Under the Influence (with Jo Piazza) - Can I Quit Being Influenced with Jessica Elefante

00:00:00.000 Influence is everywhere. This show wouldn't exist if it weren't. Thanks for listening, guys.

00:00:06.460 Love you all. But maybe one of these days we will solve the problem and I won't have to make this

00:00:13.220 show anymore. Until then, we're going to keep chugging along. Because here's the truth about

00:00:20.500 influence. We're bombarded with it constantly. And frankly, we are all exhausted by it. Our lives are

00:00:29.000 being choreographed by forces that always want something from us. Mind-altering algorithms

00:00:35.860 create our foundations and warp how we see the world. They manipulate our decisions,

00:00:41.780 and frankly, they even dictate our beliefs. Yet, rarely do we question these everyday influences

00:00:49.600 of our modern times, even as we go further down the path of being unwell, unhappy, and unhidden.

00:00:58.440 That is the reason that I recently picked up the book Raising Hell, Living Well by Jessica

00:01:04.420 Elefante. See, every once in a while, a book just smacks you in the face, like the first time that

00:01:11.160 you watched the movie Ferris Bueller's Day Off, and you're like, oh my god, I love this, and I love

00:01:15.740 Matthew Broderick, and I just want to watch this a thousand times. I just want to read this book

00:01:20.800 a thousand times. I highlighted, I underlined, I texted Jessica, who I didn't even know before this,

00:01:28.480 to tell her how much I love this book. And now I want to shout it from the damn rooftops. 0.99

00:01:35.060 Here's the thing. Jessica used to be a brand strategist and marketer. She was on the other 1.00

00:01:41.320 side of this. Jessica actually helped brands create problems for us so that we would spend 1.00

00:01:47.440 money with them to fix these fake problems. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Jessica is now a reformed 0.99

00:01:58.040 bullshit artist, much as I am a reformed celebrity journalist. And she wants to help you to see the 0.98

00:02:05.300 bullshit, to quit the influence. She has gone from influence creator to influence fixer. And 0.99

00:02:12.880 today we are lucky enough to have her walk us through what influence is and how we can one day

00:02:18.840 overcome it. Hello. I stayed up really late last night reading your book. I'm sorry about that. I

00:02:35.880 hope you're not too tired. No, I mean, I'm really tired and it's your fault, but do not be sorry.

00:02:40.580 I love this book. It is called Raising Hell and Living Well, Freedom from Influence in a World

00:02:47.680 Where Everyone Wants Something from You. And it's out this week, so everyone needs to order it

00:02:51.980 right now because it changed even this morning for me. Really? Yes. This book made my morning

00:03:01.120 better. It made me commit to not mindlessly doing the scroll and also to use the phone

00:03:08.260 for work and not for anything else. I got on, I made a reel about the Sicilian inheritance because

00:03:15.700 I'm just, I'm just a sales monster these days. I'm a monster. And I posted it and I haven't picked

00:03:24.380 up the phone since because like your words just had such a big impact on me. I want you to tell

00:03:31.180 the audience what this book is about in like, what's your elevator pitch? Yeah. Well, first of

00:03:37.400 Well, thank you. That's really incredible to hear. It's, you know, you're one of my earlier

00:03:42.000 readers. And so to hear how it's, you know, affecting people, it feels awesome to hear that.

00:03:46.880 So thank you. And yeah, so I was a, I mean, I was a sales monster. I was a master wheeler dealer. I,

00:03:56.540 you know, joke that I was a bullshit artist, that I wanted to be an artist. I wanted to be a writer, 0.97

00:04:01.000 But instead, I accidentally fell face first into a world of influencing people, persuading people, sometimes manipulating people on behalf of brands, businesses, you know, the companies I was working for.

00:04:18.160 And when I finally realized the epic, you know, down the drain moment of what I had done to myself and the world around me, it was influence that was sitting at the crux of everything.

00:04:28.980 And so this book is kind of like my apology letter, a bit of a confessional and a critique on our current culture and on myself.

00:04:38.380 And the whole hope is that if I can open a reader's eyes to influence that is around them, then they can choose to escape it if they want to.

00:04:50.620 Yes, yes.

00:04:51.360 And more, more yes.

00:04:53.280 I love that this is someone who created this terrible thing, helped create this terrible thing and wants to do an apology for it.

00:05:03.500 I feel all the time that I should do that for the Kardashians because I was a gossip columnist in the heyday of when they were created by the media machine.

00:05:15.860 And look what that's done to the world.

00:05:17.980 Yeah, I talk about them, you know, and I think it's the middle of the book of just how, you know, we are what we consume. Right. And I guess during the heyday of gossip magazines and early, you know, online TMZ and at the nexus of everyone having their own app, we were just all like kids excited about all this new shit that was being put down our throat.

00:05:40.940 But we none of us thought about the after effects, I guess. And maybe that's how we get a reality show president. 0.97

00:05:46.900 yeah no shit i say i say it all the time i say donald trump is the president we deserved 0.98

00:05:52.640 and i can say that as someone who covered him as a celebrity i then covered him as a politician 0.98

00:06:00.060 and i i understand america's intense obsession and relationship with celebrities and i'm i was 0.82

00:06:08.800 not at all surprised no that he won no neither was i yeah i was sad it was really fucking sad

00:06:15.980 um but you know i there's a chapter in the book that i do kind of use him as like a master class 0.98

00:06:23.900 in you know the art of persuasion you know he is uh who he is because of his ability to bullshit

00:06:30.960 his way through life and so i try to hope and help the reader understand that like rationale

00:06:38.320 and like being a rational person and knowing you know facts and data it doesn't matter and

00:06:44.460 And unfortunately, the unscrupulous people of the world that want to influence people to buy things or vote, you know, a certain way have figured out that those don't those things don't matter more than being triggered through dopamine and our feelings, strong emotions.

00:07:00.040 Truth. Truth. I am going to quote you back at you.

00:07:03.300 I love I love it when people do that to me. And it always reminds me of that line.

00:07:07.760 And when Harry met Sally, where Bruno Kirby says, no one's ever quoted me back to me.

00:07:12.220 You write, my formerly plugged-in, fast-paced, tech-based career gave me a unique perspective on the power of influence from the inside out.

00:07:22.560 I knew it wasn't just algorithms and ads that were guiding our decisions, worldviews, and self-perceptions, but practically everything in our culture was telling us to live a certain way, stay online, never be satisfied.

00:07:36.480 I decided to do something about it.

00:07:42.220 I want you to define what you think influence is.

00:07:46.480 Yeah, so I use it very broadly.

00:07:49.600 I talk about it sort of in three different ways.

00:07:53.620 There's your inner influence, your outer, your surface influence, sorry, and your outer

00:07:58.700 world influence.

00:07:59.580 And so to me, influence is anything that is pushing you in a specific direction.

00:08:08.880 and that could be your religion that could be something you know a value that your parents

00:08:17.440 or your family have put on you that could be literally an algorithm or a headline that wants

00:08:23.700 you to click but it's not inspiring you because people will will challenge me and go well you

00:08:29.700 know you want to be you know inspirational so you know inspiring versus influencing the big

00:08:35.720 difference to me is one is pointing you in a specific direction with a specific outcome.

00:08:42.020 Some influences are fixed, some are insidious, and some just kind of live around us like the

00:08:47.880 air we breathe. So if I was to take my inner world influences, I have, you know, it's the

00:08:56.540 things you can't change. So it's your biology, right? It's the fact that, you know, I was born

00:09:03.520 as the eldest daughter. These influence who I am, right? And who I become. And then there's

00:09:09.380 things that aren't fixed. So things that like the beliefs that, you know, my local community had

00:09:14.700 me believing growing up or the education that I took in. So those things can change over time.

00:09:20.080 And so when I think of influence, I really want people to just understand the motivations

00:09:25.400 of the influences around them. And sometimes it's not even a motivation. It's just the fact that

00:09:31.240 It's specifically pointing them in a direction to take an action of some sort.

00:09:37.540 And one of the things that you write a lot about is that corporate America and now largely through the use of influencers on social media, they create the problems that we think we need to be solving for.

00:09:52.360 So they kind of put us in a catch-22 of, oh, my gosh, you didn't know that you had this problem with your wellness, weight, or parenting, or breastfeeding, or sleeping, or sleep training.

00:10:06.760 But you do.

00:10:08.720 And so now let me sell you something so I can profit off your problem.

00:10:14.920 For sure.

00:10:15.300 And, you know, I feel bad pointing to and I start at the very start of the book, like in, you know, I write a letter to the reader and I, you know, say that I try not to judge other people who might be doing something that I think that is shady like I did.

00:10:36.160 Right. Because we don't we have to take a beat and recognize that they're also under influences themselves.

00:10:42.380 And so, for example, when I started, you know, left corporate America and branding and I wanted to wake people up to like how we were using our technology was going to make them unwell.

00:10:53.100 It was genuinely my motivation was pure and true. 0.70

00:10:56.480 But then I ended up recreating the same wheel because I grew up under, you know, a career of hustle culture and achievement and the girl boss world. 0.90

00:11:06.980 Right. So I recreated the same thing again. 0.89

00:11:08.820 So I was one of those people.

00:11:10.180 I was trying to fix a problem. And instead of, you know, being a solution, I just became a cog in the machine. And it wasn't until I saw all those other layers of cultural influence above me that I was able to see that, like, it's so much bigger than me, right?

00:11:26.760 Like, we end up kind of doing the bidding of these societal structures or businesses.

00:11:34.940 You know, I kind of think of, you know, corporations as a huge, giant structure now in America.

00:11:39.420 It's a little unavoidable the way that it is.

00:11:42.180 But we're operating from a place of, like, having drank the Kool-Aid for so long, we don't even realize that we're recreating the problem, right?

00:11:51.720 We're doing their bidding for them.

00:11:54.960 And what's the Kool-Aid?

00:11:55.900 When you say the Kool-Aid, what are you referring to?

00:11:59.900 Well, the idea that we should be consuming all the time, you have to go to college, you

00:12:07.060 have to get married, you have to breed by a certain age.

00:12:09.880 They're just up until very recently, and this is one of the positive things about the internet

00:12:14.040 is they were just accepted almost as fact.

00:12:16.740 And then you operate on that conveyor belt of buying into college or marriage or the

00:12:22.680 big house with the mortgage just because everybody else is doing it.

00:12:25.580 And so I just think we're at a really interesting time right now where people are starting to understand that maybe all this stuff that's been, you know, shared as normal or sold to us is not best for us.

00:12:41.260 Right. And we're the ones who are suffering trying to buy a ninety nine dollar wellness course on meditation because we're so fucking fried. 0.97

00:12:49.740 I love that you call it Munchausen by capitalism. 0.80

00:12:53.100 I really fought to keep that in there it made a lot of people uncomfortable but I can't think

00:13:01.340 of it any other way no nor should you Munchausen by capitalism I mean I in my book I sent you

00:13:06.880 pictures last night of me marking up this book and I I just did a lot of exclamation points and

00:13:13.680 then a fuck yeah like there because that it is and you also write right before that in our 0.89

00:13:20.920 promotional and brand saturated society, we have a problem. Well, we have many, but the one I'm 0.99

00:13:26.420 addressing now is how we've become so accustomed to living in a world where we are constantly being

00:13:32.160 told or sold that we no longer think it's odd. We don't. This feels so normal, right? It feels so

00:13:39.760 normal to be sold to on a daily basis that we don't stop and think hey right no i don't need

00:13:51.600 those 99 moisture wicking leggings for the jogging that i never do

00:13:58.860 and i don't need to walk down the street and see 800 logos on my way to drop with my kid off at

00:14:06.840 school right like it's so in our background now that it's just we see it as if it's you know a

00:14:14.060 part of the trees it's a part of the landscape and we're just kind of like being lulled into

00:14:19.480 submission and so I feel like this book is my you know rebel call or whatever where I just want

00:14:27.680 people to get furious and like just start pushing back I feel like we've hit that sort of glass

00:14:34.480 ceiling moment where we could say no don't put ed tech in my schools that is sponsored by google

00:14:41.000 because the advertisers on the platform that are teaching kids i mean i don't know if you've seen

00:14:46.380 this where it's like spot the difference right and instead of it being i don't know nature or

00:14:52.160 something about history it's literally spot the difference in their logos right oh who is allowing

00:14:59.680 this. But I always say that, like, who is the adult in the room? But our adults in the room

00:15:04.800 are all being sponsored or paid or funded, right? And the problem then goes back to capitalism. It

00:15:12.580 goes back to money. So the adults in the room need to not be sponsored, not be funded by somebody or

00:15:19.500 lobbied so that we can do the things that are really right for us, for our own health, for our

00:15:24.220 society. But really, the whole reason I wrote this book is for the kids, because they don't know that

00:15:30.040 it's not normal to have an iPad in their classroom that has logos on it to teach them how to spot the

00:15:36.280 difference between two screens. Yeah, I don't love the screens. I have a six-year-old, and he's the

00:15:44.120 one that's in big kids' school now. And it's a lot of screen time, man. It is a lot of screen time.

00:15:50.780 And I think about this a lot in terms of social media, also news.

00:15:57.800 How will these kids ever understand the difference between being sold to and unbiased information?

00:16:05.020 And does that even exist anymore?

00:16:07.160 And I think that we are in such a scary place that books like yours can help just to deprogram us a little bit because we have been so programmed to just mindlessly engage.

00:16:24.080 And that's not to say, I also don't judge.

00:16:27.580 Influencers need to make money because we do not live in a system that mostly pays women to do work and support their families. 1.00

00:16:35.260 We have no safety net in this country. We are all just floundering. Even I'm floundering my way 0.85

00:16:43.540 through this brave new world of how will I support my family for the next 30 years?

00:16:50.200 And so I do not judge anyone for taking sponsorships or for becoming an influencer.

00:16:57.040 What I do think is that it's up to us as the consumers to be aware of how we're being influenced.

00:17:05.260 And to teach children how to see influence.

00:17:09.140 That's what we have to do.

00:17:11.180 I love what you talk about in the book where you talk about intrinsic motivations and extrinsic motivations.

00:17:20.560 And so the intrinsic motivations, what is making me feel happy?

00:17:24.640 What is making me feel fulfilled and energetic?

00:17:27.420 What matches up with my values and helps me feel connected with myself?

00:17:31.520 and then the extrinsic ones i'm doing this because someone asked me to i'm not finding joy i'm doing

00:17:38.360 this to pay the bills or i would add i'm just doing this because i'm not paying attention i'm

00:17:43.020 mindlessly mindlessly doing this and what i think that i would love people to take away is we should

00:17:51.120 be asking ourselves every time we're consuming some kind of media if it's aligning with those

00:17:57.460 intrinsic motivations? Is it making us feel happy, fulfilled, energetic, or matching up with our

00:18:02.480 values? I have a 12-year-old and a two-year-old, and I became totally addicted to, you know,

00:18:11.040 internet culture and my phone and all the things, having had 25 years without it, right? I'm that

00:18:18.200 Gen X, like, you know, cross between before and after. And I could only think about, like,

00:18:23.380 what does that mean for my kids right i had a whole life away from the shit and i still fell 0.97

00:18:28.920 for it even knowing what how it worked right and being one of the people who made it a problem 0.81

00:18:34.960 and so that's kind of where this came in is i would talk to my son hayes about you know the

00:18:41.000 difference between an advertisement and a piece of you know news or newspaper or i would talk to him

00:18:47.120 about how advertisers were able to say that those shoes are going to make him faster than his friends

00:18:52.680 but it's not true. And he didn't understand why could you say something that wasn't true.

00:18:56.660 And so it was all these sort of conversations. And he said to me, Mom, you know these things

00:19:03.240 and I know these things. Not that I'm some all knowing asshole, but these were our values and 0.97

00:19:07.140 our beliefs and things that I wanted to pass on to him. But he he goes to me, the other adults 0.96

00:19:13.100 don't know this. And now I'm the weirdo. And it was because we had these boundaries, like, you

00:19:19.480 know, maybe I didn't let him have a cell phone or I didn't let him go on Fortnite. And I would say

00:19:23.120 to him, different house, different rules, or these are not our values, or what are we trading,

00:19:27.240 you know, by allowing this thing to enter our house. And he said, I don't want to be the weirdo.

00:19:32.620 Can't you tell everybody else? And so that's why I wrote this book. That's why it started,

00:19:37.200 was really because of that conversation. And so it's not that, you know, I want people to feel

00:19:43.180 that the sky is like falling, everything's terrible. And I mean, it is, and everyone feels

00:19:47.680 that way, but there's a reason for it. And I believe I lay that out in the book, but by the

00:19:52.160 end of it, right, I take the reader from under the influence to above the influence because

00:19:56.100 I want them to know that they can like make trouble in their own life. They can break away

00:20:03.640 from these sort of, you know, programming that we have, and then they can help write the wayward

00:20:09.480 ship for these kids because this generation has no clue unless we teach them and they're going to

00:20:14.080 do whatever it is we show them is normal and if we show them it's not normal and we start to talk

00:20:20.100 about digital literacy and the culture of advertising and now we have you know ai coming

00:20:26.520 into it it really comes back to like the same way you would talk to your kids about like sex drugs

00:20:32.040 religion like we have to become super super super present in the real world with our communities to

00:20:37.600 start to push back on these influences amen sister sorry i get on my pulpit you are great well we

00:20:47.180 know everything everything can keep going i was like when you were saying that i was i was i was

00:20:52.720 picturing john lithgow in footloose but instead of telling the kids they can't dance he's telling 0.51

00:20:58.860 the kids we need to understand who fucking owns youtube exactly exactly who's and and and the

00:21:08.460 loopholes that they've allowed the content creators i mean you know these conversations are so i mean 0.80

00:21:15.040 first of all that's a really rad compliment and i'm gonna go home and tell my husband that you

00:21:18.700 said that so thank you yeah you know here's here here's here's a creepy thing if you go back and

00:21:24.320 re-watch Footloose now, as I recently did, because it's a surprisingly tender movie for

00:21:30.800 young boys to watch. The relationship between Kevin Bacon and his friend Willard is very,

00:21:35.900 very sweet. But you're going to relate to John Lithgow and Diane Weiss way more than you are

00:21:43.240 the kids. Now I know what I'm going to be watching on Pizza Movie Night. Very tender,

00:21:49.520 very tender movie, I have to tell you. We're going to take a break here and

00:21:54.140 when we get back, we're going to talk about what we can be doing, how we can be solving this

00:21:59.860 problem, because that should be, I think, our mission. We should say no less than it is our

00:22:06.680 job to solve this for the kids. 100% agree with you. And I'm excited to talk about that.

00:22:24.140 and we are back we are back with jessica elefante is it elefante it is well it depends on which

00:22:32.580 parent of mine you talk to they're they're um divorced and one says it one way and one says

00:22:38.240 it the other way and i think it's just to poke at one another but yes i say it elefante see yeah

00:22:43.720 well i i am very italian-american so i would say oh i'm like yeah it's elefante right um

00:22:50.000 It rolled right off your tongue.

00:22:51.880 I did.

00:22:52.600 Can you tell that I'm also the author of the soon-to-be bestselling book, The Sicilian Inheritance?

00:22:58.100 Oh, I can't wait.

00:22:59.340 It sounds like heaven right now.

00:23:00.800 I'd like to be in Sicily.

00:23:02.700 I know.

00:23:03.540 I know.

00:23:03.880 We're actually doing a big writing retreat next summer in Sicily.

00:23:09.320 So if I can do what I want to do with this book, which is get it in the hands of everyone

00:23:17.000 I see reading Colleen Hoover books at the pool.

00:23:20.000 then we can afford to bring amazing writers to Sicily and and get them together with amazing

00:23:26.460 readers. So you are a sales monster. Where do I sign up? I'm coming. You're coming. I'm a sales

00:23:33.200 monster. I'll send I'll send you the link and I'm going to get you a book as soon as we as soon as

00:23:37.000 we get off, get off this interview. Thank you. But no, let's promote your book because this isn't

00:23:41.800 about me, even though it's always about me. Your your book is Raising Hell, Living Well,

00:23:47.380 freedom from influence in a world where everyone wants something from you.

00:23:51.080 And before the break, we were talking about how we get sucked into the influence.

00:23:55.160 And now I want to talk about how we get sucked out of it.

00:23:59.020 What can we be doing?

00:24:01.180 Yeah.

00:24:01.460 So, I mean, the first thing is to become aware of everything that's happening around us.

00:24:07.760 And that's essentially like the entire first half of the book is I'm showing people not

00:24:12.360 just like the things I grew up with and how it formed who I became, but also how I became an

00:24:17.900 influencer and the tricks that I used, right, of, you know, corporate marketing, budgets, and then

00:24:25.480 eventually how I kind of became a guru in this like new wellness space of digital well-being and

00:24:30.600 how my motivations, though intrinsic, became extrinsic based off of, you know, being rewarded

00:24:38.180 by corporations again. So again, you'll see a pattern. But the second half of the book is about

00:24:43.800 how to come out from under. So I, you know, that awareness is really the key point. And if you stop

00:24:50.780 there, I really think it's going to help people push back in their life. But if you continue,

00:24:56.780 I get to this point in the book that's called Influential, where it's how you can, you know,

00:25:03.940 everyone has influence, right? You have influence in your own four walls, in the communities you

00:25:08.840 exist in. Obviously, we all have megaphones now on our social media platforms. It's how you choose

00:25:14.680 to use it. And not all influence is bad, right? So a stop sign is influential. It helps us not

00:25:20.780 harm one another. You do need influence, but the key is that it is good intentioned and that

00:25:28.620 you're using it for, you know, good reasons. So, you know, one of the things I talk about is like

00:25:34.580 waking up to the influence that you already embody that you don't even realize. And once you know

00:25:39.100 that you are influencing, whether it's your children or your neighbor or the people who

00:25:43.460 follow you on social media, you're determining how you want to best utilize that influence.

00:25:49.000 And I hope you choose to use it for good. And then, you know, the next way is to like pick

00:25:55.520 a fight like what is the thing that you really really feel strongly about that you want to

00:26:00.140 help change and there are ways that the internet has been absolutely incredible you know i talk

00:26:06.620 about like these sort of like google doc activism and how social media is used to get people to

00:26:12.460 organize but a lot of these things if they remain just in the online spheres they kind of well they

00:26:19.400 make a lot of change in that moment that we can use it for an even greater ability to make the

00:26:28.100 change that we want by reconnecting offline. So I challenge people to say, OK, this may not be

00:26:34.940 going away. We can push back on how we're using it. We're not going to keep this as like an

00:26:39.100 accepted norm. Really critically thinking about what are we trading by bringing these things into

00:26:44.220 our lives? What's lost? And then using our influence for good to push back on those things.

00:26:49.400 how do you go about your day so that you do kind of less harm, less harm to yourself and less harm

00:26:57.980 to others? Well, you're catching me at a really ironic time because I do have to publicize this

00:27:06.920 book, right? I have to promote it if I want people to read it. It has to cut through the noise. And

00:27:11.520 so people have asked, they're like, what do you do? Like, how do you do this? You're talking about

00:27:15.080 not being persuaded, but you have to persuade people to buy the book, which is makes you want

00:27:20.600 to die a little inside. But also I know how much work I put into this and how proud I am. And I

00:27:27.520 hope how much how much positive influence it's going to have in the fight that I've chosen to

00:27:33.200 pick. So I'm doing it. But, you know, I'd be lying if I'd say it's all perfect. Right. I definitely

00:27:39.940 now, as we're in the run up to the book release, I find myself like on my phone at bedtime,

00:27:45.160 which I didn't used to do before because I'm playing catch up because I want to be present

00:27:48.880 with my kids. So there's certain boundaries that I won't cross. So like I don't have my phone out

00:27:56.400 and I'm working from the couch while I'm sitting next to my kid after school and he's having a

00:28:00.620 snack. Like I try to be leaned into wherever I am, especially with them. And so it's not perfect

00:28:09.120 right now it's always been this way where it gets worse if I'm you know putting something out into

00:28:14.080 the world I know what comes with that right like I have to be available and communicate but I'm not

00:28:20.260 doing it the way that people expect me to so I told my publisher that like I'm not going to be

00:28:26.300 a talking head I'm not recording like videos in the lead up to my book coming out I'm not going

00:28:33.080 to be a guru right like the writing speaks for itself I will do podcast interviews without video

00:28:38.360 I will write I will send snail mail in the mail because I love snail mail and I really believe in

00:28:45.520 that personal connection but I'm not going to be doing you know Reddit AMAs and digital all these

00:28:53.480 things that we know help sell books so they probably want to kill me a little bit but also

00:28:56.820 it's kind of that I'm walking the walk and talking the talk where I meet people in a digital space

00:29:03.740 but I try very quickly to move it to an offline connection.

00:29:06.960 I give people my cell phone.

00:29:08.520 We talk on the phone.

00:29:09.640 We meet for coffee because that's how I think this technology should be used.

00:29:14.780 And then for media, you know, I am finding I'm not I'm the person that if I can't set

00:29:23.080 the boundary and keep it, I opt out completely.

00:29:26.120 So the more that Netflix vies for my attention and doesn't automatically shut off and gives

00:29:32.200 me too many choices. And I feel like I can't be intentional where I'm only going to watch

00:29:36.160 the bear because he's so sexy and it makes me think of working in a bar again. But then I'm

00:29:42.520 getting a million other things, you know, shoved down my throat. I'll just stop. I'll just turn the

00:29:46.820 TV off and walk away. So I think that kind of answers your question. I'm not perfect by any

00:29:53.940 means. And it's getting harder. It's getting a lot harder as the Internet is and media is

00:29:59.260 becoming more invasive and fractured because they're losing their revenue streams as the

00:30:04.420 algorithms change and people become exhausted. Totally, totally. And I love that you said you're

00:30:10.400 not perfect and we're all just struggling to figure this out every day. It was it was very

00:30:16.060 interesting for me. I was reading your book after I started reading it while the kids were doing

00:30:20.900 their homework last night. And like you, if I'm sitting with them and they're doing their homework,

00:30:25.740 I try not to be on my phone or staring at my phone when my husband does it I hate him a little

00:30:31.560 um yeah and I still haven't figured out a good way to tell him to get the f off his phone because I

00:30:37.440 say get the f off your phone and then we get into a fight yeah but I feel okay reading a book while

00:30:42.760 they're doing their homework because it's boring I don't I'm not I help them but they don't need a

00:30:47.260 lot of help and I'm bored but reading a book I feel like I'm modeling reading to them yes and

00:30:54.000 it's a physical media, right? And that's one of the things I guess I should say about media and

00:30:58.860 mediums is it makes a difference on what device you're consuming it on. And so reading a book

00:31:05.560 is much better for our brains cognitively and our memory of what we consumed than on a device.

00:31:12.120 So the same could be said for their homework, right? Like if they're telling the kids to

00:31:15.500 write an essay, you know, by doing it on their iPad, but you know pen and paper is better.

00:31:20.940 these are the choices the little swaps that you can start making but really quick joe don't tell 0.99

00:31:25.620 your husband that you want to fucking kill him even though you want to make it i do want to yeah 0.98

00:31:30.180 make it about you so say be like i notice i'm doing this around the kids and i don't like that 1.00

00:31:35.700 the way that it's feeling and i was hoping you could join me and let's have a reset this weekend

00:31:41.440 make it about you. Lie. Fine. I will. You're a better person than I am, but. No, I'm just more

00:31:51.880 persuasive. I know. You are. You are. No, that's going to shut him down instantly. He's in his head.

00:31:57.900 He's like, go fuck yourself. And now I'm going to double down on it. So the only way to really do 1.00

00:32:02.300 make changes in people is to have them arrive there kind of on their own through an invitation

00:32:06.600 and never shame anyone, even though we weren't screaming them.

00:32:10.760 Yeah, I know.

00:32:13.580 It's way less fun, right?

00:32:15.600 Totally, totally.

00:32:17.320 And harder, to be honest.

00:32:18.960 It's harder. 1.00

00:32:19.920 Yeah, you want to let that fuck it flag fly. 1.00

00:32:22.240 All the time, all the time. 1.00

00:32:24.560 But as I was reading your book and I wanted to, I want to support you.

00:32:31.320 I want people to buy this book.

00:32:32.340 So I immediately wanted to take pictures of it and post it.

00:32:35.860 and also talk to you about it.

00:32:38.700 But the nice thing is that you wrote me a handwritten note

00:32:43.240 that was folded up like a middle school note,

00:32:46.380 which I really appreciated.

00:32:48.300 I wish we could pass notes all the time.

00:32:50.160 I love notes.

00:32:50.860 And you also gave me your cell phone number.

00:32:53.600 So while I did have to pick up my phone,

00:32:55.660 instead of going on an app

00:32:57.300 and messaging you through Instagram,

00:32:59.860 I could text you, which was really nice.

00:33:03.220 It was really nice just to text you pictures

00:33:05.200 of what I was underlining in your book. We're constantly being pulled in the direction of that

00:33:12.800 because of the things that we want to accomplish professionally. I say this all the time.

00:33:17.560 If I didn't genuinely want to share my books with readers, I want to connect with readers.

00:33:24.020 I want other awesome authors like you to connect with readers. I would get off social media,

00:33:32.700 But that's now genuinely the best way to do it.

00:33:37.020 Of course.

00:33:37.780 Of course, because that's why you've got to fish where the fish are.

00:33:39.920 That's where everybody is.

00:33:40.760 That's where they're spending their time.

00:33:41.980 And no one should feel guilty about that.

00:33:43.780 We've all been trained to do this.

00:33:45.700 Literally, there's scientists and engineers and biologists who are brought into these companies to figure out at the exact moment you're going to set your phone down or you're going to close an app to keep you back on.

00:33:58.260 like our our innate being is being used against us so it's nobody's fault it's their fault it's 0.98

00:34:05.180 not our fault i like i like blaming someone else me too i really do especially really do man damn 0.98

00:34:10.800 the man damn damn the billionaires i love blaming rich men me too oh um but i just want to say so 0.98

00:34:21.000 like for social media, it's like, how can you use it? Right. Right. In a way that is better for you 0.99

00:34:28.180 and for everyone. And so for me, it's to take, like I said, those connections offline as quickly

00:34:33.780 as possible and create a real connection in some way. Not that those aren't connections, but

00:34:37.680 they're they're more shallow, like surface level. Right. And so the people that I am inspired by are

00:34:44.960 the people that I want to help with research for my book or the people who just genuinely like

00:34:50.680 want to share that you know reading my words has changed their life like those are deeper right and

00:34:56.020 more thoughtful and one of the problems I have with the digital world and social media in particular

00:35:01.700 is everything has become very easy to spout off um and the first thought that comes to your mind

00:35:08.200 and hide behind it too and so when I thought about this book coming out in the world I write

00:35:14.440 you know you know like very truthfully in it and there's going to be stuff that people aren't going

00:35:20.120 to like. Of course, you're never going to please anyone, everyone. And I was like, OK, I know I

00:35:25.800 need to be on social media and I want to hear what people have to say. But I get to a very dark place

00:35:31.280 when I am taking on constant communication from others. Right. It pulls me away from myself,

00:35:38.020 my kids, the present moment, the world. So I was like, how can I do this where it's a balance?

00:35:42.100 It's not that I don't want the feedback or I don't want the connection. So what I've done is I've set

00:35:46.260 up a P.O. box and any of my sub stacks comments are off unless, you know, you are a subscriber.

00:35:54.840 So I know your name there. The reason that's important is because you're not going to say

00:35:59.460 something wicked shitty to me on the Internet if I know who you are. Right. And if you really

00:36:06.540 have something that you need to share with me, I am totally open to hearing your feedback.

00:36:11.120 if you have taken the time to sit with it, write it down, put a stamp on it, put it in the mail and

00:36:16.640 send it to me. It's taking that instant sort of verbal diarrhea or hate or instant reaction,

00:36:24.220 right, to allow the person to sit with it for a little minute. And then I will read what you have

00:36:29.300 to say. And so it's very different. I know a couple other authors who've done it, but that's

00:36:33.540 my boundary. And I'm hoping it works. We love that boundary. That's a good boundary. And I think

00:36:39.700 that that's great advice too. It's that we have to give ourselves boundaries. We have agency. We

00:36:47.440 have to remember that, that we have agency, that we get to choose how and when we consume these

00:36:55.200 things. And it's up to us. So it's just questioning like where these accepted sort of norms or ideas

00:37:03.520 come from and setting the boundary of what works best for us.

00:37:09.700 Thank you.

Under the Influence (with Jo Piazza) - October 11, 2023

Can I Quit Being Influenced with Jessica Elefante

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