James Altucher & Steve Cohen

My oldest daughter, unfortunately, goes to college.

I was against it.

I’ve even wrote a book “40 Alternatives to College.” And I’ve written a ton of articles about the problems with student loan debt.

But whenever I tried talking to her about it, she would just and walk away.

So I did something different.

I almost don’t want to tell anybody this.

I don’t want to be in the middle of a high stakes negotiation someday and for someone to say, “Oh, I see what you’re doing. You’re using the advice hack.”

I don’t want anyone to know.

But too late. The podcast is life.

Here’s how it works I told my daughter, “I need your advice on how to talk to you about college…”

Then BOOM. I added the “because” hack.

“Because…”

I could’ve said anything here.

I could’ve said, “I want your advice because I want your advice.” People have the same response in their brain either way.

Saying “Because” makes people more likely to do what you want. Robert Cialdini (the godfather of influence) wrote about this. He cited experiments where they found that saying “because” helps influence people to do what you want.

The weird part is they don’t know why. They just know it’s true.

I said, “Because.”

I told her the truth.

“Because I care about you. And I want to help.”

I combined the “advice hack” with the “because hack.” And it worked.

Sort of.

She still went to college. But now I know that when she’s 28 or 29 years old and having a serious problem, she’ll know she can come to me. I didn’t want her to think I was her enemy.

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Here are 3 more life hacks from my latest podcast “6 MORE of The Best One Minute Life Hacks:”

5/25 RULE
This one comes from Warren Buffet.

It’s how he became wildly successful in one area.

Make a list. Write down the top 25 things you love to do the most.

Reading, writing, being with family, etc.

Then make two columns.

On the left, put your top five. On the right, put your next 20.

Then do this:

Never look at the things on the right again.

Sometimes you have to give up stuff to get closer to what’s more important to you

I went through this a couple years ago. I wanted to write everyday, do stand-up, run a club, run multiple businesses, be with my family and the people I love, podcast, and 100 other things.

I needed to slim down my life. I had too many items in my head. My mind would go from one idea to another.

Planning got difficult. I felt conflicted and overwhelmed.

So I did this trick. The 5/25 rule.

And it worked. (There’s a part two to this in the podcast). Steve had some advice on how to hold yourself accoutable to your top 5.

5×5 RULE
This one’s not in the podcast. So it’s a bonus. And I post a lot of these on my instagram.

10-10-10 RULE
Steve and I did this podcast together. He brought up this book, “10-10-10: A Life-Transforming Idea” by Suzy Welch. This the basic idea:

Whenever you’re not sure if you should do X or Y ask yourself these 3 questions:

1. “Is it going to matter 10 minutes from now?”
2. “…10 months from now?”
3. “…10 years from now?”

It’s good advice. Except I could be dead in 10 years.

OR (even worse) the things I think I want to spend my life doing could be dead.

Right now, there’s something I really want to do. But the longer I wait, the more I feel bad. Because now I’m not just thinking of the idea. I’m thinking about me not doing it.
I want to make my own 10-10-10 rule.

• Can I start in 10 minutes?
• Will I still be doing it 10 months from now?
• Will I look back in 10 years and be glad I did it?

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We recorded this podcast two parts. So if you like these, check out either part (or both).

And I’d like to hear from you… because it’s fun.

Let me know what hacks you and your friends use. Maybe it’ll show up on part 3.