#112 How To DESTROY Negative Thoughts (And Rewire Your Brain) | Tony Robbins

21:48So I think it's important to look for what's behind it all. If you shift what's behind it all, you shift everything, right? That's my focus. Do you ever not keep promises to yourself now? That's a great question. Yes, there's one that I've not kept to myself. to be honest it's the only one i can think of i don't know that i promised myself honestly that's the truth and that is you know i'd slow my schedule down you're not keeping that i know that for a fact no you can tell by my voice um no i've not kept that that promise but honestly it's like you know like i get a phone call last night from a dear friend of mine he's got a friend that's suicidal in the middle of the night and it's like you know i get these calls every day somebody's got you know cancer somebody's got whatever and i have such a database of businesses and relationships in the health area and the relationship area and the business area and the finance area and the emotional well-being area that I find myself called.

22:42And so then I end up being up for two and a half hours, selfless stranger, not do those things. And so my wife and I are going to have a meeting this next week and then I'm going to have to take it from decide to commit to resolve because I think I decided, but I didn't really commit and resolve because I'm so called. That's the thing too. It's like people have different ways of motivating themselves. I've never been a motivator. I don't even like the term. Motivation is a good thing. It's like a warm bath or shower. You should probably have one every day, but it's not enough, right? You need strategy.

23:11You need follow through. But what I'm really interested in is like, what's deeper than that? What's the inner drive in that? And when I look around at what's happening in people's lives, I say, what? You can think of it as this way. You can think of there's like, let's say, pull motivation and push motivation. Push is what most people use. I'm going to push myself through and I'm going to make this happen. Well, that takes enormous, I would say, inner strength. You clearly have that. I clearly have that. Inner drive. But everybody's only got so much of that, right? What's unlimited is pull motivation, pull drive.

23:44That's something that is something you care about more than yourself, so much more than yourself, that it's not effortful. It gives you an energy that's also almost feels superhuman to other people. And it's because you know this is what you're made for. and when you find that, you know, it's been said before, you know, the two most important days of your life of the day that you're born in the day you discover what you're born for, right? I know what I'm born for. And so changing that in my life and saying, I'm not going to do that. I have to find somewhere in between the two. I have to find what I am willing to commit to in that process.

24:13Well, that's interesting. My first response in my head was, no, of course, I keep my word to myself for everything. And the probably still is true because my word to myself is I will always show up when it matters most for people. Wow. Yeah, you almost have like a higher priority than you've even realized above the sub-priority. Well, it's so timely because you're having an event in January, and I really wanted to go to, I was going to go to your last event, and we're in the mix of all this fertility stuff. Oh, I understand. It's one of the first times where I haven't been able to keep my word as often as I'm used to to other people, and it's out of my control for the first time.

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25:20Head to nextinsurance.com slash Cody and check him out. I love the idea of this event because, you know, new year, new you. There are all these things around this time of year. But we don't actually keep our promises to ourselves for the most part. And one of the ways that I, in the beginning, maybe thought of you was like, oh, it's positive thinking. We have to positive think. And that is actually the opposite. No, I don't even believe him. I don't believe in negative thinking. It doesn't help you. I believe you need to find what's true. I don't believe you should go to your garden and there's weeds there, so you chant, there's no weeds, there's no weeds, there's no weeds.

25:57It's like, no, reach down and grab the weeds, right? You've got to see what's real. You've got to see it as it is, but also not see it worse than it is. Most people see it worse than it is because they're afraid of failing, so then they don't try, right? And then you've got to see it better than it is because without a vision, people perish, right? You have to have a vision. And then you've got to make it that way, and that's where the strategy comes in, right? So that's how I look at it. But no, I'm not. I've never been into positive thinking per se. When they did The Secret, they came to me to be part of The Secret, I said, I will not participate in a million years.

26:25This is bullshit. So you're saying the law of attraction is bullshit? I said, no, law of attraction is real. It's one of dozens, dozens of laws. And you're saying that's the whole game? And I remember this guy was saying, yeah, but I was coming here to talk with you about this. And he said, and I was running late and I thought green, green, green. And I got all green lights. So what's going to happen when you're coming to see me and you get all red lights? So you're going to say you're thinking about it? Are you telling me some person who was in Alcatraz was there, or not Alcatraz, but in Germany, you know, in a concentration camp, that they were just a negative thinker?

26:55Sometimes not getting what you want is what the universe or God wants for you. So you develop lessons, skills, muscles, strengths, caring that you wouldn't have had without it. So it's not just that. There's other things like capabilities. There's like skill sets. You can't do that. So no, I was revolted against that. And I watch it go like this and, of course, crash. Because everybody wants the oversimplistic view of life. But that won't get you results. Just thinking positive is not going to do it. Thinking negative will certainly hurt your life. But that's not the full gig. No, no matter how bad I want it, if I go try to one-on-one you on that basketball court, I don't think I'm winning.

27:33You've got like just a tiny few inches more than I do. But it's important because these days I live in Austin, Texas. And there is so much, you know, if you think it, you will get it. And if you rub this crystal, I brought a crystal. I like a crystal. but I still don't think it's going to fix everything for me. No, no. I mean, listen, I think thoughts are real. And whatever you think about consistently, you tend to manifest in your life. But there are other things beyond just that one force of what you want. And to think otherwise is to think you're the center of the universe, which is absurd to me.

28:03If that was true, why wouldn't we just get whatever we want immediately? Well, because you'd be spoiled rotten. You wouldn't care about anything or anyone. I mean, think about it. When you were born, what did you have to do to be loved? Nothing. Nothing. Scream, yell, go to the bathroom in your pants, throw up all over your mom or your dad. You're still loved, right? But there was a day when that stopped. And that's the day that fear entered your body. That's the day you try to figure out what to do. So you would, because you know to survive, you need love. Love is where someone puts their needs aside for yours, right?

28:30And as humans, we're like different than other animals. Some animals, there's egg, crack, and you never see a mother and father. But you have some competitive advantage. You have horns, you have teeth, you have camouflage, right? Our competitive advantage is love. And so our capacity to feel that caring allows us to connect, allows us to work with each other, allows us to expand beyond what other people can possibly do. And so I look at it and say, okay, if this is our capacity, why is it that we have this unconditional love in the beginning and that everybody pursues it for the rest of their life and rarely feels it?

29:02Because if you're unconditional love forever, you'd never grow. You'd never bring anything to the world. It would all be about me, me, me. Just like ridiculous. So you have to grow up and realize life's not about you. It's about we. And the more you contribute, the better. Business is a spiritual game. It's a perfect example. Every religion on earth has some version of love thy neighbor like thyself. Different versions of it, but a version of that principle within it, right? Karma, whatever you want to call it. When you fall in love with your client, not just fall in love with your customer, I should say your product or service, that's going to change.

29:36Fall in love with your client and you're trying to do everything you can to meet their needs. You turn them into a raving fan and you love on them and you think constantly about meeting their needs like a mom does their kid or like a best friend does for somebody they really care about, you're going to grow in business. You're going to grow anything that you do. But we're not meant to just have unconditional love because then we wouldn't grow. We need to grow. We need to expand. And so otherwise, all these stupid thoughts like, oh, I'm just going to think it's going to happen and be there. Plus, if you went to Vegas, what's the worst thing to happen if you go to Vegas?

30:05Well, maybe lose all your money. No, the worst thing that can happen is win. Oh, interesting. Of course. Yes. Then you think you're skilled. Steve Wynn is a good friend of mine. He built most of Las Vegas. So he disagrees. I was with him one day, and this guy won a$10 million jackpot. And Steve is a very tight guy in finance, right? Very tight guy. Like, he knows what every, you know, one of his retailers is doing, and he wants the maximum dollar for each one. And Louis Vuitton wasn't paying him enough. He'd get very upset. I'm like, you're doing quite fine, right? He says, no, I want to. But when a person won, I saw none of that.

30:34So I finally said, Steve, usually you're pretty uptight about something like this. He goes, no, Tony, don't you know? Do you see all the people around him? See all the pictures? That guy will come back for the rest of his life, but so all these other people. He goes, the odds are my odds. He goes, that makes me money. I'm in it for the long game. That's how it works here. But if you went to Vegas, and let's say you pulled one of those worn-in bandits, and you get the jackpot, what was your response going to be? Sweet. Awesome. Yeah. Second time. Probably less excited, but still excited. A hundred times every time you get the same victory.

31:06Wow. Now it's called a job. That's fascinating. So we need jackpots in our life to make us feel alive. If you got everything you wanted every moment, you'd be bored out of your mind. It's such a good point. What's interesting about you is, you know, I think a lot of people struggle with people-pleasing, right? And, you know, maybe they try to do things that other people think will make them likable. You seem to do the opposite. Like, you are so comfortable pushing buttons, saying hard truths. and at least what I've seen publicly, kind of pushing people out of their comfort zone. I don't do that until they first know how much I care.

31:44I earn that right and they see that. I don't just come in like a jerk and go this, this, this, because I really do. No, I don't think you come off that way. But I think that's scary for people, even though I do believe a lot of times that's what we need. We need like Chris, my husband, calls it a benevolent bully, somebody to push you like you need it. Have you always been like that? Or how did you learn to push people the way they needed to? No, I was more of a pleaser growing up. Everyone has a dominant force in their life. My mom was the dominant force. And I had four different fathers, so she was the dominant force, as you might guess.

32:18She was quite a force of nature, got rid of them one after another. And I learned to please her, or it was quite physical with her. And I was 5 '1 in high school. And then even when I grew 10 inches in a year, I learned to bend my hair down so she could grab my hair and smack me against the wall. She was a beautiful woman. I don't want to give you the wrong impression. She was as loving as you could be, but she abused alcohol and prescription drugs. And when you put those two together, you become a different personality. So I had to work out in my head, how do you deal with someone whose love you crave the most, who's trying to harm you, but you know loves you, you know?

32:51And so rather than go through the whole victim bullshit, I just, there's not any part of me that's ever been a victim. It's like, okay, she's wired with pain and I got to figure out how to, basically I became a practical psychologist because of her. I had to figure out how to manage her states, her emotions, so I could protect my younger brothers five years younger, the younger sister seven years younger. And I got really good at it, as I had to be. But then also with women in my life and relationship, in the beginning it was all pleasing all the time, which is the one I'm sure you know. It's probably why you married a Navy SEAL.

33:19Having a pleaser doesn't please a woman. Men are confused by that. They're like, she wants me to please him. Yes, she wants to be pleased, but she doesn't want you to be a pleaser. What the hell does that mean, right? So I learned that lesson. But even during that time, when I still have to serve someone, I'm there to serve someone. So if I will, at the end of an intervention, you saw I'm Not Your Guru. There was a moment there where I was working with a young woman who was part of this cult where they raped children and said it was for God. And she was in such a horrible place. And so I did this work and it's like, I feel like God comes through me in those moments.

33:51I'm not trying to be overly dramatic, but as you say, it looks like magic and it's different every time. And so afterwards, this group pushed on the wall, pushed on the door and I was like, After those things are done, very often I can't show any emotion then because I'm there with them. If I fully feel what they're feeling, I can't help them. But I am feeling it inside. I put it in a box. And then I go to the back room there, and then I just start bawling for what this woman had been through. Now it makes me emotional thinking about it. And the guys that were doing the show said, no, we have direct access.

34:26And they open the doors, and you see me there crying. and um but it's because you know this is what i'm made for it's like i i hate suffering he'd say anyone's suffering so i am unbelievably committed to end suffering any way i can but i also know my own suffering will not help that person who's suffering so i need to call to a higher part of them and i can do it in multiple ways i can do it with humor i can do it with intensity i can do it fun i can do it being weird but i will find the way to get them there and it's different every time. And that's my art. You know, that's where you can call it the universe.

34:57I call it God comes through you because you're trying to serve something more than yourself. You get different insights. If you're just trying to serve yourself, you get a certain level of insight. If you've got a family you care about, you're trying to serve your family, you get a different level of insight, you know, trying to serve, you know, a community, you know, the world. I don't mean virtue signaling bullshit. I mean, like, you know, it's in your heart, the level of insights that are given to me that I can't possibly know about a person while they're standing there. Like people think there's there's a script backstage or someone people come up, even the guys are filming.

35:26So they went, do you have like an earpiece or something? And I was like, what are you talking about? They came and literally checked, see if I had earpiece. How could you know that about her? And I was like, I just knew, you know, I just knew immediately. So, um, the emotion I go through is enormous. It's not like I'm just cold and this is how it is. And usually by the end of it, the person feels very loved and very taken care of. They have the breakthrough that they're looking for. But, you know, I had this conversation with Oprah one day. Women are so abused by our society. When I say abused, I don't want to just be derogatory.

35:58But women are put in this image of who they're supposed to look like, be like, act like. And women to me are unbelievable. You're about to be a mom. There's another part of you that will come alive when you're a mom. It's unbelievable what women do. How their kids don't know it and don't understand it is mind-boggling to me. But to be a mom and a business person and to be a lover and to be a husband or a wife and all those things at one time, it takes just unbelievable energy, strength, and so forth. And when I see what happens with women generalizing about themselves, like I'm just a homemaker or something, makes me crazy.

36:32But the one thing women have, if a woman isn't super attractive, is they have support. Men don't have that. Men don't go share their feelings. We don't go talk about our relationships, right? I remember we were having a program in Mexico, and this woman was saying, you were with your friend and you know he got divorced and you don't know if he's dating? He says, we played golf. And she goes, and it didn't come up? He goes, how would it come up? And she was just like stunned because she thinks how a woman would think versus how a man's brain would think, right? And so I say this because I was telling Oprah, I said, one of the beautiful things about the sisterhood, if a woman's really attractive, sometimes there's backbiting and there's the opposite.

37:15There's not the support. There's just tremendous support. Women share their problems. Men don't share their problems. Men's job is to solve a problem. And then you get with a woman in your life and you want to solve it for them. In a man's world, the more you solve problems, the more you move up the hierarchy of being a man. In a woman's world, no, you share your problems so you can connect and feel for the person, right? And you want to stay with it and so forth. So what happens with that is it's actually good for a feeling of support, but it does not create breakthroughs because women will support their women in terrible, terrible beliefs, terrible states, terrible.

37:49They have a terrible relationship. And they talk to two other women who have a terrible relationship about how, what they should do with the relationship. And no, it's all him. It's no, no, it's no matter how often you slice it, there's two sides, there's him and there's you. Right. And so I was doing an event one time for 5 ,000 women in radio music, music hall for Oprah. It was all women. I never heard that, that high a pitch of sounds in my entire life in one room. And she said, okay, well, I want you to do an intervention like this. I said, well, Oprah, interventions can take 15 minutes. They can take an hour.

38:20I go and tell. It can take two hours. She goes, well, we don't have that. I said, I know. And you're doing this program live. She goes, well, I think you could do it in the timeline. And I said, okay. But I said, I also have to be willing to do whatever it takes. She goes, of course, of course. And I already had this conversation with her about you can't support women just in their limitations. If you really care about them, you got to call truth with them. You can still be supportive. And so this woman stands up and she talks about how she's lost her business because of 9-11. And she's not been able to build it because of her husband and her kids.

38:51And she's 110 pounds overweight. It's because they all demand something from her every moment. Now, I'm a lover of women. Like, I think women are, no man on this planet got here without a woman. I mean, through a woman who risked their life for you to be here. That's my core belief about women. I own women like this. But this is bullshit, right? I got plenty of friends that had in the building 9-11 their business didn't go under. So it's not 9-11 that did it, right? And your husband didn't make you 110 pounds of weight, nor did your children. And so everything she's saying is a lie. And the women around her are like, oh, I'm surrounded by 5 ,000 women.

39:24I go, eff it. I can't do this. I can't not do this. I said, now, what you just told me is total, absolute bullshit. And the whole room went. It was like shock. And then there's sounds and I'm like, I'm not being mean. But if you want transformation, if you want to change your life, you cannot do it by blaming everybody else for what you've done. 9-11 is a horrific thing. I'm sure it massively interrupted your business. But she wasn't even in the building. She wasn't even close to the building. I said, this is not why your business went under. You're making excuses. And I'm saying this because I care.

39:58Excuses will only hurt you. And right now, you don't have a relationship with your husband, clearly, by the way you're talking about. You don't need a relationship with your kids. And that's another reason why you're probably 110 pounds overweight. You're bearing your emotion with food, right? And then all of a sudden there started to be some sounds. And then Oprah says, and she's behind me about, you know, like 50 yards. It's a giant building, right? She goes, but Tony, but Tony, but to be fair. And I snapped back and I looked at her like this. I'll never forget because I was in state. When I'm in state, you don't break my state, right?

40:26And she goes, oh, I'm doing that thing, aren't I? And I said, yes, you're doing that thing, right? So I had to go to a break and I just kept working with her. By the time I was done, I brought her back and got in a great place. And a year later, she was on Dr. Oz. She lost 115 pounds. She had a relationship back. She'd restarted a new business, right? So sometimes you've got to do what's uncomfortable. And so, yes, I'm willing to do that to have someone's life change. Because otherwise, you're just making yourself feel good. I can make myself feel good and her feel good and go, gosh, that's so horrible.

40:56I understand. And all those things. But F that. If you stood up, my belief is if you stand up in my room, something's caused you to stand up. Some part of you wants transformation or you wouldn't be in my presence. And it's going to happen. God, so true. I think that's one of the saddest things about what happened with sort of the PC-ness of society today is that so many people feel like they can't say the thing that might actually help because it might hurt somebody's feelings. Where do we get up this thing that you're not supposed to offend anybody? Here's a question for you. Can people be offended by anything if they want to be?

41:29Yes, but I don't think that should change what I do because of it. No, but I'm just saying, so anyone you can, who said, where do we come up with this new magical rule? You're not supposed to offend anybody. If you're not going to offend anybody, you're not going to have any impact. You know, I think it was, was it Emerson who said, you know, be nothing, do nothing, say nothing and create nothing. That's how you can be sure you're never attacked, right? You know, I'm not willing to do that. I'm here on, I've got a purpose. And of course, some people are not going to understand it. But people in my seminars do.

41:56That's why they're still there 12 hours later, you know, when they wouldn't sit for a three-hour movie. They won't get up to go to the bathroom because they're watching real life as it's happening. It's more dramatic than anything you could write in a script because it's real. Because even today, reality television is bullshit. It's made up, right? People know it's fake. You feel when something's real. And when something's real, you can relate to it. And it calls to some part of you to be more real. And when we're vulnerable and we're real, we can change anything. But when we try to soften it, you know, like use all the language, pretty good, it's okay, all that kind of stuff.

42:26those softeners keep you from getting to the place where you could actually have a transformation it's so true yeah i got in trouble on the internet a few weeks ago because i said i don't think you should cry in business meetings just because you can't express yourself fully like i just i i think if you need to self-regulate like you could step out whatever but i don't think that you should have a belief that it will help you and it is totally fine if you cry in business meetings that is just not our society there's no crying in baseball yeah there's just not and it's happened to me a few times and whatever.

42:54If you cry, I'm not going to do you. I don't think it's going to help your career. You didn't tell them they couldn't cry, right? You just said that I don't think it'll help you. Exactly. Yeah. And so you got a tag for that, of course. Of course. Okay. I want to play like a couple little games. One is I hear that you like this pattern interrupt exercise. And this gives me anxiety to even ask you these questions. But like the idea is we give you a series of negative patterns and then you say how you would break free from them. And what I find fascinating about you is like, you kind of just in the moment already know the thing to say.

43:32To the person, right? You know, it has to be like, I didn't even know what's going on, but I'll give you some general things if you want. But what would be a pattern up for you versus me versus another person is different based on your model of the world, right? Interesting. So it's like, you know, what, based on what you believe, And I figured that out very quickly when I'm doing an intervention with someone. And so I'll figure out what it is. If I know, for example, you value significance the most, then I might show you how by doing whatever it's costing you the significance and I'll have leverage there.

44:03If you're driven by love, then I will use love as the metaphor. If you're driven by certainty, then I'll show you how it'll take away your certainty if you keep doing this, right? So I'm looking for leverage. It's not just breaking a pattern. That's like a stupid technique that won't last. It has to be tied to something there's an inner drive about. So we all have six needs, human needs. Certainty, everybody has it. It's a survival need because certainty can be comfortable because if you're not comfortable, if you're in pain regularly, regular pain means damage. Regular damage equals death. So it's the base need for human beings.

44:34But if you're certain all the time, you're bored silly, so you need uncertainty, right? You need variety. You need surprise. We need significance. Our culture way overvalues significance today because of social media. That's fame. you know, put on filters and pretend they're different than they are. One of my buddies has his own gym. And he told me this the other day, I couldn't even believe it. He said, on a daily basis, women and sometimes men come in who are, you know, influencers, because he's got a great gym. They lay out all the equipment, they take all these pictures, and they leave. They don't work out a single ounce.

45:06When you're 27 to 32, you have to be an idiot to not be fit, right? I mean, it's like decent genetics and you can be fit, right? So, but they're making money off of it. They don't do anything. It's just about looking good, right? And then using their looking good to try to make money. So, I mean, that's going to wear off for them, unfortunately, at some stage in their life, right? So, it's like significance is overvalued. The need for connection and love is the deepest need that people have. But most people want certain love. And so, they try to control the love and kills it. Or they want significant love.

45:36Like it's got to be the most significant thing. And then they start to promote who they are more than they are. because they think that's what's necessary and they're not truthful, right? And then we need to grow and we need to contribute. Those are the spiritual needs. If you don't grow, your relationship's not growing. If your business is not growing, it's dying. That's the law of life. Everything grows or dies. But also when you grow, then you have something to give. What makes people have a meaningful life is to feel like there's something beyond yourself because meeting your own basic needs any idiot can do.

46:04You can lie to yourself and do that. You can work just 12-hour days and do that. There's a million ways you can meet those basic needs of certainty and uncertainty and significance and connection, at least, not so much love. But when I look at people, I try to see what's driving them. And then I know better which pattern of work. But go ahead and give me your list and I'll just give you some simplistic responses. Can you tell right away after meeting somebody what their one of the six is? Six knees. I look to see what are their top two. And what if you know nothing about them? I ask questions along the way very quickly.

46:37You ask a lot of questions all the time. One person counted one time. I had a woman was suicidal and a guy in the back who was a trainer was writing down. I asked 167 questions before I made one statement. Today we helped a latte for Sam coffee shop get an insurance quote simply and easily and made sure a floral delivery van was able to make someone's day. We're the Hartford with decades of experience insuring millions of unique small businesses. When it comes to your small business insurance. Thank you. One size absolutely does not fit all. Get a quote or find an agent today at the Hartford.com slash small business.

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47:43Fascinating. So you ask questions to figure it out. What about, you have a lot of businesses now and can you tell immediately if somebody is somebody you should partner with or not? No, I can't tell immediately. I can get seduced because people put on their best behavior. They're going on a date, right? So I look at it this way. If I'm going to evaluate somebody, I have three questions. Same as what you would have in your business or on a date. Can they do the job? If I'm interviewing them in one of my companies, by the time it gets to me, of course they can do the job or I wouldn't be interviewing them, right?

48:10Or if you were dating, can they do the job? If you've been dating them six months, yeah, they can do it. The more fun question is, can they do that job well long-term, right? Will they keep doing a great job? Because everyone does a great job in the beginning, right? And what determines that is, are their goals in alignment with the job, right? So I used to, I remember years ago, we had a woman that worked for us for five years as our personal assistant and we're traveling the world and we're pretty 24 seven and you become part of our family, right? And we love her and still do. She's still a close member of our family, but she fell in love with another of our employees and had a child.

48:44And so she needs to stay put. So we had to replace her. And so we went to the LA because we're living in California at the time, Southern California, went to the LA personal assistance association. we went through five hires in five months and none of them were even close to good and they all sounded so good to start with and then one day i realized you know we're fishing in the sewer who comes to la to become a personal assistant they don't come to become a personal assistant so they can help people change the world help a family they come because i discovered they wanted my clientele they want to talk to quincy jones in those days or anthony hopkins or slice the loan or you know whoever it was that I was dealing with at the time and they would treat them like gold and treat all my other clients and friends like they were dirt right including my wife which so did I get rid of them so I realized you know you've got to decide where are you going to find somebody who's more aligned with the job in their nature and their goals or I have a friend that I bumped into in Fiji one time I have a resort in Fiji and my wife and I we're flying commercial most days still and we you know you go through immigration there's about five lines my I said why don't we go in this line here?

49:51It looks like it's fast. She goes, no, this line's faster. I said, look, this one's actually fast. She goes, I think this one's faster. I said, fine, you go in that line. I'll go in this line. And we play these silly games. We're going to race. So we're going back and forth. I'm ahead and she's ahead, you know, back and forth. We're being silly. And this man hears my voice because I said to him, I'm my wife. And he goes, Tony. And I turn around and look. And it's this guy. I hadn't seen him in about nine years. Brilliant businessman. And I said, what are you doing here? He goes, what are you doing here?

50:15I said, well, I'm here with my wife. I have a resort here. I'm here to take a few weeks off. And he said, resort here? I said, yeah. I said, where are you going? He told me. I said, oh, too bad. We're the number one resort. I teased him. I said, but what are you here for? He goes, I just got married. I said, again, it was his third marriage. He goes, yeah. And I said, well, where's your bride? She was standing next to the stage. And they were doing the same thing we were doing. So you're in the line. And I said, so how long have you known her? I said, I haven't talked to you. What, seven, eight years?

50:40He goes, yeah, probably just a little bit of last time I saw her, probably seven years. So you know what, seven years? You're just now getting married. I said, how come? He goes, she wore me down. And I thought, oof, oof, oof. So then quickly, I'm trying to change the conversation in my head. I'm like, well, are you going to have kids? He goes, Tony, you know, I've had two families before this. I went through all of that. I lost all my money twice. We are not, I said, well, I looked across and this woman's like 29 years old and he's 48. I said, have you had a discussion about this? He goes, yes, that was my deal.

51:11If we get married, no kids. So I'm thinking, oh my God, he's in for a rough ride. So we get to the front. We introduce each other's spouses and they go off. And I look at my wife and she looks at me and I go, they're in trouble. She goes, oh, you have no idea. I said, I think I do. What'd you learn? What'd you learn? She told him, yeah, he thinks we're not going to have a kids we'll have within two years. And they did. And he got divorced for a third time. The problem is they didn't have their goals aligned. You don't have to have all your goals aligned, but a major issue is like a child or not.

51:42It's got to be aligned or you're not going to sustain that relationship. So whether it's a business or whether I use business because it's easier to modulate in your head, right? Or a relationship, it's the critical element there. And then the last part is, is the right team fit? In a business, you can relate to this, I'm sure, because of all those businesses you run. You know, you can have somebody who's a superstar with the wrong team fit. They rub against everybody else. They piss everybody else off. and maybe they're like your top salesperson or your top marketing person, your top whatever.

52:11And you don't want to get rid of them because man, they bring in a lot of revenue. But unless you do, they'll destroy your business. They've always said, you know, it's not the person you failed to hire. It's the person you failed to fire that destroys your business. And so I'm a big believer in testing. Now, one of the things I do with partnerships today, just as a little clue, I shared this with Patrick David the other day and I didn't realize how important he thought it was. And I was like, I guess it really is. He said, because I've been through so many rough ones. I said, I was too. but what I do is a full background check on everyone now.

52:38And it saves me enormous amount. I tell them up front, listen, I'm an open book. Please do a full background check, everything on me that you want to check. But I don't go into any partnerships without a full background check. It's not out of disrespect. It's out of respect so that we know. And if there's anything that you want to share with us or anything comes up that you think is inappropriate, you can share it with me. I'll give you the report and so forth. Well, the panic you see in some people's eyes, then the tightening in some people, and then the people like, no, it's totally fine. And then you get the report and then they never call you back.

53:08I mean, I have saved myself so much money, time, and energy by having that one investment in a long-term relationship upfront. So smart. I wish I would have done that earlier on. Although I think some of the biggest partnership mistakes I made were cheap in retrospect. Like they were painful, but you're like, I needed to lose that money. I needed to lose that relationship or I would have kept having the same pattern. Yeah. There's always a benefit, but as the years go by, you'll probably be less tolerant of having those things happen. Well, it's heartbreaking, I think, because the partnerships, I remember one in particular, I thought we were buddies.

53:38I was like, yeah, I met your baby. I thought we were best buds. And there was one instance where they kind of targeted me. I was on the internet and I didn't realize there was this type of human that, I guess there are predators everywhere. And so then I had to realize where am I short in my analysis of people? And how did I sell myself on what I wanted instead of what was in front of me. Most of my most important skills came from some early mistakes with people, one of which I had two partners and I brought them on board and made a deal with them that was ridiculously good for them. But it was based still on some results and they absolutely stole$758 ,000,$250 ,000 of the$758 ,000 to put me in debt,$758 ,000.

54:20My company was doing a million. So not billions, a million, right? So it was like all the money I knew and I'd been on the road 225 days and everybody told me have to go bankrupt. And I wanted to kill this guy. He fled to Mexico. And I realized, well, I'm chasing him in Mexico. My business is going to go under. So I went to Fiji and I was like, I was so angry at him, but I said, no, who I'm most angry with is me. Because how did I not see this? Right? I don't care how good he presented. Was it about human behavior? I don't fully understand. And I was second day in Fiji in this sweaty little hut.

54:54And, uh, and I went to sleep for that thought, just burning thought. I woke up the next morning and I wrote literally for six straight hours and filled up three journals, all these distinctions I made. I created my day with destiny program because I did it to me. That's my favorite program. It's the only seminar I've been through because I did it for me. Changed everything, rewired me so that, you know, sometimes you have values that pull you apart. You know, like you want to please everybody and you want to be as successful as you can. You want to be totally honest and you want everybody totally happy.

55:22Right. And I learned how to align my values so that I was pulled instead of having to push or being pulled in different directions. And it was the most first time in my life I felt calm. And everybody around me is like, you're so different. It was like a rewiring for myself. So I agree with you. Sometimes your biggest mistakes, if you learn from them, are the most important ones. But I don't want to make the same mistakes. And so I look for systems to help with that as well. You have a program coming up in January that's Time to Rise Summit. I've never been to this one before. I want to hear about it.

55:56And I also want to hear about how you prepare for these shows that you do, because I hear you obsessively prepare even to this day for the shows you put on. Is that true? That's true. I believe in overloading my brain because I never know what's going to happen. Because I don't just do a rote talk. Sometimes I'll prepare everything and then I go out into the audience and I feel different things. I see people, I see where they are and I have to adjust. Also, could you imagine this will be my 49th year I'm about to begin. So I would be bored out of my brain if I was just doing the exact same thing.

56:32I know there's certain things that work and what to do, but I have to be able to adapt to feel alive and do art. And art is something that's different every time. It's not the same. And it's also what challenges me. So I feed my brain everything I can. And then I trust when I step on the stage, what'll be necessary is there. How do you feed it? Like, what does that look like? Well, for example, my date with destiny, I have people fill out about a 20-page interview report. There's 5 ,000 of them. Oh, sorry. And I read them for a week. Not everybody does it, by the way. You know, somebody will wait until the last minute or don't turn it at all.

57:05It's only your destiny. Don't worry about it, right? But what it gives me is the patterns in the room. I may not remember every name, every story, but I remember what the patterns are. And then when somebody stands up, even if it wasn't that person, I know if I can work with this person and help them transform, I could be affecting 50 or 100 people simultaneously, right? That I consciously know about. That's how I load my brain. I also brainstorm out different examples or tools. I'm always coming up with something new in terms of insight or strategy. But the event you're talking about is a really unique event.

57:37I started it because of COVID. Because I was used to doing stadiums, right? And in 2020, the governor of California's team calls me up. I know him well. Not a big fan. Newsom called you? Yeah. Well, Newsom had his team call me, and then he wrote me directly. He was upset about me telling the world that he canceled the event, which he did. He said, you're not making me look good, he said. You go, that's you. You're a nice man. I like you personally, but I don't agree with your policies. This is ridiculous. So we had an event there for 14 ,000 people. and two weeks before he sends out the message to me from his team and says, you only put 100 people in the stadium, our new rules.

58:15I said to his people, I said, this is absurd. You know we can't put 100 people in a stadium. What are we going to do with the other 13 ,900 people? And so I said, screw them. I'm going to move this thing to Vegas. They'll never shut down Vegas. Right? So two weeks before we moved 14 ,000 people to Vegas and they shut down Vegas. Right? So then I'm like, oh, my God. I mean, I need to help these people. The time they need us most is during this time because everybody's depressed and upset and not know what's going to happen. So I said, okay, let's move it to Texas. Texas is its own country. I met the governor there.

58:51I don't know him personally really well, but I met him. He says he's not going to shut down. Seven days before they shut down. We rented a big church, 14 ,000 people. So then I was like, I'm just relentless. I'm like, okay. Well, they allow you to put 10 people in a movie theater. And I said, okay, we'll do 1 ,400 movie theaters, local for people that don't have to travel. We'll have big screens. We'll have big sound. At least 10 people interacting with each other. And they shut down the movie theaters. So I was like, okay, we're going to build a studio. And my CFO was like, you're going to build a studio?

59:23We lost$100 million in six months because I didn't want to fire anybody. Because he kept saying we're 10 more days to stop the, whatever the language was used in those days. and I was like so I said we can't wait so I bought a building because I couldn't build it fast enough 50 foot high ceilings I built 22 foot high led screens made them 50 feet around me and got 0.67 resolution highest resolution in the world I could see more in your face than I can even see now because you're this much bigger right and then I called Eric Jan the founder of zoom and said 1200 people's not going to work I need 25 ,000 people and he's a fan of mine so he changed the tech so we could do it.

1:00:00And then I hired all these people. I all said, we can't do this in nine weeks. I said, well, then you're not working here. And I just kept going through people. We literally the night before were putting it all together. And we got up, we did this event and we had people from all over the earth that participated. And I had 193 countries there and we had over 25 ,000 people. Normally we'd have 15 ,000. So it was even more people because they could do it from different places in the world they wanted to. So then I was like, okay, I want to, I want to reach everybody. Let's do an event for free. Let's do one event for three days, not just an hour thing or two.

1:00:35Let's do like two and a half hours a day for three days, enough to give people a real transformation. We'll do it right at the beginning of the year. It's kind of a comeback challenge, I called it back then. It's now called Time to Rise. And the comeback story is the best story of your life. You're down, everything's not working. That's what inspires people. This is the comeback time. And we put it together. We had a million people show up, million one. And now we've done it for seven straight years. I think it's going to be last year I'll do it. I'm just, my schedule is so full. But I would do one last one.

1:01:03And we're going to do it for three days. And people from 193 countries attend, every country in the world. And we go for, like I say, two and a half hours. And we help you not just make a New Year's resolution, which nobody keeps, right? Because they don't have a plan. They don't have a strategy or anything else. We help you create the breakthroughs that are necessary. And you become part of a really cool community because we have a Facebook community. And so in the middle of the night, I give people an assignment. And they make these videos. And you see people transforming from all over the earth.

1:01:27every age group, every direction, every country, every language. So I love that aspect of it. And there's no charge for it. Literally, it's free. So if people go to Time to Rise Summit, time to risesummit.com, time to risesummit.com, they can register for it and they can attend it. And you can think about like going to a great two and a half hour movie three days in a row, but instead of just being entertained at the end of your life is really transformed. And then, you know, we've done so much value for people. Then some people decide they want to do other things with us, which is wonderful, but there's no requirement in any way, shape or form.

1:01:57It's been my way to give back. It was desperately needed during COVID. And then we just kept the momentum for it for now. Do I get claps at the event, the Tony Robbins claps? You do, don't you? Because it's my favorite part of the event. Well, I can't wait to come to this next one. I can't wait to see what this next evolution looks for. You don't have to come to it. It's digital. Come from my couch. Yeah, you can do it from your couch. You can do it from your office. And we start here at 10 in the morning. it's midnight in uh what do you call it sydney australia for example and they go each day all the way through it as well so three or four in the morning so you'll be joined by people all over the earth and you have a cool community of people that all have something coming they want more they're not willing to settle yeah if you want more for your life if you want it's time to rise and take more out of your life you don't want to have next year be the same as last year then you need some tools you need some inspiration you need some community and you need some days where it's actually going to happen.

1:02:50Like you said, put it on the calendar and make it lock. So it's coming up January 29th through the 31st. January 29th through the 31st. And again, if they go to timetorisesummit.com, get you signed up and lock it in your calendar. And I encourage people, bring your family, bring your friends or your coworkers at the office and do it. It'll be an experience you won't forget.

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