Infidelity, Commitment, and Healing: A Real Conversation with Lewis Howes | E184

20:06I think that's amazing. I do wanna come back to the prep and I appreciate the compliment. Extreme Preparation is my brand. I'm writing a book by it. It's the core of my executive coaching. I love it. People want one-on-one coaching. When's the book out? Hopefully the end of next year. I'm well behind on my book.

20:20Lewis Howes:What's holding you back from getting it complete? Just, you know, the divorce has been a big distraction and mentally you have to be in the right place. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Do you have a guide or a coach helping you finish it? Yes. I mean, I have a ghost writer, but they don't actually write the book. So that's the... Kind of coaching you? It's kind of like, you know, you spend 40 hours, you know, with your ghostwriter. And, you know, he'll put things down on paper, which is easier than you beginning from scratch. But it's easier to... First, I was thinking, okay, maybe I should just do this on my own.

20:53And it is better to have someone pushing you forward. You know, I've got deadlines. Of course, I've missed them all. But at least they can follow up with you. Yeah. You know, then I have a publisher and they're following up too. So we're all working together. So now I'm cranking. But just go back to the preparation. So I've never listened to another podcast in my life. I woke up four and a half years ago, and I said, I'm going to start a podcast. But what I do do is I listen to – I print out every transcript of podcasts that my guests have been on. So that's how I get the details. For yours, 254 single-spaced pages of transcripts.

21:27Lewis Howes:Oh, my gosh. Right? In addition, I've read everything about you. Uh-huh. Right? And then I found certain things online, too, that were not in the transcripts. Obviously, I read your website. And the research shows. So on average, I prepare 14 hours per show. Wow. That's great. You and I have been asking you to be on my show. Thank you for being here. Yeah, yeah, of course. Jordan, recent webber shout out to him because you guys met at a SiriusXM. Yeah, yeah. So he's the head sales guy there. And he went up to you afterward and said, hey, my friend Randy has a show in search of excellence. He did, I remember that.

22:03Lewis Howes:It's like a year ago or something. Shout out to Jordan, who's an amazing friend. But it's very important to do your research. Extreme preparation will get you anywhere. If a company's laid off 40 ,000 people and you're that guy or that woman who's done the research and shows people that you can really add value, everyone is hiring at the end of the day. Everybody. I got my big break writing cold letters asking for informational interviews to 300 CEOs as a loser lawyer who had three jobs in eight months. There was something called LexisNexis. There was no online, no Google them. Everyone told me my idea was crazy and stupid and that no one's going to meet with you.

22:43And at the end of the day, one thing, you got to trust your gut. Two, when some people tell you that, it just motivates you and you got the fuel on fire to succeed. So I got 80 meetings. And every single person, CEO of Disney, Viacom, Sumner Redstone, out of 300, and every single person said the same thing. I've never taken a cold letter like this in my entire life. You need to create the process of what those letters say. That's going to be in my book. So yeah, that's all in the book. But it's the same thing today, Louis. That's cool. But people don't take the time to do it. They don't. Each letter took five hours to write.

23:17And I got all these people who I coach. Were they handwritten or were they typed? No, they were typed. E-mails. No, no emails. Letters. They were typed. They were typed with you shipped.

23:25Lewis Howes:You sent them. They're physical. Yeah. People take the time. to read the live stream. Addressing informational interviews is different than a job interview because you're appealing to the sense of giving back. And most CEOs, most successful people realize they think back where they came from. I never forgot where I came from. I remember every couch I slept on. I remember just begging and pleading. You want to give back, but you want to do it with the right people. The people that really get appreciated, not just someone who doesn't do their research. They have to earn it. They have to earn it.

23:53Lewis Howes:And you can earn it by doing five hours of research and sending a letter, just doing it one step harder, right? A little bit more, you could earn it that way potentially. My letter had a self-encovered and a quote that the CEO had given at some point in their career. That's cool. The key to Disney is how we hire their CEO of Time Magazine, the date. Then it was tabbed with my three-page single space letter that listed every job they'd ever had in their career. I want this structure. I want the book now. Steven Bolbach, CEO of Marriott Scooping Ice Cream at Disneyland when he was 16 years old for$1.27 per hour.

24:28Who knew that? It was mentioned in one article. One magazine somewhere, yeah. Yeah, from 17 years ago. And once again, this is LexisNexis, where today you can maybe go find it, maybe not go find it. Wow. And it's like, that's how you get the meeting. And every now and then, maybe once a month, I get the tab, single-spaced letters, and everyone gets a meeting, right? Wow.

24:49Lewis Howes:So how would you, would they email you back? Would they email you back? Oh, no, they mail it. They would write a letter and say, let's do the name. They would type it. I get a cellophane cover. I get the tabs. I get the transcripts. It's everything. They know my dog. They've listened to shows. They can cite a podcast. They can cite quotes that I've, you know, they know my family. Wow. No, but I mean, when you did these letters, what, 30, 40 years? When was this? Like, you were 20-something? 1996. How did you get these responses back? Oh. Were people emailing you back? Phone calls. No. Emails? No, I mean, that was kind of.

25:24It was kind of a new thing.

25:25Lewis Howes:So they would call you. The CEOs would call you. The assistant would call. And say, hey, he got your letter. We'd like to meet with you. Yeah. What was that like, getting those calls? I mean, the first one, the first meeting I got was Mark Platt, who was CEO of TriStar Studios. I remember going in, you know, as a kid, you're like, oh, my God, the movies are so great. I remember going onto the lot. I got a special parking spot. I'm walking around on these movie sets thinking, oh, gosh. I remember walking into the office. He had a basketball hoop there. Like, oh, my God, I mean the head of a studio.

25:52This is incredible. and just, you know, a positive reinforcement. Stacey Snyder was the next person and, you know, you remember all these people who you meet. Eli Brode hired me at the end of the day and again, it's a crazy story. I mean... So how long would they give you? Was it like an hour of time? Was it like... It depends. It depends. And you would just get

26:10Lewis Howes:an informational interview? You would ask them questions? I would ask them questions. They would ask me questions. Were you recording it? Voice-relibering. Recording a memoir. I don't know, a tape recorder or something? Or are you just like writing it? And the thing is, I was making a mistake. because I remember writing this guy, David Hermelon in Detroit, who was a well-known businessman on 10 % Detroit Pistons. Insurance was his thing. And so he was a well-known guy. I wrote him a letter. And in the letter, it's kind of like how I get my podcast guests. You have credibility. It's how we build companies.

26:40You have one customer. It's referenceable. And you have credibility. So maybe you responded because I had some credibility. And all of the guests, by the way, Gary V was on my show. Robert Green was on my show.

26:51Lewis Howes:Tony Robbins, yeah. Yeah. Tony was amazing. I just had him on last week too. Yeah. Great. My hero. Tony's the best. He wrote me or someone called me from his office and said, okay, David would like to meet with you. So I took the red eye. I'm in the back of the plane. I have no money. I go to this deli and it's like the mafia buster. There's eight people. It's seven in the morning, which is four o 'clock in the morning, my time in Los Angeles. I sit down and he says, Randy, he's Jewish. I'm Jewish. It's kind of like a Jewish geography thing. Where'd you grow up? Oh, who's your mom? I said, you know, my mom's name.

27:24I said, I've known Linda since we were in fourth grade. Why do you have her call me? I said, David, I'm here. And he said, well, that's actually interesting. And I respect the fact you did it on your own. But he said to me, he said, you're getting all these meetings. Look at all these people you met. He said, what are you doing? What's your goal? And my goal was to get a job. And he said, well, do you ask people for a job? And I said, no. And he said, why not? He said, because I feel bad. You know, they're giving me the time. They're doing this. You'd want to ask for something else. He changed my life at that point.

27:54He said, you got to ask for the order. I sell insurance for a living. No one wakes up and said, I need life insurance today. They don't even know what it is. So the bell went off. Eli Brode, I met a little while longer. I didn't have to ask for the order because my research was so detailed. He said, I need to hire you. He said, you have the biggest set of balls I've ever met in my lifetime. But I knew everything about it. He said, I've never met anyone like you. I was asking questions about in the footnotes of the financial statements regarding pool of interest of accounting. It was the 17th footnote.

28:27And you're like, where the fuck did you get this from? But I didn't even know what that meant. But it's like, that's how you do it. That's how you knock someone off their chair. And with extreme preparation, that's how you do it. That's the core of my executive coaching. And again, it works 99 % of the time. That's incredible. You got to get this book out now. It works, yeah. I mean, the book is going to be. Put it out yesterday. Hopefully it's life-changing for people because these techniques, anyone can do them. You just got to put in the work. You're right. And people say this too. I sent out 100 resumes.

28:55Well, how much time do you spend on each one? Are they different? Like, okay, if you would do better, your probability of success would increase massively if you spent an hour per one.

29:05Lewis Howes:We got a guy on our team. He's a young video editor guy. he made this incredible like video resume custom to me and the show that was so unique and different than every other application we get i was like this guy spent days on this at least days and i go and he's no guarantee of getting a job he's not getting paid for this but it was so creative i was like we need someone who's thinking like that who's going to willing to do whatever it takes and now he works with us. It's the best. It's like, if you just phone it in and send general resumes or whatever, it's just not going to stand out. We're going to go back in time.

29:42You're on your sister's couch, start paying rent, and you go on Craigslist. Jim was on my show, by the way, Newmark, founder of Craigslist. Okay, nice. He was great. You should get him on your show, by the way. Very interesting interview. That's cool. There's a sports marketing job. You apply for it, get the interview. Yes. And then you don't go.

30:01Lewis Howes:I don't go. Yeah. So talk about, you didn't go because you didn't want to do it. And at the end of the day. I got dressed up and I was like ready to go out the door. I remember this. And I was like, cause I went, I had a sports, I finally graduated college and I got a sports management degree. So I was into sports cause I played sports and I liked marketing. So I was like, okay, I could see myself doing that. And I opened the door to leave my sister's house. And I'm like looking out at the car and I was just like, I couldn't walk out the door. I was just like, nah, I'm not going to go. And maybe I lacked the courage to go for it or something, or I was like, ah, afraid or something, whatever.

30:35Lewis Howes:But it was really, I just, I had a lot of confidence at that moment where I was like, I feel like I'm going to get this job. I feel like when I go, I'm going to wow them. I'm going to talk about all the things I can do. I'm going to show them what I can do. I've already done some of these things and I'm going to get this job. I'm going to get some job, like some entry level job at this place. And then I'm determined, I'm going to work hard. I'm going to, I'm going to climb this ladder here and I'm going to be successful. But for whatever reason, I was just like, I don't think that's what I'm meant to do right now.

31:00Lewis Howes:And even though I didn't have any money and I was like struggling and living on my sister's couch still, I just felt like I was meant to do something different. It was kind of a wake up call. It's like, well, if I'm not going to take this route, then I need to go all in on this other stuff. And I need to start really learning how to make money and start figuring this out and have the courage to do these things. Not just research and do a little bit on LinkedIn, but like now I need to figure out how to make real money and get off my sister's couch and be a grown adult. but you gave up something while you're broke living on a couch without a concrete plan, actually a written plan, to pursue a passion.

31:37So everyone's listening out there today and everyone's saying, all right, here's Lewis Howes who didn't get a conventional job and is just going to keep living on a couch because you think you can do something based on your passion to help people. Is that the same advice you'd give your kids?

31:53Lewis Howes:Oh man, that's interesting. I don't know. I guess it all depends the context of like how old they are and the situation in their life from what season they're in because I did jobs before then. I worked as a truck driver for a few months, six hours a day. I didn't want to do that job, but I think I needed to do that job because of like what it taught me. And it taught me that I didn't want to do these things. So I did other things that I was like, all right, I don't want to do these things. But maybe I would tell them, hey, you should go work for like a year somewhere and just learn some skills and realize you don't want to do that maybe and find something else.

32:25Lewis Howes:But I know what I would tell my kids. I think it's all based on like their personality type and what their dreams are. I would want them to fulfill their dreams the best way possible. That might be working at a company somewhere and learning and developing there. It may not be. I think it depends on their personality. But I would want to teach them early on how to be resourceful. And I think some people are meant to go start something on their own and figure out how to earn money and then manage all that that comes with money. And I think other people like being a part of a team and they do well being on a part of a team and they could rise with a team.

32:59Lewis Howes:I was almost forced. I don't think I was meant to be like a leader that learned how to make money. I was forced into that. It was very unnatural for me and it was very uncomfortable because my father essentially wasn't able, you know, he was essentially, he was alive, but he wasn't all there. He didn't, He didn't have the financial support that he could give to me or the education anymore. There was no safety net with my dad because of the situation. I was, and my sister was like, after a year and a half, you got to leave. Like you either got to pay rents. You can't just be a bum on my couch anymore.

33:31Lewis Howes:So I had to like, I was forced to eventually have to learn how to take action. And I could have gone and worked for a company and I would have got the job. But I just felt that something else was calling me. So I was like, all right, this is my time. while I'm broke, while I have nothing to lose because I'm already at the bottom. Let me at least try for something and I can always go work somewhere else and I'll be okay. And I think that was a good turning point for me that it gave me an opportunity to try something different. Another big moment in your life and it's important to all of us is I meet professionally with people.

34:05I invest in people's companies. And one of the things that they have to do is give me the one-liner on what they're doing. Elevator pitch. So if you can't explain to me in one sentence what you're doing in the same way that my grandmother, before she passed away at 104, could understand it knowing nothing about technology. I have zero interest.

34:25Lewis Howes:In funding you. In funding you because if you can't tell me, you cannot sell what you're doing. So tell us about Jim Calm and the elevator pitch and how important that was in your career. Oh, Joe Calm. Yeah, Joe Calm was, he was an online marketer who had also written books and New York Times bestseller. Early on, this is 2009, I believe it was 2009. I'm starting to go to like conferences and events to network because I'm like I need to be around these leaders and experts and thought leaders and I was reading a lot of blogs at that time and I was just like trying to learn about online marketing I was learning from all these kind of experts teaching these thought leaders and then I start going to these conferences I'm taking buses around the country and staying in freaking hostels with like 20 guys throwing up in the middle of the night just to like get in and finding ways for people to give me a free pass And I'm somehow getting in front of all like the big speakers at these events and having moments with them.

35:16Lewis Howes:And a lot of it was like, okay, you've got one moment to say something interesting and they're moving on to the next person. And he goes like, what's your elevated pitch? Like I had another guy there was a friend of mine who came to one of my LinkedIn networking events who knew this guy, Joel. And he said, here's my friend, Lewis. He's the LinkedIn king. So he kind of positioned me without me having to say anything in front of like one of these thought leaders. And Joel looked at me and said, okay, give me the pitch on LinkedIn. and I go, well, here's why LinkedIn is the best and it's the biggest network and it's gonna help you grow your business.

35:45Lewis Howes:I can't remember exactly what I said, but I said something that was like, I put it out there and he's like, okay, cool. Then he moved on and I was like, I don't know what I said, but I had a lot of passion and enthusiasm with what I was saying. For whatever reason, a few weeks later, I got an email from him that says, hey, I'm doing this online bootcamp, this like free workshop, essentially a webinar, where I'm teaching about Twitter. I'm teaching social media marketing for businesses and I've got the Twitter person, I've got the YouTube person, and the Facebook person. But I don't know anyone else talking about LinkedIn.

36:13Lewis Howes:Again, it's 2009. No one's really talking about it. I don't know anyone talking about LinkedIn like you. Can you come and do a training, like a webinar, teach? I was like, yes, I'm in. But I'd never done one. I didn't know what I was doing. So I tried to research and study how to do it. And I ended up doing this webinar with him. And this changed my life because it unlocked. Within an hour, I made$6 ,200 selling a program that I hadn't even made yet. I had a PayPal link that I just gave people. and I said, hey, buy this program. I'll deliver it in two weeks. We'll do it weekly live. We'll do it live.

36:45Lewis Howes:And it was a broadcasting joke. He got it. You got that right? We'll do it live. And unlocked something in front of me because I was like, I was running around the country doing these LinkedIn networking events, making 500 to 1 ,000 bucks, maybe 1 ,500 bucks like cash. But it was like, it was a grind going around, like getting one by one of people to show up to an event, giving me five, 10 bucks. Not really making much. this was$6 ,200 in an hour just teaching something I already knew and I was like I could do this every day for the rest of my life you know it's like teaching something I already know and just sharing with people so I was like I need to learn webinars I need to learn how to master teaching presenting slide design you know curation I need to learn how to sell I need to learn how to do all these things and that's what I did for like the next five six years was just like do the same thing over and over every week and try to develop new skills.

37:39Lewis Howes:But that unlocked my ability to think about, oh, I can actually make money. When before then, I didn't know how to make money. I didn't know money would ever come to me. I was kind of afraid of money. I wasn't sure of it. I just didn't understand it. Like even money terminology just kind of scared me. I was like, uh, I'm too stupid to know what that means. So maybe it's not meant for me. And so all these things gave me like, it opened my mind to possibilities of how to make, like, it's possible. I did it once. Let's see if if I can do it again. And that was a game changer. But that one relationship, showing up to that event and meeting that guy, giving him a passionate pitch around why I think LinkedIn is the best thing ever.

38:15Lewis Howes:Him following up and saying, let's do this thing. Me saying yes, having the courage to figure out how to do it. All this stuff, I had to keep taking the action steps to make that even a possibility where it opened my mind. We're going to hit your show now. But before we get into the details of the show, I want you to define for everybody, what is greatness? For me, greatness is pursuing your gifts and talents, developing them to live your dreams. And in the pursuit of your dreams, you're making an impact on the people around you. I love it. But I think it's a two-pronged approach. It's about doing what you feel called inside of you to do and figuring out how to develop those skills to make that into fruition, but doing it in a way where you're impacting people positively in that process.

38:57Lewis Howes:In the journey, at the end, you're just always in service to other people while you're in service to the thing you're called to do. So many of us experience kind of a jumping off point at our lowest point. Yeah. And so here we are 13 years ago. Things are not going great for you. You move to LA for a girl. You break up. You had a problem with a business partner. And here you are. And you've got these two guys you know who started a podcast. They talk about great lead gen for you. I think Joe Rogan had a podcast back then. That was a couple other people. And that was about it. A couple other people.

39:30So tell us the first show you had, who was the guest? And then tell us how you've been able to grow your show to be one of the best, most successful shows ever.

39:40Lewis Howes:Robert Green was my first guest. And I had like an email introduction through him at some point from someone. That's a big one. It was a big one, man. And I was like, I need someone big to start, right? And so that was the whole, hey, can I help you sell a bunch of these books? Let me do a webinar with you. So I literally went to his house and like recorded a webinar on my computer selling his books. But I made it like a great interview piece. At the end, I sold his books and he allowed it to happen. And then we launched it as like an episode. And for me, I just, I said for myself, I'm going to do this as an experiment.

40:12Lewis Howes:I'm going to do this for one year, once a week, every week for a year. And I'm going to see how I like it. I didn't try to make money with it. I wasn't trying to do anything. I was like, I'm just going to see if I can build my brand, interview fashioning people, learn and hopefully help some people. And after one year, I was like, man, I really love this. And the messages were people coming in saying, Hey, Lewis, I listen to you on Mondays. And then I don't know what to do the rest of the week. Can you do twice a week? So year two, I did twice a week. And then they said the same thing. Hey, I listened to you twice a week.

40:40Lewis Howes:And then I don't know what to do the rest of the days. So I've done three times a week for the last 11 years, every single week for 13 years. And I think preparation has been one of the things that allowed me to connect with people and interview people. Originally, I use my kind of LinkedIn skills of like getting people on the phone or in person to book guests. And that's something I've seen you do, you know, firsthand how you've been consistent and following up. And a lot of it's been patience too. I've been patient for years until I booked guests. And I have like one of the biggest shows and I still have to be patient to get guests that I want and strategic and finding the right moment in the right time.

41:14Lewis Howes:Okay. When are they launching something? How can I serve them? Not how can they serve me? And I still use that same approach, you know, before every guest comes on, they sit down. I ask them all the same question. What would make this the most powerful conversation you've ever had? Right before we start, I say this. We say a lot of other stuff beforehand, but then it's like, what would make this the most powerful conversation you've ever had? And my intention is to impact millions of lives around the world with what you're about to say. And I think it grounds them to say, oh, this person wants to serve me.

41:44Lewis Howes:He wants to help me. He's trying to put me in the best light possible. He's trying to get the best out of me. So let me make sure I give him my best. And it's not about him. It's about serving millions of lives. And I think when people realize the impact they're about to have, I think they give, you know, they get, they get centered, they're present, they're authentic, they're more vulnerable, all these things. And so the preparation has supported me. And it's the pre-show is the show. You know, it's like when we connected out here, for me, that's everything. how those first few minutes land. And it's usually the same thing with the guests.

42:20Lewis Howes:Like I'm thinking of the pre-show experience, how my team receives someone. We, you know, get their like coffee orders beforehand, ask what they need for special requests. We have things set up in the green room, whatever they need. We try to pre-plan these things. And I've got 13 years of experience doing this. So I've learned what works for me. It's greeting them outside. It's making sure they have like whatever, like the whole thing is set up from when they come in to when they leave. It's trying to make the best experience possible for them. And there's always ways to make it better. Just like there's always ways that you can prepare differently and improve your preparation.

42:53Lewis Howes:It's like, okay, how can we improve this? How can we improve this? How can we improve this? From like, what's the mood we want to create with the music that's on in our green room? From the photography we take beforehand, all this different stuff. It's part of the pre-show experience. When you go to Vegas and you watch Cirque du Soleil, there's a show before the show. You know, the performers are out there. They're interacting and entertaining you. Like the show has already begun before you sit down in the chair and watch the theater. And I think when you can create that with a guest, whether it's how you approach them in your email, how you connect to them beforehand, it's making the whole experience great.

43:27My first guest was a guy named Sam Zell, who was a mentor in the real estate world. He was a god. He invented the modern day of Reed. He was on the first Forbes 400 list who came out in 1982. and he had gone to Michigan and this reporter named Jerome Levin who was the head business reporter for the Detroit Free Press called me when I was living next to the Jack in the Box and said, I heard you're going to make a lot of money and there's a story about this kid in Detroit who's about to blow up our company had actually gone public and so he was going to write this piece he did, my mom couldn't have written a better piece and he called me that night and he said, hey, what did you think?

44:05Oh, Jerome, that was really, really nice It was something I didn't want to do, by the way. No one needed to know my financial situation. Everyone loves talking about the money. And he said to me on that call, he said, do you know who Sam Zell is? And I said, yeah, he's a hero to me, a business guy. I've read about Sam. His name is all over University of Michigan campus. And so I said, do you want to meet Sam? Like, I'd love to meet Sam. I'm thinking the reporter does not know Sam well enough to call him at 9 o 'clock at night. All right, I'll call you back. Five minutes later, he called me back.

44:36I talked to Sam. Here's his number. He'd love to meet you. I text Sam, and there I am, Louis, living my dream. I just bought the Porsche that I always wanted. I used to sit in the Porsche dealership once a year. One day, I'm going to have this car. And there I am driving down PCH, top-down, music blaring. I'm going to meet Sam Zell. It was amazing. So he became a friend and a mentor to me. It was one of the great moments of my life as well. And we were friends. But I never requested something of him. I didn't want to impact the friendship. I'm the same way. I'm the same way. Very hesitant about it.

45:10Lewis Howes:I'm the same way with a lot of people that I meet. I don't ask them for things. Like, I don't ask them for anything. Yeah. And maybe I need to stop doing that. I was so nervous. I said, okay, I'm going to start a podcast. And you asked him to come on. Eight and a half years ago, one of my interns who said, you know, our internship is life-changing. You teach us every day. You have guest speakers who don't do this, but they come in because they're friends and we like to help people. I said, no one listens to podcasts. That's really stupid. I'd never listen to a podcast. And obviously, like so many things in life, I was wrong.

45:42And four and a half years ago, I woke up, I'm going to start a podcast just because I want to give back. Like you, I said, what's my goal in life? What's my passion? It's to give back. It's to help people. It's to serve. Like of all the things I've done, this is it. And like you, I have the same goal, 100 million people. That's the goal. We can do it together. Yeah. And so, God, I was so nervous. You know, I picked up the phone, called Sam. And I'm like, oh, God, this is the first time I've asked him for anything. And before the words were out, he said, I'd love to do it. Wow. It just made me feel so good.

46:12I got emotional. I could hardly speak, thinking, God, that's the kind of guy he is. And people give you your big break, and that gave me credibility. Sherinstone was my second guest. But Cliff Kingsbury, a football coach, was my third guest. That's pretty cool. Yeah, Cliff's amazing. If you haven't had him on your show, he's a great guest. That's cool. He's going to get another shot here at a head coaching job. So he'll probably have another one. I think one of the things that's important for anybody starting a company is you can't wait until perfection. You got to get it out there. You just got to start now and stop worrying about making it perfect.

46:50You had that same mentality. Tell everyone kind of what you were doing at the beginning, doing this, doing that, and how it's always good to constantly improving. I mean, with the podcast? Yeah. You were filming with your phone.

47:02Lewis Howes:I was recording on my phone in busy gyms, and it was loud, and the tech was bad. I didn't know what I was doing. I was filming in my kitchen living room. I still remember I was in a tiny little apartment when I moved to L.A. originally the first year, just a one-bedroom apartment. And I had a little circle table in my kitchen. And I had Sean Johnson, Olympic gold medalist, in my little living room with two little mics. It was just the most basic setup with big names. and were you kind of like god they're coming to my small apartment you know what are they going to see when they walk in here a bit but i was also just like whatever young and hungry and i was like hey i'm excited i was just like i want to make this great and put it out there and there was again 13 years ago there was no like podcast recording studios like no one was really doing and there was no video it was just audio really back then it was all audio maybe joe rogan was doing or maybe a couple tech shows or something but it wasn't like big and so i was just trying to record and do the best I could.

47:59Lewis Howes:And just, again, I was building relationships with people and just saying, how can I serve you? How can I promote you? How can I offer more guidance or help? And it didn't feel like an ask. It more felt like, I want to promote you. And so I was finding people that I already had a relationship with that I was like, hey, I just want to help. I want to promote. You got this thing out. You got this book out. Let me help you. Here's a way I can do it. And they'd be like, great. So it didn't feel bad. You just got to get out there. You got to do it. Yeah. And just say, how can I make it better? How can I improve every time?

48:27Let's talk about some of the things that make us successful. You've talked about mindset. So what do you mean that someone needs a great mindset to actually go do it and accomplish their dream?

48:37Lewis Howes:Well, I just think gratitude and generosity are the gateway to abundance in all areas of your life, relationships, financially, health. That when we are grateful and when we live in generosity, when we give to others, it's going to make us feel more rich. It's going to enrich our lives. And I think that's what a great life is, is a rich, beautiful life. And that starts with gratitude and generosity. And that could be, you know, I just have gratitude baked. It seems so basic, but I have gratitude baked throughout my entire day. From the morning when I wake up, I say, thank you, God. I say thank you to my wife.

49:14Lewis Howes:And I say what I'm grateful for. If someone calls my cell phone, I text. I don't really pick up the phone because I have it on mute all the time. But if you text me or if you call me, you get my answering machine, it's going to say, feel free to leave a message, but share what you're grateful for first. I love that. I'm always evoking gratitude out of others and asking them, hey, what are you grateful for today? Literally, I had two team members that were in my office this morning before I came here. They walked in. I said, what are you grateful for from the weekend? They both shared, oh, I'm grateful for I got some time with my friends, my family.

49:42Lewis Howes:I got to sleep. I got to recover. Cool. I just think that mindset makes us more creative, makes us more appreciative, makes us more resourceful as opposed to living in a victim mindset of what you're ungrateful for or being a lack of generosity. And I was never going to be the smartest. I'm still never going to be the smartest. I'm never going to be the most intelligent or have the most skills. But I learned early on by going to events and conferences and meeting people, meeting, you know, if I was 23 and I met someone like you, I'd have been like, I don't belong. But I brought so much joy. I brought so much curiosity.

50:15Lewis Howes:Like I was just curious. I'd be like, can you tell me more about this? And I would just listen. And I would be so attentive and be like, wow, that's fascinating. And I was just so curious about human beings. That was generous. That was me being generous by being curious. For whatever reason, people just wanted to be around me, not because I had anything to offer. I didn't have money at that time. I didn't have a skill set, I didn't have degrees, whatever, credibility, but I was like, just curious. And I think that allowed me to get my foot in the door. Now you gotta be, you gotta do more than just that, but that was the mindset that started for me.

50:47Lewis Howes:And I think if I look at all the people, you have a lot of friends who are billionaires and sports stars and sports coaches. It's like, yes, they're all willing to work harder than everyone else in their field, obviously. They have to work hard. They have to have extreme preparation. They have to do all the little things right. But I think if you accomplish it all, but you don't have friends or your kids don't wanna spend time with you or you just have anger in your heart, that's not greatness. So you have to have gratitude and generosity. And you've learned at this season, 56, 57. 57. You've learned, okay, I have all the money.

51:23Lewis Howes:I've did the billion dollar thing. I've got, you know, I've got it. I know everyone like, sure, you can make more money, but what are you going to do with it? You can't take it with you. So you're at the point where like, how do I serve? How do I invest in others? Whether that's with a check, my time, with my content, with my books, with mentorship, whatever. You want to find ways to use your money, time, your resourcefulness to give and serve a hundred million lives. That's what's a rich, great life for you. It's not, how do I build the next unicorn? You don't care about that. I mean, maybe if it happens, cool, but it's not your main focus to make more money as your number one priority.

51:56Lewis Howes:Sure, you're playing the scorecard and it's like a game still and you've got to do something with your time, but a lot of your time is giving, service, connection, relationships. And that's greatness to me. You're listening to part two of my incredible interview with Lewis Howes, one of the best interviews I've ever done. Lewis is the host of the School of Greatness, which has over a billion downloads. He's a former professional athlete. He's an executive coach, best-selling author. If you haven't yet listened to part one, be sure to check that one out first. Now, without further ado, here's part two of my awesome interview with Lewis.

52:27I mean, my goal is to have people achieve the success that I've had by teaching them lessons that I've learned and how to get there. And most people think about, okay, they love talking about the successes. I love talking about the failures a lot more than the successes because that's where you, I think, learn the most. One of the things too that I love about my podcast, I get to meet people like you who teach me things that I can incorporate into my own life. Imitation is the greatest form of flattery. I'm changing my message on my voicemail today to the gratitude.

52:57Lewis Howes:Just say, hey, what are you grateful for today? Then leave me your message. Right, I mean, that's brilliant. And I just want to comment on one thing you said as well. Always surround yourself by people better than you who know more than you do. Ask people questions and also think it's a dumb question. If you're the smartest person in the room, you're in the wrong room. Absolutely. I've been saying that forever. And it's, you know, like you, I feel stupid around some of these people that I get to meet. Like, oh, shit. I guess one question I'd ask you is, you know, when was your first divorce? I was 38.

53:25Lewis Howes:38? Yeah. You're going to be 58. I'll be 58. Hopefully the finalized of this one. So it's a 20-year difference. Yep. So if you could go, if you could give a piece of advice to your 38-year-old self from where you are now, with everything you know from marriage and divorce, what would that advice be to that 38-year-old self? I think it would just be the same. You got to live your life and you got to be true to yourself. You have to put your significant, your spouse or whoever this is, before your own needs. And marriage is work. And so when I was younger, I had this ideal that, gosh, you know, marriage is bliss and relationships are work.

54:04Marriage is work and it's hard. You know, the sad thing is more than half the people who get married get divorced. And if you're a product of divorce, the probability of increase gets like 75%, 80%. And so it's my kids are—

54:19Lewis Howes:Because you didn't have a healthy model. Right. And I mean, my kids are terrified. Now, on the other hand, my mom said this to me, everyone has a right to be happy. No one signed up to be a martyr. Not that my marriages were so bad because they weren't, right? I mean, people have problems in their marriages. And obviously, I'm a little embarrassed. if I'm going through my second divorce, I'm 57. You know, you want to date women. And gosh, you know, do I really want to date someone who's been divorced twice? Yeah, yeah. And I've got five kids. Now, by the way, if you don't like the fact that I have five kids, I don't even want to know you.

54:50Yeah, exactly. Like I have no interest in dating you. But if you look back and you think about, you know, what did I learn and do differently? I think we have to understand that who you are at 38 is not who you are at 57. You're a different person. You're a whole different person, different life experience. You've been through things with your kids. You're more mature on the one hand, and you've been through life experiences on the other hand. And when you have a spouse 17 years younger than you, at 40, did I grow into the same person at 57? I didn't. And this is true for everyone looking at marriage today when you think about it and you're newly married and relatively newly married, and you've got to ask yourself, are you going to grow on parallel paths for the rest of your life?

55:31And the answer is, regardless of how much you're in love, and how much support you have, you don't know the answer to that question until life actually happens. You don't know. Right? People get sick. There are relationships. You have in-laws that can really affect, I mean, there's a million things, right? There's jobs, all kinds of things. And so -

55:49Lewis Howes:If you could go into the future then at 67 and imagine traveling to the future, what would your 67-year-old self say to you now about the next steps you should be taking? Well, they would say, I'm glad you are where you are because I'm going to be happily married at 67 for the third time. I'll have grandkids, God willing. First of all, I hope I'll be living at 67, right? I appreciate where I am every day. I'm healthy. My kids are healthy. I'm grateful health first, right? If you could take all the money and put me in the shed, as long as I was healthy, I mean, I could live and I would make it back.

56:22I would do something. But I think that I'm going to get remarried again. I want to get remarried again. I want to share my life with somebody else. and third time's a charm, they say. There you go. So we'll see. That's awesome. Yeah. That's great. I mean, and that's a great question that you asked. Let's talk about, I mean, you've given me so many compliments on the show and I'm grateful. Extreme preparation is the core of my success. I mean, it's work ethics, extreme preparation. Extreme preparation means being creative about things, right? It's doing things and thinking things. I'll give you something else in my book, which people hear the story and they said, oh, you know, this is a way to think about turning the impossible into the easy reality of how you look at the situation.

57:05Just reorienting your mind. So my daughter went to Wisconsin, had a friend who asked me for advice on, he's got this job for coming up, and it's like he just wants the emotional reconnection for me to give him the positive experience. He's not going to do it, though. He's listening. No, he's motivated, but he's listened to my show before. So it's like he's a disciple of the show. So I said, all right, Andy. I said, give me the layout of the room. I said, okay, there's 80 companies. He wants to meet with 14. I said, well, can you get the names of the people who are meeting there from the company?

57:37He said, no, that's the issue. I said, so that's the problem. I said, no, that's the opportunity. And so I said, give me the layout of the room. Give me how many square feet it is. You know, have you been there? Yeah, I was there last year. So he gives it to me. I said, I assume these people have booths, you know, whatever company is there. And I said, can you read the name tags of these people from 15 feet away? He said, yes. I said, when does it start? When does it end? You kind of got to go backwards on the math. And I said, you're going to get there early. You're going to do a tour. You're going to write down people's names.

58:04You're going to have 14 pieces of paper. And you're going to go out and you're going to go on a corner after you do this. You're going to look on LinkedIn. You're going to write down three bullet points on every single person at every single company, company by company. You're also going to bring thank you notes that are pre-written because you're going to be in time. It's a fill in the blank. This is a Mad Lib issue. Amazing. Right? And so I said, you're going to go in and then you're going to go interview. And just like we talked about having the preparation, doing the work, doing things nobody else does.

58:30So we went in. I mean, this was a done deal before I even started going into these, right? So he had it all prepared. He had it all prepared. And he looks at the notes and he goes in and he said, you know, Lewis, you know, tell me about, you know, Principia College and how you, you know, were sleeping on your sister's couch when you were 24 years old and it took you three years to get off the couch. Everyone's like, what the fuck? Yeah, how did he know this? Right, how the fuck? Until he tells them the process. Everyone's blown away. Not only do you go 14 for 14, but you have now given somebody the impression of something, a story that they will remember forever and tell for the rest of your life.

59:04You will be that person. And even before that person gets back to their boss, he's told everybody, he's bragged about you.

59:11Lewis Howes:This one person stood out the whole time. Okay, so that's the home run. The walk-off grand slam is I have a rule, 10-minute thank you note. So you fill it in, you leave, and now you're going around and you've got 28 thank you notes. You bring 30 in case you make a mistake, extreme preparation. Plan ahead for mistakes. The walk-off grand slam. There is a difference between writing a thank you note. I mean, emails are so lazy. Forget the email. You need a physical thing. Physical thing, and it's the speed by which you deliver the email. Always. I tell people, job interview, bring the thank you note, coffee shop, half hour, deliver it back.

59:49Lewis Howes:So wait, you go after you're done, then you write it? Well, it's pre-written. I mean, if it's in person, so you go downstairs. I mean, sit on a curb if you have to sit on it. If there's no coffee shop, you go down and write it. Or you've already pre-written it. Pre-written, but just fill in the bag. I mean, if you're there and you're not dealing with 14 companies, you can write it out. It's a little better, and you can get the details in there. But go back a half an hour. And by the way, thick cardstock. Make the investment with your name on it. If it's thin, you're weak. If it's thick, you're strong.

1:00:20Right? It's the impression. Right?

1:00:22Lewis Howes:I need to get all these details from you. Right. I need to figure out where do you get your card stock from? Let's go. I mean, you go online. There's like 20-pound paper, 30-pound paper. I mean, there's all these different kinds. What's the pound I should get? Like 50. 50-pound paper. Yeah, like 50. You're just doing one piece? Emboss. Emboss. Are you doing like a - No, no cards. Just your name on it. Yeah, just your name on it. You don't have to have a whole thing with a thinner head. Just like a card. One card. Not a whole long letter. No, it's like a three-sentence thing. One card. One card.

1:00:47That's it. Front of the card, not front and back. No. That's it. I mean, sometimes you go over. That's all you need. You've got a lot to write. That's all you need. It doesn't need to be a whole long letter, though. These are the little things that are the difference. Citadel, 29 ,000 summer applications for a job. How are you going to separate yourself? Working for Ken Griffin, the best hedge fund, most successful, probably ever created by mankind to go in and get that job. You know, this preparation is in the separation.

1:01:16Lewis Howes:And then now there's probably like 100 people sending letters. So you have to be even, you know, out of those 100, how do you differentiate, right? Right. I mean, you know, last summer, our summer program, 10 ,000 applications. Wow. And I'm a small nobody. I got a small firm, right? You go on LinkedIn, you advertise, and that's a lot. People want the mentorship. People want the job. How many do you take? Five, 10? 32. Wow. We didn't have it last summer for various reasons, but it's been a life-changing program for most people. That's cool. Full-time mentorship if you're the best intern, writing a letter of recommendation.

1:01:50I've emailed the CEO of Goldman Sachs, David Solomon, who's been on my show. Why don't you just hire them full-time?

1:01:55Lewis Howes:Well, because I have. So I've hired over the years, I think, five or six former interns who are superstars. One or two has been very disappointing, but that's how the ball bounces. How has Extreme Preparation led to your amazing success? Can you give us one example that has stood out? Yeah, I guess one of the moments for me was with Kobe. I booked Kobe. I'll keep the story short. I booked him at like 5 o 'clock before I had the interview the next morning. So I got a call from his publicist. My team was talking to him, and they tried to plan it like a month out, the interview. And I just said, don't get off the phone until you book it tomorrow.

1:02:34Lewis Howes:Because if we schedule this a month out, it's going to get rescheduled. It's not going to happen. I just know how this goes in LA with people. Like, that's why if I can't do it, I don't commit to it. You know, it's like, that's why I push it off for you for like a year. You know, I was like, hey, I'd love to. I'm just not doing interviews or I'm traveling. My wife's pregnant. I'm in Spain, you know, all these things. So I was like, but when I say I'm going to do it, okay, I'm in, you know. And so with him, we agreed. The publicist was like, okay, 8 a.m. tomorrow morning. And it was like five or six o 'clock at night the night before.

1:03:01Lewis Howes:So I didn't have time to prepare. So it was kind of like, how do you prepare, have extreme preparation when you don't have five days or two weeks to prepare for this. You like, what, 14 hours to prepare for an interview set or something? Okay, like, and I want to get sleep and I want to be prepared, like, physically, and I want to be exhausted when I'm there because that's not going to look good. So how do I, and I had a commitment that night that I was already going to. You were at a concert that night. I was at a concert with Lindsey Sterling that I was, she's a friend of mine. I was like, I'm not going to bail on something.

1:03:28Lewis Howes:I already committed to her, so I have to keep my commitments. So I was like, how do I make the best of this? So I'm preparing, like, before there, before she's warming up, I'm, like, researching online, but then I'm present when she's there. Then I'm working at night. And I'm like, I need to get sleep because that's the most important thing. But I get up around 4, 4.30 and I have my videographer, Tiffany, with me in the car. And I'm just like, you need to do all the research. We're prepping now. I can do all the research that people don't ask him about. Let's go through everything. We listened to a couple of his podcasts that he had.

1:03:56Lewis Howes:It was like an hour and a half or something to drive down there. And the interview was at 8 a.m. We get there around 6.15 or 6.30, somewhere around them to the office. The assistant opens the door, turns the lights on in the office and kind of walks us around. And I'm trying to find a place to set up for the podcast, you know, our kind of camera setup. I walked past his office, but I didn't, the lights were off. And as I walked back past it, I see a shadow of him. And I was like, oh man, was that Kobe in there? And she was like, yeah, he's the first one in here every day. And I go, that is extreme preparation.

1:04:25Lewis Howes:Here's a guy who's won five NBA championships. He just won an Oscar for like a documentary he did. And he had all the money, the success in the world, and he's still showing up first. I'm like, I don't do that. That's like a whole nother level of extreme preparation. That's just who he was. And she was like, yeah. And he was in the gym with his daughter this morning, working out, playing basketball before he got here. The one that passed away as well. I was just like, whoa, I'm preparing. I got there early. So I was making sure I was set up. I was preparing on the way there. And I was just saying, we need to find the things that essentially what you do, like what will stand out when I bring it to him, when I ask him.

1:05:07Lewis Howes:We had a whole list of things that we couldn't talk about. So that eliminated a lot of topics that his PR team was like, you can't ask these questions or go to these topics. So I had to get creative. And I was like, I've never heard him talk about love. I've never heard him talk about relationships in a certain way. I've never heard him share these other things. And for me, the pre-show is the show. For me, that is the show. And I was thinking he would get to come out sooner, but I'm there for an hour and a half, like 20 feet away from his office, but he can't see us and we can't see him. And he doesn't come out until three minutes before eight.

1:05:38Lewis Howes:And the whole time I'm like, okay, am I going to have 10 minutes with him beforehand, 20 minutes, an hour? I don't know. And the interview was only supposed to be 20 minutes long is what the publicist said, because he had interviews all day coming up. So I was like, how am I going to get the best stuff in 20 minutes? It's really hard. And I told Tiffany, I said, have me mic'd up, have the cameras rolling. and when he walks out of his door, put the mic on him and start rolling. Because whatever we get beforehand, I'm gonna try to make it part of the show. And I kind of did what I did on LinkedIn early days.

1:06:05Lewis Howes:I was like, what is my first sentence? How can I find three things to connect with him? If this was like an email, how can I build that relationship? And right away, I just said, thank you so much for all you do in the Olympics. I know how much of a fan you are in the Olympics and I have so many Olympic friends that said you were like the coolest guy showing up at other sporting events, saying hi, taking selfies with people in the athlete's village. So I just want to say thanks for that. And he goes, dude, I love the Olympics. It's like one of my favorite times every four years. I just love the athletes.

1:06:35Lewis Howes:I love it all. And I go, I'm actually on the USA handball team and I'm pursuing my Olympic dream. And he goes, you play handball? And I go, yeah. And he goes, I played handball growing up in Italy. I go, I know. I go, it's pretty cool, right? He goes, it's the best sport. I wish they played it more in the USA and it's so cool you're going for this. And then I go, and I just wanted to, you know, I go, we have some mutual friends. I literally did the same script from LinkedIn. It's like, who do you know in common from your like LinkedIn profile connections? What interests do we have in common? And I did that.

1:07:04Lewis Howes:And I said, we have some mutual friends. And the publicist said, oh, who do you know in common? She like doubted me. And I said, Novak Djokovic I had on the show. And he says some amazing things about you. And he goes, man, Novak Djokovic, that's my guy. I just talked to him recently. He's a killer on the court. He's the goat. And I go, I know. And then I literally said, there's a lot of things that we have off limits. that I shouldn't talk about? Is there anything else that you don't want to talk about? Or what would make this the most powerful conversation we've ever done? And he looks me in the eyes, he grabs my knee, he goes, ask me anything you want and take as long as you need.

1:07:33Lewis Howes:And I was like, welcome everyone to the School of Greatness, Kobe Bryant, here we go. And so that was, you know, I didn't have days, sometimes you don't have less time to prepare. And you have to use like your experience, your resourcefulness to just be present in the moment. Like maybe you meet someone on the street or you're on a plane and you're like, oh, that's the CEO of this company. You didn't have hours to prepare. You have a moment. And I think it's leaning on your experience of preparation and saying, what is one question I can ask? How can I be present? How can I be served? How can I acknowledge the person for what they've done and be grateful and generous?

1:08:07Lewis Howes:And I think that's the key to abundance. We're near the end of the show and you've talked about relationships before. A lot of people, if you ask them what's the most enjoyable thing they've ever done in life is sex. You have said that you should not enter a relationship just to have fun and have sex. And here I am. I'm recently single and I'm like, what are you talking about? Yeah. I mean, listen, if we want to live a life with our ego, then you can have all the fun in the world and there's nothing wrong with that. I just don't think it's the best way to enter a relationship that's going to be a harmonious, aligned, peaceful relationship.

1:08:42Lewis Howes:So you can enter a relationship and have fun and have sex right away and all these different things. And that's kind of how I entered a lot of my previous relationships. And none of them worked. They all ended in kind of pain and just like frustration and therapy. That was just like a struggle. It didn't feel like there was alignment. And so with Martha, my wife, I was just like, we're not having sexual intimacy, you know, and we're entering the relationship with therapy is what I said. So after like months of like hanging out and going on dates, I was like, okay, I'm, I'm going to commit to you.

1:09:13Lewis Howes:You know, I want to commit. We talked about like potentially getting together. And I was like, okay, I want to commit to you, but only if we get into therapy first. And we talk about our values, our vision, and our lifestyle. And obviously, we can't predict the future and things happen. And like you said, like in-laws and loss and all these different things happen to kids. But I said, if we can try to predict the best way we can by being in alignment with our values, our vision, our lifestyle. And I go, this is what I'm going to be up to for the next decade plus. This is who I am. Can you accept that in me?

1:09:42Lewis Howes:Can you share with me what you think you're going to be doing? Can I accept that in you? And here are my values. Most women don't like my values, the order that I have them. She really wanted to know what they were. And I go, you're never going to be my number one priority. And no woman wants to hear they're not number one in a man's life. Now, there's context to this. So if someone's taking this out of context, they're going to think that's the worst thing ever. I said my health is my number one value. It's making sure I take the time for my health physically, spiritually, emotionally, and mentally.

1:10:12Lewis Howes:Because if I don't have my health the best it can be, I'm not going to be best for number two priority, which is still not you. Which no woman wants to hear that you're not number one or number two in their life. And I said the number two priority in my life is going to be my mission with what God wants me to have in this world. My level to serve people, to serve humanity. because I'd been in relationships in the past that almost every relationship I'd been in wanted to take my time to be with them instead of serving my gifts and talents with others. And they wanted me exclusively with them. And it was always this fight and this friction of like, but I need some time to go out there and like express myself and build and create and generate.

1:10:51Lewis Howes:And so I was always resenting of like the woman wanting to be number one at all costs. No, don't go to the gym. No, don't go to work. No, come here now. And I was like, that doesn't work for me anymore. and maybe I'm bad and wrong for that, but I need someone who can accept where I'm at in my life and maybe later in life it'll change. It'll be more about putting the relationship first. But if you accept that my health is a big priority, it doesn't mean I need 10 hours a day for this, but I need time to take care of my health, physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually. If you understand that I am on a big mission in my life right now to impact and serve 100 million lives weekly, and that takes time, then you'll understand my third priority, which is our relationship and our family.

1:11:29Lewis Howes:And if you understand my one and two, you're going to feel like the number one priority because I'm going to be so present with you, so giving, so grateful, so generous, so loving all the time that you're going to feel like number one. And so I think it's just, it's not like, oh, you're going to be like down on the list of priorities. It's more on your stand, I have other priorities as well that make me better. And when I'm at my best, we're going to be at our best. And I want you to focus on what's important for you as well. And I think it's just a reframing of it as opposed to, ah, you're down the list of priorities.

1:12:01Someone told me that you'll learn the meaning of life when you have kids. And so my priority with five kids is always on my kids first. It comes before. Your health? Well, it's sort of like when you're getting a divorce, people say, you know, one of the reasons why is you're worried about the kids. And what they say in return is if you're on the plane that's going down, you got to take your mask down before, you know, you got to be healthy before the kids. So sure, your health. That's what I'm saying. Yeah. I get it as a kid.

1:12:27Lewis Howes:And listen, I have twins now, and I'm going to put my life into them as well. Yeah. But I don't think we can just say, I'm going to let go of all my health just to rescue my kids. Right. You know, every day. And I'm going to endure all this pain that I don't have to endure in a suffering marriage, potentially. I don't know. I'm just saying in general. But it's taking care of your health, because then you can model to your kids and be like your best with them. Right. I mean, I'm going to go back to the sex comment for a minute. Not because I'm—I think this is something to talk about as well. because I think intimacy is such an important part of a relationship.

1:13:00And experience it right at the beginning, I think is important to determine if you're compatible. And a lot of the fun sex at the beginning does turn into relationships. I've had this in my own life.

1:13:13Lewis Howes:For all of mine, essentially, it's like the sex, the chemistry, the chemicals turns into like, I want more of that connection feeling. It feels good. But if you aren't aligned to their values and vision, in two years, that feeling is going to fade and you're going to have friction. I'm not saying that you can't develop in parallel with the values. I'm just saying you can start out by having fun and you don't know what's going to happen long-term because that's happened. I've had a relationship. Sure. I had a marriage like that. Yeah, of course. Yeah, of course. For me, what I learned is like all those way of doing it before didn't work long-term and ended in like sadness and suffering.

1:13:50Lewis Howes:And so I just wanted to try something different. And that's what worked for me so far. five years in, that's what's worked for me so far. You've also talked about cheating and infidelity in marriages and the reasons why people cheat. The stats show, they're crazy stats, that some huge percentage of spouses cheat on their spouse. So you've given a theory as to why that is. So what's the theory? What was the theory? What did I say? I don't know. What was the research? The research says that there's underlying reasons for infidelity that it's not that you want sex from the other person. It's that you're looking for something else.

1:14:27Lewis Howes:I can't remember what I said in context of this, but if I'm thinking about it right now, I don't think you've healed. I don't think you've healed a lot of things that you need to heal. And I think it's also like you're not clear on truly what you want. Like I'm 40, I chose to be married knowing that I was letting go of different life that I could have, which is sure I could be with lots of girls or be single and have fun and do these things. But that wasn't fulfilling. I could do that for a few years or whatever and then get married or something. But it's like, I want to have a rich, beautiful life.

1:14:59Lewis Howes:And it means if I'm going to be in a monogamous marriage, which is what my wife wants, and I don't think really would work to have like a non-monogamous marriage personally, then it means letting go of the temptations of the world that I think cripple a lot of men. You know, I think it crippled me for most of my life. And I think if I'm not focused on it and focusing on my relationship and seeing how I can improve it consistently, Listen, I'm one year in marriage, so I'm not here to give marriage advice. And I'm three months and having kids. So I'm sure everyone's going to say, wait till you're 10 years in and wait till your kids.

1:15:30Lewis Howes:I'm sure everyone's going to say these things. But what has worked for me so far five years in is being committed to the vision of my future self. I witnessed what my parents went through, what my dad did. And I witnessed the pain that four kids had to suffer with that type of model. It doesn't mean everything they did was wrong. They did a lot of beautiful things. But that model of relationship didn't work. It hurt a lot of us. And we didn't have the tools and how to heal. And for me, I want to live a beautiful, rich life. If I'm going through breakups and this and this constantly, it's going to be more painful.

1:16:01Lewis Howes:Sure, there's going to be lessons and beauty, but it's all going to be from needing to heal more. And at this season, I feel like, you know, someone told me on my podcast yesterday that Martha, my wife, is my guru. She's here to teach me my greatest lessons. It doesn't mean it's going to be easy all the time. You know, there's going to be some challenges that I have to face myself in the reflection of her. And so that's my commitment. It's my commitment. The version of me 10 years, 20 years in the future is whispering to me or yelling at me, telling me, here's what your life could be if you continue to show up committed, fully present, all in versus allow your temptations or sexual desires to get the best of you.

1:16:41Lewis Howes:Then here's how your life's going to be. And sure, you can recover from it and good things could happen in the future and you might meet someone else or whatever, but But I'm just one day at a time. One day at a time, just committed to what I need for my future self to be fully fulfilled. We're at the end of the show. I always concluded with a game. I call Phil and Blake the excellence. Are you ready to play? Let's do it. The biggest lesson I've learned in my life is? Learn how to love yourself. My number one professional goal is? Do something that heals another person today. My number one personal goal is?

1:17:15Lewis Howes:Be a great dad. My biggest regret is? Not healing sooner. My biggest fear is? That I wasted my potential. The craziest thing that's happened in my career is? It's yet to happen yet. The funniest thing that's happened in my career is?

1:17:34Lewis Howes:The first thing that came to mind was like giving a speech in Mexico, my first speech in Mexico, and getting punched in the eye walking out on stage when I was going to try to speak Spanish for the first time in front of this massive audience and just feeling like this was, for me, it was just a very funny moment getting punched in the face accidentally by someone right before I walked out. The best advice I've ever received is love your wife with your whole heart. 10 years from now, I'm going to be in service to people. 20 years from now, the next big thing is going to be looking people in the eyes.

1:18:12If you could take one trait that's responsible for your success, it is vision. The most important thing that's contributed to my success is relationships. The one thing I've dreamed about doing for a long time but haven't is being an Olympian. If I could invent one thing in the world, it would be a machine that lets you take advice from your future self. If you could go back in time and give your 21-year-old self one piece of advice, it would be take a workshop that lets you heal your heart. If you meet one person in the world who's alive today, it would be? Be one person? If you could meet one person in the world who is alive today, it would be?

1:18:48Lewis Howes:First thing that came to mind was Jim Carrey because I said him on the show, but I don't know if he'd be the only person I'd want to meet, but that's the one that came to mind. If you were president of the United States today, the first thing you would do is? Create a program around emotional intelligence training for kids. If you were on your deathbed and had 60 seconds to live and I had to say one thing to Martha and your twins, it would be. Thank you for giving me such a beautiful life. Thank you for loving and accepting me. And I want to remind you that I love you. I'm going to always be with you and make sure that you love each other, support each other and hold each other high of what you know you're capable of creating in this world.

1:19:30That's beautiful. The one question you wish I'd asked you but didn't is. How can I be of service? The answer is?

1:19:37Lewis Howes:I don't know. I'll have to think about it. Do you have any questions for me before we conclude what has been one of my favorite interviews of everybody since I started my show four and a half years ago? I thought you were going to say it in the last week. Favorite interview of the last week. I do have questions, but I'd love to ask you on my show when you have your book complete. Awesome. I'd be honored to be there. When you have your book ready to launch, I will have those questions. And I'm sure we'll talk before then as well. Awesome. You're amazing. Thank you for being on my show. Thank you, Randall.

1:20:05Appreciate it. You're an amazing guy. Congratulations again on your tremendous success. Appreciate you. Thank you. Thank you so much.