The Stories in Your Head

Podcast therapy is in session. Grab your tea.

This episode started with Brené Brown and ended with the same agent showing up in both Katy's and Alissa's worst client stories. It's a lot. It's very good.

The concept comes from Brené Brown's book Rising Strong: "The most powerful stories may be the ones we tell ourselves. But beware — they're usually fiction." The idea is that we fill in the blanks when we don't know the full story — and in real estate, there are a lot of blanks.

Here's what we cover in this episode:

- The Brené Brown framework: "The story I'm telling myself is..." and how naming it changes the whole conversation
- Rumination: the clinical term for telling yourself the same story over and over — and why it's the number one risk factor for depression and anxiety
- Common stories agents tell themselves: "Sellers don't want to pay my commission," "My market is oversaturated," "My sphere thinks I'm bothering them," "I can't ask for referrals without being salesy," and "I'm not successful because of my brokerage"
- We don't see things as they are. We see things as we are.
- Alissa's first clients who disappeared for two years — only to show up at a showing with no hair and significantly less weight, having survived a serious cancer diagnosis, and still managed to apologize for not being in touch. Perspective. Instant.
- Katy's client who bought the cutest house ever and used someone else — only to come back years later to sell that house with Katy, after discovering the agent who grabbed them was a master manipulator who gave them a terrible experience
- Alissa's current live situation: the builder client who keeps removing her from the email chain, has never denied her value, told her from day one he didn't really want to use an agent but it doesn't cost him, and yet she is in her head about it — full podcast therapy session ensues
- Katy's advice for the builder situation: you sold his house for free, he got the buyer you brought, and he didn't pay you a dime for it. Show up at closing, smile, get the check.
- The Zillow button story: the couple who used someone else because they clicked "see this home" and an agent showed up immediately and told them they had to use him — and then gave them a terrible experience — and are now coming back to Alissa
- Never burn the bridge when you're in your feelings. You will regret it.
- "Have you given up on buying a house?" — the one question from Never Split the Difference that ends the ghosting cycle
- How to confront the stories you tell yourself: talk it out, journal, challenge the thought, and then actually confront it by asking the question
- Ask the client who used someone else: "I hope I didn't do anything wrong. Could you let me know what happened?" You will almost always get a response. It will almost always make sense. And it will almost always be fixable.
- Prune your database: give your leads permission to leave — "If you no longer need my help, just let me know and I'll remove you from my list." That email gets more responses than any soft follow-up ever will.
- How all the assumptions work on every side: buyers making assumptions about sellers, sellers assuming about buyers, agents filling in the blanks about agents, and everyone wondering what everyone else is thinking while most people are barely thinking about you at all
- The meme with the cartoon husband and wife: she thinks he's thinking about other women. He's thinking: if two people on opposite sides of the world dropped a piece of bread simultaneously, would the Earth briefly become a sandwich?
- The Hustle Humbly community therapy session happening on Thursday — if you need a place to talk this stuff out, hustlehumblypodcast.com/membership

Toast of the week from Laura Lee Smith with the Life on the Brazos Group in College Station, Texas, toasting her buyer's agent Naomi Smith — who turned into her best friend, biggest cheerleader, and Girl Friday for work and life. Cheers to Naomi!

Referenced episodes:
- Episode on rejection (search "hustle humbly rejection")
- Never Split the Difference by Chris Voss
- Rising Strong by Brené Brown

Want to toast someone on the show? Email team@hustlehumblypodcast.com.

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