Snake Doctors Are Highly Marketable

12/20/10 • 4 min

Recently, I spent some time in Belize doing some humanitarian work. You see, while there are some villages that are geographically isolated and don’t have access to the internet, Belize hasn’t typically been poor enough or problematic enough to attract a celebrity the way that some African countries can. Therefore, I decided to give these villages the benefit of a celebrity visit.

In the village of Santa Theresa, I met a Mayan snake doctor, or what you might call a witch doctor. He asked me what I did, and I said that I was also a doctor, but, like him, my doctorate wasn’t granted by any sort of fancy “university”. My doctorate, of course, is what I call the “doctorate of life”, I told him. Since we were both doctors, I explained that he should feel free to talk openly about anything that he knew, such as healing deadly snake bites or the ancient tradition of ghostbusting, the latter of course made popular by the Dan Aykyrod film.

The snake doctor, whom I’ll call “Ray Stantz” to protect his identity, said he only shares his knowledge if someone pays him quite a bit of money and spends at least six months working beside him. It occurred to me, as I’m sure it does to you, that to spread knowledge this way limits franchising opportunities.

“Perhaps you don’t know it, Ray,” I said, “but you’re living in the Information Age, and the best way to reach your audience to teach snake doctoring may be something like an instructional DVD series.”

Ray said that while he had a portable DVD player, he didn’t think this was the best way to pass on his craft. “Some knowledge you can only get by experience,” he said. “Since you are a life doctor, you know that the only way people will understand what you are saying is to live what you are saying, or they understand because they have lived what you are saying.”

I hadn’t actually thought about it this way, and Ray had a pretty good point, but I knew he was deflecting a bit from talking about himself. When I pressed him about it, he readily admitted it and said he had good reason. “In the old days, some Mayans used to kill for knowledge, or what they thought was knowledge” he said, “or would use the knowledge I have to kill each other.” In fact, he went on to say that at times they would sacrifice some of their own to try to appeal to the gods for their knowledge.

“I know what you mean,” I said. “Sometimes I feel like I would kill for some more Google data about my fans.”

He asked me to explain what I meant, and I told him it wasn’t important. He nodded and said, “What you say about the Information Age is interesting. Maybe we’re entering a time where we can have all that knowledge that we wanted in the old days, without having to kill for it.”

I rubbed my mustache. “That would be a different age indeed. Maybe we would no longer have to sacrifice each other for marketing dominance.”

Ray Stantz smiled at me. “Maybe we’re entering an age where dominance is not so important,” he said.

I have to tell you, as The Most Famous Fake Doctor Of Our Time, Ray’s words really made me stop and think. I mean, was there some way to also make him the most famous snake doctor of Belize? With wisdom like that, he could totally make a killing. But I guess that’s up to him.

Just My Thoughts,
Dr. Matt*

* Dr. Matt is not a real doctor.

“I know what you mean,” I said. “Sometimes I feel like I would kill for some more Google data about my fans.”

I rubbed my mustache. “That would be a different age indeed. Maybe we would no longer have to sacrifice each other for marketing dominance.”

Ray Stantz smiled at me. “Maybe we’re entering an age where dominance is not so important,” he said.

Just My Thoughts,
Dr. Matt*

* Dr. Matt is not a real doctor.

Previous Episode

People Who Set Your Value Suck

With a busy schedule of public speaking and celebrity endorsements, I haven’t had time to take a lot of appointments from clients. However, the other day, a client walked in that I hadn’t seen in a while. He’s the one that I call Freddle, and since I was making up names for him, I thought it appropriate to give him some more, so you may remember him better as Freddle Dolly-Parton McMannohaggonbaum, which, let’s be honest, is far more interesting than his real name, which I’m actually starting to forget.

Anyway, Freddle is a fickle sort, it seems. Probably the biggest issue he’s struggled with has been one of confidence, mostly because he always manages to blame someone else for his lack of it, first his ex-wife, then his soon-to-be ex-girlfriend.

This time, halfway through our session, he started in on me. “Dr. Matt, why haven’t you been available? I really thought I was starting to make progress, and then you took off. I really needed you.”

“Freddle,” I said, “in my professional opinion, your progress leaves much to be desired.”

“What do you mean?” he said. “I’ve done what you told me. I’ve done my best to remove barriers to confidence. I’ve gone out there and gone on lots of dates. I approach people more, I speak my mind. I’m not so afraid to tell people what I want, and I’m not willing to take abuse from people anymore.”

“Frankly,” said Freddle, “I think I’ve done quite well, and I just think you’re defensive because I called you out on not being around.”

I rubbed my mustache for a moment. “You’re right, I’ve made a mistake,” I said.

“Thank you,” said Freddle.

“Don’t thank me yet,” I said. “You see, my mistake is that I thought you understood that confidence has to do with your feeling of self-worth, of which you apparently still have very little.”

Freddle frowned. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Confidence is not the act of going around and demonstrating how confident you are. You’ve taken your lack of self-worth and instead of it keeping you timid around other people, you’ve swung the pendulum the other way to the place where you’re trying to demonstrate your worth at every turn.”

Freddle didn’t like this at all. “Dr. Matt, I feel like nothing I do is going to get your approval.”

“Well, now we’re getting somewhere,” I said. “You’re right, nothing you do is going to get my approval, because it doesn’t matter to me whether or not you shape up.”

This surprised Mr. Dolly-Parton McMannohaggonbaum. “What?” he said. “What do you mean? If you don’t help people, then it means you’re not very good.”

“Sorry to burst your bubble,” I said, “but since you’re the one who’s responsible for your own life, then if you don’t stop your stupid behavior, it’s you who’s not doing very good, not me.” Freddle didn’t know what to say to that, so I figured I might as well keep talking to pass the time. “Listen, the only person I’m responsible to in this room is me. If I did only what I thought you wanted, then I would just tell you what you wanted to hear. But what if what you want to hear isn’t what you need? In that case, all my jaw-flapping is only going to reinforce the problem, or in your case, problems.”

I continued: “I’m not in your head so I can’t tell you what you need. I can only tell you what I know. You have to decide what to hear.”

“I don’t get it,” Freddle finally said. “Don’t you say in your book Just Stop Having Problems, Stupid!, that if I want to be more confident, then I should just act more confident?”

“Well, first, thank you for reading my book,” I said, “and I should mention that it’s only two dollars and 99 cents on the Amazon.com, but anyway, what we call one thing is sometimes something else all dressed up in fancy clothes. If it were just shyness, then that approach would work. But for you, as I said, the problem is self-worth, so if you used that approach, then you need to start treating yourself with self-worth. And that means that you seek to get your sense of worth from yourself, not from others. In fact, avoid getting it from others. Trust me, they’re just going to suck at it. The reason is that most people don’t know their own worth, so how can they legitimately recognize yours?”

“Here’s the other thing,” I said. “You’re so worried about proving your worth. That’s a bunch of bull-honky. Babies have worth, don’t they?”

“I guess,” he said, confused.

“Sure they do,” I said. “Trust me, if you try to adopt one, they’re expensive! So, they don’t have to...

Next Episode

Dr. Matt’s Contract With The Internet

Folks, it seems like every year we get to a whole new year. In the past, I know that I’ve said that my only resolution for the new year, if I had one, was to get more famous. But I’ve learned and grown, and I wouldn’t want you to think that that was my only ambition.

In fact, I was talking to a friend of mine recently, and she said that she thought that I sometimes came across as self-centered. Since I welcome constructive criticism, I invited her to explain what the heck she was talking about, because I couldn’t make heads or tails of it. I walked away from that conversation with one inescapable conclusion, that it must be that I’m a hard person to get to know, and I haven’t taken enough time to really show people who I am. In other words, I need to start gettin’ real, and I need to start gettin’ real lickity-split.

To kick-off this new goal, I’ve decided that I’m going to make an arrangement with you, The Internet. As a people that fill a series of tubes, you’re probably used to results, and I’m someone known for delivering them. So, I’m going to give you ten things that I’m going to do for you this year. We can even put this arrangement in the form of a Contract, a Contract With The Internet, if you will.

So, here it is. I, Dr. Matt, agree to do the following 10 items this year:

Become more famous. Don’t worry, I’m not going to abandon my previous principles, and the more famous I am, the more people I can help.
Answer more of your questions. No more dodging of the hard ones, like if a particular piece of clothing makes you look fat. The answer is undoubtedly “yes”.
Meet you in public. In the past, I’ve often avoided book signings because of the inevitably uncomfortable conversation about the Dr. Matt sweater that you knitted. It’s possible that I have actually encouraged this obsessive behavior, and it’s time I encouraged it even more.
Introduce you to more of my friends. I know my friend Jonathon Stembridge-Rickenbacker loves to hear himself mentioned often, but he offers one good perspective amongst many, which I plan on sharing.
Talk about my feelings. Like right now, I feel important. Tomorrow, I may share another.
Listen more. Midgie is usually picking on me for this one. She says not every thing someone says needs an answer. I told her Alex Trebek would disagree. She said, “No, everything he says requires a question.” I had to admit that I didn’t know what she meant since I’d never watched Wheel of Fortune.
Admit when something I’ve said is wrong. I’m always willing to look at new evidence, so that my current rightness is as right as it can be. To be the most right person around at any given moment is the truest measure of humility.
Stop dwelling on the past. Like the time when something I said was wrong. It’s time to get over it.
Be an excellent lover. I just wanted to share that this was a goal of mine.
Be myself. I know this is kind of a repeat of #9, but I thought it was important to list on its own. Internet, you and I have gotten this far, and we’ve gotten this far because I shared with you my thoughts, however they spilled out from my brain. I think it’s a winning formula that’ll keep us together. Oh, and one more...
Be flexible. Be willing to go with the flow, like adding one more item to this list, or throwing out this contract if you decide to be a jerk about it. Everything you learn changes the way your brain fires its little neurons, and I learn something just about every day, and I do it so that I can share it in a way that makes sense to ya’ll. I don’t give a hoot who Dr. Matt was a year ago, although I suspect that he was still pretty amazing.

That’s my deal, Internet. So go ahead, be bold, get real, and put your deal out there for everyone to see. By doing so, you’ll show all your friends how much you’re not self-centered.

Just My Thoughts,
Dr. Matt*

* Dr. Matt is not a real doctor.