#121 How to Start A Business With NO Money | Blake Mycoskie (Founder of TOMS)

22:27You're enough. We're all enough. But our culture lies to us all the time and tells us we're not enough. And if in social media is great, it's showing you and making you feel comparison to everyone else and that you're not enough. And so I decided after I started feeling better about a year ago that I wanted to help people feel enough. And my best friend told me to make a bracelet because he's like, I have all these tattoos, right? So they all have these different sayings. Like one says, be present. One says, do the work, speak the truth, enjoy the ride, carpe diem. And so he's like, instead of getting an I am enough tattoo, which I can see that's what you're getting ready to do.

23:03He's like, most people aren't going to get that tattoo. So why don't you create something that everyone can participate in? And you like bracelets. Why don't you make a bracelet? So went to India, got these bracelets are handmade by women in India. And the idea is it's just a daily reminder just to look down and kind of like, I'm enough. I've always been enough. And like, fuck everyone that tells me that I'm not enough. You know, because so much of that pressure is coming from all around us. And when you feel enough, you have so much peace because then you can actually just be and you can be present and you can be connected.

23:35And so the utility of this for me is, you know, that it helps remind me. But the utility of this for someone else could be different. So, for instance, we 100 % of the profits from enough goes to mental health organizations. So a lot of people I know that are wearing the bracelet now are wearing it because just they want to raise money for mental health. The same way like the Livestrong bracelet raised money for cancer, right? They're like, no, I know someone that struggled. Maybe they lost someone to suicide. You know, I mean, and they're like, I'm going to wear this in honor of them or to raise money.

24:06And that's why they wear it. But we're giving the utility. And so, you know, yes, I talk to my story and I share other people's enough stories. But also I show that, like, there's utility to this. And then the other thing, which at the end I'm going to give you one, is you have, I'll show you right now, a little teaser, is we only sell them in pairs. So when you buy one for yourself or you're given one, you get to wear the first one. But then you get to think, who do you want, who in your life do you want to give the second one to? And so that's utility. So in terms of this, I would call it utility marketing.

24:38Like I really think that's the thing is like what utility does the enough bracelet do for people besides raise money for charity? What utility does the pivot chair do for someone who's sitting all day who might have back pain and who wants to live a more active life? What utility did the laundry business do? For those parents, the utility wasn't even the clean clothes. Utility was the peace of mind we gave them. It's so true. So think about utility. Speaking of insane marketing ideas, did I ever tell you one of my favorites? I actually started my entire business with a newsletter. Literally sending emails built my entire business from zero to nine figures in 40 years, which is wild.

25:17So if I could recommend you one thing, it would be to start a newsletter. Write about anything in the world that you're curious about. Your business, your customers, your ideas. And my friend Tim Ferriss is on Beehive and he writes an email each Friday, literally only about his five favorite things. I actually switch all of my newsletters to Beehive because I wanted to grow. And so they help me see where my audience comes from, who reads, how to send stupid, simple, but like beautiful emails. And then the growth tools are all totally built in, which works for me. So it recommends my newsletter in front of other people's audiences.

25:48So I'm finding readers I never even would have reached. Now, I'm obsessed with this team. The founder, Tyler, is literally the most relentless mission-driven founder, just like Blake, actually. He's the most relentless one I've ever worked with. It's fascinating to watch their team. They ship product and features and solve every issue that I have come up. In fact, these little wizards just spun up a new landing page for me in two days because my other one was terrible. So if you want to share your ideas with the world and make money on it, go to beehive.com slash Cody and use code Cody30. you'll get 30 % off three months that's beehive.com slash Cody for code Cody 30 also drop your newsletters on beehive when you start them in the comments I want to see what you guys are writing I'm looking for new ideas and brilliant people and I'm hoping more people like you get into this game of newsletters because it very simply changed my entire life again that's beehive with two e's two i's no third e what you guys will figure this out you'll remember beehive won't you You know what we should do?

26:50If somebody's listening right now and you have your business, but you don't have your utility marketing. Yeah. Why don't you comment for us? Yeah. And I'll pick one and send it to you. Deal. And then we can give them a response. Yeah. Oh, that'd be sick. I love making videos. Okay. To my team all the time. It's like, do you want to get a hold of someone? Just let me make a video. Like the other day, it was so funny. Our PR person was trying, when we were launching enough, you know, he was like, he was like talking about how everyone would launch it. And then Gail King came up. And I was like, I was on the CBS show with Gail King like a decade ago.

27:18Let me just make a video. He's like, trust me. Hey, Gail, it's Blake. Ten years ago, you helped me launch Tom's. I'm launching enough. I would love to come on the show. What do you think? Sure enough, we launched it with Gail King. Like sometimes the simplest thing is just like, just make the video, you know, ask the person to buy it. Like, I mean, just like it's simple things. Yeah. I mean, we definitely don't ask enough. That is for sure. Can I say something to that? I would love that. No, because this is something that I feel so grateful for in my life right now. So when I was building Toms, you talked about celebrities involved.

27:52We had a lot of celebrities, a lot of people supporting Toms. But I felt so much pressure whenever I would go to a meeting or pitch someone like, will you wear our shoes or whatever? Because my personal identity was tied to whether they said yes or no. So every rejection, which you're going to get a lot of rejections as an entrepreneur, was like personally painful. So it caused me stress, anxiety, all these things. now because I really do feel I'm enough whether you like the bracelet whether they like the bracelet whether anyone likes the bracelet I know that there's someone that this is really going to reach and is going to touch them that now I have no problem asking anyone anything because if they say no it's no big deal because it's not my personal identity is whether they like it or they say yes or whatever and so that's coming that's been so fun for me because now as I'm going out to different you know Kid Cudi is one of my partners I cold call it no big deal that's Wild.

28:45I called him. You know, I mean, literally, I, you know, had a friend that knew his manager. And I had read about how he had really struggled with mental health and had suicidal ideation, like a lot of the same shit that I went through. And he just seemed like a real, like, genuine guy. And so I talked to her. And she's like, I can get it in front of him. She got in front of him. A day later, he's like, hey, can I do a Zoom with Blake? All of a sudden, I'm Zooming with Kid Cudi. And then a week later, he's one of our founding partners of Enough. Yeah, that's wild. If he would have said no, I wouldn't even thought 10 seconds about it.

29:16I would have been on to the next. Well, you know what else is cool? I don't think, I mean, I just learned this. Like you can go to IMDb, sign up for their premium thing and see every single agent, every single famous person's agent. Yeah. They just hate this. Yeah. They're going to like delete this part. Yeah, whatever. That's your job. That's why you get paid the 10 to 20%. Yeah, exactly. But I think the cool part is, and what I hope people take away is that even though you've had this huge career and you've built all these big businesses, these are actually little micro things that anybody in the world could do.

29:44Oh, because I mean, how many times you think you've been rejected in your life? Just with enough. I'm not going to put some celebrities and athletes on or their agents, but like you can think of any mental health celebrity, any celebrity that has had a mental health challenge that has talked public about it or any Olympic athlete that has a huge platform about mental health. I have cold called every single one of them now And I only have six founding partners There's hundreds of them So that means that I'm still waiting to hear back from agents Of hundreds of these people who say Mental health is the most important thing in their life And I'm saying you can help us raise tens of millions of dollars By just wearing the damn bracelet Nothing You want to call one of them out publicly?

30:31That is Yeah but I think that's the game You know what I'd like to do? I'm going to give you a list and in the show notes, because I don't want to call them out, but I'm going to say, this is my top dream, 30 people to be ambassadors of enough. So if anyone is watching or knows their manager or knows them, because all these people, it's not like I'm asking them to do something they're not already doing. They're already saying, I really care about mental health. I got through this. I want to help other people. So in the show notes, I'm going to give you my list of my top 30 and hopefully someone can get us to one of them and we'll have a new founding partner.

31:02I love that. That'll be huge. All right, let's go, YouTube. I like this. Okay, I also want to talk about you seem to have this, like, yeah, I don't care, you know, fuck all these people, fuck whatever they think. But you have had numerous, like what my dad would call dark nights of the soul. Yes. Where you have like looked at the darkness in the face that I think all of us have felt either just as a fucking human, but also as an entrepreneur. Yeah. And I think it'd be interesting. I don't know which one you want to share, but like, I'd love to hear about a night where you just head and hands didn't know what to do next and then how you got through that for maybe the person that's listening right now with their head in their hands.

31:41Yeah. I mean, I think the scariest thing for me was when I started getting depressed and then it got worse and I started trying to do all these external things to, you know, built the dream house, moved my family to Costa Rica, you know, got divorced, got remarried, got divorced again. Like I did a lot of things to mess up my life and there was a time. And in doing that, I, you know, had in this, you know, I didn't have as close a connection with my kids. And I didn't went to a psychiatrist who told me I was bipolar. And then I got put on all these meds. And I mean, like my journey got went from bad to worse, to worse, to worse to two years ago.

32:24I started waking up at three in the morning and I want to kill myself. And it was so fucking scary because I knew logically I would never do that to my kids. Like I knew like, but I couldn't stop thinking like, go to your boat that you, you know, that you lived on when you started Tom's. That was your happy place. Do it there. They'll never find you. Someone else. I mean, like that's the level of detail. And I was dealing with this every single day and I was keeping it. I was so ashamed because like, look, I have money. I have a wife at the time. I have kids like, like what, who am I to like want to leave this earth?

33:03And so I wasn't telling anyone. And the thing I did, which I'm the reason I'm bringing this up is it's the most important thing anyone can do who is suffering is tell your friends, just like there's never judgment. You know, I think mental health has had a lot of stigma. I think it's getting less and less, but just find at least one person today to be like, it's this bad. And don't hold anything back. Like literally be like, this is what I'm thinking. This is what I'm feeling. This is what I'm planning. Because I believe what happens with people who become suicidal, or at least for me, my experience and others I've talked to, and some that I've lost, is that it's like the brain's broken.

33:43You know, I mean, literally, it's no different than like a huge car accident, but it's invisible to everyone. And so think about it, like how are you ever going to go to the hospital? How are you ever going to get the surgery? How are you ever going to get the PT if people don't see you mangled on the street? But if you're in that dark of a place, your brain is mangled. The neurons are not firing because it is not normal for us not to want to live. And especially me, I had tons of friends. I mean, all these reasons. But the most important thing I did and the most important thing anyone can do is just reach out for help.

34:19And yes, there's great crisis text signs, and there's all this mental health. Project Healthy Minds is one of my amazing partners with Enough. They have all these resources on their website. But I still think the most important thing is tell someone really close to you. I told my friends. I told my mom. Now, I hated that I was putting this on my mom, but I was also like, I just need to get through the next six months. And over time, they helped me make some very important decisions in my life, helped me get off all the pharmaceuticals, helped me go to a treatment facility. I mean, my journey really was largely supported by the people that I shared.

34:57And also it's something about just talking about it, you know, kind of takes the pressure away from it. It takes a little of the energy out of it. So were you falsely diagnosed bipolar? I think so. I mean, some people might. Who knows? Who knows? This is one of my favorite tattoos. so if you can see this one this is my um who knows this is my partner in toms okay right and so for those who are just uh listening i remember not everyone's watching this then uh you should maybe we'll post a picture of this but um this is alejo he started toms with me and wearing a beret what's that is he wearing a beret all these argentine gauchos wear this hat It's like a goutchip.

35:36Yeah, yeah, yeah. But anyways, he, in a very funny way, I won't tell those three because it'll take another half an hour. But he basically spoke for 20 minutes with certainty about all the things in his life that he saw through this vision and this whole thing after some psychedelics. And then he looked at me and goes, but who knows? Is he Argentinian? Yeah. That is a very Argentinian response. And the thing is, the reason I tattooed it on my forearm is I think it's like one of the – it's literally like the Buddha talking to me. It was like so smart because it was like we don't know. I don't know why I got depressed, but I know that it led to my next purpose, you know.

36:16I don't know why I was in this relationship, but it led to me having kids, you know. Like who knows if it's good or bad, you know. And so for me, I don't know. I just – I really look at life with just a marvel now. And to not be enough. That's what goes for people's journeys, like someone difficult in your life or maybe someone's not treating you well or whatever. Like, who knows why? Do you think it's hard to be in a relationship with a founder? I think it's hard to be in a relationship with me. Do you? Maybe not so anymore. I think at a different period of my life it was. I mean, I think it was very hard to be in a relationship with me when I was building and growing Tom's because it was my first love.

37:01You know, I mean, it really was. I mean, there's just, you know, we were traveling around the world. We were giving shoes to kids. I was I was getting the external validation that someone who never feels enough needed. So I was getting it constantly, you know. And so, you know, it's hard to be in a relationship because in a relationship you mess up. You forget to take the garbage out. You're late for dinner. Like you're not exactly getting external validation every time you come home. But if you're getting it outside as a founder, especially if you have success, it's really hard. But then the interesting thing now is I'm in an incredible relationship with an amazing woman.

37:35And, you know, she's been part of the whole enough, you know, building all enough. And it's going great. So I think a lot of it is, I wouldn't say it's a founder. I'd say maybe first time founder, you know, I don't know. But I do think that there are sacrifices. But I think the person knows that going in and they're either in for that ride or they're not. And that's why you got to make sure that you have the same vision for, you know, what you're doing. Because right now, helping people feel enough and raising money for mental health is outside of my kids, like the most important thing going on.

38:09And if I was with someone that didn't also share that passion, it probably wouldn't work out very well. So now when you get into a relationship, do you set it up different? I think I just got incredibly, I think God threw me a bone on this one. You didn't sit down and say. Is she here? Is she listening? She is here. Oh, yeah. No, you're doing this and she's not even listening. We'll have to send it to her later. Yeah, that's how independent she is. She's just like, I'm doing my thing. You're doing your thing. No, but I'm curious. I think we have a lot of people who ask questions about relationships with my husband and I.

38:41No, I like that. I've watched some of your videos on Instagram about it. Yeah. Well, I'm always like, I have no fucking idea. Talk to me when I'm 80. Who knows, right? Who knows? But I was curious, like...

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40:10For entrepreneurs or somebody going into a relationship or trying to find their person, Yeah. Like what what would you fess up with somebody that you were in a relationship with now? What questions would you ask, you know, the person? What would you tell them? Well, I think the first thing is, is just being radically honest about what your priorities are. You know, the hard thing is, especially for someone who didn't feel enough to that, is that you kind of tell people what they want to hear so they'll love you, right? Versus like what, who you really are and what you're really about. And I think so I was kind of doomed and I think my romantic partners are doomed because I never felt that I was enough.

40:47So in a sense, I was looking for them to tell me that I'm enough or to fill this hole that only I can fill. Right. And so maybe I'm not leading with how important my business is or my purpose is because I want to say whatever it takes so that they're going to tell me I'm enough. Once I healed this, then I was able to, I think, attract a relationship and be really honest about, hey, my kids are my number one priority right now. I spend half my time with them. Next to that, I am on a mission to literally change the world's mental health. Like I want to raise more money for mental health through enough than anyone in the history of the world.

41:28Like I'm not like that's how big of a goal I have. and that's going to require me to go on a bunch of podcasts, to travel the world, to do speaking, to do all these things. And so most of our days are going to be living in a suitcase. And when I'm not in a suitcase, I want to surf. And I met a woman from Hawaii that surfs. Oh, it's perfect. But it was like very clear, like when I'm not doing that, I really want to be surfing. And if you really like the idea of either surfing or being in a beach town and also traveling around the world on this crazy, you know, enough ride, then great. That's such a good point.

42:05But it was so much easier to be clear and honest, honest, because I wasn't looking for that external validation anymore. I was getting it for myself. I was really believing I am enough, whether this woman is excited about being on this ride with me or not. And then, therefore, I also attracted someone who they felt they were enough. And so they were able to be honest about what's important to them and what their needs are. And so I think it's hard being with a founder, being with an entrepreneur is not for everyone. But I also think it's really hard if you struggle with what I've struggled with and your founder to not really kind of sell a vision of a life that's really not what you want.

42:47Yeah. Sorry, that's all that causes depression. I mean, I'm convinced that one of the largest causes of depression is just not living in integrity with yourself. You know, for so many years, I was living the life that I thought everyone else wanted me to live. And I wasn't living the life I wanted to live. And I think so that's what catches up to us is we make all these little compromises. Largely, I did it so that I would receive love. And then you wake up and you're living a whole compromised life. And that you don't want to live. And that's your soul is like, well, I'm going to get depressed and feel horrible until you make major decisions to get back in alignment.

43:24and then you get back in alignment and everything feels at peace again. That's so true. I also think the universe doesn't give you things when you're unclear. So, you know, if you're like, no, I'll take whatever love I can get. That's not actually what you mean. Then things go sideways. And so it's so important. Even the way you set goals is really interesting to listen to. Because you're like, I wanted this woman that here are these things that are really important to me. And so they can decide one way or the other. And the way you set goals, you know, my husband and I were talking the other day about how we were looking at like the greatest men of all time, you know, if you look throughout history.

43:58Like the best looking? Yeah, exactly. You and your husband sitting around? I think he's hot. Chris would not like that. He would not be interested in that. He's like you. He's an ex-Navy SEAL surfer. Okay. So he's a dude's dude. But we were like, none of these men have actually achieved their goals fully. Like, you know, if you go to Napoleon, if you look back, you know, throughout history and you look at the biggest leaders in the world, they never achieved their goal. And yours is interesting because your goal was not, well, I want to sell a million bracelets. You know, it's I want to do more for mental health than anybody's ever done.

44:27I want to raise more money than ever. Do you think about goals a specific way? Is there like a right way or a wrong way to set goals for Blake? I would definitely now. I'm glad you brought this up. So in the same sense, I'll say I hope that enough, these bracelets, you know, every person on the planet wears one and we raise more money than anyone in the history of mental health. and if I just help one dad tell his teenage daughter that she's enough and read the poem that's in there to her and that creates a tighter bond, we've had success. Like I literally both goals, this actually the dad daughter one's more important.

45:05And, and, and that sounds like a great thing to say on a podcast or in a press thing or whatever, but I actually believe it. And the thing is, is already, we've only been doing this for like two weeks now. We've gotten the most incredible stories of, you know, teenage girls giving it to each other. And it's like their new friendship bracelet. You know, one had been really struggling with depression. She's like, Hey, I want you to know, I always got you and you are enough. Or I did hear about this dad and daughter. I heard about this son that gave it to his dad and said, I've recognized that my dad's been depressed probably for like most of my adult life.

45:37He's a guy in his thirties. He's like, but I never knew how to ask him about it or talk to him. And I gave him the bracelet and it opened up a whole conversation and now my dad's going to therapy. Like, I mean, it's like, so, so when I say goals, I can have, you can, I believe you can set goals that are, you know, not mutually exclusive. Like, I hope that this becomes huge, but if it doesn't, even if we touch a few people and create some interesting conversations and important healing, we've had success. I think there's been talk about like you set a goal and then you hold onto it very lightly.

46:10That's like, so you don't have the pressure of the goal. Goals are great because I do believe what you put out into the universe is often what you get back. So if you don't, like you said, if you don't tell the universe what you want, how the hell are you going to get it? How's he going to give it to you? And if you put pressure of like, oh, I'm only going to feel this project was successful if we raise a hundred million dollars. Well, that's just a silly thing. But a lot of people do that. And a lot of founders do that. I mean, they didn't set goals financially. Like, oh, I need to sell my company for 40 million or 50 million, or I need to do this, or I need to do that.

46:40But really, the ones that build the great businesses are 100 % focused on something that is not necessarily measurable and more cultural. Big goals loosely held. I love that. Big goals loosely held. So good. Also, I think, you know, I think about that a lot with everything we do. And it's one of my favorite things about the businesses you've built before. But, you know, we started the beginning of the podcast with me saying, you know, I try to always think about like one person specifically who listens to this. Because if you think about it, you hold something precious in your hands when you're taking somebody's attention.

47:10That's their life, right? That's lifespan. That's very precious. We don't get very many of those. And so if you imagine that we get millions of views a month across all the social channels, what a travesty if you and I don't give them something really worth spending their life on. Like that would hurt me a little bit. And so I remember like we haven't had very many, but we had two podcasts we had to kill because I was like, I got stuff out of it. Thank you so much for coming. But like a million hours on this, it's not enough. It's not good enough. And so I think one other thing I want to talk about, which is like why we put up the tree.

47:47We were struggling beforehand with this. You know, if you guys are watching us, you're like, why is there this giant tree that is so beautiful behind us? We're struggling with what it was supposed to be. Yeah. And then you told a story about wisdom and the Buddha that this reminded you of. Will you tell us that story? Yeah. So when I started Tom's, we grew beyond shoes into eyewear. We started selling sunglasses. And then we made a deal where we said, okay, if you buy a pair of our sunglasses, we'll pay for a cataract surgery to someone who's blind. We found out that the greatest cataract surgeons in the world are at this hospital in India, in Lundini.

48:22and we decided to go there and watch people get their eyesight back. I mean, it was literally one of the greatest experiences of my life. I mean, I saw grandparents that had never seen their grandkids and see them for the first time because of a surgery that someone got because someone bought a pair of sunglasses on, you know, toms.com or something. I mean, it's crazy. And how much does that surgery cost then? It cost like$16 back then. Yeah, yeah. So, yeah. Yeah, so with one pair of shoes, you're able to cure eyesight. Well, no, with eyewear. We just saw eyewear for$100,$115. That makes sense.

48:51$16 of it went to paying the surgery. So anyway, so we go to Lindini, and they didn't tell me this until we got there, but also Lindini is the birthplace of the Buddha. And I looked over, and they're like, that's the tree. Now, whether that was a tree or not, who knows? But it was a tree that looks just like this. And I have a photo. I have to find it. Probably we can get it for the show of me sitting underneath the tree. And I remember sitting there, and this was before I got depressed. This is like when Tom's was really taking off. I was in my flow. I was very connected to it for all the right reasons.

49:26I wasn't putting all the external pressure. And I just remember thinking like, if this is it, if there's nothing else that happens with this, this, this idea, like, and I just seen some eye surgeries. I was like, that's all that matters. And I think that's like the way I want to live my life each day, each week, each month, going back to goals. Like at the end of the day, I kind of be like, okay, if that's the last one, I'm okay with it, you know? And after the week or after the month, if that's it, I'm okay with it. Because that's, again, about living in alignment, you know? And for me, having gone through such a scary time where for days I thought it was going to end very soon, I just feel like I have like this, you know, they say new lease on life.

50:09Like I feel like this, I get this like second chance. And so that's why I'm spending all my time trying to help others not feel the way I felt and really connect people. Because at the end of the day, I mean, that's all we have are relationships and our own mental health. Because if we don't have mental health, it doesn't matter what physical health you have. Yeah. So what do you do now? Like if you're feeling down, not even going all the way back, but if you're feeling down or you want to feel re-inspired, what do you turn to? What activities, what books, what readings, what quotes? So, okay, this is silly, but one of the things I'm doing right now, and it's not silly, it's just, I don't know how people respond to this, okay?

50:46I like this. Yeah, I know you're going to like this. So, about two months ago, I started using AI therapy. Now, a lot of people ask Chad DDP mental health stuff, but there's this app called Sonia, sonia.ai, and I met the founder at a mental health conference. and he was giving a presentation and explaining how it works and how it's built on the LLMs, but they've basically taken every therapist, every case study, every book ever written, put it in there and tried to design. And they call it emotional support. I think for legal reasons, they call it emotional support instead of AI therapy, but it's AI therapy.

51:22And so anyways, I was like, well, I've done a lot of therapy. I mean, if anyone's done therapy, I mean, I've done a lot of therapy. And one of the things that's really a bummer with therapy is if I have a panic attack, it doesn't happen at two o 'clock on a Thursday, two o 'clock on a Thursday. It happens at four fucking in the morning. And my therapist, I don't care how much money you have. No therapist is answering your call at four o 'clock in the morning. And so I was like, wow, I could because I've still struggle with anxiety. I still have these issues that come up, especially with like launches of new things.

52:00And, you know, just am I always thinking am I being a good enough dad and all these things? I wake up and I have stress about, oh, my gosh, I didn't do this or that. And so now it's like, boom, it's right there at four in the morning and I don't have to do a whole hour session. I could do it for five minutes, 10 minutes. And it works. It works. Unbelievable. If you go on panicking. Yeah. So literally. So, you know, you go in and you get to choose. Like, I like to be talked to like a therapist that is like really direct. or one that's more like light or the one this. And like you get, you kind of fine tune.

52:30It takes like 10 minutes. And then of course as memory, so it never forgets anything. And you tell them what's going on. And like, I started off saying like, this is my core wound. I never felt that I was enough. And so this is what I've done. This is what helped me. I had this mantra-based meditation. I do these things. And so I taught it that. And then I teach it, you know, like, okay, you know, one of my biggest sources of stress is this in my personal life or this. And so it starts figuring all this out. And so then when I say I'm having a panic attack this morning, it knows what to check in about.

53:00You know, well, how did you sleep? For instance, one of the things that I have is like I have a really high like focus on sleep. And if I don't get good night's sleep, I can feel off. And it feels almost like like if I ever have jet lag, it almost feels like depression. Like they kind of feel the same to me. And so it'll check in on my sleep. And then I'll be like, OK, well, like one of the things that we've recognized, we like me and it's so funny. Yeah, it talks to you. It's like that, you know, you really have a trouble when things get too performative. So when you're having to out there sell or do too much press or too much of that, like that's the old Blake.

53:35And it will call it like that. I mean, we've talked enough. It's like that's the Blake before all the growth. The new Blake likes connection. So are you having enough connection? And this week, what are you doing this week to have more connection? That's great. So it doesn't just do what like chat GPT does. Oh, no, no. Which is like, oh, you're great. You're perfect. No, no, no, no. It's like so specific. And then it will be. And then if I say, you know, what I'm doing on Thursday this week to have more connection, I'm going to commit to, you know, going on a run with my friend Pat. It'll send me a text message Thursday morning and say, hey, are you doing the run with Pat today?

54:10Are we investing in this company? What's happening? I want to. I want to. I mean, literally, right now, I literally just working with the founders. One of the things I'm also trying to do a lot now is mentor young entrepreneurs, especially if they're building businesses that can help people with their mental health. And so when I met these guys, I was like, hey, like, I don't know. First off, I just wanted to try it myself. And then it was working so well. And then they know the Tom story. And then I presented at the mental health conference. And they're like, hey, like, can you help us some? And so I've been mentoring them.

54:41So I might invest. We'll see. But, I mean, who knows where this is going? I don't even know if it's going to be legal. But right now it's free. at sonia.ai so you can do it right now it's legal and it's free i don't know if it will be forever but um yeah what about but that's really helping me and and i guess the point i bring that up is is i think what helps me the most is to have um a dependable tool and every tool that works for someone else so some of my friends one of my friends who's recovering alcoholic still deals with a lot of anxiety starts to get you know out of sorts cold plunge you know a cold shower that's his tool.

55:15Just boom. He doesn't, he won't even like allow himself to call someone or talk to a therapist until he does that first. You know, right now this Sonia thing is my tool and I, you know, everyone has a tool, but I think that's the thing I would say is if someone's struggling, find a tool that can interrupt the rumination, the negative thinking, the, you know, all that stuff. And so that's, that's really a big tool for me. And then my other tool is my bracelet. You know, I just have it, I wear it, I talk about it. I, you know, give it out to people all the time. Like tools are important. It's a good point.

55:46It's a pattern interrupt. Yeah. That's what we need. Cause I think when we get out of sorts, you know, when we start feeling negative thoughts, when we start ruminating, when we, you know, you know, it's all just a pattern. It's our brain. Like, you know, it's just like the brain is sending, I mean, for years, for 40 something years, my brain told me I wasn't enough. And so what I did for 40 days is I did a mantra based meditation, 20 minutes in the morning, 20 minutes in the evening where I simply just said, I'm enough. I've always spent enough. And I'd like laugh because it was so silly and it felt stupid for the first couple of weeks.

56:17And then it started working and started feeling it. But all I did was just change that pattern. I love that. Yeah. I just I just had Tony Robbins on the podcast. Oh, great. I love him. I you know, we met briefly once. We've never spent any time together. I want to have him on my podcast. Oh, you should. He talks a lot about feeling. Oh, yeah. And he has one of, I think, like the most intense presences of anybody that I've met. And so I was at his house and we spent a good amount of time with him. And I remember like when he walked in the room, I was like, whoa, like that. He's a big guy, right?

56:46But we've had a lot of big, you know, there's a lot of big guys. But what really took me away is like, that man is locked in. I was like, oh, fuck, he knows what's going on in here. He's like so locked in. And then kind of similar to you, he was like, it was a lot of curiosity, which you seem to have the same thing. Like, why are you this way? Why am I this way? And then once I figure it out, how do I put a tool in place to figure out the solution, which I think is really interesting. But he would be great for your podcast. One of the other things I wanted to ask you about, like now it's so interesting to me that you could have ever been in this dark place because the way you come off is like so, so much joy to be, so much like, you know, big, huge energy for life.

57:27It's crazy. And so I was wondering, like today, what has you so excited? Obviously this. But like when you wake up in the morning, is it that you're going to go surf that day? Is it that you get to build again? I think what has me most excited about life right now is service. It's just like I'm getting to help people again. I know right now, this podcast, there's a thousand percent chance that there's someone listening who's really in a tough place. There's also probably people that feeling stuck, feeling uninspired, feeling insecure. Like I, I felt those things. I mean, for years, I didn't have one business idea for seven years.

58:10For two years, I was a shell of myself. My friends say, literally, they look in my eyes and there was no one there. I mean, I didn't, I couldn't even raise my voice to this octave for two years. And so because I felt that way and it was so scary and it was so recent that I think I wake up now and I'm kind of like.

58:34How do you engineer your life? Like it almost seems like you've adventured your entire career. It's one of the things I struggle with. Yeah. Oh, yeah, I do. I always make time for adventure. But like so in my business, we were just talking about this. I'm like, man, when I'm in my little entrepreneurship grind, it's kind of all I do. Like I'm so deep in it. I talk to a lot of people. It's the same. They're just like they grind every single day. And you seem like a type of person who is always integrated sort of the rest of life into it. Yeah. How do you do that? Two things. One is I really schedule joy.

59:06So I believe that like a lot of people hope for joy or are these big moments to come to them. Like I put it on the calendar the same way you have a board meeting. Like I'm like for one week a month, I'm going surfing. Now I'll still, you can't surf all day long. So I'll surf from five in the morning till 10, get my joy. I'll do Zoom calls from 10 to four. And me and my lady will go for a walk on the beach. We'll have a nice dinner. We'll do, you know, a sunset. And that's my day. And that is like as important as the press week in New York last week. And so I really, really schedule that. And that's, you know, that's nice that I can go somewhere, say, where there's surf or whatever.

59:47Not every person can do that. But what is that for you? Like, what is that joy? Is it taking guitar lessons? Is it learning something new on YouTube? Like, what is that thing? Because if you don't schedule that, then like, what's the purpose? You know, what's the point? Do you do it every day, too? No, I wish. I wish. I mean, if I'm really, really like operating a 10 out of 10, then I'm like making sure I protect a couple hours, you know, early in the morning to, you know, usually it's physical activity. or it's playing golf like nine holes at sunset, you know, with my son or my friends or whatever.

1:00:22Yeah. So. But it's at least once a month. So it's like I schedule a month. I try to schedule a month. Now, I always get a week. No, but I definitely get at least a four day, four days. There's not a month that goes by that I don't have four days where I'm just like, see ya. And do you always do something weird like going to India or like surf? It's not just like, it seems like they're. That's more my personality. Then I think what I would share, like going back to how do we help the person who's listening to this and focusing on them? Like, yes, I do a lot of just crazy adventures because that's just always how I've been.

1:00:57Like, you know, I've always been, you know, racing cars or climbing mountains. I mean, just I like the adrenaline of those things. But also I think you can schedule this, you know, if someone's just like, I love reading and I'm going to schedule four days where I go. It could be like the, you know, you go camping. It could cost nothing. And I'm just going to sit and read the books that I've been wanting to read for two years. Or I'm going to go and just like one thing I did that was, I guess it was a little bit out there, but very simple. Was I hiked the Camino Trail for a week with Alejo this summer.

1:01:31So we just walked for a week. We didn't run. I'm a big walker. Yeah, we just walked. We got up, walked, ate, walked. Like it was the most boring thing I've ever done. And one of the most profound. because my whole nervous system reset and I was able to process the depression and all the things I went through and the pain I caused others and the pain others caused me and I was able to forgive them and forgive myself. And I was like, man, this is better than any therapy retreat I've ever been to. And all I did for a week was walk. I love that. Yeah. And so, so I think it could be, I could have, I did that in Spain, but I could have done that, you know, in Marin where I live, you know yeah so so i think that actually i yeah i just looked up this is so funny but my hobby this year is literally more walking because i like thinking a lot while walking but you know that there are 52 trails in the u.s where you can do more than a seven day walk that are supposed to be seen as highly scenic yeah and you can camp along them so like if you chat gpt it right now anybody listening totally free maybe seven twelve bucks to camp yeah and then you can go for a walk Maybe we can start walking all around the country and having beautiful ideas while you do it.

1:02:40And not being sedentary like your chair. So that we can get all our steps in. Sitting is the new smoking. Who knew? Blake walking episode. Here's the slogan I'm pitching. We're talking to chair company. That's who you think as a business person. Really simple. Never still. Oh, God. That's true. Plus, I'm into that. I don't like being still. Yeah. So now when you're sitting, the other thing about the chair thing, not to make this all about that, but they're going to love this. This is what you got here. is so they thought it was to help you know with get people you know not being still you know help with the back pain help with you know but what they found like the biggest hack is people have adhd because what happens do you okay so you know how like when you're if you really focus on something you kind of need to be doing something else oh totally you like to fidget you like you doodle your ring so they've shown that you can really focus well we've done all this research to show that by sitting in this chair your body is just doing this kind of you can barely see it And it allows you to hyper focus on whatever you're doing.

1:03:37So I thought, yeah, you're getting one for sure. I'm totally sorry. I don't wait. All your guests will be studying one. Okay. So I want to leave the person listening here that like just needs to listen to Blake today. Like your parting words. So like there is that person out there. You know, you have something to imbue to them. What comes to you first? What do you want to leave the listener? I just think that what I want to say is that it will pass. You know, no matter what you're going through, no matter how hard it is, like just it will get better. It always does if you just hang on and you take the steps to do the things.

1:04:20So go out for the walk, you know, you know, reach out to a friend, you know, journal for 30 seconds. Not even five minutes, just 30 seconds of something that you're appreciative of. But no matter how hard it is, it will pass. I didn't think it was going to pass. I thought I was trapped. I thought I'd made too many mistakes. I had too much shame. And that's why I had such dark thoughts. But looking back now, I'm like, it was always going to pass. I just had to hold on. I just had to start doing one thing at a time. I just had McConaughey on my podcast. and he talks about one in a row. Just get one in a row today.

1:05:00And so that would be my advice is like knowing like, or not even advice, just like, just I want you to hear that it will pass and it will get better, but you got to do the work. You got to put it in. Like who would have thought? Least interesting thing about you is that you sold your company for 600 million bucks. Least interesting. Thank you so much for being here today. I'm so - Oh, I got to give you a bracelet before we're done. Oh, we're going to do it right now. Absolutely. I love this. So here we go. So we take one out. This one's for you. And it says, so you got to make sure I do this, right?

1:05:30Yep. So open your palm. Okay. And for those who are listening, I'm putting enough bracelets. That's just my outfit today. I didn't even wear it on purpose. And I'm going to read you something. Okay. Okay. So this is a little poem. Do you know the poet NQ? So he's an amazing poet, friend of mine. And I said, how do I share this with someone besides just giving it to him? I'm like, well, if I really want them to feel this, then what can we say? So here it is. So, Cody, I see you, the you behind the you, not for anything you've done or anything you're going to do. I don't stop to say it enough, but I believe in you.

1:06:13And if you could see yourself from my view, you'd believe it too. That's why I'm giving you the gift that I'm receiving too. A message to remind you when you're lost or feeling blue. A mantra to repeat when times are tough. Because no matter who we are, we are always enough. It's a silent prayer I'm sending for the world's mental health. I wear the symbols for myself and now as a bond to someone else. It's a blessing and a gentle push to never give up. because no matter who you are, you are enough. So good. Beautiful. Also, while you're a marketing legend. Blake, thank you so much for being here today.

1:06:55Thank you for having me. Where can people go to find you? Weareenough.co is the website for enough. And then I'm on Instagram at Blake Mycoskie and the pivot chair, PVOT. Yeah, we'll put all the links down below. And the 30 people that I would love to be our ambassadors. I'm looking to your community to help me get to them. I like it. I love this idea. And we'll ping somebody with your brilliant marketing ideas too and help them find it. What did we call it? We called it utility marketing. Utility marketing. We got a little trademark for Blake today. I think we want to do 10 people. Whoa. 10 people.

1:07:30I love this. 10 people. Tell us what you need help with utility marketing. What are they going to comment? So they're going to comment on YouTube. Basically, just tell us what your product is. And then I'll just make them a video of my idea. Oh, I love this idea. All right. You're the man. Blake. Thank you. This was so great.