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Calling all conscious achievers who are seeking more community and connection, I ve got an invitation for you.
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Join me at this year s Summit of Greatness this September 7th through 9th in my hometown of Columbus, Ohio to unleash your true greatness.
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This is the one time a year
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that I gather the greatness community together in person for a powerful, transformative weekend.
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People come from all over the world, and you can expect to hear from inspiring speakers like Inky Johnson, Jaspreet Singh, Vanessa Van Edwards, Jen Cinchero, and many more.
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You ll also be able to dance your heart out to live music, get your body moving with group workouts, and connect with others at our evening socials.
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So if you re ready to learn, heal, and grow alongside other incredible individuals in the greatness community, then you can learn more at lewishouse.com slash summit 2023.
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Make sure to grab your ticket, invite your friends, and I ll see you there.
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The new rich is peace, you know, because you can put somebody in a Rolls Royce, he s still gonna have the same problems.
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He s gonna have those problems in a Rolls Royce.
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And I think once you become in this place where you just have peace with who you are, I had to work so hard and do so much work on myself just to even get a taste of that.
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Welcome to the School of Greatness.
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My name is Lewis Howes, a former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur.
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And each week we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness.
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Thanks for spending some time with me today.
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Now let the class begin.
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Welcome back, everyone, to the School of Greatness.
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Very excited about our guest.
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We have the inspiring Jay Jeezy Jenkins in the house.
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My man.
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How you feeling?
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Good to see you, man.
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Excited about this.
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We ve connected on social media for a while.
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You have an amazing new book out called Adversity for Sale that everyone needs to get.
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But you ve been on the scene for a while, a couple decades.
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You ve been in the music scene, multi-platinum, award winning, all the different things that have happened for the success that the world has seen.
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What I think is interesting is most people we were just talking about don t see the darkness and don t see the failures necessarily.
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They see the money, they see maybe the success, they see who you re working with, all the talented people you get to collaborate with.
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but I don t think everyone gets to know about the adversity that got you to where you re at and actually how it s the failures that give us the most information on how to be successful.
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We re talking about your younger years where you went through different adversity, grew up, your parents were separated, you re in and out of bootcamp style institutions.
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And you had some darkness early on.
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Yeah.
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A lot of it.
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Now, were you successful before in terms of the music world?
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Were you doing music and having stuff out there before a lot of the darkness came?
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Oh, no.
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Let me give you a little history.
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So my father was in the military.
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My mother and my father married young.
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I have a sister.
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My older brother died.
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And me and my family were abroad.
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So I lived in Japan.
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And Hawaii too, right?
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Hawaii, yeah.
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So that was the beginning.
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My parents got divorced because my mom was
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You know, my mom was a little spicy at the time, you know what I mean?
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My dad was how he was, and I don t think they can put it together because I don t think there was therapy, all those things back then that I know of, and they just divorced.
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And it was like one day we was living this life, and the next day I was back in the hood with my grandmother, living with my grandmother.
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And then I tried to live with my grandmother for a while, and there was a lot of people in the house.
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So I ended up moving with my mother.
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And when I moved with my mother, it was really a little dysfunctional because I looked just like my father.
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She didn t like your father.
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No.
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So she didn t like you.
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No, at all.
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And so we just kept bumping heads.
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And one day I was supposed to go to school.
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And this is around the time I was getting in the streets and I was just like, I ain t going.
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And she was like, oh, you ain t going to school.
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And I ll never forget it.
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We got in this big, the biggest argument we ever had.
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And I looked up and she had her, she had a little 25.
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It was like a chrome with a, a little pearl handle.
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She put it in my face.
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She said, you re gonna go to school.
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You re gonna, she said, you re gonna go to school.
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You re gonna go to the hospital.
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And I just remember- She put the gun in your face?
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Yes.
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I looked at her.
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Your mom?
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Yes.
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How old were you?
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Maybe about,
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14, 15.
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Holy cow.
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Yeah, maybe about 14.
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I couldn t have been 16.
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I just wanted to make sure I get the time.
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Sure.
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So she puts the gun like right in your face, like closer.
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Yep.
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Tells me, you re going to go to school, you re going to die today.
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Oh my gosh, man.
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And I believed her too, though.
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My mom wasn t in the play with it.
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Like she was serious.
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She was serious business.
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And I knew what it was, so I was out of control.
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By this time, I m 13, 14 years old.
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I m selling drugs.
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You know, I m into a lot of things that kids shouldn t be into, right?
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But because this is where I felt like I had a place, you know, because they treated me different.
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You felt more accepted there?
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Yeah, yeah.
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In the streets.
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Yeah, in the streets.
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That at home.
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Right.
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Really?
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And so when I left her, I went back to stay with my grandmother.
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And that s why I say I relate to you on the sofa thing.
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I slept on the sofa a lot of nights.
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The whole childhood.
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Years.
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And the thing about my grandmother, she kind of let me do what I wanted to do.
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Because there were so many grandkids in the house, she didn t really have any controls.
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I would go out, stay out as long as I wanted to, and come in.
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And so I was able to start building my
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building my foundation to be what I was becoming, if you will, because I didn t have any restraints.
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Right.
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It was game on.
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That s not a good thing.
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You know it s crazy I say that all the time because my grandmother lived right across the street from this basketball court right and every Sunday everybody would come to this court from all the towns around and they would play basketball and they d be like all the hustlers and all the cars and you know all the women and you just like and I used to be so tired because I was up hustling all night.
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that I used to sleep on the sofa.
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So I would be asleep while they re playing ball, right?
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But I would listen to everything, the conversations and everything I could hear, because I had a phone more, I didn t want to miss out, right?
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And that was like my thing, just laying on that sofa and just listening to everything.
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And then one day I was just like, man, you know, I can t wait till I can pull up in front of this park in a yellow Testa Roaster and hop out and be this big guy and all that.
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And the crazy thing is that was my vision then, you know, of course it wasn t a big vision.
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That was the dream.
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Yeah, there you go.
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And I ended up doing that, but my grandmother passed before she got a chance to see it.
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So my point of case is everything that she thought that was gonna, you know, send me to prison and get me killed,
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actually gave me the foundation to be who I was.
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And that s why I relate when you re saying about your brother.
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It s like you have to go through things to start to understand why you re here.
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And for me, it was like, I can do this.
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But it was a real game because it s like, this ain t Pac-Man or something you playing because if you lose, you know, it s death or jail.
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So now,
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I m picking up skills, because what do you have to have if the consequences are dire?
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No, I got discipline.
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Wow.
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I m smart.
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I m thinking things out.
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I m problem solving.
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You learned this from the streets.
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Yeah.
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What were the three most powerful skills you learned hustling in the streets that you still use today?
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Oh, sure.
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Discipline is real.
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You can do anything in the world with discipline, and if you don t have it, the world can do anything to you.
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Discipline is key.
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The second one, I always think, would be it s problem solving.
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It can be chaotic.
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I m the calmest person in the room, and in my head, I m already putting together how I m gonna solve the problem, right?
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And the second thing, I mean, the third thing would be understanding that
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You don t need anything to make something.
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You just gotta have the drive to do it.
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You feel what I m saying?
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It s like you don t need a product to make money.
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You just need an idea and the drive to get it across.
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And I learned that in the streets really quick.
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Because if your personality s good and you re a good person,
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People who do things for you that they wouldn t do for somebody that they feel like might try to take advantage of and rob them.
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Wow.
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Take something.
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It s almost like, I really like you own it.
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But could you fully trust everyone or anyone in the streets as a 16, 18-year-old kid?
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I m going to tell you something real.
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I ain t never trusted nobody in my life.
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Even today?
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No.
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Today you don t trust anyone?
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No.
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Not even your wife or kids?
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My wife, like nobody I know.
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Wow.
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But let me say this.
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from my past.
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From your past, okay.
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But what I had to learn
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and earn was to get only quality people around.
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Because I just kind of brought what I had with me to the table.
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And everybody don t got the proper etiquette.
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So it was like, it wasn t the right table.
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And as I started to lose people on one front, I had this very dark space where I was trying to figure out who I was because these are the people that made me feel like this is my support system.
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They accepted you on the streets, they were there for you when you were struggling, when your parents weren t there.
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They brought you in.
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This is my support system.
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Man, that s so tough.
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And then now, I m getting to this space where I m making different decisions.
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And by the way, my support system is almost like having a pack of wild wolves.
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You know what I m saying?
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I m just being honest.
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You feed them every day.
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And then when the food starts slowing, they start looking at you.
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They get hungry.
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Right.
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You know what I m saying?
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So now I m having to navigate this, and I m having to separate myself, so to speak.
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But as I m separating myself, I m losing my power.
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How so?
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Because I don t have control over anything else.
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I got control over the streets.
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I m not in corporate America yet.
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I can t make any decisions or no moves.
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I m not over here.
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I m nobody.
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How old are you at this time?
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This is actually after I put out my second album.
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You know I m saying and and I just started to see things happen and I talk a lot about in the book.
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This was my my my say like you graded what you do right and you know all these people in this community so you got resources but if I just took you and put you in the White House you might be a little like what do I know so it was a lot of that and.
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as I started to transition.
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So you brought your crew with you as you started to do music?
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Correct.
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I didn t really have a choice.
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Yeah, it was all you knew.
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Well, no, because I was still doing what I wasn t supposed to be doing.
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Oh, you were still on the street.
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This is my corporation.
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While you were trying to be credible.
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Absolutely.
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Yeah, yeah.
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So this is my company.
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Right?
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This is how the bills are being paid.
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This is how we re staying afloat.
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This is how I m paying for the music.
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But once I go like, okay, this ain t really working, I got to lean more towards the music.
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And I never forget, I went cold turkey.
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I like, I just kind of like, one of my friends said something to me about it.
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And I m like, you know what?
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I don t want to go to prison because I m not a prison type.
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I m keeping it real.
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Like I m, it just ain t.
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I m too fly of a guy for that.
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I ain t got time to be wasting my time.
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You know what I mean?
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So, and I didn t want to get killed.
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because it was like, you know, I was losing, you know, 30, 40, 50 friends a year, like clockwork.
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Really?
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Yeah, still to this day, right now, right now.
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Wow.
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I just lost three people that I know that I m affiliated with, so I lost three people in the last two days.
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Do you know anyone who can be successful doing, hustling the streets?
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Right.
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while staying alive, not going to prison after 10, 20, 30 years, and feeling peace in their heart.
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No.
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Why do people do it for so long?
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I get it when you re like a teenager and you re getting brought up in it, but why keep doing it?
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Because...
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In their eyes, that s the closest they ever been to success.
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In my eyes, that s the closest I ve ever been to success.
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I paid for my, just to put a understanding of it, like this room we in, right before my mom kicked me out, I bought her a trailer, a double-wide or a single-wide trailer, as big as this room.
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That s as big as it was.
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Me and my mom, my sister stayed in a space like this for years until she kicked me out, that I paid $3,500 for.
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Wow, well you think I got the $35 the streets right so just like how s that not how you made it?
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Yeah?
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Yeah, how s that not success right?
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This is I m doing something my family doing something my mom.
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I m not even thinking about the consequences right, right?
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I m not thinking about what could happen.
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I need to eat now
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Right.
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But when you, but let s say, you know, for those that stay in that game for five, 10 years and they see three to five, 10 friends a year die or go to jail every year, what s the motivation for saying, Oh, it s not going to be me.
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I m going to be fine.
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Or I can outsmart the law or outsmart the bullets.
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Okay.
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So,
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That s why I m doing what I m doing.
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Because I m the one.
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I m the only one that made it from what I know.
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And that s why I m telling my story because I had to make a lot of decisions that weren t favorable, that wasn t cool, that wasn t like what you re supposed to do when you re in my position.
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I had to go against the grain.
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And that s when I realized that I m a disrupter and I m a visionary because I see, I can tell you in 10 years when I want to be like, when I continue in 20 years where I want to live at, you know what I mean?
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I can see it, right?
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And then I can tell you what I m not scared to go up against to get there, right?
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And that s why I wrote the book because this success is like, we equate success with money.
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And I don t care how much it is.
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You know what I m saying?
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If I got more than I had yesterday, I m successful.
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But that s not the truth.
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What is success for you?
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Success to me is peace.
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It s peace of mind.
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It s being able to get up every day and live your life.
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to the fullest with making memories, doing things that you love to do, without, you know, having to be told what to do, because you earn that and you put yourself in a position where you re able to go do something that you actually love.
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And it has purpose for you, right?
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Because this book and what I do is, because a lot of people get caught up in the jeezy, like the rap.
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I ain t never been a rapper.
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Really?
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No, I m him.
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I ain t his mother, his daddy, his brother, his cousin.
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I m him.
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I m the guy who walked out on the streets and showed all these kids in this generation coming up that you can be from where I m from.
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I m gonna leave the back door open for you.
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You just gotta get in there.
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That s the first part.
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You gotta be disciplined to make those decisions, yeah.
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Right?
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But that s not where the game start.
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Where s it start?
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Now you gotta stay alive.
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Now you got to stay free.
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You know what I m saying?
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Because if you see what s going on with culture and entertainment, these kids are going to jail like it s nothing.
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They re dying like they re in Vietnam or something.
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You feel what I m saying?
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So that s my purpose and why I m here and why I want to tell my story because
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I had to make some painful decisions to get here, and I m still thriving and trying to get to the next level.
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But this is bigger than me because I m going to have to sit down with somebody one day and tell them, hey, man, you know, you might want to try it this way, you know, because there s been so many calls where I ve had some kids where I wouldn t call them kids, but young guys that I really respected.
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And I would go talk to them about certain things.
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And they d be like, yeah, I could see that.
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And then next week they re gone.
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They don t listen to you, they don t take action.
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Well, the thing is, you have to package it right.
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You feel what I m saying?
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Because I m coming to you and I m looking clean and buttoned up.
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I don t look like one of you because you know how I used to look.
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You know how I used to be, you know what used to be around me.
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You respected what was around me because you felt like I was leading men that you respect.
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Now that that s no longer around, you kind of second guess what I m saying because that ain t the ideal you got for yourself, right?
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Until you start to get in that place where you start to get things that you actually really care about.
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Kids, wife, family, career, you know what I m saying?
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And now you re like, oh, what do I do?
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Because now you have to start making those and the thing is you have to evolve if you don t evolve even in the streets I knew that going in and just like I m not staying here I just need this to be you know the vessel because.
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Music is my talent, which I stumbled on over, but business has always been my passion.
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I always saw myself with a plain-jane watch, wedding band, three-piece suit.
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Really?
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Yeah, that s me.
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That s who I am.
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Clean cut, good skin.
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You smellin  good, man.
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That s me.
1
SPEAKER_00
And that s what I strive for.
1
SPEAKER_00
So I was never caught up in the stigma of the streets.
1
SPEAKER_00
Like, I understood it, but I understood what it was, too.
1
SPEAKER_00
You know what I mean?
1
SPEAKER_00
So I m like, I can t come from the streets and walk straight into the boardroom.
1
SPEAKER_00
So how do I get there?
1
SPEAKER_00
And then I started to map out this plan.
1
SPEAKER_00
The plan was to go from where I was, to figure some things out, to establish myself, establish my credibility.
1
SPEAKER_00
And started to get into this music.
1
SPEAKER_00
I started as a CEO at first.
1
SPEAKER_00
I spent a lot of money.
1
SPEAKER_00
That didn t work.
1
SPEAKER_00
My artists went to jail.
1
SPEAKER_00
One of them got killed.
1
SPEAKER_00
And now I m stuck with all the studio equipment.
1
SPEAKER_00
I m like, I got to do it myself.
1
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
1
SPEAKER_00
I do it myself.
1
SPEAKER_00
It takes me 10 years to build it.
1
SPEAKER_00
Boom.
1
SPEAKER_00
Now I m a success.
1
SPEAKER_00
But then I got all these bad things that are coming with me because now nobody ever cut the water off.
1
SPEAKER_00
You know what I mean?
1
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
1
SPEAKER_00
I got to start transitioning that.
1
SPEAKER_00
But this is the thing.
1
SPEAKER_00
They don t understand I already got a vision.
1
SPEAKER_00
I m already going where I m going.
1
SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
1
SPEAKER_00
Absolutely.
1
SPEAKER_00
I m going there.
1
SPEAKER_00
So as you start to get closer to where you re going, people start to fall back.
1
SPEAKER_00
And they re like, I don t really like what he s doing anymore.
2
SPEAKER_00
he s listening to?
2
SPEAKER_00
Why is he eating clean food?
2
SPEAKER_00
What are we doing?
2
SPEAKER_00
You know what I mean?
2
SPEAKER_00
So it s that.
2
SPEAKER_00
And the thing is, you know, I think the sad part about it is, you know, everybody s supposed to have their own vision.
2
SPEAKER_00
And my vision and your vision is supposed to align so we can get to where we re going together.
2
SPEAKER_00
Whatever I can do to help you, like we talked about earlier, and whatever you can do to help me, that s when visions align.
2
SPEAKER_00
Everybody s just kind of walking behind you just to see where you got to go and they re not knowing you going there As you get closer to it to go.
2
SPEAKER_00
I don t I don t I want to be over here This is where I m good at but I m like we can be good here today, but I don t know about tomorrow Right and that s what happens when you have people that get into the streets and stay in it.
2
SPEAKER_00
They don t have a vision They just they just needed what they needed right then and as you get more comfortable
2
SPEAKER_00
with getting what you get, then you get this thing that I talk about in the book, this mindset of, I m glad it ain t me.
2
SPEAKER_00
So you hear about somebody getting murdered, I m glad it ain t me.
2
SPEAKER_00
You hear about somebody going to prison, I m glad it ain t me.
2
SPEAKER_00
But the whole time, you rolling the dice.
2
SPEAKER_01
Could be you any moment.
2
SPEAKER_00
Tomorrow.
2
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I m not trying to paint it like this dark cloud because I love it so much in the streets.
2
SPEAKER_00
I give the streets everything.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I mean that.
2
SPEAKER_00
Even to this day when I m out and I see people.
2
SPEAKER_00
And you gotta understand, by far, I m not the biggest rap star.
2
SPEAKER_00
Not the biggest.
2
SPEAKER_00
But in the streets, I m everything.
2
SPEAKER_00
I m everything.
2
SPEAKER_00
Today.
2
SPEAKER_00
It don t get no bigger.
2
SPEAKER_00
Really?
2
SPEAKER_00
Because they all, either their fathers knew me, their older brother that s in prison, their cousin from the block.
2
SPEAKER_00
Somebody got a cheesy story about why
2
SPEAKER_00
They love me.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s almost like Bob Marley.
2
SPEAKER_00
You go to Jamaica, seven miles where he s from, everybody s going to tell you a story about Bob.
2
SPEAKER_00
How he helped them fight the bully at school, how he helped somebody jump their car off, how he gave somebody bail money, how he paid for kids  Christmas.
2
SPEAKER_00
That s who I am.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I ve been that.
2
SPEAKER_00
And for me,
2
SPEAKER_00
That s what it s about.
2
SPEAKER_00
And throughout the streets, the streets taught me about integrity, right?
2
SPEAKER_00
And that s like the big one to me, because it s almost like, if you ain t a man of your word, you re not a man.
2
SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
2
SPEAKER_00
And it s like, you wanna keep your word when you play with people that are just as dangerous as you are.
2
SPEAKER_01
They re not gonna play.
2
SPEAKER_00
They re not gonna play around.
2
SPEAKER_00
Break your word, they re gonna break you.
2
SPEAKER_01
So you mentioned,
2
SPEAKER_01
You mentioned your, I mean, I shouldn t be laughing about this, but it s just kind of crazy to think about.
2
SPEAKER_01
You mentioned your mom put a gun in your face when you were 14, 15.
2
SPEAKER_01
How many times have you had a gun in your face since then?
2
SPEAKER_01
I got pretty slick after that.
2
SPEAKER_00
I got pretty good at like seeing the energy and knowing like.
2
SPEAKER_00
Escaping it, yeah, not putting yourself in it.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I was telling somebody this other day, like I think in my mind,
2
SPEAKER_00
I just built up this superpower of just not getting caught up in nothing.
2
SPEAKER_00
Really?
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I ve just been so good at that.
2
SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
2
SPEAKER_00
People will tell you right now, I still move militant.
2
SPEAKER_00
I moved militant before Barack Obama.
2
SPEAKER_00
Really?
2
SPEAKER_00
Oh, yes.
2
SPEAKER_00
Because I m not exempt to anything.
2
SPEAKER_00
I m not.
2
SPEAKER_00
We just lost an MC Hustle, we just lost this one, that one.
2
SPEAKER_00
Like, you re not exempt.
2
SPEAKER_01
Even if you ve had a good track record for a certain amount of time, and even if you re being an integrity to the right things, and being of service.
2
SPEAKER_00
One thing about it, if you got a choppa with Guzma, you still got a choppa with Guzma.
2
SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
2
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
2
SPEAKER_00
It doesn t go away.
2
SPEAKER_00
The people don t go away.
2
SPEAKER_00
Really?
2
SPEAKER_00
Something from 10, 20 years ago might still catch up to you.
2
SPEAKER_00
Absolutely.
2
SPEAKER_00
Really?
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s real.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I don t mean it in the sense of, I mean, you re still dealing with individuals.
2
SPEAKER_00
You re dealing with people.
2
SPEAKER_00
Right.
2
SPEAKER_00
Emotions.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, you re dealing with- People holding onto stuff.
2
SPEAKER_00
And people see you moving differently, right?
2
SPEAKER_00
And they see you enjoying your life.
2
SPEAKER_00
And they think, oh, I should be getting peace.
2
SPEAKER_00
Right.
2
SPEAKER_00
Or not even just that.
2
SPEAKER_00
Or it s like, oh, he ain t the way he used to be.
2
SPEAKER_00
Therefore, he s not.
2
SPEAKER_00
Or he thinks he s better than her or whatever.
2
SPEAKER_00
Right.
2
SPEAKER_00
And just jealousy, my coach, is the real deal.
2
SPEAKER_00
Really?
2
SPEAKER_00
Oh, yeah.
2
SPEAKER_00
You can lose your life about that easy.
2
SPEAKER_00
I mean, that s nothing.
2
SPEAKER_01
Even if you didn t do anything to someone, but just that you came from somewhere, you made it, and they didn t.
2
SPEAKER_00
The craziest thing, you didn t even make it.
2
SPEAKER_00
You just got to be there when the energy s off, and they re jealous, and they re mad, or they re upset.
2
SPEAKER_00
They got nothing to lose.
2
SPEAKER_00
That s it.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I got nothing to prove.
2
SPEAKER_00
Right.
2
SPEAKER_00
So I know better.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I think that, you know, I carry those list of rules and morals as I continue to navigate the world.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I think people that are around me don t understand why I still think that way.
2
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
2
SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
2
SPEAKER_00
But I just know better.
2
SPEAKER_00
And it s not like I m scared or worried, but I m not going to go nowhere.
2
SPEAKER_00
I shouldn t be.
2
SPEAKER_00
I m not going to hang around.
2
SPEAKER_00
I ain t going to Roscoe s.
2
SPEAKER_00
I ll tell you that.
2
SPEAKER_00
I m not doing that.
2
SPEAKER_00
Wow, man.
2
SPEAKER_00
I m missing my assistant.
2
SPEAKER_01
You re very intentional and mindful about your environment, people you re surrounding with.
2
SPEAKER_00
And that came with not trusting anyone.
2
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
2
SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
2
SPEAKER_00
Because I couldn t.
2
SPEAKER_00
And people around me might look at you and might tell you if they sat down with you like, that s not true because this.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s like, no, I didn t.
2
SPEAKER_00
I know how to play the game.
2
SPEAKER_00
I love you.
2
SPEAKER_00
I still love you.
2
SPEAKER_00
But I know what you re capable of, right?
2
SPEAKER_00
And at the same time, I know what s going on with the dynamic.
2
SPEAKER_00
You see me moving in a different direction.
2
SPEAKER_00
You don t like that.
2
SPEAKER_00
You re never going to like that.
2
SPEAKER_00
How could you possibly like that?
2
SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
2
SPEAKER_00
So now it s like the love I have for you, I can t allow that to let
2
SPEAKER_00
you know, me being vulnerable in a certain sense.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I know it sounds like, you know, but it s life.
2
SPEAKER_01
How do you have peace, inner peace, emotional peace, and self-belief and self-confidence while also knowing that people that you grew up with or, you know, you re losing friends to death or jail or, and still happening today, how do you feel peace, calm, and confident?
2
SPEAKER_01
running a business, running your life, traveling with your wife, whatever it might be.
2
SPEAKER_01
How do you feel those things?
2
SPEAKER_00
I feel peace because I know that when it s all said and done, my kids gonna know that their father was a great man.
2
SPEAKER_00
I feel peace in knowing that there s no better husband in the world than me.
2
SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
2
SPEAKER_00
I m that guy.
2
SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
2
SPEAKER_00
Because this is something I strive for.
2
SPEAKER_00
I wanted these things.
2
SPEAKER_00
I know that when it comes down to my culture, there s nobody that s realer than me because I m not,
2
SPEAKER_00
I m not a rapper, I m a prophet in my mind.
2
SPEAKER_00
I m here to share what I ve learned and to share what I know, hoping that it can change lives and save lives because that s the only thing I can do at this point.
2
SPEAKER_00
You can give me a billion dollars, I m gonna live the same life.
2
SPEAKER_00
Of course I want it.
2
SPEAKER_00
I can pick up more people, but I m gonna still be the same person.
2
SPEAKER_00
And for me, it s like I get peace in knowing that I got good friends now and I can build with.
2
SPEAKER_00
I just had my homie lost one of his nephews and the other one lost his cousin.
2
SPEAKER_00
But it was a time where as black men, we couldn t even talk to each other about how we felt.
2
SPEAKER_00
I m in a circle of people now I could tell them like, man, I don t know how I m, and we all come together and we talk about this and I ain t judging you.
2
SPEAKER_00
It didn t used to be like that.
2
SPEAKER_00
I just had to keep all my feelings and everything that I was feeling balled up inside and deal with it myself.
2
SPEAKER_00
which caused me to go outside of my comfort zone to find the answers, which was a great thing.
2
SPEAKER_00
But now I can call one of my brothers or somebody and say, hey look man, my man, his nephew died and the next day my other man s cousin died and it s just like now I gotta make these calls.
2
SPEAKER_00
But the calls are like, they re intentional.
2
SPEAKER_00
Hey bro, if you need to process this, you know, you need to just sit down, like you want to smoke a cigar, let s just talk, you know, and that s a different type of piece, right?
2
SPEAKER_00
Because now I got an outlet.
2
SPEAKER_00
And then what gives me peace is I started getting mentors, whether it was my, cause I had- Did T.D.
2
SPEAKER_01
a mentor of yours?
2
SPEAKER_00
Bishop Jakes is one of my mentors John Maxwell.
2
SPEAKER_00
Oh, yeah.
2
SPEAKER_00
I just had John on he s great green Roberts amazing Tony Robbins him and you name it, you know, these these are my this is my circle.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah speed up Wow, and um and for me, it s like
2
SPEAKER_00
These are people that I can reach out to, to even help me process stuff I need to process for the people that I love.
2
SPEAKER_00
I want help, right?
2
SPEAKER_00
Because now we all got this.
2
SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
2
SPEAKER_00
It s not just mine, right?
2
SPEAKER_00
And what brings me peace is knowing that, you know, my decisions can change lives, right?
2
SPEAKER_00
Because my decisions have took lives.
2
SPEAKER_00
Meaning like I ve been a part of things.
2
SPEAKER_00
But now it s not like I just turned this new leaf and I m just in a different space.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s like this is who I am.
2
SPEAKER_00
This is who I was evolving to be.
2
SPEAKER_00
I just had to go through the fire.
2
SPEAKER_00
Just to understand because I can t look at you with a straight face and go, I wouldn t do that.
2
SPEAKER_00
I don t think that s good.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I never did it.
2
SPEAKER_00
I m gonna be like, yo, I m like, yo, man, like, I ve been there.
2
SPEAKER_00
And that s why when my brothers come to me, if they going through something or whatever, I can sit down and have an intentional conversation about, you know, processing it.
3
SPEAKER_01
and understanding where we at, and then we can, and here s that street sense kicks in again.
3
SPEAKER_01
Oh, you ever thought about this?
3
SPEAKER_01
You should sit down with such and such and y all figure that out.
3
SPEAKER_00
And that s how it works.
3
SPEAKER_00
How old were you when you started to be able to open up and have these types of conversations about your emotions, about your feelings, about your thoughts, as opposed to just with yourself?
3
SPEAKER_00
Because
3
SPEAKER_00
I never spoke about any of my emotions until I was about 10 years ago when I hit 30.
3
SPEAKER_00
That s when I started to process and heal and be able to talk about these things that I was like, no one could ever know this stuff.
3
SPEAKER_00
I would say when I was 40.
3
SPEAKER_00
Really?
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, it s less than five years ago.
3
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
3
SPEAKER_00
That s when you started to be able to say, all right, let me start processing or opening up.
3
SPEAKER_01
Well, what happened was I was living in Malibu and my music was changing.
3
SPEAKER_01
Louis Farrakhan hit me, brother Farrakhan.
3
SPEAKER_01
He was like, Jeezy, brother Jeezy, your music is changing.
3
SPEAKER_01
The enemy is coming.
3
SPEAKER_01
I m just like,
3
SPEAKER_01
My enemy s in my neighborhood, and he ain t coming where I m at.
3
SPEAKER_01
I m in Malibu.
3
SPEAKER_01
He s like, I m just telling you.
3
SPEAKER_01
Get off the phone with him.
3
SPEAKER_01
Next week, I m on tour with Wiz Khalifa.
3
SPEAKER_01
Young man gets killed by my tour bus, and they lock me and my crew up.
3
SPEAKER_01
So now I m sitting in L.A.
3
SPEAKER_01
County Jail.
3
SPEAKER_01
$10 million in bail, you know what I m saying, because of 10 people on the bus.
3
SPEAKER_01
I didn t do anything.
3
SPEAKER_01
First time in my life, I didn t do anything.
3
SPEAKER_01
And I m 6 10 .
3
SPEAKER_01
You were on the bus.
3
SPEAKER_01
Well, actually, I got off the bus.
3
SPEAKER_01
Oh, wow.
3
SPEAKER_01
And went to a hotel room, and then I came.
3
SPEAKER_00
But it was your bus.
3
SPEAKER_01
Got on the bus the next morning.
3
SPEAKER_01
They followed us to the next venue.
3
SPEAKER_01
Oh, man.
3
SPEAKER_01
That s where they got me at.
3
SPEAKER_01
Holy cow.
3
SPEAKER_01
And now I m sitting in jail, 10 people in jail, $1 million apiece, $10 million.
3
SPEAKER_01
And my team came to get me out the first day, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
And I go, I can t leave them in L.A., in jail.
3
SPEAKER_01
I cannot.
3
SPEAKER_01
You know what I m saying?
3
SPEAKER_01
So let me figure out how to get everybody out and then we ll get out together.
3
SPEAKER_01
So I got everybody out on bail because we still had to go to court.
3
SPEAKER_01
I had to pay for all that.
3
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
3
SPEAKER_01
Flying everybody back and forth, feel the court, whatever.
3
SPEAKER_01
Shout out to my lawyer, Blair, Blair Brad.
3
SPEAKER_01
She killed it.
3
SPEAKER_01
But, um,
3
SPEAKER_01
The thing was, that one last time, I was depending on the people that was my people to make sure that my family and my people was straight.
3
SPEAKER_01
And when I got home, when I finally got out, nobody did anything.
3
SPEAKER_01
Really?
3
SPEAKER_01
And I was, cause I ve been the bad for everybody.
3
SPEAKER_01
I don t pay for things that ain t got nothing to do with, ain t even my business, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
And I was just so devastated.
3
SPEAKER_01
Cause I m like, yo, what if I, what if this would have been it?
3
SPEAKER_01
What if I would have passed?
3
SPEAKER_01
You re not gonna make sure my kids, I m not gonna check on my daughter s mother, y all don t do these things.
3
SPEAKER_01
And it s just like, I ve done that for y all, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
And I m not pointing fingers, I m just saying I know what I would do, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
And that s when I started to learn I can t put my expectations on anybody, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
So now I gotta do what s best for me, because now I feel like I m all alone.
3
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
3
SPEAKER_01
I was it.
3
SPEAKER_01
I cut everything and then that s when I went on my mission to just start and one of my business partners, we used to always just sit down and talk, have a bottle of wine, smoke a cigar.
3
SPEAKER_01
And he s like, what do you want to do?
3
SPEAKER_01
I was like, I want to do real estate.
3
SPEAKER_01
And I started doing real estate.
3
SPEAKER_01
That did well for me.
3
SPEAKER_01
I want to do spirits.
3
SPEAKER_01
So this is all what we did.
3
SPEAKER_01
So I m like, why don t I just do that in life?
3
SPEAKER_01
So I, Robin Green,
3
SPEAKER_01
I called Robin Green to go to the LA Athletic Club, sit down and have tea.
3
SPEAKER_01
I asked him seven questions, and he started giving me this game.
3
SPEAKER_01
John Maxwell, who came and married me and my wife, you know, in my backyard.
3
SPEAKER_01
That s amazing.
3
SPEAKER_01
And one of my best friends, and me and John talking, he gives me this insight, and I just started to move.
3
SPEAKER_01
Towards the light you know I m saying because I just wanted to get a different perspective because I didn t have anybody around me right to give me their Perspective and TD Jake s same thing and I m not just saying it because these are established people these are men They have done well in their lives in their community and their relationships.
3
SPEAKER_01
They want to share something with me that I didn t have any access to Wow
3
SPEAKER_01
And that s what made me start to open up and start to understand and start to be at peace and start to do all these things because now I know it s okay.
3
SPEAKER_00
Holy cow.
3
SPEAKER_00
So before five years ago, when you would face a challenge or adversity.
3
SPEAKER_00
Let me say this too though.
3
SPEAKER_01
I met my wife.
3
SPEAKER_01
on set when I went to do her show, because she works in television, to promote an album I was working on.
3
SPEAKER_01
And I told my publicist, I said, yo, I m going to marry that woman.
3
SPEAKER_01
But I knew that I had to do some work on myself.
3
SPEAKER_00
Sure, sure.
3
SPEAKER_01
So this is the five years that I went and got myself together.
3
SPEAKER_01
Then I came back, and I was like, yo, you know, I m actually ready for you.
3
SPEAKER_00
Like, holy cow.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_00
So you met her right around that time, five years ago or whatever.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yep.
3
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
3
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_00
This is fascinating because did you kind of let go of all those people in your life around that time that was?
3
SPEAKER_01
I mean, I wouldn t say let go because it wasn t that easy, but I just think we grew apart and things just started to happen differently.
3
SPEAKER_00
They didn t want to go on the same path as you.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_00
So naturally, they re not going to be spending as much time as you.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_00
And then it just, you know, it got a little crazy for a while.
3
SPEAKER_00
Imagine, man.
3
SPEAKER_00
People don t like
3
SPEAKER_00
watching someone else change and doing things differently, especially if you ve known for a long time.
3
SPEAKER_00
And you re used to doing certain things with them.
3
SPEAKER_01
Well, they want you to be the old you because it makes them be uncomfortable.
3
SPEAKER_01
The new you makes people be uncomfortable.
3
SPEAKER_01
And for me, I just kind of felt like... the hardest decision I ever made in my life.
3
SPEAKER_01
Hardest decision I ever made in my life.
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SPEAKER_01
When I made the decision... Was what?
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SPEAKER_01
Was to walk alone.
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SPEAKER_01
Hardest decision I ever made in my life.
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It was like, I mean, for the first...
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That s where Thug Motivation came in.
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For the first three albums up until my album The Recession, I had so much survivor s remorse and I was so like in a bad place.
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Like I was drinking like you wouldn t believe.
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SPEAKER_01
Really?
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Oh my God.
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I was 260 pounds.
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Skin was bad.
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I was just like, you know, cause I thought I was going to prison.
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SPEAKER_01
The whole time, I m just, cause everybody around me started to get indicted.
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So I m like, just waiting, it s coming.
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Like if me and you hanging out and you get indicted, and I m like, damn, they got Louis, that s my man.
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One of my y all.
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And it was just like that whole thing.
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So a lot of the music and why I was so, so strong and direct was because I just wanted to be heard.
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In my mind, I m just like, I m going to be gone.
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So this is my only chance.
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So I really focused on the music, put everything in the music.
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Cause I was just like, I just want to leave this behind.
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if I m not gonna make it out this.
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And I was in such a, and this is the thing, I didn t have the verbiage for all these things I was going through.
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SPEAKER_01
I didn t know what depression was.
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SPEAKER_01
I didn t know what anxiety was.
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Like, I didn t know these things.
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I didn t have no, well, you think I can go to the next room with one of my homeboys and be like, I m feeling crazy.
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SPEAKER_01
I think it s anxiety.
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You re like, yo, man.
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SPEAKER_00
Drink this, smoke this.
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SPEAKER_01
Hey, chill out, bro, you re working.
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SPEAKER_01
And on top of paranoia,
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On top of paranoia.
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One of the cops coming in, one someone come with a gun.
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Everybody I would see, I would just think, you know, that the agents, the this and that, all these things are going on and I m trying to make music.
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And I was just so depressed, I was just drinking so much and I was like waiting, waiting to the day.
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Like I would just go to sleep sometimes and be like, okay, if it s today, I m prepared.
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And mind you, the whole time this is going on, because I m built the way that I m built,
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I m distancing myself farther away from my family.
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My sisters, my cousins, my dad, my mom at the time before she passed, because I m preparing, right?
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Because if I go, I don t want to be like, I can t be a weak link, you know?
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Because I miss the outside of my mom, my family.
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So I m mentally disconnecting myself from them, because I don t want that to affect me if I got to go to prison.
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Holy cow, all that s going on.
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One day, I ll never forget, I started to work on The Recession and I was dealing with this young lady.
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We had this breakup.
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It was public.
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She was a public person.
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We had a breakup.
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And I just went in the studio the same night and I didn t come out until I worked The Recession.
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And what I was doing was
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I was, um, I was reading, reading books.
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This is something new for me.
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SPEAKER_01
What year is this?
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SPEAKER_01
This is oh, oh, eight, eight.
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Okay.
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SPEAKER_01
Oh, seven.
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Going to oh, eight.
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Right.
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Reading books.
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I was watching the news.
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I was working out.
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Now I m in the gym.
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I mean, I don t know how to work out because I don t like to be told what to do.
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So I ain t want to go with a trainer.
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SPEAKER_01
So now I m YouTubing videos, you know what I m saying?
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SPEAKER_01
You know, YouTube was my best friend and I learned how to eat clean, you know, how to stay hydrated.
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SPEAKER_01
I wasn t drinking water for like, I went months without water.
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SPEAKER_01
Oh my gosh, man.
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SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
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Yeah.
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It was Cristal.
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Oh my gosh, man.
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Cristal and Waffle House.
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SPEAKER_01
That was it.
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That was my diet.
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And I was like that, and I lost 60 pounds.
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And I wrote The Recession, which was one of the best albums, in my opinion, that I ve ever written in my life.
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Because it was dealing with politics, the world, the things were going on.
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I wrote My President is Black before Barack Obama.
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This was before he won.
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This was like six months before he won.
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And then he won, so that made that song go even crazier.
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I had Put On with Kanye West.
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This was the first verse that he did since his mom passed.
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And now I m going to do shows and I used to do my shows used to be like all the gangsters and gang members and the drug dealers in the front row.
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Now I m down.
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I m like one ninety one eighty five.
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Right.
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And I m doing shows and it s all.
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women in the front.
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SPEAKER_00
Really?
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Yeah, and I go do my first show on the recession tour.
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SPEAKER_01
They think they re looking at Usher or what?
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SPEAKER_00
And I m doing the show and I come out on stage and all sorts of stuff start flying on the stage.
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SPEAKER_00
I m looking at my security guard like, yo, what you gonna do with this?
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SPEAKER_00
He said, balls.
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SPEAKER_00
I said, what s going on?
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SPEAKER_00
He said, it s bras and stuff.
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I was like, oh my God.
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Panties and bras.
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You know what I mean?
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And from that standpoint on, I was like, oh,
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I can be better, I can look better, I can be better.
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SPEAKER_00
And this is when I came into stardom.
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SPEAKER_00
This is when I gave myself, yeah, this is the first time, my third album was the first time in my whole career where I said, you are a bonafide star, you have to go out here and you gotta do what you gotta do.
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And you can t worry about your past, you have to be what you become.
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SPEAKER_00
And that s when I fell into like Jeezy, right?
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SPEAKER_00
That was the first time I felt like I was worthy
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SPEAKER_00
Really?
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah, because before then, I m like, I m thinking it s a fluke.
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SPEAKER_00
You know, I m like, you know, I m selling a few records, but it ain t the type of money I m used to.
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SPEAKER_00
Let s talk about that.
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SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
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And how long was it really going to last?
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SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
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SPEAKER_00
And you re not even really an artist.
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SPEAKER_00
So, you know, you can write a hit album and be talented and can t write another one.
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SPEAKER_00
Right.
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SPEAKER_00
A lot of people do that.
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SPEAKER_00
Right.
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SPEAKER_00
So now I m starting the process there because I m like, OK, I got one.
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SPEAKER_00
What happens now?
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SPEAKER_00
So now I m trying to stay in the studio, but I m not living the same life that I was when I was writing these records.
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SPEAKER_00
Because I m transitioning, so I m seeing things different.
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SPEAKER_00
And nobody wants to hear that.
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SPEAKER_01
So what are you going to do?
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SPEAKER_01
How many people in the music business that you interact with truly believe that they re worthy of love and peace and success?
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SPEAKER_00
I can t really speak because
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SPEAKER_00
I know for me, I just feel like I m just a grown man.
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SPEAKER_00
I don t group myself in that.
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SPEAKER_00
Not that I have any disrespect for it, but it s like if I go to a golf club and everybody there is well off, I might wanna play golf, but I don t wanna be in their group.
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SPEAKER_00
And I think that it s hard to get to know somebody when they don t know themselves.
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SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
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SPEAKER_00
It s hard, you know, because they re living out who they think they are, who people told them they are.
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SPEAKER_00
A false identity.
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah, you know, you can t get to know them because they re going by a name that they made up and that it s who they are and that s how people perceive them in the world, right?
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SPEAKER_00
And, you know, not to say that anybody s a bad person,
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SPEAKER_00
But it s almost like you go to a wrestling match, you gotta know the undertaker ain t the undertaker at home.
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SPEAKER_00
Right, right, right, right.
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SPEAKER_00
You gotta know that, right?
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SPEAKER_00
But I think that s different because I m Jeezy at home.
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SPEAKER_00
I m Jeezy every day.
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SPEAKER_00
It ain t got nothing to do with the music.
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SPEAKER_00
The music just happens to be a part of what I m doing.
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SPEAKER_01
So, I mean the music you said this earlier you weren t never you never trying to be an artist You were never trying to be a musician an artist or rapper.
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SPEAKER_00
You weren t trying to love the music though You love that was the thing because I learned and I talk about that a lot in the book I learned a lot from like Tupac score and because he had morals and values before I knew what they were he stood for something and
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SPEAKER_00
He was a revolutionary.
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I didn t know that you can even have an opinion about this stuff.
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You see what I m saying?
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SPEAKER_00
He stood on that.
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SPEAKER_00
He died for it.
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SPEAKER_00
He s like, you know, what s the difference between him and anybody else that was assassinated?
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SPEAKER_00
He died for what he believed in, right?
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SPEAKER_00
And the things that he believed in gave
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SPEAKER_00
people like myself some type of moral compass because I knew I couldn t do that because Pog said you couldn t do that right and then I knew I shouldn t do that because he said somebody did this to him and that s how I was starting to pull things out of the music.
4
SPEAKER_00
So I loved the music so I was listening to like the Pogs and the
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SPEAKER_00
Master P s and the A-ball, MJG s.
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SPEAKER_00
I didn t listen to the music just to hear it and enjoy it.
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SPEAKER_00
I listened to the music like sermons.
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SPEAKER_00
Wow.
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I m trying to find the word in there.
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SPEAKER_00
The message.
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SPEAKER_00
And that s why I love music so much.
4
SPEAKER_00
But you weren t trying to be a musician.
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SPEAKER_00
No.
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SPEAKER_00
I was trying to be, honestly, I was trying to be an entrepreneur before I knew what entrepreneurship was.
4
SPEAKER_00
Because the guys that I saw that was doing it on a major level was the Master P s and the Cash Money s.
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SPEAKER_00
They were living this crazy life and I was hustling trying to get the stuff that they was getting.
4
SPEAKER_00
I bought Lexuses and Rolex watches and all this stuff at that time.
4
SPEAKER_00
I was known for that.
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SPEAKER_00
People know if you know me.
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SPEAKER_00
I had the latest car, I had the best watch, I had this.
4
SPEAKER_00
And this was before music, right?
4
SPEAKER_00
But these were the entrepreneurs, and I m like, well, I can do this.
4
SPEAKER_00
I just gotta go find some talent.
4
SPEAKER_01
So I was... So you re trying to be the label.
4
SPEAKER_01
You were trying to find the talent.
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
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SPEAKER_00
I was dealing with some guys out of Florida that I was trying to get some money with in the streets, and they...
4
SPEAKER_00
They had a record company that they was building, right?
4
SPEAKER_00
And we went to this Black Spring break in Daytona or something, they had like the Winnebago s and the cars with their stuff on it, t-shirts, and I was just like,
4
SPEAKER_00
I could do that.
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SPEAKER_00
So I went back to Georgia, bought a studio, went to the neighborhood, got some artists.
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SPEAKER_00
There wasn t artists, there was the homies, you know what I m saying?
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SPEAKER_00
Got artists, and put everybody down.
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SPEAKER_00
My man was with me as well.
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SPEAKER_00
And we put everybody in the studio, and we was trying to make records.
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SPEAKER_00
And we was trying to get our name out there, and it just didn t go that way.
4
SPEAKER_00
And then the charges came down, people started getting real time, and so on and so forth.
4
SPEAKER_00
And now we stuck with this studio with no artists.
4
SPEAKER_00
And everybody like, well, look, you really lived the life, you might as well talk about it.
4
SPEAKER_00
How?
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SPEAKER_00
I was a little reserved because I m already, again, good over here.
4
SPEAKER_00
The last thing I want to do is go over here and look corny.
4
SPEAKER_00
Right.
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SPEAKER_00
Because I don t really truly have talent.
4
SPEAKER_00
I m not writing songs every day.
4
SPEAKER_00
However, when I went back to my childhood, I had to realize, my wife is going to kill me about this,
4
SPEAKER_00
It was a girl in my class when I went to school in Hawaii, right?
4
SPEAKER_00
And she was different than this or whatever.
4
SPEAKER_00
And I was just like, wow, you know, because I had never seen, this is my first time out of the hood, like I ve never seen this.
4
SPEAKER_00
So I m like, so I started writing her poems.
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SPEAKER_00
And then the more I wrote her poems, my dad would come in like, what are you doing?
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SPEAKER_00
I m like, I m writing her another poem.
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SPEAKER_00
He s like, man, come on.
4
SPEAKER_00
So I wrote her poems like every day and then she ended up becoming best friends and first girlfriend with him.
4
SPEAKER_00
But I realized that the way I can articulate myself when I write was something special then because you re feeling what I want you to feel.
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I m getting the result.
4
SPEAKER_00
I m with you now.
4
SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
4
SPEAKER_00
We re connected.
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SPEAKER_00
And I just remember that.
4
SPEAKER_00
And then when I started to understand how to put my life into words, it started to be therapeutic for me because now it s like, oh, I did deal with that.
4
SPEAKER_00
Oh, that is trauma.
4
SPEAKER_00
Wow, I did go through that.
4
SPEAKER_00
How did I overcome that?
4
SPEAKER_00
And now I m putting it in my music.
4
SPEAKER_00
And that s why my music has always been about motivation.
4
SPEAKER_00
It s been about inspiration.
4
SPEAKER_00
It s been about how can I help you with my pain?
4
SPEAKER_00
How can I prevent you from feeling what I felt?
4
SPEAKER_00
And even if you do, how do I make you feel like you re not alone in this?
4
SPEAKER_00
That s where the music came from.
4
SPEAKER_00
Because if you go back to Pac, Thug Life was a movement.
4
SPEAKER_00
But if you listen to it, you think it s about killing and robbing.
4
SPEAKER_00
It s not.
4
SPEAKER_00
It s about standing for something.
4
SPEAKER_00
It just made it make sense to us because we all feel like we re living the thug life.
4
SPEAKER_00
So I came back and my first album was Thug Motivation because I wanted to set it up like a class.
4
SPEAKER_00
This is something you sit down and then my second album was The Inspiration and then my third album was The Recession.
4
SPEAKER_00
And the crazy thing is I got the recession from being in a room with these guys.
4
SPEAKER_00
I went to this little private dinner and I m in a room with all these guys that got all this money and they were so concerned.
4
SPEAKER_00
They was like, you know, the recession is coming.
4
SPEAKER_00
I m thinking about selling this and doing that and I got to get rid of this business.
4
SPEAKER_00
And I m going like, you guys got a lot of money.
4
SPEAKER_00
Like, what are you worried about?
4
SPEAKER_00
And he s like, do you know what a recession is?
4
SPEAKER_00
I m like, yeah, but I didn t.
4
SPEAKER_00
So I went back and Googled it and I m like, huh?
4
SPEAKER_00
So I m asking questions now.
4
SPEAKER_00
What happens with this?
4
SPEAKER_00
How does that?
4
SPEAKER_00
So when I wrote The Recession, that was me running back to tell the culture what I just learned.
4
SPEAKER_00
Because we know what a drought is.
4
SPEAKER_00
A drought on the street means there ain t nobody working.
4
SPEAKER_00
But a drought on the money is totally different.
4
SPEAKER_00
So that means there s no money nowhere.
4
SPEAKER_00
So if you think you re living bad now, you re gonna live even worse.
4
SPEAKER_00
So that was my intentions when I wrote The Recession, to tell people what was going on.
4
SPEAKER_00
And I just caught that.
4
SPEAKER_00
Moment in time where it hit and that music was like the soundtrack for what everybody was going through and it was the recession, right?
4
SPEAKER_00
And they just right when I dropped it that s when they announced it and it was huge when I say huge it was crazy and Every interview I did after that.
4
SPEAKER_00
I started to really notice again hear those words.
4
SPEAKER_00
I
4
SPEAKER_00
Because now I m writing about what I m learning instead of just what I m doing, and I m putting it together.
4
SPEAKER_00
And now my interviews are different.
4
SPEAKER_00
Like, people are asking me real questions.
4
SPEAKER_00
They re not asking me, well, what s up with Lil Ray Ray?
4
SPEAKER_00
It s like now, like, so what do you think about the president?
4
SPEAKER_00
Have you ever met him before?
4
SPEAKER_00
Right?
4
SPEAKER_00
And I got to tell you a crazy story about that, too.
4
SPEAKER_00
So my past, so after I did My President is Black, he won the first time, right?
4
SPEAKER_00
So he invites me to a chorus
5
SPEAKER_00
dinner in New York.
5
SPEAKER_00
Go buy Tom Ford suits for my crew, get myself together, and I fly back to New York and I go to the Correspondents  Dinner.
5
SPEAKER_00
I m watching my peers go in the Correspondents  Dinner, and I m getting out of the car and I see my security talking to Secret Service, and they was like, no, no, he can t, he cannot.
5
SPEAKER_00
I m like, can t be around you.
5
SPEAKER_00
Right.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
So he invited you, but he couldn t.
5
SPEAKER_00
His team invited me.
5
SPEAKER_00
I couldn t get in.
5
SPEAKER_00
Most embarrassing day of my life.
5
SPEAKER_00
I m told everybody I m going.
5
SPEAKER_00
Like I m telling everybody, right?
5
SPEAKER_00
And now I m sitting in this hotel room, in this hotel called the London in New York, and I m just sitting there and I m going like, all the good I do, all the things I m trying to do, like, how you, like, I m a good dude.
5
SPEAKER_00
Like, how you going, like, you, like, this ain t even real.
5
SPEAKER_00
Like, you know what I mean?
5
SPEAKER_00
My past is my past, but I started to understand how big and deep my past was and that they went and dug into it.
5
SPEAKER_00
what they would have found, right?
5
SPEAKER_00
And I ll never forget, I was on tour, maybe like, so it was year one, so this was maybe like three years before we got back in the office again.
5
SPEAKER_00
And my mom called me, I m in London, on the tour bus.
5
SPEAKER_00
She said, hey baby, you see what the president s talking about to you?
5
SPEAKER_00
I m like, what?
5
SPEAKER_00
She s like, yeah, the president was just talking about you.
5
SPEAKER_00
I said, no, no way.
5
SPEAKER_00
She said, yes.
5
SPEAKER_00
As he s talking about me, she said, yes.
5
SPEAKER_00
I said, OK.
5
SPEAKER_00
She had my sister send me the clip.
5
SPEAKER_00
He was at the next correspondent dinner.
5
SPEAKER_00
He said, my first term, I went with Al Green.
5
SPEAKER_00
My second term, I m going with Young Jeezy.
5
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
5
SPEAKER_00
Like, plain as day.
5
SPEAKER_00
And he looked at Michelle.
5
SPEAKER_00
He said, she likes when I sing that to her.
5
SPEAKER_00
And that s when I was just like, OK, I get it.
5
SPEAKER_00
He got some ice in his veins.
5
SPEAKER_00
He seen me.
5
SPEAKER_00
I can t feel no way, right?
5
SPEAKER_01
Right.
5
SPEAKER_01
He gave you a shout out.
5
SPEAKER_01
He gave you props.
5
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
But here we go.
5
SPEAKER_00
Here go that life again.
5
SPEAKER_00
I had people like that too.
5
SPEAKER_00
I m in my own light.
5
SPEAKER_00
I m doing my thing.
5
SPEAKER_00
You can t be right beside me.
5
SPEAKER_00
You re still in the things that don t.
5
SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
5
SPEAKER_00
So that was his way of showing me, I see you, you know.
5
SPEAKER_00
But I can t be.
5
SPEAKER_00
I can t be.
5
SPEAKER_00
You know, it s going to be a little while before we re able to sit down and just have a cocktail, bro, but I see you.
5
SPEAKER_00
And to me, that acknowledged me, not just because he was a president and because he saw me, right?
5
SPEAKER_00
Publicly.
5
SPEAKER_00
Right.
5
SPEAKER_00
That made me, you know, I was just like, okay, cool.
5
SPEAKER_00
which I took a page out of that, and even guys that I know from the streets that we have some history, I make sure if it s still that type of terms that I still see them.
5
SPEAKER_00
Because sometimes people just want to be acknowledged.
5
SPEAKER_00
Absolutely, man.
5
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
5
SPEAKER_00
Have you got a chance to sit down with him?
5
SPEAKER_00
No, actually he came to Atlanta to do a rally for Stacey Ambrose.
5
SPEAKER_00
We got a chance to chop it up right quick.
5
SPEAKER_00
That s cool.
5
SPEAKER_00
I don t think the Secret Service still trust me yet.
5
SPEAKER_00
They was like looking at me up and down.
5
SPEAKER_00
So it s like, all right, what do I got?
5
SPEAKER_01
Wow, man.
5
SPEAKER_01
This is fascinating.
5
SPEAKER_01
So how did you get the confidence, knowing that you weren t a rapper or an artist or musician, how did you get the confidence to... Obviously, you re writing down your thoughts, what are really poetry in your way, and sermons in your way, and motivation and teaching, and you re putting it into an album.
5
SPEAKER_01
How did you sell so many records and get your name out there coming from the streets?
5
SPEAKER_01
How did you promote yourself and build a brand record after record?
5
SPEAKER_01
Of course.
5
SPEAKER_00
when you didn t know what you were doing?
5
SPEAKER_00
That s the thing.
5
SPEAKER_00
That s the good thing.
5
SPEAKER_00
That s the golden thing about the streets.
5
SPEAKER_00
You don t gotta know what you re doing, as long as you do it.
5
SPEAKER_00
Because there s no, and that s, like I say, back to the book, there s no straight path that we re trying to get through.
5
SPEAKER_00
You gotta navigate these things.
5
SPEAKER_00
I think what gave me the confidence was survival.
5
SPEAKER_00
And that I knew that I was studying before, like, say, Francis Wynn,
5
SPEAKER_00
Again, when people just be listening to the music, I d be listening for the word.
5
SPEAKER_00
Or I would be a young guy to go sit around a bunch of old guys and just listen to them talk to see what I can learn from them.
5
SPEAKER_00
And that just kind of was my school.
5
SPEAKER_00
It kind of gave me confidence because I knew more than the average kid my age, right?
5
SPEAKER_00
And I was learning how to move because my older cousins was in the streets before me and it was pretty big.
5
SPEAKER_00
So I watched a lot what they was doing, a lot of people that was around them, and I was like, okay, and I m just, I m a sponge.
5
SPEAKER_00
Your brother was performing in the streets.
5
SPEAKER_00
No, no, my cousin was in the streets.
5
SPEAKER_00
Gotcha.
5
SPEAKER_00
Like, they was doing this before I was.
5
SPEAKER_00
They were doing it big.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, they were the guys.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I was just watching what they was doing.
5
SPEAKER_00
So you observed, and then you replicated.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, it s a sponge, a sponge, a sponge.
5
SPEAKER_00
And that s what gave me confidence because I just felt like I knew more than everybody else, right?
5
SPEAKER_00
And then I wasn t scared to go ask the questions.
5
SPEAKER_00
Interesting.
5
SPEAKER_00
And then going about building a brand, I watched and studied how music worked.
5
SPEAKER_00
And even from the Cash Money era to Master P, you know, Master P and them had the tanks on and all that stuff.
5
SPEAKER_00
I m just like, what is that for me?
5
SPEAKER_00
And I had this necklace with this big diamond encrusted snowman on it, right?
5
SPEAKER_00
And it was like, it was the craziest thing ever because it started as a chain, right?
5
SPEAKER_00
And then people started calling me Snowman, right?
5
SPEAKER_00
And now I got a brand.
5
SPEAKER_00
And then when I put out my first album, they took the snowman and put it, shout out to Shana Ayers, she was helping me with it.
5
SPEAKER_00
They took the snowman and put it on the CD cover.
5
SPEAKER_00
It immortalized it, and now this snowman is everywhere.
5
SPEAKER_00
And everyone wants to wear a snowman.
5
SPEAKER_00
So the shirts were made for branding and marketing.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I gotta go back to how I branded and marketed myself.
5
SPEAKER_00
The shirts was made for branding and marketing, and we only made 100.
5
SPEAKER_00
It blew up so much we ordered 1,000 more.
5
SPEAKER_00
Then, out of nowhere, I promise you I don t know what happened, it went from some shirts that we were sending out to you go anywhere on Harlem, anywhere on 125th, whatever, every store got a different version of Snowman shirts.
5
SPEAKER_00
This was all around the world.
5
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
5
SPEAKER_00
So now, Jay-Z calls me because he s the president of Def Jam.
5
SPEAKER_00
He s like, I m going to the Magic Show.
5
SPEAKER_00
You should come with me.
5
SPEAKER_00
So this is the magic show out there the clothing show in Vegas.
5
SPEAKER_00
So they got the rock rocker wear booth out there.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
And he like you ll just walk through it.
5
SPEAKER_00
So me and Jay-Z walk around the magic show.
5
SPEAKER_00
What year is this?
5
SPEAKER_00
This is like old.
5
SPEAKER_00
It was six, seven, oh six.
5
SPEAKER_00
And we just walking around it, and people keep running up to me going, Jeezy.
5
SPEAKER_00
No, I m with Jay-Z.
5
SPEAKER_00
They re like, Jeezy, man, thank you so much.
5
SPEAKER_00
We love you, man.
5
SPEAKER_00
You re the realest.
5
SPEAKER_00
This is great.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I m just like, so after the fifth person, I look at him, you look at me.
5
SPEAKER_00
It s like, what s going on?
5
SPEAKER_00
No one s saying anything to Jay-Z.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, but not even just that, though.
5
SPEAKER_00
We re both looking at each other like, what s going on?
5
SPEAKER_00
Because I don t know what they re talking about.
5
SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
5
SPEAKER_00
And I asked the guy, I said, yo, what do you mean?
5
SPEAKER_00
He s like, yo, everybody s making money off these snowman shirts, because now they sell them in bulk.
5
SPEAKER_00
Oh, man.
5
SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
5
SPEAKER_00
Because they re selling them to all the mom and pop stores.
5
SPEAKER_00
So we went to one guy s shop, he had them to the ceiling.
5
SPEAKER_00
And one of my guys back then told me when I first did it, I said, trademark it.
5
SPEAKER_00
But I m still thinking like that.
5
SPEAKER_00
I m like, nah, it s just whatever.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I never trademarked it.
5
SPEAKER_00
Craziest thing ever.
5
SPEAKER_00
The crazy thing was, but it s a double-edged sword.
5
SPEAKER_00
So I didn t trademark it.
5
SPEAKER_00
However, I think that made my brand bigger than life.
5
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
5
SPEAKER_00
Because everybody had access to it and they were selling and they were making money, which means that I was helping them help me.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
And they were probably getting out there faster than you could.
5
1000%.
5
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
5
SPEAKER_00
Now it goes back to
5
SPEAKER_00
how I started branding myself.
5
SPEAKER_00
So what I would do when I was first trying to figure out where I was going, I was doing these mixtapes with DJ Drama.
5
SPEAKER_00
He s like a big deal in the culture as far as like street tapes.
5
SPEAKER_00
So what I would do, people would do street tapes and like put them in stores and sell them, you know, five, $10.
5
SPEAKER_00
What I did was I pressed up like 100,000.
5
SPEAKER_00
and gave them all out.
5
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
5
SPEAKER_00
I went to this club every week on the east side and I gave them out.
5
SPEAKER_00
Then we were around town, gave them out, beauty supply stores, beauty salons, barbershops, and I did that.
5
SPEAKER_00
That was the first take.
5
SPEAKER_00
I saw the needle move a little bit.
5
SPEAKER_00
In Georgia, in Atlanta.
5
SPEAKER_00
In Georgia, yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
Then my second tape was Trap or Die.
5
SPEAKER_00
So I pressed up 500,000 of these.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I just started giving them out.
5
SPEAKER_00
Best thing I ever done.
5
SPEAKER_00
Because my grandmother always told me, if you want something from somebody else, give them something first.
5
SPEAKER_00
Best thing I ever done.
5
SPEAKER_00
I could still do those songs right now on any stage.
5
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
5
SPEAKER_00
Because it was like, it was like grassroots.
5
SPEAKER_00
And now I m getting everybody starting to know who I am.
5
SPEAKER_00
And then I put this DVD of all the footage of me just running around with the Trap or Die tape.
5
SPEAKER_00
And when I knew it was real is when I used to walk into my, we call them trap houses.
5
SPEAKER_00
Sure, sure, sure.
5
SPEAKER_00
So I was going to my friends trap houses or whatever, like my homies or whatever.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I go like, you know, just go through there, holler and whatever.
5
SPEAKER_00
And they would be watching my DVD.
5
SPEAKER_00
Wow, shut up.
5
SPEAKER_00
In the other room, it d be like 10 people in there looking at the DVD, and you looking like, y all know me.
5
SPEAKER_00
It s like, oh, this is crazy.
5
SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
5
SPEAKER_00
They re watching me.
5
SPEAKER_00
And that s how I knew.
5
SPEAKER_00
And then it went from there, because I used to hang out a lot.
5
SPEAKER_00
I used to be in all the premier clubs, wherever, because I used to wear my jewelry, drive my cars, because that was my marketing.
5
SPEAKER_00
Like, I just looked like the guy who was already successful and was trying to be successful.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I ll never forget when Trap or Die came out.
5
SPEAKER_00
I was walking in the club, and mind you, I m a street guy, so I m not used to people just walking up on me.
5
SPEAKER_00
And this was back before you can just take pictures of anybody and anything.
5
SPEAKER_00
And people come up on me like, yo, Jeezy, man, I love what you do, man.
5
SPEAKER_00
Like, the sixth time somebody came to me, it just felt like somebody was paying them to say this, you know what I m saying?
5
SPEAKER_00
Because it was weird.
5
SPEAKER_00
I never, you know, and it just started happening more and more.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I m like, oh, oh, I m on to something.
5
SPEAKER_00
Like, this is real.
5
SPEAKER_00
And then I started to go out
6
SPEAKER_00
like the malls or whatever and be just doing regular stuff.
6
SPEAKER_00
People come up to me, yo man, I really love you man.
6
SPEAKER_00
I love what you re doing.
6
SPEAKER_00
I m just sitting there and I m going like, this is it.
6
SPEAKER_00
I gotta focus now.
6
SPEAKER_00
And I started recording my debut album.
6
SPEAKER_00
And while I m recording my debut album, I was paying for it myself.
6
SPEAKER_00
And they come to me about a deal.
6
SPEAKER_00
So I take the deal with Def Jam.
6
SPEAKER_00
And when I m taking the deal and working on the album that I m paying for, that they re going to reimburse me my money, I don t know how to perform and I m not taking care of myself.
6
SPEAKER_00
And so now I do this show in Jacksonville at the Super Bowl, like in a club, nightclub, and the system is terrible.
6
SPEAKER_00
And I had problems on my vocal cords already.
6
SPEAKER_00
and I tore my vocal cords.
6
SPEAKER_00
So now, I m one foot in the street, one foot out, I got some buzz as an artist, and I gotta get surgery.
6
SPEAKER_00
And the whole conversation is, we don t even know if he s gonna sound the same or how he s gonna sound.
6
SPEAKER_00
So now, I m like, it s going down.
6
SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
6
SPEAKER_00
Like, I don t know what to do.
6
SPEAKER_00
It was probably one of the scariest moments of my life because now I gotta go in there behind you.
6
SPEAKER_00
I don t even have insurance.
6
SPEAKER_00
So I had to pay for my surgery with a brown paper bag.
6
SPEAKER_00
So I had to pay for my surgery with a brown paper bag.
6
SPEAKER_00
So I made it through that.
6
SPEAKER_00
And then right after that, I wanna make sure I say this word right, because somebody said I didn t say it right last time.
6
SPEAKER_00
I got hit with Bell s palsy.
6
SPEAKER_00
And now my mouth is crooked and my face is,
6
SPEAKER_00
This is like the second thing.
6
SPEAKER_01
After the surgery.
6
SPEAKER_00
After the surgery.
6
SPEAKER_00
Holy cow.
6
SPEAKER_00
So now I m like, I m hiding.
6
SPEAKER_00
Cause I look crazy.
6
SPEAKER_00
And, um, I was scared.
6
SPEAKER_00
I remember talking to my mom.
6
SPEAKER_00
I was just like, mama, I don t, I don t know what to do.
6
SPEAKER_00
But then I realized quickly too, that I wasn t taking care of myself.
6
SPEAKER_00
Right.
6
SPEAKER_00
And at the same time, you don t have people around you that are taking care of themselves.
6
SPEAKER_00
They re not, you know, people drinking.
6
SPEAKER_00
You re eating bad.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_00
Not sleeping.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_00
And you can, he was too paranoid.
6
SPEAKER_00
Like I couldn t, I mean, how,
6
SPEAKER_00
I can go off, before these days, I can go off like an hour and a half of sleep.
6
SPEAKER_00
Oh my gosh.
6
SPEAKER_00
Any day.
6
SPEAKER_00
That was my thing, I sleep when I die.
6
SPEAKER_00
Right.
6
SPEAKER_00
Because you couldn t sleep, you know what I mean?
6
SPEAKER_00
Because you got so many things going on and your mind is in so many different places, but you re trying to navigate it.
6
SPEAKER_00
And that s why I say, you know, the new rich is peace.
6
SPEAKER_00
It is.
6
SPEAKER_00
You know, because, you know, you can have a billion dollars, you know, like my uncle used to say, you can put somebody in a Rolls Royce, he s still gonna have the same problems.
6
SPEAKER_00
He s gonna have those problems that a rose was and I think once you become in this place where you just said peace with who you are Who you re becoming it and like I say again, I had to give myself permission to evolve Wow Because it was almost like I wanted to grow but I couldn t grow because of my surroundings These weeds and these things that will hold me back and when I started to clean that out I started to like grow and boom and blossom and I just started to understand like
6
SPEAKER_00
Wow, the air is different up here.
6
SPEAKER_00
The thought process is different.
6
SPEAKER_00
I like getting up at 5 a.m.
6
SPEAKER_00
in the morning.
6
SPEAKER_00
I used to get up, I wouldn t go to sleep until 6 a.m.
6
SPEAKER_00
Wake up at 2 p.m., yeah.
6
SPEAKER_00
But I love it now because it s like, and even some of my friends, they ask me, what are you doing now?
6
SPEAKER_00
And it s crazy because people ask me.
6
SPEAKER_00
a lot of things about life, and I m surprised, because they re older than me, right?
6
SPEAKER_00
And they re like, yo, so what are you doing now?
6
SPEAKER_00
I m getting up at five, I m doing this.
6
SPEAKER_00
What book you reading?
6
SPEAKER_00
I m reading this book, I m reading that.
6
SPEAKER_00
They come over to my house, I give them a copy of the book.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s weird, it s cheesy.
6
SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah, sure, sure.
6
SPEAKER_00
You know, this guy used to pass you the blood, now he s giving you books, you re like, ah.
6
SPEAKER_00
I take pride in that because it s my piece.
6
SPEAKER_00
I love when I go through my phone and one of my guys hit me like, yo, I m on chapter 10.
6
SPEAKER_00
Oh my God, it s mind blowing.
6
SPEAKER_00
I m like, yeah, wait till you get chapter 12.
6
SPEAKER_00
But in my mind, that s my piece.
6
SPEAKER_00
And I had to work so hard and do so much work on myself just to even get a taste of that.
6
SPEAKER_01
How did you get, I mean, how did you get to a taste of peace?
6
SPEAKER_01
How did you start to even heal your thoughts, your emotions, your body?
6
SPEAKER_01
Because I m assuming 40 years of some type of psychological or physical trauma, whether it be not sure where you re sleeping at night, mom s pointing a gun in your face,
6
SPEAKER_01
on the streets, who knows what s gonna happen every day, sleeping an hour a night, doing that for 40 years.
6
SPEAKER_01
Seeing friends die, seeing friends go to jail, doing that for that long, having surgery.
6
SPEAKER_01
There is no peace.
6
SPEAKER_01
There s no healing.
6
SPEAKER_01
There s no time to think about, let my nervous system calm and relax.
6
SPEAKER_01
Let me process these memories of my past from parents to childhood friends to,
6
SPEAKER_01
other stuff that maybe you haven t talked about, and really allow my body to feel whole.
6
SPEAKER_01
Right.
6
SPEAKER_01
When did that start to happen, and is that still a journey for you?
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, it s still a journey.
6
SPEAKER_00
I learned that when my mom passed.
6
SPEAKER_00
I didn t agree with that.
6
SPEAKER_00
Really?
6
SPEAKER_00
Because I m numb.
6
SPEAKER_00
When was this?
6
SPEAKER_00
My mom passed three years ago.
6
SPEAKER_00
I m none.
6
SPEAKER_00
I ve been through it so much, I don t feel that part.
6
SPEAKER_00
I gotta be honest.
6
SPEAKER_00
I don t know how to connect with that.
6
SPEAKER_00
And that s something that I m working on every day because it s like when you going through all these things, it becomes normal life to you.
6
SPEAKER_00
And then you have to understand this is what s gonna happen, you gotta deal with it, you gotta keep moving.
6
SPEAKER_00
Right.
6
SPEAKER_00
And when my mom passed, I knew that I didn t grieve right.
6
SPEAKER_00
I was just like something s not right.
6
SPEAKER_00
We re sitting on another mission.
6
SPEAKER_00
So to answer your question is how do you get to that?
6
SPEAKER_00
I m still working on that now.
6
SPEAKER_00
And that s why I m even opening up.
6
SPEAKER_00
being transparent about what I m going through, but I think at some point, as black men, we all in that space, bro.
6
SPEAKER_00
You didn t come from a certain type of life.
6
SPEAKER_00
And for me, it took me to get around other people to understand that everybody s went through something, right?
6
SPEAKER_00
And you gotta be different outlets of how you can, you know, just start to dump some of that stuff off.
6
SPEAKER_00
And the crazy thing is, and I m not just saying that, even when I started listening to your podcast, John Maxwell s and just different people, I just respected their perspective.
6
SPEAKER_00
I started to get a lot of information about how to deal with those things and what I should reach out to.
6
SPEAKER_00
which is why I m so passionate about the book because there s information in there, right?
6
SPEAKER_00
There s information in these shows and these episodes that you do that you wouldn t even expect people to pull that from and go, man, maybe I need to, or maybe I should sit down with somebody and like, I didn t know what processing means.
6
SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
6
SPEAKER_00
I didn t know that something from my childhood could affect me worse in my 40s, right?
6
SPEAKER_00
I didn t know all these things, but I m working on those things every day, I m working on.
6
SPEAKER_00
Trust.
6
SPEAKER_00
Wow man.
6
SPEAKER_00
You know I m working on emotions like I love my kids right and I m just making sure I m intentional about connecting with them because I know there s sometimes with me where I get caught up in my world and I m thinking about everything that I got going on that I might not be present but then I didn t know there was a such thing of being present.
6
SPEAKER_00
So now I gotta check myself on that.
6
SPEAKER_01
You could be present.
6
SPEAKER_00
You re always hustling for the next thing probably.
6
SPEAKER_00
So now it s checks and balances.
6
SPEAKER_00
Wow, man.
6
SPEAKER_00
And it s in the information.
6
SPEAKER_00
And that s one thing I do like about social media.
6
SPEAKER_00
These days I hate all the other stuff.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s terrible.
6
SPEAKER_00
But there s a lot of information there if you know how to sort through it.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s like YouTubes, like books, like podcasts.
6
SPEAKER_00
There s information that we need that we just can t get from people that are around us because they re searching for the same thing.
6
SPEAKER_00
And I think that s what helped me get on the mission of healing because
6
SPEAKER_00
This is the thing, I didn t know I needed to heal.
6
SPEAKER_00
I felt like I was Iron Man, you know what I m saying?
6
SPEAKER_00
Like, I m good.
6
SPEAKER_00
Like, ain t nothing hurting me.
6
SPEAKER_00
I felt like that.
6
SPEAKER_00
And then when I started peeling back the layers, I m like, wow, like, you know, like, like how somebody gonna feel your devotion if they can t, if you re not, you know, it s how people are gonna feel you if you re not even being, cause you know, by the way, this is,
6
SPEAKER_00
I would never talk this much, just to go back and look at my first interviews.
6
SPEAKER_00
I m like, yeah, nah, it was like interrogation.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yes or no, yeah, yeah, yeah.
6
SPEAKER_00
It was interrogation.
6
SPEAKER_00
It was like, nah, I don t know about that.
6
SPEAKER_00
But now I feel like, you know, it s my purpose and my responsibility to open up.
6
SPEAKER_00
Because we don t make it to our 40s and 50s.
6
SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
6
SPEAKER_00
And we don t make it there being us and still being cool and still being successful and still being like, you know, if it s a black man, you get over a certain age, nobody cares about you.
6
SPEAKER_00
Not even your kids.
6
SPEAKER_00
Really.
6
SPEAKER_00
We can t give them no money or do nothing for them.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s like,
6
SPEAKER_00
You know, you just get to a certain age, it s so hard for us, right?
6
SPEAKER_00
So you have to put things around you and put things in place that keep you held accountable and that fulfill you so that you can go out here and be the best that you can be.
6
SPEAKER_00
And for me, that s what keeps me going and keeps me on the journey of healing.
6
SPEAKER_00
I don t got a problem saying that now because I got more.
6
SPEAKER_00
my friends and people that tell me, you know, things like, yeah, man, I m really going through this.
6
SPEAKER_00
I m like, well, I m here.
6
SPEAKER_00
Like, what can I do, right?
6
SPEAKER_00
So I m already knowing he need to heal, right?
6
SPEAKER_00
And I can understand that.
6
SPEAKER_00
So now I give him space to heal, right?
6
SPEAKER_00
Checking in, you know, let s go have dinner or something.
6
SPEAKER_00
Let s just get out for a minute.
6
SPEAKER_00
And because the thing for my coach is when you go through things you isolate yourself, you know, and that s like the worst thing ever because now you.
7
SPEAKER_02
You know, you in this, you know, and a wall is for real.
7
SPEAKER_02
You know, a wall can keep people out, but it can also keep you in.
7
SPEAKER_02
You know what I m saying?
7
SPEAKER_02
So it can keep the bad things out, but it blocks the blessings as well.
7
SPEAKER_02
It does.
7
SPEAKER_02
You know, and I think, you know, I had a wall up for, you know, my first probably, you know, 30 something years of my life.
7
SPEAKER_01
Really?
7
SPEAKER_02
Oh, a big one.
7
SPEAKER_02
I m talking about like, I m talking like, no, nothing wasn t getting past that wall.
7
SPEAKER_02
Cause that s how I was surviving.
7
SPEAKER_02
It s different to live,
7
SPEAKER_02
for love and to live for survival.
7
SPEAKER_02
And if you ask me, you know, what was the difference?
7
SPEAKER_02
I was living for survival here.
7
SPEAKER_01
Now I m living for love.
7
SPEAKER_01
Were you able to experience love up until the last five years with that wall?
7
SPEAKER_01
No.
7
SPEAKER_01
Really?
7
SPEAKER_01
No.
7
SPEAKER_01
What does love feel like now that you have the wall coming down or at least partial wall, you know, maybe?
7
SPEAKER_02
It feels like trust.
7
SPEAKER_01
Really?
7
SPEAKER_02
It feels like a village.
7
SPEAKER_02
It feels like community.
7
SPEAKER_02
It feels like support.
7
SPEAKER_02
It feels like understanding.
7
SPEAKER_02
It feels like grace.
7
SPEAKER_02
It feels like those things because, again, you never had it.
7
SPEAKER_02
And not to say that it wasn t there, but I wasn t letting anybody in.
7
SPEAKER_02
You weren t allowing yourself to experience it.
7
SPEAKER_02
Right.
7
SPEAKER_02
So now it s just like knowing people.
7
SPEAKER_02
Because, you know, for a while, you just really feel like nobody really, like, really is down with you.
7
SPEAKER_02
Because when you go through, like, a lot of the stuff I talk about in the book, you realize how people
7
SPEAKER_02
Go left and right, not really down.
7
SPEAKER_02
You kind of just build that up in your head.
7
SPEAKER_02
You kind of like, okay, all my interactions are like, you know, they re one-offs.
7
SPEAKER_02
I m not looking to build with you.
7
SPEAKER_00
You know what I m saying?
7
SPEAKER_02
I already know at some point it s going to go left and you re going to feel a way about some and there s that, right?
7
SPEAKER_02
But what I had to learn is, like, you know, even when I was wrong, you know, I could still go back and have a conversation with somebody who s mentally on the same level as me and be like, you know what, man, I just had a bad day, bro.
7
SPEAKER_02
Like, I was doing this and that and going through, and you said this, and I just kind of felt like I wasn t there.
7
SPEAKER_02
You know what I m saying?
7
SPEAKER_02
Like, no, it s all good.
7
SPEAKER_02
That s how two men talk.
7
SPEAKER_02
When you re coming from a culture where if we don t agree, somebody gotta go.
7
SPEAKER_02
Wow.
7
SPEAKER_02
You know what I m saying?
7
SPEAKER_02
Sure, sure.
7
SPEAKER_02
Oh yeah, somebody gotta go.
7
SPEAKER_02
And I ain t talking about just leaving.
7
SPEAKER_02
Right.
7
SPEAKER_02
You feel what I m saying?
7
SPEAKER_00
Right.
7
SPEAKER_02
That ain t how we operate.
7
SPEAKER_00
Go forever.
7
SPEAKER_02
Yes.
7
SPEAKER_02
Holy cow, man.
7
SPEAKER_02
And that s how it s set up.
7
SPEAKER_02
And the thing about it is, what I learned in this world, and this world is, there s no conflict resolution in this world.
7
SPEAKER_02
we don t have conflict resolution, we don t have understanding of how this is supposed to go.
7
SPEAKER_02
There s a resolution, it s just not a healthy one.
7
SPEAKER_01
Right, right, right.
7
SPEAKER_02
And in this world, there s conflict resolution, there s, I m wrong, you re right, you know, and there s, you know what, next time I try this, there s, you know, you know,
7
SPEAKER_02
You lose somebody, we there for you.
7
SPEAKER_02
You know what I m saying?
7
SPEAKER_02
You re going through something, you got help.
7
SPEAKER_02
You know what I m saying?
7
SPEAKER_02
If you feeling depressed, I want to be the one to call and make you laugh and tell you something crazy.
7
SPEAKER_02
You know what I m saying?
7
SPEAKER_02
Or if you got some issues with your business, I want to introduce you to my lawyers and my friends and their friends and so on and so forth.
7
SPEAKER_02
If I went on a vacation somewhere, man, you should go there.
7
SPEAKER_02
I ma set you up with the people.
7
SPEAKER_02
So now you re building this community of we all we got.
7
SPEAKER_02
And in this community, you are who you got.
7
SPEAKER_02
You know what I m saying?
7
SPEAKER_01
You are.
7
SPEAKER_01
Ain t no way around it.
7
SPEAKER_01
With all the experience you have now from all the stuff and the trauma you went through growing up and the process of healing and the process of trusting in the last five years and processing and all these different things, what would you say is your greatest superpower now?
7
SPEAKER_01
And maybe it s not what people would think it is.
7
SPEAKER_01
And also, what is your biggest weakness still that you re working to overcome that you want to become better at overcoming?
7
SPEAKER_02
my biggest weakness would be dealing with a lot of my childhood trauma.
7
SPEAKER_02
Because there s sometimes a little J still comes out.
7
SPEAKER_02
You know what I mean?
7
SPEAKER_02
I have to work on that because even if you feel slighted, and again, what I had to kind of come to grips with is that what served me then doesn t serve me now.
7
SPEAKER_02
You know what I mean?
7
SPEAKER_02
And it s like, you know, a violent behavior would serve me then.
7
SPEAKER_02
It protected you, it guarded you.
7
SPEAKER_02
The tough demeanor is like, ah, you know.
7
SPEAKER_02
And what was the next one you asked?
7
SPEAKER_02
What am I working on now?
7
SPEAKER_01
The greatest superpower.
7
SPEAKER_01
Superpower.
7
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_02
I say the greatest superpower to me is having a good heart.
7
SPEAKER_02
You know what I m saying?
7
SPEAKER_02
Because I always had it.
7
SPEAKER_02
You know what I m saying?
7
SPEAKER_02
And just doing things for people makes me feel like
7
SPEAKER_02
it fulfills me.
7
SPEAKER_02
It s almost like when somebody call me and be like, yo, thank you for introducing me to such and such, or telling such and such, stop by my business.
7
SPEAKER_02
I m like, oh nah, I love what you do, whatever.
7
SPEAKER_02
That s a good thing for me.
7
SPEAKER_02
And then also, my superpowers.
7
SPEAKER_02
Problem solving.
7
SPEAKER_02
Like I love that.
7
SPEAKER_02
Like you can put 100 problems on this desk.
7
SPEAKER_02
I m scanning through them, okay, this is what we re gonna do.
7
SPEAKER_02
That s my thing.
7
SPEAKER_02
And just to add something on to that, I think my biggest super, super power is integrity.
7
SPEAKER_02
I have to move correctly because I have to be able to look at myself in the mirror and there s been some times that I couldn t.
7
SPEAKER_02
because I didn t move correctly.
7
SPEAKER_02
Your past.
7
SPEAKER_02
My past, definitely.
7
SPEAKER_02
I mean, you know, and based off, like, you know, I would lie if I felt like it was going to benefit me or get me out of trouble.
7
SPEAKER_02
I don t think I can do that today.
7
SPEAKER_02
So I try not to get in trouble because I m going to be like, yeah, I did it.
7
SPEAKER_00
Right, right, right.
7
SPEAKER_02
But I had learned that a man that s a real man doesn t lie under any circumstance.
7
SPEAKER_02
He doesn t.
7
SPEAKER_02
Wow.
7
SPEAKER_02
When did you learn that?
7
SPEAKER_02
When did you start that switch of... I started that around...
7
SPEAKER_02
about my late 30s because I was still trying to figure it out then.
7
SPEAKER_02
And I wouldn t say nothing crazy, but if you asked me something, there was some pressure behind it.
7
SPEAKER_02
I could be in a situation or it might not go my way, then I might lean towards what s gonna work for me.
7
SPEAKER_02
But now I couldn t do that.
7
SPEAKER_02
I couldn t look somebody.
7
SPEAKER_01
There s no peace.
7
SPEAKER_01
When you re always telling a white lie or hiding something, you know.
7
SPEAKER_02
Well, also what I learned too, it worked for me because you have to be covert, right?
7
SPEAKER_02
You coming from this world, you can t tell people everything you re doing.
7
SPEAKER_02
Now you re supposed to tell me next step, because they could be there waiting for you, right?
7
SPEAKER_02
So that was how I lived.
7
SPEAKER_02
But when I started to be more transparent, I started to notice that these quality people that I was bringing to my life became closer to me.
7
SPEAKER_02
They embraced me more.
7
SPEAKER_02
Because you got to think, I was the guy that
7
SPEAKER_02
Talking about coming over your house for dinner.
7
SPEAKER_02
Oh, no.
7
SPEAKER_01
Right.
7
SPEAKER_01
It was.
7
SPEAKER_01
But the more vulnerable and open and honest and integrity and your word that you are consistently, the more people want to support you.
7
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_01
Who have the same values.
7
SPEAKER_01
And the more they want to.
7
SPEAKER_02
you know, even give you a lot of the knowledge that they have.
7
100%.
7
SPEAKER_02
You know what I m saying?
7
SPEAKER_02
It s just like, and not even, you know, like really pour into you, like really lean into you.
7
SPEAKER_02
And at first, you know, that was a little weird to me because nobody had ever helped me before.
7
SPEAKER_02
So now I m trying to figure out what s the catch.
7
SPEAKER_02
Right.
7
SPEAKER_02
Or they trying to get out of it.
7
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, yeah.
7
SPEAKER_02
Right.
7
SPEAKER_02
So now I m trying to figure out what s the catch.
7
SPEAKER_01
Trying to use me, trying to get something from me.
7
SPEAKER_02
Right, right, right, right.
7
SPEAKER_02
And it took a while.
7
SPEAKER_02
And I m just like, wait, hold up.
7
SPEAKER_02
Wait, wait.
7
SPEAKER_02
And then, you know, I m not good with time.
7
SPEAKER_02
Like I remember the trauma stuff, but like, cause of course I lived a crazy life in and out here and there.
7
SPEAKER_02
So you meet people and see people, but then when you see people, you haven t seen them in a while and they kind of greet you with that love and they tell you like, I just really love you.
7
SPEAKER_02
Like at first I couldn t believe it.
7
SPEAKER_02
Right.
7
SPEAKER_02
But over time started to be like, yo, maybe, you know, it s, that s, that s, you know, that s genuine.
7
SPEAKER_02
That s, that s, that s real.
7
SPEAKER_02
Cause where we come from, if somebody tell you they love you, you gotta be watching your back.
7
SPEAKER_02
Really?
7
SPEAKER_02
Yes, absolutely.
7
1,000%.
7
SPEAKER_02
With them?
7
SPEAKER_02
Yes.
7
SPEAKER_02
You out of nightclubs, somebody get in your ear, you know I love those.
7
SPEAKER_02
That s it.
7
SPEAKER_02
You don t want that.
7
SPEAKER_02
Really?
7
SPEAKER_02
Yes, you don t want that.
7
SPEAKER_02
Why, they could be shooting you the next day or something?
7
1,000%.
7
SPEAKER_01
My gosh, man.
7
SPEAKER_02
I ve seen it happen more times than you can think.
7
SPEAKER_02
I ve seen it firsthand.
7
SPEAKER_01
What is the biggest lesson your wife has taught you?
7
SPEAKER_02
The biggest lesson she s taught me,
7
SPEAKER_02
in life is that having a partner, is having somebody that is on the same wavelength as you and you guys are building it better.
7
SPEAKER_02
The building together is the best thing in the whole wide world.
7
SPEAKER_02
My wife is smart, super smart, super savvy, you know, fly, say that.
7
SPEAKER_02
And it s just like, that s my partner.
7
SPEAKER_02
Like we can talk about things and she s there with me, right?
7
SPEAKER_02
And then she can also tell me things that I wouldn t take from anybody else.
7
SPEAKER_02
Because there s been times I ve been in a situation where my wife is like, have you ever thought about?
7
SPEAKER_02
I m like, no, I have not.
7
SPEAKER_02
Let me get into that.
7
SPEAKER_02
And we sit down, we politic, and we talk, and it s just like we re coming with a plan.
7
SPEAKER_02
And I love that.
7
SPEAKER_02
And she can hold her own, and that s what I really respect about her.
7
SPEAKER_02
She has just as many resources and things as I have, and we always put them together to do things.
7
SPEAKER_02
That s amazing.
7
SPEAKER_02
She s very well-traveled, and I love
8
SPEAKER_01
that we can go anywhere, she s plugged in, and we live a life together that we both sit down.
8
SPEAKER_01
I mean, the first couple months we was together, we sat down and we did a vision board, and it was like this big vision board, it was in the living room in my condo, and we was just doing all these, you know, saw these ideas, and we looked up, maybe like a year later, we had done everything.
8
SPEAKER_01
That s so cool, man.
8
SPEAKER_01
We gotta do another board.
8
SPEAKER_00
That s cool.
8
SPEAKER_00
That s amazing, man.
8
SPEAKER_00
Um, I ve got a few more questions for you.
8
SPEAKER_00
That s okay.
8
SPEAKER_00
This has been inspiring, man.
8
SPEAKER_00
I could hear your stories.
8
SPEAKER_00
Thank you so much, brother.
8
SPEAKER_00
I could hear this stuff for a long time, but, um, I want to ask, I mean, you mentioned Jay-Z briefly, um, but you ve worked with a lot of big artists over the years, right?
8
SPEAKER_00
I mean, who are some of the names that you ve worked with or either been on tracks with?
8
SPEAKER_01
Have they been on your album or you worked with?
8
SPEAKER_01
Kanye West to Rihanna to Mariah Carey to,
8
SPEAKER_01
Wow, the list goes on.
8
SPEAKER_01
The only group of people I ain t worked with that I ever wanted to work with is Sade and Tupac.
8
SPEAKER_00
I think everything else I got covered.
8
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
8
SPEAKER_00
How did you go from not being an artist, not being a rapper, not knowing anything really about music, to working with the biggest names in the world?
8
SPEAKER_01
I think it s my connection to the streets and the people and the culture.
8
SPEAKER_01
Because, again, you have your community and you have
8
SPEAKER_01
some leadership there.
8
SPEAKER_01
By connecting and collabing, you get to get these people ears that you never would have got because they don t know you or believe you, but they believe me.
8
SPEAKER_01
So that s the key to it.
8
SPEAKER_01
Because that s the most reason why people do collabs, is to tap into whatever you got.
8
SPEAKER_01
And it s just like, you know, when you got people like Rihanna, we done records, you got Kanye West, we done plenty of records.
8
SPEAKER_01
You got people like Jay-Z.
8
SPEAKER_01
I got more records with Jay-Z than he has with Biggie Smalls.
8
SPEAKER_01
Like, just think about that.
8
SPEAKER_01
Holy cow.
8
SPEAKER_01
Right?
8
SPEAKER_01
But that s what I m saying.
8
SPEAKER_01
So for me, I think we just tap into what each other has.
8
SPEAKER_01
And for me, my stronghold has been the culture, the people.
8
SPEAKER_01
Like, I am the people s champ, you know?
8
SPEAKER_01
And it s way beyond the music.
8
SPEAKER_01
Like, the music is just the vessel and connection to the people.
8
SPEAKER_01
I think it s more life things to have, because you can track and see where I was in a bad space.
8
SPEAKER_01
You can see where I was trying to figure it out.
8
SPEAKER_01
You can see when I started to come out of my rut.
8
SPEAKER_01
You can see when I started to think different.
8
SPEAKER_01
You see when I started to eat different.
8
SPEAKER_01
You see when I started to dress different.
8
SPEAKER_01
So you re seeing that evolution and you re starting to go, hold up.
8
SPEAKER_01
I m from where he s from, I can do that.
8
SPEAKER_01
He s doing like, you know, real estate in Atlanta.
8
SPEAKER_01
Like, we re really over the world.
8
SPEAKER_01
I m healing right now.
8
SPEAKER_01
Something I always loved.
8
SPEAKER_01
I mean, it reminds me of my old life.
8
SPEAKER_00
You buy something, you flip it.
8
SPEAKER_01
It s my thing.
8
SPEAKER_01
And I got business people come to me, talk to me about real estate.
8
SPEAKER_01
These are people in the culture that s really excited about going out here and doing these things that they probably wouldn t have ever thought that they can do, but they re seeing what I m doing and they re going like, wow, like, and now I m getting these calls from people that, you know, that I used to know in a whole nother life.
8
SPEAKER_01
Like, man, I just bought this duplex, man.
8
SPEAKER_01
Like who can I talk to about managing it for me or whatever, whatever.
8
SPEAKER_01
And it s like, these are the conversations I want to have with you.
8
SPEAKER_01
I don t want to have a conversation with you.
8
SPEAKER_01
The old way.
8
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, it s not good.
8
SPEAKER_00
I got three final questions for you.
8
SPEAKER_00
I feel like I could ask you tons of stuff.
8
SPEAKER_00
But I want people to get your book, Adversity for Sale.
8
SPEAKER_00
Yes, sir.
8
SPEAKER_00
You got to believe.
8
SPEAKER_00
Make sure you guys get a few copies of the book.
8
SPEAKER_00
Give them to your friends.
8
SPEAKER_00
From Jay Jeezy Jenkins.
8
SPEAKER_00
This question is what I ask all my guests at the end of our conversations.
8
SPEAKER_00
It s called the three truths.
8
SPEAKER_00
So it s a hypothetical question, hypothetical scenario.
8
SPEAKER_00
Imagine you get to live as long as you want to live.
8
SPEAKER_00
You know, you can extend your life for as long as you want, but eventually it s the last day.
8
SPEAKER_00
But you ve created so many vision boards, you ve accomplished all your dreams a thousand fold, right, for the rest of your life.
8
SPEAKER_00
You ve lived exactly the way you want to live.
8
SPEAKER_00
But for whatever reason in this hypothetical world, no one has access to your content, your information, your music, your books.
8
SPEAKER_00
This conversation is gone.
8
SPEAKER_00
Everything you ve ever put out is gone.
8
SPEAKER_00
But on the last day, you get to leave behind three lessons.
8
SPEAKER_00
And this is all we have access of your information, the three lessons that you would share with the world.
8
SPEAKER_00
I call them the three truths.
8
SPEAKER_00
What would be those three truths for you?
8
SPEAKER_00
The first truth would be
8
SPEAKER_01
Karma is real.
8
SPEAKER_01
I ve done some pretty bad things in my life.
8
SPEAKER_01
And I tell you, man, the man upstairs, big G-O-D, he made me pay.
8
SPEAKER_01
He made me pay.
8
SPEAKER_01
And I ll never go back down that road again.
8
SPEAKER_01
So do right by people and do right by yourself, you know, because karma is real.
8
SPEAKER_01
That would be my first truth.
8
SPEAKER_01
My second truth would be it s never too late for anything.
8
SPEAKER_01
You can be how old or you can be in the worst situation in the world.
8
SPEAKER_01
It s just never too late to turn it all around.
8
SPEAKER_01
It s never too late.
8
SPEAKER_01
If you get started today, you re on your way tomorrow no matter when.
8
SPEAKER_01
And my last truth would be
8
SPEAKER_01
evolve or die.
8
SPEAKER_01
And I don t mean in the sense of the word, but if you re not evolving, you re not living.
8
SPEAKER_01
And the last thing you want to do is take that with you.
8
SPEAKER_01
And they say, you know, the richest place in the world is a cemetery because everybody take all these great things with them.
8
SPEAKER_01
And it s just like you might lose a lot evolving, but you ll gain so much more.
8
SPEAKER_01
Right.
8
SPEAKER_01
And you have a whole different respect for yourself because we only got one life and your life has to affect
8
SPEAKER_01
more than what you can see or touch, your life has to affect.
8
SPEAKER_01
I can never thought the end of my life would affect millions, right?
8
SPEAKER_01
And I m still continuing to chip away at that, right?
8
SPEAKER_01
And again,
8
SPEAKER_01
When I m no longer here, I want my kids to know that their father was a great man.
8
SPEAKER_01
He stood for something.
8
SPEAKER_01
And he wanted to help people the best way he could.
8
SPEAKER_01
He didn t actually come in the best way.
8
SPEAKER_01
Right, right.
8
SPEAKER_01
But he wanted to help people as much as he could.
8
SPEAKER_01
And I hope...
8
SPEAKER_01
And I pray by people seeing me evolve and giving myself the permission to do so on my own terms and my own time, that that helps them understand that there s no judgment.
8
SPEAKER_01
If you want to do and become better for yourself, your family, your peers, your community, your culture, your people, you got that right.
8
SPEAKER_01
Because when this life is over, it s a wrap.
8
SPEAKER_01
It s done.
8
SPEAKER_00
And what you didn t do, you ll never get a chance to do that ever.
8
SPEAKER_00
GZ, I want to acknowledge you before I ask the final question for your, really your ability to look within over the last, you know, three to five years and say, you know what, I m going to start talking about things that I never thought I was able to talk about.
8
SPEAKER_00
I m going to start opening up and being vulnerable, even though.
8
SPEAKER_00
I would have been laughed at, made fun of, kicked out of the house or whatever growing up if I would have done these things then.
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And I acknowledge you for allowing yourself to start to heal and transform and transmit the message that you ve learned from, you know, the karma that you ve had to deal with in the past from wrongdoings and mistakes and things that you did that were out of integrity to being the best human you can be.
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And obviously still no one s perfect, but being on that process of service,
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adding value the way you can, creating, bringing people together, collaborating.
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So I acknowledge you for the man you re continuing to becoming.
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The man you re healing into a beautiful man it looks like.
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And I hope we get to play some golf sometime, hang out sometime more.
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And I want people again to get the book.
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Before I ask the final question, is there anything else we can do to serve you today?
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Man, just make sure we spread this message and um, you know, and let s just continue to be a brother like yeah And I want to let you know as well Like you you really I ve turned a lot of my friends and my peers on to you and it s like they call me the next day Like it s amazing Because you just never like a different episode of what you re going through in life You can just kind of go through it and pick what you re going through and listen to it and I listen to your stuff every morning, man What you can do for me is continue to do what you re doing that I m acting more people that you know
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My man, I appreciate it.
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Final question, Jeezy.
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What is your definition of greatness?
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My definition of greatness is to be
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The best version of yourself by any means is greatness to me.
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That means win, lose, or draw.
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Just be the best version you can be of you and that s all you got to give.
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There s nothing else.
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Like if you re good up every day and you re doing the best you can do and you re being the best that you can be, that s greatness.
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You re already walking in the path.
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It only gets better.
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You know what they say, good habits, good things come out of that.
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Bad things come out of that.
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So at the end of the day, if you got a habit of being the best version of yourself, you re only going to get better at that.
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And that s greatness to me.
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I hope today s episode inspired you on your journey towards greatness.
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Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a rundown of today s show with all the important links.
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And if you want weekly exclusive bonus episodes with me, as well as ad free listening experience, make sure to subscribe to our greatness plus channel on Apple podcast.
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If you enjoyed this, please share it with a friend over on social media or text a friend.
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Leave us a review over on Apple podcast and let me know what you learned over on our social media channels at Lewis Howes.
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I really love hearing the feedback from you and it helps us continue to make the show better.
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And if you want more inspiration from our world-class guests and content to learn how to improve the quality of your life, then make sure to sign up for the Greatness Newsletter and get it delivered right to your inbox over at greatness.com slash newsletter.
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And if no one has told you today, I want to remind you that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter.
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And now it s time to go out there and do something great.