1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday

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Welcome to Feedback Friday.

I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger.

As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, my co-pilot, on this flight where you never pay extra for bringing your baggage, Gabriel Mizrahi.

Everybody gets to bring their baggage on this flight, and there's no wait limit.

No.

Now that Southwest just got rid of free bags, we're really your only option, whether you like it or not.

How's that?

Feedback Air.

That's what we're called.

Man, imagine if we started an airline passenger is just encouraged to share their drama with one another.

The flight attendants give you advice by the lavatory.

No peanuts.

Somebody might be allergic.

Economy classes basically are subreddit.

That's right.

That's right.

On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people, and we turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.

And our mission here on the show is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker.

During the week, we have long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, Russian spies, chess grandmasters, money laundering experts gold smugglers this week we had randy blithe lead singer of the heavy metal band lamb of god really cool guy he's the author of a new memoir just beyond the light we talked about mental health addiction crazy rock star stories he actually spent time in a check prison castle for murder super interesting conversation with a guy who's seen and done a lot we also had wendell potter editor-in-chief of healthcare uncovered Wendell was a marketing executive at a health insurance company.

He saw a lot of shady stuff and he ended up becoming a whistleblower.

And we dive into how these companies make money by actually not covering life-saving treatments.

It's a truly fascinating and horrific look inside the American healthcare system.

We also did a skeptical Sunday last Sunday on slavery, how it still very much exists and is actually more prevalent than ever, which is both incredibly depressing and wild and something I wasn't even sure that I was going to believe until I saw the numbers.

On Fridays, though, we take listener letters, offer advice, play obnoxious soundbites, and rehash our own bizarre stories.

Speaking of which, you just got back from China.

That's right.

China!

And Taiwan.

Antaiwan.

You don't have that sound close now, do you?

And Taiwan.

Taiwan.

Jace, tell people what timestamp they can go to if they don't care about my trip to China.

Sure thing, Jordan.

If at any point you'd like to skip this next section, you can jump to the first question around 21 minutes and 30 seconds.

It all depends if you heard an advert at the top of the show or not.

If you skip to somewhere around there, you should be able to find it.

Enjoy the show.

How's a jet lag?

You look okay?

No, I'm not okay.

First of all, the jet lag is brutal.

And I use fly kit, and you can use our code JordanHarbinger.

It's an amazing product that limits your jet lag.

What doesn't limit my jet lag or doesn't allow me to do fly kit like you're supposed to actually do is having two young kids, having two young children.

Because what happens is they're like, I'm not tired.

And I'm like, I know you're not lying about not being tired because even though it's 10 p.m.

here and you were supposed to be in bed hours ago, it's 9 o'clock in the morning or whatever in the other place.

So we force them to go to bed.

They can't go to bed till really late.

They're rolling around.

They don't want to go to sleep.

Then they get up at 1, 2, 3, 4 a.m.

and they're like, I'm hungry.

Normally when your kid wakes up and goes, I'm hungry.

You're just like, yeah, you just don't want to go to sleep.

No, you're starving because you barely ate dinner because it was a weird time in the old time zone.

And now you're starving because you missed lunch and now it's dinner time in the other time zone.

So it's really been hard.

So I've been up from 1 a.m.

to 4 a.m., you know, sleep a little bit before that, sleep a little bit after that.

So my aura ring is like, are you trying to kill yourself or what?

That's basically what's happening.

I'm just glad you got back safe.

I'm not going to lie.

When you told me you were going, I was a little bit worried because you've been talking about how you've done all these episodes about the CCP.

So I can't go back to China.

And then you were going to go back to China.

I was like, are you sure that's a good idea?

So I didn't want to go.

And my family was like, we want to go to China.

We want to go to China.

We want to go to China.

This is like my in-laws, parents, everything.

And I was like, I don't think it's safe for me.

My mother-in-law does a lot of business in China.

And I was like, you need to check and see if I'm going to get arrested at the airport.

Now, if they really want you, they're going to not say anything, but I'm not that important.

My whole personality in business is not just like saying bad things about China or the CCP.

But I've definitely covered China in a negative light for sure.

I've also covered that in a positive light.

But yeah, I was worried about that.

And she was like, all right, we asked, and I can't get into detail, but basically, we wanted to make sure I'm not on any lists and I'm not on any lists.

So the other thing that if you don't know people in China and you want to make sure that you're going to be safe when you go there, safe-ish, there's always a risk with authoritarian regimes.

But I had to reapply for my visa, which was also a point of issue because I had my original 10-year visa from 10 years ago where I was probably not talking about anything having to do with China.

I got it really easy.

This one.

I had to tell them, hey, I'm a journalist, podcaster, whatever.

I've covered China.

And the agent who was handling this for us was like, if they approve your visa, you're fine because we're going to disclose this.

If they find something that's a problem, they just won't let you in.

They're just going to not give you a visa.

You're taking their word for it, but if that's true, then that's a bit reassuring.

Right.

I guess.

And so I really was like, okay, it's not like my whole career is anti-China journalism or something like that.

It's hard to argue with a balanced view of China.

And also, frankly, My problem is not with the whole nation of China.

My problem is with the Chinese Communist Party and some of its policies, not even all of its policies, honestly.

So I'm not exactly a force telling people to never go to or do business with China.

Do I think people should do certain things or not buy certain things?

Yeah.

And I say that, but just I'm not doing enough damage.

I just don't think that they care.

So sounds like it was a good trip, but you haven't told me much about it.

Was it dope?

Yeah.

Look, Taiwan was great.

Taiwan is basically clean, China in many ways.

It's cleaner, safer.

I really like Taiwan.

The food there is great.

I had a blast.

China itself, this is going to sound so stupid and cliche.

There's so many people.

No.

There's a lot of people in China.

Wide open spaces.

Wide open spaces.

So I was in Shanghai, Hangzhou, and Suzhou, and some other smaller cities as well.

By the way, a tier two or tier three city in China is the size of New York.

Yeah, I bet.

And a big tier one city like Shanghai is like Sao Paulo.

So it's just absolutely massive.

Or it's the size of New York if you count the whole metropolitan area.

It's hard to even wrap your mind around that many people.

So if you go to a touristy area like the Bund, which is like the waterside in Shanghai, there are so many people that you can't barely walk.

And there's military everywhere keeping order, especially on the weekends.

We also went over a holiday, so I'm not sure if there was an increased presence there.

And I remember I was like, I'm just going to use my Chinese and talk to them and ask them questions and stuff.

And I said, is there going to be fireworks?

Is there a special event?

And the guy goes, no, man, it's just Saturday.

And I was like, wow, there's always this many people here.

He goes, yeah, Friday, Saturday, Sunday.

Yep.

He's like, they're here for you.

It just, you couldn't even move.

It was like being at Disneyland.

It was like New Year's Day in Times Square, New York level of crowd.

So a lot of people have talked about how much China has changed in the last few years, especially after a lot of foreigners left and things got a little tighter.

Well, what's interesting is I thought I'm in Shanghai.

I'm in a touristy area.

There's going to be foreigners everywhere.

Jen thought the same thing.

We saw maybe five white people the whole time.

Which tracks, right?

Because a lot of them have left.

They have left.

I even asked, I said, oh, I thought there'd be more foreigners here at the hotel.

And he was like, recently more Chinese tourists, more other tourists from Asia.

And I was like, oh, he didn't say foreigners have left or they've stopped doing business here, but there's tariffs.

And I was like, eh, that was yesterday.

I don't know if that's really going to affect everybody who's here now.

Literally, this happened like yesterday or two days ago.

That was weird.

Stores were really surprised that we were there.

I remember people were like, oh, are you a tourist or do you live here?

And I'm like, no, I'm a tourist.

They're like, oh, okay.

I said, there's not that many white people here.

And they're like, no, not really.

I thought that was interesting because it's Shanghai, man.

This is in Shanghai.

This is not in a tier three, four city.

This is not some place where it's, oh, there's a white person here.

How odd.

I'm in a shopping mall with like an Omega store and an Apple store.

And that anti-foreigner vibe you hear about, did you feel any of that?

No.

Actually, not at all.

But again, I'm not really qualified to opine on whether a foreigner would feel welcome in their neighborhood in China.

I felt totally fine in Hangzhou and Suzhou and Shanghai walking around shopping and doing tourist-y crap as a foreigner.

It's a world of difference from like going to your local lunch place where the guy suddenly is not nice to you anymore because you're white or black or whatever.

I didn't have any sort of experience like that.

And additionally, even if there was anti-foreigner sentiment, I speak Chinese.

So people were like, whoa, a white guy that speaks Chinese.

How come you speak Chinese?

I mean, that was the first thing that they wanted to ask.

So I think even if they were going to be like, oh, I'm so sick of Americans, they're terrible.

That wasn't what we talked about.

They were like, how did you learn Chinese?

Yeah, that changes the whole dynamic.

They probably appreciate it.

It changes the whole dynamic.

Yeah.

And so maybe if I talked to those people and stayed around for a month or two, they'd be like, by the way, we hate America and Americans are crap.

But I didn't get that.

I got, holy crap, how did you learn Chinese?

That's insane.

And what about Taiwanese people's feelings right now?

Have you noticed any change in how scared they are?

Definitely.

Oh, man.

Yeah.

They are worried about the economy because of the terrorists.

They're getting tariffed into oblivion too.

They have noticed business go down pretty much the day after this happened.

They were like, yesterday was abysmal and today is also abysmal.

It could be a coincidence, but we just think people aren't spending.

And I was like, wow, these guys talk about canary and the coal mine.

But what about the big question, like China invading?

Yeah, yeah.

China invading.

People are absolutely worried about this, but they're so used to hearing about it all the time that it's not like they live their life looking up in the sky, worried about the missiles coming in.

It's like South Koreans in North Korea.

So I go to like Korean restaurants around here that are basically only Korean people in them.

And they have a news channel playing on the TV.

And the news channel every single time is footage of South Korea firing missiles and then some crap about North Korea.

They're desensitized.

So you get desensitized, right?

Like this is Xi Jinping.

He said he's going to invade by 2027.

And people are like, that gives me enough time to go to work, come back, go to the mall, hit the gym, and do my laundry.

That's where they're at.

They're not like, oh my God, they're threatening us.

They've been getting threatened since 1949 or whatever.

But it does seem to be coming to a head.

It does.

You can feel the day approaching.

I have no idea when that day is coming, but it could be within their lifetime easily.

Almost certainly.

I mean, the Chinese said that the People's Liberation Army should be ready to take over Taiwan by force by 2027.

Now, Does that mean they're going to invade in 2027?

Not necessarily, but we can see them building invasion equipment on the shore.

So

regardless of whether or not they use it, they're preparing the invasion.

So that's scary.

Yeah.

And it depends on whether the United States is going to blockade them, if there's a result, if we detach significantly from them, how that all plays out.

Yeah, that's totally real.

Man, that reminds me of that letter we took, what was it, like two or three years ago from the, I think it was like an American guy who was married to a Taiwanese woman who said she and her family would not leave if China invaded.

Like they would fight until the end.

Wow.

Yeah, I remember that.

That's kind of scary if you think about it.

It's so intense.

Oh, my wife's family is going to pick up arms and join the insurgency.

They're so proud and so passionate.

They don't want to turn their back on their country.

But it's also like, I don't see that going any other way, but the obvious one.

Do you?

China's going to take it, right?

Yeah, I think so.

If the United States decides that they're going to blockade China somehow by not letting them get petroleum or something like that.

I mean, yeah, but that's a massive escalation.

It's going to be a big deal.

So instead of an actual invasion, it seems like what they're going to to have to do is posture that there's going to be a major invasion, and then it's going to force everybody to the negotiating table.

And I'm not going to get too much into this, but I also get it, right?

I mean, Taiwan is supposed to be like the real China, but it's not.

It's an island off the coast of China.

And the communists aren't going anywhere in China.

And they took over Hong Kong and nobody batted an eye, really.

Bit of a different situation there, but I take your point.

Different.

But yeah.

And then, so the question is, do they destroy the whole island so that Xi Jinping can look strong or do they just negotiate and figure out how to make closer ties?

And okay, over the next 20 years, we're going to slowly integrate into the mainland yada yada and start doing this and retain some autonomy.

I don't know.

Anyway, back to your super fun trip.

Yeah.

Any highlights?

Man, I really enjoyed it and I would go back.

I definitely wanted to see more of China, not just major cities.

I think there's going to be, like we were just talking about, a major conflict with China in the future.

And maybe we won't be able to go back because if we say that we're blockading them or we're cutting them off at the knees at every turn because of this whole thing, they're not going to give Americans visas or it's going to be really hard or it's going to be straight up too dangerous or really just unpleasant there because everybody who sees you is going to throw a rotten tomato at your head.

So I would love to go back soon.

You and I should go if you're down.

I don't know.

We'll see.

It could be.

It takes some work to get me to China these days, but we can talk about it.

Yeah.

We'll get you a fly kit.

And everybody that we met that we hung out with was really cool.

I didn't do anything unusual in China.

It was a lot of walking around and eating and shopping for gifts for people and stuff like that.

But I really thought it was a cleaner and safer feeling China than when you and I went, say, in 2013, was it?

2011, 2013.

Look, that was Beijing where you and I went too, but it felt way more dodgy.

And also, remember last time I visited you in Shanghai because you spent a couple nights there and we witnessed a literal street fight.

Oh, yeah, that's right.

Those two bloody guys in the square.

That's right.

Yeah.

These two shirtless dudes were beating each other's other's ass.

Yeah, I think about that still sometimes.

I do too.

I wonder why.

You didn't speak Chinese back then, so you didn't know what was going on.

No, that was crazy.

That was the only time I've ever seen a full-on MMA-style street brawl in public.

Yes.

Like in real life.

It was pretty dark.

I've worked security, so I've seen crap outside of clubs and bars.

But outside of me working security.

I don't think I've ever seen two people actually beating each other's ass.

And they were bleeding.

It was like fight clubs.

Yes, it was.

And they were shirtless and yelling.

And people were gathered around because everyone else had gathered around.

And again, this is not a country that has a lot of guns.

So it wasn't like someone's going to start spraying.

This was like two middle-aged dudes, too.

And they were going after it.

So it felt a lot cleaner and a lot safer.

And honestly, part of the reason is because when you have an authoritarian police state, a lot of the violent criminals are in prison or dead.

Weigh that however you want.

And I remember one of my tour guides, she said something I'm paraphrasing here.

She said something along the lines of, we don't really have freedom and we can't vote.

America is a free country, but also we don't have gun violence.

We don't have fentanyl.

We don't really want that if that's what freedom means.

Now, the irony is not lost on me.

I might quibble with some of that argument.

The irony is not lost on me that fentanyl precursor chemicals mostly come from China.

Yeah, that's hilarious.

But she thinks they don't have it.

They don't use it there.

They don't use it there.

And it's not true that you don't have drug addicts in violence.

You just have violence with knives, cars, other things like that.

And the other reason is because anybody who says anything on the internet about how they might start a criminal enterprise goes to a re-education camp and you never see them again.

But in her mind, she's like, we might be able to enjoy freedom, but then we also get all these other problems.

So we don't need freedom, is what she's saying.

Yeah, and it's such an interesting, fascinating, really rationalization of totalitarian police state government.

Because I get those arguments, but it's also why you can't then do anything.

Like, I felt like asking her.

So when you were trapped in your apartment during COVID and some people literally starved to death or couldn't get medication, that is also a downside, but you're just not going to to talk about that, huh?

Yes, it's easy to forget about the times when you were welded into your apartment and died.

That sounds like North Korea light.

Yes.

She also said, and my mother-in-law, funnily enough, kind of shared this one.

She goes, we have so many people that if we had democracy, if everybody had a say in how things were run, we would never get anything done.

Oh, wow.

Isn't that funny?

I mean, she's maybe not wrong about that.

Not wrong.

Yeah.

I get it.

Democracy, not to get into a history lesson here, because I'm far from qualified, but original democracy, sort of ancient Greece democracy, that wasn't everybody gets a say.

That was everybody who's educated and lives in a big city and also does this and also does that and these guys that own land, they can have a say.

It wasn't like everybody and their uncle could just vote.

They weren't interested in everyone's opinion.

They were interested in a bunch of opinions that were from people that they had selected.

No, it was just like educated property owners,

men, et cetera.

Yeah.

You have to basically have an Airbnb near the Acropolis or to get that.

You have to see the Acropolis.

Voting sticker.

That's right.

It is an interesting way to look at things.

Maybe when you have 1.3 billion people, which we also don't necessarily believe they have, but let's say they have a billion.

That's a lot of people.

Do you need them to vote?

Do you want them to vote?

It seems to be working for them.

Would I want to be subject to that particular level of government governing?

No, dude.

I wouldn't.

But it's also harder to argue that they should be a democratic, free country.

Yeah, but like India has, doesn't India have a billion people?

Yes.

And they have a democracy.

And yes, it's a mess.

And yes, it's crazy.

And yes, it's inefficient.

and voting takes several days and I don't even understand how they pull it off, but it's possible.

It's possible.

Yeah.

It's just going to be chaotic.

Yeah, but I mean, at the end of the day, it's, do you want toilets or do you want democracy?

It's a false binary, though.

It is a false binary.

That she thinks they only get one or the other is funny, but it does make you wonder, how do these people contort themselves to believe that authoritarianism is what they need?

Look, I live in the Bay Area, so I have a sort of selection bias.

But even the Chinese people here that I know, they're like, America has so many problems.

I'm like, oh, are you going to move back to China?

And they're like, hell no.

I moved my parents over here too.

And I'm like, wait, wait.

You just got done complaining and ranting about how bad it was and you're moving your parents and your uncle over here too and you're never moving back.

And then I remember one older guy was like, you can't even have this conversation in China.

Yeah, truly.

You go to jail if you have this conversation on the internet in China.

So yeah, it's bad here.

We're sitting here screaming about how we hate the president.

You can't do that.

It's illegal to do that in China.

So it's kind of ironic and funny.

There's a lot of Chinese people who will complain about the United States and how terrible it is, but then their dream in life is to move here and bring their family over.

And you hear that a lot.

I just think that's really interesting.

I'm not even trying to throw shade on Chinese people.

I get it.

It's a weird choice, but clearly they're voting with their feet in many ways.

Whether it will stay that way, TBD, I remain fascinated with China.

I really think it's a cool place.

Don't love the government.

If I'm allowed to go back, I'll go back until I'm not.

Hopefully I don't find out that I'm not by going to jail over there.

Also, Taiwan, a listener recognized me in a cafe in Taiwan.

No way.

Yeah.

It was funny because he was the only other person in the cafe too.

Me and Jen sat down in a small cafe.

Nobody was there.

It was like a cafe that was also in a store.

She's like, oh, this is just a convenient location.

And then I'm talking with her and I'm like, I'm going to go to the protein store and get my meathead fixed.

And this guy goes, excuse me, are you Jordan Harbinger?

And I was like, wow.

That is so random.

Very random.

So I sat down and talked to them for like half an hour, 45 minutes.

That's awesome.

Oh, that's so cool.

One other guy in the dang cafe, and he's a show fan.

What the hell are the odds of that?

Is he Taiwanese?

Does he live there?

No, no, it's a white dude from Germany who happens to live in Portugal and was visiting a buddy in Taiwan.

Oh, that's so unexpected.

I know.

That was a good dude.

Really good conversation.

Sure was more fun than just going to the protein store and coming back.

So I'm glad that he stopped me.

So that reminds me, say hi, folks, if you see me.

This is probably

a little bit of a weird thing to assert, but I do see people stare at me in some places for a little bit longer than I think is normal slash polite for people to be looking.

And I always wonder, does that person recognize me and they just don't know whether or not they should say something?

Because otherwise, why are they still looking at me?

Oh, look at this narcissist.

That's what I thought.

Oh, my God.

It's weird, right?

If everyone could see my co-host's face right now.

And I thought that about this guy.

And then it turned out that he knew who I was.

95% of the time, they're probably staring at his face.

But I will say that other times when I'll finally say hi to that person, they'll be like, hey, do you have a podcast?

It happens all the time.

So it started to train me in this weird way where I'm like, if someone looks at you for too long, check and see if there's a booger hanging from your nose.

If no, maybe there's something else going on.

I don't know.

Maybe you have a podcast.

It's happened quite a bit.

So I don't know.

It's got me feeling some kind of way.

The moral of that story, though, is please say hi.

It's like the coolest thing that happens to me in any given week.

I meet someone cool from some other place who listens to the show and I get their story.

Even when I'm in a hurry, I try and talk with people.

And like I said, it usually only happens when I really have to go to the bathroom.

I've told that story many times.

I won't get into it now, but basically the closer I am to shitting my pants, the more likely it is that someone's going to recognize me and want to chat.

That's some sort of like Murphy's Law rule of Jordan Harbinger show fans.

You guys can feel when I urgently have to take a leak.

And you're like, hey, Jordan, I have a couple of questions for you if you don't mind.

And I don't mind.

My back teeth are floating.

That's the only problem.

All right.

Gabe, what is the first thing out of the mailbag?

Hi, Jordan and Gabe.

My friend and I are both in our mid-30s, have worked together in a corporate setting remotely for three years and get along great, supporting each other both in and out of the office.

She's very smart and funny, and she's a terrific mom.

She and her husband have been married for 12 years, each make six figures, and have two kids under 10 years old.

But over the past year, her husband has been pulling away from her.

I don't think he's cheating, but he's been sleeping in the guest room, not communicating, working more, and acting quite depressed, which she says is unlike him.

He's still a fantastic father and partner in all other ways.

She loves him, appreciates him, and is still attracted to him.

But from what I understand, she hasn't really tried to find out what's behind her husband's radical change in behavior.

They tried couples therapy once last year, but she found the therapist to be too woo-woo, so they stopped going, but put off looking for a new one.

She started hanging out in separate areas of the house, focuses solely on the kids, and went so far as to say that if he doesn't get his act together, she's prepared to be a single mom forever and doesn't need a man.

Wow.

I chose not to push her until she was ready to share more and invited her to come visit me for four days in my city of New Orleans.

In preparation, I sent her a bunch of attractions and asked about food or drinks she would like to have at my house.

She seemed completely uninterested in the endless activities my city offers, but did send quite a few snack requests.

And not just types of snack, but flavors and brands that were not at all healthy, but could only be found at Whole Foods.

I found it odd, but wanting her to feel comfortable, I stocked up to the tune of $150.

On the ride home from the airport, I suggested a late lunch and told her about a few restaurants and activities near my house.

Maybe, she replied coolly, and said nothing else.

It was oddly disconcerting, like I had said the wrong thing.

Once at my house, I i showed her where the snacks were and told her to help herself anytime she was completely disinterested and had in fact brought a lot of snacks with her which she stored in my pantry

when i again suggested a late lunch i learned she had also pre-researched the menus of many of the restaurants near my house she determined that they were either not for her or quote didn't offer enough options So she researched more restaurants.

She did not look up from her phone for an hour.

Finally, with some prodding from me, she chose a restaurant a few miles away that offers plenty of options for everyone.

Once there, she poured over the menu, again, for nearly 30 minutes without looking up or talking.

It was extreme.

Then she must have asked the server 20 questions.

What sauces were offered, what substitutions could be made, what the bread options were, etc., then sent him away so she could think some more.

I've never seen anything like it.

She finally ordered two appetizers and an entree, all basic fare, with no alterations or substitutes.

In the first three hours she thought and talked about food more than i do in a month this is why you go to the freaking cheesecake factory right for the 30 page menu there's something for everyone it's just so bizarre i'm secondhand irritated already if you couldn't tell i can see yeah you're getting worked up yeah i'm getting worked up and i'm also trying to put myself in this situation i almost kind of want to see something like this firsthand and then be like okay i don't want to deal with this anymore and leave i've never experienced anything like this i've never heard of anything like this well strap in, buddy boy, because things are about to get weirder.

Let's see where this goes.

Each morning started with two hours of her scouring restaurant menus online.

Then she picked areas of the city to explore based on the food options she had found, none of which she wanted to enjoy once we were nearby.

But she did want to read every single outdoor menu posted, everywhere we walked, crossing many streets to ensure all menus were read.

All places she had no intention of eating at.

Also included were trips into every bakery, ice cream shop, and pizza place in our path.

Again, just to know what they offered.

Every time I asked if she wanted to eat at a particular place, she told me, no, menus are just my thing.

Oh, worst hobby ever.

Menus are just my thing.

What else is this woman into?

Just reading the care instructions on every single item of clothing and

every clothing store.

Knowing whether something needs to be hand-washed, cold, and air-dried.

Kind of my thing.

When I pressed her, she shared that it was nice to finally be able to do her thing

because her husband did not, quote, share this passion with her, unquote.

Oh, I'm so surprised that her husband doesn't share this passion.

This seems like the most annoying thing to deal with on an everyday sort of basis.

My God.

Okay, so there's something going on here.

Clearly.

This is not normal.

This is not a hobby.

This is an obsession.

It's almost like a compulsive behavior.

If this were my guest, I would be going out of my mind.

My friend and I spent at least 70% of our time talking about researching and hunting down food options, but she always picked a very vanilla place and ordered a very vanilla meal.

There was no conversation while eating.

Her sole focus was on the food in front of her.

This happened for three days.

When it came to live music, an airboat, a street tour, a museum, a casino boat, a jazz dinner cruise, even watching a movie at home.

She had really odd excuses for why she didn't want to.

Okay, so this is so extreme.

This isn't even just the menu thing.

This is some kind of OCD

thing, right?

We'll see where we end up.

Same story with retail shops.

She wanted to see every item they offered.

Not to buy, just to know.

Oh, man.

Back at my house, she ate an entire box of breakfast bars she'd asked to have on hand by the end of the second morning.

What do you expect?

She said when I noticed.

She also found a plain frozen pizza in the freezer and seemed unable to leave the house until it was eaten.

Then, the day she left, all of the snacks she'd brought and stored in my pantry were gone.

Not sure if they were eaten or packed.

She finally examined the snacks that I had bought, opening quite a few to taste and then leaving them on the counter as rejects right in front of me.

Oh my god.

Eventually, she took four family-sized bags of unopened snacks I had bought at her request and put them in her carry-on.

She shared that she'd need options to nibble on on the plane, but would also need to find a meal at the airport to bring on the plane, so she wanted to get there early.

Her flight home was two hours long.

Oh my god.

Okay, there's something disordered.

It's official.

This is a disorder.

This woman is fixated on food in a clearly unhealthy way.

And this is actually said.

I'm curious, if you're this fixated on food and you're eating entire boxes of breakfast bars, whole pizzas, that's not somebody who's going to stay at a healthy weight for a very long time.

I still have like half a letter to read here.

So let me just get this again.

Oh my God.

Okay.

Keep going.

Another odd thing.

While she chose all of our activities, I paid for every Uber to and from my house and many in between.

I make good money, so hopefully I don't sound sound petty, but all told, I spent over $325 ubering us to the different food areas she wanted to explore, but not indulge in.

Not once did she offer to pay for a ride, buy me a meal, or even get me a bottle of water.

What the hell, man?

Not cool at all.

So she's staying with you.

She's putting you through all this objectively weird crap.

And then she's not even singing for her supper.

Literally, she's dead silent at the meals, which is so weird.

She is an awful guest.

She didn't even offer to help pay for the rides.

So entitled.

This is bizarre.

Obviously, her husband has grown very sick of this nonsense.

I would have happily spent money on a higher-end restaurant or activity with her, any experience we could have shared, but these expenses didn't sit right with me.

She's incredibly detail-oriented at work, so it seems very unlike her to not realize the literal and figurative costs.

Jordan, that makes me think that she didn't want to offer because offering to help pay for the rides would mean acknowledging how bizarre this behavior was.

Was she just embarrassed?

Maybe.

I almost feel like you're giving her too much credit.

She might not be fully conscious of that shame.

Yes, the shame has to be there on some level, but honestly, she could just be that entitled.

I guess people can be entitled as hell and also detail-oriented at work.

Yeah, it's just hard for me to imagine somebody being that oblivious.

Same, but

while I did my best to be empathetic and forgiving of all this, her behavior really threw me.

I felt like little more than a guest on her visit myself, and I actually felt a little used for my city's many restaurant menus.

As strange as that might sound.

You just came over for the menus.

That isn't strange.

What's strange is using your friend to get your restaurant menu fix and then not even acknowledging it or picking up a lift here and there.

I think if you had some sort of weird compulsive thing, you'd be like, okay, look, I got this weird thing that I do.

I'm going to handle it.

I'm going to drag you along.

It might be a little bit boring.

Let me know when it gets a little bit boring.

And then you just pay for everything and you go, thanks for indulging my weird ass thing that I have to do.

Sorry, I had to go to every model train store in New Orleans.

I'm a weirdo.

Okay, now let's do something fun.

All of that said, I should mention as kindly as possible that my friend is quite overweight.

Far more than I was aware of and more than earlier in her marriage from the photos I've seen.

Okay, as you might have guessed, I had my suspicions, but that tracks.

This person really struggles with food.

And I do feel bad for her a little bit here.

But you can't eat a whole box of breakfast bars or frozen pizza, read every menu, eat everything.

I mean, it's just, that's a pathological issue.

I didn't mention this until now because she completely ignores this fact herself.

Her husband is thin and fit.

I worry that her food obsession could be straining her marriage and almost certainly other relationships in her life.

Yes.

I care about my friend, and she seemed totally oblivious to her food behaviors being very different.

But I've never been overweight and don't know what it does to a person mentally or physically.

Should I suggest to my friend that she has a relationship with food that seems very unhealthy, is radically time-consuming, is impacting others, and is quite possibly fracturing her marriage?

Should I approach the topic of her looking into these new weight loss medications out there?

Or is this none of my business?

Was my friend just letting her hair down on her visit, having no family in tow?

Or is this none of my business?

Signed, weighing all my options when I'm not loving what's on the menu.

Gabe, are you trying to fill my inbox with hate mail?

You do seem a little underutilized these days.

I figured I would just give you something to do.

You just seem like you're at loose ends.

I'm bored these days.

I got nothing.

So the last time we took a question about how to respond to a friend's weight, or I guess it was a person writing in about their colleague's weight, this is two, three years ago.

Man, a few people got really mad at us, dude.

To be fair, though, a lot of people also agreed with us on that one.

Yes, that's true.

This is such a charged topic, and I get it.

Anything to do with weight, appearance, food, it's sensitive.

There's a lot of political correctness that people have, in my opinion, just gotten used to getting, a lot of grace that they've been getting.

We're supposed to walk on eggshells around this kind of thing.

I understand, but I struggle with this because, yes, on one hand, talking to somebody about their weight is one of the hardest topics.

I get it.

There's a lot of pain and shame and history.

around all that stuff.

But on the other hand, being severely overweight, like to the point where it's a medical issue, that is objectively a health risk and it is objectively dangerous.

Yeah.

And in this case, with the whole menu fixation thing ruining the trip and everything else around it, objectively inconsiderate.

Yes.

A lot of objective lease.

Are you really not allowed to tell a friend or close colleague, hey, I care about you and I'm worried?

I'm not saying it's an easy conversation.

I'm not saying people shouldn't be thoughtful, but the emails I got last time were basically along the lines of, I'm never listening to the show again because you should never tell people they're overweight.

It's hateful.

You're fat shaming.

You're a terrible person.

You're cruel.

You should be ashamed of yourself.

This is their business and no one else's.

I agree.

It's ultimately their business, but that doesn't mean that they couldn't benefit from somebody who actually cares about them saying, hey, I'm concerned about you and here's why.

How are you doing?

How can I support you?

Delivered the right way from a place of genuine concern.

I just cannot see that as anything but an act of love.

Tough love, maybe, but it's love.

This is not your mother shaming you in front of all your friends and saying you look fat in your prom dress and no one's ever going to love you.

This is a close friend saying, hey, man, how's everything going?

If I can give a personal example, my buddy, this is 15 years ago, I was in New York and he goes, oh, you look like you lost weight.

And I go, yeah, was I big before?

And he's like, yeah, you were.

You look great now.

And wondered if this is a conscious choice.

Not really.

I just stopped eating a lot of takeout.

And he goes, I got to tell you, you're a good looking dude.

You look even better now.

He did that.

And he had the opportunity to do that because I was a little bit lighter.

And I never forgot that.

And it was one of the reasons why I paid attention to my weight from then on.

What was it like for you to hear that?

It was fantastic because what I realized was, oh, I should pay attention to this.

Cause I honestly hadn't really noticed.

Another guy that same week who I worked with had said, you know, that you'd probably get more girls if you lost a couple of pounds.

You should work out with me.

And he said it in a kinder way than that.

But I was like, oh, yeah, you're probably right.

And

I realized that they only told me that because they actually cared.

They weren't being jerks about that.

These guys knew me so well that they knew that they could say that and I wasn't going to be like, screw you, you jerks, and cry in my room.

Was there any part of you that was hurt or wished they'd never said that?

Yeah.

Honest to God, no.

It was straight.

I'm willing to hear this.

Yeah.

But look, maybe I'm the exception to some rule here where I don't get offended if somebody tells me something that I need to hear.

Look, I don't want to hear somebody go, Hey, you jerk.

You look like an idiot because you're wearing these stupid clothes that make you look like a fat lop of crap.

You You don't have to be mean about it.

That would make me angry and sad.

If you're not getting away with some kind of behavior, overeating or being rude to people or being late all the time, look, if you're late all the time and a friend goes, hey, Gabriel, When you're late and everybody has to wait for you, it makes us resent inviting you.

And we don't want to do that, man, because we love you and we love when you're there.

We just need you to be there when everybody else is there so we don't miss our dinner reservations because we love you, man.

We want to include you.

We don't want to think about whether or not we can or should include you because we don't know if you're going to show up on time.

I mean, that's a nice way to put it.

Yeah.

This is the same thing.

It makes the medicine go down just fine.

It's the same thing, only there's less shame around somebody who's late all the time than there is about somebody who's maybe overeating.

But why is that the case?

It's an interesting question whether it's more hurtful to talk to someone about something like this or to not talk to them about it.

Exactly.

Which one is really serving them, though?

Yeah.

The thing is, this topic, for for some people is a minefield.

It is.

I agree.

I mean, we're dancing in that minefield right now.

People have already got their emails ready to yell at us one way or the other.

It's so different for every person, too.

It's not as simple as, listen, I love you, but you're unhealthy or you need better habits.

Let me help you.

When this kind of disordered eating, and I agree with you, Jordan, I think that there is something disordered going on here, perhaps combined with a kind of obsession.

My understanding is that it's always a manifestation of something else.

There's something internal going on here that is probably pretty complicated.

Yeah, clearly.

And we don't quite know what that is.

Although what's happening with her husband is almost surely a part of it.

Or maybe that's another symptom of it.

But yeah, this friend is clearly in some kind of distress.

And this food obsession, the menu hunting hobby, if we can even call it that, maybe it's playing a role in keeping her together somehow.

Or staving something up.

Yeah, numbing, basically, kind of like all addictions.

Although that detail about needing a snack on the plane home, making sure there was plenty of food in the house to begin with, that makes me wonder if she's afraid she'll find herself in a situation without food at all.

Is that the deeper problem?

Is it some kind of food insecurity?

Did she go through some kind of deprivation as a kid that's now getting triggered again?

It's so bizarre.

I wish we could talk to her and find out because there's got to be so much going on with her, but we can't.

I am just trying to imagine every possible reason somebody would behave like this because it's so unusual and so extreme.

And I've never heard of anything like it.

But yeah, we can't know.

What I do know is this.

This woman is a colleague and a friend.

It sounds like maybe less of a friend after this trip.

She's not your bestie, okay?

She's not your homie since high school.

She's not a family member.

So I'm really not sure that you have any sort of strong obligation to talk to her about this.

And because you guys aren't super tight, I'm not sure how much she'd even let you in and listen.

Does that mean you can't say something?

No, you totally can.

Who knows?

Maybe she would love to talk about it, be open to talking about it at least.

I just don't know if you're close enough where you are obliged to walk into this same minefield to help this person address this weird thing.

So I hear that and I agree.

If she chose not to bring this up, I would understand completely.

But I also think that there might be some decent reasons for her to consider trying in the right way.

Tell me.

And thank God because I don't want to be the only one getting hate mailed this time.

You guys can reach Gabriel at Friday at jordanharbinger.com.

Just to set up a new inbox just for this, really.

Yeah.

Okay, look, they spent this trip together.

They have a strong working relationship.

Our friend here seems to really appreciate this woman.

She's smart.

She's funny.

She's a great mom.

She's apparently super on top of things at work.

And now she's seen another aspect of her friend in this more intimate IRL setting.

And she's worried.

I think she might be allowed to say, listen, I'm really glad we had this time together.

I was excited to hang out with you.

There's something I want to share with you.

I've been going back and forth about whether to do it because honestly, I'm a little confused about it.

I'm not sure it's my place.

I don't know how it's going to land with you, but I've also asked myself what it means to be a good friend to somebody.

And so I'm going to take a chance as your friend, as someone who cares about you, and tell you that some of what I saw during our time together concerned me.

Specifically, the fact that so much of the trip focused on looking at restaurant menus and thinking about food.

Now, look, I'm not here to judge what's fun for you.

I know you want to do this at home.

You don't get to do that.

I'm actually glad you felt comfortable doing it with me.

If that's why you wanted to come to New Orleans, cool.

What made me a little sad though, and honestly concerned me, is I feel like this menu hunting thing got in the way of our time together.

It made the focus of the trip these restaurants and getting to these restaurants and talking about these restaurants and that left very little time or space, sometimes no time or space for you and me to really spend quality time together.

And I think it made it hard for you to fully experience my city.

It took over the whole trip.

So I can't help but notice that restaurants and menus are really important to you.

And I guess I just want to see if You can help me understand why.

And what was the trip like for you?

I'm curious.

Something like that.

And go from there and see if she engages with you.

I don't think you're doing anything too controversial by starting out that way.

And if it leads to her opening up about the deeper stuff that might be going on eventually, you might be glad you did it.

She might not have anyone else to talk to about this.

So that's kind of where my head is.

What are you thinking, Jordan?

Does that land at all?

No, I like it, Gabe.

Although I think it's equally likely that she'll dodge the question or shut down.

But yeah, maybe that's a way to test the waters.

I just, I can't help but notice, though, there are two things you did not touch on on that script, which are her friend's weight and the whole thing about her sticking her with the Uber bills.

Okay, so I wouldn't go directly at either of those from the start because her friend's weight, to your point, I think there's probably some shame around that, perhaps quite a bit of shame.

It's probably related to deeper stuff that our friend here does not even know about.

And I think if she comes right out and says, hey, I'm concerned about your weight.

That's a risky approach.

I think that's like hitting the shame button really quickly and she might shut down immediately.

Good point.

I also don't think she needs to go right at that particular issue if the weight is ultimately a symptom of something deeper.

The Uber thing, her friend's general unthoughtfulness and the fact that she didn't seem very interested in her friend's experience, that she left her feeling used, that is also fair to bring up.

I just don't know if it's the most productive thing to bring up from the very beginning.

Because it makes the conversation about money or manners rather than, hey, I'm worried about you kind of thing.

Exactly.

But in a way, she is touching on that by saying, hey, this menu reading thing got in the way of our time together that's a gentler way of saying you were so obsessed with studying menus that you missed us and by extension me yes yes if her friend has any self-awareness i would hope she would go oh wow i didn't realize it overshadowed the whole trip i'm sorry about that and then they can talk if this conversation does go well she can work her way towards that i guess hey I guess I want to help you see that when you did XYZ things, it left me thinking this, it left me wondering that, and it left me feeling a little used, which I doubt you intended, but that's how it landed.

Although, now that I'm saying that out loud, I don't know.

I'm not loving it because it does sound kind of petty.

And the point is, her friend is a serious problem and it's impacting their friendship and possibly all of her relationships, including and especially her marriage.

But I think you're on to something because it is a fair response to what went down.

Whether this friend consciously intended to use her or not, she did use her.

It's complicated because can you use somebody if you didn't intend to do it?

I don't know, whatever.

But I don't think it's the worst thing in the world to work up to saying, our trip left me with some difficult feelings and that really bunned me out.

Difficult feelings.

I like that.

That's another invitation for a friend to be like, okay, what kind of difficult feelings?

Yeah.

And if she doesn't, then that would be a sign that this woman probably can't empathize with you or engage in this conversation.

And at that point, I would probably say to myself, okay, I'm probably not going to get anywhere time to pull back.

This person needs to figure this out in her own way on her own timeline.

I'm not the person she wants to hear this from.

And then it's up to you to work through this stuff on your own.

Because look, if our friend here is being vulnerable by saying, hey, this really worried me, this didn't sit right with me.

I'm willing to wade into this awkwardness to resolve it.

And her guest is like, ah, yeah, I don't know what to tell you.

Menu's just my thing.

Sorry if that wasn't fun for you.

Nothing over here for me to talk about.

Then I don't think that this deeper conversation is even possible.

And there's just nothing our friend here can say to make her want to go there.

That's exactly right.

So I think what we're saying is you're allowed to not bring this up because in a way it's not your business.

At the same time, she made it your business by accepting your invitation to visit and impacting you with her behavior.

In addition to the fact that you are friends and so you do genuinely care about her.

So my feeling is you could bring it up with her, but I would not jump straight to suggesting that she has an unhealthy relationship with food or I would definitely not suggest that her weight is possibly fracturing her marriage because A,

like we said, very sensitive.

And B, you don't know actually what's happening in her marriage.

There might be so many things going on.

So it's a little presumptuous to just say, I think it's because of this one thing that I'm seeing.

And I definitely would not jump to recommending that she go on Ozempic or whatever.

Yeah.

All of those topics are way down the line and they are up to her.

I think she's going to have to do the work to figure out what role this food thing and this menu thing is playing in her life and how it's echoing in her other relationships.

Your mission, if you choose to accept it, is to just open the door as a friend and see if she wants to walk through it.

Exactly.

And if she does, it's into a room with another door and then another door and another door.

This might be several conversations.

It's a labyrinth is what we're saying.

Yes, it is.

A lot of doors until she finds herself in a room called food and she's willing to walk around in it with you.

But honestly, my feeling is that might not be a room you can or need to walk into with her.

That's a room she needs to walk into on her own or with a therapist or whatever.

But Gabe, you touched on something interesting.

It's actually one of the things that I really struggle with when people write us going, how dare you encourage people to talk to somebody about their relationship with food?

That's none of your business.

When is something actually your business?

Look, if you work with somebody who's unhealthy, you're not super close to them.

You go up to them in the break room and you're like, hey, you're overweight.

Put down that crispy cream and hit a Pilates class.

That is obviously overstepping.

It's rude.

It's hurtful.

It's not going to work.

But if you invite a colleague to visit you, they stay in your home.

They request a bunch of special snacks that are expensive.

They make the whole trip about them and what they want to do and they don't check in and see if you're having a good time at all and make sure they're not overstaying their welcome or taking advantage of you.

If they're a crappy guest, basically, and co-opting you into their objectively, again, bizarre interests, then it is your business, right?

I mean, you are being impacted.

If this woman were staying at a hotel or she paid for these menu outings because she knew they were for her, she was like, hey, I'm going to go out for a few hours, do my menu thing.

Let's link up in the afternoon and do that boat tour.

That would be different.

But the reason our friend here was left with these difficult feelings is that her friend involved her in her compulsive weirdo behavior and subjected her to some objectively uncool things.

Isn't she somewhat warranted in bringing it up?

She's not looking for drama.

She's not going out of her way to make this woman feel bad.

This happened in her home, in her city on a trip that she planned.

I guess what I want to appreciate is sometimes a difficult conversation.

It is your business just by virtue of the fact that you're a human being in a relationship with another human being.

I think it's a very fair point.

I also think that this particular conversation, like we keep saying, is very complicated.

And so it does require more sensitivity and more care than one that is, hey, you were rude and I want to talk about it.

But to your point, Jordan, if it's her business to bring it up because it impacted her, then her best bet might be to speak mostly to her own experience.

I'm worried about you.

I was left with some tough feelings.

I couldn't help but notice that, whatever, the food took over the whole trip.

The snacks were a big deal.

We didn't speak for 45 minutes at the restaurant when that was quality time that we were supposed to have.

That's different from, you have a problem.

You need to lose weight.

You're rude.

You're inconsiderate.

This is why your husband is pulling away, whatever it is.

That approach might put our friend here on more solid ground, too, because she and her colleague might disagree about whether this is a problem or whether it's something she needs to tackle.

But this woman cannot argue with our friend here's feelings, with her experience.

And then her friend has an opportunity to go, huh?

If I'm leaving this person with those thoughts and feelings, is there something for me to look at here?

Instead of feeling like she's being lectured to, yeah, okay, I think that's the right approach.

So it's the approach that I would probably take if I could work up the courage to have this conversation.

I'm not saying it's going to be easy, but I also think you should probably keep your expectations low.

And I'm saying this in part because you said something in the very beginning of your letter that I'm just realizing was very interesting, which is she and her husband started therapy and then they stopped because she said, what did she say?

The therapist was woo-woo, but then they never looked for another therapist.

So maybe this therapist was bullshit and they were like, this is not the person for us.

But the fact that they haven't found a new one and they are having marital problems and there's a lot for both of them to talk about here kind of makes me wonder if this friend might not really want to get into this stuff.

Not sticking with therapy might be one way to sidestep some important and difficult work on her part.

Definitely.

So if that's any indication of how willing she is to talk about this stuff, just keep that in mind and just know that you might not get the result you want, but that doesn't mean it's not worth trying.

But look, the way your friend behaved, it was objectively challenging and worrisome, even if she didn't intend to be difficult.

And I am sorry that you didn't get the trip you hoped for.

That sucks.

And I do think that on some levels, she's got to know that, right?

Even if she can't acknowledge it.

But she's also given you something potentially greater here, which is an opportunity to consider whether you want to lean into a difficult conversation and build that muscle, or whether you want to redefine your relationship with her and pull back.

Both are fair choices.

Both lead to some growth on your part.

But whatever you do, remember that your friend is probably going through something pretty intense, however difficult this was for you.

I can almost guarantee it's 10 times harder for her.

So make sure you approach her with empathy, kindness, patience, curiosity, and you can't go wrong.

Good luck.

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Now, back to Feedback Friday.

Okay, next up.

Hi, Jordan and Gabe.

I've been doing Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and Wai Tai since 2018 under the same coach.

Last year, I got a new job that requires over 50% out-of-state travel, which made training consistently unrealistic.

I told the coaches I was happy to keep paying my $139 monthly dues, even when traveling, to help them pay the bills and and eventually upgrade to a larger facility.

Then, late last year, I bought my first house.

After redoing my budget, I decided training wasn't a worthwhile expense and asked to cancel my membership.

I texted the head coach on November 25th, asking to cancel my membership, which was due in three days.

He said yes, he could cancel, but there's a 10-day cancellation window, so I would be billed for the following month.

He also said that I'm paying a grandfathered rate that I would lose if I left and then returned, and that the new price would either be $159 or $179 a month.

So I said, never mind, don't cancel it.

I'll be on a project in town in three months and can train again.

And I moved on.

Weeks later, I caught up with another team member who said they had paused their membership and never heard of a cancellation window.

I then remembered that I had paused before due to an injury and never been told I still needed to pay.

Huh, that is sus.

Fast forward to March of this year.

I'm renovating my bathroom, buying a new garage door, stuff like that, and I hadn't been to the gym once in 2025.

On March 20th, I asked the coach again to cancel.

Again, he told me that there was a 10-day window and I would have to pay for the following month.

I said, okay, but then I went to the bank, canceled my debit card, and got a new one.

I know this was shady on my end, but I was ready to pay him if necessary, and I'm kind of scared of this guy.

He's the type who loves a random fistfight and often talks about how he stays strapped.

And he sounds a lot like like Jaden.

My son, my five-year-old.

What do you say when he's...

I'm going to go get my gun.

And I was like, why?

To protect myself.

Protect myself?

Ridiculous.

And often talks about how he stays strapped and isn't afraid to use his gun.

I'm guessing he does not have a nerf.

Something

slightly more lethal.

I was hoping he wouldn't notice I didn't pay, but he noticed and he was pissed.

He messaged me first thing in the morning about a week later saying my payment didn't go through.

I told him, nope, it didn't because I canceled the payment and I wanted to see the contract before I paid.

In short, he sent someone else's membership agreement and it had a 30-day cancellation window, not a 10-day window.

It also had a cancellation fee of $79 that people could opt to pay instead.

I asked to pay that fee.

He said the $79 is actually on top of the next month's payment as well.

I said that's not true.

Repeatedly asked for my signed membership agreement.

He then called me asking to talk and got upset that I didn't answer.

I wanted this in writing.

He sent multiple voice messages saying he was disappointed in me, I'm burning bridges, I'm not a team player, and asking me why I lost my respect.

He was deleting some of the more aggressive messages along the way too.

Oh my god, this guy's crazy.

He's a loose canon.

You're out of control when you're spewing rage in the text thread and then you got to delete the message.

This guy's a kooky loser weirdo and you want to stay away from people like this.

Finally, he sent me my contract.

There was, in fact, no cancellation window.

I pointed this out and he said that I had verbally agreed to the new contract, which is a total lie and also not how contracts work.

Then he sent me screenshots of him telling three other students they had to pay for a month following their departure.

How much you want to bet those screenshots are completely made up of numbers that don't exist.

I'm now officially banned from the gym.

He's saying I owe a balance of $139, but he won't send me to collections.

Yeah, good.

I'm pretty upset with this treatment after all these years on the team, and now I'm aware that others have been scammed too.

I was looking into filing a complaint with the FTC or posting the screenshots on social media so that he can't keep getting away with this, but I'm scared of the blowback.

If he weren't such an a-hole, I would probably let it go, but his bullying, lying, and manipulation really irked me.

I don't think he can get deported to Brazil anymore since he's a citizen.

I don't know.

Apparently, citizens can get deported to El Salvador, so, you know.

Three weeks ago, you might have been right.

I don't know what's going on now.

100%.

Do I have any legal options here?

Any other ideas?

Signed, putting this financial yoke in a collar choke without trying to provoke a dodgy bloke.

Well, this sucks.

You are not crazy for being angry about this.

You were a loyal student for years.

You did a nice thing by continuing to pay even when you weren't training.

And when you tried to leave, which you're obviously allowed to do, this dude manipulates and rages at you.

Your martial arts coach, no less, which on top of being gross and uncomfortable is a huge violation of trust.

So first of all, you did nothing wrong here.

You're totally on solid ground.

Contracts generally have to be in writing to be enforceable.

It's not always true, but that's especially true when it comes to specific terms like fees, cancellation windows, things like that.

The fact that your contract doesn't mention a cancellation window, that he tried to retroactively impose one based on nothing, I mean, he just made that up.

That tells me that he doesn't have any real claim here.

And that's probably why he's not sending you to collections or dragging you to small claims court.

And the amount, by the way, is so small, it's not even worth it.

So if you walked away now, you'd almost certainly be totally fine.

Nothing is ever going to come of this.

But just to be safe, I would definitely keep all those screenshots, copies of all your messages, just in case you need to defend yourself down the line or warn other people.

Now, about reporting him, filing a complaint with the FTC is fine and it might make you feel like you did something.

I would not get my hopes up for that.

In all likelihood, the FTC is not going to act on a single complaint about a local gym for such a small amount.

But since you think he's been scamming other students for a while now, and if you can get proof of that, maybe get them to submit complaints to, you could also file a complaint with your state's attorney general's office or your local Department of Consumer Affairs.

Those agencies do investigate, especially if they get multiple complaints.

Another option, although I'm not a big fan of it in this case, but it is an option, is to leave negative reviews of the dojo on Google, Yelp, Facebook.

This way you can warn other potential students without putting yourself at legal risk as long as you stick to facts and you don't veer into opinions that could be construed construed as defamatory.

For example, if you say, hey, this gym's cancellation policies were not clearly disclosed, I was pressured to pay fees not stated in my signed agreement, that's fair game.

If you say, this guy's a criminal, even if you show some proof of that, it gets a little dicey.

And if you post, I would do it anonymously and carefully.

I would not do a whole Twitter thread with your real name about this, just sidestep all that drama.

Although he'll probably figure out that it was you on Yelp, unless he's scamming so many people and has made so many enemies that he can't tell who's doing what.

Honestly, it sounds like this guy's probably in the scamming business at this point, essentially.

For most people, he's just charging them whatever he wants to and they're paying because they feel like they don't have a choice.

My trick for this, by the way, is to wait like 60, 90 days because they've scammed so many people in the meantime and they've probably forgotten about you.

But doing it the same week that you had a blow up with him, yeah, he's going to know it's you.

The other benefit to waiting is that your emotions are so much calmer when you wait a little while.

So the reviews can be way more incisive, scathing, and fact-based instead of whiny and ranty and sounding like you're venting because you feel like it was unfair.

People tend to take those reviews much more seriously.

But listen, given what you know about this guy, this is a situation where you probably just want to quietly leave and stay away.

Your fears are valid and well-founded.

This dude is unstable.

He sounds like a kooky, total loser of a guy.

You don't want to set somebody like this off, somebody with nothing to lose who's bragging about how they're armed and can't wait to fight.

I mean, over 140 bucks, whatever.

You're in a decent position.

You owe him very little, probably nothing from a legal standpoint.

He's not coming after you.

You're free of what I have to imagine is a toxic gym.

The people who stay in a situation like this are probably not cool, well-adjusted, or fun to be with.

You've got a new house that you own.

I would not give this a-hole any more of your time, money, or emotional energy.

He is just a total loser.

What I would do, though, is take these lessons into the rest of your life.

The biggest thing you've learned here is how to stand up for yourself in situations like this, how to protect yourself.

Most people, I'm sure, they back down with this guy because he's scary, he's intimidating.

That's he's a bully, which is why he gets what he wants and feels like he can get away with it.

You had the cojones to say, nah, this is not right.

Show me the contract and called his bluff.

And you stood your ground when he tried to manipulate you into paying more and more money.

Being willing to do that when it's necessary, it's kind of a superpower.

I also wonder if some of this might have been avoided if you had done that even more and earlier on.

You agreed to keep paying when you were out of town.

You capitulated when he said that you would have to pay a higher rate if you rejoin later.

You dodged his calls.

And then when things really came to a head, instead of just saying, hey, I'm leaving the gym.

Thank you for everything you've done for me, but it's time for us to part ways, you canceled your debit card and waited for him to figure it out.

Now, look, I know you had some good reasons for that.

I would not want to put myself in a risky situation with a lunatic either.

But when I hold all of these facts together, it does paint a picture of some avoidance on your part.

Very understandable avoidance, but it is avoidance nonetheless.

And I do wonder if that is partly how you ended up here.

And given that he's not sending you to collections now, I do wonder if being a little stronger with him early on would have nipped this in the bud, maybe not resulted in you getting pistol whipped in a parking lot or whatever.

It's possible this guy is just more bark than the bite.

Yeah, it's just a quality to keep an eye on because it's an interesting part of the story.

Maybe you made the right call in this case, but going with the path of least resistance, capitulating to keep things on an even keel, yeah, that often ends up empowering bullies and failing to protect you.

Agreed.

This one is a little ambiguous given what a loose cannon his coach is.

But also, this whole situation does seem to be revealing an interesting quality for him to look at, which is ultimately helpful.

So sorry this happened to you, bud.

It sucks.

I feel like everybody has a bad martial arts teacher story.

I know I do.

What about you, Gabrielle?

I do too.

Yeah.

We should talk about that one day.

It is interesting.

Yeah.

Look, it's relatively low stakes.

The real headline is, you got out.

That's the win.

All right.

What's next?

Hey, guys.

Our son, Brian, has been challenging since he was two years old, locking us out of the house, throwing constant temper tantrums, getting up in the middle of the night and climbing on the counter to reach glasses on the top shelf, and playing with the blender.

At four years old, he began climbing 20 feet up a tree.

He would not sit still, and we constantly worried for his safety.

Brian also had a temper, knocking games over, throwing the remote if he lost.

At seven, his sisters were scared of him.

They locked themselves in the bedroom once, and he kicked a a hole in the door.

He'd hold them down and apply pressure points on their body.

Jeez.

At 17, Brian became violent with me, his mother, leaving bruises on my upper body.

Jeez, this is a tough kid to have.

Sorry to hear all this, man.

Jeez.

To the outside world, Brian is a model citizen.

He excelled in school and Eagle Scouts, became a chemical engineer, is amazing at his job.

He volunteers, plays sports and instruments.

He married a very quiet, unusual woman, had four children in in eight years, and is a quote-unquote great dad.

This is so strange.

This guy is super dysfunctional and super effective and accomplished, and you don't often find all of those qualities in the same person.

It's kind of fascinating.

It is fascinating, isn't it?

But what a complicated son to have.

So interesting.

But along the way, Brian started sending me hateful letters, emails, and texts, and regularly hung up on me.

He claimed I beat him and his sister daily with spatulas and belts, that I tried to choke her when they were young.

This is a total lie, confirmed by his sister.

Oh man, Gabe, this reminds me of the letter we took a couple weeks back from the woman whose son accused her of all these heinous things later in life because he wanted her money.

Yes, that's so true.

I wonder if there's some overlap between these two guys.

Total armchair diagnosis here.

I could be totally off.

Let's hear it.

Based on what she shared, this could be partly ADHD, the not being able to sit still, the climbing on things, the impulsive behavior.

That's all kind of textbook.

But the temper tantrums, locking his parents out of the house, physical aggression, hurting people, that is more serious.

Oppositional defiant disorder is what the guy from the other story a few weeks ago had.

I wonder if this applies to this son as well.

Yeah.

And also there's like a risk assessment aspect, like that when he was a kid before he even understood what he was doing, when he's playing with the blender and reaching up on things and grabbing things.

I don't know.

It's fascinating.

Could be, or it could be even more severe.

I don't know.

So she goes on, I also discovered that he and his wife were in an open marriage for the past five years.

Things imploded when she wanted a sexual relationship with his best friend or would file for divorce.

Yeah, that's not how open marriages are supposed to work, but okay.

Oof.

You mean you're not supposed to force them into it.

You're not supposed to say, I'm going to divorce you if you don't let me bang one of your best friends.

It's supposed to be like more consensual stuff here.

Yeah, yeah.

Then things got ugly.

She claimed that Brian hurt her, had pictures of bruises on her phone, and said she was done.

He was drinking and smoking pot.

He punched his fist through the wall, spattering blood.

This picture-perfect family was just a facade.

The tension was so bad that I was concerned they might kill each other.

Yeah, that must have been awful to see that play out.

Can you imagine being a parent and your son is like spinning out like that?

That's rough.

Yeah, wow.

My son went berserk.

Brian said that he married his psycho mother.

He made up a bunch of lies about me and repeatedly said, admit it, you did it.

I had to admit to them, or he wouldn't have a relationship with me or let me have one with my grandchildren.

I finally caved to quote-unquote heal the family.

I felt sick to my stomach, like I sold my soul to the devil.

After that, Brian immediately talked to me like we were best friends, like nothing ever happened.

Okay, wow.

I can understand why you did that, but I'm not sure that was the right move.

This is insane on so many levels.

The fact that he had her admit that it got his way and was like, okay, I can pretend to be happy now.

Yeah.

What to make of that?

Either he knows it was not real at all and it was all a technique.

and once he got his way, you could just go back to liking her.

Or he's totally disconnected from his feelings.

I'm so confused.

I don't know.

Brian is now divorced and dating the second woman he met on a dating app where he's looking for someone to help raise his children, not for love.

He takes selfies constantly.

He posted pictures of his wife and him kissing on a cruise on social media the day after she moved out.

Later, he posted that his wife forced him into an open relationship and listed the full names of the men she slept with.

Oh my gosh.

Wow.

She.

Indeed.

How do I live my life knowing that I lied to have a relationship with my grandkids when I probably never will?

That my husband didn't support me for years in challenging these lies and Brian's physical violence toward me.

How can I have a relationship with Brian or my grandchildren after all this?

Signed, Struggling with My Offspring when I'm tied to his apron strings.

Wait, Gabe, tell me if I'm just not listening.

The husband thing wasn't mentioned at all earlier.

Just comes in the clothes.

So isn't that kind of a detail you might want to throw in there that the husband didn't support you, didn't protect you from the violence, didn't help you in any way?

Why was that just a footnote?

I'm not sure.

Maybe she just thought, here's where I'll tell them that also happened, but that is curious.

Yeah.

There's a lot more to know about that because where my mind goes is, did he not believe you?

Does he have a different version of these events?

Yeah.

Because I find you compelling and based on your letter, and it sounds like your daughter is confirming your story.

So I believe you.

But then the question is, why doesn't your husband believe you?

And is he checked out or is he on the son's side?

Or what's going on here?

Yeah, what's happening there?

Okay, it sounds like you aren't either.

It just seems like important information.

Your spouse didn't support you and all this.

Whether that means there's another version of the events or he doesn't have your back, whatever, I'm not sure, but we'll come back to that.

So to state the obvious, I'm so sorry that you've been through all this.

Like I said, very challenging son to have, very upsetting.

He's a terrible guy.

Part of me is going, what happened to this kid in his early years?

Because it's hard to believe a child would just act like this for no reason.

And he did accuse you of some stuff later in life, but Brian does not sound like a reliable narrator.

I feel you're probably telling us the truth.

I agree with Gabe.

I know that nature is real.

Some people are just born with certain wiring.

Maybe you struggle to respond to Brian in a way that would help him address his issues and work on these behaviors, which I can't entirely blame you for because what's the playbook for a child like this?

Maybe Brian has has real mental health brain disorder stuff built in and it's an impossible situation.

I'm also sorry for him to some degree, especially when he was young.

It sounds like he was at the whim of a lot of rage and impulsive behavior, chaotic energy.

It's very hard for a child to manage that.

And then to deal with the reactions you get to that energy from your family and other kids, teachers, everyone you deal with.

It's heartbreaking, really.

It is.

But as an adult, Well, he sure has an opportunity and a responsibility to take care of himself in a very different way.

To look at this behavior, this dysfunction, these feelings, to find some healthy ways to address them.

It just doesn't sound like he's doing that at all.

Although it also sounds like he might not even recognize these as problems.

Which is very much part of the problem here.

Yeah.

Right.

How can you work on anything when it's always somebody else's fault?

Man, there's so much going on here.

But to cut to the chase, which we don't do very often on the show, I am not sure you can really have a true relationship with Brian.

Not a fair, healthy, high-functioning one anyway, not an honest one.

Definitely not a safe one.

You're describing a person who is not only aggressive, physically and emotionally, apparently abusive, you are talking about somebody who is emotionally coercive, unstable, chaotic.

And if the nonstop selfies just weird as hell and projection and general failure of empathy are any indication, possibly this guy is a clinical narcissist in some ways.

This is a weird mix of behavior.

You are up against a lot.

If you can't say, Son, I love you, but you're out of control.

You're being hurtful.

You're making a mess of your life.

You're accusing me of things I didn't didn't do.

And if he can't even begin to take that in, no, I don't think you can have a real relationship.

I'm sorry to say.

Now, you might have some kind of relationship with him that allows you to see your grandchildren, which is where you are now.

And maybe that's worth it.

If Brian is a hopeless case, there's no other way to be in your grandkids' lives.

That's your priority.

I would want to know what the quality of a relationship with your grandkids is, whether you guys have a meaningful connection despite how Brian's acting, whether your relationship with him infects your relationship with his kids.

All of that matters.

But I think the better question might be: at what cost does my relationship with Brian and with his kids come for me?

What am I willing to tolerate in order to be close with them?

What do I have to overlook or forgive in order to do that?

And how does all of that make you feel?

Yeah, how does that make you feel?

Because based on your letter and reading between the lines, I think it makes you feel not great.

You're having to swallow a lot.

You're having to stuff down so much anger and sadness and concern.

You have to compromise on your integrity.

You have to allow yourself to be the target of your son's irrational accusations and feelings.

Sounds like you're kind of a vehicle for his messy projections.

Then when he gets what he wants, he flips the script.

I mean, this is very confusing.

It's awful.

I just don't know how you do it.

I don't know if I could do it.

I don't think I could either.

Look, only she can decide what price she's willing to pay here.

My concern is when Brian apparently made up a bunch of lies about her, she said that she caved not just so that she could have a relationship with her grandkids, but to quote unquote, heal the family.

And then afterwards, she was like, what did I do?

Like, I sold my soul to the devil.

So she is paying exactly this price you're describing.

Yes, I'm getting the sense that her remarkably high tolerance for Brian's crazy, for lack of a better word, and her ability to subordinate her own standards and needs to his, maybe to many other people's too, that is a huge variable here.

This might be an opportunity for her to go, why do I do that?

Do I want to keep doing that?

Am I really willing to live with these feelings to just keep things on an even keel and get what I want with his kids?

You know, it's an interesting theme on today's episode.

I also want to point out that doing that, that hasn't healed the family, not in the slightest.

If anything, it's just sidestepped a ton of dysfunction and hurt.

And she must know that, or she wouldn't have put that phrase in quotes.

But I guess I flag that because it's okay, besides getting to take your grandkids out for ice cream, who's ultimately being served by this approach.

Because she might say, well, my grandkids are because they get to be friends with me.

But it might also be true that this serves Brian and that it also, in a way, serves herself because in a certain way, it does let her off the hook for having to really stand up to him and try to talk about this stuff.

And look, I get it.

Her son is legitimately terrifying.

But the more we talk about this, the more I wonder what's worse, her having to bear Brian's rage and irrationality or her having to sacrifice her integrity and dignity and still possibly be at his rage and irrationality at any given moment when he decides to snap.

Which would be another really good question for her to ask herself, especially after the initial shock of standing up to him passes, you know, because the first couple weeks after you draw a line with somebody is very intense and it's scary.

Like you feel raw and vulnerable.

The person's yelling at you, whatever.

But after that, does something new become possible?

Does a new relationship with yourself become possible?

I think it's likely.

So to come back to that thing we kicked off with about your husband, how he didn't support you.

To me, that is another rich area for you to explore.

I'm speculating here a bit, but if your husband didn't support you in challenging Brian's lies for years, that does raise some important questions about how you and your husband are communicating and about his lens on all this and ultimately who's really on your team.

I guess it makes me wonder if you also feel alone in all this.

And if so, how exactly did you end up here?

Because what Brian's done is my favorite word, objectively insane.

So I'm struggling.

to imagine why your husband wouldn't support you and just saying, Brian, this didn't happen.

This isn't right.

Come on, man.

And I think I'd just be speculating even more if I tried to offer some theories, but I really got to encourage you to explore that question on your own and with your husband.

Even her question there, how do I live my life knowing that my husband didn't support me?

That kind of mirrors the way she's dealt with Brian his whole life.

She's not saying, how do I change this dynamic with my son?

How do I have a new conversation with my husband?

It sounds to me like her question is more, how do I just make peace with this anger?

How do I put an end to the tension that I feel?

It's almost like she's resigned to the idea that this is just the way it is, but she's also looking for a way out of the distress.

And I'm not sure that's possible.

She can't just wish these feelings away and hope that the rest of her life, she won't feel uneasy.

She feels uneasy because there's a real problem here.

These feelings are a signal that something with Brian needs to change.

She either needs to stand up to her son or pull back or draw better boundaries with him or talk to her husband in a new way and find the support she needs.

There are options here.

But alongside all that, the real question of your letter to me is where am I in all this?

What do I need?

What do I stand for?

When do I get to say enough is enough?

I get to have a voice here too.

And in a really painful way, your son is giving you the opportunity to explore these questions.

I'm so sorry that he's put you through so much.

This is awful.

But you are all at a very different stage of your life now, a very different role as parents, and there are approaches that can make this situation more sustainable or at least fairer.

fairer sadly that could mean not being as close with your grandchildren which i know would be so hard but in a situation where your son is not allowing you to have everything the question he's posing to you is essentially what matters most and i can't tell you the answer to that but i can encourage you to factor your own values and needs into that equation a little more than you've been doing sending you a big hug and wishing you all the best.

All right.

Now you're going to want to ram your fist through the wall to reach the chaotically generous discounts on the objectively amazing products and services that support this show.

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Now, back to Feedback Friday.

Oh, that's right.

It's time for the recommendation of the week.

I am addicted to Lit Villa.

My recommendation of the week is an insulated tumbler called The Beast, which is such a funny name for an insulated tumbler, but it does live up to the name.

So this is one of those travel thermoses for coffee or tea that, you know, keeps your beverage hot or cold for hours and hours.

I am one of those psychos who likes to drink boiling hot beverages.

I make black tea every morning and I get annoyed when it cools off really quickly once you pour it.

I've tried so many tumblers over the years.

This is by far the best one I found.

It's all the things, high quality, food grade, stainless steel.

good insulation, splash-proof, closable lid, which by the way, one of my favorite features.

I've dropped this thing multiple times, especially when I'm getting in and out of my car.

It can be full of tea and it won't spill.

It's kind of amazing.

And it comes in a bunch of different sizes.

I use this thing every single day, multiple times a day.

I pack it when I travel because I don't want to be without it.

It's awesome.

So if you drink things, especially hot things like in the morning, at work, you want to travel with it, this is the one.

And as always, we'll link to it in the show notes.

I hope you like it.

This is like an upgrade.

I remember a few months ago, I was like, get a Yeti mug.

It keeps your drinks cool for a long time and hot.

And you're like, no, get the beast.

It's a whole gallon of boiling hot for you for 12 hours.

I will say this, though.

Yeti is also incredible.

They're a little bit less cool aesthetically, like they're more camping vibes.

It's not the prettiest design, but the technology on the Yeti is awesome.

So between these two brands, you'll be covered.

But this one is, I don't know, has a special something.

It even comes with a metal straw from the look of it.

Look at that.

30 ounces.

I didn't know you would be so interested in the metal straw.

I never used mine.

Do you want me to give it to you?

I was so big on metal straws and I was like, oh, yeah, save the turtles.

No more straw garbage.

I'm going to bring my own straw.

Then I was talking to an expert about waste.

I think it was actually Krista Armit on the show.

And he's like, the energy to create a metal straw.

Do you have any idea how many plastic straws that is?

And it was something like tens of thousands.

You will never use that many plastic straws in your life.

So you have two metal straws.

Congratulations.

You've used.

multiple lifetimes of plastic straws worth of carbon and energy.

That is a very classic Krista Armit take.

Yes.

But it does actually make a lot of sense.

And you can't win, can you?

You kind of can't win.

And also, if you fall with a metal straw in your mouth,

it's game over.

If you fall with a plastic straw in your mouth.

Who's walking around with the metal straw in their mouth?

Aren't you walking around with the beast?

Yeah, but I don't use the straw.

Oh, that's true.

You don't use the straw.

But it does come with a straw.

You just fall on your thermos.

Okay.

That's right.

Followed me.

I've fallen.

I've fallen.

I can't get up.

Because I got a straw in my carotid artery.

That's right.

Daddy, chill.

By the way, you can reach us Friday at jordanharbinger.com.

Please keep your emails concise.

Try to use descriptive subject lines.

That makes our job a lot easier.

If your son manufactured criminal charges against you to get your money, your neighbor, are you okay over there?

I'm just still laughing about Daddy Chill.

Your neighbors are eavesdropping on your therapy sessions through the wall, or you're debating whether to call out a parent who abused you as a child when you need their inheritance.

Whatever's got you staying up at night lately, hit us up Friday at jordanharbinger.com.

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Also, our subreddit, if you like the memes or you want to tell us to stop using the sound bites, I'm going to ignore those by the way.

But if you want to discuss the questions or the episodes, we're having so much fun over there.

You can find it on the Jordan Harbinger subreddit.

We got to cut one of the questions because we're going so long.

Let's go out with a bang here, Gabe.

Funny you should say that because I'm about to deliver.

All right.

Dear Jordan and Gabe, I wrote you guys almost two years ago.

I was the 35-year-old virgin wondering if I should tell the first person I sleep with that I had never had sex or just roll the dice and see what happens.

Do you remember that?

Yeah, I remember that.

Yeah, that was episode 861, by the way.

So he goes on, about a year ago, I dated a girl for three months and we slept together.

Hey, look at that.

Congratulations.

All right, all right, all right.

Yeah.

She was my first and she was the best first I could have hoped for.

I think she had figured out that it was my first time based on the way I answered certain questions or the way I acted in general.

And because she knew ahead of time, she was very patient and understanding.

Great.

Yeah, I'm glad you found a solid first partner.

I remember that was a big question for you.

Man, that must have been a relief.

Yeah, she sounds sweet.

We got along great, but ended things after realizing that our ultimate goals in life were too different.

We parted as friends and have developed a legitimate friendship.

We text and talk on the phone, and I've hung out with her, her kids, and her friends.

Her friends and her sister really like me, as do her kids, who are 10 and 7, who have recently started calling me uncle and adopted me into their family.

She's on board with this.

We're now concerned, however, that when either of us starts dating a new person, we'll have to end our friendship, or at least not see each other in person because we've had sex.

I can see how hanging out with your ex could be a cause for concern in a relationship, but things are very platonic now.

There's no secret longing for each other.

There have been times when we've been alone and there is no sexual tension there.

But is a new person really going to buy that?

Is it possible for this friendship to go on?

Or does it have to end for us to move forward with a new relationship?

Can Harry and Sally really be friends?

Signed, debating whether to concede that our friendship's not guaranteed now that we've done the deed.

First of all, amazing update.

I remember how anxious you were in your original letter about whether this was going to happen, how it was going to happen, who it should be with.

The fact that you went through this major milestone with somebody who treated you well and ended up being a meaningful part of your life.

That is just, it's wonderful.

It's so sweet.

I love this.

Yeah.

Big congrats there.

I also love that you and this woman have developed a real friendship, especially after sleeping together.

It's quite rare.

And I got to think that says a lot about both of you, you know, that you guys are mature enough to put your old relationship to bed, pardon the pun, and begin a new kind of relationship based on different feelings and different goals.

And again, I think that's tremendous.

So it probably won't surprise you that my feeling is, yes, it is possible for this friendship to continue and for for you guys to date new people.

As long as you guys are totally for realsies on the same page and your intentions are clear, you say neither of you is secretly pining for the other.

When you're alone, there's no sexual tension.

I got to take your word for it.

Then I don't see why you guys can't stay close while you date other people.

If one of you secretly has feelings for the other, if one of you is like, well, I'd sleep with them again if I had the chance, then no, I don't think it's sustainable because the foundation is kind of a lie.

I can't say it's the majority, but a lot of male-female friendships, one person, person, they would and the other person wouldn't, but they're not on the same page.

I'm going to take your word for it that you guys are totally on that same real page and your friendship is legit.

Whether a new person that was going to buy that, whether they're going to be comfortable with your history, that is an entirely separate question.

If either of you meet somebody who's not cool with you guys being friends, that is going to raise an interesting question for you guys.

Whether you should end this friendship to make them feel comfortable, whether that person needs to trust you guys and reconsider their stance on someone being friends with an ex, that is ultimately up to you guys and frankly, this new person to decide.

My stance on this is men and women can absolutely be friends even when they have had a romantic past, as long as both parties are super clear and transparent about their feelings, their goals, there are appropriate boundaries in place, all of that.

If things are still messy, if there's any loose end anywhere, if one person is still secretly crushing on the other, or the friendship lives in kind of an ambiguous zone where it's kind of platonic and kind of romantic and if alcohol gets involved, it's a whole thing.

That's a different story.

Then it's complicated.

And maybe then that friendship, big air quotes around friendship there, that's probably incompatible with dating a new person seriously.

Although I would argue that would be an issue even if there weren't a new person in the mix.

Definitely.

For sure.

It's just that those messy friendships, the mess gets clearer when somebody starts dating someone new because then it's like, well, who is this person?

Why are you guys hanging out?

But you're right.

There are are good reasons to get clear on those ambiguous friendships regardless of your dating status.

But in this case, where it's truly platonic and there's a lot of pure affection for each other and he's just a big part of her life, I just don't see why they should have to give that up when they start dating someone new.

But again, that assumes that the new person they meet shares that view.

And I recognize that many people don't, especially based on their experiences in life.

And that is a legitimate gripe.

But I think it's kind of a shame that a lot of people don't because then their objection is just, your history makes me uncomfortable.

I need you to stop seeing this genuine friend.

And in this case, apparently like an adoptive uncle, which is so sweet.

So you have to stop seeing them so that I can feel okay.

And look, that's kind of selfish in my view.

Cause if you're weirded out or you're insecure about somebody's past and it's truly all in the past, which again, that part is key.

My feeling is, you know.

Then it's kind of a you problem.

Exactly.

It's a you problem.

So maybe try working through those feelings first because your partner has not actually done anything wrong.

But, and this is the crucial part, you have to tell a new partner when you and a friend have any sort of romantic history.

You don't tell them a month in after your new partner has hung out with them 10 times.

You're upfront with the information and you give your new partner a chance to get to know this person and see for themselves, hopefully, that this friend is really just a friend.

If your new partner walks away from that meeting with a bad impression, If they don't believe that your friend is sincere, assuming your partner met you and your friend in good faith, of course, then you have some decisions to make, whether it's to reassess the friendship or talk to your partner about their concerns or talk with your friend about what signals were getting sent, maybe all the above.

Now, I've had female friends where we talk on the phone all the time and I'm single and they're single.

And then they meet a new guy and it's like, oh, I want you to meet my boyfriend.

And it's like, all right.

And we stop talking on the phone as much.

And eventually I meet the new guy after maybe even a few months.

And he's like, oh, I'm happy to meet you.

I've heard a lot about you.

Look, he's not going, you're the guy that talks to my girlfriend three hours a week on the phone because we stopped doing that.

Your role in their life shifts a little bit.

Some things are more appropriate for a person to do with their partner instead of you.

And this was really important because, frankly, he would have had every right to be suspicious of this.

But after a while, they're dating for a few months.

He feels quite secure in the relationship.

Then he meets me and it's, oh, you used to date Kim.

Yeah, well, a couple of times, then we realized we were better off as friends.

And he's like, yeah, okay, cool.

He's not thinking, you're the guy that hangs out with her all the time when I'm not around and I'm supposed to just be okay with this.

I don't want to get involved with this nonsense.

It's a totally different situation.

Part of what you're touching on is also you being respectful of this person's time with their new partner and giving them some freedom.

Just invest in that person for a little while before you introduce a whole new element.

So that's interesting too.

But I do think you make a good point.

You do have to kind of adjust your position in their life within reason to some degree.

Yeah.

Sometimes.

And yeah, and you can't be close with eight people, right?

So if you start dating someone new and you want to really invest in that person, yeah, you might not speak with your friend on the phone for three hours every week or whatever.

Overall, Jordan, I am with you.

I feel that men and women have so much to offer one another.

And it's kind of a shame that a lot of us struggle to have genuine friendships with the opposite gender or we're not encouraged to in a lot of places.

Is it complicated?

Sometimes.

Does it depend a lot on the personalities of the people involved?

Definitely.

But one of my closest friends, when we first met, we dated very briefly, years ago.

And now our relationship is completely different.

She's like a homie she's almost part of my family it would be really sad to think about not having her in my life because one of us started dating somebody new yeah i totally hear that i have a couple of those in my life too but look the key is you have to navigate these situations thoughtfully and carefully Everyone involved has to be honest and open.

Look, you got to be willing to make some adjustments along the way, like you said, that are compatible with staying friends.

So yes, Harry and Sally can be friends under the right circumstances.

Although Harry and Sally in that movie, look, it's been a while, but they're slowly falling in love with each other.

That's the whole point.

I think that's the story.

And they're confused about how they feel.

So that's where all of this falls apart.

But that's not what's happening with you and this woman.

You're not Billy Crystal.

Congrats, better hairline.

Hopefully, you're a true friend.

Fine, you're good.

Also, I don't know how much I would stress about this until it actually becomes a problem.

Right now, it's just sort of an abstract concern.

Yeah, that's fair.

But it might be worth talking to her about this in advance so that you can know whether you guys are on the same page about how important this friendship is to each of you.

Because if you're like, hey, I couldn't date somebody who wouldn't let me be friends with you.

And she says, I met someone and he was uncomfortable with it.

I don't know.

I might have to say goodbye.

Or she gets vague about it and quiet.

That's good data for you.

Then you guys can talk about that and maybe see if there's room for you guys to arrive at a new place.

And I don't know, maybe there's something for you to work out there.

Or you'll discover that you mean different things to each other.

Which, again, would be really good for you to know now.

Not just so you know what's coming down the road, but so you can really make sure you're investing in the right friendships.

That's a good point, Gabe.

Man, there's so much nuance here.

There's so many variables at play.

When you hang out, who else is there?

Is it a solo hang?

Is there alcohol involved?

What do you guys talk about?

How are these topics discussed?

Ultimately, all of that comes down to the intentions and characters of the people involved.

But hey, look, whatever happens with this friend, let's celebrate the real victory here, which is you lost that V card, man.

You had that experience with somebody special, which isn't often the case, and you were able to build a great friendship afterward.

All of that, it just says so much about you and your capacity for meaningful relationships, which I know will play a big role in all of your relationships going forward.

That is the win, whatever ultimately happens with this woman.

And good luck.

Go back and check out the episodes with Randy Blythe, Wendell Potter, and our skeptical Sunday on slavery if you haven't done so yet.

The best things that have happened in my life and business have come through my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust.

I'm teaching you how to build the same thing for yourself in our six-minute networking course, which is free.

It's not schmoozy.

It's all available for you on the ThinkIFIC platform at sixminutenetworking.com.

Build relationships before you need them, folks.

Dig that well before you get thirsty.

Sixminutenetworking.com.

Show notes and transcripts are on the website.

Advertisers, discounts, ways to support the show at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.

I'm at Jordan Harbinger on most social media.

You can even add me on LinkedIn.

You can find Gabe on Instagram at Gabriel Mizrahi on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi.

This show is created in association with Podcast One.

My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, Tata Sedlowskis, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi.

Our advice and opinions are our own, and I am a lawyer, but I am not your lawyer.

So do your own research before implementing things you hear on the show.

Remember, we rise by lifting others.

Share the show with those you love.

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In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn.

And we'll see you next time.

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