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Apr 12, 2021 • 4min

Seeking Salt Water with Meiko Krishok

Meiko Krishok is the founder and co-operator of Guerrilla Food (GF), a Detroit-based grassroots culinary team that uses food as medicine. GF is the team behind the  Pink Flamingo To Go farm-to-table carry-out restaurant in the Palmer Park neighborhood in Detroit and Pink Flamingo popular seasonal vintage food trailer that is located in a community garden in Corktown, Detroit.Meiko was last on the show talking about the ease and joy of growing garlic. To offer your own advice, call Zak @ 844-935-BESTTRANSCRIPT: ZAK: There was a Danish author named Karen Blixon writing at the beginning the 20th century. One of her pen names was Isak Denesen. And it's Denisen who the following quote is attributed to. The cure for anything is salt water: sweat, tears, or the sea. My guest today, Meiko Krishok, who's been on the show before has been thinking about this piece of advice a lot lately. MEIKO: To me all those things work in different contexts. So, like, sweat is sort of an easy one. It's like, movement or physical activity and the actual expelling of energy. Right? And how relieving it can be to go for a walk or a run or work in the garden. And then tears is another obvious one. It's sort of about that release emotion, whether it's happiness or sadness.ZAK: What makes you cry?MEIKO: Movies. Every now and again I'll read something and it'll make me cry. You know how some people are like, oh I cry all the time. At this point in my life I don't cry all the time. And then the sea. I do feel like there's something especially therapeutic about the ocean. I don't know if it's chemically what's going in salt water. You can float more in salt water than fresh water. And the waves. 'ZAK: Yeah, I can't wait to go to the ocean again. MEIKO: I've been trying to take Epsom salt baths.ZAK: That's a good home hack!MEIKO: Is it a good home hack but it's not the same. It's not the ocean. You don't get the power with it. But you do get some benefit. ZAK: Maybe you have to cry in the Epson salt bath. MEIKO: hahahah Our GDPR privacy policy was updated on August 8, 2022. Visit acast.com/privacy for more information. ---Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow---Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9---Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at ZAK@bestADVICE.show---Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow
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Apr 9, 2021 • 5min

Bystander Intervention Training with Dax Valdes - PART 5 (Direct)

Dax Valdes is a senior trainer at Hollaback.SIGN UP FOR The 5 D's of BYSTANDER INTERVENTION TRAINING GET TRAINED IN BYSTANDER INTERVENTION by Hollaback in collaboration with ASIAN AMERICANS ADVANCING JUSTICE.To offer your own advice, call Zak @ 844-935-BESTZAK: Thanks for listening to The Best Advice Show. This is part 5 of our week-long series on Bystander Intervention training. With the help of Dax Valdes from Hollaback, we've been going through the 5 D's of Bystander Intervention.DAX: Distract. Delay. Delegate. Document. Direct.ZAK: Five actionable steps we can take out in the world if and when we see someone being harassed. And it's this final D, direct, that seems the most daunting.DAX: So, direct is this is one that everyone thinks about when they think about bystander intervention. You are setting the boundary about what you want the person to do. Hey, stop talking to her that way. That's not cool. And then, that engagement is over and then you turn and you focus on the person who is experiencing that conflict and then you get them out of there. Get them to where they need to feel safe. So, if it's something that's happening on the street, hey man. Why don't you back off and stop saying things to her. And then I would turn to the woman and say, hey, let's get out of here. Let's go for a few blocks and make sure you are all taken care of. And direct can get tricky because the person that is doing the conflict would probably want to get into a back-and-forth with you and it's gonna take all of our will power not to shoot back with the thing that's gonna be the most explosive to meet their energy. ZAK: Direct in particular seems like a real delicate dance because like you say, you're not being combative but you're being resistant in a way. You're being calm but you're also being assertive. This is a challenging one, I think.DAX: Yeah, that does take a lot of practice. Cause, a lot of folks might not feel that comfortable being that direct but, again, if they see somebody doing it in a way that is, oh, I think I could do it. And so maybe it's not the next time they see an incident of harassment happening but maybe the time after that. Seeing two instances, it's like, ok, I can do this. I know what to say and I feel confident enough to do so. And even if it does not go the way that you might originally plan, you have 4 of the other strategies to rely on so maybe direct didn't work and it is something like, delegate, asking somebody else to help you in that instance. Maybe it is somebody who is physically bigger nearby. Hey, can you come here and just help me out here. This guy is yelling at this woman and you look you could, squash him. ZAK: Yeah, you said to do this well it's gonna take some practice. So are you suggesting that there's a way to practice this stuff outside of the loaded situations?DAX: You know, sometimes you're sitting at home, thinking about what you would do in this particular instance if you saw this conflict happening but knowing what these strategies are and reading other people's stories about what happened and what you could have done or thinking about like, oh yeah, I could have done it this way. I could have done it that way is a start for that. But, again, the action doesn't have to be incredibly huge. A small gesture goes a long way. Are you ok? What do you need from me in this moment? How can I support you? Our GDPR privacy policy was updated on August 8, 2022. Visit acast.com/privacy for more information. ---Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow---Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9---Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at ZAK@bestADVICE.show---Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow
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Apr 8, 2021 • 4min

Bystander Intervention Training with Dax Valdes - PART 4 (Document)

Dax Valdes is a senior trainer at Hollaback.SIGN UP FOR The 5 D's of BYSTANDER INTERVENTION TRAINING GET TRAINED IN BYSTANDER INTERVENTION by Hollaback in collaboration with ASIAN AMERICANS ADVANCING JUSTICE.To offer your own advice, call Zak @ 844-935-BESTTRANSCRIPT: ZAK: In the last year, anti-Asian and xenophobic hate has skyrockets all over this country. And of course, street harassment has been endured by humans since the beginning of streets. But the organization, Hollaback, wants us to know that we aren't powerless...that we can do things as random people on the street when we witness harassment.DAX: My name is Dax Valdes. I am a Senior Trainer at Hollaback and I'm based in the traditional land of the Lenape in New York City. I'm originally from San Fransisco and I have the privilege of doing this work with Hollaback and uplifting these trainings for my Asian community.ZAK: All week I've been going over Hollaback's 5 D's of Bystander Intervention training. Distract. Delay. Delegate. Direct. And today's D...ZAK: Tell me about document.DAX: So, you're creating documentation of the incident so this is something that you can do with your phone. So you can take a photo or a video. We're all glued to our little rectangles and so you can hold your phone sideways and record what's going. It's Monday, March 22nd. It's 3:30 and this woman is yelling at this guy and his two kids and where you are...I'm standing on 59th and Broadway in broad daylight and it's happening right there. And what we recommend that you do is you should give that footage to the person that was experiencing harassment so they can decide what to do with it because we don't want to blast that footage on our socials without them knowing because then we're just essentially replaying someone's trauma over and over again.ZAK: Yeah, I could see someone's instinct to go on Facebook or Instagram Live during that situation, but that's not what you recommend.DAX: It's gonna work differently for everybody but if it is particularly traumatic for that individual, having that footage can be really helpful in showing what harassment looks like for them and maybe at large as part of their community and they have agency on how they're sharing so they can share it on their socials or with their family and friends that this is what this looks like.ZAK: And so it's like going up to them after and being like, do you want me to email this to you?DAX: Yeah. I saw what happened. And it's like a combination of Delay afterwards. I saw that. That wasn't cool. I'm sorry that happened. I took this footage so if you want to report this or whatever you need...This is for you. And again, showing that they're not alone and that people are looking after them or people are looking out for each other. Our GDPR privacy policy was updated on August 8, 2022. Visit acast.com/privacy for more information. ---Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow---Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9---Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at ZAK@bestADVICE.show---Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow
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Apr 7, 2021 • 4min

Bystander Intervention Training with Dax Valdes - PART 3 (Delegate)

(Warning. Today's episode contains a news clip which describes a disturbing hate crime that recently took place).Dax Valdes is a senior trainer at Hollaback.SIGN UP FOR The 5 D's of BYSTANDER INTERVENTION TRAINING GET TRAINED IN BYSTANDER INTERVENTION by Hollaback in collaboration with ASIAN AMERICANS ADVANCING JUSTICE.To offer your own advice, call Zak @ 844-935-BESTTRANSCRIPT: ZAK: Warning. Today's episode contains a news clip which describes a disturbing hate crime that recently took place. It's The Best Advice Show where everyday I share one piece of advice. Something that hopefully you can try at home. All week I'm featuring Dax Valdes. He's a trainer with the group, Hollaback and their mission is to end harassment in all forms. So, this week we're going over the 5 D's of Bystander Intervention Training. We're learning about what we can do if and when we see someone getting harassed. The first D we learned on Monday in Part 1, Distract. Yesterday was Part 2 when we learned, Delay. And today, Part 3...Delegate. ZAK: Can you just set-up a scenario?DAX: One of the attacks that happened in Queens where a man pushed a woman over.NEWS CLIP: Police in Queens arrested a man accused of shoving an Asian woman to the ground. 47 year-old, Patrick Mateo is charged with assault and intent to cause physical injury and harassment. On Tuesday, the 52 year-old woman was outside a bakery on Roosevelt Ave. in Flushing when the suspect had gotten into an argument with her and then pushed her. Her head hit the metal newspaper stand. She needed ten stitches. The attack is the latest in a spike of unprovoked attacks against Asian-Americans. DAX: If you happened to be there in that scenario, one of the things that you could have done is, hey, go and tell someone and say, can you go check on her, see if she's ok. I'm gonna try to get help. Or, I'm gonna check on her. I'm gonna see if she's ok. Can you go into the store and ask the store manager to call the police or can you ask them for a band-aid cause not everybody will have gone through a Bystander Intervention training and people want to help usually, but they just don't know what to do. So, we gotta tell them. Hey, back up. That guy is harassing that woman. I'm gonna see if I can go intervene. ZAK: And one thing that you're not saying is like, in this delegation one is like, you go and pin the aggressors down. That's now part of this. DAX: No. you don't know what the other person might be capable of. If we're meeting violence with violence, physically or verbally...If we get caught up in that then we are not doing the best job that we can do as a bystander to help take care of the person in conflict. Cause it's not about us or even them in that moment. It's about the person who's experiencing that disrespect. Our GDPR privacy policy was updated on August 8, 2022. Visit acast.com/privacy for more information. ---Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow---Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9---Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at ZAK@bestADVICE.show---Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow
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Apr 6, 2021 • 7min

Bystander Intervention Training with Dax Valdes - PART 2 (Delay)

Dax Valdes is a senior trainer at Hollaback.SIGN UP FOR The 5 D's of BYSTANDER INTERVENTION TRAINING GET TRAINED IN BYSTANDER INTERVENTION by Hollaback in collaboration with ASIAN AMERICANS ADVANCING JUSTICE.To offer your own advice, call Zak @ 844-935-BESTTRANSCRIPT: ZAK: Hello. Thanks for listening. This is the show where everyday I give you a little morsel of wisdom that you can try. Sometimes immediately. This wee on the show, I'm doing something a little different in that I'm featuring the same guest everyday. I'm talking to Dax Valdes a trainer from an organization called Hollaback.DAX: Hollaback is an organization that was founded in 2005 by a group of friends and there mission is to end harassment in all its forms so they started this as a blog post and they were collecting stories of harassment and they read those stories and they started to notice that the only thing good thing that ever happened to people who experienced harassment was when somebody intervened on their behalf to help them out.ZAK: Dax is here to teach us about what we can do as bystanders when we see someone getting harassed.DAX: These tools, these strategies, these methods are for anybody experiencing or sees an instance of harassment. But the lens is hyper-focused right now, so...we're focused on the AAPI experience.ZAK: The group Stop AAPI hate just put out a report where they counted 3800 incidents of Anti-Asian harassment since March of last year. Yesterday, In part 1, Dax taught us about the distract method of Bystander Intervention. It's one of the 5 D's that Hollaback trains people in. Today, the second of the 5 D's. Delay. So, imagine this...DAX: Somebody driving by in a car and yelling a racial slur and everybody's shell-shocked, like, did that just happen? Another tactic is delay. After the incident is over, you check in with the person who's been harassed. Even, I saw that. That wasn't cool. Are you ok..? can make a huge difference.ZAK: Why is that delay?DAX: Because you're waiting until the harassment is over and those moments of harassment happen so quickly sometimes that it's all you can do is delay and just check in with them.ZAK: So you're kind of going and validating this thing that just happened. You're not pretending it didn't happen and you're making sure the victim is ok. Interesting. So, what else can you say to a complete stranger who you've just witnessed be harassed.DAX: Acknowledging what happened and making an offer how you can support them in the moment is great. Hey, do you want me to wait with you until your friend comes to get you. Do you want me to go with you and talk to a store manager or wherever it happened. In some cases, it's like, do you want to go report this or do you need help reporting this? Depending on what the person needs at that moment. So, being able to take care of them and make them feel supported in something that is super scary for them is a small action that goes a long way.ZAK: Thanks you Dax Valdes. Dax is from Hollaback. If you want to get trained in their 5 D's of bystander Intervention, you should! You can sign up at their website. It's free. It will take about an hour. It builds on the stuff that Dax and I have been talking about on the show. I've put a link in the show notes. Hollaback is doing these trainings in collaboration with Asian Americans Advancing Justice. Our GDPR privacy policy was updated on August 8, 2022. Visit acast.com/privacy for more information. ---Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow---Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9---Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at ZAK@bestADVICE.show---Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow
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Apr 5, 2021 • 7min

Bystander Intervention Training with Dax Valdes - PART 1 (Distract)

Dax Valdes is a senior trainer at Hollaback.The 5 D's of BYSTANDER INTERVENTION TRAINING GET TRAINED IN BYSTANDER INTERVENTION by Hollaback in collaboration with ASIAN AMERICANS ADVANCING JUSTICE.New York police have arrested a man who viciously attacked a 65-year-old Filipino woman near Times Square as she was walking to church on MondayTo offer your own advice, call Zak @ 844-935-BESTTRANSCRIPT: ZAK: Today's episode contains graphic and disturbing descriptions of a recent hate-crime that was caught on video. I'm not gonna play a video but you will hear me listen to it. If you want to see it, I linked to it in our show notes. And if you don't want to see it or hear the descriptions, skip this episode.AMY GOODMAN, DEMOCRACY NOW excerpt: ZAK: (Watching recent attack on 65 year-old woman in NYC). Oh my God. Oh my God.AMY GOODMAN, DEMOCRACY NOW excerpt: New York police have arrested a man who viciously attacked a 65-year-old Filipino woman near Times Square...ZAK: That's one of the things that makes this video even more disturbing. But it's to watch these guys, apparently, they're security guards, literally close the door on this woman. I don't know what could have been done. The attacker is really violent. Really fast. But, depending on the situation. Depending on how physically violent it is, there are several things we can do as bystanders.DAX: Hollaback is an organization that was founded in 2005 by a group of friends and there mission is to end harassment in all its forms so they started this as a blog post and they were collecting stories of harassment and they read those stories and they started to notice that the only thing good thing that ever happened to people who experienced harassment was when somebody intervened on their behalf to help them out.ZAK: All week on the show, we're gonna learn the 5 D's of bystander intervention from Hollaback.DAX: Distract. Delegage. Document Delay. Direct.ZAK: Five actionable steps that we can take to help out the person who's being harassed.DAX: Not necessarily dealing with the person doing the harassing but taking care of the person in conflict. At the start of quarantine last year, there was an uptick in reported crimes towards Asian-Americans and a lot of these incidents go unreported for any number of reason.ZAK: But a lot of these incidents are reported. The group Stop AAPI hate just put out a report where they counted 3800 incidents of Anti-Asian harassment since March of last year. Most of these attacks aren't physically violent. 70% are acts of verbal abuse and harassment. Alright, so what can we do? When we talk bystander intervention training, the first to think about, says Dax...DAX: You gotta just trust yourself. If you feel comfortable stepping in. Great. You should do it. And it's always a judgement call and it's always a brave thing to do. If you're seeing something that's erupting into physical violence, you have to prioritize your safety. But if it's something like...ZAK: You see two people on the sidewalk and they don't appear to know each other. And one of them is verbally attacking the other. What do you do?DAX: You can drop something. Accidentally spill your drink in-front of somebody. Oh, I'm so sorry. ZAK: Distract.DAX: If you see somebody in conflict, you could walk up to them and say, I'm sorry I'm late. Who's this? Well, we gotta go. Thanks. Even if you don't know them. Or, don't I know you from somewhere or could you give me directions. If you're starting a conversation with the person who's in conflict, you don't have to talk about refer to what you just saw or what's going on with the person who's doing the harassing. Just keep it cool. Talk about something unrelated and hopefully the person who is doing the harassing is starved of attention and they exit the scene. It might not always work that way but you're doing that, other people are seeing this and thinking, oh, yeah. That's something I can do. Our GDPR privacy policy was updated on August 8, 2022. Visit acast.com/privacy for more information. ---Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow---Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9---Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at ZAK@bestADVICE.show---Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow
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Apr 2, 2021 • 7min

Urban Foraging with Jean Wilson

Jean Wilson is an artist, farmer and urban forager in Detroit.ZAK: Today on The Best Advice Show, I'm dipping into my archives. 13 years ago I got some advice from Detroit farmer and artist, Jean Wilson. She taught me a super effective way to pare down my grocery bills. It's Food Friday.ZAK: It's about 9 o'clock, I just pulled up to a westside, organic market. I'm here with Jean Wilson. So, what are we about to do?JEAN: We're about to dive in a dumpster and look for some fresh produce.ZAK: Are you diving just for yourself?JEAN: I do end up feeding myself and then also my mother who's on an income of $500 dollars/month social security and my friends and then end up cooking large meals for sometimes hundreds of people.ZAK: You're cooking for hundreds of people you just said? Just random people you find on the street?JEAN: Well, like last weekend we cooked up as much food as we could and we took it down to the lower, Cass Corridor area and served people over there. When I see a lot of food, I find a way to get rid of it. I just can't see this food going to waste.ZAK: Let's go.JEAN: This particular place doesn't waste very much at all.ZAK: We're looking inside a big, metal dumpster. It's about a third of the way full, there are probably 10 garbage bags.JEAN: Light ones we toss aside. When it's heavy it's a good sign. I'm gonna hop up inside. Keeps me inside.ZAK: Jean's in the dumpster. I'm gonna stay outside. You just ripped open that bag. I see some Cliff Bars. Empty, though. Jean, you've done this before. You are moving like a super-human right now. You've already gone through 4 bags. What constitutes what's take-able and what isn't?JEAN: I just take stuff that's good. Like, this whole onion looks good. This apple looks entirely good.ZAK: When was the last time you went into a grocery story and paid for food.JEAN: I've probably spent 50 dollars in the last five years. Seriously.ZAK: Whereas most people spend on themselves, maybe 200/month would be a modest estimate?JEAN: My mother spends six or seven dollars a week because she's particular. I'll eat anything. I just pick out the healthiest stuff and I pick out what I have. Sometimes there was just cheese and crackers for a few days, well, that's ok but as long as I continue to dumpster for food the quality and freshness and quantity and choices have been amazing. We should be getting together and making sure that this food doesn't go to waste. We all should be eating all the food.ZAK: What is that a mango?JEAN:Yeah, that's a really good mango. There's a couple good apples.ZAK: How about them apples? Jean, what is garbage?JEAN: Something that can't be used at all. Something that can't be eaten or fed to the worm box in the kitchen or the compost in the backyard.ZAK: But what we just put in my trunk, that's not garbage?JEAN: What do you think? Wanna come over for dinner tomorrow? Our GDPR privacy policy was updated on August 8, 2022. Visit acast.com/privacy for more information. ---Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow---Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9---Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at ZAK@bestADVICE.show---Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow
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Apr 1, 2021 • 4min

Writing Joyful Lists with Sylva Florence

Sylva Florence is a writer, translator, bike-tour leader and author living in Italy. Her new book is called Finding the Sylva Lining. Read her blog here. Scheduling Joy with Nate Mullen. If you have advice call me and tell me what it is @ 844 935 BEST!TRANSCRIPT: SYLVA: Hi Zak. My name is Sylva Florence and my advice involves making lists. It started because I suck at organizing my life. I'm an artist and so I think in a very creative, scattered way and so I started to make lists and I noticed I get an absurd amount of joy when I cross things off my list. And I started to obviously keep myself on task better and keep myself organized better because if I don't make lists, I'll forget things like, paying my bills. So, but I've also been starting to add other things to my list which were not just things I needed to get done but things I wanted to get done and even more things that were delightful to get done. Like, I'll just read you my list that I made today. Taxes...Ride BikeFarmers Market. I love in Italy so I am very lucky to have an incredible farmer's market and as long as I put farmer's market on my list then I remember to go get healthy vegetables and say hello to my farmer lady. Clean house already. I didn't quite get to that so that will have to be put on tomorrow's list.Chill. That's gonna happen shortly. Hi-Gene. Because I try to reach out to someone everyday. At the end of each day I make a list for the next day and I have fun with it. Yesterday I put...Get up and do a happy dance because I spent a lot of time in-front of the computer and I needed to get up and move. So, anyways, make your lists, check them twice, have some fun with them. Include some things you wouldn't normally put on a list, like get up a do a happy dance. And maybe it will give you the same pleasure it gives me to accomplish various kinds of tasks and also have included a little bit of joy and all you need to do is write it down. ZAK: Silva Florence is a writer, translator, bike-tour leader and author living in Italy. Her new book is called Finding the Sylva Lining...cause that's her name! So good, Sylva. Our GDPR privacy policy was updated on August 8, 2022. Visit acast.com/privacy for more information. ---Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow---Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9---Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at ZAK@bestADVICE.show---Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow
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Mar 31, 2021 • 6min

Automating Your Finances with Joe Saul-Sehy

Joe Saul-Sehy is the creator and co-host of the Stacking Benjamins and Money With Friends podcastsUnderstanding Time Horizons with Justin WaringTo offer your own advice, call Zak @ 844-935-BESTTRANSCRIPT: ZAK: Today on the show, a few simple tweaks you can make to automate your financial picture.JOE: That's one of my favorite things to talk about, Zak and I think it's the hidden thing that people don't think about. They think they need to make more money. They think that they need to pay attention to their budget a lot. Which, you know, both those things are great but, man, automated your financial picture so that money just goes to the right place I think is the best advice I've got.ZAK: Heck yeah. So, I have been meaning to do that for, I don't know, five years and just haven't. So, how would you suggest folks get started?JOE: Well, the cool thing about it is that you just do it once. The nice thing about automating your finances is you do it once and it's all done. And I think that the way we think about it is that our brains can only handle so much at one time. Here's where I'm coming from. Sherlock Holmes, the smartest guy who never lived, in A Study in Scarlet, he famously said, 'What the deuce is the solar system to me.' And what he's really saying is he only has so much room in his brain attic and he needs to just focus on the important stuff. And one of my favorite researchers about time management, a woman named, Laura Vanderkam. She talks about our brains being a battery and that battery during the course of a day, it runs out. So, I don't want my brain battery running out before I remember to build my net worth. So, this is where automation comes in and all these important things we need to do, like remember to save and pay the bills on time. If we automate that stuff, we can just focus on the most important thing in our financial life which is finding ways to be better at our job and maybe make more money or have a more fulfilling career.ZAK: I love it. So, what do you use to automate?JOE: So, the first thing I have is something that helps me track my money and I use a low-cost program called Tiller cause I don't like ads but there's plenty of free things. There's a great one called Clarity Money. There's another one called Mint. There's Money Lion. The bad news about those apps is that they will market to you at the same time as they're helping you but what I like about all of these is that you can set alerts that you tell you when you go over set numbers. So if I spend too much money at a restaurant. This happened to me just a few weeks ago. I go through a drive-thru to pick up some food and immediately my phone buzzes because I went over my restaurant budget for that week. I really like the fact that I don't have to pay attention to my money every minute. I just have to pay attention at critical times. The other thing, though. The one that most people have is if you have a job and you have direct deposit, almost everyone direct deposits to their checking account and this is a really easy, automation shift. So, you already have the automation, we just have to have it go to the right place. Have that go to you savings account instead. And all of a sudden your brain has flipped and now the money is automatically saved and instead of deciding how much of your paycheck you want to save, now your money is already saved and you have to decide how much you want to spend and now we're doing critical task, number one, I think, which is we're disassociating the amount of money that we make from the amount of money that we spend. And when I made that one switch, all of a sudden where I didn't think I could save money before, money started piling up in my savings account because I'd always leave a little there instead of taking every dime to spend on whatever I needed that walk. Our GDPR privacy policy was updated on August 8, 2022. Visit acast.com/privacy for more information. ---Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow---Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9---Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at ZAK@bestADVICE.show---Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow
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Mar 30, 2021 • 5min

Asking the Dumb Question with Jesse Thorn (and Larry King)

Jesse Thorn (@JesseThorn) is the owner of the podcast network, Maximum Fun and host of the podcasts, Bullseye, Jordan, Jesse, Go! and The Turnaround. The Turnaround with Jesse ThornInterviewing with Aaron LammerTo offer your own advice, call Zak @ 844-935-BESTTRANSCRIPT: ZAK: It's The Best Advice Show where every weekday, someone I like offers one morsel of advice. Ideally, something you can start practicing today. On this episode, I'm gonna talk interviewing with one of my favorite interviewers.JESSE: I'm Jesse Thorn and I'm owner of the podcast network, Maximum Fun and also among other things the host of the NPR show, Bullseye. ZAK: Jesse' gonna talk about interviewing an iconic interviewer on his podcast about interviewing. And for those of you keeping tracking at home, this is my second interview with an interviewer about interviewing. The first one was with Longform podcast host, Aaron Lammer. There's a link to that in the show notes. Ok, here's Jesse talking about an essential piece of interview advice you can try at home, even if you don't have a talk show.JESSE: Like, the thing that I think about all the time that I learned from...I did a show called The Turnaround where I interviewed famous interviewers and I just did it because I never went to journalism school or had a mentor or anything. I just was like, doing my college radio show until I was 40. And, we sort of were surprised that Larry King said yes to coming on the show. Like, basically, we just made a list of every famous we could think of, sent out one email to each of them and saw who said yes. Cause it was a low-budget show. ZAK: But you had for people that haven't heard it, you had Ira Glass, Brook Gladstone, Larry King, did you get Terry Gross?JESSE:Yeah, that was the first time I talked to Terry Gross and I was very gratified. I'm a huge fan. But Larry King I was not a huge fan of, may his rest in peace. I wasn't against him or anything, I just never had cable tv as a kid so I never saw him, you know? And I never listened to overnight talk radio. But, I went into his house and he had this big house in Beverly Hills. ZAK: Did someone answer the door or was it him?JESSE: Yes, his assistant just a really sweet, obviously, intensely competent man. His assistant offered me a bottle of water and I was like, what is this gonna be like? And he sat us down in Larry King's trophy room which was like, the trophies were like structural to the room. There were so many trophies and prizes and pictures of him with Hank Aaron or whatever and he came in and he just Larry King right away. The moment he walked in the room, I understood why he was Larry King. Cause you're like, oh, this guy is the most engaged person ever. He locked eyes on me. He was completely present with me and the question that he said he was really proud of when I asked him about this, he said, one time a pilot came on my show...LARRY: And I said when you're going down the runway do you know it's gonna take off? And he said I never think about it. Yes, it will take off but it may not stay up. An engine could go. Birds can fly into the plane. But if I'm going 160 MPH down that runway, it has to take off. Now it may take off for five feet and crash but it will lift off the ground. But he never thinks about it. JESSE: And to me, that's like the perfect question because Larry King doesn't care that it makes him look dumb or makes him look like he doesn't know about pilots.ZAK: Yeah, there's narrative in that question.JESSE: Yeah, and it's like go so much emotional content, you know?ZAK: I spend my entire life not trying to sound dumb. Trying not to sound dumb. Not trying to sound dumb. See? And so, to know that one of the keys to really engaging and asking good questions is to not worry about sounding dumb. This is the work. Our GDPR privacy policy was updated on August 8, 2022. Visit acast.com/privacy for more information. ---Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow---Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9---Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at ZAK@bestADVICE.show---Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow

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