Why Your Fear of “Burning Out” is Killing Your Momentum 

0:00I'm very aware of what my content is about. That is what I believe. I do not believe one needs it. Of course, you need to be cautious. We're animals. We're structured to protect ourselves. But I think the world has become shockingly good about worrying about dumbass fucking shit. This is the Gary Vee Audio Experience. The first question is basically like you have an ability to like make a 180 at any point with all your businesses and like everything that you're doing and thoughts and just, you know, and you say it's like just part of your. DNA so I'm wondering if you think if it's an ability to shift with whatever it is right the friend that I'm most attached to that I don't even like think about is the adaptable alien one of the reasons I called the adaptable alien the adaptable alien is the first time I remember saying this publicly so this would be a big scoop and this is because a lot of people call people that are special like you're an alien right like they call Victor Wembe Yama an alien like you know when you're you know like you're not human and i i've been often called a robot or even an alien when people have seen how extreme my adaptability is and that's why the adaptable alien was called the adaptable alien not the adaptable ant or the adaptable ant eater or you know pretty cool love it um would define because my question kind of is do you think that other people, like people are always like, I need to do this at this time, at this time, at this time, especially nowadays, like there's so stuff for like discipline of a schedule.

1:37But do you think that's hurting people? Yes. Makes it lack adaptability? Yes, I think adaptability is the greatest gift in life. And I think, you know, people that are rigid tend to be more anxious. And being disciplined and organized is wonderful. But being overly rigid, you know, like, I hope you're enjoying the podcast right now. Make sure you follow the podcast. That's why I'm interrupting. Let's keep going on this show, but follow the podcast. It'll make my mom super happy. Is being rigid good or bad? That's a great question. It really depends on the context. In some cases, being rigid, like sticking to strong principles or having a clear structure can be really good because it gives you consistency.

2:20Yeah, but real quick, I'm going to interrupt you. That seems more disciplined or organized. I agree with you that it's contextual, but like let's call spade a spade like being rigid can be an incredibly challenging thing and i don't know what webster's dictionary defines rigid at but like in this moment i i do think rigid is different than being disciplined and organized that's why the word exists wouldn't you call that negative and don't give me some you know you're just gonna appease me and agree with me like stick to your guns here like where are you at yeah i'm i'm with you 100 100%. I think you're totally right.

2:55Rigid really does have this cold and flexible edge to it. And that can be stifling. Like if you refuse to adapt, you miss out on growth, creativity, or even just human connection. So yeah, I'd say rigid. Okay, but real quick, I just changed my mind. And I think rigid is awesome. What do you think? You know, I see where you're going. I mean, sometimes having that firm structure or clear boundaries. Yeah, see, this is why AI pisses me off. AI is like the great enabler of our society right now, which is dangerous. because we're dangerously entitled to begin with, and I don't need AI entitling me.

3:25But anyway, for me personally, not for my AI, I do view being rigid as an anxiety accelerator, and one of the great goals of my life, I've decided, is to eradicate anxiety. You mean just amongst the world? The world. I've decided today that my new goal in life as a superhero is to eradicate anxiety, which I'm obviously being a little tongue-in-cheek and joking, but I'm very aware that that is what my content is about. That is what I believe. I do not believe one needs it. Of course, you need to be cautious. We're animals. We're structured to protect ourselves. But I think the world has become shockingly good about worrying about dumbass fucking shit.

4:09I would argue my Ds and Fs and my entrepreneurial spirit and me loving sports and me being a salesman has trained me for adaptability from the get. I've been practicing adaptability my whole life. When you're not scared to get bad grades, you don't put your book report in on time. That's called adaptability in a way that's not seen by many. They think it's frivolous or not appropriate or lazy or I got comfortable with breaking things. and then I had all the response I'm the oldest son in an immigrant family I've been prepared like I've been trained to have responsibility do you know how many people are 23 years old and never had responsibility a lot that's the issue like watching the footage you walk really fast really fast right but it's actually interesting because there are some studies that like the speed at what you walk is consistent associated with better performance and like your mental capacity, right?

5:16By the way, you wanna hear a fun fact? I was walking slow because it was Bryce's first day. I'm being dead fucking serious. I just wanted to be empathetic and not like completely leave him in the dust. And I noticed he was like a little slow in his transition with his bags and coats and I was like, all right, let me be a nice guy here. But like, I was thinking about hazing him day one too and just like completely being so far away from him that he was gonna get nervous. But I just like him too much too fast already. So I kind of like, but he's gonna, he's definitely, wait till you see Bryce speed of transition from where we're at to where we're going change over the next six months.

5:57It's gonna be like not even the same human. We're gonna timestamp this and then come back in six months. My question is, do you think that if you were to slow down, that you'd actually get more tired and that would yes you want to that's a great observation do you know that if I eat lunch in the middle of a work day I'm finished my body is so accustomed to when food goes in it relax because I only eat dinner and I anytime I eat dinner that's it like I'm pretty much like you know so yes I get incredibly yes it's not where I want to be by the way on the record when I relax, I fully relax. You should see me on a beach vacation.

6:44Wake up. Now I'm a little bit better about going to exercise, but like wake up, eat breakfast slow, read like the New York Times printout thing that they give you at these bougie places that I go to. Walk to the beach, sit down, put on music.

7:02Lunch, go back to the pool or the beach.

7:07Dinner, bedroom. watch a movie, cuddle, go to sleep. I could do that for fucking seven weeks in a row if I was on a seven-week vacation. The whole world was on a seven-week vacation. I'm all in on what I'm in on. There's just a little fun fact that I want you three newbies to know about me. Yeah. So you never eat lunch, really? No. I would say that I've eaten lunch less than 10 % of the days that I've worked in my life. Maybe less than 5%. Actually, less than 5%. you just don't get hungry your body's used to the since I was fucking 15 you know and that makes sense too because like your blood sugar levels and stuff makes me tired yeah and when I eat lunch it's usually like at a nicer place I like wine a glass of wine during lunch I'm fucked you know two different topics just to finish this out a little bit part of this also is just showing people that even what they might seem as a mundane thing, as meetings after meetings after meetings, that's the real life as a CEO entrepreneur, right?

8:14100%. How comfortable do you feel canceling things on your calendar as someone jam-packed as you? And what's your barometer for priorities when to cancel something? It's a great question. I hate it. I also hate not being on time. I don't know what you guys saw through that day, but at this point, I'm a little bit publicly known, So I have this great fear that anyone, and I mean anyone, an intern at VaynerMedia would think that I think my time is more valuable than theirs. So I try to be prompt. Canceling is devastatingly scary to me for the same reason. I will cancel if there's a fire, if there's a family situation that's not a fire.

8:56Like if my daughter called me or son called me and they just needed to talk. or if there's something really pressing and the calculus of the meeting I am in right now had changed during the meeting and requires incredible amounts of current thought and execution that makes me feel comfortable with doing something I desperately don't want to do which is to cancel. You interact with so many different people from so many genres, different people, like every walk of life basically. But how do you emotionally say check in with that many different energies? Like, or what is something that you practice with like within yourself?

9:35I know it's like gratitude, but like what do you mentally tell yourself to stay checked in and present with these people? Nobody's energy negatively impacts me. The great strength of my life is the inability to allow someone else's energy to penetrate mine. So if they're giving me incredibly negative energy and Debbie Downer, I become a therapist, guidance counselor, head coach, cheerleader, and build them up. And if they give me great energy, we join forces for a great energy moment. If they're focused, I'm focused. I believe the world is filled with people that are unfortunately in a place where other people's energy are the drivers of their energy.

10:14That is not my reality.

10:19I'm also fully in control. I mean, I'm not a robot. If somebody's energy does not feel right to me, I have the ability to disengage with the situation. but the only time I felt those energies the person that I felt that from historically was an atrocious person

10:42it's crazy how my intuition and my energy calculator has been able to figure out people long before the world has figured them out I'm really proud of that I'm very grateful yeah it's a good segue to the other article topic that you wanted to explore which is the obligation mindset so like the art of saying no even when you want to say yes and my first question just so that we can get that out there how do you define an obligation mindset? Let me just riff because it's interesting one of the great gifts and curses of my life is I want to say yes to everything it was a remarkably great gift early on in my career because I had unlimited time, unlimited responsibility, unlimited energy, unlimited ambition, and unlimited humility.

11:35Nothing was beneath me. No one was beneath me. Thus, everything was yes, yes, yes. And all those incredible yeses created serendipitous outcomes, friendships, memories, inside jokes, and many professional upsides. As my career started to evolve and my life started to involve family, children, personal life, obligations, magnitude, and then ultimately hitting this crescendo moment where my time just became outrageously valuable. All those things became true. However, my essence still wants to say yes to everything. Every ask, every need. And it's a really interesting challenge. No question. The best thing I can do 98 % of the time in my day when approached is to say no.

12:36Yet I still say yes 80 % of the time. or 50 or 30 or I'm not sure, but I can tell you I'm saying yes to so many things that people, quote unquote, that look like me, have careers like me, are doing things like me, are saying no to and view it as an incredible strength. I think that's right, practically. But emotionally, I don't think it's right. And there's a part of me that ideologically and romantically believes that one random yes in the face of everyone else would have said no to it actually leads to something that creates all the other wasted time, quote unquote, to be net ROI positive. however even with that romantic ideological POV that is grounded in me actually believing it's true I do sense a need to be better at saying no to get into a place where I fulfill the obligations I've already said yes to all the way through before I add more yeses but I'm still trying to figure it out I think the world is grounded in too many people that say no when they should say maybe, which leads to the best yeses of their lives.

13:58And I believe that people get high in their own supply and get too fancy and start saying no out of sheer ego.

14:07Those are two things I want to desperately avoid. While challenged with practically, I should be saying no to many, many things that I say yes to. Especially when I have obligations to see through. AKA, how much longer can I just sheerly use my will to make everything happen and at what cost? The optimist's dilemma. Do you think that do you think that the younger like younger people should be saying yes because you were saying like that and how they say no. I think the three of you would make me throw up if I knew how many things you're saying no to.

14:48Literally anything. I'd like to know what you do with all of your time and then on one side of the, I want to see every minute you live on one side of the ledger and then I want you to show me what you said no to. I'll give you an example. Please. No to a birthday party. Is that specific enough for doing that? That's great. That happened? Somewhat recently, yeah. Great. And you decided to do what? Rest? Probably exercise and then rest, yeah. And how many hours did you sleep that day? Eight. Yeah. And was that an acquaintance, a friend? massive mistake. Too much serendipitous things could have happened there.

15:27Now the question becomes, are you saying no, let's break it all down. There's rest, eight, like that was during a weekend? Likely, right? Like I'm already like, no way. But then it gets to the next thing. For example, are you a human where small talk with strangers sucks energy out of you and that puts you in a bad place? The answer is yes. Well, notice how that was my first question. Now I understand why you said no. But now I want to know why. And if you'll love this, and this is like not poking, but this is gonna help you and I know you know me already. It's really out of insecurity or ego.

16:16For not enjoying a small game? Yeah. There is no other path. and that starts to get interesting in life. Like you're in such a young place, this is happening in real time right now. You're gonna walk, it's perfect, on a Friday late afternoon, it's perfect. You're gonna be able to like, and I know you even a little bit now, like you're gonna think about this. Like what if that leads to such a great thing for you? That you need to lean into more humility or more confidence. How cool is that? Fuck man, I wish I had a mentor like me when I was younger. Really though, this is like real shit. like that is like such a quick this is by the way why I'm mad at therapists I think they can solve the thing much faster I think they just want the money like there it is pretty cool

17:04correct

17:09because if you say no it's over

17:14if you say no to playing Monopoly you can't win Monopoly but if you play Monopoly you could win Monopoly, but you could lose it. But if you don't play it, you've already lost it. So it's, yeah, it's very clear to me. And when you're young, man, God, so many opportunities. You know, for love, for new friendships, for money making, for exploring your favorite passion that you didn't know. And kids, you guys all need more friends, not less, right now. I mean, you work remote. Like, you know, like, my favorite thing about our office is the culture I've created that allows people, once they get there, to know they can say hi to somebody.

18:03Like, your true best friend in the world might be sitting in media department right over there. Like, actually. It's so cool, you know? And so when you are remote, you need to force yourself even more, right? Well, hopefully that changes soon. I know, I know. I know, that's... No, it's true. I mean, personally for me, I think a lot of people that I've seen in work have said no because of boundaries, because they're afraid of burnout. So they're afraid of working extra because I'm going to get burnt out. They're asking too much to me. But what I said, yeah, I honestly have been like that as well.

18:34And then it flipped the switch like two years ago where I'm like, I don't care. I'm going to say yes to everything because I need to make things happen. And it was crazy. I mean, that's why I'm here. Yep. You know? Yep. And that's why I'm so mad at what the world's selling to these kids right now. And it's gotten so political. Ugh. Like, what system are you fighting to not fulfill your ambition?

19:04Like, like, I don't know. Like, I don't know. And by the way, I actually have no feelings towards, one is allowed. Like, just allowed. to be complacent or lazy or not productive or mailing it in. I'm telling you I have no judgment. I just see a direct correlation to unhappiness with that because the results come along with it and then you start to blame.

19:36We have this concept that there's systematic issues. There's systematic issues in socialism too. it's called murder in the shadows with no accountability like I don't I don't understand like yeah but Gary all the systematic issues I'm like okay where are you going like okay where are you going if you can point to the place

20:02notice how no one who like shits on America and America's unlimited problems in my opinion but you notice like I don't know where they point to they love to go to like the Nordics They're like Sweden. I'm like, and then I'm grown and educated. I start to ask questions about depression and suicide levels and what, like, you know, like, okay. I don't know. And then you have to be lucky, right? Like I'm built for this country. I was definitely not built for the Soviet Union. Like there are people that are built for Sweden that are in America that should be in Sweden. Like, you know, but you're allowed.

20:37Like go and get a Sweden citizenship. Well, how, what? I'm like, well, that's like what you need to figure. Like the same engine that doesn't make you do the thing doesn't make you do the thing to go find your happiness there either. It's all the same thing. I just want people to know they're in charge and capable and that hard work is, this concept that hard work is, what is burnout when you're 23? I mean, I personally also think what you were saying before of how people are so isolated now too. So maybe it's not that you're so burnt out, but you're doing this, you feel like you're doing this on your own.

21:12Yeah, but you're allowed to get a job in an office. This is the whole cake and eat it too thing. You're so burnt down and lonely, but you like not working as much because you can hide at home. You like not having to commute. Again, it's like sleep in the bed that you made. We've just created incredible permission for complaining and whining. which then compounds itself.

21:45Where do you think that came from? Prosperity. What did your impact on that? Prosperity. They came from parents allowing it. You guys are the generation and even my generation were the generation where like the parents allowed more and just kept seeping and more and more and more until we got to a place where there's no consequences for children doing wrong behaviors. And then, you know, I'm generalizing. I mean, there's 29-year-olds who got punished every day for looking the wrong way at their parents, but I'm talking net. So, anyway, how did we get there? I don't know. Yeah, I can keep going on this kind of topic, but...

22:26By the way, we're gonna replicate this exact thing we're doing more often. I like you guys. You're the new class. And, like, I have a good vibe with you three already. We're gonna make a lot of, there's a lot of content that we just made. This is for the article for all the people that wanna say yes to everything all the time, always and forever, who maybe like me have gotten to a place where they've gotten a little bit better because their time has gotten more valuable and they've become a little more disciplined, but still in their fucking heart and soul wanna say yes to everything. You just gotta look in a different direction and realize you have the obligation to finish the yeses that you've started.

23:03And what I mean by that is I get a lot of my companies and a lot of my projects to the 90 percentile and then move on because I have so many more new yeses and that last 10 % really would make a lot of them stronger and I'm trying to be more disciplined at that. Yeah, that's the punchline. That's what it was. Almost everything. Resi, Empathy Wines, all my books, like almost everything I do. I'm so talented. I get them to 90%. It feels like 120%. but I know it's 90 % and the only reason I'm not seeing them to 100 % which would be like 400 % is because I have something else. Fly fish is opening.

23:44Fucking anything. What do you want? When the book we work on, when I go sell it, you'll see. I'll take my foot off the pedal when it gets to a good place but I know it's early. And if I didn't say yes to four more things and just saw that through, it would be three times more successful. That's what I'm trying to figure out later in my life now. That's why I'm calling it the obligation. If I became more romantic of seeing my obligations to 100%, even though my 90 % looks like everyone else is 150, which would require me saying no to a couple more things, I think everything that I'm working on would work better.

24:22It's very nuanced. I've never heard anyone talk about what I just said. Do you think for someone else, because obviously your 100 % might be someone else's 30%, but that's not a comparison because that person should just be going to their 100%. Correct, that's right, that's exactly right. That's right. I'm not going to my 100%. And because my 90 % looks like everyone else is 200%, it's not obvious, but I know it, and now I'm trying to be vulnerable and introspective and share some content that might help someone else. This article is for the minority of very successful people, which is rare for me.

25:02You know I talk gem pop. That's why it's unusual which is cool. What's interesting, sorry, Sammy, I'm going to jump in. You said yesterday with Bryce you make, I forget the number we have it on the recording, a couple hundred decisions a day basically. Yeah. Tons of decisions. I've seen like people like Bezos and other executives or former people say if they make only a couple of great decisions in a day that's a win. Same. Same, okay. So you make a bunch of decisions, but you're happy with a couple big picture. Nope, I prefer all of them to be remarkably good decisions. I just know that most of them aren't massively important.