Tom Bilyeu on the Truth About Patience and Teaching Entrepreneurship

25:01So I'm with Tom, man. Like unless you miraculously have leverage on the singular A leader of the company, which even in a three-person partnership, there is an A within that, you will not be able to change the culture because culture 100 % stems from top. You're either a CEO that likes happiness and impact and like, why we have a good culture is I hate negativity. I'm weirded out by it. And so because I'm also the best money earner, nobody has leverage on me, so I fire other people that don't do good things to my culture. Unless you have a leader like that, that means they care about the money.

25:39And when you care about the money, the culture has no fucking prayer. Yeah. No, culture, man, is literally everything. Everything. My thing is my new absolute obsession is emotional safety. And it's one of those things, people don't talk about in business, it feels super weird to say words like emotional safety, but I'm telling you right now, whatever you do, whether you're starting your own business or you're in a business, look for somewhere where you can have emotional safety because coming into work and feeling good about it is a big deal. And I think there are two metrics, and this is really going to get people in a weird place.

26:08Metric number one, laughter. How often do people laugh? You have to fucking pay attention to that. And then number two, and dude, the first time this really occurred to me was I was in your office, and I was looking out, and I saw two people put their arms around each other. I thought, wow, that's interesting. And so when you build emotional safety, you will just see that people connect and bond in a way that becomes physically expressed. You should see VaynerMedia weddings. They're absurdity. people that haven't been here for six, lifelong friendships. Totally. That's trust man, it's emotional safety.

26:40There's like an agency being built in Bali right now by Sean Calayo and Pinsuda. Like this is like in perpetuity, like I tell everybody, it's like a framework. I totally agree. My big one that's more practical, I like yours better, I hate that I have to be the straight man but it's a good one for a lot of people listening, is voluntary retention. Like the way I judge Vayner is how many people that I really give a fuck about that I think are awesome people and are awesome at their job have left Vayner. The number's staggeringly low. I know we got something. Yeah, totally. You know? Thank you for the question, brother.

27:14Gary, like, this is a top point. Google did a study of effective teams, and they called it Project Aristotle, and it was the biggest piece of making a successful team. So it's backed by research. Google actually had a study of their style. It makes sense. It makes sense, brother. But here's the problem, Google's stuck because they're a publicly traded company and that's why they have the entire company walk out on them. They're stuck. Guys, life is binary. Like either you're making, as a business, either you care more about the money or more about the feeling you feel in running it. I am a, I would be fired by every publicly traded, if Vayner went public, I'd be fired.

27:54Fired fast. I have easily taken this business from 40 to 140 million in revenue and 200 over the kind of holding company and I'm making way less money today than we did at 40. God, that's so interesting and I really hope people are listening. No, no, no. For real, hold on because that dude, that's the juice. Once you understand that in your life, motherfuckers, you're either going to be chasing money or you're going to be chasing fulfillment and nary the twain shall meet and when you chase fulfillment, you may also build a massive fucking company. I'm going to do both. I always say, and I'm making up the rules, that I'm gonna be the best entrepreneur because I'm gonna make the most money and have the most impact on other entrepreneurs.

28:37Yeah, no, I love that. And I think there's a third part to that that I clearly see in your company and is literally the cornerstone of impact theory. And that is people over everything. It's the connection that each person feels, the trust from that will be able to do something extraordinary because when you believe in people, your guard is down, you're emotionally invested. Where does entitlement fall into it? Because I will tell you one of the flaws in me running Vayner over the last seven years, and we've gotten a lot better in the last two years, and we're well on our way, but I definitely created a macro culture of entitlement because I had people over everything, and I took everything on my head.

29:11Yeah, so it's two things. One, it is absolute high standards, so you have to have standards, explain what they are, and know what people have to do in order to be in that sort of safety circle, and then the other is your boy Ray Dalio. I'm looking at your girl Lindsay down there. so Ray and his whole notion of say truth hear truth that that is the one time I will say when I read that book it changed me forever as an entrepreneur because it was a failure of my imagination to believe that you could hold a thousands of people in an organization to and this is how he says it and this is so true even if you have a criticism that you're prepared to take to the grave that you don't even say to your significant other you still have an obligation to voice that that's super fascinating because that is absolutely not a strength of mine radical Radical candor is something I continue to evolve into.

29:59It just doesn't, you know? I'm really great when shit comes natural to me. Like I just don't like money. And I will use money and I'm really emotionally strong. I will help other people emotionally. Like it's really funny. Radical candor and that, even to that level is absurd. No question is a strength of his and others that I haven't had. Now I've gotten dramatic. my brother had AJ's was much better at it naturally I've gotten a lot lot better and it's been a strength of mine look today we fired somebody that it fucking I've been thinking about it for nine days super not pumped I feel like shit right now but if I don't do it the whole fucking thing crumbles yeah it gets toxic for other people so people over everything doesn't mean keeping people around even though you've manipulated your own self in believing they're better off with you than not with you true but here's part of why I say people over everything and it doesn't mean that I'm just going to let you get away with murder.

30:55It's like you've got the collective. And for the collective to have trust and all of that, then they have to know that if somebody isn't living up to it, they're not carrying their end of the bargain, that they're going to be let go, like simple as. But that it's going to be done openly and respectfully and that you're going to help them transition out gracefully unless somebody's just like willfully horrible. And that happens too. Sure. This is where ego of hiring is a vulnerability. Like people hire people, they end up being awful and they don't want to admit they made the mistake and they keep them around.

31:22Yeah, hello? Colin? Colin? Yeah, this is Khaled. Khaled, it's Gary Vaynerchuk. You're on the Ask Gary B Show with Tom Bilyeu. Live! All right. How's it going, Gary? Life is good, my man. Thanks for having me on your show. I really, really appreciate it. I'm going to get straight to the point because I know your time is really expensive. I just had a question. You know, this has something to do with my life. I've been in the exotic car business for a very long time. I mean, you know, it's a very expensive business to get into as someone in my shoes, you know, an entrepreneur, you know, don't have, you know, a lot of funding behind me at all, actually.

32:01So I have a large list of contacts. I've been networking for a long time. It's not the grade to make the hands you shake. So I met a lot of people, a lot of celebrities, you know, A-list celebrities, you know, music artists, all walks of life. And I've been doing this for about 10 years. I'm 26 now. So I've been in the game for about 10 years. Dude, how the hell do you not have an Instagram link at the bottom of your website when you're in the most visual and kind of exotic car world? You know, I definitely, I have a really nice Instagram. I mean, I haven't posted anything in a while. But you have a nice website with some fucking exotic fucking animal on top of a cool car, but you have literally the Facebook and Twitter logo at the bottom, but not the Instagram one.

32:49I know. So that was actually a dealership that I worked for. Got it. I'm currently working for myself now. Respect. Basically a broker. Respect. And now I'm working by myself. I'm brokering deals. You know, taking clients. Because clients come back for me. They don't come back to the dealership. Of course. The person has the leverage. Exactly. So what's the question? My question is now, basically, I have the experience. I have the clients. You know, the demand is there. I'm getting calls every time, you know, a concert's in town, anything, celebrities need cars for rentals, they want to buy new cars.

33:25I'm trying to figure out how do I get to the next level, Gary, as far as getting funding to start a company like that? How do I find investors who have the capital and are looking for, you know, that kind of a business startup? Dude, your entire fucking life is interacting with people that have that kind of money. And you know that's very true Gary. I mean people are billionaires, all sorts of people. But here's the biggest thing I have to overcome. I feel like every time, if this is an objection, is that I'm young, I don't have per se a track record. Brother, the number one mistake that people make in life, let alone business, is they say no for the other party without asking.

34:13Word. Yeah. Like, now, now, if you, you know, look, I have empathy. I hate asking anybody for anything. So you've got these clients. It doesn't feel appropriate from transitioning to you just rented them out, something, and now you're like, hey, give me a million bucks. But inevitably, you've now interacted with some fucking ballers an eighth time, a tenth time. Some of them have even shown a liking towards you because they see themselves. Tom and I, I'm sure, do this, just knowing him a little bit. Like when we see ourselves in people, you just gravitate towards it. You're like, because you're just always very aware that circumstances helped you so much.

34:50And so I'm always in the business of helping somebody out when it feels right. You just live it that way, right? That's just the fucking game. Look brother, you're gonna have to ask somebody for the money, right? And a kid like you, who's more like a kid like me, you're not gonna get it from traditional VCs. They don't invest in shit like this and we don't have the pedigree to get money from those people. You have the pedigree to get money from other hustlers. For sure. Well, here goes nothing. Gary, you ready to invest in my company or what? 100 ,000 % not. Here's why. You must have either missed it a few minutes ago or you skipped over it.

35:28I literally just said 11 minutes ago that I hate fucking investing. I know. I'm just messing with you. I know you are. But I really appreciate you having me on your show and I did want to tell you, I never kept it above me to do other side hustles like going to garage sales or picking up Lionbirds and scooters and charging. I mean, I've been doing all the things that you have, trying to save up money and invest it. Good for you, man. Look, there's a lot of your vibe that's interesting, man. Like, you come from an industry that I'm always scared of, it's the slickiest of the slick, but you're articulating yourself, even in my intuitive feelings, which I go by all the time.

36:03Look, man, listen. I really appreciate that. Let me say something to everybody who's listening. The reason so many kids are starting companies and wanna get venture capital is if they fail, they don't have to pay anybody back. I think there's another reason. There's a lot of reasons, but this is one that nobody talks about, Tom. Yeah, fair. You give up 25 % of your company. The amount of people that I think are starting companies, startups, that already know on day one that they have no chance of success is remarkably high, but the capital they raise allows them to live the lifestyle with no damage to their credit.

36:40There's too much fucking money in the system. Here's why I'm telling you that. If you really believe in yourself, bro, and you've been doing something for 10 years, and this is gonna brain fuck everybody on my team, I hate when people have credit card debt. Like, it's my freak out of freak out, right? Or debt in general. I will tell you that I've been at my best when I knew that I was operating, not taking any chance, and when I'm willing to do that, I'm willing to do anything to get the money like fucking loan shark shit, like mafioso breaks my life shit. You know why? Because if I understand the interest and I understand I can figure it out even if I'm paying 50 % interest, let alone five, the days of getting money from the bank, people don't think about that anymore, but let me give you where I'm actually going.

37:29You know how many kids should be asking their parents for money or their rich aunt a lot. The problem is they're not thinking about it right. They need to walk into their rich aunt and say, Aunt Sally, I need 150K but I will pay you back. And if it dies, I will then get a job and I will pay you back 5 ,000 bucks every quarter for the rest of my fucking life. People are not putting their fucking balls on the line. People aren't doing that anymore. Everybody wants to raise money and give up 20 % of a company worth nothing. You don't have to risk it when you're delirious. The reason I'm giving you this advice is you've been doing it for a decade.

38:07You feel intuitively right to me. So I'm saying to you, do what Tom and I did and live the practical life, not this bullshit life. Live the practical life, man. And you know what? That was the first step for me to move forward is to stop trying to live up to everybody's expectations, stop looking at everybody else and humble myself and actually have my friend move in, you know, split the rent. Yes. You know, share a studio. Humility. Humility for the alpha male and woman in their 20s. Humility is the secret fucking sauce. But now let's push it. Did you actually do that? Yeah, I did. Because here's the thing.

38:47I was always trying to buy the most expensive stuff. Because that's what you were looking at. Everybody. When I stopped doing that and I just focused on myself and I accepted myself for what position I'm in. And I'm like, okay, Khaled, your fucking shit's in the toilet right now. Keep going, Khaled. Yes. You know, you need to get your stuff together, lower all living costs down. Yes. And just like do every little side hustle that I can because I can maximize my time now that I'm working for myself. So I could do a bunch of little stuff. You know, at night I'm doing the scooters. I mean, I'm doing 40, 50 scooters a night.

39:22We're going to garage sales, picking up stuff free off Craigslist. You know, I'm marketing stuff online for people, Google Ads. I'm doing a bunch of stuff and I have my cousin. And are you happy? and he's helping me. You know what? I'm very happy because I'm not working for anybody. Real quick, this is real quick because there's a lot of bubbling up of like Gary, you're pushing people to work too hard and all this stuff and I'm watching it. I'm like, I love when elitists who work their faces off to make a bunch of money then tell everybody else not to work hard. That's the bullshit anyway. So to me, if you love what you're doing and you're happy and you're mentally and physically healthy, do you.

39:58I'm not judging anybody about doing anything but it's all about self-awareness and putting a framework around where you don't keep up with the Joneses. Yeah, and I want to put my finger on something. So dude, your vibe changed so much when you got into the pocket on where you're confident. Humans lead with belief. In the beginning, you didn't have that belief because you're stretching for the fancy cars and all that. But when you slid back to, I'm living in a studio apartment with six other dudes, I believed in you. And if you came to me with that hustle and you're like, look, motherfucker, I have boiled my life down to nothing.

40:26I have no expenses. I eat Top Ramen and I grinded the fuck out from the floor of my friend's bathroom. I will make this shit. If you give me money, I will spend the rest of my life paying you back if it fails. And you have that belief because you actually believe it. You know it's true. You know you can do that and you're operating from a position of strength. Now just your energy is gonna convince people to get on board with you. But when you try to posture, hustle like from a place that's not real, that's where people don't buy into you. And the beauty is like that's what I sense like the whole time.

40:55Dude, this is really cool. By the way, this is the kissing cousin to why I want kids to stop taking money from their parents. It all comes down to the same thing. It's called fake environments. Either you live on your merit or you don't. I've been on my own since I was 15. And I'm very thankful for it. Cause my parents instilled me with the right morals and the right hustle at a young age. And then I was forced to be a man of my own and I worked mechanic shop and I sticked in the car thing for a long time. So it's like my passion too. So it goes hand in hand. I enjoy everything that I do to the till I work.

41:33I love it. Even when I'm working. Awesome, man. Thank you for the call. Fake environments. I want to wrap up with this. Okay, you get it because last time Scooter made us do another call and it turned out so awesome. Someone wants an internship with Tom. Okay, got it. Tom, I'm so about this fake environments. If I can convince people that credit cards are bad, that parents' money is bad, that posturing is bad, the happiness is absurd. The happiness is absurd. Also, I want to get people on obsessive thinking. So one of the things people always ask me, okay, what's your secret to your success? I normally say reading, but I'll say that there's actually something else I do that people, it's hard to articulate, but here it goes.

42:10There's a great question that Peter Thiel asks, how do you take your 10 year plan and make it happen in six months? So if you obsessively think about how do I accelerate this? Like how do I, what's that quantum leap forward? And for him to be thinking about that, like the collapsing down to very little expense, so that he can get into a place that's actually winning, win with that, build like a package up that he can go pitch to people and say like, look, I only want whatever. I want to flip more scooters, whatever. So he's getting in at 1 ,000 or 10 ,000 instead of 400 ,000. Then he can build that momentum and you just keep going upstream, upstream, upstream.

42:45Lack of patience, man. Well, it's interesting. You and I disagree on the use of the word patience like so violently. Please. So my thing is fuck patience, literally. But the thing is I always tell people, I know what Gary means and Gary means play the long game. Macro patience, micro speed. A thousand percent. The problem is when people hear patience, they get in a passive mode. Yes. Motherfucker. So I'm fucking psychotic about that. You use the word passive though. Yeah, exactly. You can't let people get into a passive situation. The word's patience, not passive. Yeah, but what I'm saying is when people hear that word out of anyone's mouth, I understand, but I'm living a life of everybody semantically articulating the manipulation of words to their non-meeting.

43:24It's interesting. So here's how. I love the amount of judgment that is being thrown at me right now in circles around people manipulating the words that I'm, it's absurd. Patience is not passive. So my thing is how do people react to it? I couldn't agree more, but the reality is if we are now in a place where we can't allow the words to actually mean what they mean, we have to challenge that conversation as well. Because now you're getting into how people filter everything and now we're talking about the most important P, which is perspective. If their filter is taking it, then that's what gets so interesting about having to do this one-on-one versus through content.

44:05Content is vulnerable in its macro. It's super interesting shit. Very interesting. And on this particular thing, I'll say forget the words because you and I are saying the same thing. I know we are. And so the last thing I wanna do is argue that when we get to the point. We're semantics. A thousand percent. And I'm with you. My thing is how do you get people to realize that momentum is the thing that I think matters. So have you ever been in like an above ground swimming pool? You can start walking in a circle and it creates the vortex and then you can pick your feet up and it just carries you.

44:36The whole thing I was talking to you about that I got to walk you through of like what you need to do for your studio to like win the world, literally internally for a few minutes was called momentum marketing. Nice. You can't be believing more. Who is this? Royce? Like Royce Clayton? If you know who Royce Clayton is, leave it in the comments. I forget that Google exists these days. I so grew up in a non-Google world. Everyone's like, that's easy, Gary. He's the shortstop for the Giants. Hello, this is Royce. Royce, it's Gary Vaynerchuk and you're on the Ask Gary Vee Show with Tom Bilyeu. Oh my God, holy shit.

45:11I was listening to you guys live. Oh my God, it's so cool. How you doing, Royce? Where you from, Royce? Cincinnati, Ohio. Are you a Bengals fan? Oh, big time. The Jets can trig on off. Your cursing could use some up in your game, but I appreciate it, man. You do know that the Jets beat the Bengals in a huge playoff game in Cincinnati in 2010, right? Oh, I'm sure. Clearly you do not. All right, go ahead. I mean, yeah. Wait, Andy, I put in like a couple questions. Pick whatever. Which one do you want, Andy? The ones that you said Tom and Gary different on. Oh, yeah, Tom. Patience. I love your stuff too.

45:55I listen and watch a lot of Impact Theory. Love it. Thank you, man. Tom, I saw you, sorry, I listened to you on the Joe Rogan experience a couple months ago. And you mentioned how you heard how some people believe that you have to be a natural porn entrepreneur or you can turn into one if you have entrepreneurial tendencies. Ethan, you disagreed with the fact that a lot of people out there believe that you have to be a natural born entrepreneur. I was wondering, I know Gary, you always say how you're only a natural born entrepreneur. There's no thought if you've ever worked a job in your life that you could be one.

46:34So I guess, can you become an entrepreneur or do you have to be a natural born one? Well, good news. Like, I'll lose this right now No, because everybody's an entrepreneur now, and most of them are not natural born entrepreneurs. Now let's talk about people that are successful entrepreneurs and not successful entrepreneurs. That's fair. That's a big deal. Then there's also people bleeding entrepreneurship with operators. So I think operators are something that can be taught, and those individuals, she and he, are incredible. COOs, co-founders as the number two. Guys, there is a mental strength that comes along with you're the last line of defense, that is by definition what entrepreneurship is built around, that I do think we underestimate in what is like, comes natural, but I think that there, I think that being a successful entrepreneur is more of a skill than a taught behavior.

47:36In the framework of my perspective, being taught to be an operator is I see every day. Most great COOs are people that were taught to be an operator. Many of them are considered co-founders but would have not been successful without the energy of the human that was there to eat the pressure and actually lead the company is how I see it. Tom? Yeah, so this is one that I have lived the exact opposite. So I started out, my parents taught me to be a good employee, to keep my head down, do as little work as possible and avoid punishment at all costs. I had a newspaper route. I was too afraid to go knock on the doors to collect the money.

48:15So for like two years, I delivered the paper for half the money I could have gotten. I never stole somebody's flowers out of the yard and sold them back. Like none of that. So, but then to get what I wanted, which was to make films on my terms, I had to generate the capital. To generate the capital. Why do you need Lambos to do that? Why do I need Lambos? Well, you said earlier, you were like, you were into some of the flashy stuff. I get why other people chase that. I said you weren't. No, I was chasing. I wanted money to build a studio. Got it. So I knew that I had to learn a certain set of skills.

48:44Now, my whole thing comes down to humans are the ultimate adaptation machine. Literally, what we do is adapt. That is our design. So you can take there was a woman who swam the Bering straight and she turned literally over a year of cold exposure, turned white adipose tissue, which is the fat into what's called brown adipose tissue, which generates more heat. Now, people will believe it at the body, right? Nobody's here telling me that I'm crazy for that. It's so easy to show people that you can change your body. But for some reason, people don't think that you can change the mind. So let me ask you a weird question.

49:12First of all, I completely only believe you can change the mind, which is now gonna get into an interesting semantic. So keep going? Yeah. Yeah, so... No, no, no, I'm sorry. I'm gonna go keep going. But you're gonna... No, but you're gonna appreciate it. You're gonna answer. For sure. Does that mean everybody's born a natural born entrepreneur? That means everybody is. It means everybody that meets minimum requirements, and we will have to talk about that... Okay, so that gets... That's fine, that gets into a different place. Yeah, so if you meet minimum requirements, and some people do not. But what if you're Hakeem Olajuwon?

49:40What if you, Tom, are actually Hakeem Olajuwon? Okay. So Hakeem Olajuwon is born in Africa, doesn't realize he's a natural great basketball player because he's not exposed to it, but actually was born a natural, like what if you actually were? Just because the environment you were in suppressed. So you're saying I was a natural born entrepreneur just in a weird environment. Because that's where I'm going with this, which is you were in an environment where your parents created the environment to eliminate the entrepreneurial spirit, but that it was down deep in there. And more importantly, just because ripping flowers back to, first of all, you had a paper route.

50:15Let's break that down for a minute. Maybe you were scared of asking for money, just like the last kid, but let's really, really talk about it. What the fuck were you doing with a paper route? In my family, you had to have a job. So my parents made me get a paper route. Did they make you get a paper route, or did you have more than one choice, Tom? Now, this is very important. I don't remember. Fair enough. I don't remember. To me, there's - Well, here, let's answer that question. So let's assume for a second that I'm secretly a born entrepreneur just in a bad environment, which I'm very okay with.

50:42And not a bad environment. It's bad for entrepreneurship. It's a great environment. That, I have no beef with that. So my thing is knowing that people can either good environment be trained and bring out those natural inclinations or not. My thing is figure out what you want to do and then go down the path of gaining mastery in that. In that, all will be revealed. I got it. I apologize. which is now I'm being selfish because it's so fun hanging with you. Fear. Right? Fear is an incredible part of all of this. Yes. When and how did you start taking fear out of the equation? Because that's the transition you made.

51:16I don't know, I would never say that. I wouldn't, like fear for me is a constant. So you feared asking people for money. Definitively. Cool. Later you didn't. No, I still do. Interesting, me too by the way. This is the weirdest part of me. One of the reasons I didn't finish off raising my fund is because I hate asking people for money. But I don't know if I fear it. I just hate it. I hate anybody having leverage. That's really what I'm all about. Yeah, I'd really have to sit down and think about the semantics of whether I just hate it or I fear it. But there are definitely things that I do that I fear.

51:46And I use fear as a guidepost of where to move because my fundamental assumption is humans adapt via stress. so your restrictions are and adversity are such an incredible framework right and those are the things oh by the way the biggest reason I want to talk about real and fake entrepreneurs right now you know why there's no fucking restrictions to being an entrepreneur not only in money but in the bio of your fucking Instagram account right this is it this is the punchline unlike you know you and I are so fucking similar I like have so much fun with it because that means I love you so much because fuck I love myself.

52:25Right? That was amazing. No, but I'm serious. By the way, self love is super, like the greatest gift, by the way, loving yourself doesn't mean you're delusional and think you're great. Like self awareness is the foundation of loving yourself. I love myself for the things that I am and I'm not. It's super important. Like how uncom, in the same way that people were uncomfortable talking about mental health, we need to start making it comfortable for people who like themselves to talk about it because it will encourage other people to realize liking yourself isn't ego or delusion. it's grounded in self-awareness.

52:56Yeah, here's the thing. Your superpower is you don't judge yourself. You're right. That became very clear to me and I think that's amazing. By the way, you nail, and you know what else not judging yourself does? You don't judge other people either so you end up liking a lot more people. You motherfuckers are judging. Last night I spent 98 hours consuming judgment. People fucking judge. We're doing this post-election. People judge. Who the fuck, you have no context of what's going on in somebody's bedroom. Or most importantly important, in their head. You're right, I don't judge myself because I know what my intent is.

53:31I'm obsessed with intent. It's insane how much I love everybody here if I know their intent. Once I wrap my head around one's intent, it's game over. It's like fucking binary switch and I'm going to bat for them in perpetuity for me, outside of me, with me, against me. If I think somebody's a good person and they're literally my direct competitor, I weirdly secretly root for them in some weird way. Because if they're better than me, they deserve to win. I was so pumped when I was with all those super angels and Scott Belsky and Chris Saka had better investment, I had a great investing career, they were better.

54:09And I love talking about it, right? I fucking love talking about it. They deserve it. That's what I love about sports, man. None of this bullshit of like entrepreneur, entrepreneurship's amazing, you know why? Nobody can judge it, it's all hidden. Man, God do I want the world to melt. You know why? People are confused. Everybody thinks I want the world to melt because I do a bad job communicating because I like keeping a lot of shit in that I'm gonna take advantage of it. I want the world to melt because people are gonna be happier. That's really interesting. Tom, people are in fake environments.

54:41No listen, this is why Tom's smart, man. He gets it, he gets it right away. I'm serious, people are gonna be happier because everybody's living a fake life right now and keeping up with the Joneses and when everything melts, everybody gets back to the right. Not paying the piper in 2009 in America for the economic melting and going through seven years of a recession and us propping up fucked our culture in a way that nobody talks about. Have you read The Stand by Stephen King? I don't read shit. Of course, I already knew the answer. Can you break down it for me? Because it literally speaks to exactly this.

55:13The center character of the book is somebody who's just popping off as a musician right when this world-ending flu happens. But the guy survives. And so he goes from everybody loves me, they're treating me well, they've got free cocaine, and then now no one knows who the fuck I am. And that whole machinery that was about to make me like the biggest thing on the planet just fell out from under him. And he's solo? And it's not solo because there's enough people to survive, but he realizes all that bullshit that he was chasing now, it just doesn't exist. So there's this simplification of life. And to your point, as he gets beyond that hunger for the fame and the adulation and just has to deal with staying alive, his life actually gets better.

55:54I love this shit so far. God, can I not wait for the economic meltdown because it's the beginning of happiness at a bigger scale. It's interesting. So the comic book that we wrote for Neon Future is literally about that. So I wanted to start post-economic meltdown, look at how people react, and then - That fucking superhero better look like me because I fucking believe in it the most. Right, we'll have to work that in, Gary. We'll have to work that in. Cesar, start drawing. Did we answer my man's question? What do you think? Yeah, yeah. No, yeah, for sure. I did have one other question that's just been like on me for about a month or so.

56:32Oh, that's it? So I'm hanging up, that's not that long. I'm kidding, go ahead, go, fast. Okay, okay, okay. So my other question I submitted, you know, I'm busy, you know, I guess, in the dirt, I guess you could say. I just graduated from college, and I'm working for actually a startup here in Cincinnati as a business development. And, you know, being around this environment, you know, I'm listening to you, Gary, and Tom. I truly believe I have a lot of entrepreneurial tendencies. so I'm building my personal brand and just I guess documenting things that I believe and things that I'm learning throughout life just through LinkedIn and vlogging.

57:19Good, so you're documenting more than posturing, right? Yeah, no, I'm not faking it. I'm letting people know if I don't know something. So I'm in the dirt but I know you also say to try as many things as possible in your age. Taste as many things as you can. Remember, and this is what is hard about advice and putting out content, people start blending in. That's why I have a lot of empathy for your patience thing. When kids ask me, I have no idea what I want to do. Gary, I don't know what I like. The only practical answer to that is like, yo bro, hey gal, go taste some shit. It sounds like you have a better feel of what you like and thus you don't have to quit this startup and be a sous chef.

58:07Right, no, I guess, and then my final question in that is, you know, in doing this, I have a lot of people ask me, why are you doing this? What are you doing? You're like, what are you trying to get out of this? Or what are you trying to be in 10 years? Tell them to go fuck themselves. Who gives a shit? You don't fucking know. Brother, the next time somebody says, where are you going to be at 30? Or where do you see yourselves in five years? Or 10 years? look them dead in the face and say, what about you? Do you know how many miserable fucking 54-year-olds there are? Most. And I'll give you a slightly different take on that.

58:43And I'll say that skills have utility, man. This is something that people don't think about. You're going to spend years developing a skill set. That skill set is going to let you do something. And so what do you want to be able to do? And that's the thing to me about adaptation, about anybody being an entrepreneur or not. It's just about skill acquisition. The difference between where I was when I didn't know what the fuck I was doing as an entrepreneur, and now when I do, is I've learned a set of skills that apply themselves in the real world. Either influencing other people, getting them pointed in the same direction, creating momentum, knowing how to sell, knowing how to market.

59:15A thousand percent. Some weird tactic. How old are you? A thousand percent. Forty-two. And you're young as fuck. As fuck. When are you, 43? March. Great. So I'm four months older? Okay, fine. So listen. Royce, do you understand? Oh, absolutely. No, but do you, like, who gives a fuck why they're asking? Bro, people asking questions like that, it's fascinating to me. I've been really watching this, obviously. Like, the amount of people that ask that question sheerly out of Misery Loves Company has been one of the most fascinating things for me to observe. I think people are also terrified they're gonna miss out on something.

59:55And it's, the only thing that you have is today. So, if you're worried about today and you take care of today, 10 years from now is gonna take care of itself. What do you fucking love doing right now? What do you want to get great at right now? You're so right because you're not gonna know the alternative. There's no weird video game where you pick a path but then you get to rewind it and watch what would have happened. Like if you go start, go to move to the company's headquarters in Afghanistan or go to work to a different friend in Cincinnati or move to the big city of New York, Royce you're not gonna know how it would have worked out.

1:00:30And if it sucks switch it up like that's the thing that drives me nuts Here's how I think entrepreneurs need to think of themselves. You're standing in a room with a thousand doors Your job is to close 999 of them and walk through one People are so paralyzed by all the opportunity cost of actually having to shut a door that they never make a decision Make a decision even if it's fucking terrible dude mistakes are the most information rich data stream There is love this standing still is the only problem Dude, I make decisions so fast, it scares the fuck out of everybody around me. Yeah. Seriously, I'm just making decisions.

1:01:04Like, the end. Yep. And that, my friend, is why you win. You can add value to the show. It's 100 % true. A decision that the team's debating for days on end, Gary answers in two seconds. And all of us walk out of the room feeling very confident about it. Here's the thing, even if you didn't, it's better to have a decision and be able to go try than to sit there and fucking talk about it. I love losing. This is how it all works together. I love when I made the wrong decision. I'm not going to do that decision in that circumstance if I recognize it again. Right. Yeah, I think of entrepreneurs as athletes that don't have a limit to their body.

1:01:42So it's like, it's one thing if you know you're only going to be in the NFL for four years because your body can't take the tax. When you're going to be in it forever, it's like, yeah, if you fuck this play up, you make a mistake, what's the matter? You're going to get more powerful. And entrepreneurship is more science than people realize. Like you're learning from the nose, it's a data point, you build on top of it. I'm insanely better than I was at 22, which would blow the 22 year old me out of the water because I thought I was the best then. Experience fucking matters. And what the 22 year old named Royce doesn't know is that 42 year old Tom feels exactly the way Royce does right this second.

1:02:18Because when you're doing what you love and you're in that zone, I feel way younger than 99 % of the 22 year olds that are unhappy. That is for sure. It's fucking true, man. And just energy level, like that's the thing. And I know you get a lot of criticism for it. I get a lot of criticism for how many hours I work. And I'm like, motherfuckers, are you not listening? Like here's the punchline. I work that hard because I'm having fun. I don't want to go skiing, dick face. I do not want to go skiing. I do not want to go to a beer garden. It is not fun for me to go look at a museum. I am not interested in watching Netflix.

1:02:55I am not interested. That doesn't mean that I think everybody else should do that. I think, and I've said consistently, self-awareness, happiness. I've said it a million fucking times. Do I believe in hustle? Yes, I do. I like work ethic. It's controllable. Do I want that to put you into depression or health scares? Yeah. Of course not, dick face. Of course not. But don't sit on a pedestal after you fucking worked hard for 15 years and then tell all these kids that they should have work-life balance, you fucking elitist. Yeah, dude, I'm, yeah. If that's what lights people up, go for it. Do not be a fucking hypocrite.

1:03:35Do not be a hypocrite. If you make 47 ,000, I only talk what I live. Right, just like, so I got really scared when you're like, when you transition on that one debate we were having a little bit there, and you're like, weird, because I just live the actual opposite. I'm like, fuck. because it's the number one thing I believe in. I hate when people work 11 years on their startup, work their faces off, I watch them grind, and then they hit, and then they're sitting on money, and they're not part of their life, and then the advice they're giving isn't what they lived. I wanna hear from people publicly that made 47 ,000 a year their whole life and are happy as shit.

1:04:16Go talk about that, we're talking about happiness. People are using mental health as a weapon to make themselves look good, just like non-profits. You might be tricking the 99%, but you're not tricking the 1%, partner.

1:04:31Cool. Thanks, Royce. Tom. Dude. It was amazing, man. Tom, you get to ask the question of the day. There's only one, at least from my perspective. Can't wait to hear it. What is the impact you want to have on the world? Because, baby, chasing fulfillment, that's the game. That is the motherfucking ROI. Thank you, brother. You got it. Thank you. You keep asking questions. We'll keep answering them. Look, Tom, for speaking. Awesome. Everybody, if you enjoyed this podcast, please go back and look at the prior episodes. They're loaded. I appreciate your attention. And thanks for being part of this journey.

1:05:10See you later.