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But the truth is, we used to have this the saying in the Secret Service, the truth is simple.
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You don't have to work so hard.
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But so when somebody's really working hard to sell you something, that's when your red flags are up.
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Today's guest is none other than Evy Poumpouras.
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Now, she is a former Secret Service special agent.
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She was part of the protective details for President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama, as well as former Presidents George W. Bush, William J. Clinton, and George H. Bush.
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She worked complex criminal investigations and undercover operations, executed search and arrest warrants, and investigated both violent and financial crimes.
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Evy currently can be seen as an assessor on the Bravo series Spy Games.
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So if you've not seen it, check it out.
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Now, today I'm excited to talk to Evy about her amazing new book called Becoming Bulletproof, Protect Yourself, Read People, Influence Situations, and Live Fiercely.
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And inside she shares the lessons from protecting presidents, as well as insights and skills from the oldest and most elite security force in the world to help you prepare for stressful situations, instantly read people, and really make a difference in your life.
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Evy holds a Master of Science from Columbia University in journalism, a Master of Arts in forensic psychology from Argosy University, and a Bachelor of Arts in political science and international affairs from Hofstra University.
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And as you can see, super academic, super practical, and someone who literally in 2 seconds has made me realize she's also just really nice and kind.
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Evy Poumpouras, Evy, thank you for being here. Hi, Jay.
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Thanks so much for having me.
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You are such an accomplished, incredible individual that the life that you've lived just absolutely fascinates me.
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I don't even know how where to begin, to be honest, and that's not usually me.
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I usually know exactly where to start.
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But also what I love about it, Evie, is and we've never met before and I really hope that one day we do get to meet, but even just interacting with you now, I'm like, how has this person lived in such a tough stressful job, yet your energy is so sweet and kind and soft and loving.
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Like, tell us about that just to start it off with. How does that work?
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I think though people feel that there's only one version of themselves.
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Like, you're just one thing and it's not true.
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Like, there's different versions of us and I I learned this over time.
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Because I would hear people say, "I'm just going to be myself."
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And I always wonder, like, what is myself?
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And I really didn't understand this.
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It was when I became a polygraph examiner, I became an interrogator for the US Secret Service.
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And then I would interview so many people, Jay.
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Like, hundreds of people would come through the door.
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And I learned that I couldn't be one thing with everybody.
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And that people respond to different things and need different things from you.
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And so some people needed a more sensitive version of me.
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Sometimes I needed to bring out a more authoritative version of me.
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But, you you assess people and you you you realize, all right, who's my audience?
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And what's going to resonate best with this audience?
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But, it's still authentic. It's still me.
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And I found that when I started to do this, I began doing this at work.
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But, then I began doing it in my relationships.
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And I realized that it actually strengthened my relationships and it strengthened my communication skills with people because I was really paying attention to people and becoming in tune to them.
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So, if I had somebody who was soft-spoken and shy, I would say, "Okay, this is not a person that Secret Service Evie would really need to be with or to to to to be that type of person."
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But, at the same time, like, you can still be strong and you can still be assertive and you don't have to be a jerk about it.
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You know, you can still have grace and kindness and connect with people.
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And there's actually part of my studies when I studied interviewing and interrogation, and it's really about connecting with people.
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People hear interrogator, and you think of the the TV stuff, and it's it's not like that at all.
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But one of the things I was taught is that the most successful interviewers, like those people that would get confessions or admissions or information from people, they were the ones that were perceived to be competent and then warm.
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So, being fear-based, making people fearful of you, intimidating people, being cold, thinking that that is going to get people to listen to you more, it actually backfires on you.
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You You're already blowing my mind. What a great answer.
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I I couldn't agree with you more, and I love what you said about how it can still be authentic even if you're adapting, because I think people feel like if you're using techniques, then how can you be a You know, how can you care?
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But if you're doing it from a place of compassion and a place of connection and a place of wanting to understand, then that's what brings the authenticity. Am I right? Does that make sense?
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Yeah, it does, because But that's But that's what drives me.
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I think you know, I mean, think of it this way.
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You ever go to a meeting or have a conversation with someone, and it's just bumping heads, confrontational?
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You're thinking, "Why did that happen that way?"
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It's because both people are trying to shove their ideas and their perceptions almost like down the other person's throat, and it doesn't it doesn't resonate.
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I One One of the things I found, like the best in interviewers were the people that uh that made people feel understood.
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Like usually we just want to feel understood, and some people want to feel understood, and they're very aggressive about it.
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Like you'll have someone maybe just yell and scream and you know, give you their opinion on something, but what they're really telling you is like, "I'm not being heard."
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And so, I'm screaming and I'm yelling cuz I want to feel heard.
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And once people feel heard, and if you cannot take it personally and think, you know, how dare you talk to me this way.
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If you can put your ego aside and ego's a big sabotager, but if you can put that aside and just understand, "This doesn't have to do with me.
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This has to do with this person.
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They're not feeling heard by me or by anybody.
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So, let me kind of sit back, be quiet, and listen, and let that that resonate with them.
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And then, after that's done, you know, come back in a more meaningful way.
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I can't tell you how many times I I sit in the interview room and people would just be angry.
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They're angry that they're there.
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They're angry that they're talking to a special agent.
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They're angry that they're talking to me. They're just angry.
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And rather than bump heads and try to put them in their place because truly that would be my ego doing it, I'll say like, "All right, let me just sit back.
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Let me let them vent, honestly."
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And then, once they that was done and the steam came out and, you know, they're exhausted, too, then I could really come in in a meaningful way.
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And now, they've also told me what's resonating with them, what they're upset about.
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And when I speak to them, I can make sure that I I'm thoughtful in my conversation, rather than coming in blind and just pulling things out of nowhere and then saying the wrong thing.
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So, look, could you use this to manipulate power people?
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Like, you know, yes, you could, but it's going to backfire on you cuz people can read through that nonsense eventually.
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But, if you use it in a way to connect with people, and you can use compassion or empathy. I use empathy so much.
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It draws information out of people because when you empathize with people, you build rapport, and they trust you.
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And the more people trust you, the more they open up.
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And that is truly that's interrogation that the best interrogators, to speak.
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And I use interviewing and interrogation interchangeably cuz in the world I came from, truly it's the same thing.
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It's a conversation with people.
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But when you can when you can do that, everybody opens up to you and and you get what you want, whether it's me wanting a confession or admission or information on the case, or even doing a business deal.
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You know, and I work in television and negotiating terms.
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I I make sure to hear what that other person is saying before I say, "Hey, let me tell you what I want."
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Because also when I hear that, I'm thinking, "Okay, this is what's important to them.
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I can bend on this cuz I'm not worried about this so much, but this is what's what's important to me.
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So, I'll bend here, but I won't bend here."
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And so, you can come in a more meaningful way and connect with people. Yeah.
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Do you Do you ever find that people in your personal life, because they know your skills and know what you are, they like always feeling a bit like, "Oh, no, Evie can tell what I'm really thinking."
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Like, do you find that people kind of sometimes like put their guard up when they're around you because they they feel like, "Oh, Evie can see right through me."
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You know, it's interesting.
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Some people will say that.
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Actually, let me say this.
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My family now, they just do whatever they want to me.
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So, I'll just put that out there.
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I don't know why it is, but we can have like degrees and expertise, but when it comes to family, none of that matters. It's true. It's true. Very good point. want to hear it. Yeah.
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But I think it's about connecting with people and I don't But it's genuine, you know, I I I genuinely listen to people because I I I I want to know what they think.
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I care about what they think.
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And so, when it comes from an authentic place, I don't think people see that.
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But when it looks like manufactured, when it looks like and it feels like someone sell you some selling you something, you probably had that.
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We've all had that where you feel like somebody, "All right, this person's trying to sell me really hard."
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And if If something's truthful and genuine, you don't have to sell so hard.
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You know, the truth is we used to have this the saying in the Secret Service, the truth is simple. It's simple.
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You don't have to work so hard.
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But so when somebody's really working hard to sell you something, that's when your red flags are up.
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That's when you're kind of like, "Why is this person working so hard? Something's not right."
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Tell me how you even get to the point before we dive into the book, and I'm really excited for everyone who's just tuning in and watching or listening right now.
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We are talking about Evy's new book called Becoming Bulletproof, which is all about protecting yourself, reading people, influencing situations, and living fearlessly.
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We're going to put the link in the comments section, so you'll be able to buy the book if you're loving this conversation.
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So, Evy, before we even dive into the book, I just want to talk a bit about how you even get there.
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Like, how do you even become the role that you became?
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Like, what does that process take?
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What did you want to do growing up, and how did you find yourself, you know, becoming such a successful secret agent?
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Tell us about that journey and that process.
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Yeah, I will tell you one thing, work, work, and more work.
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Truly, like I My parents are immigrants.
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They came from Greece, and, you know, they were very poor.
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They grew up in poverty in Greece.
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My parents were very, very poor.
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And they came to the United States, and we lived in New York City.
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I was born in Harlem, Washington Heights area, which was a very high crime, very poor area.
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And Greek was actually my first language.
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I learned English in school.
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And we I think we grew up around crime, a lot of crime, a lot of drugs.
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I saw the difficulties my family faced as immigrants.
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You know, they had had very heavy accents.
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You know, even my dad, you know, I would see the hardships he would go through.
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In fact, when he came to America, he couldn't find a job.
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Nobody wanted to hire him.
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He had like a really accent.
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You know, I'm quite fair, but he was quite tanned, very dark, very ethnic looking, and they went through such hardship.
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But in his first job actually in America, he he finally had gone through so many places.
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I remember nobody would give him a job.
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And the last place he went to was a donut shop, a coffee shop in Harlem. And he went in there.
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He's like, "Just I'll work for free."
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Cuz the guy was trying to didn't want to give him work.
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And he's like, "I'll work for free. I'll work for food."
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He's like, "Let me just get experience here, so at least I can go somewhere else and say, 'Hey, I have experience working in a donut shop, selling coffees.'"
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Or he's like, "I'll take your trash. I'll do whatever."
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And my first my father's first job in America was working for free. He worked for free.
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And I think it was after a few weeks that the man actually hired him.
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And so I think growing up with that and seeing the hardship they went through, I was like, I I'm not going to go through that.
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And I want to make a better life for them.
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And I was like, you know, when I watch you know, it sounds silly, but we watch a lot of TV because we couldn't we couldn't really play outside that much.
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And I would see on TV these people doing extraordinary things in extraordinary roles.
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And I I went to Greek school.
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I went to a Greek-American school.
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And I learned about Greek mythology and heroes.
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And I was so inspired by it.
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You know, like when you're a kid, you're like, "When I grow up, I want to be this."
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And I was inspired by courage and by bravery.
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And having grown up, you know, we'd been victims of crime and dealt with so many hardships, I was like, "I am not going to grow up afraid.
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I'm not going to grow up weak.
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I'm going to protect my family.
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You know, I'm going to do well so I can help take care of them."
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And I think just intuitively, it led me into this career cuz I knew nothing about law enforcement.
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J- I didn't even like police.
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They would pull me over when I was a teenager and I was like the biggest brat.
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I I I knew nothing about that world, but I knew I wanted to serve people and help people and I I created this drive where I was just like work work hard work hard work hard and even in college, you know, I got an internship working for a congresswoman.
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I'll never forget congresswoman Carolyn McCarthy.
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And I worked for her for 2 years for free. For free.
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And everybody's like, you're crazy.
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You're wasting your time. And I was like, no. I'm learning.
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I'm connecting with people that I would never Jay, I would never connect to these people. I had no network. I had no access.
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All I knew was my my parents immigrant community.
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And no college education.
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I don't even think my mom finished high school actually now that I'm talking or my dad.
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And I was just like, I have a choice and I have to drive myself.
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And I think just one thing led to another.
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I didn't grow up with this idea when I grow up I'm going to be a secret service agent.
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I had no idea what that was. Zero.
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And but I also was of the mindset like, why not? Like why why can't I?
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Why can't I help my family and other people in a meaningful way?
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And I think when you're in the struggle and you see other people struggle and I think just authentically I wanted to to help myself, help my family.
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And first I started in the I went into the New York City Police Department.
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I applied and I was just like, why not?
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And I got into the police department.
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And and I had simultaneously applied to the US Secret Service.
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I I bought a book on international careers and I I spoke languages at the time.
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I loved languages and I spoke multiple languages and I'd studied in different countries while I was in college on my own.
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I worked like multiple part-time jobs and I'm like, all right, this semester I'm going to work and And next semester I'm going to go to Mexico and do a a semester there and then I come back and I'd work and then the next semester I'm like, all right, I'm going to go to Italy now and work and go to school there.
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And I just had this hunger to open up my mind.
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And I think all those things kind of led me down a path where I was like, what more I could I do?
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And honestly, the US Secret Service I studied government, I studied international affairs, I bought a book that said careers in international affairs.
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And I was just and had about I had about 300 organizations in there.
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And I was like, somebody's going to give me a job in here.
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And I sent a resume out, Jay, and this is back in the day when there was like no internet, none of that stuff was around.
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And I sent out 300 resumes the summer I graduated.
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I'm like, somebody's going to say yes.
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And I think I got maybe 25 rejection letters and then eight or seven people replied back, hey, you know, fill out this form and one of them happened to be the Secret Service.
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Just happened to be that.
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So I was just like, well, why not?
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And I think although I didn't plan that path, sometimes I think that life takes you down the path you're meant to go and although you don't you don't realize it.
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And I think like when people ask me, what's your five-year plan or what are your hopes and dreams?
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And I'm like, look, I I I feel it, I see it, I think this is it, but nothing has ever turned out the way I thought it would or expected it to work out.
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And it's almost always for the better.
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And I'm not saying it's not hard cuz it's it's a hardship.
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You know, and even you know, I write it you know, when I was applying for these jobs, even when I went to the NYPD, my family was very upset with me.
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They were like, why are you doing this?
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And even my dad, I had to get his paperwork, you know, I needed his naturalization paperwork and and all that stuff and although he was a strong, resilient man, like he couldn't understand.
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He's like, "Why are you doing this?
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Why would you think that they'd hire you?"
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And it was hard, you know, it's hard to hear that when you're like 18, 19, and you're thinking, "I can't listen to this. I have to just try."
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And I was always like, "Let somebody else tell me no.
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Let somebody else reject me. I'm okay with that."
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But I was like, "I'm not I can't listen to other people because at the end of the day, like, I have to live with myself."
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And I learned over time cuz there were moments where I would listen to other people, and I'd look back, and I'm like, "Man, I shouldn't have listened to this person. Yeah.
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I should have really done what I wanted to do.
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And so what if I failed?"
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And that really kind of became part of my DNA after that, why I could And it took a time to get to that to that point where I could tune people out.
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I mean, I listen to people. You need good counsel.
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But if I felt something, Jay, like, I would I would tune people out, and I'd like, "No. Just go forward. Do it."
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You know, and and I think that just kind of became part of who I am in my my internal mantra, maybe, so to speak. Yeah, for sure.
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Thank you for sharing that, by the way.
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It's it's always fascinating to hear about someone's background, and I loved what you said about almost stumbling into this world.
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And I I I often say that, you know, we get to where we want in life, just not in the way you imagined it.
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And it's And I love the analogy you gave because I can connect with what you said so strongly when I hear you say things like, you know, you just sent out all these resumes, and you just waited to see who responded.
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And for anyone who's listening or watching right now, Abby's talking about a really important principle, is that so often we sit there, and we try and figure out, like, oh, which path should I take?
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And we try and construct it, and we try and build it perfectly, and we try and technically figure it out.
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And it's almost like the real answer is, open all the doors, and see which ones stay open.
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Some of them are going to close and some of them are going to stay open and keep walking through the ones that stay open and so we can see that in Abby's life and it led to this incredible journey.
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So Abby, what I want to dive into now is I want to talk about some of the almost the mistakes that we make in reading people.
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And I think you know, the biggest challenge that people have is like how do I know someone's telling the truth?
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How do I know if I can trust someone?
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How do I know to believe someone?
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This applies to whether you're a CEO hiring for your company, whether you're an entrepreneur hiring for your startup, it relates to whether you just want to date someone or you're talking on Tinder or hinge or whatever it is.
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Like there are so many places where I feel we ask ourselves the questions, can I trust this person?
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Is this person telling me the truth?
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Tell us the mistakes we make when trying to assess whether we can read someone right and and how to do it properly.
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Yeah, I think it's so important because like who you have in your circle of people whether business, whether personal relationships is so important and you have to make sure that people are meant to be there and sometimes people come in and they may have good intentions for us initially but then
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sometimes it's like you know, this relationship needs to finish and evolve and you I always talk about you constantly assessing everything and everyone around me to make sure like is this working now because it may be working before and but maybe it's not working later. And
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And you know, how do you get people to trust you?
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But the biggest thing is to really read people and it's not like a gimmicky thing.
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Like you really have to pay attention to people.
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I think one of the greatest mistakes I see that people do is that they will not look at the actions of a person.
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So you may have someone who's like let's say they're in a relationship Jay and their partner comes home late all the time or their partner makes excuses all the time or their partner does these things.
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And so if you're on the outside of the relationship and you see all these red flags, you're like you look at it like that person's cheating. No question.
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Well, then the person that's in the relationship because they're not they can't separate the actions from the person.
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They're like, well, he's working late or she's working late cuz of this.
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Oh, well, they were talking to that person because of that.
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Oh, well, they couldn't unlock unlock their phone for me because you know, they forgot the security code.
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Because you start to mix the individual with the actions.
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And that's where we make a mistake.
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We don't judge the actions.
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We we we we look at the person.
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And that's what happens when we end up getting betrayed.
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It's not until after the fact where you're like, man, like how did I miss that?
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You know how after something happens all the nickels start dropping? Yeah.
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And you're like, but they did this. I I knew it. I I dismissed it.
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I should have paid attention.
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And that's because you're really focused on the person and you help make excuses for the person because it's in your benefit.
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Cuz if you've invested time in someone, as as we're talking, let's say a personal relationship, you don't want them to be unfaithful.
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It doesn't suit you for them to be unfaithful because it means you've lost all this time, all this this investment and this energy.
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So it's easier for you to fall into that narrative and listen and believe their excuses because it's it's the narrative you want to believe. Yeah.
22:33
And so you really have to be careful when somebody shows you things through action, you have to stop and say, if this action was somebody else, independent, someone I didn't have a relationship with, what would I think?
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Or if somebody else came to me and said this person did this this and this, what would I think? Yeah.
22:51
So look at the actions people present to you and believe in them. Mhm.
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You know, there's a great quote that always says, when people show you who they are, believe them the first time. Mhm.
23:03
Like when they show you, believe it.
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Like they're telling you, they're showing you.
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Don't don't create that narrative.
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I think that's one of the greatest hurdles I see people that they can't overcome it.
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Like the signs are there.
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They can read the person if they want to, but they choose not to cuz it's not it's not the narrative they want. Absolutely.
23:24
And what about in situations where like you don't get to see their actions?
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I I completely agree with you, but what about this scenario where you're like you're just interviewing someone right now.
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Like when you were in an interrogation, like you're not going to you don't get to see that potential suspect's actions, but you're literally reading their body language, you're reading their communication.
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Like how are you doing it then when you haven't actually seen someone's uh actions?
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I think about that often.
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I interview I have a very large team and and I'm always trying to become a better interviewer as well because I'm like you just you don't know whether to trust someone, whether to give someone a chance, whether someone's being genuine.
24:01
Like how do you how do you do it from that perspective without the actions?
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You know, like for yourself, like if you're interviewing people and you're hiring people, one of the biggest and most important things I tell people is whoever you're talking to, make them feel comfortable.
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So, you never want to interview somebody like from behind a desk or a table.
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You don't want them to feel This is the thing, Jay.
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You don't want them to feel like they're being interviewed.
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Cuz in that moment I'm like, "Oh, it's an interview interview. I'm going to sit up.
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I'm going to be super careful."
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And then also keep in mind like I always knew this and I knew this from doing interviews that the majority of people will tell some form of lie or they'll embellish either in their application or in their interview process.
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And how do you corroborate that?
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One important thing is to know that somebody will do that so that you're a bit more aware and conscientious of it.
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But body language is super important.
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If you can talk to people in person, you should really try to do that.
24:54
I can't tell you how much you get from in-person interviews cuz you also feel people.
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Nobody talks about that, but you feel people's energy. You You sense them.
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It's before even cognitively you've been able to make any type of assessment of someone.
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Intuitively, your your sixth sense, so to speak, which it absolutely exists, it's telling you something.
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So, when you've got that nagging feeling or something's not sitting right, absolutely listen to it. Absolutely listen to it. And then read people.
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Look at their mannerisms.
25:25
So, one of the things you you could do we would start off I would talk to someone in a conversation about very neutral things. How are you? Where are you from? Oh, great. What brings you to LA?
25:36
Kind of that, but authentically.
25:40
Build that conversation and in that moment you're really assessing that person just to like how they are when they're relaxed. How are they're sitting?
25:45
So, if they're for example sitting and I'll give you a very very basic example.
25:52
If they're sitting a certain way and then they shift during the interview, you can take notice of that.
25:58
Actually, I'll use one of your interviews for an example.
26:02
So, I watched your interview with Curtis Jackson Mhm.
26:04
uh from a couple of weeks ago.
26:08
And I was watching you ask Curtis questions about his book.
26:13
And anytime you ask Curtis a question that had to do with him remembering something or reca- calling something, Curtis would always look up and to the right. Yeah. Always.
26:24
Every time he had had to access a memory and idea.
26:26
And so, I would watch that interview and I don't know him.
26:27
I the first time I'm really watching him during an interview and in that moment I'm like, "Every time Curtis needs to remember something, that's where he looks. Up and to the right.
26:36
He's recalling a memory."
26:37
So, now in that situation, if you ask Curtis something else, right?
26:41
You see Curtis doing this over and over again.
26:43
Then you ask him another question.
26:44
That's a question related to memory.
26:46
But then you don't see him look up and to the right, you see him look somewhere else. That would be a pause.
26:52
You'd say, "Okay, up until this point, every time I asked him something about memory or something about recalling an event, he looked this way.
26:59
But now he's looking somewhere else."
27:02
So, in that moment, you could argue or there your red flag could go up.
27:04
Maybe Curtis is creating a memory now.
27:06
And I'm not saying he did this, but sometimes like when people create lies, they access a different part of their brain.
27:13
So, you may access a part of your brain when you're trying to remember something.
27:16
And for him, all that was was he would look up into the right. That was just Curtis.
27:21
But I wouldn't have noticed that if I didn't watch and pay attention to his patterns.
27:25
And so, I would watch a deviation.
27:25
Or if you ask somebody a question and they're sitting in their relaxed posture, then out of nowhere you ask them something and you know it's a sensitive topic or maybe you're not even sure and their posture switches to something very common, something like this.
27:40
You could say in that moment, "All right, I just asked the question and his or her posture just shifted. Why?"
27:49
Now, could it be that they're tired?
27:50
Could it be that that's their normal posture? It could be.
27:52
But if they're not like this the whole time, that should be an indicator to you like there's something that happened here that they shifted their posture.
27:59
And so, when you see these defeat deviations and then you you're able to to realize certain people's patterns, that's when you become a better reader of people.
28:10
And there's certain things, positions you want to look for, even verbal language is super important and I talk about red flag verbal language.
28:16
I talk about something like for example, what I would see a lot when I worked financial institution crimes, one of the things I would hear victims tell me a lot when I'd say, "Hey, why did you give this person your money and not ask questions?"
28:32
And they would say, "You know, well, he you know, I asked, but he said, you know, trust me."
28:38
And you know, anytime I would hear that, it was a huge red flag. It still is.
28:40
And so, a truthful person will will explain things to you.
28:46
A decep- a deceptive person won't.
28:46
They won't explain things to you cuz they don't want to explain things to you.
28:50
So, even there's certain patterns in language or somebody's that repeatedly says, "I don't know. I don't recall."
28:56
I call it I have a term for this.
28:59
It's like I think that I have amnesia um tactic that people use.
29:06
You see it deployed when people don't want to answer questions.
29:10
And that's really important with reading people.
29:13
But, I think what's also important for people to understand is like the way people deceive, the way people lie.
29:18
And we think that a liar is going to be very obvious.
29:21
So, like there's three ways people lie.
29:23
The first The first way people lie, Jay, is they can make something up from beginning to end.
29:27
It's a It's a fabricated story. It's completely made up.
29:32
The second way people lie is I put in a little bit of truth, a little bit of lie, a little bit of truth, a little bit of lie. So, I mix it up.
29:38
So, it's kind of like a peak and valley thing.
29:43
The The most common way people lie is through omission. Mhm.
29:47
And it's what they don't tell you. They leave it out.
29:49
And the majority of us, because we feel bad most of us do have a conscience, and some people have it more acutely than others, but most of us just won't say it because we're like, "I don't want to be a liar, but I'll leave this part out."
30:01
The thing is it's still a lie because it because you left that out, it changes the story fundamentally. Mhm.
30:08
And that's where we really have to read people.
30:10
But, when you see something, you also have to be able to to come up with follow-up questions.
30:18
And that's another big thing.
30:18
A lot of times we let things slide and don't we don't inquire. We're not inquisitive.
30:23
We'll take what people give us and then move on. Yeah.
30:25
So, if you ask somebody a question, they keep saying, "I don't know. I don't know."
30:30
and you let it go, that's that's something that you have to look at and be like, "Okay, they're dodging this question.
30:36
How can I come back and ask this?" Or maybe ask it later.
30:39
You know, it's kind of like you put a pin in it. Yeah.
30:42
And these are some of the fundamental things that you want to look for.
30:44
Body language, reading people, connecting with people, openness.
30:50
When people feel relaxed, too, they're going to give you more information with their body.
30:53
I call it We called it bleeding information.
30:55
So, also, too, Jay, when people lie, they're they're nervous.
30:59
Nobody wants to get caught in a lie.
31:01
There's a stress response that happens.
31:03
So, you'll you'll see them their body leak, bleed. We used to use bleed.
31:07
They would bleed information.
31:09
And so, you'd say, "Why are they doing this with their body?
31:13
You know, why all of a sudden, you know, they're sitting calmly and all of a sudden now they're scratching their head when we're talking about, you know, whether or not they got fired from their last job." Right.
31:23
That's a deviation from what they were.
31:25
And so, it really is about being in tune and looking for all those different things.
31:28
But, most importantly, knowing when you see it and then coming back in with questions.
31:33
And another key thing that's really important is asking open-ended questions.
31:38
And I I'm a huge advocate of this.
31:40
If you can get people to tell you a story.
31:44
You want people to tell you a story.
31:44
And the more they talk, the more you will learn about people.
31:51
They'll tell you what they're thinking, what their feeling, what their values are.
31:54
You'll get a really good read on them. A really good read.
31:58
And again, that read will help you later on when you get into areas that you're concerned about.
32:04
Whether they've been fired, whether, you know, they've been to jail or stolen money or done whatever or, you know, whether what they put on their resume is truthful.
32:12
And that's what you look for, those deviations. Wow.
32:16
You're You're blowing my mind right now. This is great.
32:18
Everyone, I hope you're taking notes, all right?
32:19
Evy's giving us so many practical tips already.
32:22
The three types of lying, fascinating, right?
32:24
The need for open-ended questions.
32:25
We don't ask enough of them.
32:27
And that's something that we all know.
32:28
We know we should ask open-ended questions, but we don't know how to ask them.
32:31
We don't know when to ask them.
32:33
We We struggle to remember to ask them.
32:35
And we end up asking yes and no and close questions and so everything that everything I hope you're taking notes because I'm taking mental notes a lot of these things and I promise you that there are so many practical tips in there as to how to really build that rapport, how to build that connection and how to build that trust.
32:51
Now, Abby, you say that law enforcement academies are there to break you down and build your resilience.
32:58
How do they do that because it's almost like I feel like for anyone who wants to build their resilience, first we have to break ourselves down to in order to really build it.
33:06
I I remember in my monk training I felt like monk training broke me down before we built anything.
33:12
Tell us about how it's done in the law law enforcement academies that you've experienced.
33:18
I I honestly think it's done in a similar way that the foundation of it is similar because it's it's stripping you of all your flaws.
33:24
It's stripping you of all the weaknesses that you may have that you should not have.
33:28
And and it it feels it's hard.
33:32
My my first week in the academy day like I was like I want to quit.
33:36
Everyone's yelling at me.
33:36
I don't know what I'm doing. I'm super confused.
33:40
I I came here with good intentions.
33:40
No matter what I do I can't get it right.
33:45
And it was done purposefully because they want you to know what it feels like to have to be stressed out and they want to see how you're going to react.
33:52
How do you react to stress?
33:55
You know, and even like what was what we're seeing today when you see officers doing certain things that they should absolutely not be doing.
34:02
Like when you are out there you can't you can't be like everybody else.
34:04
Yeah, people can get in your face and people can be rude and people can put hands on you.
34:12
But you you can't be them.
34:15
Just because somebody else escalates, you don't escalate.
34:18
You have to keep it together.
34:18
And that is one of the most important things with regard to the profession and part of why they they try to do that in the training process.
34:28
And it's actually they call it hormesis.
34:30
Hormesis is a Greek word, hormetic effect, where you induce small amounts of stress into somebody, they adapt that stress, they overcome that stress, and then they're they're stronger, more resilient, a little bit, and then you give them another stressful situation.
34:47
They adapt to that, they overcome it, and then another, and then another, so then what happens is you've created a pattern or a habit, rather.
34:55
You create a habit in which stress comes, you recognize it, oh, no big deal, I've seen this before.
35:00
You accept the stress, and then you adapt to it.
35:05
But when we are really kind of buffered from stress in life, and then when it does happen, we're thinking, oh my god, this stressful situation happened, what do I do?
35:17
That's because you're not used to that. You've not adapted that.
35:19
And so with training, especially Secret Service training, I mean, it was large amounts of stress, and like running and and being tactical and having somebody yell at you and treat you like garbage and then failing at something and being humiliated and then ridiculed.
35:35
You know, all these things, and then you have to sit there and take it and stomach it.
35:40
And and sometimes it's truthful, and then sometimes there's a little bit of drama and theatrics involved because they want to break you down, but the mindset was, if you can't handle this in here, Right.
35:52
you going to do out there?
35:52
Out there when people and you you know, especially in the Secret Service, when you're dealing with threats, you're protecting other people's lives, like you you have to keep it together, so when the whole world is falling apart around you, or there's chaos, you you you you can't follow suit.
36:09
You have to be so like streamlined, so focused, like, I get havoc is happening around me, but I got it. I'm laser focused.
36:19
And truly, Jay, that that can only be done to you by breaking you down, making you feel that burden and that pressure and that stress, and then you overcoming it.
36:27
And then it also makes you more confident after that.
36:32
You become more confident in yourself.
36:34
You're like, yeah, I've been here. I overcame this. I'm good.
36:35
And it And it really does something for your self-esteem your self-esteem and your decision-making abilities.
36:43
They teach you to be decisive.
36:43
It teaches you to be decisive.
36:45
To not look to like shop around for other people's answers, but intuitively to say to yourself, I know the answer. This is my answer.
36:53
I don't need anybody else's okay to do this.
36:59
And so I think that like that process really helps create a strong people.
37:05
But there's also another part of it that's called the self-selection process where only people I would see this pattern like and it is like this with special forces and even certain jobs out there.
37:17
Only the people that really believe already from the get-go that they can do something, only those people put in for it.
37:24
You know, I hear people a lot of times say to me like, oh my god, I could never have been a Secret Service agent.
37:29
I could never have gone through training.
37:31
And I think to myself, why not? Why not? How did I?
37:38
And we we defeat ourselves before we even try to do anything.
37:44
Like we'll we'll create a dream and kill it within like a minute.
37:51
That is so powerful what you just said there about how we defeat ourselves even before we try.
37:55
And I don't know if you meant to rhyme it, but you did rhyme.
37:58
You said uh we we we create a dream and then kill it within a minute.
38:01
Uh and it's uh it's so true. It's so true.
38:04
And And And what I wonder is when you describe the tough, challenging resilience training that you went through, it sounds like for a lot of people the stress of their lives feels like that high stress environment, but we don't react well to stress.
38:20
And what you were taught to do effectively is how to deal with very acute levels of stress.
38:25
So, what were the If you If you were to break it down into a process of like three or four steps, what were the steps of that training to get better at dealing with more stress?
38:36
Uh I I love one example that you gave of like, you know, more and more stress, like small amounts of stress, then bigger amounts of stress.
38:43
But, what were other techniques that were used to help you do that?
38:44
Cuz I think a lot of people could benefit from them right now.
38:48
When something happens, don't resist it. Mhm. We resist things. Yeah.
38:53
Like even if you take Jay, like the pandemic, like I'll hear people like, "I can't believe this is happening.
38:56
I can't believe this is happening.
38:57
I want things to go back."
38:58
And we don't live in the truth of things.
39:00
We live in the past, we live in where we wish to be, and that that destroys you right there.
39:07
So, the first thing is you have to accept, this is where I'm at, it sucks.
39:12
But, this is where I'm at. So, you accept it.
39:15
And then now, once you accept it, and that's the biggest hurdle, believe it or not. It's you.
39:19
We are always our biggest hurdles, but once you accept it, now it's like, "Okay, how do I handle it? How do I adapt?"
39:24
And can you filter out the noise?
39:27
Cuz there's always so much noise around us. Yeah.
39:31
And filtering out the noise is really, really powerful.
39:32
And then, you know, and you you did say something earlier about how do we we have stressful lives.
39:37
Something that's really important that I want to to to to emphasize is that you are also the gatekeeper of what kind of stress you allow into your life. Mhm.
39:46
So, you If you have access to people that cause consistent and chronic amounts of stress in your life, that's no good. Mhm. That's not a good thing.
39:55
Like you are the gatekeeper, and so you have to say, "Noise, chatter, this is all not good for me."
40:00
Because it makes you more chaotic.
40:02
If you're around chaos, you're going to be chaotic.
40:03
And you push You have to You have to be the gatekeeper and keep that stuff away from you.
40:07
But, for those moments when things do happen, it's the acceptance and then your ability to adapt, and to be okay when you don't adapt right.
40:17
So, there's plenty of times where I've not adapted right, or done the right thing, or handled something right.
40:23
And I always go back, and even training was like that. What did you learn?
40:26
What are you going to do better next time?
40:27
Training was designed to make you fail over and over and over again.
40:35
I failed like failure was like my my my my my Cape Crusade.
40:39
Like if you I failed at so many things, and but when I failed, I was like, all right, what do I need to do differently?
40:46
Why didn't I perform at the level I was supposed to?
40:48
And then the fear of that failure, the fear of like, I might not graduate as a special agent, and I'm not going to lose this opportunity.
40:53
So, passion is a big thing.
40:55
Whatever you're pursuing or dealing with, you have to have passion and and drive.
40:59
You have to say, this is important to me.
41:02
If something's not important to you, you're not going to it's not going to matter.
41:07
You're going to be flippant with it.
41:11
But I think that that's those are like the key things, and then just when stress does happen to you, I guess I tell people in the way I was taught, like don't look at it as a horrible thing.
41:22
Look at it as an opportunity to learn, and make it embrace it. Embrace the challenge.
41:25
Embrace the confrontation. Embrace the hardship.
41:27
Yeah, someone's coming at you, now what?
41:29
And I know I'm thinking and talking in a tactical sense.
41:33
You know, and I remember in training, I didn't write about this in the book, but we did something called Red Man.
41:38
And they would put us in a room, as one of the final training things, and they put us in a room to fight somebody.
41:40
Like really fight someone.
41:43
They're like, okay, you have to go apprehend somebody.
41:46
We call it Red Man cuz he was like covered in a gear.
41:51
And Jay, he would beat the crap out of you.
41:53
I mean, he literally lifted me up, this guy.
41:56
And it was an instructor.
41:56
I can't remember if it was two instructors, and like throw me across the room, and they're like, go get him. Go get him.
42:02
When instinctually you want to like kind of hide, you know what I'm thinking, man, I'm going to get a beat down.
42:06
But I remember thinking, I'm like, you're going to have to earn that beat down.
42:11
You may beat me, but you're going to have to earn it.
42:14
And not being afraid to lose, not being afraid to fail, not being afraid to be rejected.
42:19
And I've you undergo those things in training all the time.
42:24
Your ego goes out the door.
42:26
You got an ego, you're the first person that that leaves that academy.
42:27
They will They will push you out.
42:29
They will make your life hell till you go.
42:33
And so, embracing that and embracing failure is so powerful.
42:38
Just being like, all right, what's up? Next. That's insane. That is insane.
42:42
It's It's It's crazy to think about it because, yeah, there are multiple ways to break someone down.
42:49
And I'm hoping as you're listening and watching to this, you're realizing the messages that are coming out of what Evy's saying around how, you know, we're not going We're not getting chucked around in that way, but we're going through our own failures and our own rejections and our own stress.
43:02
And And learning to not resist that stress, learning to not resist that pain allows us to actually strengthen our resilience muscle.
43:09
Now Now, Evy, you've worked with some incredible leaders and leaders that people have, you know, people watched on TV and obsessed over and learn about.
43:19
And And I'm intrigued by what you feel you learned from them or what you observed in them.
43:23
So, if you take someone like uh you know, former President Bill Clinton.
43:27
Like I've I've always heard that he's he was extremely charming.
43:31
He was able to make everyone feel special, like they were the only people in the room.
43:35
What was something that you observed about him that you think we're we're less aware of, maybe? I Yeah, I was so lucky.
43:41
There was I remember there was a point I remember walking into the White House years later.
43:46
And I'd have moments like these.
43:47
I was like, Oh, my My office is the White House, you know?
43:50
And I'm about to go see the president.
43:52
And that In the beginning, you have those moments.
43:53
And after a while, you get used to it.
43:55
But even sometimes, once in a while, I'll be like, oh, yeah.
43:57
Okay, Bill Clinton's coming or Okay, oh, Barack's coming down the hall, you know? Let's go.
44:03
Um But look, I was there to do my job.
44:05
So, I wasn't there to be a groupie.
44:07
I wasn't there to be like, "Sir, sir, I have a question.
44:10
How would you handle this problem?"
44:11
Like, that stuff didn't fly.
44:13
Like, you were there to to do a function, but like, Jay, I was like a sponge, a sponge, and I absorbed from everything cuz in the White House you'd have the presidents coming through, the first ladies coming through, foreign heads of state coming through, sometimes really remarkable people who had extraordinary lives, Nobel Peace Prize winners, and I I was like, I am so lucky to be here.
44:37
I'm going to absorb everything I can.
44:41
And like, you know, you bring up Bill Clinton cuz he was one of my first protectees, truly.
44:47
And I spent a lot of time with him, and he really was like, you'd see him, he'd talk to people, and he would like, "Hey, how are you?"
44:53
He'd make he'd connect with people, he'd pull them in.
44:57
There was like there wasn't the superficial like, "Oh, hey, how are you?" and go.
45:02
And I saw with that why people loved him cuz I remember when I first started, everywhere we went there was like droves of people, and I was like, "Is he like the most popular protectee?
45:09
Like, is he the most popular president out there?"
45:13
And after a while, I saw why because he would really go, shake hands with people, talk to them.
45:18
He He would remember a face.
45:21
He'd meet someone and then see somebody later, be like, "Oh yeah, I met that guy 5 months ago somewhere."
45:26
And you're thinking, "How do you remember?"
45:27
Cuz this is someone who meets thousands of people. And that was a skill.
45:33
It came from a genuine place, don't get me wrong, but a lot of these are skills and habits that you you tweak and you you you you you fine-tune, especially when you're a leader.
45:45
And sometimes people think, "Oh, that's the president, you know, he has to be a leader."
45:49
And I always thought, I was like, "Why Why can't I be a leader?
45:53
Why can't I have leadership qualities?"
45:57
And any And anything I do.
45:57
I don't have to be president.
46:00
And I really was like a student.
46:00
I would go to work and I'd do my job, but I was a student.
46:05
Whatever I could see, whatever assignment I could volunteer for, I was that person.
46:10
To be in proximity and to learn from successes and failures, and also talk about stress, these their jobs, regardless of your political affiliation or anything like the presidents that I would be around, they they would deal with high-stress situations.
46:22
They couldn't fall to pieces. Yeah. They couldn't.
46:26
They couldn't be upset or cry because somebody called them horrible names or insulted them on national TV, cuz that would happen.
46:33
They were like, I got to keep it together, and they kept it together until sometimes when you're around not sometimes, when you are around strong people like that, you you become that.
46:43
You absorb the energy of the people around you. You become resilient. Yeah.
46:47
And so in that way, although maybe growing up I didn't have that, I didn't have access to people like that, I didn't have access to anything like that, but because I worked hard to I put myself in an environment that allowed me to have access to people like that. Mhm. You know, I did that. I made that happen. Mhm.
47:07
And then the people around us like we absorb that energy, we absorb those habits, we absorb those characteristics.
47:15
And I I keep that to this day.
47:15
You know, I'm like, whose habits do I want to absorb?
47:19
And then even Jay also I learned from some politicians and not necessarily like my the presidents or first ladies, but you know, other politicians habits where I'm like, that's something I will never do.
47:28
That's something that's not right.
47:30
You know, you can learn from not just the positive people, the positive things people do, but even the negative things people do.
47:37
Like they that can teach you how not to be, who not to be. So well said. So well said.
47:42
I think that's brilliant, like and that's something all of us can do, right?
47:46
Like whether you're working in a company or working at a startup or anything like any one of us can look to people and yeah, people with negative behavior teaches what we don't want to be like and people with positive behavior teaches what we do want to be like and and I think that that's something that we can all do so practically because when people say like, "Well, what's the good in being in a bad situation?" That's what it is.
48:08
You learn what you don't want to repeat.
48:10
You learn what you don't want to recreate.
48:11
And and I think that's really really beautifully explained. Uh but yeah, okay.
48:15
So, Abby, what I want to end with with you is your final five.
48:20
These are your rapid-fire questions.
48:22
So, you've given us some incredible answers with so much depth and insight.
48:26
Now, we're going to turn it the other way.
48:28
So, you'll be a pro at this because I'm guessing you you've done so much more of this than I have, but you're going to answer the next five questions with either one word or one sentence maximum. Oh, the pressure, Jay. The pressure. Yes.
48:39
Yeah, I mean, you this is like easy for you. You're like, "Come on.
48:42
I got thrown around the room." Uh but but let's do it. Let's do it. Okay.
48:47
So, the first question is, "What question do you usually open interrogations with?"
48:55
Oh, tell me about your day. Ah, interesting. Okay. Question number two.
49:00
Uh what is the most powerful thing you learned from Barack Obama observing Barack Obama?
49:06
It doesn't have to be directly from him. His voice. The power of voice. Wow.
49:09
His His voice like he commanded his voice. Yes.
49:13
And I never I never thought about that till I watched him.
49:18
And how what a powerful tool that is, paralinguistics.
49:20
Not what you say, but how you say it. Yes. Great lesson. Love it.
49:25
Uh what's one thing you learned from Michelle Obama? Self-worth. Mhm.
49:33
She taught me like that I think because I grew up a certain way and I we didn't grow up in poverty, but we didn't grow up great either and I always thought that taking care of yourself and doing certain things meant was a luxury and you shouldn't do that. Yeah.
49:50
And I I had a wrong perception of it and I I I learned from her that that just means you love yourself and you respect yourself. I love that. self-worth. I love that. Taking care of yourself. That's beautiful.
50:03
Okay, question number four out of your five.
50:04
If you could create one law that everyone else in the world had to follow, what would it be?
50:14
Stop trying to shove your opinion down somebody else's throat. Just listen.
50:15
You don't have to like it, but just allow people to express themselves even if you don't like it.
50:23
Thank you so much for watching that video.
50:25
If you enjoyed it, here's another one I think you'll love.
50:28
If you're listening to this and you're in an unhappy situation, I get it. I get how hard it is.
50:33
One of the things that can help is to say this demon would come out with another person, too.