Walking with Gary Vee - the biggest creator in the world!

0:00Gary fucking V. You're very sweet. How are you? I'm so well, you? Good, thank you. Okay, so you say your life is chill right now? It's chill for me. I'm more calm when I have a lot of balls in the air than just one. I think self-awareness in business is not being deployed enough. Some people want to do more things, but they've heard that you need to focus on one thing, and I'm trying to maximize happiness, not financial upside. and I think more operators are actually creative and need other outlets and so I would say for me it is chill to do a lot of things and for other people that would be chaotic and stressful and I I'm empathetic to that but I'm self-aware to know how I roll what was your most unproductive day recently that's a really good question you know like I'm sure that I've had plenty of not productive days if a day was filled with meetings that let's say weren't the most important because I am operating quite a bit.

0:54Yeah. I don't view that as unproductive. I view that as like, I needed to get these things done. Yeah. And so they were a little bit more like maintenance, right? Yeah. Like, and I don't view maintenance work as not productive. It just wasn't maximizing my home run hitting power. You messaged me saying, keep up the good work. What the fuck? I nearly died when you said that. I want to know why you asked me that, how I can improve and what you would do if you had my account to go 10 times faster? The first thing I would do is not worry about the 10 times faster. Really? I'm so impatient. I know patience is your thing.

1:29That part. I'm intense. I want to go faster. Am I not intense? Lack of patience is hurting a lot of y 'all. I think when you start to want to go faster, you start to look for shortcuts and you can get caught. I go very, quote unquote, fast, but I also go very, very slow. The reason I pinged you, and I'm sure some of the people watching here have gotten DMs from me, is I like spending my time watching the culture, watching what people are doing, paying attention. I view myself as a cultural strategist. And there's a lot of youngsters like yourself that are really up to good stuff. However, if I got that message from someone like me back in 2007 or 2008 when I was doing Wine Library TV, you know, the answer was patience.

2:11It's like, hey, don't get too ahead of yourself. Keep putting down good deposits, laying down the foundational brick work to build a proper house. Everybody right now is looking to go 10 times faster. And I asked them why. Is it that you want more money quicker? Do you want more outside validation quicker? Like what hole are you trying to fill when you're going faster? For me, I was so fortunate that I wasn't looking to fill the financial or the emotional hole. So I was just able to go at my own pace. I think it's more like I know I can. And it's like, I know how hard I'm working. So I want it to go as fast as I'm working, basically.

2:49Yes. But again, what is fast? More followers, more views, more money. More impact. Well, more impact, you know, is very lovely to hear and noble. But I would argue that, like, if one human being is watching this right now and you inspire her to have the courage to do this, well, that's substantial impact. That's so nice. That's so true. Okay. A few more questions. One, what is a daily ritual you do that keeps you sane as a busy fucking founder? I am incredibly focused on gratitude. Do you journal? I don't journal. Not tactical, like I sit down and do it. It's more just in me at all times. Wow.

3:32Every single day of my life, have passing thoughts or even more substantial sit down and in a moment, whether in the shower, whether on a plane, whether even in between while I'm talking to you right now, things will go through my mind that look like thank you god so much that nobody in my family is sick right now or or passed away or had something traumatic happened i'm just incredibly grateful for the mundane and it is my daily ritual envy and comparison is destroying the universe gratitude is underutilized my daily ritual is my relationship with gratitude even though it's not done in like a tangible way it's more done in it's like oxygen to me it's like it's my currency it's my bloodstream so let me ask you when is success now made your life harder probably only you know privacy you know i have teenage children who you know i think want to hold on to the time we have when I'm with them.

4:36Yeah. And there's intrusiveness that comes along with notoriety that I think I'm empathetic to and I'm never mad at someone coming up to me ever, even when I am with my family. Really? But I definitely have seen my children not like it as much over time and that is a little bit of a challenge. What's your favourite swear word? Fuck. Do you love swearing? Why do you love swearing? because people think it's bad but I think it's passionate I love it you know to me I don't give it that kind of weight yeah I don't think it's overly cool yeah I definitely don't think it's some atrocious thing for me I'm just an immigrant jersey boy from the 80s and 90s like it's unbelievable how much cursing was our currency like I don't in fact I didn't even know I cursed that much until I started to become a little bit of a public figure yeah I was like oh shit I'm more potty mouth than I realized because everybody I was around was basically in the same kind of linguistic dance.

5:40What is something you're still figuring out? That's a great question. One thing that I do, I love life. I love people. Yeah. One thing that does stick with me is what's going to happen when I'm 80 or 90 and I'm logically understanding there isn't that much time left. Will that make me bitter? Will I become sad? Will I become depressed? So much of my joy comes from knowing there's so much more to do. And so I am a little bit concerned slash I'm trying to figure out will I get there and be in a place of content and joy of all the things I did and try to maximize that last decade or am I going to be sad like oh damn this thing I love more than anything which is just life and people I love life you know yes what can that trigger resentment concern depression angst and I am trying to figure out how to make sure it does not how how by even talking about it out loud right yes by even being aware I would say the one thing that I am passionate about is that people are just more aware.

6:52The more aware you are of who you are, self-awareness, the more likely you can mitigate your shortcomings. So I'm aware of this. I'm now sending it to the world and talking about it publicly. Yes. And I am trying to think through it and navigate it. What song pumps you up when you're having a rubbish day? Hungry Eyes from Dirty Dancing, the movie. Oh, when he does The Lift? Yes, like hungry. Yes, I believe that love is the actual answer to everything. Oh, okay. I just got engaged. Cool, you have lots. It's awesome. Thank you. So I would go with hungry eyes. If I'm in need of a bolt, look, I'm very fortunate.

7:37There are not a lot of days that I define as rubbish, but if there's a moment where I need a boost, that is a song that I would definitely go to. Okay, last question, because I know if someone's having a really rubbish day who's watching this and they need that Gary V motivation what are we saying to them what's the message nothing that happens in business is your real life explain I will if people understood how detached I am from my professional career even from my Gary V of it all they would be flabbergasted that nothing that happens your professional career should send you down anything that looks like depression or anxiety you should be concerned you should be thoughtful you need to be a human being i get it but i will tell you that the first thing they should do is detach from it and realize there's always an alternative you may have to have humility and go backwards yeah you might have to shut down your business you might have to get a job yeah you might have to make less money but nothing that happens professionally should have the power or does have the power to actually affect your real life you need to be detached from your professional career i know i know it's surprising coming for me because i'm so yeah listen you're all in i'm all in and i love it yeah it's a game it's a game the whole of life is a game yeah the whole of life is a game but what i would argue that the whole of life meaning is the love you have with your friends and family and like your true circle your true circle if you just sold your company to google for a billion dollars but the next day your fiance say got terminally ill would you be a happy person i know that's what my friends keep saying to me because i keep forgetting you have to see your friends while you're building and if you get success and then you lose your friends in the process what is success yes comma there are moments where friends even family may get a little less of your allocation of time because you are building something you're allowed you're allowed okay but is it the most important thing in your world no and when you look at it and from a totalian standpoint it's definitely not important but in a moment of time young woman onto something just this is a good time to go yeah yeah in yeah i would say to you the mistake that many make and i probably was not great at this in my 20s is when you are allocating your time to your friends yeah try to be there mentally there was definitely times where i would go and hang with my buddies while i was building the wine store for my dad where my brain was still in the wine store.

10:11So last thing, if you had to do one thing as me right now building this, what would you do if you took over my page tomorrow? This video must be on seven to eight platforms, not two. Okay. It is. Yeah, it will be. So then if you're there, which I'm proud of, the next thing I do is I transcribe this entire video into written form and this is posted in written form in long form Twitter X, in LinkedIn written only, in Substack, written only, and in Beehive, written only. Using the written content as a gateway drug to discoverability of you, your platform, and the videos, having that full circle would be something I would do.

10:50Epic advice. And then last question, what's your life motto? That I want to give more than I take. Yeah. You are such a legend.