How to Build a Life You Love | Nick Cannon

0:00This is the Gary Vee Audio Experience. If you're listening to this before 9 a.m. Eastern Time, which I know a lot of you are, dog walking, the gym, just consuming on your travel. I'm live right now probably, if you're hearing this, or shortly. I'm live at 9 a.m. And then the questions themselves, the Tea with Gary Vee show is back if you're unaware. The questions themselves are on Whatnot. So go check that out. We're at vfriends.com slash live for that. I'm excited to be doing Tea with Gary Vee. I'm gonna do a lot in 2025. It's my home. I miss it. It was such a big deal in COVID and I hope to see you there.

0:39Now to the podcast. Ladies and gentlemen, once again, it is a privilege, pleasure, and honor to be in the space of a true scholar, academic in his own right, a thought leader, the one and only, I gave him all those accolades, but the most important title, the father, Mr. Gary Vee. My guy. Pleasure. Pleasure, man. How you doing? I'm, knock on wood, but I'm really good and it's a real honor to be here. I feel very much the same way about you. There's, you know, I think about people that really work and really build. And watching you over the last two decades plus has been a joy, so it's nice to be here.

1:14Man, likewise, man. And I feel like there's so many places we can start, but obviously here in Cannon's class, man, we like to tap in with the experts in different spaces. So I always start the question off, man, like what is Gary Vee an expert at? If you put me in the corner and said, you really got to give it for this crew right here. I would say I'm very, I'm an expert in understanding where attention actually is. I really pay attention to people's eyes and ears. So my entire professional career, but even going back to being a professional, when I was slinging baseball cards and comic books, or even when I was selling lemonade or trying to shovel snow or mow people's lawns in Jersey, everything I ever did was try to figure out where the attention was.

1:59which tree, which pole was the best lemonade sign? Which table was the best at the show? What could I do at my table that would make all the people walking by stop and look at my cards? And then at my dad's liquor store, where do I put the signs? Where do they look when they first walk in? What do they look at at the register? You just have that innate link. In it, in it, exactly right. It's funny you bring that up. The reason I think I'm an expert in it is because it was innate and then I formed it and built on it for the last 40 years. obviously today that's been about marketing like early on web early on social media early on mobile transformation and early on the platforms as a lot of people who are listening right now or watching definitely remember me six years ago yelling at them tick tock tick tock tick tock tick tock and so in the macro which platforms about the pop what's the next instagram what's the next tick tock or in the micro what's the best tactic to get noticed on linkedin or youtube or on podcasts or on physical tours, I would say my expertise sits in attention.

3:03And you built an empire, an attention empire, in this space to where now media, and this is probably where I would love to at least start for a moment because we're in a state, even currently, where media can be used to manipulate, media can be used to help and motivate, and media can really, I mean, it's really about capitalism. At the end of the day, people are making a lot of money off of media. Some in good ways, some in bad ways. There's a lot of transitioning and transformation happening from old media to new media. That part. Because the first part you talked about is how it's always been.

3:48Right, right. You know, I don't know why. I was a really bad student, so I apologize for all the academics, but I think of my life academically, I think the format of school didn't fit me, but there was one class I crushed at, and that was history. And within history, there was some shit that I was really focused on. And this is weird. Like, even today, it's weird, now that people are starting to understand what's going on, but as a kid, 30 years ago, when I was 14, 16, I was obsessed with coups, when governments would be overthrown. Right, right. You know, I was born in the Soviet Union, so maybe I was very affected by communism versus, is you know democracy but i love the news i love paying attention bless you my man and i really paid attention to it and the thing that most caught me nick and now i understand it back then i didn't and this is why i'm jumping on this point i was always fascinated that when the army would try to throw over the dictator they would go to the newspaper and the radio and the tv station at the same time that they would go get the guy or the gal at the palace and intuitively i was like damn, media is everything.

4:51So yeah, we got the internet now and social media and everyone's trying to point fingers at it, but since the printing press, the radio and the television were invented, those mediums have been used by governments, by businesses, by human beings to story tell and dictate to what those people wanted people to know. When the printing press was invented, the far majority of books that first came out were printed by religious institutions. and here we are hundreds of years later and religion's a big fucking deal in our world. So to me, the only thing that changed is that every human has access to the media now.

5:28That's huge and that's why we're seeing a lot of shit. Are we afraid of now AI controlling media or at least the... Well, I think the AI part that I'm not afraid of it but it's gonna be one step backwards. I think this is gonna hit for everyone in the room and definitely at home. video has actually been the judge and jury of our society. Video. Video proof. That's how we know Kennedy got assassinated. That's how we know there was a war. Video. Rodney King in this town. We knew anything you want. The Trump assassinated. We know if we didn't have that video proof, I'm sure a lot of people would be skeptical if it even happened.

6:08Now we have deep fake videos coming. You and I, in the next 10 years, are going to be all over the internet, saying shit that we never said because somebody's going to type in, I want Gary to use the N word. I want Nick to say this and positive things and negative things. And we'll be physically doing stuff too. Oh, it's going to look, just so you know, in 36 months, there'll be a video. By the way, they'll take the clip of this and change what we're saying to each other. What's that mean? Play out the chess moves. It means that no one's going to believe anything on video. And this is why I get bullish on the blockchain because I think that technology right now how it's confusing.

6:46You know, obviously there's Bitcoin, there was the ridiculousness of the greed, but the importance of NFTs. There's a lot of stuff there, but that as a ledger to control truth, I think will become prominent over the next 10 years. But yeah, I mean, AI is gonna change the world in a way that I think most people don't understand yet. This is some real talk. I don't know if you've put your name, image, and likeness into a trust for your kids. But the fact that in 50 years, I could have a meeting with Nick Cannon and he can teach me of comedic timing and all the things you've ever put in every interview will feed the AI and it will feel like I'm sitting in a room with you, the fact that your great grandkids can sell that is crazy.

7:25Imagine right now if you could buy an hour with Albert Einstein to talk to him for real. Would you? I would. Yeah. Just to do it. Right. If it felt real. Yeah, yeah. So look, I think people get crazy with technology. They think like when they're alive, shit stops. if we dug up our great great grandparents right now and showed them the world internet phone they would lose their minds electricity do you know electricity was demonized when it first came out people were scared to put electricity in their home because the rumor was that it was demons so most people still stayed on candles people hold on they are scared of technology I think it's going to be massive but I'm not scared of it I'm trying to understand it that's wise man And you said so many things there and definitely want to unpack it.

8:15But I think one thing that was super important is when you tap into what's the truth. Because even even without, you know, the deep fakes and all that is like the truth is subjective. You know what I mean? That part. It's my truth. It's your truth. And my perspective and your perspective. And you've been so outspoken, you know, through throughout the time that we've all. gotten a chance to know you. And you live by your truth. I mean, I feel like you're the type of person like, yo, Gary said it, then that's how it is from his perspective. Where did that come from? Losing a lot. Not being scared of the system.

8:57I think, you know, I was an immigrant. I come to America. We live in dirt neighborhoods. I'm sure I don't have to tell a lot of people who are listening what dirt neighborhoods bring. You learn real quick. you build up your instincts real quick. 80s, I grew up in the 80s. Kids that are listening right now, we used to go outside all day. My parents didn't know where the fuck I was. Kids that are listening, I wanna tell you something real quick, you're gonna laugh at this. I've been using this lately because it just blows my mind. In the 80s, at 10 p.m. on television, a commercial would come on and say, it's 10 p.m., do you know where your kids are?

9:33Because our parents literally didn't know. We were literally out there like that. They might have forgot. Where my realness comes from is I'm not scared. I'm not scared because I love people. I want good. My intent is real off the charts. Again, lucky DNA, great parenting. I got real good DNA. I'm nice. And then my mom molded it. And really molded it. So I know I want good for people. I'm trying to win-win. But not at someone else's expense. I think it's a huge issue in the world right now. people think they've got a, somebody else has to lose for them to win. So I feel like I have good intent and I feel like I'm not worried to be misunderstood.

10:14I was misunderstood my whole life. Getting all those D's and F's in school, every parent. And when you're seven, nine, 11, 13, teachers and your friend's parents, they're grownups. That's the authority. And they all told me I was going to be a fucking loser. And I was in my own shit. Like I'm not, I never understood Even back then I was like, how do these people think I'm a loser? And they talked about being a professional loser, right? A grown-up. I'm not going to be able to live. And I'd always be like, man, I made$1 ,300 this weekend selling Ken Griffey Jr. and Barry Sanders rookie cards. That's more money than my teachers make, prorated 52 times a year.

10:52How are these people telling me I'm going to be a garbage man? Which, by the way, that was the 80s thing? That's a good-ass job. They had it wrong too. You get pain paid and you retire. Anyway, nonetheless, so because, and sports, I played sports all the time, and as you can tell, I'm not fucking LeBron, so I took plenty of L's that way. Plus, I fought a lot. I really think when kids scrap, like a real punch, I think it matters a little bit. There's a lot of people walking around right now that are tough on keyboards because they've never been really punched in the face. Punched in the face. You know, and so I really do think getting punched in the face is a good thing.

11:30I'm an advocate for kids fighting. I'm being dead serious. I think we lost our balance. So I think for me, grownups told me I sucked, got into fights, played a lot of sports and lost a lot and grew up in a fucking Soviet immigrant family where like my mom wasn't hearing it. So like if I was looking to disrespect, I was getting smacked in the face. I think kids disrespect parents way too much now. Parents aren't, forget about spanking, parents don't even ground you no more. I think that's lost. So I think the reason you get what you get is if my family was that way, if my neighborhood was that way and I wasn't scared, the fuck am I gonna be scared of somebody on the other side of a fucking screen that I don't know, Nick?

12:09Right. You think I'm worried about Johnny Pants 19? You think I'm worried about Sarah Thompson 63 saying she don't agree? I'm not scared. Real talk, man. So diving into the origin story a little bit more. Do you think you have this perspective? Is a little bit of that New York? Is that? 100%. I was about to say, People who come from New York are just built different. Not only New York, Jersey. I went Queens and Jersey, but also I went to fucking Martin Luther King Elementary School. Let me promise you what Martin Luther King Elementary School looked like in 80. You were around us. That's exactly, and by the way, I got real lucky.

12:48Not only was I lucky enough to be around y 'all, my shit was crazy. I'd post my second grade picture sometimes on social just to make people realize what the benefits of diversity is. Not only did I have black kids, I had literally my second grade class was like 30 people. You guys know, you've seen the picture. Like literally five Asian kids, five Indian kids, six black kids. It was so mixed, but we were all lower income. And so nobody was being handed shit. So of course it comes a little bit from that. But it also comes from the opposite side. So that's the tougher part. It comes from the warm side too.

13:24I think when I talk, I'm trying to make it good for you. not trying to act tough the content I'm trying to put out is like I'm trying to shake people like yo you can do this like you can actually do this you know so I think it comes from a warmth too so not only maybe outside my home was a little bit tough in the first 15 years of my life especially but inside my home my mom was warmth, rainbows, love be kind to everyone she was that person that emotional stability for everyone I saw my auntie my grandma like neighbors she was that beacon of like positivity and optimism but no delusion yeah she would tell you like you gotta work yeah you gotta fix this so I think I just had a I got very fortunate my guy yeah no that's awesome so uh I want to stay in the space of school for a second let's do it because um you talked about Martin Luther King Elementary uh and even you saying that you probably weren't the best student.

14:26Let's talk, because this is an academic podcast and probably in a sense where it's not traditional. I mean, there's a lot of people that are gaining information from Cannon's class that, you know, is degree worthy, but don't have the means or really are the process to go through, you know, the value of a degree, this expensive ass piece of paper that, you know. By the way, by the way, one of the reasons I woke up at 4 a.m. to be here this morning was because I wish 15-year-old Gary had Cannon's class. I wish I grew up in this era where I knew the school system wasn't feeding me, but I would have been devouring content like this.

15:05So thank you for doing it. No doubt. And that's really what I want to discuss. The school systems today, I mean, as a father and even necessarily not being the greatest student during your process, how important is the education system to be successful, to be the next Gary V? for probably for 40 % of the people listening very there's you know successful like Gary V entrepreneurship that's not a classroom thing that's like telling people you got to go to class to learn about basketball of course you got to film you got to watch film of course you got to know the game but practice is on the court entrepreneurship's on the court you know that entrepreneurship plays out in real life that being said I think successful like me is not based on me being a good entrepreneur nor do I want that or require that or my hopes and dreams for everyone is that though if you are one I hope that for you my success is about self-awareness Nick my success is about waking up most 90 % of mornings hyped and ready to go and grateful that success is what I actually wish on everyone so back to your question 40 % of the people better listen real careful and say Hear me out.

16:19School is your path. You are a corporate animal. You are in structure. Like the amount of people, so I own a very large advertising agency. We work with thousands of executives over the last 15 years. The CEOs and CMOs, chief marketing officers, head of marketing, analytics, of the biggest companies in the world. Some of these people are brilliant. Some of these people that I've met in the last 15 years, Nick, they make millions of dollars a year. They have millions of dollars in stock options of the biggest companies in the world, which they're going to cash out on. And they would have made zero dollars and zero cents in entrepreneur land.

16:58Right. Got it? Yeah, yeah. They need, they need, they need, they need, they need, getting a piece of paper from Howard is how they got everything. Yeah, yeah. And so this is a story of do you know yourself? if you're a hustler kid that's a salesman that has a learning disability when it comes to reading you are gonna lose in school I know unlimited of them but if you know that you wanna be a lawyer and then that's gonna lead to your business world or you know you wanna go into corporations you wanna work at Tesla or Google or you know open AI like going to Harvard and Yale and Howard matters you just have to know how you learn and how you live I'm just glad especially for the people in this room, we all know.

17:43We all came up. If you didn't go to college, you were a piece of shit. Like that was like, you're the worst. Now, it's finally turning and kids have options. So for half the people listening, the education school system that's in place is a very good framework for them to go and enjoy it because it's easy to them. But the other half that are like me, like you need to think about it different. And the number one thing you cannot do is you cannot take on debt from a college for a piece of paper that's gonna do jack fucking shit for you. Facts. If mommy and daddy are gonna pay for college, go. I did.

18:22I was such a bad student. I went to Mount Ida College, which was in Newton, Massachusetts. It was like a junior college. By the way, it made Martin Luther King look like the penthouse in the Upper East Side of Manhattan. This place was... Your college was worse than your elementary school. Nick, when I tell you 97 % of what I did in college was play Spades, CeeLo, and Madden, that's what I... Now I gotta get you on the Spades podcast. Bro, I'm ready. I stun people at Dwayne Wade's Spades party at NBA All-Star. They see me. They don't know. I'm a sheep. They think I'm a sheep. I'm a wolf in that game.

19:00He said I play Spades, CeeLo, and Madden. That's what I learned. Nick, that's what I did in college. But I went for one reason. My parents wanted me to. and I was like, if you want me to, you've gotta pay for it and they did. So for the kids listening, if mommy and dad are gonna pay for it, go. I had four years of vacation. But if they're not, which is the way it is for a lot of people, please listen to me. It is 2024. You're probably listening to this in 25, 26, 27. That piece of paper's ROI against the debt you take no longer exists. In the 60s, yes. You know, it wasn't very expensive. if you take on a little debt, you get a nice job at Ford, three years later you're paid off and you go.

19:43Not in 2025. Do not take on college debt. Please be careful of it. Especially if you're entrepreneurial like me. If you're gonna be a lawyer or a doctor, if you know you're a corporate animal, maybe that debt will play out for you in 15 years, but you're gonna be mentally prepared to not enjoy 22 to 32. You're gonna live real rough paying off that debt. And by the way, that might be the right move for a lot of people. You know, that's their best way to get there at 32. For a doctor, that makes sense. But I really want to make sure all my creative people, all my salesmen, all my entrepreneurial people, all my artsy people, please, there's no stigma anymore of not going to college.

20:24Nobody gives a fuck. My company is a real legit company. The hottest Madison Avenue agency in the world. We don't even require a college degree. I couldn't tell you what college 99 % of my employees go to. Wow. Have no fucking clue. doesn't matter and by the way Google, Facebook real companies are taking it out of the equation because they're not getting the best talent some of the best engineers these kids are like fuck college I'm going to make a million on the side building a little app that's exactly who Google wants it's becoming like sports out here nobody gave a fuck that LeBron didn't go to college at all so I think business is starting to become like sports talk to me about your talent not about what box you check.

21:08Most of these kids are handicapped by these screens and they don't really know how to interact. There's an experience that you get when you leave the nest and go home. Which I believe in. Yeah, yeah. Like Spade, CeeLo, Madden. Oh my God. My basketball game got way up after four years in that idea. Listen, yes, but I'm going to say something again. This is the counter argument to me all the time. Gary, you always talk about college this way, but what about growing up this? I'm like, bet, yes. Let me ask you a question. is it better to spend$200 ,000 and incur massive debt at high percentage to pay that off or is it better to spend$50 ,000 to go and live in Asia or Europe and get it like you like when parents are like grow up there go to fucking Thailand you'll grow up quick and learn plenty of shit and make money and have fun and live like a king with 80 bucks why are we taking$230 ,000 in debt for some bullshit college.

22:06Yes, from 18 to 22, you grow up. No shit. You're growing up. You're gonna grow up somewhere. But this concept, we gotta send them to a... I promise you, you'll... I got a kid in my company, Adam, who didn't go to school. He works in our company. He's growing up plenty quick. Yeah. He's wired into New York restaurant scene with Eitan. He's around Sid and Zach and Dustin, grown-ass men, young men, and he's learning from them. Yes, there's some great shit that you miss out on, like dorm life, keg parking. Yes, but fuck man, I promise you when Adam's 32, he'll be just right. He'll have everything he missed out on and then some plus some and some more.

22:43I love it. All right, so still in the origin story space. Yes. I need to know Gary Vee's lowest point because normally when the superhero or the villain, you always see their lowest point and that's where they become the superhero or the villain. I think my lowest point is yet to come. I have not lost a core family member yet. Wow. So I got unlucky and lucky. I got unlucky because in Russia, in the Soviet Union, it was bad. The reason people know Russians to drink vodka, everyone was depressed. People don't realize how bad that place was. It was a jail. The USSR from 1917 to 1989 was more like North Korea.

23:23You couldn't leave. Wow. So it's not like Iran or other places right now where you could actually leave. Yeah. you couldn't leave. So both my grandfathers died before I got to know them. My grandmother, my mom's mom died at five. Most of my family was killed during the Holocaust, like extended family. So we have a very small family. So, and my parents were 22 and 20 when they had me. So that's a blessing. So yeah, my parents are coming to London with me for this Jets game. So, you know, I believe my lowest, I live life. Here's why I'm answering this. nothing, Nick, public shaming, losing lots of money, nothing in professional life is real to me.

24:07Hey everybody, actually, I'm sorry to be jumping in the middle of the podcast, but the truth is I'm like shitting the bed on this. Everybody else is getting people to review on Spotify and Apple, and like the Vayner Nation does none of that because I've never asked. So if this podcast has ever meant anything to you, please go to Spotify or Apple right now and leave a review. By the way, even if you give me a one-star review, because you think it's shit. I respect it. But just leave a review, an actual review. Four or five stars and the actual details of why. Yeah, that would mean something for me.

24:36So thanks. Now back to the podcast. Real talk. I'm detached as fuck from Gary V. Mean it. Right, right. I get that. But in real life, when I lose my mom or dad or God fucking forbid, I don't even want to say it out loud. Lose someone who I'm not supposed to lose before I go, I'm finished. I tell my people all the time, like when my parents go, like don't, because everything's on my back, I'm like, you need to make sure you know I'm out for 30 days because I need to really deal with that because that's, those are my, like I'm the byproduct of those two in a real fucking way and I know that's going to hit me and I almost think I talk it like this way almost to like, prepare yourself.

25:15Yeah, the therapy of it, like I'm trying to build a foundation to be ready for it but outside a catastrophic death of my inner, inner circle, everything else is noise yeah yeah really so I mean that's a great perspective if we break that down for a second because really what you're saying is the importance of family and the importance of love and connection to your tribe is so much more valuable than anything that can happen in the space of business and even self motivation in that sense because you know we all get down we all get you we all go through shit but at the end of the day you're like look I got another You're gonna like this because again, watching you from afar and we share some friendships, big shout out Watt and we're gonna get close for the rest of our lives and I'm looking forward to that.

26:02What day isn't loaded with adversity for you and I? We got too much shit going on. Like I flew out here, I got up at four, I was up late last night so I slept a couple hours, I was supposed to talk to Sid but I needed some sleep. I wake up, we got two hours left in this flight, I gotta do some email but I log on and there's 700 emails and text and 13 headaches. I got a problem in my Japan office right now. There was something that went down in New York that I'm not happy about right now. There's not, like when I hear people complain about shit, I'm like, that's my every day. Every day. I believe the reason you and I can do a lot of stuff is our capacity to eat shit and deal with adversity.

26:42The reason most people don't do a lot of shit is they can't deal with it. The stuff that I hear people complaining about, again, losing, like the things that people are like, oh, this was a low point. I'm like that's about money. I'm like that's about ego. I'm like that's about selfish acts. Like to me, none of that is a problem. I wanna be as successful as possible. I'm trying to buy the New York Jets. They're gonna cost me 10 billion dollars. Like I'm trying to build and when things get fucked up, this year's been challenging. Both VFriends, my Pokemon brand, and VaynerX, my holding company for marketing, my two biggest companies, I would say both of them were a challenge this year.

27:22My three here will shake their head right now. I've been in the muck. They know. I've been in the office 12 hours a day not doing the Gary V thing. Haven't been really on tour speaking. Haven't been doing shit like this. I've been in it. Every day grinding. I wouldn't call this like a easy year. For anyone. You know, it was a challenge. But there's also a part of me that's a little bit like, I'm a little fucked up when it comes to the game in a good way, I think. I like the adversity. Like, I like being in the dirt. Like, my favorite Rocky is when he lost everything and was back to zero. Like, I get that.

27:59Like, I like, you know, I feel like I'm a superhero in some ways where like, or in a movie where like, you know how like the lead gets punched in the face and like gets really punched in the face and he like spits a tooth out and he's bleeding and he looks back at you and now you know you're in trouble? That's how I fuck with life. Like when life punches me in the fucking face, I'm like, okay life, I'm about to fuck you up in a good way. And so I'm okay with being in that. But to answer your question, yeah, that little thing, the love of my 7, 10, 12, 15 inner circle, then the second tier is the people around me every day.