a Fyre Festival & Toxic Social Media Culture

This is the You Winning Life podcast, your number one source for mastering a positive existence. Each episode, we'll be interviewing exceptional people, giving you empowering insights and guiding you to extraordinary outcomes. Learn from specialists in the worlds of integrative and natural wellness, spirituality, psychology, and entrepreneurship so you too can be winning life. Now here's your host, licensed marriage and family therapist, certified neuro-emotional technique practitioner, trainer and certified entrepreneur coach Jason Wasser.

Hey everybody, today's guest is yoga instructor, University of Penn Wharton School of Business graduate, and business expert who has worked in numerous fields like marketing, finance, healthcare, entertainment, and events. He's traveled extensively for work and pleasure and is a regular at festivals like Burning Man. He's currently involved in venture capital firms and invests in the blockchain and cryptocurrency industry. As an active advisor to startups and a serial entrepreneur. You may know him from his role in trying to salvage the Fyre Festival. He's the creator of the '90s Fest and his most recent podcast, The Look Up, which focuses on challenges young adults face. Mark Weinstein, thanks so much for hanging out with us today.

Well, no problem. Thank you for having me.

So right off the bat, going into your education, when you went into the corporate world, You have a really interesting educational background that I would not say is typical and normal, right? You have a degree in economics and you specialized in East Asian languages and civilization. So how did that come about? What's the cross-pollination? It's super cool.

Yeah, that's a great question. It's been a while. So I decided that I wanted to study finance. I wanted to study business. So everyone in my family is in medicine. My dad's an ophthalmologist, my mother's an occupational therapist, sister's a psychologist, my other sister is also an occupational therapist. One, I'm terrified of blood. I have like a blood test phobia, um, so working on that one, uh, specifically the finger pricks, the worst. Um, and you know, I think I was always told by my father that, you know, medicine wasn't the field to be in. He, as a doctor, kind of felt doctors were getting squeezed on all ends by insurance companies, by large practitioners building out, you know, mega practices, things like that. And he— I think he always felt he wished he had more of a business acumen. And so the idea for me was, you know, go get this education in, in business and try to get the best one possible. So I went to Wharton. Felt super lucky. I remember my college counselor advised me that I would definitely get into Penn, but I wouldn't definitely get into Wharton, so go for the sure thing. And I was like, screw you, I'm gonna apply for the one that I want, and luckily nailed it. But at the time also, I had East Asian Languages and Civilizations is super random, so I had just seen Mission: Impossible III It's, you know, Tom Cruise is jumping from building to building in Shanghai, and I was looking at the screen, I was like, is that really China? Like these like giant skyrises. I was like a suburban kid from Long Island, you know, wasn't, hadn't really traveled the world at that time. And I was like, wow, holy crap. Like, and so I started learning a bit more about China. I was like, oh, China is the future of the industry. So if I wanna, if I want to be in, in business, I should really understand Chinese. So I decided I was going to drop Spanish, which I studied in high school, and take Mandarin. And I did 4 years of Mandarin. And in addition to the language classes, we had to learn about the history of the country and the region and philosophy and whatnot. And so what's interesting is I went to China after college, was there for 2 months, and was basically like, this is not for me. I had a girlfriend back in the States. I had a job offer at a bank in New York. And, you know, I wasn't reading 10-Ks and 10-Qs in Mandarin, so I wasn't business fluent after 4 years. And, you know, if I wanted to do something in China, it would have had to be more entrepreneurial. But what really came— what I really took away from those studies was I learned about Taoism and, you know, Zhuangzi, Laozi, who's the famous Taoist that wrote the Tao Te Ching. And what's little known is that actually Sun Tzu, the author of The Art of War, was a Taoist philosopher. And so there's a lot, there's a lot to, to learn from that philosophy. And that indirectly led me to the philosophy of yoga, which has guided, guided my life, or I try to have it guide my life, um, imperfectly., for sure. Uh, since, so it's been, it's been definitely a winding path from there, but, but that's probably the biggest takeaway was the philosophy. I still have a copy of the Tao Te Ching on my desk and I reference it every, every now and again. There's so much wisdom in here.

So you went out thinking that you were going to conquer this whole business mindset, tackle the world over there, and you come back with a spiritual path. So what was it that you thought you were looking for that wasn't being answered internally at that point in your life, right? Nice Jewish boy from Long Island, right? Didn't go into the medical field like we're, right? Like we're all supposed to. It's funny that my uncle, my mom's brother, is a medical doctor. My grandmother's two brothers are old school psychiatrists. We got all the doctors on that side. And then like, you have me and my siblings who are in the furniture business and me, the therapist, right? So, and I'm also petrified of giving blood until I started doing acupuncture, right? For getting blood tests, and that changed everything for me. So at that point—

Yeah, I should definitely lean into that fear a little bit more.

A little bit more, right? Just lean that 3% more into it. So at 18, 19, 20, 21, and then that early right after college, like what was, what do you think was missing for you? What were you looking for that wasn't, that you weren't connecting to, or that you were looking out there for? Like, I'm looking for this answer, something's missing. Was there something like that going on?

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, there was, um, there was a lot going on for me at that time. You know, as, as a young person, I think I was very focused and, and still today to an extent, but more so then I've had more time to reflect on this. I was very focused on achievement for achievement's sake. So the end goal was always get into an incredible university, get into the best possible university that you can get into. And then I accomplished that, and I was like, okay, now what? And you get to Wharton, and it's like, if you think you're Type A, you go there and it's like everyone's Type A+, right? Like everyone's work hard, play hard, trying to be, you know, trying to be the alpha. Um, many of these students came from the city, their families were in hedge funds and private equity. I didn't even know what a hedge fund was. And they knew like I want to manage, you know, hundreds of billions of dollars after Wharton, and that's my goal. I want to play that game. And it's the game of, you know, the game of money. So you get into the college and then, and now the next achievement becomes, you know, what's the best possible job that you can get? And I started really without thinking of whether or not I wanted to work in that field, just started playing that game. And the game was at Wharton you studied finance. So what was happening with me was this dissonance where my favorite classes and my best classes were actually management classes, but the finance kind of mentality there was that management were soft skills, it was kind of BS, finance was your path to investment banking, investment banking was your path to private equity in a hedge fund, and that's how you would make the most money. And And I was chasing, you know, I was chasing that for sure. And halfway through my studies at Wharton, the financial crisis happened. And so, you know, we're in 2008, I'm a junior at Penn. Two of the largest recruiters for on-campus recruiting every year disappeared, Lehman Brothers and Bear Stearns. And, you know, and the others really scaled back. So then it was kind of survival mode and even just getting any job at that time was— really felt like a massive accomplishment. And the fact that I got a job offer at an investment bank, um, at Jefferies right out of school during that time when things were super messy and deals weren't getting done was to me a huge accomplishment. And in spite of the fact that I had done an internship in investment banking at Jefferies and realized that it wasn't something that I even enjoyed or that was for me, I felt almost this sense of duty to follow that path. And so I did. And so I did 2 years of investment banking, one at Jefferies, one at Morgan Stanley, before I finally kind of followed, you know, made the decision to follow my heart, let's say.

And at that point, yoga, meditation, all that stuff, where was that fitting into this one side of this, right, Wall Street and big money corporate, and the other side of this internal self-care mindfulness softness, gentleness? What was the balance going on for you at that point?

There was— I mean, there was no balance. Um, leading up until my junior year of college, there was no balance. It was on all the time. I was the social chair of my fraternity. Um, all I cared about was winning in every aspect of my life. I was lifting weights actively. I was like Jim Tan Laundry, you know, from Long Island guy. Um, I was partying 4 or 5 nights a week and didn't really learn for the sake of learning, but learned for the grades. So I would just cram, you know, 2 weeks before midterms and finals and push for A's, and I was able to get them. And so it was all just win-win-win. And then what I think is really interesting about— and I'm privileged in this way, um, you know, Penn encourages its students to study abroad. And so there's this cliché about study abroad that it kind of like opens your eyes to a different way of living, but it really did for me. So junior year, first semester, I kind of removed myself from the Penn bubble and I— sorry, my roommate. Remove myself from the Penn bubble and am in Europe for the first time. And when I get to Europe, I didn't study in China because I wanted to be with my friends. So I get to Belgium and, you know, people often say about life in Europe that in America we live to work, in Europe they work to live. So there was this kind of like massive slowdown and the courses weren't as intense as at Penn. And in fact, attendance wasn't required. And, you know, your grades are based on one final at the end of the semester. And I was just like traveling and enjoying and super privileged to even have the opportunity to do that. And so now things start to slow down for me a little bit. And that when you're someone that's always on the go, go, go, go, go, go, when that space opens up, it can be overwhelming in its own way. So I get slightly overwhelmed by that. Around the same time, my dad had something that's called a widowmaker. So it's a surprise heart attack where a piece of cartilage just breaks off from one of your arteries. And he basically, he was like on death's edge. And I went back to the US to see him after that happened, not realizing just how bad it was until I got back. Luckily he survived again, like super lucky for that. He's still around today. But there was something that, that, that, that event kind of triggered within me and the door had been cracked open by, you know, by Taoism a little bit. And now it's time of reflection and the whole world, this is also '08. So the whole world that I'm being taught is falling apart around me and just something happened. I got back to Penn and, I was just questioning everything. I wasn't enjoying the social scene that I was a part of. My friends started calling me Who Am I? Because I was having all these existential questions. And I wasn't really getting any satisfaction out of the work. And also I had injured my shoulder at this time, so there was this confluence of things, and I stopped lifting weights, and there was a yoga studio nearby, so I started practicing yoga. And yoga, I think most people, especially men, enter in the West because yoga was a tradition passed from man to man mostly in the East. But you know, most men in the West enter yoga because they want to get more flexible or because they have an injury that they want to heal. And I was no exception. And what happened was the Taoist philosophy and the yoga philosophy started to kind of leak into my everyday life and started providing me some, some tools to reflect on the questions that were coming up in my heart. And that really was the beginning of the change for me. But I still had this outcome-oriented, achievement-focused, you know, Type A mindset that took— I mean, still is still something that I work on every day. And it's not inherently bad. There's positives there as well.

Well, there's a way to leverage that, right? If you understand the tool that it can be and you don't let it overpower you or you use it for good, not for evil, right? Then it can become an incredibly harnessed resource. For people. And it's interesting because I— my backstory is that I grew up here in South Florida, and being the scholarship kid, I went from public school to private school, and I didn't do well. My parents divorced, had a bunch of stuff going on, and I barely graduated high school. So funny enough, I didn't have the choices of options of schools to go to. I got into whatever I got into, went to Israel for 2 years and studied over there. And then years later, I started working with different youth groups and camps. And then I got a job offer at Princeton University's Hillel, the student— the Jewish student union. So here I am, the kid who went from a 1.8 GPA to doing program director at Princeton. So I very much understand the mindset of being really the, the person who definitely didn't fit in in that world, being introduced to this mindset of go, go, go, go, study, study, study. Everything you do yesterday is going to determine the next 25, 30 years. Who do you know? Who do you network with? You go to the right eating club. They didn't have frats and sororities like they did other campuses, right? Everything was about the connections and the future. And yet 18 to 21 is this time where you're on your own, like you, right? We've been and figuring stuff out. And it's really challenging because I know a lot of people listening to the podcast are in that age bracket of what I'm, what I'm promoting this out to. And I want them to hear what you're saying, that the slowing down is the most important thing. And I think that's a big philosophy.

Yeah. I mean, it's, it's just take the opportunity to reflect. Um, I think we, we carry with us so many, so many shoulds, let's call them that are, you know, you should do this, you should do that, that are really just like paths that are created for us. By our parents, by our teachers, by our friends and our colleagues, without necessarily reflecting on whether or not that path, those paths and practices are the best for us. And so, you know, when I speak to college students, I encourage them to get still, to try to find moments of stillness, because I think Without stillness, it's really hard to cultivate self-awareness. And self-awareness is the practice of identifying what is true to me. And if we don't know what's true for ourselves, then we get swept up in other people's games. And that's ultimately unsatisfying.

And so it's 2020, it's the beginning of the month, and Beginning of the decade. Yeah, right. Beginning of the year, beginning of this new decade. And there's a lot of stuff that's going on where this idea of stillness is being lost, but a lot of people are trying to find it and figure it out. And I think that's why there's a massive resurgence in natural healthcare, yoga, Ayurvedic medicine, spiritual stuff. I think people are really, especially with all the chaos in the politics and everything like that. And I know that one of the things that is the dance is going back and forth between how do you find the stillness of yourself when there is a social media avatar that you have to put out to the world.

Yeah.

That dance between the two, because on one side, right, Gary Vee and all the entrepreneurs, they'll talk about like, you are your brand. So what you put out there is going to be representative and it's going to show up and it could be wonderful leverage like we're using for our businesses and our speaking. We're using social media for that. But let's say you're a high school kid, you're a college kid. What's— how do you navigate that? Where on one side, the stillness is so important, the conversations internally, the self-reflection is important when you're having much more pressure right now with— now it's not just Instagram and Facebook, it's now— and Snapchat, now it's TikTok and TikTok and all these things. And, and I know there's positive things to use when it comes to this, and I know there's a challenging thing. So how would you advise people listening to you to find that balance between We do need to promote our resume. I do believe that your resume is your social media at this point and what you're capable of connecting with other people and bringing value to other people. But on the other side, how do you know who you authentically are versus just doing what everybody else is doing?

Yeah, especially, you know, if you're, if you're in media or even if you're these days, if you're in health and wellness, you know, fitness teacher, yoga instructors, I think your social media account is your calling card in a lot of ways. And I saw this early on when I first did my yoga teacher training in 2014. You know, there were a lot of teachers that were leveraging Instagram to get private clients, and that's your livelihood. So, um, so it is important and there are positive benefits from a business building standpoint, from a relationship building standpoint, finding like-minded people around the world. If you truly are sharing what's of interest to you, you know, they'll connect with you. So those are all, you know, those are all benefits. And I think definitely, like, I am not anti-social media. That's important to know because I do think it's a part of our life. I believe that, you know, health and wellness has different— we have different categories. So we have our physical body and our physical health, which includes kind of exercise and diet. We have our mental health, we have our emotional health, we have our spiritual health, and then we have our digital health. Um, so digital is this new, new-ish bucket, right? And how do we develop healthy habits around that? And I think, I think that start startup culture, I think, um, VCs in Silicon Valley are starting to wake up to this digital health and digital wellness trend. Um, because we, we kind of hit peak social media and we realize all the negative effects effects that it has on people. And so cultivating the positive aspects of social media use is super important. So that was a little bit of a ramble, but in answering your question, I think it's really challenging, really, really challenging, especially at a young age as our brains are developing, to develop and cultivate a healthy relationship with social media because the way that social media is built it is to tap into our, you know, our base emotions of fear, of greed, of comparison and jealousy. And those tools, if the goal is to keep you coming back and those emotions are what keeps you coming back, then even almost mistake by mistake, right? It's not necessarily intentional, but by mistake, these platforms will optimize for those emotions. So it's just one— again, just one is just being aware of that is empowering.

Well, then the idea of being a creator versus a consumer. So how would you distinguish that?

Right.

Because you're using it and I'm using it to put it out there as a creator. And I know that like the first few times that I was on TikTok over the last month or so, an hour passed as I'm flipping through it. And like, it was insane, where it's kind of like where your brain does shut down way different than maybe watching a movie or TV. But you don't realize, right, you are thumbing through and, and going through that. And you're seeing— I'm seeing a whole spectrum of stuff. I'm seeing like the really ridiculous, stupid things that are there. And then I'm seeing people share parts of their story and their trauma and trying to connect with the community and a tribe, which I think is the beautiful part. Of the social media. I was discussing this with a friend of mine. He took me 2 years ago to Comic-Con here in South Florida. And I'm not like the world— I'm not— it's incredible to see that culture. But imagine like 20 years ago before social media had anything, a lot of these people were alone and isolated. And now, like, not only do they have friends, but they're finding like relationship partners and stuff that like they would have been 56 years old and never have met someone. But through the digital connections, they're now creating a really awesome tribe of people to connect with. So I love that part of what's happening on social media. And I think TikTok, it might be leveraging that a little bit differently than Instagram is because there's a little bit more of an interaction in some way, shape, or form, I'm finding. Yeah.

I mean, it's again, it's right. Like, it's, it's just an extension of the human condition. So It can extend positivity and gratitude and community building, and it can extend jealousy and envy and fear. It's just, it's just, it is just an extension of that. I think what we've learned through people like Tristan Harris and the Center for Humane Technology is that the more powerful motivators happen to be the kind of lizard brain type responses just because those are so deeply ingrained in our programming as humans because it's, it's survival, right? Like you, fear is an emotion that kicks in to preserve us. So we're going to be more susceptible to fear. Um, because if you walk into a dark forest and you feel joyful, um, You die, right? Back in the day, if you feel fearful, at least you have the opportunity to kind of project that there might be some danger and you can protect yourself. And so it's just been the power from an evolutionary standpoint, it's just this powerful tool that gets passed down. And so it works the same way in social media that that gets leveraged. And so what we have is like, you know, massive outrage and tribalism that gets created in the political sector. We have jealousy and FOMO that keeps people coming back to look at these platforms. And that, I think, is really the dark side of all of this that is important to just be, again, be aware of. And for me, like the steps in— there are kind of certain practices that you can put in place for social media, but that are also really just applicable to social to your social life in general. And I mentioned two of them already. I think the first is getting still, right? So instead of taking that time to scroll through TikTok, take that time to, to just sit and, you know, maybe breathe for a little bit. And it doesn't even need to be meditation. So another, another kind of view that I've been developing over the last year or so is that, you know, meditation has become this new thing to do. And it's like the act of meditating. So I'm doing meditation. It's just like a new activity.

Well, it's become the Lululemon of mindfulness, right? If you're wearing yoga pants, it's as if you've done yoga. And like mindfulness, especially in the psychology world, and I don't know if you've discussed this with your sibling, right? That the mindfulness has kind of taken over the last 8 years of like the therapy world. And now people are like mindfulness-based practices and mindfulness-based therapy, but it's become this like cliché term and word versus the practice of. The actual doing, sitting in it versus just talking about it.

And the problem is like for someone with an achievement-focused mentality, with an outcome-driven mentality, you know, like it just becomes another box to check on your resume, another box to check off your to-do list every day. And that's, that actually can, can have the reverse effect where it introduces more stress into your life. Or if you miss a week of meditation, you fall into a depression because I'm not doing what I'm supposed to be doing. I'm not taking care of myself. Like, this is the time of year we're about to enter. I think that time of year over the next 2 weeks where people start to fall off from their resolutions and then there's this kind of cycle of negative self-worth that gets created. Um, so it's, it's really a challenging time for many people because we all have huge ambitions and hopes of how to improve ourselves. Um, and meditation is one tool. In that toolbox. But like, again, this act of like doing meditation, it's almost counterproductive. So like, I wouldn't even call it meditation, but just whatever your practice is, if it's whatever feels good to you, if it's going on a hike, right, in nature, taking a moment, if it's journaling, if it's, um, if it's sitting and breathing, fine. If it's actually just going to the gym and lifting weights and that's when you feel the most zen, right?

Take time having a musical instrument, whatever, grabbing a musical instrument.

Exactly. Take time for yourself. Right? And that, that self-expression, that is a form of stillness. And once we, you know, when we're able to find some stillness, then we can start to cultivate some self-awareness. And self-awareness is, is like, what is it that I want? What is it that I need, that I desire? And identifying those things is like crucial without judgment, right? Like, I think many of us judge our, you know, material desires, for example. But that's some heavy programming. I mean, everywhere I'm in LA, everywhere I look, it's just pumping me full of like, you need this, you need that. Like, you know, you should look better, you should have a fancy car, whatever it is. So that's like, be kind to yourself because that's some serious programming to unwind.

And we're all going through that, right? And especially if you're a middle school kid, a high school kid, college kid, with the social media stuff and everybody's like, just the pressure. And we talk about this every generation, whether we're like when I graduated in '96, whatever was there is the same. It's just now amplified in some way, shape, or form. Like it's getting worse. I think it's just more accessible.

It's more accessible. It follows you everywhere you go. I mean, in '95, '96, the average teenager didn't even have a television in their room, right? Like having a TV in your room room was— you were affluent and it was a big deal. And over time, you know, that became more prevalent. So like, you know, you're watching TV in the living room with your family, then you're watching TV before bed by yourself, then you had a personal computer for the whole family, then you had a personal computer in your own room. So you're on AIM, you know, my middle school, high school years, I was on AIM every night, you know, until all hours talking to friends. And that was the beginning. AOL Instant Messenger, for those who are not in the US out there. And, you know, and now it's your mobile phone, and the mobile phone is the first thing you see when you wake up in the morning, it's the last thing you see before you go to bed. And it's not just that you have access to unlimited tail end of content, whatever you want to see is at your fingertips. It's also that it's completely customized for you and this digital avatar of Jason Wasser that gets created, you know, via Google, Facebook, and TikTok and Instagram and all these algorithms that say Jason likes mindfulness, Jason likes yoga, wellness, psychology, and I'm going to create the perfect buffet of content to keep him on my platform. And so, you know, it's everywhere, it's ubiquitous, and it's completely customized. For each of us individually, which makes it more challenging, but also more beautiful because you get to see things that you're interested in. And there's less noise, right? Like if you're scanning through the TV with your clicker before you had Netflix, you know, you had to settle for what was on on Friday night with probably what HBO was showing or somewhere else. Now, you know, you can choose that content that's most interesting to you and most relevant.

Well, it's so interesting because the best way I heard this all explained from a neurological perspective is actually Simon Sinek talks about it.

Where—

right, incredible. And for anybody out there who hasn't seen any of his TED Talks or any of his YouTube videos, easily accessible. But to go back a few minutes to this idea of the three brain theory, which we were talking about this lizard brain. So I just want to break it down for people out there who haven't heard this before. So your neocortex is your rational brain. It's the stuff that makes sense to you. It's logical. You put it into categories. It's your purposeful meaning and purposeful behaviors, right? We know that you and I are sitting here and talking to each other, and I know that you're in California and you know I'm in Fort Lauderdale, right? We know what we know and we know that makes sense. Then you get into your, um, mammalian brain and the mammalian part of your brain is the emotions. It's how you feel about whatever is going on. And it also is the part of your brain that's timeless. It doesn't carry a timestamp. So when you think back to a memory from 15 years ago, it's going to trigger physiology of, right, of that time exactly the same way as it does in the moment. And that reptilian brain, as you were describing before about the forest and the darkness, is that fight or flight, safety, breathing, the basic necessities of survival. So when those three brains aren't in sync, we get what we get, which is anxiety and stress and depression and all these other things. But the marketing world has figured this out. And they take each part of those brains, and they advertise exactly to a certain segment of your brain in each of these commercials or in social media. So if you think that this is all non-conscious, or it just happens to be this way, this is actually really thought out. And you you know, you're being marketed specifically and targeted specifically for what, who you are. So I want people just to be aware of that, but also the beauty of that, that you can use this for the positivity, you can use this to find more of what you want and go deeper on self-care and all these other things, because you're now going to be suggested on Netflix, oh, you like this movie or this show? Here's 18 others that are going to be right in that thing. And like, oh, I never thought I would want to watch that. But apparently, Netflix Right?

The only— so yes, and I think it's great because we have so much unlimited access and it's mostly tailored to our needs. Now there's always like this dark and light with all of these things, right? So the light of that is, wow, I have access to all this incredible content. The dark side of all that is confirmation bias. So we start to build tribes around ideas that we already believe and just keep reinforcing it with content that we already believe.

Believe.

And then you end up in a place where all of the vegans are watching Game Changers and believing it, and all of the carnivores and kind of like jacked meat eaters are like, this is bullshit, and reading all of the content that's getting pushed to them on Instagram and Twitter and Reddit. All keto all the time. Yeah, keto all the time. Butter, butter is good. Basically Atkins 2.0. And vegans, you know, I have superpowers. You know, the circumference of my dick is huge, whatever. They say in Game Changers. Um, and, and they're both just consistently getting reinforced via content that is catered to confirm what they already believe to be true. And so then you get tribalism, and tribalism has really negative effects on society. Um, and it's happened, and we see it in politics, right? Like, I went with the fun example of vegan versus keto, but like, you know, you see it in politics. And what We know is that the YouTube algorithm accounts for 70% of the billions of minutes of YouTube video that's watched every single day on the platform. And basically, they recommend 70% of the content that people watch. And as you watch more content, it continues to get more and more fringe. So when you're watching political content, they The algorithm is a black box. It's figured out that if you want political content and you're right, they're going to keep pushing you further and further right because that's going to tap into that fear. That's going to tap into that anger, those base lizard brain emotions, and you'll continue to watch. And so it unintentionally, I believe, I don't believe this was the intention of Google and YouTube when they did the algorithm. They're just trying to optimize for attention. Now all of a sudden they're optimizing for for fringe and for tribalism. So that's super, that's the dark side of all of this. And again, it starts the same way that our, in my opinion, our self-practice starts with stillness, and stillness generates awareness. We need to take moments, I believe that we need to take moments away from social media, whether it be, you know, a Sabbath where you're not on your phone, or a day away from YouTube, or certain hours of the day, right? Wake up in the morning for an hour, we do our self-practice without touching our phone, and in the evening before bed we don't touch our phone. And that stillness, then we start to become— we need that awareness. Now there's self-awareness, but there's also awareness that the content that I'm getting pushed is fringe content because they know this about me. And if I have that awareness, then I'm less susceptible to be completely impacted by that content, and I'm able to look at it through a critical lens. Awareness that Mark's beautiful photos from traveling the world also have a side of, you know, Mark's fighting with his girlfriend at that very moment that they took that beautiful picture on the beach, or Mark's having financial troubles and can't figure out why he's traveling all the time and trying to make ends meet, but it's a mess. There's always some truth that's not being shared online. So that, again, it's like awareness. And I used to think it was about honesty. More honest sharing on social media. But the reality is that if my social media feed were just for me, it were like a family photo album, it still wouldn't have all these dark moments. Like, if you look back at the VHSs that your father used to make of family time, it was like he wasn't filming, unless accidentally, like the times where you were fighting with your sister and crying, or the times of struggle. He was mostly filming like the birthdays and and, you know, the vacations and things like that. So I don't think we're going to have an Instagram where everyone's sharing, or TikTok where everyone's sharing, you know, completely vulnerable. And also there's this other kind of like what I've, I've spoken about this on my podcast with a few other guests as well, like this vulnerability fear that gets created. So first people are like, oh, travel content works, fashion content works. And then someday somebody discovers, oh, if I actually share like my vulnerability, that gets followers. And then you have this kind of race to see who's more willing to share the deepest, darkest secrets of their soul with a million strangers when really, like, what's, what's the intention behind that activity?

Well, isn't that the idea of the difference between actual true vulnerability, as Brené Brown talks about, right? Which is the idea of that it's something that you are uncomfortable with, that could be scary, that could be maybe even harmful, but you can find a way to put it out there or do it where it becomes a safe and healthy way for you to do it, versus the idea of just oversharing and people just dropping their stuff and leaving a trail of debris everywhere they go. And I think it's a really thin line that I want people out there to listen and understand that just dropping all of your therapeutic issues on the universe and social media is not being vulnerable, right? It's really just like, if you're looking for a space to do that, then that's where therapists come in and people who are in your intimate circle for who can help you and support you through that, versus just putting it out to the world to just be acknowledged, to get a like because you said the most deepest, darkest thing and someone liked that, and therefore now you feel better about yourself, but it doesn't solve the problem. So there is that dance between the oversharing and the vulnerability. And, and I like how you were talking about like this idea of a tech fast. One of my previous guests, Jim Sheils, he's an author of a book called 18 Summers, and how to have 18 summers basically to build a culture with your family. And he's really big into tech fasting, and he's not Jewish, but we talked about the idea— he's familiar with the idea of the Sabbath and Shabbat. But I think this idea of having some time in your day, whether it's a 24 or 25 hour period like we have in our culture, or it's going in right before you walk into your yoga studio or the gym. You're just really gonna be present, even if you're just listening to music.

Or— yeah, I was gonna say, I would love, love, love to see statistics on— I would love to do an A/B test of— because I'm at the gym sometimes. I love lifting weights. I started lifting weights again. Yoga wasn't giving me that, like, pump that I like from the weightlifting, but But I've like all the time, I'm, you know, seeing people and I'm guilty of this sometimes. You're sitting on your bench for like 10 minutes on your phone. I would love to see results of people that remove their phone from their person or just listening to an iPod, you know, while they're exercising versus those who are on their phone. I guarantee that stress reduction that exercise causes is limited by phone use, things like that. Like I don't even know if there's a study out there, but that'd be interesting.

Well, for anybody who's going to be listening to this, whether on your side or my side, and you're that person, you want to take this challenge. Do this for the next, I don't know, 2 weeks and see what it's like. Bring your phone in, but don't check it in between your sets. Put it down, see what you feel like. Get those breaths in, get that connection to your body and how you're feeling. And then hit us up on social media and let us know how you felt. Document it, document it, right? And send it to us and we'll share it with everybody. But listen, let's hit our own community for A/B testing, right? So if anybody out there is listening to this once this is released, let us know that you're gonna do this and we'll, you know, maybe we'll come up with a little bit something of how to really make it really fun and really cool and we can share it with other people of what that's like and you can set that standard. So one of the things that I remember from the time I spent in Israel after high school, I I spent 2 years in Israel, and I was learning in a yeshiva. And one of the customs of the school was between, I think it was like 3 and 4 or 4 and 5, whatever it was during that afternoon learning session was happy hour. And it wasn't your traditional because in Israel, as you know, as you've been, right, the legal drinking age is you just have to be able to look over the bar. But so it's 18 there. But the happy hour there was for this one hour, we're not going to talk crap about anybody. And now imagine that, right? So this is 1996 to 1998, like dial-up internet, and we didn't have it. There was only one, like, there was only like one laptop that was used in the office if you wanted to send an email to anybody back in the day. No one was doing it. So can you imagine, right, someone deciding by listening to this that they want to pick one hour and they want to have their own personal happy hour where maybe they're not going to check social media, they're not going to talk crap about someone, they're going to do some type of self-care. And just implementing that mindfulness in a very simple way. And I really love that idea that it doesn't have to be done in one particular specific way. Make it, like you said before, like just find what's gonna work for you in a healthy manner. Absolutely. Yeah. So this idea of tribal—

Just take time for yourself.

Hmm, go on.

No, I was saying just take time for yourself. Right, right.

So this idea—

a certain way, right?

Does it? It's what fits and what's healthy for you, which is really the theme of this entire conversation. So when you were talking about tribalism a few minutes ago, and then this idea of like us versus them, better, worse, different, how much of the Fyre Festival philosophy was leveraged against it, or for using that?

Yeah, I mean, that's— that I think is what's so— what was so fascinating about you know, this story, and now it's been a year about since the documentary came out, it was both— the marketing campaign leveraged FOMO and jealousy and, you know, in-crowd versus out-crowd. So if you were in the in-crowd, you were going to attend Fyre Festival and you'd be living life like a beautiful model influencer, you know, whatever. And if you're on the out-crowd, you couldn't attend. So that led to a sold-out show because that really worked. You know, that's an old tool of marketing that seems to continue to work because it taps into, you know, our sense of lack of self-worth, and if you— that we can fill a hole in ourselves with a purchase. And then what's ultra fascinating is the takedown of Fyre Festival and the massive flameout was due to, you know, social media as well tapping into you know, other emotions, which the other side of those emotions of jealousy and envy, which was like, oh, actually we're on the out crowd, but the people on the in crowd are stupid, right? And they're idiots. And this schadenfreude, this joy at the suffering of others. Well, who cares that they're, you know, that they got bamboozled, that they got ripped off, that they ended up on an island, that they were maybe somewhat in danger because they're a bunch of stupid rich kids, right?

And they had it coming to them anyway.

And they deserved it.

Yeah.

Right. So that's, you know, that's kind of the dark side of the takedown of Fyre. It's like this humor, this joy in the suffering of others. And look, the reality is nobody got hurt. It wasn't this, you know, it wasn't— there's so many worse things in the world, right? Like, which is why I think when I think about Fyre, why it was— I think they released the stats. It was like the third most watched documentary on Netflix this year, ahead of Beyoncé, ahead of you know, a ton of other crazy ones. But it's not like it was nominated for an Emmy, but not like an Oscar, right? And I think because there are just more important issues out there than, you know, than this festival. But the festival highlighted these social media issues, which is why I started the podcast and why I wrote about it right after the festival in 2017 about like, how does Fyre Festival represent what we all do online? You know, at the time, again, I thought honesty on social media was the answer. I don't think people are dishonest on social media. I just think they don't share the whole story. And I don't think one— now I don't believe that one has to share the whole story on social media all the time. It's just more just be aware that when you are getting into a, you know, zombie scrolling session on Instagram and it looks like everybody else is living the best life, that you are comparing your whole picture and all of your dirty laundry to somebody's, like, you know, somebody's banquet outfit, you know, somebody's red carpet outfit. That is the avatar of themselves that they are trying to project to you. That does not represent everything around them. And one, one of my teachers highlighted to me, because I was like feeling a strong sense of jealousy, and he— well, first, first thing he did was he said jealousy and envy are two different things. Jealousy is to hold on to something. You jealously guard something. Envy is to desire what somebody else wants. But the counter to both of them is awareness again and appreciation. So awareness, like jealousy happens locally. So if you, or envy happens locally. So if I see, you know, someone, If I saw someone that had a ton of money, they were driving a fancy car and they have a beautiful girlfriend on their arm and I'm, I'm single, I'm single, I'm looking for a girl and I'm struggling financially. Well, I'm going to be envious of this person because they seem to have everything that I lack. So it's just more a reflection of what I believe I lack. But if I then found out that this person had terminal cancer and they were going to die in 2 weeks, I would never want to trade places with them.

Right?

So like, it's all— we're locally jealous. Like, you wouldn't be jealous of— most people wouldn't be jealous of the homeless man that has, you know, that has the girl that they desire. So it's just— that's the interesting part, is that we see these snippets that tap into these emotions. We see these snippets online, but we, you know, you are the best Jason living the only life that you, Jason, can live. And everybody's different. Everybody has their own set of baggage. And it's just so important to understand that. And that, I think, is like, that is fundamentally the key of human connection, is to be like, no matter what— it's just so hard to listen to someone like Jim Carrey be like, I wish that everyone in the world could get rich and famous because then they would realize that it's not the answer. Because it's like, yeah, Jim, like, GFY, because you because you did it, you know, like, you were rich, you were famous, like, it's easy for you to say. But, but it's true. You know, like, rich people aren't happier. Famous people are definitely not.

They don't talk about the hard work and the getting up early and having to wait around and the times of rejection and self-doubt and shame and all that other stuff.

You can—

you see the other side unless there's someone who is living in integrity with that and sharing. It's not so easy. It's not so, you know, I talk people out of becoming a therapist all the time.

Yeah, exactly.

Right. I would love— right. And it's like this, it's not the— it's not the— it's not such a sexy career, even though I love what I do. And I'm using social media to leverage it. But like, people are talking about these things as if it's like, I want to figure out like why, you you know, Dr. Phil or all these people have talk shows. I want that. I'm like, yeah, but what do they have to do to get there? That's the tricky part.

Yeah. And, and that's, that's just it, right? Like I, I, in my work life, I really value freedom. So I hate sitting at a desk from 9 to 5. Um, it's just not something that I really like and I've made an effort to remove myself from that lifestyle. And to focus more on, you know, on projects. And it's cool because I get to move around a lot. I get to work with a bunch of different people, and there's a huge positive side to that. But there's also a side that I think a lot of people would not want, which is when you work project to project, you live and die by the projects that you can gain. So there's often a sense of uncertainty. I am not going to— I don't know that next month I'm going to have an office to walk into. And so there's this trade-off between freedom and security. And I think people often want what they don't have, but then when they get it, they're like, oh, actually, this isn't what I want. And so it's just a function of like really understanding that, really understanding again that we're all human, that we're all imperfect, that everyone's situation is unique. That life is challenging no matter where you are, that there's always going to be good with the bad and bad with the good. And, and that's it. Like that, that level of, that level of acceptance, right? Like, I've just been living by this Shakespeare quote of late, which is, nothing is good or bad, less thinking makes it so. So we, you know, it's Stoic. Another book I have on my desk is The Daily Stoic. By Ryan Holiday, which I absolutely love. And it's a new Stoic lesson every day. And the Stoics teach this kind of concept of acceptance. And it's yogic philosophy as well. And I'm sure, you know, I haven't studied Judaism as much as you have, but yogic philosophy talks about karma yoga. So we act, but we act without attachment to the results of our actions. Because I'm going to act the best way that I possibly can, and I might win the game or I might lose the game, but the outcome of win or lose is not good nor bad. It just is. It's subjective. We apply our own subjective personal lens to outcomes and situations. And if we're able to step back and say it just is and accept, that's like— that to me is the key in social situations. That's it. That's like one of the fundamental keys to life. And of course, because social media is an extension of the human condition, that's one of the fundamental keys to social media as well.

Well, one of the first teachings that I remember from graduate school— that was a good, like, nice long thing. So I remember one of the first things I got in graduate school is exactly the summation of what you just said from the clinical perspective, is that the problem is not the problem, it's the belief about the problem. That's the problem. So I use the example of like, if I have a box of, you know, tissue paper on my, on my desk here, because I have to have them strategically laid out in my room, right? As therapists should do. And you know what the crazy thing is, I remember this going back, and I joke with my clients, I'm like, We had like a discussion over the course of 2 weeks of if you see a client cry, whether you don't give them the tissues or not, whether you let them take it, whether they ask for it, you should just hand it to them.

What message?

I just throw them the— I throw the box at them now. I'm like, hey, there's one right there. Or I just— what I like— it's such a crazy thing that you have to check, right? We had to check all these hidden meanings and make sure we don't want them to stop crying. We're not telling them to stop crying by giving them a box. All these meta messages, which is so very much part of the conversation we're having, that there's the message and then there's a meta-message, right? What's going on behind the scenes? You know, are they going to think that we're telling them to stop crying and stop expressing their emotions because someone else did that previously? But the idea of like naming it, right? And I say, let's say I have a couple and I'm like, okay, so what's that called? And they're like, a Kleenex. And I'm like, no, that's the brand. Yeah, right. And it's not— this is a Trader Joe's box of tissues. So, you know, it's— but this— but it's also like, what do you call when you put a paper in a machine and you want another version of that? And they're like, oh, Xerox. That's the brand.

Yeah.

So this is the culture and the language that we've been programmed to where we have an identification with certain things, that this is what it is, this is how it is, and our language then backs it up, then our story backs it up. Then our experiences back it up, right? This is very law of attraction, very in that, in that regards. And we will only get that which we believe. We will never get anything opposite of that. So as we go back and funnel it through FOMO, and for people who don't know, that term is the fear of missing out, and it's a very anxiety-provoking scenario. And I remember years ago when I was traveling from here to New York and had an option of going to two different young professional retreats that were happening in the same weekend. The amount of anxiety that I had about having to decide if I go here, I know one or two people that are going, but maybe I'll meet more people at that one because I'll know people and I'll feel more comfortable versus the other one where I don't know anybody and maybe everybody else will know each other and I won't know anybody. So how am I going to connect with those people? So which one do I do? But maybe I'll meet more people there because I'll have my own, right? And this is what people are doing left and right.

Yeah, absolutely.

And that's an extreme version of that, but that's kind of like, if I don't go here, I'll be missing out. If I don't buy this, I'll be missing out. And I think that ties into the last segment of what I want to ask you, is that you recently traveled to Auschwitz.

Yeah, yeah.

And was that your first time over there?

It was my first time in Auschwitz.

Yeah. So I went twice, 2010, 2012. I staffed an incredible program that you're familiar with, excuse me, the March of the Living. And so I went as staff for that. But going as an adult, and did you have family members that were connected?

Yeah, yeah, I had, I had family that was there, like, 7 or 8, something like that.

Okay, so yeah, so now you know, my grandfather escaped off one of the trains before he came here, and most of his family was wiped out. What was that like for you as an adult knowing, right, this culture, this history, especially what's going on today, right, the last 2 weeks of 2019, I don't think there was a day where there wasn't an antisemitic event, which doesn't minimize what's going on in all of the trauma and tribulations of all the different cultures and all the different societies or the different, right, the violence in the LGBT community or to cultural communities or religious communities around the world. But very specifically, most recently, this was something that was hitting, you know, a little bit in our world. What was that like as an adult going there for the first time? What did you walk away with? What's been your new influence of how you're taking that into your day to day?

Yeah. You know, like I had been to the Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem and the one in D.C. And I mean, I don't know, my response might be surprising. I was not— I think I went like I took a train from a place called Garbicz, Poland, Garbicz, to Kraków. And then Kraków, you know, I went to Auschwitz, so I did like a 7-hour train and I was kind of like imagining, you know, being on that train on your way to the camps. And I think I went in with an expectation of it being a profound experience for me. And I left feeling it was a little bit sterile. I felt the camp was much more of a museum in its treatment. It wasn't super emotional. It was very factual. There were moments where, you know, it's like there's this powerful imagery, like when you see all the shoes or all the hair, you can't help but, you know, tearing up. But yeah, it feels more and more like a relic to me. Whereas I think like in Jerusalem and in DC, like they really hit home the narrative of the human, of the people that were there. So I was actually like quite a bit just like surprised at the lack of emotional response that I had being there, in spite of all the horror that happened there. It's just this very, it's a very sterile place. That's kind of the word I would use to describe it now.

Well, that makes sense because I know that like the living experience of meeting survivors and right as we're getting past in time that now we're talking about the child survivors that are now in their 80s and 90s and are within the next 15 years, there may not be anybody left. But I know that my experiences since my grandfather passed away has been the profound conversations I've had with people who've experienced that. And, and I just met— and the name is not coming to the tip of my tongue— but she was a survivor of the Rwandan genocide. And she spoke at one of the business conferences that I was at. And it was the first time I met someone who was my age, that was probably the same age as my grandfather, and a little bit older, but she was a kid, right? She was a college kid age that went through the genocide in Rwanda, which was the same age as my grandfather when he went through the Holocaust. And to meet someone who's now my age bracket who went through that in their early 40s. So I think like the living, like you said, the living experiences connecting to the museum that may be more in D.C. or Jerusalem, or the people or the stories. There is a lot of relics out there, and I want people to really understand that the connection, the human connection, what's going on. Because I think the message of the Holocaust is not just about the Jewish people, but it's about how do we make sure that we do stay connected as a massive tribe of humanity more than these factions.

Yeah, and that's— this is the issue with the tribalism that's happening online globally is just You know, like we dehumanize the other, so we forget that they have a family and that they have, you know, they have a life, they have emotions, they have feelings. You know, Jews were the first step in Nazi Germany was to make Jews a subclass of human. They weren't humans, they were Jews. And I think, you know, you're not a Democrat, you're not a progressive, you're, you know, you're a neocon or, you know, a Republican or conservative, and these become dirty words. And it's like, it dehumanizes Japan. In China versus Japan, right? Like, if you go to Nanjing in China, there's still language that refers to the Japanese devils, you know? And it's just like, that's the first step. And so I think that's the danger of tribalism online is is we start to objectify others. We remove the humanity from their positions. And I think we do that not only with people that we disagree with, but we also objectify gurus. Um, you know, like, I'm not your guru, right? Like, that's like, if that's the guru that I want, not the guru that's telling me he's my guru. Because you objectify someone, you put them on a pedestal, you basically are able to defer personal responsibility to them.

Um, especially when they're valuable, especially when there's criticisms about them, especially when there's personality flaws. But I think that's the beautiful thing about someone like a Tony Robbins. He's like, I'm imperfect, this is what's going on in my life.

Yeah, yeah, totally. And we're seeing like, you know, we're seeing the teardown of gurus with via content with Wild Wild Country and Osho and with the Bikram story, you know, coming out on Netflix and I think like more what we love more than villains is we love to see heroes torn down. And so it's just, I just think like dehumanizing anyone in any way is a slippery slope. It's like, it's so easy to forget that when you're fighting with somebody online on Twitter, for example, in an argument, that that person is living their life, having their own challenges, you know, and I don't know, it's just sometimes the, sometimes the, um, the humanity gets lost. It's, it's dangerous. So Auschwitz is a good reminder of that.

Yeah. And I'm wondering, like, as you're traveling through your career and you're evolving and you're creating your own identity, in a way, I wonder, like, what side is the, the Fyre Festival not benefiting you, right? That, that you don't want that to be part of your identity, part of your your stigma of who you are to be wrapped up in it, right? It's like, as I follow Josh Malina on social media, right, from Scandal and West Wing, like, his joke is like, I was that guy who played that guy on West Wing, you know? So, right?

Exactly.

And he's brilliant about it, and I love what he puts out. We're putting all this together for your own newer journey over the last couple years, where you were really involved, you were front and center, you really did try to salvage and do a lot of things. To really make things better. What is it like for you to have this like station identification around you're that guy? And how has that helped and hindered you in your own internal personal growth and branding and marketing? But really, like, I'm more concerned about the psychology side of it. Because on one side, we talked about like, you can see what happened, you walked in, you did right, it's very clear. How it was positioned for you, you know, how you were positioned. But now you got to go and be that guy out in the real world as well.

Yeah, I think that's, that's been, it's really interesting. Like, there was a ton of positive things that came out of this documentary. I mean, when it, before it came out, I was terrified because I had no idea. I was like, you know, I got interviewed for that documentary 4 months after the event. I was at a very different stage of my life. I was jobless. I was figuring out next step in my career. My second startup had basically just fallen off, you know, was struggling to try to sell that. I moved to a new city, was— I had ended a long relationship. I was in this kind of like place where I just didn't give a fuck really about speaking to a journalist about, you know, about this event. And then fast forward 2 years, when the docu— or a year and a half, when the documentary is about to come out, I had a new job, a new partner, was thriving in a city, financially secure, like everything's going really well for me and all of a sudden I'm gonna be this fire guy. And there were moments of, you know, fear of like, wow, why did I do this? And like, do I have any control? My friends were like, what were you thinking? Did they pay you? I'm like, no, they didn't pay me. They're like, you're an idiot. The closest people to me were the ones telling me how stupid I was. And so there were these moments where I doubted, you know, why I did it. And even like Netflix, you know, after the documentary, they really wanted me to be involved with press. And I was like, no, I'll I'm not sure. And in the end, it turned out that my role in the documentary and the way I was portrayed was really positive. And so I'm grateful for that. And, you know, there obviously were some hate messages and this guy's an idiot and like, he's obviously full of crap and whatever. There's always that, but it was mostly positive. Now the challenge from that has been, you know, for a bit, I was in, I was, you know, I had my 15 seconds. And that's really interesting because you go from not really caring about, you know, people's outside perception— like, you care about people's perception, but not in this way— to like, now my Instagram account has a lot of followers that I've never met before, and what kind of content should I put out, you know? And there's this whole, like, even to this day, I'm just like judging myself if I put out something that's not delivering a message, right? I was just I was just on vacation in Mexico at the end of the year, and I just wanted to do like a frickin' Instagram post where I share like some pretty pictures of me and my friends, and I don't need to say something that's so frickin', that's so trying to be inspirational, you know? And there's that struggle as well, watching 8,000 people. There's, you know, like, people crave attention, positive or negative. So having people not give a shit is even harder for us emotionally. So having 8,000 people just, just decide with their unfollows that I'm not interesting enough to follow. Like, I'm human too, you know. That's been really frustrating for me. I'm like, oh well, you know, should I— and I knew it would happen because they followed me because of Fyre Festival and they don't care about Fyre Festival anymore, so they don't care about me anymore. And that should be okay, but they moved on to the next thing. Every post, yeah, I'm like looking at a post and I'm like, oh my goodness, you know, like I lost 100 followers or 500 followers from this post. I never cared about that before. So in 2020, I'm trying to— most of what I posted last year after the documentary started to be impersonal. It was mostly guests from the podcast or quotes because I think there was a fear of sharing myself with strangers. And now I'm trying to in 2020 share more of myself. That's one of my goals, more myself on the podcast, more of myself in my posts, you know, and not necessarily like, again, this vulnerability. Vulnerability theater where I'm like, oh, I'm Mark and I'm struggling or whatever. Just more like, this is what I think, you know, like take it or leave it. This is how I feel, take it or leave it. And trying not to overthink so much.

Well, I think the cool thing about your podcast is that you're actually bringing in data, right? You're interviewing people who are experts. And I think that brings a separate level of expertise. But, 'cause I know your background has been in the culture of music and business, But when you bring in like, right, there's been some people like, right, there was a PhD I think you brought in for one of them, right? I think it was your—

Yeah.

Episode. So I really do appreciate the balance. And for people out there, like they, you, you're up to how many episodes at this point?

Well, I have 20 episodes. One of them is like the intro episode for the whole series. I started off just strictly about social media and the impact on young people and all of us. I'm branching out into other subject matter because I think that's just like a small portion of what we can address and raise awareness for. So I want to speak more about the opioid crisis in America and mental health and depression. I'm doing a series on criminal justice reform right now. I think that's tied together in kind of the cultural psyche of our country of punitive justice versus restorative justice. So, you know, just branching out. I've got 6 episodes on the back burner, so it'll be a 2025 26 in the coming month or two. And yeah, just for me, like maybe for you Jason Wasser too, like it's not a business, it's actually a hobby. The irony is that it's what I share most on my social media. So even friends like think that that's my job, but it's just something that when I'm done with a conversation like this, I feel so full and so happy that I did it and glad to connect with the person on the other side of the mic that I'm just like, I can't, I'm not going to stop. You know, but of course, there's all this tied up in it, all this ego, like, I want more listeners, I want more downloads, I want sponsors, I want all this stuff. And, and so now how do I get that? And it's all wrapped up, you know?

Totally. Yeah. I know, like, as we discussed previously, I was kind of like, how did I start doing this? And, and the people I've met and leveraged and everything has been through relationships at the end of the day. And it's only been a very few amount of people that I've interviewed as actually people I don't know in person. So I know you through my sister, right? You guys did Birthright together. And I'm having— I guess I'm having Howard Behar tomorrow from Starbucks. But that was like a cold email, like a random cold email, just a regular website. And they got back to me within 10 minutes, which is crazy. So it is about building the relationships. And I think that's the underlying theme of everything that we've talked about is having meaningful, positive, connected relationships. And I'm— and I don't know if you've ever heard, like, you know, the abbreviation of DMCs. I don't know if that phrase has come up in your world, but you know, I'm a big fan of having DMCs, deep meaningful conversations.

Oh yeah, I love those.

Right?

So when you can just drop, there's nothing better than when you can just, you meet a new person, you can just drop in right away and you're not talking about the weather or the Giants or whatever. It's just like you guys connect.

The real stuff. The real stuff. Exactly. So, It is. And this is why this podcast and your podcast exists. So I really want to thank you so much for your time. I know we've been planning this for a while.

Yeah. So, yeah, thank you. All good. It's all good.

So for everybody out there, please, please, please check out his podcast, The Look Up. And you're available on Instagram. They can find you there by—

So my— so the podcast is Look Up, like looking up from your phone. Uh, my Instagram account is, is my name, but I flip the M and the W, so it's Wark, W-A-R-C, Meinstein, M-E-I-N-S-T-E-I-N. Uh, that's— you can follow me on Twitter. Twitter, I mostly talk about crypto, believe it or not. We didn't touch on this at all. Um, the Instagram is mostly this sort of content. So, uh, yeah, that's it. I'm not on TikTok yet, or I am, but I haven't posted anything.

Well, we're definitely going to get into the Instagram conversation, hopefully in a future conversation, because I have another, another friend of my sister's who also is really, really big in that community who I'd like to actually connect you with as well. So, but, but for everybody else out there, thanks for checking out the You Winning Life podcast. If you have not yet subscribed, please do so. And if there's something in this episode or another episode that you think someone you care about will benefit from, Please do us a favor, share it out, subscribe, leave us a 5-star rating on iTunes with a really full of love review. And we'll look forward to checking in with you next time we're together. Thanks again, Mark.

Thanks for listening to the You Winning Life podcast. If you are ready to minimize your personal and professional struggles and maximize your potential, we would love it if you subscribe so you don't miss an episode. You can follow us on Instagram and Facebook @JasonWasserLMFT.