What’s up, confidence fans? Welcome back to Brojo Online. Quick little video for you today. I wanted to speak about the hypocrisy of human beings. You know, lately a lot of people have been telling me how I should and shouldn’t live my life. And I don’t take this personally anymore, but this used to really affect me. I used to have a lot of people telling me what I should and shouldn’t do. And I in turn used to tell people what they should and shouldn’t do. And I’ve since over the last few years realized both how hyperritical and how harmful this practice is. Criticism, feedback, advice, these things can control our lives and we can use them to control the lives of other people. And yet we’re all hypocrites. There is no one out there whom I’ve ever met or heard of who’s ever been able to follow their own advice to the letter without fail, who’s ever given advice that they themselves haven’t breached. And I want to make sure that everybody’s always aware of this when it comes to working on your life and improving yourself. And understand, even as you listen to me speak right now, don’t take everything I say for granted. Don’t just assume that I know what I’m talking about. That assumption costs lives. You assuming that other people know what they’re talking about and aren’t hypocrites causes you to follow advice that may be harmful for you. And you assuming that you yourself are not is not a hypocrite. And giving advice on that basis is also harmful. Most feedback comes from neediness around control, belonging, and safety. When I give you advice that you haven’t asked for in particular, it’s not for your benefit. I’m doing it because I want you to behave in a way that I feel more comfortable with. I’m doing it because if you behave more like me, I’ll feel like I’m part of a tribe. That’s the belonging part. And I feel like if you behave in a way that I guide you to, you’re more predictable and therefore I’m safer. You’re you’re less of a risk to me. And that’s the real reason anyone gives advice ever. The deep, dark, selfish reason people give advice is no such thing as altruistic feedback, as advice purely given to help someone. because you’re always helping them to be more like the way you want them to be, which helps you. Now, this isn’t necessarily a bad thing. At the end, I’ll I’ll make a call for why feedback is helpful, but I want you to always take feedback with the understanding that people are hypocritical and no one’s 100% perfect and no one really knows what they’re talking about. I mean, I coach people on how to live by their values, how to have integrity, how to be more confident, but I regularly breach these rules myself. Not as much as I used to. I’ll give myself some credit where it’s due, but I still sometimes practice uh harmful behaviors that are the same behaviors I’ll advise my clients against. Sometimes I’ll skip my morning routine. Not often, but sometimes. And yet I’ll tell that same day I’ll tell a client, you know, how important it is to be consistent with your morning routine. Now, of course, I think I’m better than most because I generally tend to be honest about me being hypocritical. But this even being honest about being hypocritical is just so that you’ll be more likely to take my advice. It’s always self- serving. And I’m okay with this as long as it’s out in the open. I want to list off some examples. Lately, I’ve had a couple of vegans telling me I can’t eat meat. Now, on one hand, I absolutely agree with the idea that cruelty to animals is [ __ ] up. I don’t see any reason why we can justify that. And at the same time, I noticed that vegans vegans are happily living in houses. You know, a habitat for other human uh a habitat for other wildlife was destroyed to build that house. So, what is harm to animals? You know, uh, Greenpeace members will still use cell phones. Do you know how much environmental damage goes into building a battery for a cell phone? It’s off the chain. Batteries are one of the most destructive things on this planet to build. And yet, people who care about the planet are still quite happy to use them. I I’m part of a stoic Facebook group, so philosophy of stoicism. And most of it is people bitching each other out on what it means to be a stoic, which is anti-toic to do. In fact, I I find it hard to understand how any philosophy of stoicism supports even being on social media. Atheists, I I I would call myself atheistic in my belief. So I don’t I try not to belong to any one group but the atheist will have faith in a science website. They’ll read something and go see science without doing any critical research which is no different to being religious. You know religions of peace start wars. Religions of love hate the member people who aren’t members of their religion. Parents give rules that they don’t follow themselves. You know a parent will tell a child only say something you know only speak when you have something nice to say and that in itself is not a nice thing to say. Bosses will tell employees that you got to work hard to move up the company even when that boss used their connections to move up the company rather than working hard. People are constantly hypocritical with their advice. This isn’t a bad thing. It’s just something to be aware of. Everyone’s trying to control each other. But that’s the thing you got to understand. When anybody opens their mouth and speaks to you, even as I’m doing right now, they they do so for their own benefit, not for yours. And that’s okay. Cuz sometimes what’s in their benefit is also in your best interest. Sometimes people will give you advice to control you, but that’s good [ __ ] advice. It’s worth following. But understand that’s not why they’re doing it. If you always assume that someone’s giving you feedback, criticism, complaints, even for your benefit, you’re making the wrong assumption. It’s never for you. It’s for them. Now, you might be able to get something from it. But always start with the assumption, they’re telling me this to control me. They don’t even know they’re doing it. In fact, they have a story in their head saying, “Hey, I’m helping him.” What they’re really doing is helping themselves. What I recommend is never give advice or take it without two things. One, carefully making sure that permission was obtained. Before you give advice, ask the person, “Do you want my advice?” If they say no, then shut up. Don’t go any further. If you go any further, when someone hasn’t asked for advice or you haven’t gotten permission for it, then you know it’s definitely not for them. You’re doing it for yourself. They haven’t asked. they don’t want it, right? Make sure you know that they want it. And also try your best to match how they want it. You know, what kind of feedback would help you right now? What do you want to know more about from my perspective? Understand you’re just sharing an opinion, not helpful information, just an opinion. And the second thing is critical skepticism. If someone gives me feedback, gives me advice, give me support, I shouldn’t just go, “Wow, I look up to this person, so this must be true.” Go, wait, let’s imagine I don’t trust this person. What would I do with this information to check it out? How would I test it? How would I balance against other things that I’ve heard? How would I look at the counterargument to doublech checkck it? Even if I’m an atheist looking at a science website, I’m still going to look at that article that says this is how men are and this is how women are or whatever and say, “Okay, let’s have a look at the citations. Let’s have a look at the peer review. Let’s see what the basis of this argument is. Is this person even this is on a website, it’s still done by a scientist who’s just a person. It doesn’t mean, you know, that they’re unbiased. In fact, it means that they are biased. I need to check for that every single time. Even when my mentor, my own coach gives me advice, I still have to think, well, that’s coming from him for his own benefit, I need to make sure it’s also for mine before I act on it. So whether you’re giving or taking skepticis uh giving or taking advice, always be skeptical. You know, when I’m telling people what to do, which is, you know, a huge part of my job, I’m constantly questioning myself like, should I be telling them this? Is this in their best interest? Why am I telling them this? Do I actually know that this will help them or I just hope it will make me feel better? I constantly am skeptical about my own advice cuz I know that as a human I cannot be trusted to be altruistic. It’s not possible. Now, on the other hand, don’t go too far with this where you’re like, I’m not listening to anyone ever because that’s assuming that you’ve got all the answers. Also incorrect. It’s that old saying, just take it all with a grain of salt. No matter where you hear it from, whether it’s an enemy or an ally, take it with the same kind of response. Okay? Did they get my permission? Yes or no. If not, ignore it. Seriously, if anyone gives you unsolicited advice, feedback, criticism, complaints, whatever, you can feel safe to ignore it cuz it’s definitely not for you. If someone got my permission or I went there and gave my permission, like I go to someone else’s website to read what they said, then the next question is skepticism. Okay, if this is not true, what would I need to look for to prove that? What would disprove this rather than prove it? And if I can’t find much that disproves it and all I can find stuff that supports it, it’s probably good advice. But if I find a lot that argues against it and I’m sort of more leaning towards that, then maybe I discard this one. So that was the point. There go the sirens. All I really wanted to share with you here is a lot of people are going to tell you how to live your life, what you should and shouldn’t do, and most of them are just hypocrites. In fact, all of them are. We all are. We all are. So, don’t assume that they know what they’re talking about. Just assume they’re trying to control you and decide for yourself whether or not that’s in your best interest. Cheers.