whatup fellows, Jeffy here writing this from my friend's place in Brooklyn, hopped up on a number of homeopathic remedies.
Last week's Chicago Bootcamp was pretty epic, and I'm ready to hit up the final stop on the US leg of the tour before taking a well-deserved weekend off back home. Here are the remaining stops on the tour:
October 22: New York City
Australia & New Zealand:
November 5: Auckland
November 12: Perth
November 19: Melbourne
November 26: Sydney
Canada:
January 7: Vancouver
January 14: Calgary
January 21: Toronto
January 28: Montreal
So yes, I took things a little too far last weekend, thinking I was invincible, and in the process completely blew out my voice. Like, to the point where on Sunday I was literally physically incapable of speech. For someone in my position this is obviously not a very good position to be in, especially given that I've got what might be the biggest speaking event of my life coming up in the New York City Hotseat.
When I first set up this tour schedule, Owen warned me that it was pretty aggressive and noted that he was curious to see how I would handle it. Honestly, up until this point it hasn't been that bad. Yes, it's been a lot of work and more than I've taken on in the past, but my entire "career" leading up to this point has been a series of increasingly taxing bouts of activity, each requiring more effort than the last. Basic principles of progressive overload. So yes, I was READY to take on this load, and like I've stated in this space over the past few weeks, I can feel that it has changed me. Made me tougher, better. And I'm sure that in the coming years, myself, Owen and the crew will continue to pile on the challenges in order to achieve our dreams and change the world in some small way inthe process.
However, seeing the relative ease with which I've been adapting made me a little cocky and so last weekend I sort of "threw caution to the wind."
Every stop on the tour, by the last night of bootcamp after a full day of hotseat, my voice feels a little scratchy and sounds hoarse, but I know that I will then have four days of rest to rebuild it. It was the same in Chicago, but on the last night, rather than take it easy after the hotseat in terms of putting stress on the voice, I continued to press the pedal to the floor and go berserk in the club, throttle wide open.
I mean, I'd been screaming all weekend. On Friday night, I pulled a girl out of a two set with one of the students. We were making out, but she wouldn't leave with me once we got outside after closing time, so I started shouting at her, "FUCK OFF YOU LITTLE FUCKIN FEATHERHEAD, SUCK THIS HOMELESS GUY'S DICK" (homeless guy looked hopeful) "GET THE FUCK OUT OF HERE, YOU'RE DONE... YOU'RE DONE IN THIS TOWN, GET THE FUCK OUT... GO, GO, GO, GO LEAVE, GO LEAVE, YOU THINK I'M SOME FUCKIN CHODE YOU CAN TOOL? AHAHAHAH DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHO THE FUCK I AM? FUCKIN KILL YOURSELF GET THE FUCK AWAY YOU'RE DONE IN THIS TOWN."
She says, "Do you know who the fuck *I* am?"
I go, "YES YOU ARE A LITTLE 22 YEAR OLD FEATHER HEAD WHO DOESNT KNOW FUCKIN SHIT, GET THE FUCK OUT, I THOUGHT YOU LIKED ME BUT YOU WERE PLAYING ME THE WHOLE TIME... FUCKIN LAME."
Mind you, the way I'm saying this, it's so fucking over the top, she can't tell if I'm being serious, or joking, or a combination of the two (bingo). People are standing around watching this in utter confusion. Then BAM I immediately slam gears and go sweet, crack a couple jokes and pull her in... boom it's back on. "You're coming with me." I literally drag her to a cab and throw her ass in. She says she won't leave without her friend who is with the student. I tell the student, "TAKE CARE OF THIS."
Student then proceeds to drag his girl over and throw her in the same cab and get in. WTF. I know if it goes down like this, it's gonna be a bamboozlement back at the place, where the girls just chat and party and nobody fucks.
I stand to the side and refuse to even get in the cab. The driver starts arguing with them and kicks them out after 2 minutes. The girl says to me, "What happened?"
I say, in front of all of them, "What happened? This guy (pointing at student) was too much of a faggot to handle his business, he wasn't gangster enough to pull your friend here away on his own like a man."
They laugh. The friend then actually DRAGS THE STUDENT OFF and says "See you tomorrow wendy" and BOOM DONE.
So yeah, similar shenanigans on Sunday morning as we rumble through the clubs. Brad is present, not running program though, so he's quite drunk and LITERALLY SCREAMING AT THE TOP OF HIS LUNGS "I AM BEATUIFULLLL WHOAAAAAAAAA" on the street as we walk to the debrief spot, eating street tacos piled high with magical carne goodness as we walk toward Eggsperience.
Stupidly, I decide to join him in this activity, until a man passing by smacks the taco plate out of his hands. I respond by taking my rather large taco and HURLING it directly at the man's head, where it explodes, splattering meat and salsa everywhere. Then, at the diner, we make some huge scene by pounding the table yelling "MEN MEN MEN MEN MEN" over and over again, and I sing "Part of Your World" from the Little Mermaid at top volume while combing the salsa out of my hair with a fork which I refer to as a "dinglehopper."
I think it was around here that my larynx popped.
Little side note here... I know a lot of people read this shit and think, "wow, you guys are so obnoxious how come you don't get into fights? DURR I would have killed you if you did that etc etc" well guess what... We have COMMON SENSE as well as EMOTIONAL ACUITY and moreover we refuse to play the escalation game with dudes. You would not kill me. You would get mad, then I would make some amazingly on-point joke with a hint of self-deprecation and you would then think I was awesome and try to get rapport with me. On Thursday, I tooled some Australian dude out HARD, body blocking him and mocking his accent then stealing away the girl he was trying to talk to. I saw this guy at the next bar, and said "HEY BRO!" and he was all "OI MATE!" with a smile on his face greeting me like I was his old friend. I'm not scared, I'm not a punk and I know how to play the game. With the taco thing, it was like, Okay, you knocked my friend's food on the street, you and your girl got a face full of taco and we're even. In fact, I think I may have actually said that to the guy as he tried to step up. lol.
The frame control shit I can pull out is mind-bogglingly ridiculous, like even to myself. I remember one time recently I was on Bootcamp and the student urinated near some homeless guy's bedding or something, and the dude was following him around, freaking the fuck out. The student was partially scared and also started playing into the escalation game with the dude. I roll up hard and say, "LEAVE. DO NOT SPEAK TO THIS MAN ANY FURTHER, WALK AWAY."
So the student crosses the street, but the homeless guy follows him, yelling obscenities. I turn back around and see this, so I SPRINT across the street, yell "HEY" and as the homeless guy turns to face me I shove his ass hard, and he goes flying back over a sign and lands on his ass. Now, I realize that this guy is going to get up and be SUPER ANGRY.
Sure enough, he pops up looking to attack and I say to him, "Oh my god, what happened?"
For some reason, this MAKES HIM FORGET I WAS THE ONE WHO SHOVED HIM. He starts complaining about the guy pissing on him, and I say, "Omg, dude idiots... dude, it's not worth it man, these idiots are drunk... are you okay?" And the dude nods and wanders off. I'm like holy fuck what just happened? I mean, you can read about this in the student's bootcamp review... yes, this really happened.
http://www.rsdnation.com/node/191242/forum
Point is, I am fully confident that I can talk my way down from any situation, and if push comes to shove I can RUN. lol. Having said that, I've only been in two altercations that I can think of in the past ten years, and in both those instances I LET IT GO THERE.
MORE IMPORTANTLY, I do not live in fear of the environment. 2PAC said, "The player does what he wants, the bitch does what he CAN." Looking for PERMISSION. I am always at the CAUSE end of things in the environment, not the EFFECT end. And if something happens that is dangerous to me, I can always CAUSE something else to happen to fix it.
Now, you can sit here and give me isolated examples in the media of people dying in the club DURR or tell me how you would kill me and all this shit, but guess what... you wouldn't kill me... you would SUCK MY DICK.
Or you know what? Maybe you would kill me. I don't know, whatever. But until that day comes, I'ma continue living my life like the fuckin BOSS.
Anyway, that was a bit of a diversion from the main point, which is that I overtaxed myself on the voice because I was cocky, and now I'm paying the price. I've been on COMPLETE VOCAL REST for the past three days, and I'm just now at the point where I feel confident that I can perform this weekend. Do you have any idea how difficult it is for a guy like me to STOP TALKING? It's weird, because I've noticed that if I don't talk, nobody does. Like, I'm in the car with all these dudes, and normally I'd be saying shit and sort of directing the conversation, but because I'm mute, well... now we drive in SILENCE. I'm not sure why this happens.
My friend said that it feels weird to talk and not get a response. I don't have this trait... which is probably one reason I'm good at pickup. I don't gie a shit if people don't respond, or if they do respond, or if they say things conducive to what I'm trying to hear. I just GO. Yes, I take into account their response to a degree, but largely I am just doing a stream of consciousness RANT and vibing off of the environment.
But anyway, even with all this rest, I can feel it's not completely healed... there's like a scab on my voicebox to the point where it's workable... but now I'm going to run these NYC events and basically rip it off. Thank god I'm taking a full week off in San Francisco after this to recover.
Lesson learned. The new Jim Collins book "Great By Choice" discusses a concept called "fanatic discipline" illustrated by the term "20 Mile March." The idea being that you march 20 miles every day, no more, no less, regardless of the weather of situation. Every day, you do your 20 miles. This means being CONSISTENT over a long period of time. Basically he outlines this concept as requiring two types of discomfort:
1. Delivering high performance in difficult times
2. Holding back in good times.
Take for example lifting at the gym, a hobby of mine in which I've certinly learned the importance of the 20 mile march. You go to the damn gym even on the days you don't feel like it. Conversely, on the days you feel like you could punch through a brick wall, you do your routine and don't try to be a hero by piling on additional weight that's not in the program.
If you don't go when you don't feel like it, you fail to improve in the long haul. If you go too hard, what happens? You get injured and this has the same effect as if you didn't go at all... in fact it may even be worse because now you're out of the game for weeks or months and it can be difficult to regain momentum.
This is why I get frustrated when I hear people saying shit like, "I've been going out for 3 months and I don't see the results I want this shit doesn't work bro" and the like. I also get concerned when I hear people talking about doing insane challenges like going out every day for three years.
Unless you're Tyler, that is. But then again he is a cyborg.
Actually, it was Tyler who brought this concept of the 20 mile march to my attention recently and I liked it so much that I thought about writing an article about it... then prompty went and ignored the damn advice. I went too hard when I was feeling good, and now I'm paying the price. But like I said, lesson learned.
Think of your journey in learning game in similar terms. This is truly a LONG HAUL not a sprint, and striving for goals in a slow-and-steady, in it to win it longterm mindset is going to make the difference between the guys who dabble around for a while and drop out and the guys who realize their dreams and end up mastering the game.
Anyway, gonna hit up some Throat Coat tea right now and hit the sack in anticipation of tomorrow's New York Free Tour (by the way if you have vocal issues you might want to check this stuff out, it's available at most supermarkets and is used by singers and other voice pros to keep the apparatus healthy). Bootcamp in New York Motherfuckin City, balls to the wall. Hopefully I won't get killed in the club. I am so scared!
-j
PS: Don't forget we got an all star cast on program this weekend, and Tyler will be there with me for this weekend's Hotseat, running his special "Foundations: Reloaded" seminar on Sunday for Hotseat attendees. So again, this is going to be TWO DAYS of program for the price of one... so now would be a very good time to check out the RSD Hotseat!