Latest / Vox Novus with Victor Fuhrman / Julio Vincent Gambuto – Please Unsubscribe, Thanks!

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Julio Vincent Gambuto – Please Unsubscribe, Thanks! · Vox Novus with Victor Fuhrman

0:05
Speaker 1: Vox Novus, The New Voice, Vox Novus, the New Dimension,
0:14
Speaker 1: Vox Novus thought and movement leaders who will share from
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Speaker 1: their experience and offer tools to help us navigate our
0:23
Speaker 1: rapidly changing world. My name is Victor Furman. Welcome to
0:28
Speaker 1: Vox Novus, the New Voice. How did the pandemic change
0:37
Speaker 1: your life? Was the outcome challenging or beneficial? My guest
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Speaker 1: this week on Vox Novus, Filmmaker and author Julio Vincent
0:47
Speaker 1: Gambuto explores the profound societal shifts prompted by the pandemic,
0:53
Speaker 1: revealing how the forced pause allowed people to reassess their lives,
0:58
Speaker 1: prioritize genuine happiness, and resist the relentless demands of modern life.
1:04
Speaker 1: His work encourages readers to break free from automated behaviors, values,
1:09
Speaker 1: and relationships that hinder true fulfillment. His website is Julio
1:14
Speaker 1: Vincent dot com and he joins me this week to
1:17
Speaker 1: share his path and book. Please unsubscribe thanks. How to
1:22
Speaker 1: take back our time, attention, and purpose in a world
1:25
Speaker 1: designed to bury us in bs Please join me in
1:30
Speaker 1: welcoming to Vox Novius. Julio Vincent Gambudo Welcome, Julio.
1:35
Speaker 2: Hello Victor, it's a pleasure to be here. Thanks for
1:37
Speaker 2: having me.
1:38
Speaker 1: And thank you so much for sharing and joining us,
1:40
Speaker 1: because your message, I think is really really important. So
1:44
Speaker 1: let's start by saying, share with us your path and
1:46
Speaker 1: what it was like prior to the pandemic.
1:51
Speaker 2: Sure, well, you know, I'm a bit of an oversubscriber,
1:57
Speaker 2: if you will, or at least I was back then,
2:00
Speaker 2: meaning I kind of signed up for everything everywhere, kind
2:04
Speaker 2: of all in the name of being successful, quote unquote,
2:09
Speaker 2: and I found myself really kind of on a treadmill,
2:12
Speaker 2: you know, going and going and going, not questioning much,
2:16
Speaker 2: kind of on autopilot and a little bit breathless to
2:21
Speaker 2: be honest, right, just kind of living this pretty relentless life,
2:25
Speaker 2: going and dodging and flying and being everywhere at once,
2:29
Speaker 2: kind of, you know, all in the name of moving
2:32
Speaker 2: life forward. And I think when the pandemic hit, I
2:36
Speaker 2: certainly fell off that treadmill and started to sort of
2:39
Speaker 2: question whether or not that really was what I wanted
2:42
Speaker 2: in my life. So the book has sort of grew
2:45
Speaker 2: out of all that.
2:46
Speaker 1: How were you called to filmmaking?
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Speaker 2: You know, I was a kid who borrowed his father's
2:55
Speaker 2: cam quarter, and that was in the eighties when you
2:58
Speaker 2: kind of had to take half the VC are out
3:00
Speaker 2: and put it into a bag and carrying it around
3:04
Speaker 2: with you with a whole bunch of wires. And I
3:08
Speaker 2: loved telling stories, and I thought that that was a
3:12
Speaker 2: really wonderful way to tell stories. Visually, I loved editing
3:18
Speaker 2: and sort of cutting stories together. I loved putting music
3:22
Speaker 2: to things and sort of making music videos when I
3:25
Speaker 2: was a kid, and that sort of you know, that
3:29
Speaker 2: was always there. It was kind of just like this
3:31
Speaker 2: connective tissue. I think that you could zoom back and
3:35
Speaker 2: look at all the different parts of my life and
3:37
Speaker 2: see that perhaps they were all connected by the desire
3:40
Speaker 2: to tell stories. And most of my work though in
3:44
Speaker 2: college and after college, was as a writer, and so
3:48
Speaker 2: I was putting stories to paper and obviously keyboard to screen.
3:55
Speaker 2: And then in my thirties, I decided that I really
3:58
Speaker 2: kind of wanted to make a go of being a
4:00
Speaker 2: filmmaker and kind of, you know, revisit that dream that
4:04
Speaker 2: I had as a kid. And it's been kind of
4:08
Speaker 2: a bullet train since then. That has stopped, at least,
4:11
Speaker 2: of course, for the pandemic.
4:13
Speaker 1: So we're all creators. Each of their projects is like
4:17
Speaker 1: a child. Is there one film in particular that you
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Speaker 1: chair with us that you're most fond of?
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Speaker 2: Well, amid a lot of short films, I've made two
4:26
Speaker 2: feature films. One I co directed, which was a film
4:30
Speaker 2: adaptation of James Franco's book called Actors Anonymous. That was
4:35
Speaker 2: an independent film that we made, and I think it
4:38
Speaker 2: was like twenty sixteen seventeen or fifteen sixteen. And then
4:43
Speaker 2: my first feature film that I co wrote and directed
4:48
Speaker 2: was called Team Marco. And it's the story of a
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Speaker 2: young boy who's obsessed with his tech and his screen
4:55
Speaker 2: and his iPad, and his grandfather, who's of course a
4:59
Speaker 2: little more old school, drags him to the park and
5:03
Speaker 2: teaches him how to play botchi uh. And this was
5:07
Speaker 2: really a you know, a love letter to my hometown.
5:10
Speaker 2: We shot it. I'm from Staten Island, New York. We
5:13
Speaker 2: shot it completely on Staten Island, with about five hundred
5:17
Speaker 2: people between the cast and extras, and so it was
5:20
Speaker 2: a really big community event. And I loved it, and
5:23
Speaker 2: I loved it, and I'm incredibly proud of it. And
5:25
Speaker 2: that's you know, that's out now and streaming you know,
5:28
Speaker 2: all over the place.
5:29
Speaker 1: So wonderful. Thank you for sure wonderful.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, that's that's my baby. If I had to, if
5:33
Speaker 2: I had to pick a favorite kid, that's it.
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Speaker 1: Your awakening to the issue with modern tech and time
5:39
Speaker 1: consumption started with a sales blast email from J Crew.
5:43
Speaker 1: What happened when you received that email?
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Speaker 2: Yes, it did well, you know, like so like everybody,
5:51
Speaker 2: I was in the house in March and April of
5:54
Speaker 2: twenty twenty, and at that point we were all pretty
5:57
Speaker 2: scared and didn't know what was really happening. And we
6:00
Speaker 2: were about three or four weeks into this nightmare that
6:03
Speaker 2: we now know to be the pandemic. And in the
6:09
Speaker 2: very beginning of the pandemic sort of like you know,
6:12
Speaker 2: the first week or two after the shutdown, you know,
6:15
Speaker 2: every corporation in America, every list that you didn't even
6:19
Speaker 2: know you were on, was sending you a message to say, hey,
6:23
Speaker 2: remember how to wash your hands left right soap water.
6:27
Speaker 2: You know, be smart, we don't know what's happening. We're
6:31
Speaker 2: all in this together. That kind of messaging was, you know,
6:36
Speaker 2: all over our screens. And then about four or five
6:40
Speaker 2: weeks in suddenly the messaging changed and it was kind
6:44
Speaker 2: of immediately back to, you know, buy this sweater for
6:47
Speaker 2: fifty percent off and make sure you buy a car
6:50
Speaker 2: and all of this kind of nonsense. And I found
6:53
Speaker 2: myself really really enraged. I had gotten this email from
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Speaker 2: j Crew the morning of I guess it was like
7:02
Speaker 2: the first week in April of twenty twenty, and it wall.
7:06
Speaker 2: You know, they certainly weren't the only ones writing these
7:08
Speaker 2: kinds of emails, but I got their email and I
7:11
Speaker 2: was just kind of floored because I felt like, wow,
7:15
Speaker 2: you know, you had just told me to wash my
7:17
Speaker 2: hands and be safe and that we were all in
7:19
Speaker 2: this together, and now you're selling me, you know, a
7:22
Speaker 2: winter sweater and a turtleneck. And so because of how
7:27
Speaker 2: kind of furious I felt alone in an apartment, hadn't
7:30
Speaker 2: seen my family and friends in six weeks or so
7:33
Speaker 2: four weeks or so whatever it was at that point,
7:35
Speaker 2: and so I wrote this essay called Prepare for the
7:39
Speaker 2: Ultimate gas Lighting, which, in a very surreal turn of events,
7:45
Speaker 2: went around the world in about forty eight hours and
7:49
Speaker 2: now I think has something like twenty one million readers
7:52
Speaker 2: in about one hundred countries. And the essay was really
7:56
Speaker 2: kind of a response to that J Crew email. It
7:58
Speaker 2: was a it was a call for us all to
8:02
Speaker 2: kind of not be lulled back into or you know,
8:06
Speaker 2: lulled into going back to normal. Uh, And it really
8:09
Speaker 2: questioned what normal was in that moment. And you know,
8:13
Speaker 2: obviously it's five years later now, and so there's plenty
8:16
Speaker 2: of perspective that we have now that we didn't have then.
8:19
Speaker 2: But my call then was really for people to use
8:23
Speaker 2: the pandemic as a moment to kind of understand if
8:27
Speaker 2: we wanted to keep consuming at the rate that we
8:30
Speaker 2: were consuming, if we you know, if we wanted to
8:34
Speaker 2: continue to just constantly be marketed to by every company
8:38
Speaker 2: in the known world and universe, and really, you know,
8:43
Speaker 2: what did we want to learn from the experience. So anyway, yeah,
8:47
Speaker 2: it'll started with a J Crewe email.
8:49
Speaker 1: And many of these events inspired you to write please unsubscribe,
8:53
Speaker 1: thanks at how did the pandemic influence your perspective?
8:58
Speaker 2: Well, you know, the book the book is is really
9:01
Speaker 2: an evolution of that essay and it's not so much
9:05
Speaker 2: focused on on gaslighting or manipulation or what have you,
9:09
Speaker 2: but it's really kind of a The book is is
9:14
Speaker 2: a look at the concept of subscription so you and
9:18
Speaker 2: I know subscription well from you know, Netflix, and you
9:22
Speaker 2: know the book at the Month Club or whatever it
9:25
Speaker 2: might be. And and and we're very savvy now about
9:32
Speaker 2: what subscriptions are and how to click and subscribe dot
9:36
Speaker 2: dot dot. But I really wanted to look at kind
9:39
Speaker 2: of why this new system has emerged. And when I
9:43
Speaker 2: say a new system, I really mean like digital capitalism.
9:47
Speaker 2: How has it taken over our lives? What has it
9:50
Speaker 2: given us, what has it robbed us of? What is
9:52
Speaker 2: it taken from us? And and perhaps if we can
9:55
Speaker 2: have a better relationship with what it is we subscribe to,
10:00
Speaker 2: we might actually take back our time and attention and focus.
10:04
Speaker 2: And so I look at subscriptions with respect to those
10:08
Speaker 2: external subscriptions like I'm talking about the things you click on,
10:12
Speaker 2: But then I also look at subscriptions meaning kind of
10:15
Speaker 2: commitments to social networks and social relationships. And then I
10:21
Speaker 2: also look at a third level, which is what I
10:24
Speaker 2: call underlying subscriptions, meaning the kind of emotional contracts that
10:28
Speaker 2: we have with ourselves about who we are in the
10:32
Speaker 2: world and to each other and start to you know,
10:36
Speaker 2: how we present to the world and to other people.
10:39
Speaker 2: And so the book is an exploration of those three
10:42
Speaker 2: levels of subscription, all pretty much influenced by the event
10:47
Speaker 2: of the pandemic at least.
10:49
Speaker 1: How did your background in filmmaking and writing shape the
10:52
Speaker 1: narrative style of your book.
10:57
Speaker 2: It's a good question because the narrative style is really
11:00
Speaker 2: a combination. It's part memoir, part social science, part social critique.
11:08
Speaker 2: I think for readers there's a lot to chew on.
11:13
Speaker 2: It's about three hundred pages of all of that, and
11:17
Speaker 2: so it's a mix really of genres and of not
11:22
Speaker 2: of styles. I mean, it's all my style, but it's
11:25
Speaker 2: really a mix of different lanes. You know, the book
11:28
Speaker 2: is selling as a self help book, but I always
11:30
Speaker 2: say that it's where it helps, where self help meets
11:33
Speaker 2: the system, meaning, you know, as we try to become
11:38
Speaker 2: happier people, how do our efforts at increasing our happiness
11:44
Speaker 2: or elevating our happiness or enhancing our happiness, how does
11:47
Speaker 2: that interact with and conflict sometimes with the larger systems
11:52
Speaker 2: that we're a part of. And so, yeah, the narrative
11:57
Speaker 2: structure itself is is really a combination of many things.
12:02
Speaker 2: And when I look at my films and I look
12:06
Speaker 2: at sort of the way that I like to tell stories.
12:08
Speaker 2: I do like to mix genres and narrative styles. You know,
12:12
Speaker 2: in Team Marco, we shot a very simple, straightforward family film,
12:21
Speaker 2: live action with actors as one would expect, but we
12:25
Speaker 2: had a lot of fun cutting in old eight millimeter
12:29
Speaker 2: film reels that my grandparents gave me that my grandfather
12:33
Speaker 2: actually left me when he died. We had them digitized
12:38
Speaker 2: and we used them in the film. And I think
12:41
Speaker 2: that's a good example of just sort of mixing media,
12:43
Speaker 2: or mixing genres or mixing styles. Call it what you will,
12:48
Speaker 2: but I like to tell stories from different perspective, from
12:52
Speaker 2: different perspectives, with as made tools as I can, And
12:56
Speaker 2: so I think, you know, if you're looking at the
12:59
Speaker 2: book and you're looking at the film, you're probably seeing
13:02
Speaker 2: a lot in common.
13:04
Speaker 1: You had touched upon gas lighting. What do you describe
13:08
Speaker 1: as the ultimate gas lighting?
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Speaker 2: Well, you know, at the time five years ago when
13:15
Speaker 2: I wrote this essay, the ultimate gas lighting to me
13:18
Speaker 2: was sort of this supreme manipulation that I felt we
13:24
Speaker 2: were going to see, and now looking back, I feel
13:28
Speaker 2: we did see an experience from our government and from
13:32
Speaker 2: big business. The two sort of main drivers were forces
13:41
Speaker 2: that were going to try to persuade us, push us,
13:49
Speaker 2: convince us, whatever it might be, to go back to normal.
13:52
Speaker 2: And I just think it was the most incredible opportunity
13:57
Speaker 2: that any of us alive have ever had to question
14:01
Speaker 2: what is normal and what Why do I do the
14:05
Speaker 2: things that I do on a normal basis? Why do
14:08
Speaker 2: I behave the way that I do, you know, on
14:11
Speaker 2: autopilot automatically every day? Why do I go to this job?
14:15
Speaker 2: Why do I talk to these people? Why do I
14:18
Speaker 2: like what I like, love what I love, hate what
14:20
Speaker 2: I hate. I just thought it was an incredible learning lesson,
14:24
Speaker 2: and so I really didn't want us to go back
14:27
Speaker 2: to normal so quickly, because I felt like we were
14:31
Speaker 2: going to miss the moment, right, We're going to miss
14:33
Speaker 2: the incredible lesson of the moment. And obviously people had
14:37
Speaker 2: rent to pay and a mortgage is to pay and
14:40
Speaker 2: kids to take care of, and so I was in
14:42
Speaker 2: a very privileged position to be able to sort of
14:45
Speaker 2: think about the moment alone in an apartment in Manhattan.
14:50
Speaker 2: And so with respect to gaslighting, my fear was that
14:54
Speaker 2: we were going to be pushed to move on and
14:57
Speaker 2: to kind of forget what we learned earned unsee what
15:02
Speaker 2: we saw unlearn what we learned and move forward sort
15:07
Speaker 2: of as if this was just a blip or a
15:10
Speaker 2: glitch in the system instead of being a major and
15:14
Speaker 2: significant moment in our lives. And so to this day,
15:20
Speaker 2: five years later, I still think there are really profound
15:22
Speaker 2: lessons that came out of the pandemic and that applied
15:25
Speaker 2: to our lives, you know today, and if anything, we're
15:29
Speaker 2: kind of living this strange offshoot of what the world
15:34
Speaker 2: would be like had we shut it down for six
15:37
Speaker 2: months or whatever we did. And so I just think
15:40
Speaker 2: that there are great lessons to be learned as it
15:43
Speaker 2: relates to media and tech and all the things that
15:47
Speaker 2: I write about in my book, you know, very specifically,
15:51
Speaker 2: you know, we are entering an age. We're already in
15:54
Speaker 2: an age where media can be manipulated outright where you
16:01
Speaker 2: can see things, hear things, experience things that do not exist,
16:05
Speaker 2: that are in a different reality. And I don't mean
16:08
Speaker 2: some like space sailing and different reality. I mean someone
16:11
Speaker 2: has crafted them to convince you of something that is
16:14
Speaker 2: not true. And now with AI that is very very
16:19
Speaker 2: easy and impossible and will get cheaper and cheaper to do.
16:23
Speaker 2: And so you know, having these tools in the hands
16:27
Speaker 2: of everyone, which is obviously what you want in a
16:29
Speaker 2: democracy that everybody can have access to the technology of
16:34
Speaker 2: the moment. It can be a very dangerous thing because
16:38
Speaker 2: what you're going to see, and what we're already seeing,
16:41
Speaker 2: is that these tools of persuasion and manipulation are are
16:47
Speaker 2: being used for ill and for you know, they're not
16:53
Speaker 2: being used for the good of the society. And so
16:58
Speaker 2: you know, my fear is that it's an I'm certainly
17:00
Speaker 2: not the only one. The great fear is obviously that
17:03
Speaker 2: it will continue to kind of worsen.
17:06
Speaker 1: There was a lyric from a song in the nineteen
17:09
Speaker 1: seventies that said knowledge is a deadly friend. When no
17:13
Speaker 1: one sets the rules, the fate of all mankind, I
17:16
Speaker 1: fear is in the hands of fools.
17:21
Speaker 2: Well, isn't that the question right? Who gets to set
17:24
Speaker 2: the rules? And where? I think in this like massive
17:29
Speaker 2: three hundred million person debate every day about who gets
17:34
Speaker 2: to set the rules? And we live in a democratic
17:37
Speaker 2: system that is meant to kind of elevate leaders that
17:41
Speaker 2: can help us to set the rules, that can help
17:44
Speaker 2: us make shared agreements among each other about how we
17:47
Speaker 2: ought to behave. But I think that that process is
17:51
Speaker 2: in crisis right now. And I think that that entire
17:56
Speaker 2: ethosis in crisis right now, because we've been given a
18:01
Speaker 2: technology and have created a technology that sort of tests
18:05
Speaker 2: the limits and the boundaries and the even the intentions
18:08
Speaker 2: of that system.
18:10
Speaker 1: Please share with us a couple of personal experiences that
18:13
Speaker 1: illustrate the transformative power of unsubscribing.
18:19
Speaker 2: I love that question, you know, there's so many I
18:24
Speaker 2: think there's the obvious right that that unsubscribing at an
18:28
Speaker 2: external level creates a lot more peace in my day,
18:33
Speaker 2: right It sort of takes the chaos off of my screen. Meaning,
18:39
Speaker 2: you know, I don't really have anything that comes in
18:41
Speaker 2: my inbox anymore that I don't want in there. If
18:44
Speaker 2: something creeps in like a weed, I tend to neutralize
18:48
Speaker 2: it quickly. I really think your inbox represents your mind
18:52
Speaker 2: in so many ways, and so I don't like it cluttered.
18:56
Speaker 2: I don't like it overwhelmed. So my data day, you know,
19:01
Speaker 2: is very different from when I was what I call
19:04
Speaker 2: over subscribed to now being unsubscribed. There's just a whole
19:08
Speaker 2: lot less coming at me messages and communications and nonsense,
19:15
Speaker 2: if you will. Also, I watched the news at night,
19:19
Speaker 2: and I watched it for a half hour or so.
19:21
Speaker 2: I don't really spend the entire day online. I don't
19:23
Speaker 2: spend the entire day connected. I don't spend the entire
19:26
Speaker 2: day consuming the nine hundred different things that happen in
19:31
Speaker 2: our society on a minute by minute basis. And that's
19:37
Speaker 2: again a bit of a luxury and a bit of
19:39
Speaker 2: a privilege. But at the same time, I think we
19:41
Speaker 2: all have to be really cognizant of what we're allowing
19:44
Speaker 2: in and what we're focusing on and what gets to
19:50
Speaker 2: take up our time and attention and energy. So you know,
19:55
Speaker 2: that's the that's the kind of low hanging fruit of
19:58
Speaker 2: what has changed. I think at a deeper level, I
20:01
Speaker 2: will certainly share the experience of falling in love. I
20:05
Speaker 2: fell in love during the pandemic and it was kind
20:08
Speaker 2: of an incredible and continues to be an incredible experience
20:11
Speaker 2: in my life. I think unsubscribing helped me to create
20:16
Speaker 2: a space that someone else could occupy with me. And
20:21
Speaker 2: I say that meaning that I think when you're going
20:27
Speaker 2: and going and going constantly, and you're saying yes to
20:31
Speaker 2: everything sort of in the name of living a rich
20:34
Speaker 2: and full life, which is a privilege to do. You
20:40
Speaker 2: can very easily sort of miss the forest for the
20:43
Speaker 2: trees and not see or at least make space for
20:47
Speaker 2: the things that you really want. And in my case,
20:51
Speaker 2: very specifically, that was love and a partnership and a
20:54
Speaker 2: true partnership. And I think unsubscribing helped me kind of
20:58
Speaker 2: not only create this space literally in my calendar for
21:02
Speaker 2: things like dates and for a relationship to bloom and blossom.
21:08
Speaker 2: But you know, some of the work that I talk
21:10
Speaker 2: about in the book and some of the writing that
21:12
Speaker 2: I do with respect to underlying beliefs is to challenge,
21:17
Speaker 2: you know, our sense of what is love, what is marriage?
21:20
Speaker 2: Where do you get the ideas and beliefs that you
21:23
Speaker 2: have about those things? And if they're not serving you,
21:27
Speaker 2: how can you kind of rewrite them and re envision
21:29
Speaker 2: them and understand them through the lens of you know,
21:33
Speaker 2: for me now a forty seven year old adult as
21:36
Speaker 2: opposed to perhaps a seventeen year old kid, and that
21:40
Speaker 2: kind of work I think has been really powerful for
21:42
Speaker 2: me because it has really allowed my partnership to bloom
21:47
Speaker 2: so lots of different ways.
21:49
Speaker 1: Congratulations on finding your love and your thank you, Thank
21:53
Speaker 1: You're very welcome. My guest is Julio Vincent Gambuto his
21:57
Speaker 1: book Please unsubscribe. Thanks, How to take back our time,
22:01
Speaker 1: attention and purpose and a world designed to bury us
22:05
Speaker 1: in bs. Julia, kindly tell us where we can find
22:08
Speaker 1: out more about you and your work and also where
22:10
Speaker 1: we can get your books.
22:12
Speaker 2: Sure so, I always recommend your local indie bookstore, but
22:16
Speaker 2: also Barnes and Noble has been very good to us.
22:17
Speaker 2: We were the Pick of the Month in August of
22:20
Speaker 2: last year and when the paperback came out. You can
22:23
Speaker 2: also just go to my website which is Julio Vincent
22:26
Speaker 2: dot com j u l Io Vincent dot com and.
22:31
Speaker 1: We'll be back with more of Julio after these words.
22:33
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22:59
Speaker 3: to creating community and providing conscious content, they aspire to
23:03
Speaker 3: uplift humanity on a global scale. Home Times co creating
23:07
Speaker 3: a more conscious lifestyle.
23:10
Speaker 1: Back on Vox Novus. My guest this week Julio Vincent
23:13
Speaker 1: Gambuto his book Please Unsubscribe Thanks, How to take back
23:18
Speaker 1: our time, attention, and purpose in a world designed to
23:22
Speaker 1: bury us in be as. Julio, how did your friends
23:25
Speaker 1: and family react to your unsubscribing?
23:29
Speaker 2: Ah, they thought I was very strange. I think they, well,
23:37
Speaker 2: those who read the book really kind of understood that
23:39
Speaker 2: it was very much a thoughtful process. I think if
23:44
Speaker 2: you hadn't read the book and you kind of understood
23:47
Speaker 2: that I was stepping away from being constantly connected and
23:51
Speaker 2: always on, you know, you probably thought that I was
23:56
Speaker 2: probably more severely impacted than the pandemic, then you'd like
24:01
Speaker 2: I think they were wonderful about it and have come
24:04
Speaker 2: to understand what that means for our relationships as well.
24:08
Speaker 2: And all it means is with respect to those friends
24:12
Speaker 2: and family, is just healthier boundaries.
24:14
Speaker 1: Really.
24:16
Speaker 2: But I will tell you I walked into a lunch
24:20
Speaker 2: one day at a restaurant, and it was a large restaurant,
24:23
Speaker 2: and I was meeting a friend, and the major d said, well,
24:29
Speaker 2: can you text your friend and let them know that
24:31
Speaker 2: you're here, because I'm not sure where in the restaurant
24:33
Speaker 2: they are, And I said, I'm so sorry, but I didn't.
24:35
Speaker 2: I don't have my phone with me, don't I don't
24:37
Speaker 2: take it out with me when I go to lunch.
24:39
Speaker 2: And she looked at me like I had five heads.
24:43
Speaker 2: She looked at me like I was an alien walking
24:47
Speaker 2: the planet. And she said, oh, my gosh, you're making
24:49
Speaker 2: me so nervous. No phone. And I said, you know,
24:54
Speaker 2: the phone makes me nervous, so I just choose not
24:57
Speaker 2: to take it for certain events or lunch or meetings
25:01
Speaker 2: or whatever it might be. And she just thought it
25:03
Speaker 2: was the oddest thing in the world. So I've gotten
25:06
Speaker 2: every response and reaction you could possibly imagine.
25:09
Speaker 1: At this point, you had mentioned having your relationship in
25:14
Speaker 1: Sue when you started unsubscribing. How do you see automated
25:18
Speaker 1: behaviors and societal pressures impacting individual happiness?
25:23
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that's really the crux of my book, Victor,
25:27
Speaker 2: which is that you know, in psychology, there are just
25:33
Speaker 2: automated feedback loops each in each of us, in each
25:37
Speaker 2: of our brains and our hearts. It's the way that
25:39
Speaker 2: we're wired, it's the way that we evolve, and those
25:42
Speaker 2: behavioral loops are studied by behavioral psychologists, but behavioral loops
25:48
Speaker 2: are the exact same kind of wiring and framework, if
25:53
Speaker 2: you will, internally that has been used to sell us
25:59
Speaker 2: so much crap. And so there is a direct relationship
26:04
Speaker 2: between our personal psychology and behavioral psychology and consumer psychology,
26:12
Speaker 2: and that is all the same thing. And so when
26:19
Speaker 2: a company sits down in a boardroom and makes decisions
26:22
Speaker 2: about how they're going to market their product to you,
26:25
Speaker 2: they are using insights, best practices, the very best of
26:35
Speaker 2: behavioral psychology. Now I'm not saying that that's all malicious
26:40
Speaker 2: or anything like that. In fact, much of this is
26:42
Speaker 2: done without malice. It's simply done because we somehow have
26:46
Speaker 2: this belief in our country that you can utilize this
26:50
Speaker 2: kind of knowledge as long as you make money doing it.
26:53
Speaker 2: I don't believe that. I think there's a moral and
26:56
Speaker 2: ethical question to be answered, which is is it okay
27:00
Speaker 2: to take data you have that relates to how a
27:06
Speaker 2: consumer might respond to messages of say status and power,
27:11
Speaker 2: and use that to craft messaging or to target them
27:16
Speaker 2: and an ad or to sell them something. Obviously that's
27:20
Speaker 2: a much larger conversation, but you know that is the
27:28
Speaker 2: nature of all of that is meant to be automated
27:31
Speaker 2: now in this new economy. And so if you look
27:34
Speaker 2: at even just the packages that come to your house,
27:38
Speaker 2: if they're on autopilot and they are automated, then whatever
27:45
Speaker 2: stops that behavior from happening, you need to disrupt it
27:48
Speaker 2: if you ever want to change it. And so that behavior,
27:52
Speaker 2: that consumer behavior, reflects that kind of automated nature of
27:58
Speaker 2: our personal psychology. And so we very much are prisoners,
28:05
Speaker 2: if you will, of our automatic thoughts and behaviors. Some
28:09
Speaker 2: of them are good, some of them are not good.
28:13
Speaker 2: But we have found a way to make the economy
28:15
Speaker 2: reflect those automated behaviors. And something like a subscription, which
28:20
Speaker 2: seems like a really silly thing to write a book about, frankly,
28:24
Speaker 2: is the mechanism by which we are able to automate
28:29
Speaker 2: consumer behavior. And so, if we're automating things that are good,
28:35
Speaker 2: that can be a good thing, right. If we are
28:38
Speaker 2: automating the wellness of society, if we're automating giving, loving, contributing,
28:46
Speaker 2: sharing community, that's a no, I'm not going to argue
28:50
Speaker 2: with that. That's incredible. But if what we're automating is
28:55
Speaker 2: wasting resources over consumption, keeping up with the Jones, is
29:01
Speaker 2: not feeling good enough, insecurity, you name it. I don't
29:07
Speaker 2: think we're moving toward a better society. In fact, we're
29:10
Speaker 2: moving toward a worse society because we're automating all of that,
29:13
Speaker 2: and we're amplifying it and amplifying it and amplifying it
29:17
Speaker 2: with all of the tools that we use to automate it. So,
29:22
Speaker 2: you know, a much larger conversation which you can kind
29:24
Speaker 2: of find in the first hundred pages of the book.
29:26
Speaker 2: But you know, autopilot is not a good thing all
29:31
Speaker 2: the time, but it has been sold to us in
29:34
Speaker 2: the last twenty years, especially in the last five or ten,
29:38
Speaker 2: as an incredible thing. Right, It's convenience, it's everything you've
29:43
Speaker 2: ever wanted on repeat forever. Oh my god, who wouldn't
29:47
Speaker 2: want that. The truth is that automation can amplify some
29:53
Speaker 2: of the worst things in our society, and I think
29:55
Speaker 2: we're seeing that happen.
29:57
Speaker 1: And long before AI as a childhood the early nineteen fifties,
30:02
Speaker 1: I remember how advertising was designed to get you to
30:05
Speaker 1: buy everything, including things that were not good for you,
30:08
Speaker 1: such as cigarettes. I remember cigarette commercials back then, where
30:12
Speaker 1: a doctor would be smoking cigarettes and he says, this
30:14
Speaker 1: is the best cigarette to smoke and program that into
30:17
Speaker 1: the population who ultimately were getting lung cancer and other
30:21
Speaker 1: diseases from smoking.
30:23
Speaker 2: Absolutely, and that's where I think, you know, we are
30:26
Speaker 2: in we are we are in dangerous territory when we
30:31
Speaker 2: don't question you know, what it is that we're automating.
30:35
Speaker 2: I'm hopeful about the future. I think we live in
30:38
Speaker 2: an incredible place and I think that you know, our
30:40
Speaker 2: nation goes through ups and downs, as every society does,
30:45
Speaker 2: but I think we have to be really mindful of
30:47
Speaker 2: how we use these tools.
30:49
Speaker 1: And in your book you allude to the importance of
30:52
Speaker 1: brand literacy. Please explain absolutely.
30:56
Speaker 2: So. You know, when we were kids, you know, there
30:58
Speaker 2: was you know, you went to the and we were like, yeah,
31:01
Speaker 2: this is the gap. Great, I get a nice pair
31:02
Speaker 2: of jeans and a T shirt and that's the gap.
31:05
Speaker 2: Now brands are everywhere, and they're quite insidious. They are
31:10
Speaker 2: in every parts of our life. They are in our mailbox,
31:13
Speaker 2: our email box, our phone. We see messages from them
31:16
Speaker 2: all the time, on every screen, all day long. And
31:21
Speaker 2: that's what is contributing to and just frankly is the
31:26
Speaker 2: noise of the world. Right now, right is that we
31:28
Speaker 2: are being marketed to at every turn, every moment of
31:32
Speaker 2: the day. And so I advocate for brand literacy, just
31:36
Speaker 2: meaning understanding how brands work, how they're incentivized, what it
31:42
Speaker 2: is that they want, how they're built, what they're built for,
31:48
Speaker 2: how they express themselves. You know, if you look at
31:52
Speaker 2: any given industry, you might say, oh my gosh, there
31:57
Speaker 2: are you know, fifty brands in this industry, when in actuality,
32:03
Speaker 2: every ten brands are owned by another brand and owned
32:07
Speaker 2: and if you trace it all back up the ladder,
32:10
Speaker 2: there's only about five or six companies in every given industry.
32:14
Speaker 2: You know, in the nineties, we used to have twelve
32:17
Speaker 2: separate airline carriers in the United States major ones. Now
32:21
Speaker 2: we have three or four. And so that consolidation has
32:26
Speaker 2: led to this, and trust policy has led to this.
32:33
Speaker 2: Our lack of enforcement about antitrust laws has led to this.
32:37
Speaker 2: So there's been a lot of factors that have gotten
32:39
Speaker 2: us here. But we're at a point now where brands
32:42
Speaker 2: dominate and they can kind of spin themselves into whatever
32:48
Speaker 2: version of themselves they need to to get you to
32:51
Speaker 2: buy something. Now, I do not think that we don't
32:55
Speaker 2: have personal responsibility in all of this. Yes, as consumers,
32:58
Speaker 2: we have to be aware enough to make smart choices.
33:03
Speaker 2: But you can't make smart choices if you don't understand
33:06
Speaker 2: how these things are designed. So when I advocate for
33:09
Speaker 2: brand literacy, I also advocate for tech literacy. I think that,
33:15
Speaker 2: like our young people need to be taught how brands work,
33:20
Speaker 2: how money works, how technology works. Because if we're going
33:25
Speaker 2: to go into you know, a world that will frankly
33:28
Speaker 2: we already live in that is so brand heavy, and
33:32
Speaker 2: that our young people are being marketed to all day
33:35
Speaker 2: long on their own devices, they've got to be aware
33:38
Speaker 2: of how this all, how all this works, so that
33:41
Speaker 2: they can make smart choices.
33:43
Speaker 1: And you say, we have to get a hold of
33:45
Speaker 1: saying yes, no.
33:48
Speaker 2: Yeah, We've got to stop saying yes all the time.
33:50
Speaker 2: I mean, look, we live in a culture that says
33:53
Speaker 2: like say yes to the dress, right, like say yes
33:55
Speaker 2: to carpe DM make sure you say yes to every opportunity.
34:00
Speaker 2: And I am now, my partner is not American, and
34:06
Speaker 2: my partner comes from a society that was socialists and
34:09
Speaker 2: is becoming capitalist over the last twenty years. And you
34:14
Speaker 2: can just sort of see in our life experience and
34:17
Speaker 2: in how we understand the way that everything from stores
34:25
Speaker 2: to the economy works. That you know, I was sort
34:28
Speaker 2: of raised in a society that said yes to everything,
34:32
Speaker 2: and he was very comfortably raised in a society that
34:35
Speaker 2: wasn't taught that. And you can see it in our
34:38
Speaker 2: day to day interactions because I am a people pleaser
34:43
Speaker 2: to the nth degree, because I was raised in this
34:46
Speaker 2: society that says, if you say no, you will be
34:50
Speaker 2: passing up the opportunity to somehow climb the social ladder
34:55
Speaker 2: or improve your socioeconomic status, or by that product that's
35:01
Speaker 2: going to change your life, whatever that is. By contrast,
35:07
Speaker 2: he was not raised in a society like that, and
35:09
Speaker 2: so he is much more comfortable simply saying no to
35:12
Speaker 2: the things that he does not want or the things
35:14
Speaker 2: that he feels he does not need. I'm very bad
35:16
Speaker 2: at it, and I've had to sort of teach myself
35:18
Speaker 2: in my forties how to say no. And look, there's
35:24
Speaker 2: an embarrassment of riches in America. We have access to
35:27
Speaker 2: everything all the time, whenever we want it, whenever we
35:29
Speaker 2: need it. But I do think that will be healthier individuals, mentally, emotionally,
35:35
Speaker 2: perhaps even physically if we learned how to say no more.
35:40
Speaker 2: I think that helps protect our day to day energy more.
35:44
Speaker 2: I think that helps protect our calendar and protect our inbox.
35:48
Speaker 2: I think it helps us protect our mental space so
35:52
Speaker 2: that when the things that come along that truly matter
35:55
Speaker 2: to us, we have the time and energy and attention
35:58
Speaker 2: and focus and cash to say yes. When you say
36:03
Speaker 2: yes to everything, you sort of constantly drain yourself.
36:07
Speaker 1: I know about people pleasing. My childhood relationship with my
36:10
Speaker 1: dad engendered the sense that if you care for others,
36:13
Speaker 1: you will be loved, and so I became a people
36:16
Speaker 1: pleaser following this ultimately resulting in my own health issues
36:20
Speaker 1: being neglected. And this led to an awakening. In your case,
36:24
Speaker 1: it was in your forties, in my case, my fifties,
36:26
Speaker 1: and the creation of healthy boundaries. I learned it was
36:29
Speaker 1: okay to say no when my energy was being usurped,
36:32
Speaker 1: and to only say yes when appropriate. I've been writing
36:35
Speaker 1: poetry since I was a kid, and this inspired a poem.
36:38
Speaker 1: Can I share that with you is It's called the
36:40
Speaker 1: healing power of no. A time comes for choosing rather
36:45
Speaker 1: than losing the essence that makes us so and in
36:49
Speaker 1: the bestowing there's a power in knowing the freedom that
36:53
Speaker 1: comes with no, when said with compassion, not angry in fashion,
36:58
Speaker 1: and letting the self love flow. There's a sense of
37:01
Speaker 1: renewing and deep soul in viewing the awareness that comes
37:05
Speaker 1: with no. So with gentle voice and the power of
37:09
Speaker 1: choice and the courage to make it so. I'm still here,
37:13
Speaker 1: my friends. There's no means in this end, just the
37:17
Speaker 1: healing that comes with no.
37:21
Speaker 2: Wow, Victor, that's incredible, and that should be all over
37:27
Speaker 2: the internet right now.
37:29
Speaker 1: Well it is. I've shared it on Facebook.
37:30
Speaker 4: Good.
37:31
Speaker 2: I'm glad. I'm glad.
37:32
Speaker 1: I actually published a book of poetry last September, and
37:34
Speaker 1: it would be my place. I want to send you
37:35
Speaker 1: a copy. Send you a copy of that book, and
37:37
Speaker 1: we're done. Absolutely, that's incredible.
37:40
Speaker 2: I mean, look, you've hit the nail on the head
37:43
Speaker 2: in the most poetic way possible. Yeah, there is great
37:47
Speaker 2: power in no, and there is great power in yes.
37:52
Speaker 2: But you have to know when to wield both of them.
37:56
Speaker 2: And I think the older you get, perhaps from my
37:59
Speaker 2: generation who was raised in this sort of way of
38:04
Speaker 2: people pleasing in the eighties and nineties because the economy
38:07
Speaker 2: was what it was, we have sort of learned now
38:11
Speaker 2: later on life the power of no. But if you
38:16
Speaker 2: look back at the last you know, fifty to one
38:19
Speaker 2: hundred years in our country, we've been trained. And I
38:22
Speaker 2: don't use these words to be provocative. I simply use
38:26
Speaker 2: them because you know this is we've been conditioned to
38:30
Speaker 2: say yes to everything, and there's incredible power in understanding
38:36
Speaker 2: your own boundaries and what you need to get through
38:39
Speaker 2: the day of the week, the month, you know, life,
38:42
Speaker 2: and to be able to say no to the things
38:44
Speaker 2: that are just not going to fit.
38:46
Speaker 1: We are aware of the negative effects tech addiction has
38:51
Speaker 1: for kids, but what about adults.
38:54
Speaker 2: I mean, it's so interesting that you say that, because
38:56
Speaker 2: you know I, like many other people, I have read
39:00
Speaker 2: Jonathan Higg's book The Anxious Generation, and I think he
39:05
Speaker 2: has focused on children rightfully so because it's a very
39:10
Speaker 2: pressing issue. I think my book is a little bit
39:14
Speaker 2: broader and sort of calls on us as adults to
39:17
Speaker 2: also do the things, or at least respond knowing how
39:22
Speaker 2: dangerous this is. I think it's as dangerous for adults
39:27
Speaker 2: as it is for kids. I don't think that because
39:29
Speaker 2: you're older, you somehow automatically have more wisdom about these tools.
39:35
Speaker 2: I think there are plenty of people who do and
39:38
Speaker 2: are able to kind of regulate themselves better than perhaps children.
39:43
Speaker 2: But I don't think your age necessarily dictates that you
39:47
Speaker 2: somehow have the power no matter what, you're more responsible,
39:51
Speaker 2: you're an adult, you should have the power dot dot dot.
39:54
Speaker 2: But I see plenty of adults who are just as
39:56
Speaker 2: addicted to their phones as kids. And I see plenty
39:59
Speaker 2: of adults of adults who are just as addicted. It's
40:01
Speaker 2: not even so much to the phone. It's to the
40:04
Speaker 2: validation and the the literal likes and love that the
40:12
Speaker 2: phone gives them. And I you know, it's we're taught
40:18
Speaker 2: not to judge one another in this way, but I
40:20
Speaker 2: think at this point in our society, we've been taught
40:24
Speaker 2: so much not to judge each other that we're sort
40:26
Speaker 2: of scared to to disagree. But I think ultimately this
40:32
Speaker 2: is a dangerous position for a society to be in,
40:34
Speaker 2: right where we're getting that kind of validation and praise
40:41
Speaker 2: and you know, our cup is being filled digitally instead
40:46
Speaker 2: of with, you know, by human interaction and human connection,
40:51
Speaker 2: and you know, sort of will unwittingly it has become
40:54
Speaker 2: the theme of most of my work. But yeah, I
40:57
Speaker 2: think It's time to kind of wake up to the
41:01
Speaker 2: fact that this little machine in my hand is not
41:04
Speaker 2: going to give me the things that are necessarily make
41:07
Speaker 2: a fulfilling life.
41:09
Speaker 1: My guest Julio Vincent Gambuto his book Please Unsubscribe, Thanks,
41:14
Speaker 1: How to take back our time, attention and Purpose and
41:17
Speaker 1: a world designed to bury us in bs. We'll be
41:19
Speaker 1: back with more after these words on the Own Times
41:22
Speaker 1: radio network.
41:25
Speaker 5: Humanity Healing International is a small nonprofit with a big dream.
41:29
Speaker 5: Since two thousand and seven, HHI has been working tirelessly
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41:50
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41:54
Speaker 2: Hello.
41:55
Speaker 4: I'm Sandy sedgeby a host of Home Times Magazine's Flagshit
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Speaker 4: radio show. What is going on? My passion is sifting
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42:06
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43:01
Speaker 1: Back on Vox Novus. My guest this week Julio Vincent
43:05
Speaker 1: Gambuto his book Please Unsubscribe Thanks, How to take back
43:10
Speaker 1: Our time, attention and Purpose and a World Designed to
43:13
Speaker 1: Bury Us in BS. Let's take a look at some
43:16
Speaker 1: of the practical steps that readers can use to unsubscribe
43:20
Speaker 1: from the aspects of life that no longer serve them.
43:22
Speaker 1: Tell us about digital detoks.
43:25
Speaker 2: Sure, you know, there's a couple of ways you can
43:27
Speaker 2: really sort of flirt with all of this if you will,
43:30
Speaker 2: or get your feet wet, And one of them is
43:33
Speaker 2: to just do a digital detox where you look at
43:36
Speaker 2: a week or a month or three months, whatever you're
43:41
Speaker 2: comfortable committing to, and you step away from all the
43:46
Speaker 2: digital tethers that keep you going, going, going. So what
43:49
Speaker 2: do I mean by that? I mean stepping away from Facebook, Instagram, TikTok,
43:55
Speaker 2: whatever it might be. You can take it off of
43:58
Speaker 2: your phone, just delete the app and maybe just reserve
44:02
Speaker 2: it for your desktop, just use the desktop version. You
44:06
Speaker 2: can do things like I do this thing where I
44:09
Speaker 2: unsubscribe from five accounts every time I'm on social media.
44:14
Speaker 2: So you know, well, we all know that, Like there's
44:17
Speaker 2: plenty of people on there that you don't even know
44:20
Speaker 2: how you got, Like, you don't even know how they
44:21
Speaker 2: got on your screen. You don't know how you know them.
44:25
Speaker 2: You wouldn't recognize them on the street. They wouldn't say
44:27
Speaker 2: happy birthday to you, So why are you looking at
44:30
Speaker 2: what they're doing all day? So my practice is that
44:33
Speaker 2: every time I'm on social media, I delete five So
44:38
Speaker 2: whether it's an organization, a brand, a person, and trust me,
44:42
Speaker 2: there are way more than five that you scroll through
44:45
Speaker 2: that you're uninterested in. So I do that as a practice.
44:49
Speaker 2: I do a practice. I think you can do a
44:51
Speaker 2: digital detox by simply doing what I mentioned earlier, going
44:54
Speaker 2: to lunch one day without a phone, going to a
44:58
Speaker 2: meeting one day without a phone. Obviously, do it safely,
45:01
Speaker 2: know where you're going, get the directions first, all of
45:04
Speaker 2: the above, but test yourself, you know, push yourself in
45:07
Speaker 2: small ways to breathe the air and you know, literally
45:13
Speaker 2: step on the grass, if not literally figuratively, and reconnect
45:18
Speaker 2: with nature in ways that perhaps you don't do because
45:21
Speaker 2: you are so tethered. I'm not pretending any of this
45:25
Speaker 2: is easy, Victor. It is quite difficult. But I do
45:28
Speaker 2: think that once you start in small ways, you get
45:31
Speaker 2: to sort of remind yourself in those ways that that
45:37
Speaker 2: in fact, there is a whole world happening if you
45:41
Speaker 2: look up from your screen. So yeah, digital detacs I
45:45
Speaker 2: think is really important, and it can be sort of
45:46
Speaker 2: a length of your choosing. It doesn't have to be,
45:48
Speaker 2: you know, really onerous.
45:50
Speaker 1: And one of the things that I started doing actually
45:52
Speaker 1: last year and continue to do to today? Is I
45:55
Speaker 1: mute every possible notification on the phone and computer?
45:59
Speaker 2: Oh that is like yes, that that is stage one
46:04
Speaker 2: for me, absolutely, Like nothing pings all day long. I
46:08
Speaker 2: don't want to feel like I have lobby and dog
46:11
Speaker 2: all day. So I think it's really important to just
46:15
Speaker 2: silence everything. You know. Look, if you're a mom and
46:18
Speaker 2: you have kids, or there's like particular moments in your
46:21
Speaker 2: day or people that you need to hear from and
46:23
Speaker 2: the things are in an emergency, obviously you know, make
46:27
Speaker 2: those adjustments as you see fit. But I think as
46:29
Speaker 2: a general rule, like yes, turn all the pings and
46:33
Speaker 2: the dings and the rings off. You know where to
46:36
Speaker 2: get the information, you know where it's housed, you know
46:38
Speaker 2: where it will come. You go to it instead of
46:42
Speaker 2: having it come to you in the most disruptive way possible.
46:46
Speaker 1: You know, And you say, downtech your devices.
46:51
Speaker 2: Ah, you know I did. This is the subject of
46:54
Speaker 2: a lot of debate and actually is becoming more popular online.
46:59
Speaker 2: But it's really I I got rid of my iPhone.
47:03
Speaker 2: I think I did it for three and a half years,
47:07
Speaker 2: and I had I had a phone called a jitterbug,
47:12
Speaker 2: which is actually made for senior citizens. It is uh,
47:17
Speaker 2: you know, has a large type and a button that
47:19
Speaker 2: you press if you fall down. It was sort of
47:22
Speaker 2: a ridiculous thing for me to be carrying around, but
47:26
Speaker 2: I loved it because I didn't It didn't really have
47:30
Speaker 2: anything on it. It just had the ability to call.
47:33
Speaker 2: I suppose you could text if you wanted to, kind
47:36
Speaker 2: of you know, text like it was nineteen ninety seven
47:38
Speaker 2: and kind of you know, put you know, three three
47:41
Speaker 2: taps in for every letter or whatever it is. But
47:44
Speaker 2: I did down tech. And when you when you use
47:46
Speaker 2: the word down tech, what I simply mean by downtech
47:50
Speaker 2: is not upgrading all day long, right, not upgrading every
47:53
Speaker 2: time there's a new operating system, there's a new hardware,
47:57
Speaker 2: there's a new laptop, there's a new angle gadget, But
48:01
Speaker 2: rather downtecking and sort of going to the devices, hardware
48:06
Speaker 2: and software that are perhaps not the latest generation in
48:14
Speaker 2: order to create more time and space. You know, this
48:16
Speaker 2: doesn't work for everybody, and obviously there are people who
48:18
Speaker 2: run businesses off of software that needs to be current,
48:21
Speaker 2: et cetera, et cetera. But I did it with my phone,
48:24
Speaker 2: and you know, I don't regret it.
48:26
Speaker 1: And your next one is probably my favorite. Unsubscribe from
48:30
Speaker 1: automated emails.
48:34
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think this is hard because they they creep
48:37
Speaker 2: up like weeds. But what I do recommend is that,
48:40
Speaker 2: you know, you spend a week, call it unsubscribed week,
48:44
Speaker 2: and don't do it on Monday. From Monday to Thursday,
48:48
Speaker 2: just put every email that's automated and automated mass email
48:52
Speaker 2: into a folder, like as it comes in all day long.
48:55
Speaker 2: Just put it into a folder. And then on Friday,
48:58
Speaker 2: take a look in that folder and first really appreciate
49:02
Speaker 2: how many emails you get in a week, especially from
49:05
Speaker 2: the same brands and the same companies and organizations over
49:09
Speaker 2: and over again. But then go in and you know,
49:13
Speaker 2: go in and unsubscribe. And so you know, if you
49:15
Speaker 2: hit certain buttons on certain systems that tell you that
49:18
Speaker 2: they'll take you off the mailing list, I don't trust
49:21
Speaker 2: any of that. Some of it works, some of it doesn't.
49:23
Speaker 2: You know, you have to really go into each of
49:25
Speaker 2: these and unsubscribe and take your name out. There are
49:29
Speaker 2: some systems that can help you do it. There are
49:31
Speaker 2: some apps that can help you do it. You know,
49:34
Speaker 2: in the most extreme case, you can kind of just
49:36
Speaker 2: start over and get a new email address. That's not
49:38
Speaker 2: always practical for people, but I do think if you
49:43
Speaker 2: take a look at how many automated emails you get
49:46
Speaker 2: all day long, it's not even a matter of the
49:50
Speaker 2: message that they're sending you. The goal really is to
49:55
Speaker 2: put their name on your screen. So the goal is
49:58
Speaker 2: not even what's in the email. The goal is to
50:01
Speaker 2: simply flash their logo or flash their name in your
50:05
Speaker 2: inbox that day so that you keep them top of mind,
50:09
Speaker 2: so that they are in your brain and in the conversation.
50:13
Speaker 2: So you know, marketing teams all over the country are
50:16
Speaker 2: sending out emails two, three, four times a day simply
50:20
Speaker 2: for that purpose. So yeah, I absolutely recommend that. And because,
50:24
Speaker 2: like I said earlier, you know, the inbox is really
50:27
Speaker 2: a representation of your mind. And if you can control
50:30
Speaker 2: the inbox, or at least architecture in a way that
50:34
Speaker 2: has some space, you can you can certainly lower your anxiety.
50:39
Speaker 1: And you have several more. But the last one I
50:41
Speaker 1: want to talk about today is decide how you want
50:44
Speaker 1: to use texting.
50:47
Speaker 2: I think it's really important, you know. I think in
50:49
Speaker 2: the beginning of this digital revolution, we kind of all
50:54
Speaker 2: bought into this idea. Subscribe to this idea if you
50:57
Speaker 2: will that you know that text had to be responded
51:01
Speaker 2: to immediately, that you could reach anybody on a text message,
51:04
Speaker 2: and therefore you should reach anybody on text message, that
51:09
Speaker 2: group chats and text chains were efficient. You know, we've
51:14
Speaker 2: been sold a lot of stories about this, but ultimately,
51:18
Speaker 2: you know, I think you just have to make the
51:20
Speaker 2: decision that this is a channel. This is a channel
51:24
Speaker 2: of communication, and how do I want to use it.
51:27
Speaker 2: It's the same thing as Facebook or Instagram and the
51:31
Speaker 2: inboxes that come with them, or your email or these
51:35
Speaker 2: are all different channels of communication. So it's okay to
51:40
Speaker 2: set boundaries and structures about how you will use them,
51:44
Speaker 2: how often you'll use them, how often you'll check them,
51:47
Speaker 2: and maybe what you'll use them for. You know, I
51:50
Speaker 2: have a friend who only she says mommies, only mommies
51:55
Speaker 2: on text message, meaning her texts are just full of
51:59
Speaker 2: other mothers and fathers, people in the neighborhood, the school,
52:03
Speaker 2: her kids. That's like her mommy channel. So if anything
52:07
Speaker 2: comes to it that's from a retailer or a marketer,
52:11
Speaker 2: or a political campaign, or even a friend or a
52:14
Speaker 2: colleague or a work or anything, she kicks those people
52:18
Speaker 2: out of the texts, meaning she takes it to email.
52:21
Speaker 2: She says, Nope, this is not the right spot for it.
52:24
Speaker 2: I'll meet you on email, or I'll get back to
52:25
Speaker 2: you tomorrow by email, or you know, hit me up
52:28
Speaker 2: somewhere else. Is that more management? I suppose it is.
52:33
Speaker 2: But it does keep the channels cleaner and clearer so
52:36
Speaker 2: that you're not exhausting yourself sort of managing not only
52:40
Speaker 2: your children, but your you know, local congress person's campaign
52:44
Speaker 2: and your Verizon bill all in the same breath.
52:48
Speaker 1: Absolutely. One of the things that I've personally become aware
52:51
Speaker 1: of in the last twenty five years is the importance
52:54
Speaker 1: of creating sacred space. How do you define this and
52:58
Speaker 1: why is it important in your process?
53:00
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean that's probably the thing I would love
53:03
Speaker 2: your listeners to get the most from this conversation. It's
53:08
Speaker 2: not just you know who wants to read the three
53:13
Speaker 2: hundred page book about email. I don't write the book
53:17
Speaker 2: is really about creating sacred space. And sacred space to
53:22
Speaker 2: me is space that is yours in which you can
53:26
Speaker 2: do anything, think anything, feel anything, be anything, and if
53:32
Speaker 2: you're lucky and you're in a relationship that protects that
53:35
Speaker 2: sacred space. Then you're probably with someone who appreciates the
53:40
Speaker 2: sacredness of that space or the sanctity of that space.
53:43
Speaker 2: And for most of us, this is our homes, right,
53:46
Speaker 2: and this is but our homes have been invaded, if
53:50
Speaker 2: you will, and I don't love that word, but our
53:52
Speaker 2: homes have been overrun and overwhelmed with intrusive messages, pings, rings,
54:01
Speaker 2: dings in so many formats and in so many ways,
54:07
Speaker 2: and so well. A lot of what I'm advocating is
54:09
Speaker 2: simply to return to a place of sacred space, so
54:13
Speaker 2: that your home is a place of joy and comfort
54:16
Speaker 2: and love and support and is not a switchboard for
54:22
Speaker 2: you know, the world's or America's marketers. Right that that
54:29
Speaker 2: whether you choose to define sacred space as the home
54:32
Speaker 2: or your yoga mat or your bathroom is completely up
54:36
Speaker 2: to you. That's not for me to say. But the
54:39
Speaker 2: world is a noisy, noisy place, and it's only getting noisier,
54:43
Speaker 2: and with the rise of AI it will get even
54:46
Speaker 2: more chaotic, I think, And so I think the need
54:51
Speaker 2: for sacred space is all the more important, and something
54:58
Speaker 2: incredible happens. Victor when you create and live in a
55:02
Speaker 2: sacred space, you get to hear yourself. You get to
55:05
Speaker 2: hear yourself think, you get to hear what you think
55:08
Speaker 2: about the world. You get to very or i should
55:13
Speaker 2: say more easily connect to your values and your ethics
55:17
Speaker 2: and your desires and your love. And something really special
55:23
Speaker 2: happens when you sort of practice creating safe spaces like
55:27
Speaker 2: that or sacred spaces like that, is you get to
55:29
Speaker 2: hear yourself again. And that's really kind of what this
55:32
Speaker 2: process has been for me. So that's why I wrote
55:35
Speaker 2: a book to help other people do it.
55:36
Speaker 1: His name is Julio Vincent Cambuto. His book please unsubscribe.
55:40
Speaker 1: Thanks How to take back our time, attention, and purpose
55:44
Speaker 1: and a world designed to bury us and be us.
55:47
Speaker 1: Julia one more time, please share with our listeners with
55:49
Speaker 1: and get your book and find out more about you
55:51
Speaker 1: and your wonderful work.
55:53
Speaker 2: Well, thank you. My website kind of has everything. I'm
55:55
Speaker 2: at Julio Vincent dot com. Julio like Julio j u
55:59
Speaker 2: l io dot com. And the book is available at
56:05
Speaker 2: your local independent bookseller or at Barnes and Noble, and yeah,
56:11
Speaker 2: check it out.
56:12
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for joining us and sharing this
56:14
Speaker 1: wisdom which our world needs right now. Thanks Victer, thanks
56:18
Speaker 1: for having me and thank you for joining us on
56:20
Speaker 1: Box Novus. I'm Victor, the voice Urman. Have a wonderful week.