(TLDR: How do you guys keep giving value knowing there are people who will take full advantage of it? How do you deal with it when situations arise where giving value results in a very bad experience? Is there some way you guys keep yourselves protected, and how do you deal with pure value takers?)
Hey all,
So the last few nights, I've been having situations where giving value nonstop to everyone I meet, has come back to soundly bite me on the rear. I was getting very into the idea of giving as much value as possible to everyone I met, because I've also been receiving value back like crazy and it's been very cool. However, I'm at a loss as to what to do about value takers who are totally out to suck value - people who seem to almost get a thrill out of finding someone who gives off value to drain like a vampire. I'll give a recent example that I feel highlights my point:
I have a guy who I considered to be a good friend who does speaking events all over the world for a company I was involved with. We'll call him Bob. Before Bob came to my town for said speaking event this week, his assistant contacted me via Facebook to tell me that Bob had let him know that I might be able to help in finding someone who'd host him (the assistant) while they were in town.
Now, I had never met this fellow - but given that he was Bob's assistant, I assumed he'd be a decent guy. And, give value all the time, 100%, right?
Well I went with this assumption, and contacted several people whom I knew who might have a place for him to stay. Once I found someone (another friend of mine who's very nice, we'll call him Jim), I contacted Bob's assistant to let him know. The next day, Jim sends me a text letting me know that an entire assistant team showed up to surprise him in his studio apartment.
I freaked out a bit - did I actually miss Bob's assistant telling me that it was a whole team that needed a place? Frantically I checked my facebook conversation with him - and found that he stated clearly that he was the only one who needed a place to stay. I felt a sharp pang of indignation flare up and quickly shot off a text to Jim apologizing for this. He said that even though things were a bit cramped that it was no problem, to which I was relieved. I filed the situation into the back of my mind and chalked it up to maybe just being a miscommunication...or something.
The next day was the day of the pre-event upsell talk. I arrived early and got to meet the assistants in person. They turned out to be complete dbags...extremely rude and ill-mannered. I explained who I was, thinking that may change their attitudes a bit...to no avail. At one point, I was mid-sentence speaking to the guy and he just turns away from me and walks off to go talk to someone else.
Wow.
If that had been the end of it, I would've just written off the situation and not thought much more about it. But lo, cruel fate had other plans for my evening. I live about an hour outside of San Francisco and don't have a car, so to actually attend the event (it's a 3 day weekend seminar), I needed a place to stay in the city. Days before this all happened, I asked another speaker at the event (another "friend" of mine) if I could stay with him so I could attend Bob's seminar. He agreed to it and was going to meet me at the pre-sell speech. Halfway through, he randomly left the event and didn't return my calls or texts asking if I could drop my things off at his house.
Derp!
So after the event was over, I decided to make a mad dash to catch the last train home (which I just barely made), or else be stuck outside in the city with my belongings all night long.
Normally I would've called up Jim, the one who offered to host Bob's assistant, and would've been able to stay with him. But since he already had a full 3 person douchebag team in his studio apartment, there was no space available for me. So in a very tangible way, I feel like giving value came back to bite me squarely in the a$$.
I know I see posts from time to time by guys like zend***phin where they talk about things like this happening, but I'm wondering how giving value applies to situations like these? Is there some way to protect yourself from these people and potential situations? I almost feel hesitant to give full value in the future because of this... I mean, thinking about this situation happening again in the future is very worrying to me.
So to close out a probably overly-long post, I'll just ask:
How do you guys keep giving value knowing these things happen? How do you deal with it when situations like that arise? Is there some way you guys keep yourselves protected, and how do you deal with pure value takers?
Hey all,
So the last few nights, I've been having situations where giving value nonstop to everyone I meet, has come back to soundly bite me on the rear. I was getting very into the idea of giving as much value as possible to everyone I met, because I've also been receiving value back like crazy and it's been very cool. However, I'm at a loss as to what to do about value takers who are totally out to suck value - people who seem to almost get a thrill out of finding someone who gives off value to drain like a vampire. I'll give a recent example that I feel highlights my point:
I have a guy who I considered to be a good friend who does speaking events all over the world for a company I was involved with. We'll call him Bob. Before Bob came to my town for said speaking event this week, his assistant contacted me via Facebook to tell me that Bob had let him know that I might be able to help in finding someone who'd host him (the assistant) while they were in town.
Now, I had never met this fellow - but given that he was Bob's assistant, I assumed he'd be a decent guy. And, give value all the time, 100%, right?
Well I went with this assumption, and contacted several people whom I knew who might have a place for him to stay. Once I found someone (another friend of mine who's very nice, we'll call him Jim), I contacted Bob's assistant to let him know. The next day, Jim sends me a text letting me know that an entire assistant team showed up to surprise him in his studio apartment.
I freaked out a bit - did I actually miss Bob's assistant telling me that it was a whole team that needed a place? Frantically I checked my facebook conversation with him - and found that he stated clearly that he was the only one who needed a place to stay. I felt a sharp pang of indignation flare up and quickly shot off a text to Jim apologizing for this. He said that even though things were a bit cramped that it was no problem, to which I was relieved. I filed the situation into the back of my mind and chalked it up to maybe just being a miscommunication...or something.
The next day was the day of the pre-event upsell talk. I arrived early and got to meet the assistants in person. They turned out to be complete dbags...extremely rude and ill-mannered. I explained who I was, thinking that may change their attitudes a bit...to no avail. At one point, I was mid-sentence speaking to the guy and he just turns away from me and walks off to go talk to someone else.
Wow.
If that had been the end of it, I would've just written off the situation and not thought much more about it. But lo, cruel fate had other plans for my evening. I live about an hour outside of San Francisco and don't have a car, so to actually attend the event (it's a 3 day weekend seminar), I needed a place to stay in the city. Days before this all happened, I asked another speaker at the event (another "friend" of mine) if I could stay with him so I could attend Bob's seminar. He agreed to it and was going to meet me at the pre-sell speech. Halfway through, he randomly left the event and didn't return my calls or texts asking if I could drop my things off at his house.
Derp!
So after the event was over, I decided to make a mad dash to catch the last train home (which I just barely made), or else be stuck outside in the city with my belongings all night long.
Normally I would've called up Jim, the one who offered to host Bob's assistant, and would've been able to stay with him. But since he already had a full 3 person douchebag team in his studio apartment, there was no space available for me. So in a very tangible way, I feel like giving value came back to bite me squarely in the a$$.
I know I see posts from time to time by guys like zend***phin where they talk about things like this happening, but I'm wondering how giving value applies to situations like these? Is there some way to protect yourself from these people and potential situations? I almost feel hesitant to give full value in the future because of this... I mean, thinking about this situation happening again in the future is very worrying to me.
So to close out a probably overly-long post, I'll just ask:
How do you guys keep giving value knowing these things happen? How do you deal with it when situations like that arise? Is there some way you guys keep yourselves protected, and how do you deal with pure value takers?
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