Hello everyone and welcome to day two of the five day alcohol free challenge. I'm joined by Project 90 top coach, Victoria English Martin. How are you, Victoria? I am having a great day, James. Thanks. Doing very well. Great to have you here today. We're going to be talking about how to socialize without alcohol, how to have fun, because a lot of people get worried about how their life is going to change if they remove alcohol out of their life. Before we get into that, Victoria, just a quick little one minute summary of you. What's your background as it relates to being a cancer survivor and also you getting alcohol out of your life and what is the work that you do inside of our Project 90 community? Sure. So I have a background in dietetics and movement, specifically Pilates. I was the picture of health and I had this one problem with alcohol. I just couldn't shake it. I thought I needed it to manage stress and anxiety. Took me quite a while to get it through my thick skull that life was a lot more fun without it. I am a cancer survivor. I do a lot of work to advocate and educate around breast cancer. I'm a mom of four. And after going through my struggles with cancer and alcohol, I decided that it was my job to take this knowledge into the universe. So I got certified in coaching and wake up every day. Very, very grateful, number one, to be alive and number two, to be able to help others understand what alcohol actually is and how much better life is without it. I love that. Thank you, Victoria. So great to have you here. We've already got a question that's come in. John says, 48 hours now, still in a fog, I've slept great. Has greatly helped your neuropathy. How do I pronounce that? Is it neuropathy? Neuropathy, maybe. Now, is the fog normal? I was a heavy beer drinker. Do you want to answer that one, Victoria? The question seems to be 48 hours now without alcohol, but still feels like he's in a fog, is sleeping better. But, you know, generally feels like he's in a fog. What do you think about that? Absolutely, that is completely normal. As we ingest alcohol, our body recognizes it for what it is. It is a toxin. It is one of the most inflammatory substances that we can put into our bodies. So when we ingest it, not only just a little bit, we'll have that inflammatory effect. But when we ingest more than what is considered casual amounts, it is going to have those effects on our body. When we take it away, our body is our brain is and body is going to say, where's my stuff? And as we return to homeostasis, which is a beautiful gift that each body possesses to return to its normal balance, it is completely normal to feel a little foggy, a little out of it. However, the good news is you don't ever have to go back to that day one ever again. It's going to get better. So perhaps make a little note to yourself about how you feel today and check that note in three or four days. I promise you, you are going to feel better. And it just continues to get that way as our body purges itself of this toxin and returns to doing what it knows how to do. So have some trust in your body, have a little faith, and it will get easier. Thank you, Coach Victoria. See, Helen has her hand up. Helen, if you want to just ask your question there in the Q&A, you can type it in as a Q&A box there, just type out your question. And we would love to answer that for you. I'm just going to share my screen again and I'm just going to show you guys what we covered yesterday. Yesterday, we went over, stop trying to quit alcohol. Instead of saying to yourself, don't drink. I shouldn't drink. I have to quit. I'm quitting. Instead, say what you will do, which is I easily only drink water ice and a piece of lime tonight. We did the pink elephant technique. If you don't know what I'm referring to, go into the Facebook group and watch the little video there that I pre-recorded about the pink elephant technique. We also talked about designing your environment, manipulating your environment, removing the visual cues of alcohol in your home and replacing them with visual cues of health and vitality. We talked about removing the visual cues of wine glasses and liquor cabinets and replacing it with a bouquet of flowers and some mason jars. Who bought a bouquet of flowers for themselves? If you did, if you've already done it, you get five gold stars because we only did this yesterday. So if you've already bought a bouquet of flowers, message down below in the chat and I would love to hear from you today. And right now in about 30 seconds, we're going to start day two, how to have fun and socialize alcohol free. Let's just see. We had a question that came in. Nope, we've already answered that one. Helen, if you'd like to ask that question, just type it in the Q&A section there. And for anyone who would like to ask a question, just go ahead and type in your question and we will get there. Someone just said, I just bought $200 worth of plants. You get around with applause. Victoria, let me think of that, Victoria. That is fantastic. You know, as we make these little changes, they sound small, right? Buy some flowers, switch out those wine glasses. That is literally changing the neural pathways in your brain.  I always suggest to our members to nurture all of your senses.  Treat yourself to maybe a lotion or an oil. Anything that pleases your senses is going to be so helpful as you just change your environment. Thank you, Victoria. And great work to... I'm not sure who it is because it comes up as Five Day No Alcohol Challenge. So I don't have the name. I think that might be a husband and wife team, but I'm sorry because your name doesn't come up. I can't refer to you by your first name. Sherry, there we go. I'll always know that it's Sherry there. So great work, Sherry. Congratulations, way to take action. I'm giving you a virtual high five. All right, here we go. Sharing the screen, let's talk about how to socialize and have fun alcohol-free. So the latest neuroscience shows us that having fun while being alcohol-free reduces your desire for alcohol on a deep psychological level. And having fun a lot of times comes down to influencing yourself and influencing others. Now, here's a very interesting graph. Influencing people comes down to 7% what you say and 93% how you say it. Let me repeat that. When you're influencing someone, when you're persuading someone, it's only 7% what you say. The rest of it is voice, tone and body language. So when you're out with friends or colleagues or business partners or staff, and they say, hey, would you like a drink? And you say, oh no, no, no, I can't. I shouldn't. I'm doing this five day challenge. I wish I could. I've only got three days to go. Then what you're doing is that you're persuading and influencing people to believe that you are depriving yourself of something fun, that you're depriving yourself of something pleasurable by not drinking. You're also persuading yourself.   I shouldn't drink it. I want to drink. I'm not drinking. What you are doing is you are influencing people to believe that you're a killjoy, that you're not fun, that there's something wrong. They're starting to think in the head, is Victoria an alcoholic? Ooh, should I tread carefully around Victoria? Now let's do a flipper runy on that, shall we? What's the opposite of that? Let's look at George Clooney. Most people I think like George Clooney. Victoria, what do you think about this photo? Victoria's got the hand up. What do you think of this photo of George Clooney here? Like, what can you tell me about this image of George Clooney? What's your impression of him based on this photo? Ooh, well. He looks content. Yes. Happy. Happy. Energetic. Energetic. Confidence. Yes, not ugly. Yes, not ugly. He looks confident, absolutely. He looks in control. Okay. Now, if I was to bring Mr. Clooney over to your home in Denver, Colorado, okay? And I said, Mr. Clooney, meet Victoria. Victoria, meet Mr. Clooney. You said, hello, Mr. Clooney. I love you to meet you. She said, hello, Victoria. And you said to Mr. Clooney, can I get you a drink, Mr. Clooney? I've got wine, I've got vodka, I've got beer. What can I get you? Of course, you're a great host, right? You want to be a great host, you're offering him a drink. And Mr. Clooney in his sly little grin, charming way, smiling way, says, yeah, I'd love a soda water, thanks. Have you got sparkling water? Have you got, yeah, have you got sparkling water? I'll take some water, ice, a piece of lime. I've got some water. What would be your, what do you think your response would be? I would happily serve him whatever he likes. Exactly. Yeah. You're not going to stand there and go, what? Does he have a problem? Why isn't he drinking?  You're not even going to question it. Right, you're not going to sit, you're not going to stand there and go, oh my God, George Clooney is not drinking. Let me just grill him on this. Go on, Mr. Clooney, just have one. Come on, what are you talking about?  The likelihood of you doing that is minuscule, right? And it's because, it's not because of George Clooney, it's because of the way that George Clooney has presented himself to you. He just confidently orders a sparkling water. He confidently requests the sparkling water, soda water, ice, and a piece of lime. He doesn't care what you think about him not drinking. He's not even thinking about it. That's because he's influencing you. 7% of what he's doing is saying, I'd love sparkling water. The other 93% is voice tone and body language. He's confident, he's unshakable, makes sense? So when you are just lighthearted and open and confident about the fact that you are alcohol free, nobody cares. You think they do, but nobody really cares. Everyone's just living their life, right? Most people are just concerned about themselves. So you can actually influence your own behavior and influence the response that you elicit from others by just going, yeah, just take a soda water. Thanks, I'll just have a soda water, ice, and a piece of lime. Some standard responses include, I just love some sparkling water, thank you. Yeah, no, I'm not drinking at the moment. Oh, I'm good with water for now, thank you. You're always being apologetic in that version. You can also be playful about living alcohol free. Someone starts to ask you, why aren't you drinking?  Look out, I'm gonna swing from the rafters.  You see how when we go back to the water tonight, I'm gonna get drunk, I'm gonna get drunk, I'm gonna get drunk, I'm gonna get drunk, you see how when we go back to this graph here where influencing people comes down to 93% voice tone and body language? Imagine if you very playfully just said, yeah, I'm gonna get drunk on this water tonight. Ah, I'm gonna swing from the rafters. I will go toe to toe with you. For every drink you have, I'll drink water.  What do you think, Victoria? Well said, James. I think that a lot of this buzz around alcohol and thinking that we need it to socialize comes from the conditioning that we receive. And as you go through our program, you start to see how inundated our society is with alcohol, it's associated with everything. If you're watching football, you have a beer. If you're at a wedding, you have champagne. If you're out with the girls, maybe it's a shots night. A lot of it is just conditioning. And when you break it down and you look at it again for what it is, and we look at what it does in those first, say 30 minutes, yes, it can help us loosen up, it can help us feel a little more comfortable if we're going into a situation. However, in my experience, and I'm sure James can attest to this, an hour or so into that party when you're drinking your sparkling water and you see what's going on around you as the drinks are flowing, everyone's not having quite as much fun as it looked like at the beginning of the party. You see people start to get a little bit sloppy, a little bit loud, repeating themselves, maybe some little arguments break out between couples or friends. So I do understand that initial thing. It takes some practice and that's what we're here to help you with is going into the situations and getting comfortable with saying those things. Like I'm good with soda water tonight, thanks. But it does get easier. And at the end of the day, you find that you have so much more fun without it. Collectively, again, yes, it can be a little awkward and it takes them practice. But in the long run, you get to go home remembering everything, no regrets, no silly comments, nothing like that. You are in control of yourself instead of alcohol calling the shots. So again, it does take a little bit of getting used to, but boy, is it worth it. And for those introverts out there inside of Project 90, we actually give you scripts where you can just practice them in a mirror before you go out to any engagement.  That's it. We've got a question here from Emma, who asks, how do I convince others I don't have to be an alcoholic to say I'd rather not drink anymore? Well, you convince them by your way of being, Emma, like the George Clooney-esque thing. So if you're being very defensive when someone asks you that, then you're convincing them through a logical argument. But we already know that there's no convincing through a logical argument or at least it's only 7%, which is why we're talking about the importance of just being light and open where you don't actually have to convince anyone.  It's like, all you got to say is like, yeah, I don't drink. I don't drink. Ah, stop drinking. I was drinking a bit too much for a while and I realized it was holding me back in my wealth and my love and relationships. And then I stopped. And I thought, oh, this is actually pretty good. I like this. So I thought, well, I'll just keep doing it. And yeah, I haven't drunk in months now. It's been really interesting. And you see how that's a really easy light explanation as opposed to, oh, my life was falling apart. I think I was an alcoholic. I got arrested in a DUI. I was addicted. I was coming home. I was like, oh, I wish I could have a drink. But I'm like, I'm doing this 90-day program and I'm on day 72 and I hope I can get to nine. See how the energy there is very dark and heavy. It's like you're white knuckling your way through being alcohol-free. So Emma, you really don't have to convince anyone through a logical argument. You just convince them by just, yeah. Yeah, I just prefer not to drink. I drank for a while. It was okay. But I just made a lifestyle choice. I often find that using the words, the phrase lifestyle choice can often, people will accept that.  I had a real problem and I had to stop. And I've been three months sober. And I can tell you this, in our Project 90 experience, we do not use the word sober. Sober is not used because sober to us implies that you naturally have a problem with drinking and that being sober means you're saying no to something because you know, if you do it, then it's gonna really hurt and mess everything up. We use the phrase alcohol-free. And the name of my business is alcohol-free lifestyle, because it's a lifestyle. So it's not like, oh, I'm 27 days sober. People say, no, I'm 27 days alcohol-free. I'm 27 days alcohol-free into this amazing alcohol-free lifestyle. We're not saying no to alcohol. We're saying yes to the alcohol-free lifestyle. I hope that helped Emma. James asked a question. If I have a night out with some of my friends and I tell them I'm not drinking because this will be unusual to them, it's likely they will make it their mission to try to make me drink so everyone can feel comfortable. Great question, thank you. So here's the thing. First of all, I can relate to that. When I first stopped drinking back in 2010, I was in the Lower East Side of Manhattan in New York and I was out with my friend Nick, or sorry, my friend Zach and his brother Nick. And we were out at a bar. I was probably two or three weeks alcohol-free at that stage. And I told them that I was two or three weeks alcohol-free and that I was gonna get to 30 days. At the time, I thought I'll get to 30 days and then I'll return to drinking. Anyway, he said, oh, you're not drinking, right? What do you want? And I said, soda water would be great. He said, okay. So Zach went off to the bar, left me with Nick. We were talking and then Zach came back. We handed the drink to his brother. He handed the soda water to me, what I thought was soda water. And then I went to put it up to my mouth. And as I did, I looked at him and he was watching me intently and he had a little slide grin on his face. And I looked at him and I immediately was suspicious. And I said, did you put vodka in this drink? And he went, yeah, yeah, I did. And I'm gonna swear here, I hope you guys don't mind.  That's a very Aussie slang term for Europe. I hope no one gets offended.  You know, it's like a man who can say that to another man.  And of course I didn't drink it. But in that moment, I realized, wow, it is amazing of how ingrained alcohol is into society that even my good friend would try to trick me into drinking something that I've already declared that I don't wanna drink. So James, I get it. I get that this will happen and that some of your friends will try to make it their mission to get you to drink. So everyone can feel quote unquote comfortable. But here's the thing, people do feel comfortable if you are comfortable being alcohol free.  So I would invite you get comfortable being alcohol free and then no one is gonna try to get you to drink because everyone's just gonna be feeling comfortable because ultimately people just wanna have a good time. They wanna know you're having a good time. They're not gonna have a good time if they feel like you're not having a good time. So all you have to do is just have a good time being alcohol free and all of a sudden your friends will stop making it their mission to try to get you to drink. By the way, James, when I first stopped drinking this was when I was in my mid 30s. I think friends trying to trick you into drinking is shockingly immature, quite frankly. And most of our clients now that we take into project 90 in their 40s, 50s and 60s, so they don't really run into that. And the way that we coach them on how to communicate with other members, with other friends and family is in a way that makes their friends and family comfortable with the fact that you're not drinking. So no one's really trying to trick you. Any thoughts on this, Victoria? Absolutely. If you went out with your friends and you shared with them, this is just, we'll provide some insight into, again, how conditioned we are. If you went out with your friends, and I don't know, let's say you went out to breakfast and everyone was having an omelet with eggs and coffee with milk and you said to them, I think I'm lactose intolerant. It really makes me feel poorly. Gives me a stomach ache, gives me a headache. I'm cutting out dairy. Would anyone sneak cheese into your omelet? Would anyone sneak milk into your coffee? It's bizarre. So when you step outside of how ridiculous this is, you can see it for what it is.  I'd say, it doesn't agree with me. It doesn't agree with me. It's as simple as that. And if a friend had a problem with that, well, I kind of had a problem with the friend. I am doing something that helps me feel better. It doesn't mean that my life was a wreck. It doesn't mean that I was losing my family or my job or anything like that. I feel better without it. And we like to say that if someone has that much of a problem then it's more about them. I use the iceberg analogy a lot. You know how an iceberg is 10% above the water and 90% below. So what you see the way people interact with one another, it's 10% about you, 90% about them. And once you get through, like I said, that first 30 minutes or so where they may be kind of nudging you and pushing you and like James and DERD with his friend slipping vodka into his soda water, they become so interested in what they're doing and what is going on with them that they'll leave it alone. So as James mentioned, it can be a bit awkward in certain situations but that's why we're here. We helped you through that. I was on a call just recently with a member and she was going into a situation and we did a role play. I was the waiter. I was the other guest pushing the alcohol on her and she talked it through with me and sure enough, she went and she ended up having a great time. So that's what I have to say. And oftentimes we also make this bigger in our heads than it turns out to be. Would you agree with that, James? Yeah, let me just share my screen as a good opportunity for me to share your screen about what people actually think about you not drinking. In most cases, let me just do, here we go. The big secret is that nobody really cares that you don't drink. That is the big secret. Nobody really cares unless you make them care unless you give them reason to care by you being apologetic or acting dull or cowering in the corner or making a big deal about the fact that you quit drinking. Okay, nobody really cares. We think we do. We think people do rather. But one of the most surprising things that a lot of our clients share with us after a few weeks after we've had them go out and we give them exercises to go out to bars and restaurants and to situations where there's alcohol and share that they're alcohol free. One of the things that our clients often say to us is like, I was surprised at how much support I got. I was surprised at how people said to me in response, oh yeah, I've been thinking about doing that for a while too. I know I drink too much. Yeah. So I think there's a movement that is happening where people are very supportive of your choice to be alcohol free. And there I say it, jealous or envious of the fact that you have taken that step that you've broken out of societal conditioning and are choosing to be alcohol free. We've got a few questions here. Let me, let's have a look here. We've got, Emma says, thanks. I'm alcohol free 30 days. Congratulations, Emma, great work. 70 in total this year. But I wear it heavy even though I feel so much better. I think I missed something, but not sure what. Thank you, Emma. Thank you so much for sharing. First of all, congratulations on being 30 days alcohol free and 70 this year. I get that you might feel that you're wearing it heavy even though you feel so much better. And the reason why you wear it heavy possibly is for a few reasons, including most of your adult life and certainly in your childhood, you have received stimuli from your parents, from your friends, from marketing, from billboards, from television ads, from movies, from TV series. That drinking is normal.  That drinking equals stress relief. That drinking equals a good time. That drinking equals romance. That drinking equals, et cetera, et cetera. And so when you suddenly try to rewire your brain after a lifetime of being conditioned that alcohol is amazing and this beautiful thing, it's understandable why there'd be a transition period there where you would wear it heavy. So I get it. Stick with it, try some of these energetic shifts that we're suggesting here with people. If you can be consistently alcohol-free, I promise you it will open up a whole new lifestyle for you which includes new hobbies, new interests, new acquaintances, new adventures, new friendship groups, new business, new ways of seeing things, greater health, greater connection, and none of those things are heavy. I promise you, all those things are energetic and amazing and fantastic. So understandable, you're wearing it like that for now. Continue with the process, try some of these things and it's about to get so much better, I promise you. Thank you, Emma. Robert asks, if you're having people over and they drink, do you have alcohol available for them? Great question, Robert. Here's how I look at it. When I lived in West Hollywood, California, I used to have a monthly business mastermind where I invited my entrepreneurial friends over into my living room. We had 12 to 15 folks and we'd get chairs and people sit on the sofa and I would invite them on and I invite them over and I always invested $200 to cater for it. So what I said to people is that this is an alcohol-free event, so bring sparkling waters or soda waters and I'll put on the food. And so I got very healthy chicken and great salads, organic salads and people came over and they brought Perrier and soda water and lime and I made sure I had a couple of bags of ice and then I had my assistant come over and she would like make people drinks, alcohol-free drinks. And so I ahead of time conveyed that it was an alcohol-free mastermind. On other occasions, I used to host a poker night. I had a poker table and my friends would come over and I didn't say it was alcohol-free. I just said bring whatever you wanted. And so on occasion, someone might bring a couple of beers or rum or wine or whatever and that was fine. Sometimes people not knowing that I was alcohol-free would bring over like a gift and say here's a bottle of wine. I'd say, oh, thank you so much. I don't drink, but I'll leave it here for the next guest who does. And so whenever anyone came over and said, can I get you something? Would you like a drink? And if they said, why is it great? I got wine and I'd pour them wine because it's not, it's fine. I wanna be a good host. I appreciate that not everyone chooses to live the alcohol-free lifestyle and that's okay. I'm not frowning upon people because they drink. Quite the contrary, everyone can live their own life. So Robert, for me, when I invite people over, I'll do one or two things. One, I'll say alcohol-free party, come on over. Or two, I won't even mention it. Just say bring your own drinks and I'll have alcoholic drinks naturally in the house anyway because people gifted that to me all the time and I'll offer them that. Okay, I hope that helps. Let's move on, we've got someone says, it's like when you quit smoking and you say, no thanks, I don't smoke. They don't beg you to have a smoke with them. Yeah, but alcohol, it's like the only drug on earth where you have to justify not consuming it.  Yet it causes more deaths, more health concerns, more marriage breakups, more relationship issues than any other drug on the planet. People have been saying for years there's this opioid problem in America. And of course there is, all right? There is an opioid problem. But the amount of media coverage the opioid problem gets in America compared with the alcohol problem is disgraceful in my view because the number of people who die, the number of people who have health issues their entire life, someone's trying to call me here. Excuse me, I'm very popular obviously. The more people have health concerns and relationship issues and a lack of productivity and a lack of confidence and a lack of self-esteem than any other drug. And yet if you read the media or digested the media, you would know that it's all the opioid problem. It's all these other issues. What are your feelings on this, Victoria? Absolutely. I could go on for days about this. Alcohol is, number one, it's a class one carcinogen. It is tied to multiple cancers. It's, you know, this is just another example of how we are marketed to from a very young age where modeled this by other people, people that we grow up around. And there, yes, this is definitely a growing trend as awareness grows about this epidemic of alcohol abuse in our country. I think, and that's part of why I do what I do, we are trailblazers. We are the people who are changing the narrative around this just like nicotine, cigarettes. You could smoke anywhere. You could smoke in an airplane. You could smoke in a lounge. You could smoke in a hospital. I think that eventually as awareness grows, this is, we are going to be the ones who got on this train early on. And things are going to change. It's going to become a lot more normalized to not drink just like it's normalized to do anything else that is good for your health. The reason alcohol is so normalized is because of the money behind it, because of the marketing. Think about when you go into a restaurant. I remember when I stopped drinking, I had to double check my restaurant check to make sure they had actually charged me for everything because I wasn't drinking. I was saving so much money. So waiters are pushing alcohol, restaurants are pushing alcohol. Think about your shelves in a grocery store, how much of it is dedicated to alcohol? So again, this is just a growing trend. We're on the right track. Yeah. Thank you, Victoria. We have another question here. Was watching TV last night and in two hours, I saw more than eight ads for beer and wine. What do you think, Victoria? You know, it's interesting. I have four children, three are in their 20s. And I have my youngest is 13. And of course, she knows about my journey and what I do for a living now. And her eyes are opened and we watch our shows together. And she is aware of every time in a show, every time someone's having a tough day.  If they're celebrating, they need a drink. If they're at any sort of event, they need a drink. She is aware of it. And I know that she will grow up being aware of that and saying, wow, this is being normalized, but look what happens to people. So again, it goes, yes. And that's why it is so normalized in our society because of the money behind it. It's just like if you're familiar with Pavlov, the scientist and Pavlov's dog, I think we all learned it in school. The scientists studied that when the bell would ring and the dogs would get a treat, as time went on, the bell would ring, even if the dogs didn't get a treat, they would react, they would begin to salivate. We're conditioned the same way with alcohol. Now, we are smarter than dogs. We have the ability to see this, make the connection and make a different choice. Because again, when you look at alcohol for what it is, we like to call it attractively packaged poison. And it's not because we're being evangelical about it. Like James said, I don't care if people drink, that's their personal choice. I don't care if people smoke a cigarette, that's their personal choice. But when you see it for what it is, a toxin, a carcinogen, an inflammatory substance and addictive substance, you can as humans, smarter than Pavlov's dog, we can make informed choices. And that's what we're here to do, simply present the information and you can make an informed choice rather than being conditioned by society, by marketers who are profiting from it and choose how you wanna live your life. Thank you, Victoria. Yeah, I wanna show you a couple of people that have been clients and gone through our process here in particular. I wanna show you, this is John Keltner and he doesn't mind me using his name. He's now more than two years alcohol free. And John used to go to his local pub in Northern California and he would drink vodka cranberry and he would do that four nights a week. And the local pub or bar was down the road, a walking distance from where he lived. And so he became very friendly and everyone knew him, kind of like that TV show from the 80s Cheers where everybody knows your name. And he went through Project 90, got our coaching, went through the process and then he continued to go to the bar in the pub, to his local bar and pub, but just ordered soda, water and cranberry juice to the point where the waiter started calling him the Soda Cran Man. And now everybody in his local community calls him the Soda Cran Man and he loves it and they love it. And so when he goes to the bar, he still gets to socialize with his friends, and they call him the Soda Cran Man.  Let me just play a little video here. See if I can- I am one year alcohol-free, 365 days. How do you get this? Well, you know what? I had it on speedy. Slightly smaller glasses because of all of the loss of puffiness in my cheeks. There we go. I lost some weight. I am one year alcohol-free, 365 days. Had to get slightly smaller glasses because of all of the loss of puffiness in my cheeks. I lost some weight. I'm wavering around the 20 pound mark and everybody compliments me on that. Although you look like you've lost weight and some of you kid me about being skinny, I would basically look forward to the end of the day when I would head over to my local pub. As far as what was I drinking? Coors light, whiskey, didn't sleep well. Wasn't very clear headed. Did not look forward to getting up in the morning and getting going. I was really feeling like I was not taking advantage of my abilities and that alcohol was really holding me back. I felt so alone. I was by myself in this predicament. I found you and reached out to you and I'm glad that you convinced me that day a year ago that it's time to make a change. It was nice to meet the group that you had assembled that were people like me, entrepreneurs, professionals and so on that felt the same way that they were somehow limiting themselves by their use of alcohol. And so it was nice to not be alone. Fear is totally understandable based on our kind of our cultural conditioning and I had all those fears going into it because it was part of my identity, right? Amongst my family and friends. At first they were of course, I'll come on, you know, just have one and they would try to encourage me and call me some colorful names, just having fun with it and so on. But, you know, I was able to kind of stick through that and that all worked out fine. After a week or two of doing this, now one of my bartender friends started calling me the soda crab man. At this point I'm getting up at around 4.30 every morning and fitting in some stretching and some movement and some meditation. And three times a week I fit in some basketball and improve my relationships, especially with my children and my 15 year old son who lives here with me and that has worked out great. All of those things have improved. I've been kind of taking notes to myself on the things that I've been doing this last year and changes and progress and so on. And it's just amazing how quickly a year can go and how good you are at that feeling and how excited I am now going to a new decade in 2020 with my full capability and what people are going to reach out and try to get some help, try to get some coaching like Project Lane. You know, commit to some coaching and a group and a community of like-minded people and then you just take it day by day and you'll find that it'll just compound on itself in terms of how good you feel still today when I see people and they'll, hey John, you're still not drinking? No, not drinking. Oh man, that is great. That's fantastic. I'm going to continue to have no intention of ever drinking again. So looking forward just to continue to success in life. So yeah, I thought that was relevant to Cher given that he referenced the social conditioning, he referenced the bartender calling him the soda crayon man, people complimenting him saying, oh, that's great, encouraging him. Not saying, come on, what are you doing? You should drink greater connection with his 15 year old son. And by the way, we recorded that more than a year ago now. So you probably heard him saying, oh yeah, I'm one year alcohol-free today. He's actually two and a half years alcohol-free today.  It's actually kind of disgusting the way that when he posts on Facebook how much he loves his romantic partner. It's kind of like, oh man, this is gushy stuff. So being alcohol-free led him to his love, to his great love, which is amazing. We've got a few comments here. Let's have a look here. We've got, Mike says, you just said it, stress relief. I work a ton of hours and alcohol is a quick stress relief, gets me to sleep quick. So Mike, thank you for your comment. It is true that alcohol will help you to fall asleep. However, the quality of your sleep will be severely compromised. A quick stress relief. It is a temporary and illusionary relief of stress. Let me say that again. Drinking to relieve stress is temporary and illusionary. When you say it gets you to sleep quick, it may. It may indeed get you to sleep quick. However, the toxins in that alcohol, your body is now working as you sleep to break down the toxins. Your liver is now working to process the toxins, which is why when you wake up, even after seven or eight hours sleep, after a drink or two, you still feel tired and lethargic because your body hasn't been in that deep restorative phase of sleep during the night. So anyone here is watching or listening. If you have a glass of wine at the end of the night to relax and help you to fall asleep, all you're doing is just creating an environment for lethargy and regret the following day.  So yes, it will help you get to sleep. And yes, it will destroy your sleep at the same time. Coach Victoria is nodding her head in approval. We've got here, Sherry says the alcohol aisle is as big as the cereal section in grocery stores. Crazy. And also cereal is not great for you as well. So when you go into the grocery store have a look at what they're selling, what our society is producing, a whole lot of mediocrity.  Sherry says, please turn down the music in the background. Sorry, Sherry, it's already happened. I'm hoping it wasn't too disruptive for you. Victoria wasn't disruptive. I don't know. Was it okay? The music was a bit loud, but I could hear him. Okay, sorry about that, Sherry. Thank you for your feedback. I will take that on board for next time. Let's see, we've got another question here. Mary asks, this is just something I noticed in the past. So I just say I don't drink. I think most people are afraid to ask why. Would you ask someone why you don't smoke? That sounds crazy. Yeah, it is crazy. It's all crazy.  We live in this society where it's just normalized this drinking of attractively packaged poison.    Hey, can I cost you business hundreds of thousands of dollars this year because you're operating at a five out of 10 instead of a nine out of 10? Hey, would you like to look less attractive?  Hi, welcome, sir, welcome, man. May I get you a glass of attractively packaged poison? Would you like regrets, shame, 20 extra pounds, $100,000 left on the table in your business? Hey, would you like a failed relationship? Hey, would you like to not attract your dream partner?  Hey, can I get you a glass of mediocrity? That's what they're inviting you to consume and they're doing it with a big smile on your face. We talked about this yesterday at the Smiling Assassins. Mary, thank you so much for your question. Thank you so much to everyone who asked the question today. Coach Victoria, thank you so much for being on the call today. We might have you come back here on another date. It was great to have you here and have your expertise. Absolutely, James. Thanks, and I could talk about this for hours. Well, we do, right, James? That's what we do. I wanna thank everyone who joined. I hope you will continue to join us for the following few days and just learn more. And like I said, we are here to help you make your own informed decisions. So thank you all for being here. Yes, if you'd like to get a replay of this, it will be uploaded to our Facebook group within the hour. So you can always go into the group. I've just added that in the comments section there, five-day alcohol-free challenge Facebook group. So you can click on there. The replay will be there. Tomorrow, that being Thursday, we're gonna have Jim Miller joining us. Jim Miller is one of our coaches, one of our enrollment coaches who used to work with Tony Robbins, the great motivational speaker, was the head of transformation at Tony Robbins for many years. He's worked with Tihar Ekker and is just an all-round amazing guy. He had an alcoholic father. He's been alcohol-free. Also a cancer survivor, Victoria. Not sure if you knew that. And just a wonderful man. And he's gonna be joining us tomorrow to talk a little bit about leadership.  It's not just what you spend on alcohol, but it's what you don't generate because of your alcohol habits. So please do tune in tomorrow at 11 a.m. Pacific 2 p.m. Eastern. And I also encourage you go into the Facebook group and just write down or type what felt valuable about today's call. Just go into the Facebook group and say, wow, it was amazing to learn this because that way you get to inspire other people. The fastest way to learn anything is to teach it. So if you can go into the Facebook group and teach what you just learned, you will not only teach other people, but you'll also embed the training into your own brain which will increase your chances of living an alcohol-free lifestyle ongoing. Pete says, thank you both, I love this meeting. So encouraging and informative looking forward to tomorrow. You say that Pete, but when you find out tomorrow how much your drinking habits are really costing you, maybe you should be looking forward to it.  But be ready, some people won't like it. A smaller waistline and a bigger wallet. I like it. Thank you so much Victoria. Thanks guys, thanks everyone. And we'll see you on day three of the challenge. Everyone have a great day. Thanks for listening to the Alcohol-Free Lifestyle Podcast. I wanna load you up with some free stuff right now. So if you wanna go to jameswanick.com slash guide I will send you my quit alcohol guide which has helped six figure entrepreneurs and top professionals reduce or quit drinking. You can also text the word quit guide to the number 44222 if you're in the US of course. It doesn't really work anywhere outside of the US but if you're in the US on your mobile phone and you'd like that guide text the word quit guide to the number 44222 or you can go to jameswanick.com slash guide. If you'd like to schedule a free 15 minute call with one of my top coaches just an exploratory call to see if or how we can help you then you can go to jameswanick.com slash schedule or you can text the word project 90 to the number 44222 if you're listening in the US on a mobile phone. That's jameswanick.com slash schedule or you can text the word project 90. That's one word project 90 to the number 44222. Feel free to send me a direct message over on my Instagram account which is at jameswanick. You can also watch video episodes of this podcast and a series of other educational videos on my YouTube channel which is jameswanick.com or you can direct message me on Facebook at jameswanick.com official. And finally a request, would you please now write a short review of the podcast inside of the Apple podcast app on your phone or on iTunes on your desktop computer? Would you please give the show five stars and write a quick one or two sentence review? This will help the show get in front of even more listeners potentially transforming someone's life. You can rate and review the show inside of your Apple podcast app on your phone or over on iTunes on your desktop. Thank you so much and I'll catch you next time.


So let me give you an example. In COVID, during the pandemic recession, we were all very mindful of the need to access food. And if you think about who produces food, who processes food, who distributes food, who prepares food, a large share of people in the food value chain are informally employed. So when we think of food and the food value chain, we have a variety of work arrangements. We have gig workers who are distributing food on bicycles or motorcycles. But we have large conglomerates who are processing food. We have small farm producers. We have big commercial farms. And the conglomerates often hire workers informally. And the big farmers, the big commercial farms often contract farmers informally. So there's informality up and down the food chain. So the top brands are rife with informal employment down their own value chains. A lot of work is outsourced from large brand firms down value chains to people in factories who are hired informally and also a large share of people who work from their own homes for export industries doing ancillary work or even the primary work of production.


What's up everybody Jason for Jasper's case race calm twenty twenty to a Maggillie baseball eight box picker team number eight RMB just sold out This is for the Mariners Braves Cardinals Royals and Tigers and again you get a piece of these teams Random number block style you get a number associated with your name We go by the first number the left side of certain number dash and again guys any and all redemptions for any of these teams We'll be going to spot zero Is it ice roller? Here's a customer name and numbers Roll it got us also six and a three nine times one two three four five six seven eight nine six three nine Jason down to m Michael. All right, so zero one two three four five six seven eight nine nine times one two Three four five six seven eight nine Seven down to eight Jason was seven Michael with two Steve with birch with zero Rex you have any or sorry Steve rich with nine Rex You have any in our redemptions Steve rich with five Jason with four Michael with one Steve rich with six Roy with three and Michael with eight All right guys, so let me do one more round of number block And then the break will be coming up after appreciate it guys. Good luck


This is stock number 11106. We are here at Summit Automotive in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, you're new and used light duty truck. Headquarters, today we are checking out this super clean 2012 Toyota Tundra double cab short box. This truck has the 4.6 liter V8 motor which pumps out 310 horsepower. This truck has been fully safe and inspected by our service shop, has a fresh oil and filter change, all the fluids have been checked and topped off. The vehicle has been gone through mechanically 100% and is 100% ready to go. Barcelona red is the color, we shoot all of our videos in 1080p, 60 frames per second, so if you have HD capabilities on your computer, tablet or smartphone device, turn them on right now because it is definitely your best way to check out the quality and condition of the vehicle before seeing it in person. If you would like to check out all of the photos on this truck in the upper right hand part of your screen is a link to our website, click that and check us out there. Comes with the steel rims, hand cook Dyna Pro, P25570R18 tires and these tires have I'd say probably 60 to 70% of the tread left, maybe even a little bit more. Front fenders in really nice shape, headlight lenses are nice and clear. Comes with factory fog lights, front bumpers in great condition as well, didn't see any dents or dings on that. The grille is in really nice condition too and the hood is in great shape as well. Passenger side front fender, no major dents or dings on that and the passenger side rim no major scuffs or scrapes. As you go down this side of the truck, take note of how clean the body is, how reflective and mirror like that paint is, especially for a 2012. We take these HD videos so if you are far away or even if you're close by just can't make the trip down but you're still interested in purchasing the vehicle, you can see the truck here, the truck and have confidence in the vehicle that you're looking at before you even get here. So you can make a smart decision to make the trip or even take part in the Summit Auto Fast Pass option in the upper right hand part of your screen, a link to our website where you can apply for financing, get pre-approved, see a payment quote, even a praise to trade, all from the comfort of your own home. So when you get here all you got to do is drive the truck, love it, you'll be all set to go. It has some really nice western painted step bars that go all the way to the bed. Frame and underbody is in really nice shape as well. It's like that all the way underneath, looks like it has all the original exhaust, lower rockers all look really good. And back here looks good as well. And the back tires have just as much tread as the front tires. This back rim, same condition as the rest. And as we come around to the back of the vehicle, rear bumper is in really nice shape. Didn't see any dents, didn't see any dings on there. Tailgate is in nice condition too, comes with a truck seat-o, soft roll-up tonneau cover, locking tailgate, has a shock down assist, the bed is in really nice shape, a little bit of light duty usage but nothing terrible. Tailgate shuts nice and solidly. And as you go down the driver's side just as clean as that passenger's side, no dents or dings over here. And for full disclosure this back rim, excellent shape as well. These are just decals if you didn't like all the stripes on the side, they could be removed. Get heated power mirrors, inside you get the gray cloth interior, no rips, no tears on those seats, they're in really nice shape, has a set of weather tech floor mats in it. Power mirrors, roll stability control assist, power windows, power locks, and as we hop inside the truck here you can see that this one only has 47,804 miles, instrument cluster is nice and clean, you do get cruise controls there, and the steering wheel is in nice shape as well. You get the CD player, now I don't know if this has a satellite or not, I think it just has AMFM and a CD player.  Two big cup holders, there's storage underneath there, weather tech floor mat on that side and the passenger seat is in excellent shape as well. I don't think this truck's ever been smoked in, smells very clean inside, the headliner is in excellent shape as well. Map lights, and up here you do get an outside temperature display and the clock. We'll take a quick look at the back seats and then we'll check out under the hood. Back seats are in excellent shape too, no rips or tears, no stains, very nice and clean, you do get a sliding rear window, latch child safety system for any child car seats you may want to put back here, these seats do go up, there is a closing storage bin back here, carpeting is very nice and clean back here as well, and these seats do fold down like so. Child safety locks in the back doors, the bottom of the doors all look really good, and we'll take a quick look under the hood. I would personally like to thank you for checking out the video today, and hopefully from this HD video, you'll be able to tell just how clean this truck is all the way around. Inside and out, under the hood we view of the 4.6 liter V8 motor, engine bay is very clean, runs very smooth. This truck has been fully safety and inspected by our service shop, has a fresh oil and filter change, all the fluids have been checked and topped off, see the shocks are doing a nice job holding that hood up, and this truck is 100% ready to go. See more pictures of this truck or one of our other 450 new and used cars, trucks, SUVs, minivans, wranglers, halftones, recorder tons, one tons, you name it, we got it, go to our website www.SummitAuto.com, full pictures and descriptions of every single vehicle from two locations, all at SummitAuto.com, and if you'd like to check out more HD videos you can go to YouTube.com slash SummitAuto, remember to like, subscribe and share on this video and all the videos that you see there, in fact in a second you'll see a link to subscribe to our YouTube channel on your left, a link to more Toyota Tundra videos like this one on your right, if you haven't been to our website on the bottom link to this vehicle on our website, click those, check us out, and we really look forward to helping you with this super clean 2012 Toyota Tundra Double Cab and Barcelona Red Metall, thanks again.


Russian Major General Vladimir Veselyevich Zavadsky, commander of the Taman Division and deputy of the 14th Army Corps has been killed, reportedly blown up by a mine, Russian military information channels report that Russian Major General Vladimir Zavadsky died on November 28, in the zone of Putin's operation in Ukraine. According to preliminary data, the death of a high-ranking Russian war criminal occurred as a result of a car being blown up by a mine. At the time of his death, Zavadsky held the position of deputy commander of the 14th Army Corps of the Russian Armed Forces. The media report that Major General Zavadsky was blown up by his own mine in the rear in the Kursan direction, Ukrainian Armed Forces Colonel Anatoly Shtifan released information about the liquidation of Russian Major General Vladimir Zavadsky. From August 2018 to June 2021, he was the commander of the Kanta-Morovskyi Guards Tank Division, which is stationed in the Moscow region. According to Osin analysts at Inform Napalma Zavadsky was previously the commander of the Taman Division. He was allegedly wounded in the Iziam area of the Kharkov region and managed to evacuate wounded.it is noteworthy that the portrait of young Zavadsky was used to advertise military service under a contract.it is worth noting that all social networks information of the Zavadsky family have been deleted. In particular, the pages of Sons on VKontact and Parents on Odnoplasniki.


year at 5% growth within 40 to 50 years is making well over 100,000 euro a year, well over 100,000 in real terms. That's a pretty good, that's a pretty good living wage. Imagine the whole population is making more than 100,000 dollars a year, right? And we don't have to worry about anything. Nobody's really poor in that kind of society. That's what capitalism produces. We're this close to getting there. And you want to put the break on it. I mean, you're already putting the break on it because we're already only growing 1, 2%. You want us to grow at negative percentage points in the name of climate change. I say let's go at 5% and we'll be so rich when it gets warmer. We'll have vastly better technologies to deal with it.  We'll do all kinds of things that we can't even imagine today. But if we stay poor, yeah, we'll have a problem. The solution to most of these problems is to get rich. And for that, you need more capitalism, not us. Thank you.


I welcome everyone to the 10th meeting of the Standards, Procedure and Public Appointments Committee in 2023. The committee has received apologies from Edward Mountain MSP. Our first agenda item is the decision on taking business in private. Other committee in agreement whether to take consideration of the revisions to the guidance on the code of conduct for MSPs and consideration of its approach to petition PE1949, review the rules concerning dual mandate MSPs, should be taken in private at a future meeting. Is the committee in agreement? I'm grateful. Agender item 2 is to consider the draft annual report for the parliamentary year from 13 May 2022 through to 12 May 2023 and the report will in due course be published. Do any members have any comments they'd like to make on the report? Emma, can I come to you? Thank you, convener. I'm a relatively new member to this committee, but I would like to say that it's really nice to read a short report. I'm glad you found it useful. Is this an opposite of the work that the committee have done prior to joining us? Of course, your joining is most welcome, but it is an interesting snapshot of the work that the committee have covered in the past year. In particular, the report on the future parliamentary procedures and practices, which was very much the start genesis that this committee took for this session, and I think it's worth pointing out that the report contains, as indeed much of our discussion about the iterative nature of change, that we should never consider this Parliament to be fixed. It's always on a journey to improvement. Some of it might be down the odd cul-de-sac, but I don't think that there's harm in learning from mistakes, whereas I do think that there is harm in trying to fix everything in ASPIC and say that we're successful on it. Thank you for that, Emma. Are there any other comments from the members? Briefly, convener, first of all, I thank the clerking team for producing the report and support it for meetings over the past year. To commend Emma's observation at the brevity of the report, the brevity of the report means that it talks in broad brushstrokes, but it doesn't necessarily give the full details of what it's been looked at. I know we'll come to these matters at some point later in the year in relation to our work programme. One of the aspects of the iterative nature of parliamentary reform that you've alluded to in the past is the fact about making this place more family friendly. I'm just minded to put on the record again that there are still no particular childcare facilities or creches that are appropriate for members of this place to not have to work remotely or be elsewhere to be here, not just members but staff who are just as important in supporting this Parliament and maybe that's a bit of joint work that we can do in the future. I merely mentioned that because it wouldn't, of course, be in our annual report because it should be brief and concise, but in a meeting we can expand a little bit more, so I wanted to put that on the record and hope to return to that. That's very helpful. Of course, the question of the crash and care facilities within this Parliament has been raised by a number of members in a number of different venues. I know those and I will mention the SPCB. We'll hear this and can be confident, Bob, that we will return to it hopefully in a positive way and with suggestions for improvements and, indeed, for facilitation of care. Are there any comics? I agree that it's good to have a report that is summarising where we are and not going into too much, but it's a very important report because it clarifies many of the areas that we've considered and the ones that we are continuing to consider. It's always good to revise and review and that's exactly what we're trying to do. The number of opportunities that we've had to look at the code and look at what might be improved and what might be considered is still very much where we are. We haven't got it right in all aspects, we know that, but we're prepared and we're willing to see and test the water and find where we should go. I think that that comes very much full of this report because we've brought in proxy, we've brought in the ideas and the situations and these are all to the benefit of the Parliament but also to the benefit of the members and this committee is here to support, protect but also to scrutinise the members and I think that's exactly what it does and the support gives us that information. Thank you. That's very helpful and, indeed, just before I formally invite the committee to agree to the publication of the report, can I echo Bob Doris's comments about the support that we have from both the clerking team, those at Spice and also those people outwith who supported us in evidence sessions bringing their knowledge to it's been incredibly helpful so on the formal record can I thank them all for that and with that are the committee happy for the report to be published. I'm very grateful. I will now move this meeting into private.


Welcome to Toffee TV, it is the Everton News Daily. Everton have been linked with a move for Wolves Winger Adama Triory. It reports that they say that he is available for around £10 million, that's what Wolves are looking for. Who knows, who knows whether Everton will actually go in for him. He was on, spent the second half of the season on Lona Barcelona, I think he played 11 times for them, didn't score a goal. He was obviously a player who is very quick, very strong and for a few years there's been someone who you looked at and thought he's got real potential, will he kick on. But it's not really happened, he's 26 now and Wolves I think just ready to let him go because like I said he hasn't kicked on so Everton link with him whether they move for him is another thing. Obviously Kevin Thelwell knows him for the time he spent at Wolves as well. Everton still maintain a strong interest in Wolves midfield at Morgan Gibbs White, that one looks more likely just right now but Adama Triory also linked. Everton today have been linked with a move for Lille midfield at Amadou on Narnet. Obviously the links have been around over the last week or so but according to reports in France today they actually claim that Everton are leading the race now, have moved ahead of West Ham United in the race to sign the 6 for 5 in central midfield player. Lille have thought to want around 35 million euros for him. Obviously that's a lot of money, it would be paid over the amortisation of his contract and stuff like that which is why maybe Everton could go in for him. It would be a fantastic addition, 20 years of age is exactly what Everton probably need in that central midfield area but West Ham fully in the race forum as well. But that's the kind of midfield player that Everton should be looking at really and hopefully we can do a deal with him, he is very highly rated and might be one of those who you're looking to improve and then sell on for a higher price which is where Everton are right now and that's the kind of thing what we have to do. Another midfield player Everton have been linked with today is young Chelsea midfielder Tino Angiore, he is apparently interested in Everton, he's 20 years old at some time on loan in Russia and at Huddersfield. Apparently he's very happy to come and join Everton, we want to take him on a permanent deal, Chelsea only want him to go out on loan, they're not ready to lose him just yet but that's one that could happen as well so at least you know the links coming into that central midfield area where Everton are looking to strengthen. And Frank Lampard has been talking about Anthony Gordon on Everton's US tour, he's done an interview with Everton TV, it's quite good give her a watch but in that he was asked about Anthony Gordon getting the number 10 shades and said you have to work hard to get the number 10 shades and Anthony has earned it, he gives everything and is going nowhere, he's our player and we want to build with him. Obviously Gordon was rumoured to be the subject of an inquiry from Tottenham and a reported £35m bid from Newcastle a couple of weeks ago but Everton very clear that they want him to stay, he's not for sale Frank Lampard reiterating that, talking about the number 10 shades which is Gordon's new squad number for the season. That is it for the news daily, give the video a thumbs up, subscribe if you haven't and if you want more videos including daily live videos become a premier member, the link is in the description and the QR code is on the screen now, see you later.


Yes. But aren't open-source systems and movements leaderless?  Say that again. Isn't it leaderless? We live in this new era, yeah. Open-source systems. Aren't they leaderless? Isn't that the point? It's, that's a great, great, great question, which is that open-source by its very nature is leaderless. The Linux system, as opposed to a Windows system or an Oracle system, is open-source and there is no leader. Hobbyists anywhere in the world can create updates, right? And nobody and everybody maintains the Linux system. The Arab Spring, there was no clear leader. Open-source movement, right? Cryptocurrency, we don't even know who created it. Is that guy, that Japanese name, one person open? People we don't know. Right. Hang on. So, sorry. You're right. We don't know who started Blockchain or Bitcoin. So, where then does autocracy in terms of leadership, as it relates to that, come into it? Or is it only for those who use it thereafter? So, that's what I was coming to. So, it sounds like whether it's Linux system, whether it's movements like the Arab Spring, whether it's cryptocurrency, these open-source phenomena are leaderless, right? And then, her question is why are you talking about not just leadership, the need for leadership, but that too autocratic, strong leadership, right? It's a very legitimate question. When I, as I think about this, initially it sounds like they are two totally opposites. But as you think deeply, you realize that open-source systems, open-source movements fizzle out. They absolutely don't last. The only time Linux, right, has been around since the 1990s, correct? What's the market share of Linux? Four percent, right? And even to get from zero to four percent, it happened when a company called Red Hat said, we will be taking care of all things Linux. Pay us a fee. Don't buy the free system. Don't take the free system. Pay us a fee and we'll bring you all the updates. We'll bring you all the support. When they fill the leadership vacuum, that's when it got some traction. Arab Spring, what happened five years later? You have even worse dictatorships in certain countries. It fizzled out, right? And why after 10 years have cryptocurrencies not taken off? Because of lack of trust. Because of lack of leadership, maybe? So in the open-source era, actually, you need more stronger leadership than in... But it just depends on who defines that leadership, who defines who becomes the leader. Sure, sure. It's the people who decide who becomes the leader. Well, you have to earn the right, remember?


So, do you need a mentor? Should you read books? A lot of different opposing views out there, it's hard to know what to believe. I'll just give you this advice someone once told me. People lie but numbers don't. When you're confused just look at the numbers. So don't listen to what I say, don't listen to other people's opinions. Do the research for yourself, it's very easy. Just look at the Forbes list. Most successful entrepreneurs. Did they have mentors? Did they read? I'm gonna read you a list. I kept a little list that I found very interesting. I once did the research and it blew me away. It was like, oh my gosh, almost everybody that I looked up to had one. I'll just give you a quick example, I'll just read randomly. Bill Gates had Ed Roberts, Oprah Winfrey had Mary, Duncan Steve Jobs had Robert Friedland, Buffett had Benjamin Graham, Michael Jordan had Phil Jackson, Sam Lawton had L.S. Robson, Zuckerberg had, of course, talking about this earlier, Steve Jobs. And I can go on and on. Here's a list of people and their mentors. Now, if you change one word, this becomes the most obvious point. I don't even know why I have to record this video. Change the word mentor for coach. You know, I sat next to Kobe Bryant at the end of last year for a few games and I went back in the locker room. He let me come back with them and I asked him, I recorded a video and I said, did you have mentors? And he instantly was like, Ty, mentors are the most important thing. And he had a wide variety of mentors. He mentioned Michael Jackson had given him advice. He had one of the CEOs of Disney. All these different people giving him advice. Mark Zuckerberg. When it comes to reading, not only do you have Steve Jobs as a mentor, but he said this. He put a post last year. He started a book club. He said, I'm not reading enough. Now, like I said, I don't know about you, but I'm not as good a mentor, a good of entrepreneurs. Mark Zuckerberg, if Mark Zuckerberg needs books and mentors, I need 10 times more than him. He's smarter than me. He's more successful than me. Albert Einstein, one of the smartest people in history, had a mentor. Every Thursday, he had lunch starting as a teenager with the family of that mentor and talked, learned math and physics and all types of things. Stephen Hawking had a mentor. I don't know about you. I'm not smarter than Albert Einstein or Stephen Hawking. If they need one, I need him even more so. Throughout history, it all stays the same. Alexander the Great, one of the great conquerors. He had a mentor.  Teach him. And so he did. The great Aristotle, interesting though, Aristotle was mentored by Plato. Plato was mentored by Socrates. You see that paying it forward? You see that Steve Jobs was mentored and in turn, he mentored others. Y Combinator is a group up in the Silicon Valley area and what they do is they find young promising entrepreneurs and they bring them in, they give them a little capital, they put them in a building and they give them advice. Give them mentorship. Point them in direction. Motivate them. You see, mentors don't just give you advice. They also motivate you. What companies came from that Y Combinator mentorship incubator idea? Dropbox, Airbnb, Reddit, what's that? Deep, multi-billion dollar companies coming from this idea. Remember, there's only two ways you learn. From somebody or from what somebody wrote down or recorded. That's it. You don't learn English on your own. You don't learn math just by laying in a bed and go, I'll learn this all on my own. Now, some people say, what, Ty, what if you only have books and mentors but you don't put in the work? Well, of course you've got to put in the work.  If you just work hard and forget to work smart, you're not going to accomplish much either. Who works harder? Day laborers or Steve Jobs or Elon Musk? Now, we need day laborers. I'm not looking down on them, but I'm saying this. If you talk about who accomplishes more, it's not just the people who work hard. It's the people who work smart. If you get out of an airplane, you're at the airport and you're in a city you've never been in, use GPS. That navigation will shorten the time. Sure, you could just work hard and drive around and try to find it on your own, but why not use a GPS? Why not do it the short way? Science is based upon a body of knowledge passed on from scientist to scientist, mentors. Tesla, the great Nicholas Tesla, had mentors on and on. It goes, the cycle goes, become part of that cycle. Bill Gates goes on a read emication. Do you know what Arnold Schwarzenegger told me? And Elon Musk, I'm going to tell you two stories that I've heard.  That's why I go and find these people. It's not to be able to name drop and say, oh, I'm with celebrities. It's to get the truth from them. The media often lies. People lie. But I ask Kobe Bryant, did you have a mentor? Yes, he gave me five names. I talked to Arnold Schwarzenegger. I was in his kitchen last summer. Just me and him, I said, Arnold, what's the turning point in your career as a bodybuilder? And he said, well, I couldn't get my calves big. I had the rest of my body big, but I couldn't get my calves big. And I heard about this guy who had big calves down in South Africa. His name is Reg Park. I got on an airplane and I flew down to him and I said, what am I doing wrong? And he said, let me see you work out. They went to the gym together and Reg Park went on the calf machine and put on 900 pounds. And Arnold Schwarzenegger, the light bulb went off. He said, I'm doing too many reps. I'm only lifting like 400 pounds. Reg Park said, put those heavy weight on. Change up your game. Just like Bruce Lee was mentored by it man. Arnold Schwarzenegger was mentored by Reg Park. And Arnold told me my calves got so big, the media started saying I had calf implants, but I didn't. My success was magnified. It became so big, people didn't even believe it because he had that mentor, Reg Park. Over and over, the cycle continues. Do you want to be in the cycle or out of the cycle? People lie. Opinions lie, but numbers don't. Look at the numbers for yourself. Go through the Forbes list.  Jeff Bezos started Amazon. Started a book company, ironically enough. But he reads books so much he has one book. It's the story of Sam Walton, who's a virtual mentor through a book to him that the pages are tattered. Jeff Bezos, now the third richest man in the world. I'm not as good an entrepreneur. If he needs books, if he needs mentors, I need more so. Conor McGregor, one of the great fighters of all time. He's had the same mentor slash coach, his whole career. I don't know about you, but I'm not as good an athlete as Conor McGregor. If he needs a mentor, I need one too. That's what I said. If you change the conversation from mentors to coaches, then you become kind of silly when you go, oh, you don't need a coach. Name a great athlete who didn't have a coach. Michael Jordan and I read a fascinating book about him. And he said, the two biggest influences are important. Why he has six rings, of course, him being a great athlete and putting in the work was important. He knew how to work hard, but he worked smart because he had Dean Smith at UNC and Phil Jackson at Chicago, guiding him, making him work smarter, making him work more efficiently. You need motivation too from mentors. Sometimes you want to give up. Sometimes you want to procrastinate. I don't know about you, but sometimes I feel like procrastinating. And then I remember the story that I read in an autobiography or the person that I met. You know what Elon Musk told me? I said, Elon, how did you start? SpaceX, you didn't have any experience with spaceships. You had PayPal before. He said, oh, I just read a lot of books. Just read books. Now that's a virtual mentor. It's not a person, but it's the same effect. An author of the book was the mentor. I shouldn't have to record this video, but it's important that I clear the air. There's a lot of nonsense being said out there. And you know, this is not a direct attack on any one person because I've heard many people say this and you might have heard it growing up. Oh, you just become book smart. Just do stuff, just work hard. Well, a lot of people work hard and aren't successful. A lot of people work hard and aren't successful. A lot of people work hard and never make more than 50 grand in their whole life. There's nothing wrong. Not everybody has to try to be Steve Jobs. Not everyone has to try to be Albert Einstein. That's not what I'm saying, but I'm saying I want to learn from people who did big things. You choose who you want to learn from. I'd go straight to the top. Martin Luther King Jr. had a mentor. Gandhi had a mentor that helped him become a humanitarian and fight for the independence of India. Oprah Winfrey had Maya Angelou, the poet. Malcolm X had mentors. Everybody, you go through history. Great people had great mentors. Great people read. Mark Cuban was over in my house, the billionaire, the shark tank billionaire. I said, do you read much, Mark? He said, you know what, Ty? The reason I got a private jet waiting down at LAX for me, empty, and so when I get in it, I can just catch up on reading without anybody disturbing me. He keeps a multi-million, I think he has like a Gulf Stream. He keeps a $50 million jet hanging around just so he could read more. Warren Buffett gets on a plane, they say nobody talks, he just reads. Go through the history. People lie, but numbers don't work. Hard, but work smart. You need tools, you need leverage. What makes Bill Gates the 16-time richest man in the world? Well, he goes on reunifications. His blog is all about books. And one thing he said that I found fascinating, he said, you know, I'm kind of lazy. I try to find ways to do it smarter than most people. And sure, he put in the hours. It's a necessity to put in the hours, but the goal isn't to put in the hours. The goal is to work less and do more. The goal is to work half as much and get twice the results. That comes from the leverage of intelligence. That's what can make you great. Find great people, read more, trust me, and just split-test it. If you don't believe me, test it for yourself. Find an amazing book. I got a free book list you can read, tylobez.com, slash books. Find one of those books. At the end of it, if it doesn't read a few of them, if it doesn't help you, stop reading. Different people have different ways of learning. But nine out of 10 people who do big things either had mentors or read books. And so play the cards. Play the odds. If you got a bad hand in poker, you're gonna fold that hand. Sure, you might win with a two and a three, but it's better to have pocket aces. Better to have two aces. The odds are better. Using mentors, using books increases the odds of success. It's not a guarantee, because you still gotta put in the work. You still must execute.  All those people just trying hard work. I recorded this video to save you a lot of hard years. So yeah, all I can say in summary is I'm not as smart or as good an athlete or as good an entrepreneur as Bill Gates Warren Buffett, Mark Zuckerberg, Tom Hanks, Larry Page, co-founder of Google, Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk, Mark Cuban, Bruce Lee, Conor McGregor, Michael Jordan, LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, by the way, I'm reciting back just a few of the people who had mentors. I'm not as good on camera as Oprah Winfrey who mentored Ellen DeGeneres. If they needed it, I needed more. If you don't need it, if you're better than them, I'd have to question your humility. If they need it, but you don't, Einstein needed a mentor and I said, nah, I don't need a mentor. I would question my humility. Remember, pride comes before a fall and it's the humble who will inherit the earth, but it's not the humility most people think.  You don't have to demean yourself. Humility in action is what the world needs. People who go, well, damn, Conor McGregor is in great shape. I wanna learn to do MMA fighting. He needed a coach, I better find me a coach. I do Brazilian jiu-jitsu. If you try to walk in a gym and say you're good at jiu-jitsu and they say, who's your mentor coach? And you say, nah, I don't need one.   I was mentored by Higa Machado, by Henry Gracie. I just had Horian Gracie at my house. His father basically invented Brazilian jiu-jitsu. I respect those mentors. And if I came to them and I said, there's people out there teaching that you shouldn't, that mentors aren't needed, you know what they would say? They would say, that's a disrespectful person. They'd say, bring them to my gym, Ty. Let them roll with me on the mats. Let me put them to sleep. We'll record it. Everybody, it's called a lineage. It's called a lineage. It's called pedigree. You say, I learn from this person who learned from this person who learned from this person. That's how science works, by the way. Isaac Newton said, if I'm great, it's because I stand on the shoulder of giants. If you think you don't need shoulders of giants, I can guess how much money's gonna be in your bank account soon. It ain't as much as you could if you listen to smart people. Anyway, leave your opinion below.