A couple people have been getting worried about me lately.
Why?
They think I’m being too… negative sometimes.
That I seem almost angry.
And, that I must have some bad stuff going on in my life or something.
Of course, they’re all wrong.
They’re “projecting” their own BS onto me and others. My life has never been better — so much so, I can’t help but wonder when some hammer is going to drop on me out of the blue.
Angry?
Please.
If anything I would like to conjure up some anger sometimes, as it’s great for productivity.
Negative?
How so?
Writing emails that are designed to protect y’all from getting screwed is positive, not negative. Only a cynic would consider any of my emails (which I am often laughing while writing them) “negative.”
But, at the same time, I don’t pretend to be a nice guy, either.
You can’t be.
Not in this business.
This goes for anyone online.
But especially for service providers.
In fact, my droog Doberman Dan put it perfectly when we were talking about clients and how so many of them are simply not decent people (and who happily take advantage of service providers and screw people over without even thinking about it).
I joked how I think people should be more like Heisenberg.
(From “Breaking Bad”)
Here’s what he said:
Yeah. Me too.
I’m feeling like the reason these fuckers keep wanting me to work for peanuts or free is because I’m perceived as a nice guy.
And my politeness is mistaken for weakness.
I’m thinking about bringing out my inner Heisenberg and turning myself into something downright fucking scary and borderline evil.
And making myself almost a ghost like Heisenberg.
I’m beginning to see it’s better to be feared than liked.
Yeah, baby!
That’s *exactly* it.
You can play the nice guy for a while.
But I can tell you from experience, you WILL get screwed over.
It’s just a matter of time.
People have very fine tuned rationalization hamsters which will spin even the most vile and sinister things they do into gold, as if they’re the victims and are perfectly justified to do whatever they want to others in pursuit of the almighty dinero.
It’s not guys like me and Dan who are negative.
It’s not us who are angry.
And it’s not people who refuse to take crap who are the problem.
It’s the people walking all over their employees, service providers and partners who are negative and angry and the problems.
As they like to make up rules to the game as they go.
We simply do what we have to do to win it.
Ethically?
Definitely.
But win we do, which makes the bad guys even more angry and negative and hellbent on screwing over the next generation of noobs and steal their innocence.
So don’t whine to us about negativity.
Don’t cry because we use some “bad” language once in a while.
And, don’t worry about our well being.
We’re simply playing (and winning) the game.
And that’s the point I want to make:
Don’t hate the player.
Hate the game.
We don’t make the rules.
We simply learn how to win with the cards we have.
You should, too.
Quit being so friggin’ nice already.
Call people out on their bullshit.
Tell dishonest clients where to go.
And, don’t take flack from anyone.
One of the reasons I call my newsletter “Email Players” is because of this. I teach my subscribers how to win the game by writing emails that make lots and lots of sales. That liberate them from relying on client work or worrying about if their sales letters are any “good” (it’s almost irrelevant with email done right) or wasting their lives doing everything the hard way.
There’s a whole other world out there with email the Settle way.
I hear it all the time from subscribers.
They almost can’t believe it when the extra sales roll in.
When they start winning the game.
You can experience it yourself.
But you have to take the first step.
I can’t do it for you.
This is YOUR life.
It’s YOUR business.
And it’s YOUR future.
You can keep playing not to lose.
Or you can play to win.
If you want to play to win, then check out “Email Players” at:
Ben Settle
