SuccessFULL With ADHD

Stuck to Success: Jason Raznick's Journey from a Taped Desk to a Multi-Million Dollar Financial Empire

• Brooke Schnittman MA, PCC, BCC • Season 1 • Episode 77

Share episode

In this episode, I sit down with Jason Raznick, the founder and CEO of Benzinga, a financial content platform that's all about making complex financial information accessible and easy to digest—something we ADHD-ers can definitely appreciate! Jason is not just a successful entrepreneur but also someone who navigates life with ADHD. He shares his personal journey from being a young boy who taped himself to his chair in school to becoming a leading voice in financial news. We dive into the challenges and triumphs of managing ADHD in both personal and professional life, especially in the high-stakes world of finance. Jason’s story is one of resilience, innovation, and learning to harness ADHD as a strength rather than a setback. 

Episode Highlights:
[0:42] - Introduction to Jason Raznick, his background, and his mission with Benzinga.
[3:03] - Jason’s early experiences with ADHD, including taping himself to his seat in second grade.
[6:16] - Discussing the dual edge of ADHD: impulsivity versus overthinking.
[10:29] - How Jason turned the corner in fifth and sixth grade and gained confidence in his learning abilities.
[11:35] - The struggle with deadlines and the stress of last-minute work.
[19:46] - How Jason deals with negative feedback and the importance of ignoring the noise.
[25:39] - Growing Benzinga and making financial news more accessible, especially for those with ADHD.
[34:35] - The importance of diversifying investments and following intuition.
[41:17] - Jason’s top success tip for ADHD-ers starting to invest: diversify and start small.

 

Connect with Jason Raznick:

 

Thank you for tuning into "SuccessFULL with ADHD." If this episode has impacted you, remember to rate, follow, share, and review our podcast. Your support helps us reach and help more individuals navigating their journeys with ADHD.

Want to be ‘SuccessFULL with ADHD’ by Activating Your ADHD Potential?
Order our 3x best-selling book/workbook for adults with ADHD ▶️ http://bit.ly/activateadhd

Jason Raznick:

So especially with like ADHD, there's information coming to you from a million places these days. A lot of it's noise. But if you're like following the stock market, you want to, you know, understand what's going on. We try to make it we try to condense it so we do it in bold, who, the, what, the where, why did, and what's this mean? What's this mean for you, that's what our we try to do with our content, to make it super simple to go where you want to read it. And that's what I like to read. So part of that is continuing to fight to make stuff easier to read, to understand, be it financial, be it sports, be it politics, like the who, what, the where, why, and you know, what's it mean? What's it mean to you?

Brooke Schnittman:

Welcome to successful with ADHD. I'm Brooke Schmidt, let's get started. Welcome back to successful with ADHD. Today, I have Jason rasnick. He's a passionate entrepreneur and founder of the Detroit based Benzinga, which is a financial content ecosystem, and it makes information much easier to consume. So ADH dears financial stuff, we're going to get into all of that. And Jason actually has ADHD, and it hit in he created this. It was Jason's mission to connect the world with news, data and education that makes the path to financial prosperity easier for everyone every day, and we know that we can definitely use that as fellow ADHD ers Benz is read by more than 25 million people every month, and he is the host of the Raz report Podcast, where each week, he interviews successful people who change the world. Jason was a winner of 2021 Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year for Michigan, Ohio regions, and named to the Crain's Detroit business 40 under 40 list, as well as the business 30 in their 30s list. Jason has also been quoted in a variety of financial news publications such as CNBC, Wall Street Journal, New York Post and he graduated from the University of Michigan's Ross School of Business. He founded two successful digital startups as a student, and currently resides in the metro Detroit area with his wife and three kids. And if that wasn't enough, in his free time, Jason's and Abbott golfer, a flag football coach for his son Josh's team. All right, welcome Jason. Big

Jason Raznick:

intro there. I got lot to live up to here. Thank you for having me on. Brooke, it's very exciting. You're You're awesome. So thanks for having me on. Well, thank

Brooke Schnittman:

you for being on. I love hosting awesome people like yourself. So Jason's not just here to share how he makes finance easier for all people, including ADHD. Or Jason actually has a diagnosis of ADHD. So Jason would love to just get into a little bit of when you learned you had ADHD and what life was like, at that time,

Jason Raznick:

yeah, I mean, it's going back many years. I know you and I talk about this in the past on, think, you know, on the Raz report podcast. But I in second grade. My parents told me, or I don't know, I was told that I, you know, taped myself to my seat. So I was in elementary school, Lone Pine sitting in second grade, and I think I took scotch tape and, like, taped my, you know, hands to my seat because, you know, very fidgety, very moving around, and driven to distractions. And then also that other part, where ADHD gears, you have a lot of awareness of what's going on near you, and you're in it, and you're paying attention to stuff that arguably you shouldn't be paying attention be paying attention to, because you should focus on the schoolwork. And so it was way back, you know, in history now. So it was somewhere in the 1980s where I was probably about 10 years old, is my guess. I was young, so yeah, and then just learning to live with that and use it as a strength and not a weakness, learning to not find excuses, to not get stuff done. Oh, I have ADHD No. Use it as a strength. Figure out the ways that it works for you. And don't get me wrong. You know listeners of your podcast, that takes years to do, and that's why people hire you as a coach and learn tips and mechanisms, and I to this day, and I know I'm jumping, you know, still try to figure out how to do things, as Brooke knows. We were supposed to start the podcast like 10 minutes ago, and I was just like asking her questions before this started. So alright, so that's a little

Brooke Schnittman:

totally fine, and nothing wrong, no reason to shame yourself at all. So, Jason, yes, we're human, and obviously a way to expand and grow is to continue to learn right and ask good questions. Yeah.

Jason Raznick:

So okay, I was gonna say one thing Brooke that I struggle with is like, do I overthink it? Sometimes? Yes, right? Like someone said to me this line, JFDI, and it stands for just f and do it right, instead of overthinking it. And I wonder sometimes, ADHD, or do we years? Do we overthink things? I'm not sure if that's a if that's a common characteristic, but yes, I would love to hear your viewpoint on that.

Brooke Schnittman:

Oh yes. I mean, it's a double edged sword, so we can be very impulsive and just do it on things that we've waited too long for or we get excited about, but at the same time, we definitely overthink our decisions because of the mistakes that we've made in the past, thinking that we're not good enough to make the right decision, and that's where we can get paralyzed in our analysis paralysis, and not make decisions. Get stressed, anxious, depressed, until it's too late and opportunities pass us by. So we can overthink things so much. And that's where a lot of anxiety that is comorbid to ADHD comes along.

Jason Raznick:

That's interesting. And so one mechanism to deal with that, which is a terrible one, is just not to make the decision, not to do it, not to pay attention to it. So then you have the out to say, Hey, I wasn't even focused on it. So that's, you know, like, but that's, you know, that's interesting. How you said that, yeah,

Brooke Schnittman:

yeah. Well, there's a like, a lot that goes into that too, because sometimes when we pass opportunities or we pass decisions, we have good reasons for passing those and they weren't the right decisions, but other times we get so paralyzed that we feel bad that we haven't made a decision. So again, double edged sword. Lots go in to it and think about but obviously you've made a decision that has worked for you financially and has worked for 25 million people financially. And I'm curious how, with your ADHD diagnosis at 10, where you were taping yourself to the seat, how you shifted from there to creating this multi million dollar global financial company.

Jason Raznick:

Yeah. I mean, I also remember being separated from the class sometimes, like going to the learning resource room and getting extra help and those kind of things. And I didn't really like that. I didn't like being separated. So at some point, I don't know if it was fifth grade or sixth grade, but at some point I turned a corner, I would say, and I had to work harder than my peers. There's no question. I had to work harder than my peers, like I did, and where it may have come easier, the way I read was different than the other another person, and I just just put in the time and really focused and really and by the way, it's not to say, like my mom and dad, but my mom, because she was taking me like I went to tutors, I had got extra help in different things. Because it wasn't just, you know, the HD, it was reading. It was learning, and learning how to deal with that, and learning different ways to learn was part, you know, was part of the challenge. And I think fifth, sixth grade is when I, like, turned a corner, I would say, in between those times, because that, because then I eventually went on to do really well in school. I went to the University of Michigan and and I did well in school, etc. But there's a lady named Miss Kent who is in charge of the Learning Resource Center. She told my parents, if you could believe this, that she didn't think I would ever be able to read.

Brooke Schnittman:

It's terrible, yeah. So I gave a, I've heard too many stories like that, yeah, I gave

Jason Raznick:

a TEDx talk about it one day. Yeah, that's the story of the younger years, I guess.

Brooke Schnittman:

Yeah. So I'm curious that, did you know that Miss Kent at the time that you were struggling to read said that? Or did your parents tell you that once you were able to read? Yeah, I

Jason Raznick:

think I learned that, like, once I was able to read. I don't think I knew that at the time, okay, but if someone didn't believe that you'd ever be able to read, then I'm assuming they didn't really teach you. And so my mom, I went to this person like Pat kasteki, who is amazing, who taught me to read. So he had to go to, like a tutor to learn to read.

Brooke Schnittman:

So you had Learning Center, you went to a tutor, you got that support that you needed. You spent a lot more time in doing things to excel in school than your neurotypical peers. But how did you turn that corner in fifth and sixth grade? Like what changed once you did all of the tutoring and extra support services.

Jason Raznick:

I think it may have been, honestly, self confidence, knowing that I could learn to read in a different way. I guess, like I noticed grammar mistakes really quickly, or spelling mistakes, because the way I learned to read, I think it's different than others. A lot of others don't notice these things, and I noticed them every time it's I think. It was once learning to read, once I learned to read, having the confidence, then putting in the time and going getting extra help and just working hard and realize, realizing you can do it if you're willing to put in the

Brooke Schnittman:

time. Gotcha so you saw the results once you got that extra help to level the playing field, and then you got the confidence, and then with the confidence, it gives you that extra boost of motivation to continue to try hard. It sounds, yeah,

Jason Raznick:

continue to try hard. Now the like, we're going back to those years, but I still probably did things too at the last minute, like I needed deadlines. I still struggle with that, where I need deadlines to get stuff done. So my habits sometimes were good, but a lot of times we, you know, go to high school years, I would be studying for the test the next day, like at two in the morning, versus having a good night's sleep. I find people who don't have ADHD or I find a lot of times people are studying way in advance, I find we like do things at the last minute because we need that deadline or something, or that fear of failure

Brooke Schnittman:

to kick start, that dopamine, which then gives you the motivation to actually do the thing exactly.

Jason Raznick:

And I and I feel like maybe that's what we say we need. I I want to change that because I feel it's unneeded stress. That's where I you know, I feel like it's something that there's no reason to have that stress. So it's like, figure out how to solve for it. Yeah? So that's part of the story.

Brooke Schnittman:

Yeah. You know, it's so interesting, because from the outside, you look like this big, successful person who's created this financial news outlet to millions, right? And you did that, you did that right, and you have a wife and you have three kids, and then on the inside, you're humble enough to share that you're still struggling with those prioritizations of deadlines, and you know, you still find yourself waiting until the last minute, which causes you stress. And I'm curious, obviously, there's tools and support for that. But how did you make all of this work in your life to build this huge company?

Jason Raznick:

So obviously, as you know, let's say it's the team, the team, the team. It's not just me. But yes, I started it. I'm the one who made the hires. I'm the one who, like started it and worked 18 hours a day, hired contractors overseas and integrated into all these brokerage firms and did the work. I don't know I I partly, maybe it was, maybe it was people doubting that I could do it. You know, fear of failure. People leaving us and saying, Oh, we're gonna fail. Oh, this, that and, like, just negative talk to us. And then when we had our we had a partial exit where we sold a majority of the company to private equity for an, you know, nice exit, but we're still in, but we're still involved. And maybe it's that constant of proving that doubters wrong, I guess, and outworking and giving people what they want to read, I don't know, in essence, like, you know how we were talking about, how we wait to the last minute to get things done. In some respect, everything was like, if I didn't get it done, then there was no business. I remember when I paid the first salary of$45,000 and I was like, holy cow, that's a crazy amount of money. I'm like, that's like,$1,000 a week. If you're taking cash, it's almost, you know. And I was like, that's crazy. Now, we pay a lot more than that now, but we had to make money to pay the salaries. You know, how you said that, that that, that splash of dopamine, or, you know, however you cause that. And that slash domain was happening all the time, because you had to get these deals done to make payroll, and so it was like, you have that deadline there all the time, which I thought was probably kind of helpful in some respect. It gets harder when you don't necessarily have the deadline and you don't have someone like, you have a coach, I have a coach, and that helps with deadlines. It's just, I don't want to accept, okay, yeah, that's just who you are. You do things last minute. I'm trying to change that. I'm trying to get better. Because I think, as you mentioned, opportunities, you pass them up. And I think living a part of a productive life is being semi efficient with your time, because the one thing we all have is 24 hours in a day, and it's a great equalize. Doesn't mean it doesn't mean that I'm saying you need to go work those all those hours, because I don't, I don't think someone's better than someone else because they work 18 hours a day. It's not what I'm saying, but what I am saying is I. Think a lot of people with ADHD use their brain to make make it more complicated in some respect, including myself, where, okay, I can get this thing done right now. Okay, so let's say I need to write you an email about something, and I'm procrastinating at it, and so I'm gonna, and I'm supposed to get it to you by four o'clock. I'm procrastinating. I don't get to at four o'clock. I get it to you at nine o'clock. How many times did I think about it in that period of six hours? I'm going to guess I thought about it 40 times, maybe 50, maybe 60. If we just did it, got it done, then we wouldn't think about it. And we move on to the next thing. And I want to get to more of a life like that. And then sometimes I am but I just think you need to be consistent. I think it may be hard for us, but I just, I don't know that's where I'm trying to get

Brooke Schnittman:

to Sure. So Doctor Hallowell, he's a leading ADHD expert, says that ADHD ers are consistently inconsistent. So what I teach in my coaching is, let's be persistent in our consistency. Right? Consistently persistent. So if you thought about sending an email 40 to 60 times in a five hour span, I wonder if, potentially, what was going through your mind is, ooh, how are they going to feel on the other side once they receive it? And do I have a follow up answer, or do I need to have the perfect response? Do I need to have all the pieces together? Now,

Jason Raznick:

I think it's partly the former. Like, need to have the perfect thing that is written and and not necessarily thinking what the response will be. But it's partly the former. I want to have the perfect thing. So perfection, you know, is, uh, enemy of getting things done. And you're like, I need to make this perfect so you get it to 75% of the way, and then you're like, struggle. And I think there are ways to deal with that, by having others look at what you're doing and say, Hey, do you have any feedback on what this is? And then then you can send it out. Yes.

Brooke Schnittman:

That's definitely a great way to conquer some of your perfectionism, having that accountability partner to say, Okay, it's good enough. Let's go send it out, or you knowing ahead of time, like if you could picture what is good enough, what is 95% what is 100% before you send it or even start it.

Jason Raznick:

But I think it's kind of funny that. So I'll get this thing done, and I wanted to show it to someone here to like, review and send out. I want them to review it immediately, right then. So I've already waited to the last minute. You know what I mean? If I would get it done early, then I'd give that person more time to review it, you know what I mean. So we get it done, and it's like, the last like, Hey, will you review it? No. Review it now and like so our urgent, our emergency becomes their emergency. And that is, you know, disrespectful. I should get it done earlier, stressful stuff. Yeah, that's the kind of stuff I need to improve upon. But yeah, I, you know, started a company, hired people, you know, millions, you know, and built decent sized company. And I think as someone who's listening to this podcast like I said, I think there's a lot of strength someone has. You notice things more you you're acutely aware of things. People may criticize you more because you go about things differently. And I think the more you do, sadly, I think you need a I think you need to create a bigger backbone, because people like to tear people down. It's just what it is. If you go look at society, I look at people who are very successful. If you go look on Reddit or different places, oh, don't even get me started with Reddit. It may it may be one person, but they tear people down. What I care about most. I mean, I want to grow the company, but what I love is helping people achieve more than they could achieve on their own, like, like that they ever thought they could achieve on their own. One of the guys who sits near me was like, talking to someone, and he was, like, all nervous, because this person was a successful business person, whatever. I'm like, nervous. There's nothing to be nervous about. The person isn't better than you in any regard. They just do different things than you. Like, there's nothing to be nervous about. But others just go online and just like you just said, like, like Reddit, for example, it is

Brooke Schnittman:

the platform for negative reviews on a lot of things. And

Jason Raznick:

you know that one person, one person, could have five of these negative being five of the negative people are 10. And now, with AI, you can do way more of it. And it's that it's that easy. So I asked one of these CEOs of public company, I said, How does he handle it? And he said, doesn't he doesn't read anymore. He just doesn't read it, and that's probably the best way.

Brooke Schnittman:

Yeah, I'm so glad that you're mentioning this, because I am also a CEO of a company not as big as Benzinga. It doesn't matter, but it doesn't matter. But the bigger you get, the more exposure you have. Have and regardless, 20% of people are not going to like you upon meeting you. Regardless, it's unbelievable. And I love how you you spoke to this friend of yours who said, I don't look at the reviews. Same thing with me, like on social media, when there's negative stuff that come from my post, I have someone who looks at it and filters it out first, because I don't think my time A is worth being spent in that land and B, yeah, it's going to make me feel like crap. Who wants to hear a negative thing about them, especially when you're doing your best and trying to help people and lives well. Here's

Jason Raznick:

what sucks. Here's what sucks. Let's say you announce some news. You get 200 compliments or 200 whatever. You get one or two negative things. You remember the one or 10 things. And there's a publication, I don't want to say the name, the found the editor, he's not there anymore. It's a publication that closed down, that got sued. It's a media publication. Their model was, let's say Mark Cuban buys then a NFL team, Seattle Seahawks. Let's just make that up. But right, Mark Cuban owns another team. You know, he got an MBA, or he's still an MBA, but he owns it this publication, they wanted to take a negative approach to everything, because they knew that's what people would talk about, so that their headline would probably be like, Mark Cuban trying to own the world, taking over for the little, you know. And so that's what gets and that's what's so sad, and that's what's like. I remember when we did our deal, I I honestly, I think I got six, 400 text messages that day. It was and, or the couple, you know, and then, like, maybe one or two negative things on Twitter. I don't remember what they were, but that's what you remember, and that's it messes us up. And I telling you, the higher the flag goes, the someone told me, once the higher the wind will blow people, just tear people down. And I don't, I don't get it. And I don't know if that's ADHD, but like, it's, it's so easy. It's so easy to go online and write a negative thing, it's also so easy to write a positive thing. But people, it makes them feel better. They see you doing well, Brooke, they're going to go and take you down. They see you making money. They're going to go and want to bring you to you know, down to their level, that's it.

Brooke Schnittman:

I think that we have both types of people, right? And since 2020 mental health awareness has been on the rise, and depression anxiety has gone up significantly, and social media and online outlets are being used to send messages. You know, it's just a different form of messaging. I was interviewing Jason Pfeiffer from entrepreneur he's the chief editor of Entrepreneur Magazine, and he was saying, you know, like these outlets aren't causing anxiety. They're not causing depression. It's the people who are trying to send these messages, and they're using these platforms to send them, and they're they are already depressed or anxious. So I know I'm going on a tangent here, but I think that to come back to what you're trying to say is like you are trying to help people we yes as ADHD ers, when we receive a negative message, it's so much more powerful than 200 positive messages. The negative messages stick to us like Velcro, and the positive message come off of us like Teflon. I heard that from one of my mentors, Dr Hallowell, also mentions that if we get a positive review, just one right, it can also be euphoric, because people with ADHD from before the age of 10 get 20,000 more negative subliminal messages than neurotypical. So it resonates. It makes us feel less than and we don't know. It's hard to differentiate. Oh, these are just not my type of people. Or they don't understand me, or I don't really care about them. Who are they to judge and think about I'm doing something for the greater good, and I can put my head down on a pillow at night and feel good about what I've done during the day. It's hard. It's really hard, but the bigger you get, the more negative messages and the more exposure you're going to get,

Jason Raznick:

I don't really know if people think they're being so negative and such haters a lot of time. And by the way, I'm not saying I'm perfect, and by any means, one thing, one exercise I do with myself, or I try to, is driving. So someone cuts you off, or something happens, or someone says something to you, the first reaction is to get upset and defensive. The other one is to just like, take it and not get defensive or upset and say, Oh, I'm sorry, or Oh, have a great day. I don't know. It's just like, it's not to raise the the stakes and argue it and because we're such a la. To just society, I feel like we're just set to argue, and this stuff just, you know, happens, and you're just but the way I test and driving is like, just be, you know, kill them with kindness. Kill them with kindness. You know, if like, someone cuts you off to think, oh, they must be in a big rush somewhere. And yeah, have have

Brooke Schnittman:

empathy for others. We never know what other people are going through exactly. Yeah, well, so Okay, so obviously, you know, the bigger you get, the more negative messages and positive messages you receive. How do you continue to grow and expand with your team in this company?

Jason Raznick:

I mean, so one thing you mentioned in when you were reading earlier or not reading, but the intro you mentioned making information easier to consume. So especially with like ADHD, there's information coming to you from a million places these days. And so some of it, a lot of it's noise. But if you're like following the stock market, you want to, you know, understand what's going on. We try to make it we try to condense it, so we do it in bold, who, the, what, the where, why, and what's this mean? What's this mean for you? That's what our we try to do with our content, to make it super simple to go where you want to read it. And that's what I like to read. So when I see on articles on Benzinga, when they aren't super simple to read. I'm like, Okay, wait, we did something. We have to change we have to change this. What are we doing here? Because no one, I don't want to read a big, long, five paragraph thing here. So part of that is continuing to fight to make stuff easier to read, to understand, be it financial, be it sports, be it politics, like the who, what, the where, why, and, you know, what's it mean? What's it mean to you? And like, here's the here's the Pro, here's the negative, here's how. Because right now, if you want to read that, it's hard. You don't know what, like at last night, I wanted to know what was really going on with something in the news. You know, if you turn on TV, there's gonna be one person has one angle, and then someone has another angle. So everyone has their opinion, yeah, and so I want to know what is like the neutral opinion, what's the neutral and then go from there. And so

Brooke Schnittman:

do you? Do you take the neutral opinion and actually create it as an opinion, or as fact? What? What is the information we

Jason Raznick:

just tried to inform and then let people decide so and better. Like, a good example would be, say your say Apple has earnings coming up, instead of just writing Apple's earnings, and you should buy the stock. Or what have you? We say, if you believe they're going to be positive, do you if you believe they're going to be in the stock's going to go up? Here are some ways you can take action on it. You can buy some ETFs and own apple. You can, you know, buy some call, you know, there's different things we're trying to give the average Joe hedge fund type abilities with, like, saying, here's some ways to look at it, or just to make basically inform people. Like, for example, this guy, Dave Portnoy, had a bet on this the Celtics, and this other guy at a bet against the Celtics. And, like, people want to, want to know what was the bet. We try to make it really we we try to decipher the information really, really simply so you can understand it. And that's what we try to, that's what we aspire to do. And I think there's a lot more that we can do in that regard, because you understand, like for SEO, it's part right? Long articles, you get better rankings and all this stuff. So it's you're fighting, but you're fighting, you know, both sides of things in that regard. So we try to make things simple. And I think going forward, it's not just news and content, there's data, there's tools that can make things simpler. So if you are looking at a ETF and you want to know how what you where you could put $10,000 and not risk losing it. Well, what's the data say? Like, what's the data say over the last 20 years? What happened? And that's another way to look at it. It's kind of what we

Brooke Schnittman:

do nice. So you're making news more accessible to people. And I love, I mean, I don't love, but I appreciate the fact of your internal struggle that you continue to share throughout this it's like you do good stuff, and at the same time you're fighting SEO, you're fighting negative reviews, right? Like, but you're trying to stay focused on what's going to help the people most. Is what I hear,

Jason Raznick:

well, 100% because if you can help people, ultimately, the end of the day, that's a positive, and people get better for that, and they come back to you, and that you build trust, you're not going to please everyone. I know that, like, I know that it's but I do think, in general, there's a net like people just think people are out to get them. That's what I that's what I would say. I don't know why that is, because I feel like if people didn't think that, in general, to be a lot more successful. Part of me building this thing up and building Benzing. Uh, is getting advice from others and trusting others to help me over the years. Now, sure, some people were probably not great, but like, there were some people that were so good that, like, they were so good that I'm like, Okay, what? What do they want? What's their angle? And they never had an angle. And this one of the guys I'm referring to, did, like, sold this company for like, two or $3 billion he let me he was asked if I wanted to invest that $25 million valuation. I didn't, because I never money, then whatever. But my point is, he was just so giving people get inspired by passion. You actually just made me think of something someone did text me, like, two weeks ago that wants to second time to get advice. And we went back and forth and I forgot, I didn't get back to him. And that's a, you know, blemish on me, because I like someone that's passionate, and I and if he thinks I can help, him not saying I could, but if he thinks I can, I want to, for sure, be there to, you know, try to do that, right? That's how the world goes around. That's karma. I mean, we're, we're here for such a short life. And you know one other thing that Brooke, I don't know if you've ever watched him, but I just saw Jerry Seinfeld in an interview, and he talking about this famous philosopher. I got to look it up, but basically, all the he had a movie coming out, and he's like, I can't wait to see the negative hate on it, because it doesn't matter, because it's going to be for such a short time in this lifetime, the negative hate is in such a short time. So his movie comes out, doesn't do, let's say doesn't do well, which I don't think it did, called frosted, frosted something, and is on Netflix. Okay, so for three months he'll get negative stuff on it. He's, you know, lives 85 years. It's such a small amount of time. So the negative thing about you see something on online, on any of these websites, and in such a short amount of time, that's why like ignoring the noise. I talked to you about that CEO who has people who say negative stuff and read it honestly. Why should he like, if he's doing his thing, takes care of his family, does best for his team members, and that's what he's doing. That's what he's here to do, and best for his clients. Like, there's going to be people that just are angry, right, especially when you're successful,

Brooke Schnittman:

yeah, yeah, totally. If it's okay. I want to pivot a little bit to the user of benzega. I want to just, I'm curious on, like, what's, what are some strategies that you recommend as a CEO to stay updated on your financial news that you put out there without getting overwhelmed as a consumer. So

Jason Raznick:

I mean strategies I do is I try to turn some stuff off at certain times, like I won't necessarily go read news at a certain time during the day, because I know it'll lead me sometimes down a rabbit hole. Another thing I do is, I used to open up a million articles. I don't, I limit it now to like, five, unless it's like some, you know, big reason, obviously, I go to Benzinga, but, you know, another site I'll go to is New York Post. And I just want to read basics, you know, fun stories and that can take you off, lead you on a rabbit hole. I try to do it during times when I'm when it's okay for me to read this stuff, or my other one is, if I open up the windows and the tabs, I'll keep them open and I'll just read them later, because I don't want to do it as a mechanism to not do what I'm supposed to do. For example, this is not your question about snap on financial news, but I like backgammon. For some reason, I had an app on my phone, and I caught myself playing it way too much, and it was affecting my sleep, so I would replay it at 10 o'clock. Till 12 o'clock, you get nothing out of it. I eventually just had to delete that. I had. I just deleted that. And that has made, that has made a difference, like, you know, to the point is, like, you want to be outside with your kids you and I'm playing the dumb backgammon game. There's so many other priorities. And what is it doing for me? You know, it's, it's, there's probably some theory ADHD, it's destroy. It's distracting from other issues, you know, things I should be focused on. There's probably something I, you know, should be doing different. So part of the reason I started Benzinga was several years ago, after 911 happened, and then years later, I was really good at researching small cap companies, like small capitalization, like that are very, you know, and on the stock market that were very small, and I would find good stuff on them. And I created a big following on Yahoo message boards with my research. I think when you're ADHD, you really can go down a rabbit hole and become like a solid expert, you know? I think the more you know, the better you can do. Yeah,

Brooke Schnittman:

I think it's also like that ADHD intuition, if you like something, you see that it's something that people are using, that you're passionate about following that decision to invest, but also not to invest everything that granted. I am not a financial advisor, so tell me if I'm wrong here, but just from my experience in working with so many people with ADHD being married to an ADHD family. Like not putting all of your eggs in one basket, diversifying, like you said, but following that intuition and going in multiple directions based on what you have done your homework, on what you believe in, and also taking other experts advice into consideration as well?

Jason Raznick:

Yeah, and I think there is some of that intuition that you you may see things before others, and then you don't know if you really are so like, should I buy more? Should I buy like, for example, those GLP plays, those ozempic plays, those losing weight plays, I should have bought 10x more than I did, right? Because eventually people caught on and bought the stocks. You just don't know. And so the point of diversification is it's vital to because you don't know what trends are, and you don't want to work hard for money, then see it go away. And so I think it's vital to diversify. I i also think some things are dangerous. You know, we all have, I think a lot of us, we want to, you know, get rich, right? Like, it's a get written quick, like, get rich quick type thing, instant gratification. And I think that can be dangerous too, you know, slowly but surely, type thing. And do the true and true buy that's in 5500 or buy good companies. I mean, Microsoft has done well over the years, right? Absolutely.

Brooke Schnittman:

And also, I, yeah, I hear everything that you're saying. I worked with a fortune 500 man, but he was obsessed with the money that he had in his stocks. He could not wake up in the morning without looking at it. First thing you know, he would follow it the you know, the ups, the downs throughout the day, and his moods would be affected by it. And I'm sure he's not alone in feeling that. When I know you touched on this a little bit before, what do you recommend for people who are just so involved in the fluctuation.

Jason Raznick:

So for Benzinga, we have a thing called Benzinga Pro. It's our real time news data platform. It's, you know, we have 1000s of people trading off it and reading real time news, and you get your stress levels up and down. There's people I know, and there's, we have users that trade for a living. So they make money, they trade for a living. It's absolutely amazing. They're consistently able to do that in up and down markets. They're they just trade for living. They're amazing. That person you're talking about, and he sounds like his enough money to be retired and doesn't need to work, but he's stressing over the stock market stuff. To me, that's not the best way to live. If that person has that kind of money, you diversify? Yeah, the market would fall. But typically, the market goes up 10% a year over a lifetime. By the way, I didn't want to have so much money in the market, because I didn't like seeing the daily gyrations. And then it's like there is some truth to be told. Don't look at it. Don't look at it so often. I mean, I sold. When I get cocky about the stock market, I have a thing on my phone. I sold Amazon stock in 1997 I had the date at $10 a share. I would be like, it was like $4,000 would be, like, worth, like, 800,000 or 1.2 million. Now, but, but, but the point is, if I didn't look at it, and don't look and so some of the stuff you just you don't look at, and you never know where it ends up. I When I bought those Apple shares, I never sold them, some from way back when. So I never, I never sold those shares. Wow, yeah, so I've had Apple forever. No, I bought it lot smaller amount, because I used the financial advisor at the time. He's like, I hated apple at at 16. I hate it. I hate it at 36 and that means, like, at $1 because this is many splits and all this. And so someone convinced me not to buy many shares. But yeah, I, you know, it's like, you stay with your conviction, obviously, if you diversify. Now, listen, if you don't diversify, and you get lucky, you can get lucky if my, if I would have put all my money in Apple, like by my conviction, if I, if I would have put my money that I had from my grandma, a little money, all of an apple, that would have been worth a lot. Instead, I put a small amount in very small it's still worth a little bit, a nice amount. But that's where the Warren Buffett thing is, if you're really knowledgeable on something, yeah, I would have been up a lot. Have been a lot more money. But at the end of the day, why have that stress on the money with the stock market when you when life is short and you could go enjoy your family, go do activities. Go help other people accomplish things. Go go to charities, fundraisers. One of the big things is I, I love going to charity stuff. I i Like charities where I can see the impact. Like, that's where I love like, some are health neurofibrosis. It's children's tumors in their brain or around their body. Young age, and I want to cure for this thing. And I donate, you know, time, and my wife's on the board of this thing and money, because it's such an important cause, because, like these kids do not deserve to go through this. I like seeing people. Affected this. I'm afraid of this guy, MD, motivator, who get who gives money away and does experiences, and I'm a big supporter of his, and doing stuff with him, and that's to the point of like the stock market thing. If that's the case, my answer is, you move some of that money to T bills, to money market funds, you get paid five and a half percent, and you don't have to have that stress, yeah? Because that person to get five and a half percent, let's say that person has ten million I was making up a number. Let's say that person has 10 million okay, he gets five and a half percent, or she says five and a half percent, that's 500,000 a year for doing that, for him to do, for do nothing, yeah, 500,000 a year. So for his money, yeah, 500,000 years and money just to sit. So, 5000 a year, he could, you can go on private planes, you can do whatever. So like, for the stock market to go, like, I don't know, like, that's just, you know, that's how, that's how I feel,

Brooke Schnittman:

yeah, understood. So just to kind of summarize this whole thing, like, what would be your number one success tip for someone with ADHD who's starting to invest but feels intimidated by the complexity of the financial markets,

Jason Raznick:

read some basic understanding of the markets, but through Benzinga or Investopedia. Like you know, how can I buy an index fund? I would, if I was to start to invest, I would buy an index fund. An index fund is a basket of stocks. So say you like Tesla. There's ETFs that own Tesla, there's ETFs that own Nike or under armor. The reason I'm saying that now, by the way, if you're young, like super young. So my kids, I get them to give me stock recommendations. We buy some stocks for them, I want them to learn about how the stock market works, that they're an owner of the company. So when they go get an Apple phone or whatever, they own a piece of apple, I like that, that I'm all for that. So I'm all for that. But what I am saying to you is, I think there's some danger sometimes, if you, let's say, a$5,000 to invest, and you buy one stock, what if that stock goes down 50% you're going to be burned from the stock market for a long time. You're not going to want to participate in the future. So, like, that's the kind of things that we I don't want people to be afraid of the stock market. I mean, I have stock, certain stocks that I think are going to go up 100% and I, my track record's pretty good with making these calls. You want to start slowly but surely. I think listening to podcasts are good too. We have a pre market prep report. I do a raz report my podcast, and I interview financial advisors, and they talk about how to invest $10,000 and the ADHD thing, information overload is also not good you. And I talked about it, how perfectionism isn't the way to go, like you actually motivate me, because I have something I need to do and I haven't done it, and I just remembered, and I'm like, I need to get back to I need to do it. I need to put this and stop. I just have to do it. I just have to do it. And I just have to, like, put deadlines on myself. I have, like, an assistant. I think I'm going to have her start saying, If this isn't, if I don't review it, she's just going to send it out. And I think I have to do that. And there's penalties to that, because if it's not good, I'll look not good. And so there's penalties to that. That's the kind of thing that I think we have to do. So we don't, so we because, you know, the line shit, or get off the pot, right? And so I think part of that is we 88 years. We got to do that. Okay,

Brooke Schnittman:

gotcha so. So don't put all of our eggs in one basket. Definitely not start consuming information from easy sources that are bite size and, you know, start small, diversify and learn from these sources as you go, is what I'm gathering.

Jason Raznick:

Yeah. I mean, there's so much information out there, so you have to decide what you want to do now. The truth is, for the stock market, there's no better time to invest than like they would say today, because 20 years from now, is the market going to be higher? Arguably, yes. So that's how it's always been. So yes. Now I again, don't think you put your eggs in all in one basket. I think you can money markets. You can buy CD at five and a half percent. So, you know, I if you need the money in six months, don't put it in the stock market bias the six month CD, you have a pie, and you figure out how to allocate and, you know, hire someone too. By the way, you can get a financial advisor. You can get people to help you. Schwab has options. Robin Hood has options. Like, there's a lot of different, you know, Morgan Stanley, the E trade. There's so many different things now that you can do we provide news and data to all those brokerages. And there's, we try to give the average Joe the same knowledge as a hedge fund manager, and the more knowledge is great, but at first you just have to get started. I love that. Just start. Yeah, yes. Just start our or better this. J. F. Di just f and do it

Brooke Schnittman:

all right? Well, Jason, it was so nice to have you unsuccessful with ADHD, for someone who is just starting or continuing their financial literacy and financial growth, where can they find you?

Jason Raznick:

You can find me. I'm on Twitter at Jason rasnick, R, a, z n, i, C, K, Instagram. Raznick, we have events. We've one company in Chicago. You can look at Benzinga events, or benzinga.com and lastly, the Raz report. Look it up, download it. There's some great interviews, a lot of celebrities, your very own Brooke here. I think you'll enjoy it. I really try to ask the questions like Brooke does, and gets really deep into asking like, how do you do this?

Brooke Schnittman:

You have a great product. You have lots of people on the Raz report sharing valuable information.

Jason Raznick:

I appreciate you. Having me on this has been great, and I hope I added some value to someone today. I don't know, but I hope and you did. I appreciate it, Brooke and I look forward to being in touch with you. We got to do this more often. Absolutely.

Brooke Schnittman:

Thanks again.

Jason Raznick:

Thank you. Thank you.

Brooke Schnittman:

Thanks for listening to this episode of successful with ADHD. I hope it helps you on your journey, and if you need any additional support for you or a loved one with ADHD, feel free to reach out to us@coachingwithbrook.com and all social media platforms at coaching with Brooke. And remember, it's Brooke with an E. Thanks again for listening. See you next time you

People on this episode

Head Shot

Brooke Schnittman MA, PCC, BCC

Host