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 I've been able to be a part of so many great companies, investing-wise, because I wasn't afraid to lose the money.
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Really?
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I always told myself, I believe in this, but if it goes to zero, I'm okay.
0
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How do you get to that place, though?
0
SPEAKER_02
 Welcome to the School of Greatness.
0
SPEAKER_02
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.
0
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Thanks for spending some time with me today.
0
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Now let the class begin.
0
SPEAKER_02
 I think it's a great idea to keep learning new skills.
0
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And it's one of the reasons I keep pushing myself to learn Spanish, train for a marathon, and even picked up boxing.
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And if you're always learning, it keeps you sharp, just like ZipRecruiter.
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Their AI is always learning.
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So if you're hiring, their AI gets better and faster at finding the right candidates for all your roles.
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And right now you can try it for free at ziprecruiter.com slash greatness.
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 ZipRecruiter uses its powerful technology to find and match the right candidates up with your job, then it proactively presents these candidates to you.
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And now you can try ZipRecruiter for free at this exclusive web address.
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That's ZipRecruiter.com slash greatness.
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That's ZipRecruiter.com slash G-R-E-A-T-N-E-S-S.
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ZipRecruiter, the smartest way to hire.
0
SPEAKER_02
 Welcome back, everyone at the School of Greatness.
0
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Very excited about our guest, my friend Scooter Scott Braun in the house.
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Good to see you, brother.
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Number three.
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Number three, man.
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People have been begging me to have you back on.
0
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We used to do kind of like an annual thing, a recap of the year.
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And people were like, I can't wait for the next one.
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But COVID.
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COVID hit.
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Yeah, we missed it.
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We missed our window.
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We missed it.
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And so now we're back.
0
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 I'm curious, so you gotta start with your three biggest lessons, business, personal, spiritual, of the last couple years to start it then.
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What is the biggest awakenings, biggest eye-opening things that have happened for you, to you, in these areas of your life?
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So which one first?
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Business.
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Okay, funny enough, the business lesson that I got over the last couple years that was the most significant happened because my life got taken away from business for the first time in 20 years.
0
SPEAKER_00
 My personal life became such a priority.
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My spirituality grew from me doing self-work.
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And because of things in my personal life, I decided to step away from business for the first time and really focus on my personal life.
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Instead of looking at it as, oh, balance, balance, or what I like to say, harmonize.
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Because I don't think you should have to weigh one versus the other.
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I had a decision to make.
0
SPEAKER_00
 I was going through a very tough time and friends had recommended me to go to this place Hoffman that you and I have discussed before.
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Hoffman Professor has been around for a very long time.
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And I was kind of like lost.
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Lost in what way?
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Internally, spiritually, personally?
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I was going through stuff in my personal life that I was confused.
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I couldn't understand what was happening.
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And I hadn't done the work yet to have
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 the foundation to handle it, to be honest with you.
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So I was really lost.
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I got depressed.
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And I hit a level of depression that I had never hit in my entire life because I couldn't fix it.
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I couldn't find the answers.
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SPEAKER_00
And a couple friends recommended Hoffman, which I had avoided for four years.
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SPEAKER_00
I was like, what do I need this place for?
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I had a good childhood.
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I've had friends who suffered and gone through stuff.
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I was fine.
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And in this confusion, I finally just surrendered to this idea of I'm gonna go to this place.
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And when I called up,
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 My friend connected me with this amazing woman, Liza, who runs the Hoffman process.
0
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And we got on the phone, she said, I can take you in three weeks to our next process, October 24th, 2020.
0
SPEAKER_00
 And I started to laugh because that was the release of my client and family to me, Ariana Grande's album.
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And I'm thinking, this is my biggest album release of the year.
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There's no way I can't be there.
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This is what I do.
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I can't leave.
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And I started laughing in the parking lot of one of Ariana's music videos.
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And I started laughing out loud.
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No one was even around me.
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And I just looked up at the sky and I said, OK, God.
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OK, universe.
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 I see what you're doing here.
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I can choose to stay on this path that I've been on that's very successful, but now I've hit this wall and I'm depressed and I'm hurt and I'm alone.
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Or I can choose me for the first time, truly me, be selfish about it and leave.
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And I went to Ariana and I told her and she said to me, you were there for me in many different times, it's time for me to be there for you, you should go.
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And I went and that week changed my life.
0
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 I realized that I had built Scooter Braun since I was 18 years old because I didn't think Scott was strong enough in the world.
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And I didn't know that.
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That was a subconscious thing from my childhood.
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And it wasn't like I didn't have wonderful parents, I do.
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But they passed on to me what had happened to them.
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Like that's what we do as parents.
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One day I hope my kids go and do this process and when they come to me, I'm gonna say thank you for finishing the work that I didn't get to.
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 You know, thank you for fixing things that I wasn't able to address.
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And when I came back, I started to get answers to that darkness.
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But I wasn't depressed this time.
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I was at peace because I went back and got little Scott.
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I would left him for so long that when the foundation of this story I had told myself of what my life was going to be, what Scooter Braun was going to become, when that foundation was cracking,
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 I didn't know what to do, because I had so invested in a story of my own manifestation, my own will, that the universe was saying, oh no, no, we're going to show you who's really in charge, and you're going to have to learn to surrender to this and actually understand what life is about.
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 And Hoffman was the beginning of a very deep transformation for me.
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I never loved my name Scott since I was seven.
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Why not?
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I don't know.
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I now know.
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It was because I didn't trust Scott.
0
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Scott, I felt, was a popular kid and played sports and was fun and cool and everything else, but deep down was highly insecure because he was overpowered as a kid.
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You felt powerless.
0
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I felt powerless at times.
0
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And I felt transactional love from people who actually loved me unconditionally.
0
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 but they were doing what happened to them.
0
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They were doing what they were taught.
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Repeating a pattern.
0
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Exactly.
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And by doing that, I created deep empathy and deeper love for those people in my life.
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But also, I went and got that kid and said, hey, you created Scooter.
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You were actually strong enough the entire time.
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And I loved my name again for the first time since I was seven.
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And I realized that Scooter was a part of me.
0
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 but Scott had to be in charge again.
0
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Ooh, gosh, this is so fascinating.
0
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I think I saw you a couple of months ago at your new place.
0
SPEAKER_02
I believe I showed you my phone.
0
SPEAKER_02
I still have it, it's out there.
0
SPEAKER_02
On my phone, I have a photo of myself when I was about six, shortly after I was sexually abused by a man that I didn't know.
0
SPEAKER_02
 And for years, I had abandoned the inner child inside of me, the little Louis, right?
0
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And I've been going through my own process over the last couple of years of kind of reconnecting, reclaiming, getting the power back, and being like, I'm here for you, I got you.
0
SPEAKER_02
Holding the little Louis inside of me, the little Scott inside of you, and developing a new relationship and integrating this healing process.
0
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And I'm so glad that you're in the process as well and talking about it because
0
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 If this was us 10 years ago talking about this on a podcast, people would have been like, who are these guys?
0
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They're crazy talking about little Louis, little Scott, inner child work.
0
SPEAKER_00
You and I weren't ready to do that.
0
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We had come up with this athlete, male, masculine, don't show your fears, don't show your hurt, overcome, which is, by the way, important.
0
SPEAKER_00
Which helped us get to certain places.
0
SPEAKER_00
And by the way, it needed to be part of that journey.
0
SPEAKER_00
And I also think that telling someone to overcome things and toughen up is important.
0
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 However, the entire conversation needs to be had.
0
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And you need to know that you're enough.
0
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I was reading this other book, Fifth Agreement, and it was talking about this lie that we're told.
0
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Hey, nobody's perfect, but we actually are.
0
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Your image is perfect, my image is perfect.
0
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You lose a limb, you're still perfect.
0
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You mess up, you're still perfect.
0
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That's perfectly part of your journey.
0
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You are perfectly imperfect.
0
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 You know, and where this all led me, interesting, because I said the first thing, was business.
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I had the best year of my life in business not working.
0
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When I stepped away, now it wasn't like it came out of nowhere, I had had.
0
SPEAKER_00
I'd been building momentum for years, but I think what the universe was trying to say to me was, you think you can't walk away.
0
SPEAKER_00
You think you can't step away and take care of you, but we're actually gonna show you that when you step away,
0
SPEAKER_00
 We were always in charge.
0
SPEAKER_00
The idea that what happened to me in my life was because of me is ridiculous.
0
SPEAKER_00
It's statistically impossible, what happened to me in my life.
0
SPEAKER_00
From the day I was born, someone would look and say, this is statistically impossible.
0
SPEAKER_02
 You mean statistically impossible, meaning like the opportunities that you were able to manifest and create in the career and the business?
0
SPEAKER_00
Lewis, if you were to look at me and you, from the day we were born, and someone's gonna say, this person's gonna end up here, and this person's gonna end up here.
0
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And they brought a statistician, and he'd say the odds are very, very small.
0
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Yet we thought it was us.
0
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Because we go through life, I'm manifesting this.
0
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And yes, your willpower and your free will plays a very large role.
0
SPEAKER_00
 But the universe plays a bigger role.
0
SPEAKER_00
There's 13 billion years of this universe moving without us.
0
SPEAKER_00
Always being able to survive and move on.
0
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Yet we come into the world as individuals and go, it's cause of me.
0
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I did this.
0
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Well guess what?
0
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I'm born in 1981 in New York City.
0
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First person in my family born in this country.
0
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I won the lottery.
0
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I won the lottery of privilege being born in this country at that time.
0
SPEAKER_00
 I should recognize that.
0
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It doesn't mean I don't work hard.
0
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It doesn't mean I don't earn things.
0
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But I should admit that the universe gave me certain things that gave me advantages.
0
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 And I should acknowledge other people that don't have those advantages and show them respect.
0
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And also acknowledge the universe that it's doing this for me.
0
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And that's what happened for me in business.
0
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I had this amazing year where I stepped away and I started to learn surrender.
0
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And then it led me to my personal life of you gotta surrender.
0
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And I struggle with that.
0
SPEAKER_00
But my spirituality grew and grew.
0
SPEAKER_00
 You know this, I did ayahuasca in the last two years.
0
SPEAKER_00
I did ma in the last two years.
0
SPEAKER_00
I went to Sedona and worked with amazing healers and did incredible breath work where I actually went deeper than I did on ayahuasca on my own breath.
0
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Which was insane.
0
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Without plant medicine, I went deeper on my own breath with this amazing teacher.
0
SPEAKER_02
 I mean, this is a whole other subject.
0
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This is why I think that we don't necessarily need plant medicines in order to go as deep as we want to go.
0
SPEAKER_00
We do not.
0
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It doesn't mean that you can't use them.
0
SPEAKER_00
I mean, they can still be powerful, but I think you can do it without it as well.
0
SPEAKER_00
I can tell you, I was not expecting it.
0
SPEAKER_00
I thought we were doing some breath work.
0
SPEAKER_02
 You're like hallucinating.
0
SPEAKER_02
Fully hallucinating.
0
SPEAKER_00
And we started to do this breath work and he had warned me that my hands would turn like raptors over oxygenating.
0
SPEAKER_00
And I was like getting through it.
0
SPEAKER_00
But funny enough, because I had done plant medicine, I understood what was happening to me.
0
SPEAKER_00
And I was able to navigate it better because I had done plant medicine.
0
SPEAKER_00
And then I had what could only be described as really a DMT dump from my own breath.
0
SPEAKER_00
 that was massive and I was fully hallucinating.
0
SPEAKER_00
I had a massive healing and an understanding.
0
SPEAKER_02
What's the biggest lesson you learned from plant medicine work, but then also breath work, the intense breath work you did, which I call it more of a spiritual breath work experience probably.
0
SPEAKER_00
Look, I think the plant medicine was the first time I understood that I have trauma from my childhood and that I'm allowed to acknowledge it and that we all have it.
0
SPEAKER_00
No one gets away unscathed.
0
SPEAKER_00
It doesn't mean that someone did something malicious to you or anything else, but we all have, even we interpret things as a child,
0
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 that are different from the reality, because we don't have that rational thought yet.
0
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And-.............................................................................................................................................................................................................
0
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 You've done it.
0
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You're in a different world.
0
SPEAKER_02
I've never done plane medicine.
0
SPEAKER_02
Oh, really?
0
SPEAKER_00
I've done emotional intelligence training like Hoffman.
0
SPEAKER_00
So plane medicine brings you to another plane.
0
SPEAKER_02
I have many friends who've done it, yes.
0
SPEAKER_00
And with Hoffman, I think doing the work here was really important.
0
SPEAKER_00
I think the breath work was kind of the same thing.
0
SPEAKER_00
 I think the breath work, I really struggled with this idea of surrender.
0
SPEAKER_00
With the plant medicine, it helped me surrender.
0
SPEAKER_00
You had to, right?
0
SPEAKER_00
You had to.
0
SPEAKER_00
But then you come into your real life, and I'm not built to surrender.
0
SPEAKER_00
I'm someone who makes it happen.
0
SPEAKER_00
So this idea of surrender, also to me, in my programming, was giving up.
0
SPEAKER_00
And I would do it for a little while, but then I'd be like, but no, I gotta.
0
SPEAKER_00
 And one of my teachers said something really beautiful to me.
0
SPEAKER_00
He said, yes, you're trying to make things happen because you see things others maybe not see and you love them.
0
SPEAKER_00
But also part of you is fearful that if you give someone else the space, they won't choose you.
0
SPEAKER_00
They won't see you.
0
SPEAKER_00
They won't agree with you.
0
SPEAKER_00
And that's okay.
0
SPEAKER_00
And I had an amazing teacher named Chess in Sedona.
0
SPEAKER_00
And before we talked, we talked about my intentions.
0
SPEAKER_00
 before we did this breath work, which I just thought was going to be some breathing.
0
SPEAKER_00
I was shocked by what happened.
0
SPEAKER_00
And what was your intention?
0
SPEAKER_00
I wanted a deeper understanding of healing.
0
SPEAKER_00
I wanted to be able to surrender.
0
SPEAKER_00
And he looked at me and he said, maybe just change the word.
0
SPEAKER_00
 And he said something that changed my life forever.
0
SPEAKER_00
He said, maybe allow.
0
SPEAKER_02
As opposed to surrender?
0
SPEAKER_00
Allow.
0
SPEAKER_00
He said, because you're choosing to surrender.
0
SPEAKER_00
You're allowing it.
0
SPEAKER_00
Why don't you just allow?
0
SPEAKER_00
It's still your choice.
0
SPEAKER_00
And when he did that, everything changed for me.
0
SPEAKER_00
 I think life is a lot about allowing, you know, about understanding that you might exert your will on something, but if it doesn't go your way, it doesn't necessarily mean it was supposed to.
0
SPEAKER_00
Another friend sent me something I love.
0
SPEAKER_00
He said, rejection is God's protection, you know, which I loved.
0
SPEAKER_00
You know, this idea that
0
SPEAKER_00
 You get rejected and you think, oh, we've all had it in our lives.
0
SPEAKER_00
Oh, man, I wish that went that way.
0
SPEAKER_00
And then a week later, something happens and if that didn't.
0
SPEAKER_02
Right.
0
SPEAKER_02
You're like, thank goodness it didn't go that way.
0
SPEAKER_00
Exactly.
0
SPEAKER_00
And the universe does these things.
0
SPEAKER_00
And and, you know, I want to say this to you because I'm sure people who are watching this, you know, they'll hear my story.
0
SPEAKER_00
They'll you'll talk about my business at certain points and they'll be like, oh, it's easy for this guy to say, you know, you knew me when I wasn't successful.
0
SPEAKER_00
But like they're like, oh, now he's successful.
0
SPEAKER_00
So he can.
0
SPEAKER_00
I want to admit that.
0
SPEAKER_00
 I have the freedom of having the time to do this self work.
0
SPEAKER_00
I have the freedom of not having to worry about a mortgage.
0
SPEAKER_00
I have the freedom of being able to pay my medical bills.
0
SPEAKER_00
I have that freedom and I don't want to not acknowledge it.
0
SPEAKER_00
I am privileged in that respect in what has happened in my life.
0
SPEAKER_00
But I've also had the opportunity to ask one of the most successful men in history
0
SPEAKER_00
 a question of what does he want?
0
SPEAKER_00
And I'm gonna say who it is, because he usually doesn't, people misconstrue different things.
0
SPEAKER_00
Jeff Bezos cares deeply about people.
0
SPEAKER_00
I've had an opportunity to spend time with him.
0
SPEAKER_00
He cares deeply about people.
0
SPEAKER_00
He's provided more jobs than anyone during COVID.
0
SPEAKER_00
He raised minimum wage when the government wouldn't do it for all his employees.
0
SPEAKER_00
He does a lot of good for the world.
0
SPEAKER_00
And because he's so successful, sometimes people want to assume certain things, but the man himself cares.
0
SPEAKER_00
And when you ask him, what do you want, what do you say?
0
SPEAKER_00
 I got a cheat code that I want to share.
0
SPEAKER_00
I looked at him and I said, Jeff, what do you want?
0
SPEAKER_00
I'm one of the most commercially successful people ever.
0
SPEAKER_00
What do you want?
0
SPEAKER_00
And he told me he wanted to evolve personally.
0
SPEAKER_00
He wanted to be a better friend, a better father.
0
SPEAKER_00
He wanted to grow in intimacy.
0
SPEAKER_00
He said, I want to evolve as a human.
0
SPEAKER_00
 And I realize you don't need $200 billion to do that.
0
SPEAKER_00
Because when I was at Hoffman, all walks, shapes, and sizes.
0
SPEAKER_00
When I go to Sedona, all walks, shapes, and sizes.
0
SPEAKER_00
It is a personal decision of choice to choose yourself to do self-work.
0
SPEAKER_00
And the most gratifying thing of the last two years for me
0
SPEAKER_00
 is I've had a lot of success and I've had more hardship and pain than I've ever had in my entire life.
0
SPEAKER_00
But I've grown more than I've ever grown since I was a little boy.
0
SPEAKER_02
You mentioned something in there about learning to love yourself or accept yourself.
0
SPEAKER_02
Did you not think you were lovable or did you not think you were enough?
0
SPEAKER_02
 Until recently?
0
SPEAKER_00
I didn't know, but yes.
0
SPEAKER_02
Really?
0
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, because we've done these before.
0
SPEAKER_00
And if you watch my other interviews, you'd say that's a very confident everything else.
0
SPEAKER_00
Here's the interesting part.
0
SPEAKER_00
Scooter was enough.
0
SPEAKER_00
 Scooter was confident.
0
SPEAKER_00
Scooter was, I can conquer the world.
0
SPEAKER_00
But I forgot somebody.
0
SPEAKER_00
I forgot Scott.
0
SPEAKER_00
I left him back there.
0
SPEAKER_00
And I didn't realize that if Scooter's world crumbled a little bit, because we would talk and you'd be like, might as touch, and you had all this success, everything was rolling.
0
SPEAKER_00
So I didn't have to address the past.
0
SPEAKER_00
And when that foundation cracked,
0
SPEAKER_00
 I found out a deep, deep, deep lie that was in my soul, which is I'm not enough.
0
SPEAKER_00
And I'm Scott.
0
SPEAKER_00
I created something that would be enough.
0
SPEAKER_00
So when you presented me or you met me in the world, you were meeting
0
SPEAKER_00
 my creation to protect me.
0
SPEAKER_00
And when that thing broke, I was left with something that I hadn't rehabilitated or looked at in a long time, which was myself.
0
SPEAKER_02
You hadn't accepted yourself fully.
0
SPEAKER_00
I hadn't accepted me as a kid.
0
SPEAKER_00
I had accepted a part of me.
0
SPEAKER_00
I accepted my intellect.
0
SPEAKER_00
I accepted what I had built.
0
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And by the way, I'm proud of that.
0
SPEAKER_00
I've done a lot of things in the world that I'm extremely proud of.
0
SPEAKER_00
And anyone who said things about me,
0
SPEAKER_00
 I'm not gonna go into details on that, but I would say that those just aren't true.
0
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And to each their own.
0
SPEAKER_00
But I'm proud of what I've done in the world and how I've treated people.
0
SPEAKER_00
And I've definitely made mistakes like all of us, but I've never done anything malicious.
0
SPEAKER_00
But I hadn't taken care of that little boy because that little boy didn't understand how to be taken care of.
0
SPEAKER_00
It's hard to do self-work.
0
SPEAKER_00
It's hard to look back.
0
SPEAKER_00
 and have empathy for those that hurt you, have empathy for yourself that you made choices that hurt yourself, to realize that the way you saw the world and you built it to protect you might be wrong.
0
SPEAKER_00
So spiritually, that surrender and allowing was a big part of my spiritual journey.
0
SPEAKER_00
Allowing is probably the most important thing spiritually that's happened to me, and also just believing.
0
SPEAKER_00
Like, why not?
0
SPEAKER_00
 You work with a healer and he says, I'm gonna take you somewhere on your breath.
0
SPEAKER_00
Sure, let's go.
0
SPEAKER_00
Let's go.
0
SPEAKER_00
Let's try it out.
0
SPEAKER_00
And then you ask me family-wise.
0
SPEAKER_00
 I think the greatest lesson I've learned is that family should have unconditional love.
0
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And you shouldn't be afraid to say it.
0
SPEAKER_00
I grew up in a family with unconditional love.
0
SPEAKER_00
But I think because of certain fears and everything, my grandparents were Holocaust survivors.
0
SPEAKER_00
My dad grew up with parents who had such trauma.
0
SPEAKER_00
My mom's dad died when she was 11.
0
SPEAKER_00
Her mom really had nothing.
0
SPEAKER_00
They grew up with a lot of trauma in a really hard world.
0
SPEAKER_00
 And I refused to see that I was getting any of that because they gave me a better life.
0
SPEAKER_00
So I just thought, oh, I'm first generation that has this good life, so I should shut up.
0
SPEAKER_00
Two generations ago it was worse, then it was better.
0
SPEAKER_00
I got it the best.
0
SPEAKER_00
But no, we pass this stuff on.
0
SPEAKER_00
 Rashi says the greatest trauma that we have is not our own.
0
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And I just feel like that's what I learned.
0
SPEAKER_00
I learned that I don't have to hide.
0
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I can look across and even if people don't see or they're afraid or they're going through their own stuff, love people where they're at and love them unconditionally.
0
SPEAKER_00
I've had so many friends talk to me about their parents or their relationship with their siblings and they're so mad at them.
0
SPEAKER_00
 for not understanding them.
0
SPEAKER_00
But are you mad at them for not understanding?
0
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Or are you mad because you're triggered by something that they're doing that you haven't settled inside yourself?
0
SPEAKER_00
And I've just gotten to this point where what my work is with my family is just to love unconditionally and to be okay where someone else is at and allow them to be where they're at.
0
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 and let them love you.
0
SPEAKER_00
And when you make mistakes, because you will, you'll be triggered, and you'll burst, and you'll screw up, and you'll everything else, just give yourself the grace of, of course, that's my human experience.
0
SPEAKER_00
Everyone in the world is suffering.
0
SPEAKER_00
I'm allowed to suffer too.
0
SPEAKER_02
What's something that you say to your little Scott on a daily basis now that you never said before?
0
SPEAKER_00
So I do a meditation, one of my daily practices, where I talk to different parts of myself.
0
SPEAKER_00
 It's actually something I learned at Hoffman.
0
SPEAKER_00
And I talk to my emotional self.
0
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And sometimes that person's five, sometimes I'm 27, sometimes I'm 14.
0
SPEAKER_00
Sometimes it's right now.
0
SPEAKER_00
Sometimes it's right now.
0
SPEAKER_00
Sometimes it's a bunch of them.
0
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But I always like to give them a hug, especially when it's a kid.
0
SPEAKER_00
That's so beautiful, man.
0
SPEAKER_00
You know, pick them up, hug them.
0
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Just be like, you're enough.
0
SPEAKER_00
 You know, you always were.
0
SPEAKER_00
You're strong.
0
SPEAKER_00
And this teacher, Chess, he said something to me really beautiful.
0
SPEAKER_00
You know, when I went in, I'd done some work with other healers in Sedona.
0
SPEAKER_00
I did a week of healing, like working with healers.
0
SPEAKER_00
And I've decided, actually, you were one of the people who inspired me.
0
SPEAKER_00
I never got to tell you this.
0
SPEAKER_00
I saw you do Wim Hof.
0
SPEAKER_00
 And I decided that why should I just do Hoffman this one year?
0
SPEAKER_00
I should do something every year.
0
SPEAKER_01
Absolutely.
0
SPEAKER_00
One week, no phone, no emails, where I just do something for my betterment of myself.
0
SPEAKER_00
So this year I went for a week to Sedona.
0
SPEAKER_00
And I did this program, Sedona Soul Adventures, this amazing woman designs program where you can meet up with different healers that she knows are good.
0
SPEAKER_00
 She saw me and she's like, you're younger than most people who come here.
0
SPEAKER_00
Most people usually figure this out later.
0
SPEAKER_00
But I think I want to do Wim Hof next year.
0
SPEAKER_00
I want to do something to better myself.
0
SPEAKER_00
And when I got to this breathwork session, I was of the mind of I have to kill the ego and Scooter must be my ego.
0
SPEAKER_00
I have to kill it.
0
SPEAKER_00
And when I leave here, I'm only going to be Scott.
0
SPEAKER_00
And then we started to talk and he said, why?
0
SPEAKER_00
Look at how beautiful this life is that this part of you built.
0
SPEAKER_00
 Look how much good in the world this part of you has done.
0
SPEAKER_00
Look how many people depend on you and you depend on them and there's a beautiful part of this.
0
SPEAKER_00
The ego has to be cleaned, not killed.
0
SPEAKER_00
You have to forgive yourself for things, these deep down secrets that you have.
0
SPEAKER_00
 that you're carrying your shame, just clean it and let it go, and then love what this part of you is.
0
SPEAKER_00
However, and this is the most beautiful thing he said, the ego must be cleaned, but the soul is perfect.
0
SPEAKER_00
And he said, and the soul should never be humble.
0
SPEAKER_00
He said, when you get to a place where you're seeing your true soul,
0
SPEAKER_00
 Love it like a king, love it like a queen.
0
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, it's a shine.
0
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, don't have any shame.
0
SPEAKER_00
It doesn't mean you're better than anybody else, but embrace yourself like Fit the Agreement talked about.
0
SPEAKER_00
You're perfect.
0
SPEAKER_00
 This idea that nobody's perfect so that we can live in our shame and use it as an excuse?
0
SPEAKER_00
No, let that go.
0
SPEAKER_00
A child walks into the room and they mess up and they cry and they scream or they get into a fight with another kid.
0
SPEAKER_00
They don't come back the next day and hold a grudge.
0
SPEAKER_00
They don't even talk about what happened.
0
SPEAKER_00
They're on to the next one.
0
SPEAKER_00
And if you look at every major religion from Buddhism to Judaism to Christianity,
0
SPEAKER_00
 I'm not a Christian, but let me tell you something.
0
SPEAKER_00
I love learning about it.
0
SPEAKER_00
Jesus was asked, show me God.
0
SPEAKER_00
He said, look at the child.
0
SPEAKER_00
Every major religion says the same thing.
0
SPEAKER_00
We get away from this, and then we spend like the first 40 years of our life.
0
SPEAKER_00
 Or 50, learning, learning, learning.
0
SPEAKER_00
And then we spend the second half of our life, if we do it right, unlearning.
0
SPEAKER_00
Shedding all this stuff, cleaning it.
0
SPEAKER_00
And then getting back to the kid, like you were talking about.
0
SPEAKER_00
Because it's always about that little kid not feeling enough.
0
SPEAKER_00
And it's crazy, sorry if we're going on a tangent, but I just want to say this.
0
SPEAKER_00
We hold a grudge with ourselves.
0
SPEAKER_00
We carry so much blame and shame on a child.
0
SPEAKER_00
 Yet if there was a five or six year old standing in front of us, we'd be like, that has nothing to do with you.
0
SPEAKER_00
But we do it to ourselves.
0
SPEAKER_00
We carry this deep, I've heard you do so many interviews where you talk about what happened to you.
0
SPEAKER_00
 but it still to this day affects you.
0
SPEAKER_00
And you carry that shame a little bit.
0
SPEAKER_00
We talked about it, like the wave will come in.
0
SPEAKER_00
And it's this constant work to tell that kid, you didn't do anything, like you were enough from day one.
0
SPEAKER_02
What do you think is the biggest shame that you had to heal or are in the healing process of?
0
SPEAKER_02
Because my therapist says healing is not a one moment and you're healed once you realize it, it's an integration process over time.
0
SPEAKER_02
It's a journey of healing.
0
SPEAKER_02
 What do you think is that biggest shame that you've healed or you're in the process of healing?
0
SPEAKER_00
I blame myself for things.
0
SPEAKER_00
 I'll say I've released myself.
0
SPEAKER_00
I will speak them out and no longer carry the shame.
0
SPEAKER_00
We all have things, deep, dark secrets that no one knows, but we know.
0
SPEAKER_00
We know, oh, I did that, that one time.
0
SPEAKER_00
Deep, dark, I refuse to carry those anymore.
0
SPEAKER_00
I refuse to be ashamed of anything that I've done because even when I've done things out of character, and these are things long time ago, they were so out of character that I hid them.
0
SPEAKER_00
 I said, that wasn't me.
0
SPEAKER_00
And I don't wanna be judged by anyone else because that wasn't me, so I'm not gonna tell anyone that even happened.
0
SPEAKER_00
We all have that.
0
SPEAKER_00
And if you're saying to yourself, oh no, you got that and I don't, you're lying to yourself.
0
SPEAKER_00
We all have it.
0
SPEAKER_00
And it could be the smallest thing, could be the biggest thing, but we have them.
0
SPEAKER_00
I don't wanna carry that shame anymore.
0
SPEAKER_00
However, the thing I'm working on in healing is I blame myself.
0
SPEAKER_00
I say, it's almost like a voodoo.
0
SPEAKER_00
I tell myself if I'm being punished later on
0
SPEAKER_00
 for that, and I knew it was gonna come, I'm carrying it.
0
SPEAKER_00
And instead of doing what I actually know, which is there's no such thing as a punishment.
0
SPEAKER_00
I think the best way to explain this, the story of Adam and Eve.
0
SPEAKER_00
When we're kids, we're told they were punished.
0
SPEAKER_00
They bit the apple, they listened to the snake, and they were cast out, punished.
0
SPEAKER_00
 But God's supposed to be like a parent to us, right?
0
SPEAKER_00
I have three beautiful kids now.
0
SPEAKER_00
Think I've ever punished my kid because I'm mad at them?
0
SPEAKER_00
No, because you love them.
0
SPEAKER_00
I love them and I'm trying to show them something they don't understand yet.
0
SPEAKER_00
I'm trying to teach them something.
0
SPEAKER_00
A punishment is actually a lesson.
0
SPEAKER_00
 Same thing with the universe and with God.
0
SPEAKER_00
He didn't cast us out.
0
SPEAKER_00
He didn't punish us.
0
SPEAKER_00
He said, oh, I have to give you a human experience so you understand that you were beautiful naked.
0
SPEAKER_00
I need you to go out there and understand what shame is and releasing shame so you have perspective.
0
SPEAKER_00
 that you were always enough right here.
0
SPEAKER_00
So you can appreciate this.
0
SPEAKER_00
And that's what I'm working on.
0
SPEAKER_00
I'm working on letting go of my blame and my shame for everything in my life as if I can control them and understand that everything is a gift.
0
SPEAKER_00
And it's easy for me to say, but then those demons, they come in and you work through it.
0
SPEAKER_00
And where do you feel the most naked in your life currently?
0
SPEAKER_00
My family life.
0
SPEAKER_00
It's funny, in the last couple of years I've been attacked
0
SPEAKER_00
 publicly in my business life, first time that's happened.
0
SPEAKER_00
It was interesting, it was like before, it was like nothing, it was only good stuff.
0
SPEAKER_00
And then overnight, that changed.
0
SPEAKER_00
And it was an interesting lesson because at first you can choose to be angry, you can choose this, oh, that's not true, or all this other stuff, but you can choose to say, well, what role did I play in this moment?
0
SPEAKER_00
What role did I play in this coming about?
0
SPEAKER_00
Was I arrogant enough to think this wasn't gonna happen?
0
SPEAKER_00
 You know, and where I choose to look at in business is I've kind of released that of like, okay, it is what it is, but I also know that it isn't true and I'm loved by so many people in my business life and I have great relationships.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And when other people are saying something about me, it usually has more to do with them or a story that they know that isn't my story.
1
SPEAKER_00
But when I did my most recent deal with my company, I took those lessons.
1
SPEAKER_00
And what I realized is I need to include every single person in the success so that everyone feels good.
1
SPEAKER_00
There can't be seven out of 10 that feel good.
1
SPEAKER_01
10 out of 10 have to feel good.
1
SPEAKER_01
 So I've known you for, I think, eight or nine years, I think.
1
SPEAKER_01
I think we met originally on South by Southwest in Austin, which would be this week, like nine years ago or something.
1
SPEAKER_01
Maybe it was 10 years ago, I can't remember.
1
SPEAKER_01
But Adam, your brother, introduced us.
1
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, we played ball.
1
SPEAKER_01
And I've known you and seen your career and your growth and the things that you've done in business for the last nine years.
1
SPEAKER_01
 and you were extremely talented and on the rise then, but you weren't worth as much as you are now, obviously, financially, and you did many deals over the last nine years, right?
1
SPEAKER_01
There were many deals you did a certain way, and then now it's public that you just sold your company for over a billion dollars to the, what's the brand, Hybe, is that what it's called?
1
SPEAKER_01
Hybe, which kind of owns the K-pop conglomerates and all that stuff.
1
SPEAKER_01
Sherman Banks, great guy.
1
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_01
 And so you had been building for years.
1
SPEAKER_01
What were the ways that you were doing deals before versus the way that you did them now?
1
SPEAKER_01
Because I also know that you gave 50 million of stock to your own employees once you did this deal, which I'm not sure if you did something like that before.
1
SPEAKER_00
Well, I never sold the company before.
1
SPEAKER_00
I had sold pieces here and I bought it back and stuff and sold other things.
1
SPEAKER_00
I think in the past, I had done deals where
1
SPEAKER_00
 some people knew what was going on and other people didn't.
1
SPEAKER_00
Meaning like some people knew what the deal was?
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, exactly.
1
SPEAKER_00
Like for example, when I gave stock away, when I gave some of my stock away, I gave it to my artists and my employees and former employees and friends who helped me get there.
1
SPEAKER_01
And former employees and friends?
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
1
SPEAKER_00
It was just people who helped me build the company.
1
SPEAKER_00
For example, Kenny Hamilton, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
Great guy.
1
SPEAKER_00
Hasn't been part of the company in years, but he was a part of it.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And then you have artists like Justin and Ariana and Demi and J Balvin and all these people, Tori Kelly, who've been there.
1
SPEAKER_00
So you gave them a piece too.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
1
SPEAKER_00
And the reason is as follows.
1
SPEAKER_00
When I had done other transactions in the past, what I learned from them when people got upset,
1
SPEAKER_00
 where I was assuming that I would have an opportunity after the deal was done to sit down and be like, I'm excited to work together.
1
SPEAKER_00
This was the vision of why I did this.
1
SPEAKER_00
But that didn't happen.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I thought to myself, when I do this deal, before I close it, I'm gonna go to every single person that this might affect, and I am going to make them a part of this in a positive way.
1
SPEAKER_00
Because I want them to feel a part of this success, whether they are here still or not.
1
SPEAKER_00
If they were just a part of the journey, I want them to look and say,
1
SPEAKER_00
 I feel good, I was a part of this family.
1
SPEAKER_00
And you can choose when people don't agree with you to say, screw them, or you can choose to say, what can I learn from this?
1
SPEAKER_00
I always look at the story of Joseph and the Technicolor Dreamcoat.
1
SPEAKER_00
His brothers were jealous that he was his dad's favorite, so they pretended that he had died and actually sold him into slavery.
1
SPEAKER_00
 Later on, really hard life in and out of jails.
1
SPEAKER_00
He was a seer.
1
SPEAKER_00
The pharaoh of Egypt hears there's this seer in the jail.
1
SPEAKER_00
They bring him out and with the famine, he tells the pharaoh what to do.
1
SPEAKER_00
He becomes number two to the pharaoh.
1
SPEAKER_01
All right.
1
SPEAKER_00
It's crazy.
1
SPEAKER_00
I mean, this guy was one of those powerful people ever at that time.
1
SPEAKER_00
And then his brothers come.
1
SPEAKER_00
 into Egypt, try to do some business, and he sees them, and he has them arrested, knowing the rest of the family would come.
1
SPEAKER_00
And he brings them in front, and they're like, why are we in front of the number two guy?
1
SPEAKER_00
They're so scared.
1
SPEAKER_00
And he says, you don't recognize me, but I'm your brother Joseph.
1
SPEAKER_00
And they're like, we are screwed.
1
SPEAKER_00
 We destroyed this guy we sold him into slavery and he said if it wasn't for you and what you did I would have not had the hardships and the life and learning that I had and I wouldn't be here So I'm not gonna hurt you.
1
SPEAKER_00
I'm actually going to take care of you and your families forever.
1
SPEAKER_00
Oh my gosh, and It's just how you choose to look at life.
1
SPEAKER_00
You know, I'm grateful to those that hurt me and
1
SPEAKER_00
 I'm grateful, and I have to acknowledge that in some ways, people feel hurt by me.
1
SPEAKER_00
It doesn't mean that I did it on purpose.
1
SPEAKER_00
It doesn't mean that they're trying to hurt me on purpose.
1
SPEAKER_00
But I'm grateful for the role that they play in my journey.
1
SPEAKER_00
And trust me, there are times in certain people that I'm like, you know, like that fire comes out.
1
SPEAKER_00
It doesn't mean I gotta be best friends with them.
1
SPEAKER_00
I don't have to take care of their families.
1
SPEAKER_00
But it doesn't mean I have to hold that hatred in my heart.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And it doesn't mean I have to look at them and say, oh, you wronged me.
1
SPEAKER_00
No, you did something that helped me in my growth.
1
SPEAKER_00
Absolutely.
1
SPEAKER_00
You can appreciate it even though you don't need to be best friends with someone.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I can just say I can choose to not carry that.
1
SPEAKER_00
And when it goes to my family, I want to give that to my kids.
1
SPEAKER_00
My kids are my greatest teachers.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yale is, you know Yale, mother of my children, one of my greatest teachers in my life, if not my greatest teacher.
1
SPEAKER_00
What's the greatest lesson she's taught you?
1
SPEAKER_00
 how to really love somebody.
1
SPEAKER_00
It's easy to love somebody when things are going well.
1
SPEAKER_00
It's hard to love each other when things aren't going well.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I think that we've shown we can do that.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I'm grateful for that.
1
SPEAKER_01
 That's beautiful.
1
SPEAKER_01
And what about your kids?
1
SPEAKER_01
Greatest lessons they've taught you?
1
SPEAKER_00
You know, part of this loving myself again, I see myself in them.
1
SPEAKER_00
You know, I see parts of myself in every one of my kids.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I see the parts of myself that got hurt.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I saw myself before I started this process, starting to pass on those patterns based on fear, based on, oh, I need to protect because you're too sensitive.
1
SPEAKER_00
You're like me.
1
SPEAKER_00
You can't be as sensitive as I am.
1
SPEAKER_01
Tough enough.
1
SPEAKER_00
 Yeah, because I was a sensitive kid.
1
SPEAKER_00
One of my friends, Molly, she calls me HSP.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I'm like, why do you call me that?
1
SPEAKER_00
She's like, you're a highly sensitive person.
1
SPEAKER_00
And she goes, people think you're tough, but you're highly sensitive.
1
SPEAKER_00
But my kids are like that.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I just want them to know they're enough.
1
SPEAKER_00
And they're gonna have their trauma.
1
SPEAKER_00
No matter what I do, they're gonna have their stuff.
1
SPEAKER_00
 but I'm gonna be rooting for them every step of the way, unconditionally.
1
SPEAKER_00
I drove my kids to school the other day and we were talking, I was talking about accountability.
1
SPEAKER_00
I was explaining what accountability means to a seven and a five year old.
1
SPEAKER_01
Did they get it?
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, because we've talked about it before and I was talking about the importance of accountability and Jagger, my oldest, is very funny.
1
SPEAKER_00
He's like, you also gotta learn about flexibility, dad.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I was like, what do you mean?
1
SPEAKER_00
He's like, if I want my iPad, it should be flexible.
1
SPEAKER_00
He's seven.
1
SPEAKER_00
 But we talked about this idea of accountability, and then I just told him, and I said, I want you guys to know, beyond accountability, that's to yourself.
1
SPEAKER_00
But I will tell you if I think you're doing something wrong, but it doesn't mean I love you any less.
1
SPEAKER_00
 I will always be here for you and love you no matter what.
1
SPEAKER_00
I will never leave you no matter what you do to me or anyone else.
1
SPEAKER_00
If you make any mistakes, I will always be here.
1
SPEAKER_00
And that was something, a talk I had with my father.
1
SPEAKER_00
My father loves me unconditionally.
1
SPEAKER_00
But when I was growing up, he used what he was taught.
1
SPEAKER_00
And one of the things was fear.
1
SPEAKER_00
 If you do that, you're out.
1
SPEAKER_00
You do that, I'll leave you.
1
SPEAKER_00
That's all he knew at the time.
1
SPEAKER_00
But I had a walk with him.
1
SPEAKER_00
And you told him about this?
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I had a walk with him and I looked him in the eyes.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I want to be really clear, my dad is an amazing man.
1
SPEAKER_01
Great guy.
1
SPEAKER_00
I looked at him and I said, Dad, you loved me so unconditionally that I see you would have never left.
1
SPEAKER_00
And he looked at me and he's like, but it worked.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I said, no, it didn't, Dad.
1
SPEAKER_00
You and I were great despite it, not because of it.
1
SPEAKER_00
 I want my children to know that.
1
SPEAKER_00
I always was a good dad, but there was something inside of me that I knew was lacking and I couldn't place it.
1
SPEAKER_01
What was that?
1
SPEAKER_00
It was this.
1
SPEAKER_00
It was now that I've done this work, I'm the dad I always wanted to be.
1
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
1
SPEAKER_00
That's got to feel good.
1
SPEAKER_00
It does.
1
SPEAKER_01
It feels really good.
1
SPEAKER_01
And it's good you learned this when they're five and seven and not 25.
1
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, really.
1
SPEAKER_00
I mean, they were four and six when I was coming out of this.
1
SPEAKER_00
 and my daughter is you know two at the time so you could look at the things and be like oh i can't believe this happened or this and and there's two things i came out of it one i played a role in it yeah okay well for taking accountability yeah and responsibility i played a role in this it's always 50 50 whether you want to admit it or not it's always 50 50 in every relationship in your life you play a role and
1
SPEAKER_00
 Choose to forgive yourself so you can forgive someone else.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I had to learn that in business and in my life, like all these different things.
1
SPEAKER_00
And then the other side of it is...
1
SPEAKER_00
 Love more.
1
SPEAKER_00
Well, the universe keeps going without us, so why not join it that way?
1
SPEAKER_00
Didn't you get a tattoo?
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I got love more tattooed right on my chest.
1
SPEAKER_00
But it doesn't mean you can't be tough.
1
SPEAKER_00
It doesn't mean there aren't gonna be times where someone doesn't deserve a punch in the face.
1
SPEAKER_00
That's a human experience.
1
SPEAKER_00
That's part of the journey too.
1
SPEAKER_00
I'm not gonna sit here and say I'm like some zen, I'm gonna have moments.
1
SPEAKER_00
And maybe I deserve a punch in the face a couple times.
1
SPEAKER_01
 You know, but, you know, it's funny, it's a funny story.
1
SPEAKER_01
We're at a charity event for Yale, must have been seven years ago, six, seven years ago, I don't know, at Bootsy Bellows, I think it was.
1
SPEAKER_01
We're at some event for F Cancer.
1
SPEAKER_01
I go, tell me why you love Scott so much?
1
SPEAKER_01
And she says something that I always remember.
1
SPEAKER_01
She said, I don't know, it's just something about him.
1
SPEAKER_01
Every day I can't see myself without him in my life, but every day I want to punch him in his face.
1
SPEAKER_01
 She said that to me and I thought that was the funniest thing.
1
SPEAKER_01
But I was like, maybe sometimes you need to punch in the face.
1
SPEAKER_01
But she was like, you know, I can't not see him in my life.
1
SPEAKER_00
I mean, look, here's the thing.
1
SPEAKER_00
We're in each other's life.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, exactly.
1
SPEAKER_00
We're tied to each other and three beautiful children.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_00
So I got, you know, and by the way, that's what real partnership is.
1
SPEAKER_00
You know, my brother always talks about this idea that
1
SPEAKER_00
 He never will call Pencils of Promise, his nonprofit, a nonprofit.
1
SPEAKER_00
He'll call it a for-purpose.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I have no interest in calling anyone what they aren't to me anymore.
1
SPEAKER_00
That's my partner.
1
SPEAKER_00
So that's the way I look at it.
1
SPEAKER_01
That's beautiful.
1
SPEAKER_01
Going back to the business stuff, there's a quote that Jim Carrey says that I love.
1
SPEAKER_01
I don't have it exactly, but it's something about, I wish everyone became rich and famous and realized that it's not the key to happiness.
1
SPEAKER_01
 From your journey, since I met you, you were worth tens of millions probably nine years ago, but now you're worth a lot more.
1
SPEAKER_01
And on your journey of accumulating more wealth and bringing more money into your life,
1
SPEAKER_01
 What have you learned about money?
1
SPEAKER_01
What does it actually give you versus what does it not give you?
1
SPEAKER_01
And does it bring you happiness?
1
SPEAKER_00
It's how you choose to see money.
1
SPEAKER_00
Like everything in your life.
1
SPEAKER_00
If you wanted to go swimming in the lake and the next day you come out and the lake is frozen over, you can choose to be mad or you can choose to go ice skating.
1
SPEAKER_00
It is how you choose to look at what you're given.
1
SPEAKER_00
 Money is an avenue to freedom if you allow it to be.
1
SPEAKER_00
If you are obsessed with accumulating more and more and more and more, then you are trapped by money.
1
SPEAKER_00
If you are obsessed with not allowing it to leave you, then you are trapped by money.
1
SPEAKER_00
 If you look at money as, this is my avenue to actually implement more time into my life, more joy into my life, then money can be very freeing.
1
SPEAKER_00
You can say, I have enough money to go to Sedona this week and work with healers.
1
SPEAKER_00
 I have enough money to take my loved ones on a vacation they can never have and see joy on their face.
1
SPEAKER_00
I have enough money to surprise somebody and buy them some merch at a show or do something out of kindness.
1
SPEAKER_00
Giving is an incredible thing and you can do a lot of that with money, but you don't need it either.
1
SPEAKER_00
 Because a lot of these things, you don't need money to implement them.
1
SPEAKER_00
Money just takes other pressures off if you allow to look at it that way.
1
SPEAKER_00
I also truly believe that when I give money or lose money, as long as my intent is correct, it will be returned to me.
1
SPEAKER_00
I actually saw that in the breathwork.
1
SPEAKER_01
Really?
1
SPEAKER_00
What do you mean if you lose money?
1
SPEAKER_00
In the past, if you like...
1
SPEAKER_00
 you're doing a deal and you feel like you're overpaying somebody.
1
SPEAKER_00
But if you go inside yourself and you say, I'm at peace with this, then I truly believe the universe will return it to you.
1
SPEAKER_00
I don't believe I can lose anything at this point.
1
SPEAKER_00
Because the more you do work, the more you realize you have enough.
1
SPEAKER_00
My kids, that's my priority.
1
SPEAKER_00
It's them and continuing to learn myself and get my kid right inside of me.
1
SPEAKER_00
The inner kid.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, the inner kid.
1
SPEAKER_00
 and find more joy and keep learning.
1
SPEAKER_00
I think one of the mistakes I made over the last year since leaving Hoffman is I depended on it too much.
1
SPEAKER_00
I had all these amazing tools and I was like using them and using them and using them.
1
SPEAKER_00
And when I read Untethered Soul by Michael Singer, he talks about this concept
1
SPEAKER_00
 that we almost sometimes overuse self-work as a mechanism to continue touching the thorn, continue to stay close to our trauma.
1
SPEAKER_01
As opposed to process it and move on.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, so if you hurt your ankle, and you put a brace on your ankle, and you play basketball with a brace every single day for the rest of your life, you're thinking about your ankle every single day.
1
SPEAKER_00
But if your ankle's healed, shouldn't you take off the brace and stop thinking about your ankle?
1
SPEAKER_00
But if you're like, no, I gotta keep it on just in case,
1
SPEAKER_00
 you're a prisoner to this ankle injury.
1
SPEAKER_00
 So with our bodies, when we're not hurt or we're not sick, we just go through life not thinking about our bodies.
1
SPEAKER_00
We're enjoying ourselves, we're eating, we're having fun, we're doing different things, but then our intellect is taking over.
1
SPEAKER_00
That voice inside our head is constantly putting us down, putting us all over the place, so we're battling with it constantly.
1
SPEAKER_00
He said the same way you treat your body when you're not thinking about it is how you should sometimes treat your mind.
1
SPEAKER_00
So I realized I was relying on it too much, I was staying close to trauma, I was talking about it all the time.
1
SPEAKER_00
I don't have these conversations all the time.
1
SPEAKER_00
I'm just going out and enjoying life, being present.
1
SPEAKER_00
 That's been probably the greatest gift that I've gotten of everything, allowing all this dirt and stuff.
1
SPEAKER_00
I didn't know how to be present before.
1
SPEAKER_01
What were you focused on as opposed to being present?
1
SPEAKER_00
What was for the future?
1
SPEAKER_00
My trauma, I mean, Holocaust surviving families is you hear stories since you were a little boy of all these people dying and little boy or little girl, like all these people died and it's on you, never again.
1
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
1
SPEAKER_00
I was five.
1
SPEAKER_00
I can't even remember not knowing about it.
1
SPEAKER_00
 Every single day of my life, I woke up and I said, today's the day it might be taken away.
1
SPEAKER_00
Every single day I woke up saying, how could it be taken away?
1
SPEAKER_00
So I had to keep building to protect, to protect.
1
SPEAKER_00
I wasn't building for me.
1
SPEAKER_00
I think certain people who didn't know me misunderstood, but I was building because I felt like I needed to be prepared to protect.
1
SPEAKER_00
So like.
1
SPEAKER_00
Protect what?
1
SPEAKER_00
Anything, any trauma, any bad things.
1
SPEAKER_00
When Manchester happened at the Ariana show,
1
SPEAKER_00
 A lot of people were sad and crying and everything else.
1
SPEAKER_00
But I wanted to go do a show right away.
1
SPEAKER_00
I wanted to strike back.
1
SPEAKER_00
Because my entire life, I've been preparing for moments like that in my trauma.
1
SPEAKER_00
That was good for me in that moment to be someone who could do that.
1
SPEAKER_00
And Ariana's courage in that moment was beyond.
1
SPEAKER_00
But I also,
1
SPEAKER_00
 I'm allowed to live in a world where there isn't that coming.
1
SPEAKER_00
My kids need their dad to just be there and not be saying, we need to prepare for the storm.
1
SPEAKER_00
Doing this work allowed me to just say, bad things might come, but they're not here right now.
1
SPEAKER_00
And they don't exist yet.
1
SPEAKER_00
So you can be present and prepared.
1
SPEAKER_00
Because the present's the only thing we have.
1
SPEAKER_01
That's true.
1
SPEAKER_00
 You know, it gave me the gift of being someone who could be prepared, but I've learned to be present.
1
SPEAKER_00
I've learned to put down my phone and enjoy the day and understand, yeah, I could tell myself a story and compute it all, and something scary might be coming, but it's not here right now.
1
SPEAKER_00
Why am I not enjoying this?
1
SPEAKER_00
Because I don't know if tomorrow's promised.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I got that for the first time in my life, to be present.
1
SPEAKER_00
And it's been interesting seeing how many people have come up to me over the last few years and be like, man, have you changed?
1
SPEAKER_00
You know, you're so present.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And I don't feel like I've changed.
1
SPEAKER_00
I feel like I've reclaimed myself.
1
SPEAKER_00
I feel like I'm more me than I've been in years.
1
SPEAKER_01
 That's why I'm grateful.
1
SPEAKER_01
There used to be, not all the time, because we have a lot of time where you're not, I used to see you a lot when you weren't working, we'd play basketball a lot on the weekends, which we gotta start doing again.
1
SPEAKER_00
We do.
1
SPEAKER_00
By the way, that was my release.
1
SPEAKER_00
That was my meditation.
1
SPEAKER_00
Saturday morning.
1
SPEAKER_00
Being on a basketball court, I'd forget everything.
1
SPEAKER_00
Because you weren't on your phone.
1
SPEAKER_00
Well, I think it was just that court, it was just a game.
1
SPEAKER_00
There's something about courts.
1
SPEAKER_00
You have to be present.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, you have to be present, and it took you away from it all.
1
SPEAKER_00
 That was probably the only time every week where you could really be present, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
It was then, and by the way, now, I'm telling you, I'll send you these places.
1
SPEAKER_00
You can be present all the time.
1
SPEAKER_00
It's great.
1
SPEAKER_01
We gotta get a Gabe going soon.
1
SPEAKER_01
I've seen you over the years, and again, there's times where you're present and times where you're thinking about the next deal constantly, is what it seems like.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, we're thinking about anything.
1
SPEAKER_00
Anything but there.
1
SPEAKER_00
Right.
1
SPEAKER_00
 How does it here feel now?
1
SPEAKER_00
Great.
1
SPEAKER_00
And you know what's interesting?
1
SPEAKER_00
There are problems in the world and sometimes they're now.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I think because I was the way I was built, I was protecting against a future that hadn't existed.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I was too, too distracted to see when things were actually breaking now.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And those are the regrets that I have.
1
SPEAKER_00
That I couldn't see when the present was not working because I was like, oh no, the present's good.
1
SPEAKER_00
We have to worry about tomorrow.
1
SPEAKER_00
And there's nothing more important than the present.
1
SPEAKER_00
There's nothing more important than being with people now.
1
SPEAKER_00
It doesn't mean you can't have a brain that can go there and acknowledge.
1
SPEAKER_00
 But then take yourself out of that story slow down Surrender allow and just be like hold on a minute.
1
SPEAKER_00
What's in front of me right now?
1
SPEAKER_00
Is it really that scary right now?
1
SPEAKER_00
Why don't I address now before tomorrow comes instead of addressing tomorrow and I
1
SPEAKER_00
 It's been, you know, your guys love, the last time I was here, I talked about the baseball.
1
SPEAKER_00
I made up that thing about.
1
SPEAKER_00
C.C.
1
SPEAKER_00
Sabathia is.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, C.C.
1
SPEAKER_00
Sabathia is pitching to you.
1
SPEAKER_00
I'll say it again.
1
SPEAKER_00
I said, you were talking about what makes someone successful.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I said, imagine Cy Young Award, top of his game at the time of his career, he was top of his game.
1
SPEAKER_00
C.C.
1
SPEAKER_00
Sabathia was pitching.
1
SPEAKER_00
 to you and whoever could hit a home run out of Yankee Stadium wins a million dollars, a billion dollars, whatever it was.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I said, everyone gets to hit as many times as they want, but you can line up as many times as you want for free.
1
SPEAKER_00
So obviously a lot of people don't even come because they see the lines, they're like, screw it, I'm not waiting in line.
1
SPEAKER_00
 There are those people.
1
SPEAKER_00
Then there are people who wait in line and then they quit.
1
SPEAKER_00
Then there are people who get there, they take one swing, they realize how ridiculous, they go home.
1
SPEAKER_00
Then there's people who take two swings, people are screaming at them, there's a million people in line, get out of here, and they stop.
1
SPEAKER_00
Someone takes 10 swings.
1
SPEAKER_00
The person who's successful, I said, is the person who keeps swinging, drowns out all the noise of everyone telling them, what are you doing, give someone else a turn, everything else, and they keep swinging until they hit that home run, because no one remembers how many times they swung.
1
SPEAKER_00
They remember they were the one who hit the home run.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I said that to you, and now I want to add something to it.
1
SPEAKER_00
 The reason why that person is successful, and I didn't realize until right now, is because not only are they shutting out the noise of that moment, but they're realizing as soon as they swing and they miss, they're still standing and the only thing present is Cece Sabathia in front of them again.
1
SPEAKER_00
The next moment.
1
SPEAKER_00
The next moment.
1
SPEAKER_00
They're present to the next moment.
1
SPEAKER_00
They're not thinking about what if I miss again or anything else.
1
SPEAKER_00
They're shutting out the loss of the past and saying I have an opportunity again right now.
1
SPEAKER_00
 and this is the only thing that's real.
1
SPEAKER_01
And they keep showing up, keep showing up consistently.
1
SPEAKER_00
Well, tomorrow, you and I, whatever we talked about five minutes ago, we're never gonna be able to go back.
1
SPEAKER_00
We can watch it, but we can't go back.
1
SPEAKER_00
Whatever happens five minutes from now, can't go back.
1
SPEAKER_00
But I can do this.
1
SPEAKER_00
 That's the only thing that was real in that moment.
1
SPEAKER_00
And there's a really beautiful book you can read to your kids called The Precious Present.
1
SPEAKER_00
I think it's called The Precious Present.
1
SPEAKER_00
It's all about this idea of the greatest present you can give someone is being present.
1
SPEAKER_01
That's probably a good book to read to a kid at night.
1
SPEAKER_01
 I think so many people are fascinated by your business mind because you've built up this incredible empire, again, just sold your company for a billion, and you have multiple other projects and companies as well that you're building up partners in on a lot of different companies.
1
SPEAKER_01
If you could share with someone your philosophy on your business mind, the way you've been able to think, the way you've been able to strategize, the way you've been able to build over the last, let's call it the last decade,
1
SPEAKER_01
 What would you say are the core philosophies, the core principles on building a business?
1
SPEAKER_01
 at scale, you know, and really making a splash with the business that you might have.
1
SPEAKER_01
And maybe not everyone has the opportunity.
1
SPEAKER_00
Like I said, there's things I've learned that I perfected a long way, but I can give you what I would say.
1
SPEAKER_01
Looking back from all the stuff, the mistakes you made, the things that worked extremely well to where you are now.
1
SPEAKER_01
Even things that have worked extremely well that I would do differently now.
1
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I'd love to hear them.
1
SPEAKER_01
Because I think people are really fascinated by this.
1
SPEAKER_01
I'm thinking you want to dive in.
1
SPEAKER_00
First thing, I actually, when I was in Sedona, I did this deep meditation on the red rocks, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
 Interesting place Sedona and I realized I started to litigate my past.
1
SPEAKER_00
Oh, I could have done this differently I would have done this differently and I realized but if I had changed anything I wouldn't be in that moment with all that knowledge So I don't regret anything.
1
SPEAKER_00
I think everything is part of your process and part of your growth and everything that you need I think I can do things differently in the future.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yes from what I learned.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yes.
1
SPEAKER_00
I think the first thing I would say is be curious
1
SPEAKER_00
 Be curious, why not?
1
SPEAKER_00
Why not look in that direction?
1
SPEAKER_00
And by the way, why not you?
1
SPEAKER_00
Why not you?
1
SPEAKER_00
You hear the story of if you're intimidated, imagine them naked.
1
SPEAKER_00
 No, some people look fantastic naked, that's intimidating.
1
SPEAKER_00
That's even more intimidating.
1
SPEAKER_00
Someone's that good looking in front of you and they're naked, you're like, geez, come on.
1
SPEAKER_00
I actually like to say, imagine someone's taking a shit.
1
SPEAKER_00
Right, because we all do.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yep, everyone has had that, and it ain't pretty, and it's vulnerable, and if you can imagine everyone on the toilet just like you, you will realize we are all humans having a human experience.
1
SPEAKER_00
Like, have you seen the show Succession?
1
SPEAKER_00
Oh, it's a great show, incredible.
1
SPEAKER_00
So, when he goes to the bathroom, and he's a badass, but then he goes to the bathroom and he can't pee.
1
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, yeah.
1
SPEAKER_00
And he's falling down.
1
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, and he's peeing on the carpet.
1
SPEAKER_00
 It shows he's human, he's vulnerable.
1
SPEAKER_01
It's so funny.
1
SPEAKER_01
I went to a speech of the Dalai Lama, I don't know, five years ago.
1
SPEAKER_01
And one of the first things he said, someone said, how are you feeling today?
1
SPEAKER_01
And he goes, ah, not so good.
1
SPEAKER_01
It was hard for me to go to the bathroom just now.
1
SPEAKER_01
 It was like the funniest thing, because we're sitting there in front of the Dalai Lama thinking, here's a spiritual guru.
1
SPEAKER_01
Man, I couldn't go to the bathroom just now.
1
SPEAKER_01
It kind of hurt.
1
SPEAKER_01
And it was like this funny moment, but he probably does that a lot to try to bring it back to humanizing himself, as opposed to everyone just thinking he's this god or something.
1
SPEAKER_01
But yeah, so being curious.
1
SPEAKER_01
Being curious, telling yourself, why not me?
1
SPEAKER_00
Why not me?
1
SPEAKER_00
Why not me?
1
SPEAKER_00
With your business success.
1
SPEAKER_00
Anything.
1
SPEAKER_00
Why not you?
1
SPEAKER_00
Why can't it be you?
1
SPEAKER_00
 You know, what about you is less than, that you are telling yourself is less than?
1
SPEAKER_00
 Why not you?
1
SPEAKER_00
Every one of us is so unique and so special.
1
SPEAKER_00
Why not you?
1
SPEAKER_00
And then building a family.
1
SPEAKER_00
I think loyalty's important.
1
SPEAKER_00
Doing right by people.
1
SPEAKER_00
I've been blessed to build a company that people try to poach my employees all the time.
1
SPEAKER_00
It doesn't happen.
1
SPEAKER_00
And when it does happen, it's because we talk about it and I'm happy for them and they're part of the family still.
1
SPEAKER_00
 We have a beautiful family relationship within the company, even though we've gotten big, we still created that dynamic.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I think that's important because when it's late at night and someone's with their family, they have to choose to take time away from their family to help the company.
1
SPEAKER_00
 So create something that they can be proud of, something that they can say, I want to do this, and incentivize them to do so.
1
SPEAKER_00
That's why I did the giveaway with my stock, because I was like, you're all a part of this.
1
SPEAKER_00
And then don't hold on so tight.
1
SPEAKER_00
To what?
1
SPEAKER_00
 Maybe fear.
1
SPEAKER_00
You know, it's, I've been able to be a part of so many great companies, investing wise, because I wasn't afraid to lose the money.
1
SPEAKER_00
Really?
1
SPEAKER_00
I always told myself, I believe in this, but if it goes to zero, I'm okay.
1
SPEAKER_01
How do you get to that place though?
1
SPEAKER_00
And were you always like that in your first few investments or was it more like?
1
SPEAKER_00
I got to that place, I think I've always been kind of built that way, but I'll give you something that can maybe help someone else get there.
1
SPEAKER_00
How much,
1
SPEAKER_00
 I don't know if you and I have done this before, but if we've done it on other podcasts, I'll do it again.
1
SPEAKER_00
Who do you love?
1
SPEAKER_01
My family, my friends, my girlfriend.
1
SPEAKER_00
Okay, your girlfriend.
1
SPEAKER_00
You get a call, you leave this podcast, and your girlfriend is sick, and they need you to give $10,000 to help her.
1
SPEAKER_00
Do you give it?
1
SPEAKER_01
Of course.
1
SPEAKER_00
They need you to give a million dollars.
1
SPEAKER_00
Do you give it?
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_00
They need you to give, for her to live, every dime you have to your name.
1
SPEAKER_01
Absolutely.
1
SPEAKER_00
 No questions asked.
1
SPEAKER_00
Same with me.
1
SPEAKER_00
Is she healthy?
1
SPEAKER_00
Is she healthy right now?
1
SPEAKER_00
Is anyone asking for that?
1
SPEAKER_00
You already have it.
1
SPEAKER_00
You would give everything away right now to have what you already have.
1
SPEAKER_00
Your health.
1
SPEAKER_00
And the health of your loved ones.
1
SPEAKER_00
 Everything that you have right now, if life changed, you would give it all away to have what you have right now.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I think that's been one of the hardest lessons for me because I was able to do it with business.
1
SPEAKER_00
And my trauma made me really good at business.
1
SPEAKER_00
But sometimes what makes you good at business doesn't make you the best at intimacy with your friends and your family because I felt I needed to protect everyone.
1
SPEAKER_00
So it made me really good at business.
1
SPEAKER_00
 but I didn't show people who I was because I didn't think I was enough.
1
SPEAKER_00
So I was there for everyone else, but I wouldn't let anyone be there for me.
1
SPEAKER_00
And what I think I've come to realize is that if you ask me, you know, you ask people, what do you want in life?
1
SPEAKER_00
You know, people would say, oh, I want to get this or I want to get that.
1
SPEAKER_00
Funny enough for me is I think I already had it.
1
SPEAKER_00
I just didn't know.
1
SPEAKER_00
 I was so busy protecting for tomorrow that I couldn't see what was right in front of me.
1
SPEAKER_01
So what do you want now?
1
SPEAKER_00
I just want to keep growing and learning and I want to trust the universe that I've become the best version of myself because of all this and I'm trusting the universe that it's bringing to me where I'm supposed to be.
1
SPEAKER_00
I'm gonna keep leaning in like I love I just finished Michael Singer's second book The Surrender Experiment and he talks a lot about this about you know so many times in life he'd feel this resistance of
1
SPEAKER_00
 no, I gotta get back what I thought I needed.
1
SPEAKER_00
Or we can't do that, that's change.
1
SPEAKER_00
And he just said, there's too many signs here, I'm gonna surrender to it and see what happens.
1
SPEAKER_00
And that's where I'm at in my life.
1
SPEAKER_00
I'm surrendering to it, I'm seeing what's happening, and I'm telling you, if I don't go into my story of tomorrow or my story of the past, my present, the person sitting right in front of you and the life that I have right now is really beautiful.
1
SPEAKER_00
I don't have much to complain about.
1
SPEAKER_00
That's pretty nice, man.
1
SPEAKER_00
What would you do if you lost all your money today?
1
SPEAKER_00
 I have my health, my kids have my health.
1
SPEAKER_01
I'd go rebuild and go do another adventure.
1
SPEAKER_01
What do you think you would create?
1
SPEAKER_01
Would you start a partnership with someone?
1
SPEAKER_01
Would you start a new business?
1
SPEAKER_01
You're not sure.
1
SPEAKER_00
You know what, that's a story for tomorrow.
1
SPEAKER_01
Hopefully that never happens.
1
SPEAKER_00
I mean, if it does happen, it happens.
1
SPEAKER_00
I mean, it's not even a hopefully.
1
SPEAKER_00
If it happens, it's supposed to happen.
1
SPEAKER_00
It's a weird thing to say.
1
SPEAKER_00
Really?
1
SPEAKER_00
But it's just gotten to this place now where money has become very, the last two years was self-work and personal.
1
SPEAKER_00
So for me, I realized how much that doesn't matter.
1
SPEAKER_00
 how much can the money in the business stuff because the things that matter can be taken away and that's just an avenue to freedom you know so i look at money and the access that i have to money is an avenue to freedom and an avenue to giving and i can enjoy life and i can put together a beautiful life for my friends and my family and you know i have friends who