Gary Vee on The #1 Reason You’re Unhappy: Do This to Overcome Anxiety & Unlock Emotional Peace

26:55Well people in the outside world who don't know me don't like me the reason they wouldn't like it is because either my communication style is in their jam which I understand like when you're aggressive and confident and competitive and jersey and like Like my shtick in their mind. Like it doesn't work for them. I understand that. Some people are more chill. Like, you know, like the reason people don't like, I love to live in New York City. Some people come to get me the out of here on that. Right. It's too much. That I respect. Number two. The people that know you or work for you. Yeah. Let me finish this.

27:27I think because I think this will help people. Because what I'm really trying to do in this is not saying about me. I'm hoping that people can start having a better relationship with people not liking them that don't know them. That's good. So number two, it's, it's their own. they want to be a successful entrepreneur and I'm triggering affirmation of like, they're not there yet. And they're like, you'll f*** this guy, right? Three, they've overly put me on a pedestal and then I do something that they don't agree with and it f***s them up, which is very flattering, but very understanding. But it's all wrapped up in who they are with themselves.

28:01On the version of people that do know me, the only thing, the black and white thing, was the inability. It's only the people closest that didn't get the candor that I actually ironically liked the most. Now what's been nice, you know what got me away with it for a long time was people's own accountability. Why I was getting away with it in my own mind to my own self was people would hit me up three, four years later with emails like, I'm sorry. Because they had gone through, look, if you're a C player, you're good with me. Because I think you need all kinds. It was D and F. So you could imagine, and that was a subjective opinion, whether I'm right or wrong.

28:42But as you can imagine, it's not like I'm bad at it. I've been doing it my whole life. So a lot of those people really were D and F-ing it. And they, through their own work on themselves, actually were able to go back and actually see a lot of the, they were able to see so many of the nice things I was doing, even though I was sloppy on the candor and on the firing. It's kind of like when you get older and you look back at your parents. You blame your parents as a kid. oh, they didn't give me this, they didn't do this, but then I know they were just doing the best they could or they really tried hard here and they were getting so much here, they sacrificed you.

29:14Especially if you become a parent yourself. Of course. Then you're like, oh. I get it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Of course. I get it. It's almost like the way I think about athletes. Like, boo, you suck. I'm like, you go out there. You go try that. Yeah, yeah. I mean, speaking about this topic, I mean, just start with, you know, still kind of with this first question, is this sustainable? what you just said right here I think is one of the biggest things that holds people back whether that's creating content online starting a business or putting themselves out there in any endeavor is people care so much what other people think about the end how do people overcome the opinions and judgments of others with their craft business or art therapy positive consumption new friends exercise psychedelics um true in work that is starting with do you understand that that's what is actually happening i believe that that is a blind spot to everyone they don't realize why they wear designer clothes they you know for so many people it's attracting the opposite sex because they're looking for that closing of the gap of love.

30:29So of course, alpha guys, I gotta get a... Think about all the trends we see. These girls won't like me if I'm not rich. But it's all deeper than that. That's the surface level pizzazz. It's like they're looking for love. And love is important as fuck. And so because they're looking for that, they believe they need the proxies to get it. Without realizing that's often going to attract not the clean version of love you're actually looking for. It's a whole, you know, it's funny. I said something to Nick, one of my key executives at Vayner Media. He came from Saatchi and Saatchi, a very classic, you know, mad men era, right?

31:14And about six months in, I could see he had it and all this. And then he was like doing a bunch of stuff and I kind of recognized what was happening. And I sat him down and I said, Nick, I want you for the next year in this company, if you want to grow, do the opposite of everything you intuitively think you want to do. What was he doing? He would do like, for example, at Vayner, what I try to teach people, I talk about the irony about what I'm saying. Be candid. Give me your hand. This is so crazy. I launched, you know, Dustin, we just launched something called elephant meetings. Let's get the elephant out of the room.

31:52Oh, that's good. It's saving our company, bro. And when I say saving, our retention is going to explode because of this. Wow. So what he and every advertising person, I'm laughing right now because I know every single ad agency, marketing agency, social media agency person is about to smile. Whether they consciously or subconsciously do it, everything is based on save the customer. Which means you're just eating. Like you're just yesing them to death even though they're wrong. Like I'll give you an example of social media. Lewis I want you to post on my space that's where we need to be and you're like yes sir Gary we will and you know that's not what you should do today and so just like classic stuff or like putting a television commercial on a pedestal versus a social media post which is my whole thesis so there was just a lot of stuff he was coming with a lot of baggage yes anyway I know he's gonna smile right now because I know it's been a big factor in his life and it's kind of what I want to say to everyone right now.

32:49It's almost like if you're not happy as you're listening right now, if you're anxious, if you feel a lot of pressure, the answer is ironically, you have to start doing the opposite of everything you naturally want to do. So right? So you naturally want to be at night dealing with this and you're all stressed. So what you want to naturally do is go grab another bottle of vodka. What you're supposed to do is not do that and wake up tomorrow morning and go to the gym. Like, you know, like I do think the other thing is let's talk about people like to say the toxic people around you. I'm going to give you a different one.

33:24What about the enablers? Right. What about the people like your mom or dad or brother and sister or best friends who are letting you get away with your bad behavior because they have my flaw? They don't have candor. So what people understand is like. They're not going to give you tough love or tough communication or just challenging communication. It's really crazy, right? Like, it's like in my real life, in the Gary Vee part of it, all the admiration comes from, like, you're the one that told me, like, shut up. Right? To the public. Right. But in real life, I'm very fortunate. I have a pretty stable, epic family situation where it's like, we don't have any, like, off the reservation family members.

34:08But, like, friends and stuff like that. Like, I was taught and it's ingrained in me to be the superhero. I want to fix. but that's what gets parents in a bad place of paying for their kids and all that. So these are complicated things, but I would say to people, pay attention to your circle because it's everything. You know, it's a cliche. It's not like I'm inventing a saying. The five people you're around, you know, all that. It's real. It's real. I really watch that and I'm like, that's real life stuff. How worried are you for Gen Z? Not at all. You're not worried? No, I'll explain why. because there's unlimited entitled lazy boomers now do i think that stereotypes have merit in them of course that's how they happen so like do i think that the circumstances of parents over coddling as a generational truth eighth place trophies as a generational truth and then covid where the government paid you more money to stay home do i think it's created entitlement and some vulnerabilities?

35:11I do. And I get it. Like if you've been over coddled, you're scared to lose. We were laughing a little bit before about our famous thumb wrestling match where you destroyed me on Summit at Sea. I viewed that as like fun. Like literally every time I see you, my chemicals go in a good way of like that dude, I gotta get him. You know, that's a good thing. Not like I'm a loser, he's better than me. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know? Yeah. And I just, you know, I think, I'm not worried about it because I know too many, like I think about my company. We have a lot, right? we have both full extremes. There are people walking around currently in my company who are out of their mind expectation wise.

35:47Like literally like if they could say it they want me to like come to their house, pick them up, walk them to like, you know what I mean? Like what they want. Yeah, there's just like a lot of expectations. We've demonized companies. You know, the problem for companies is they're not governments or schools or your parents. Governments, schools or your parents don't have merit with you. Meaning, a company, if it runs out of money, it closes. It can't pay you. It's over. And, you know, your parents, like, they'll constantly run up their own credit card for you. Right, right, right. If they're those kind of parents.

36:21The government is fucking full of shit and print money in perpetuity. Mm-hmm. Just print more money. And by the way, if I could print money, I'd give them... Right. and schools, that's fake-o-land. You're talking to somebody who, this is real now, in that famous four years of high school, never opened a book once, never did one piece of homework, never, never spent one minute studying for a test. How'd you pass? I figured out somewhere around freshman year that school was going for blue ribbon status and they needed everyone to pass. Wow. They were just enabling people to get through. Wow. I was like, good, this works for me and I'm an entrepreneur.

37:03I also knew that I was going to be such a workaholic that I was like, let me take these last couple years of enjoyment and get some, bank up some rest. And so this goes back to being weird. I have a lot of weird dynamics now that I realize the world. Because before, I lived in my own life, in my own family, in my own neighborhood, with no internet. I didn't know that my life was weird. And so anyway, and then I've got Gen Zers who are 20-year-olds, you and me. Fire coming out of their fucking. yeah like you know and it's not because they eat spicy food because they're just like i'm gonna like look me dead in the face and saying i'm gonna run this whole company one day and i'm like let's go sadly let's go so what would you say to someone in their 20s who maybe wants to accomplish a lot and maybe didn't have it that hard growing up and they feel like it's gonna come easily to them force the hard create the struggle why is that i said it to a friend you know it's crazy my friends i grew up with like in our era their kids now are 18 like right if you had a kid right it's crazy so i'm now having the craziest talks like ever i'm like i knew this kid when he was two and i'm talking to him now like my audience and i tell a lot of these kids and a lot of them especially the ones i was close with and we did a lot of business some of these parents really he made money.

38:26You know, like those early Facebook and Twitter and like, you know, like then you're like, so these kids are bougie. Right. They're wearing bad clothes than you. I told, hell yes. Yeah. Though this gap would be fresh. That's pretty money. Richard, good. I tell them like, yo, bro, I had a very, very real conversation two weeks ago. I said, bro, I said, you got two choices here. You take mommy and daddy's money and create some sort of fake picture and all the real ones know so you're not tricking winners and you're tricking 98 % of the losing players and you can live that life and many do. That's the easy way.

39:04Or if you're telling me because the kid had good words coming out of his mouth. I'm like, if you mean it, well then you need to go work at a company and work your ass off and you need to eat and you need to get three roommates instead of your own place and you need to. If you do not take their money, then you can do it. So if you were fully taken care of your whole life, you were allowed to say mom, dad, no. You're allowed. The problem is too many people like to talk out of both sides of their mouth. They want to shit on mom and dad, but they want the unlimited credit card. They like that they bought them an apartment.

39:45How are you teaching your kids about life? I'm doing it right now. My kids can watch this. they're going to watch it right think about this no kid listens to their parents so like me and my friends who like think about thoughtful we all laugh they're like can you talk to my kids i'm like yeah but can you talk to my kids are like you gary v they really don't i'm very fortunate but but no no in the way that i'm saying it they're not fully saying it they're like that it's dad yeah of course they're not about they didn't find me on the for you page and be like who's this cool guy. They're like, no way, bro.

40:20I'm not listening to you. And I'm smart enough. I don't know if smart's the right word. I'm aware enough to know I'm not going to be... Listen, I'm dad. And every dad and mom have obnoxious impact on their kid. But I'm going to be dad to them, which means an outside voice. I'm able to be a contributor to so many. I can't be that for my kids because I'm the main thing. So other people have to be contributors. But it's cool because I understand it. I'm pretty fortunate. I know a lot of people that I think are really positive contributors to the conversation and I can't wait just like my friends now are like the last four years have been phenomenal especially five years because of TikTok because it even started a little bit earlier there isn't a week that doesn't go by that a business acquaintance all the way that's over here to you to the inner circle right that my social graph that I won't get a text and be like and like it's so funny because it's happening so common it always the same thing you'll never believe this and at first i didn't know what it was and then and then a couple years in i was like what but i knew and i would smile but now i reply immediately i'm like your kids follow me on tiktok and they think i'm cool they're like how'd you know i'm like you know i'm like that's how day training attention works but you know it's really really cool i can't wait for my son in who's 11 in like four years, six years, texting me like, Dad, do you know who Lewis Howes is?

41:50Or Dad, how do you know Lewis Howes? Or Dad, you've known him since, taking a picture of us at World Cost Plus Market or wherever we've been, right? That's gonna be interesting, but I'm aware that I'm Dad, so I'm trying to give them all the shit I believe in. But I know it's a different version than what Gary Vee is because they're gonna have supplement, compliment voices to their world and it'll be interesting to see what they gravitate towards. they may be like many kids they may gravitate away from my message they may reject it they'd be like purple i want to be extreme blue or extreme red they may wow and i and i think notice how i'm saying that i'm not scared of that when you love when you try when you have intent when you're ready for it it's like a game it's like business i'm ready for the trials and tribulation of fatherhood i'm ready for the trials and tribulation of a human being i anticipate heartbreak i anticipate my parents passing away because it will happen it would be very good for my parents to pass away before i pass away mainly because i wouldn't want that for them right so like i mean like you know but those things don't cripple me those things i actually are the enhancer of me enjoying a day like this.

43:06That is a good day. Everybody I love is good. Yeah. You know what I mean? What does cripple you? Not much, brother. I think the thing that cripples me is I haven't had the extreme heartbreak of losing a family member that's within my inner six or seven. Yeah. You know? That scares the shit out of me. Yeah, it's tough. I couldn't comprehend losing a sibling, a parent, a niece, a nephew, a child. that just it's i'm not ready for that game i really my heart cries deeply for every human that has ever had to taste the sorrow of losing a child yeah and then for the people that are lucky like me who are deeply grateful in love with their parents that's also a crusher right again now i'm 48 i have so many 60 70 year old friends like it's really fascinating you can see it i mean i have friends who I can see it on their face, they genuinely, not that they want their mom or dad to die, but that relationship is so not good that there's a part of them that's a cleansing.

44:13And like they kind of. Like a freeing of, yeah. They kind of like, you know, they definitely don't think about it the way I do, which is like, please God, don't let it happen for another 40 years. Yeah. You know what I mean? Yeah, of course. So, you know, that's important to me. But I keep life very basic. I keep it very binary. It's, um. I mean, you say that, but from the outside, people see that you have 2 ,000 employees. You've got, I don't know, 100 bazillion social media followers. You've got 1 ,000 pieces of content going out every day. And VaynerSports and VFriends and the pickleball team.

44:44All this stuff. You've got all of these different... You invest in, I don't know, a million different companies. You've got thousands of relationships that are constantly texting you. That's because people don't understand the root cause of why that's happening. The root cause is because it's simple. Really? Sure. but how do you how do you how do you navigate all of these businesses relationships content how much do you how much how much do you bench i mean i can well i recently did 225 11 times okay i cannot do that yeah how did you do that two things you were physically gifted in your birth and then you put in work i trained and i have a funny feeling uh am i wrong you you've benched more at certain parts of your life, right?

45:26Yeah, yeah. How much did you do it the most? 15 times, maybe 225. Great. So why 15 that time and 11 this time? I'm building it back up. Right, exactly. This is where I'm going. Training. You would put in more work. How am I able to do this? I was gifted in being a purebred entrepreneur, which means I want to do a lot of different things. Purebred. There are not a lot of people who never opened up a book, even the worst of the worst. I'm telling you. Yeah. Because I was selling Facebook. come home, put a book back down, start pricing my baseball cards for the card show. And then the next year, it was my dad's world.

46:00Come home and read the wine. It wasn't that I wasn't working. What did I do on Wednesday, October 9th, 1991, when I got home? I went into my room, put on SportsCenter, and got the latest issue of the Wine Spectator and read it. Or Beckett or whatever it was back then. Beckett was 90 and 91 and then it started being Wine Spectator. It wasn't complicated. I was going deep. And so, you know, how do I do it? How do you navigate and manage all of it? By not being scared to drop it. That's the key. Because I have 43 balls up. I'm going to have 17 fall. I think we live in a world back to insecurity and confidence where people have one ball and they're petrified for it to fall.

46:42I have 43 and 17 fall. And I don't care if somebody... Let's pick a business. Vayner Speakers. our speaking bureau. If there's a press release that says, VaynerX is shutting down Vayner speakers. I, like a logical human, like anybody else, would be like, oh, they couldn't pull it off. It didn't work. Gary couldn't do it. It didn't go good. That's a loss. That's right. I just don't know how to be concerned with Lewis and Dustin and everybody right now reading that and saying, what are you going to say? Gary's not as good as he thinks? I don't think. Have you never been concerned about what people think about you with a loss or a challenging time?

47:26Not a loss or a challenging time. Really? The reason I've spent so much time trying to figure out candor is I really care. Let's use Max Bass. Great former employee. I love him. We just want to give him a shout out. Plus, I'm looking at this purple and yellow. He's a big Lakers fan. And he's in LA. So that's probably the way it came to mind. I care if Max Bass thinks I'm a good dude. Spent too much time with him. The quality of me as a human matters to me. Not as me as a businessman. I'm aware that I love it I love being an entrepreneur I'm famously an entrepreneur I was one of the entrepreneurs that happened to be in place when it became the thing but it is not how I fucking think about myself it's what I do it's my favorite game it is my passion it's not who I am so it's made it very easy plus I'm very fucking I'm very happy go lucky but I'm competitive meaning you know like meaning like let's say a coconut hit your head and you became a totally different kind of guy and that let's keep playing that scenario vayner speaker shuts down and you text me ha ha ha bro you thought you could do everything i'd be like bro you've lost too right like that's the other gear i have first i'm empathetic which is like oh you must not be in a good place if you want to kick me when i'm down and then second i'm like you that's the other thing that I don't understand what these people are doing.

48:44As if any human on earth today hasn't up multiple parts of their life. Maybe they're not a good dad. Maybe they're not a good mom. Maybe they're not a good employee. Maybe they're a bad sister. Maybe they're not good to their mother. Maybe they're bad at driving. Maybe they don't know how to cook. Maybe they're 400 pounds overweight because they don't have a good relationship. But like, as if anyone on earth is perfect. I mean, this is insane to me. When you see people getting attacked. Do you know any things Michael Jordan is not good at? Do you know any things Tom Brady is not good at? You can be the greatest at something and suck at something else.

49:24I can write six New York Times bestselling books, but I'm aware based on the last three days that I'm not in the top four million people that should be reading an audiobook. Now, everybody will love it. And this is why I do it because I get the feedback because they want it to be me. And I go off script and I add stuff. but the skill of reading I blow. That's why I was a bad student in hindsight. I didn't know what the f*** was going on. I was like... Yes. And that's why I was good at history. The only reason the only class I did well at was history is because I listened during class. My audio was tough.

50:02Oh, Chiang Kai-shek? Yeah, yeah. You know what I mean? Oh, that's what Germany did? Oh, that's who the president was? Oh, Walter Mondale lost every state but one to Reagan? it? Like, that's why I know that because I listened. Wow. When people criticize you for being too busy or doing too many entrepreneurial things and they have no clue about your personal life, but they'll criticize you, oh, he's probably not showing up for his kids or he's not there for his relationships or whatever it might be. How do you navigate that conversation when people say, he's just a business guy, but he's really not good at family, intimate relationships, personal life?

50:44I mean, if my mom said that, then I'd be like, let's have this conversation. If JohnnyPants49 in the comment section says it, I'm like, JohnnyPants, I don't know you. Usually it's a direct reflection of their own anxiety. Lewis, think about this. Could you imagine taking time to going to somebody else's account? Criticizing them. To try to make them feel bad? No, no. I don't like, you know, I'm trying to change some words in society. Let's say criticizing out. It sounds like classic. No, no, no. You are going to, I want to go back to first grade talk. To try to pull them down. You're trying to make someone feel bad.

51:19Yeah, shame them. You're trying to make someone feel bad. I don't know, man. Like, I just don't have that gear. Yeah. And I don't judge those people either. My lack of judgment against haters, trolls, negative people is a very big power. How do you not take that personally when so many people do? They don't know me. Honestly, brother, it's logical. It's actually very logical. I would have to think you care more about what I think about you than someone you've never met because we've interacted 31 times. It would just be logical. Yeah, I had to learn this probably the hard way for many years, really until the last five years when it started to be like, okay, when people are saying nasty things about me online or leaving a nasty comment or whatever it is, I could literally take it as a neutral information and not take it personally anymore.

52:12But it took me a decade of being in this world. Look, brother, I'm not a robot. Right, right. It's not like, you know, especially like, I'll give you a big one. the proudest thing i have in my life professionally is that i sacrificed the first 12 full years of my career to build a business for my mom and dad right right it is the single thing i'm proudest of it has also been the thing historically that people weaponize against me really don't listen to him because they don't know my story you know on a tiktok he inherited a winery right right okay first of all it was a liquor store in new jersey i didn't inherit i'm one of the few people on earth that was the direct correlation for massive growth for their family and extracted no financial value.

52:54I'm the opposite of what you think you're weaponizing against me. But you're weaponizing that against me. It's all just logic. You're saying that because what I'm saying in this video is hard. I'm saying, you, stop blaming the government, the school system, your parents. And what about you? You're a grown-ass kid now. You're 26. The f*** are you crying about? You don't like it? put in the work you've got unlimited people look up to you're talking about over five years putting in the work i'm sitting here saying man i'm still working on i'm not even i'm not even like i'm i 4.7 is what i scored me and i'm and think about i'm i'm grading my own homework which means it's really a 3.2 like like why are you not capable of being accountable or like try like we all like you eventually have to man and woman up no matter how toxic like there when people say to me well but my dad i'm like bro there are people who had their uncles abduct them there are people who watched their parents drive out of the driveway and get hit by a truck and get killed there are so much extreme like as if your circumstance is the single worst one we both are very active in a charity that is trying to help 800 million people.

54:16I'm sorry about that. I'm sorry. But I was going for effect. Brother, 800 million people on earth did not have access to what I just dumped. Water. You and I spend real time on that. 800 million people can't get clean water within a day right now on earth. Yeah. And you're telling me your mom hurt your feelings? I get it. That's real. But you're not capable of being accountable and saying, you know what? I'm going to be the one that fixes it. How many, I met a man, I'm recalling now, had drinks the other day. Gentleman who said I was the one that broke the pattern of alcoholism in my family. My great grandfather, my grandfather, my father.

54:58And I said, no. And everything was there for me to do it. I was on the streets at 13. I started to go down it. And I was like, no. So why him? He's not special. I'm not special. You're not special. We have talents. The thing I love about what you're doing with Meet Me in the Middle is you're teaching, I mean, adults, anyone, kids, but adults as well, emotional accountability. You're teaching emotional intelligence. You're teaching skills that can be applied towards day trading and content and business and just navigating the business world. High-low, right? Exactly. If I can get you right here, like if you read this as a kid, then like the amount of people that are going to - This is easy then.

55:43Bro, the amount of, when I tell, you know me pretty well. Yes. I know that this book is going to slay because I'm straight up feeding you like here's the medicine. Like I was bored reading my book. Right, Dustin? Like the first half? Yeah. Because it's so in detail. It's like - It's step by step. Do this and then add this and then do this. And Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook did really well. And I was like, okay. because they get so much top level for me every day on social. Let me in book form give them something that they can, like, right? Yeah. I know this will crush. Here's the problem too, where you're about to go.

56:15If they don't have their together, they're going to start, it's double screwed. It's going to start working a little bit and then they're going to get Johnny Pant saying, you, and they're going to be like, so it doesn't even matter. Exactly. That's why I need yin and yang. Yeah, that's why I had all the drive for most of my life. I was like, I need to be successful. I'm going to get better in sports. I was willing to put in the work and do whatever it took to win, right? And that helped me become accomplished, but it left me feeling insecure, alone, and still not enough inside. No matter how much I had, how many accomplishments or success or accolades or whatever it might be, or people telling me, followers, it didn't make me feel loved.

56:53It didn't bring me peace. That's what I was telling you before. You were like, what's different in your life right now? And I said, I feel peace. I feel abundant. I feel grateful. I feel blessed. and I feel loved. And it wasn't because I've accomplished more. It's because I went inside and I started really connecting with my heart, my emotions, childhood stuff, and just allowing myself the time and space to heal. And that's been the hardest work. That has been harder than building business and doing the podcast for 11 years every week and all these different things. but actually looking at the insecurities in front of me from as far back as I could go, looking at my younger self in front of me and developing a new relationship with self.

57:41Brother, it's everything. And it's given me peace with the ups and downs. It's just given me a different perspective of gratitude. I've always been grateful, but this has given me more gratitude towards everything. and I want to share the skill that I think has really helped me, the thing that I've had to learn that I didn't have for most of my life that has really given me this perspective in a moment. But I want to ask you with Meet Me in the Middle, if you could only give people three talents that they should work on, focus on, develop, that is going to help them in this, is going to help them with relationships, health, everything.

58:26You've got a lot of different things with Meet Me in the Middle and a lot of different characters and archetypes and identities that people can go into. But three emotional skills that people can master in their 20s, 30s and beyond, what would those three things be? I'll tell them in VFriends form. So for people that don't know, there's 250 plus, I think it's 283 VFriends and they're named as alliterations of things I believe in. So this book is Patient Pig and Eager Eagle. So you can imagine how they can meet in the middle, right? To answer your question directly, I will start first with self-aware hair.

59:05Self-awareness. And self-awareness becomes the gateway drug to self-love. Once you can see it in yourself, like I didn't see the lack of candor. And my superpower is self-awareness. This is why I was so good. I was like, I'm this, but I'm not this and I'm this and I'm not this and I didn't envy or have jealousy towards that I wasn't 6 '3". I wish I was. Right, right. I wanted to play for the Jets instead of own them one day, right? Right. But it didn't happen. Yes. And I wish I was like, could sing because I want to be a backstreet boy. But that seemed fun. But I didn't have that and there was never like, I got really, so self-awareness was really, really strong and I think it would help a lot of people.

59:47Yes. It's okay to be what you are but do you even know what you are? How do you know what you are? Do you know that you're tenacious? Do you know that you're competitive? And I think you need to double down on those things not smooth them out or what a lot of people do over obsess of what you're not. You need to tweak things. Yes. Anyway, so self-awareness. Yes. How do you develop more self-awareness? I'll go into that in a minute because I've thought about that a lot. I actually think it's about communication around your inner circle to let them feel safe to tell you the truth. Wow. It's a wild one.

1:00:24Like, tell me what? Tell me, like... If you're listening right now... What my strengths are, what my weaknesses are. I'm going to give it to you right now. Because I just can feel the listener on the other side. Hey, everyone. Real talk. If you're like, ooh, this is hitting me, I've got a big one for you. Because I said this in my last book and I've got a lot of reach out on this. Just pick the two or three people. Probably your sister and your brother. Probably your mom or dad. Definitely your best friend. Definitely your best friend. and maybe like an epic person you work with, like your favorite boss ever or current and literally invite them to a dinner, literally, I'm not joking, and say, this is gonna be a weird, fun dinner.

1:01:01I'll surprise you when we get there because you don't want them to overthink. When you get there, you're gonna say, you'll never believe this. I was listening to Lewis's podcast, Gary Vee was on. I'm really not joking. This is a very important part of this little thing that I'm telling you. You're gonna say to them, it's unlikely you'll be able to deliver on what I'm about to ask right this second. But if you're wondering why my best friends here and my boss that none of you have ever met and my sister and my aunt are here, let me tell you why. Oh, bring them all together in one? Yes. Wow. Because what you want to do is suffocate.

1:01:34It's kind of like posting your weight on the internet. And like you want to suffocate yourself. Correct. You're saying, I want to be more self-aware. I need all of you to tell me the full truth. All of you are the people I deem that I think love me the most, which means it's going to be hard for you to say. But I'm bringing you all together to say what I need is this. And you don't have to do it now because, boss, you might feel weird saying it in front of my mom the first time you've ever met her. But I need it ASAP. Tomorrow's fine one-on-one. And every family. Things will open up. Every circle is going to be different.

1:02:10Every circle is going to be different. This is like almost creating a self-intervention. Correct. Most people aren't willing to do that. Correct. Again, I think three to 11 people listening right now, and I know a lot of people are going to listen between both of our platforms. I think only three to 11 people are going to do this. And they should send us a message after they do. It's going to be amazing. And so that would be how you find self-awareness because someone's going to, like, if I hadn't done that, either my mom, who struggles with it as well, my dad, who recognizes it, Brandon Warnicke, my best friend, who runs Wine Library and Wine Text, also struggles with it, so he might have not even been able to say it.

1:02:45my brother might have been able to come through my sister now would have been able to see it more than 10 years but if i had done it somebody in that circle might have been like you're too full you're too nice wow somebody might have if i did if i did what i'm saying here which is like say it it's okay i know you don't believe me and you're even and i was very i was a challenge for people always because i was always providing so much emotional and financial values yeah i'm a real piece of work for most people because it is very common for me to be either and often both the emotional and financial values in the relationship they don't want to they don't want to ruin the relationship yeah yeah like it's you know it's a vulnerability for me i it's it's my it's my coping mechanism i always have the leverage take care of people yeah i just always have the leverage i mean there's those are the two things on earth emotional and finally that's the game yeah and i'm good at both and generous with both wow okay so that's number one uh self awareness number two gratitude gorilla i think if you can learn and this is just killing people on earth you would be flabbergasted what would happen and i've seen it with people around me recently where you just decide right now on this podcast that instead of waking up in the morning, which so many people do, being all upset and having all of their perspective and energy towards what's not good, I should be making more money.

1:04:22I don't like my job. This person I just woke up next to, I don't like him anymore. Like all the tough stuff. instead deciding to be like, I'm glad I woke up and didn't die last night. Simplicity. Gratitude comes from simplicity. Like it's like, you know, back to your point, like everyone's like, Gary, social media's f***ing up everybody. They think they need this stuff. I'm like, do you understand that I grew up watching Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous? Right. Like, have you heard of MTV Cribs? Everybody saw that. Everyone's showing the, over the top. Pimp my ride. Like, if you had a $400 used car, that felt this is not a new phenomenon as if what you didn't go to school and one of the kids was the richest kid in school you didn't have envy that they had a brand new BMW and you had to walk to school get the f*** out of here with envy and jealousy it's as old as time so gratitude what do you again I said something to somebody who was complaining in my inner circle about 3-4 years ago and they were just like but you to me and then to other stuff, right?

1:05:33And I finally said, I said, X person, let's bump this dinner because this is not like fun. Instead of telling me like why I have it better, why, and this is somebody I really know, why this person has it better, why your older brother has it better, this is the real example. I'm like, for the next 20 minutes while we eat this chicken, can you please tell me? Hand it to us perfectly. You're going to like this. I said, can you tell me who you have it better than? and it was a really interesting moment and i know that person's smiling right now and i'll probably get a text i think it really had an impact on them because i suffocated it they're like oh i was like no no just appease me we're like we're here who do you have a better than and then he went into like all our common people which he definitely had it better than and then i went into my and I'm like okay and what about everybody who is in Africa right now in concentration and the people in China like people like what about real what about somebody who during this dinner got diagnosed with terminal cancer and during this dinner looked down at their phone real quick and got into a car accident that took their life and what about the two 14 year old twin daughters that lost their mom in that picture I just painted since we've been sitting here I just don't understand how people don't understand what's going on.

1:06:54Since you and I have been sitting recording this podcast, of the 8 billion people on earth, thousands have not only died, correct, but have gotten devastating news. I saw this stat maybe five years ago that has given me a completely different perspective on gratitude that roughly 150 ,000 people a day die. We woke up today. We're not one of them. And if we can just have that one perspective, 150 ,000 people a day die. Bro, I live on that. Bro, I live on that, Lewis. And honestly, death is less scary than something, notice where I went with it. Sickness. You said die, and I jumped in with devastating news.

1:07:35Yes. Right? I ask this to myself, and I ask it to everyone. Is it better for you to die, or is it better for the person you love the most on earth and can't live without dying? I think most people are going to choose themselves in that scenario. Wow. So there's just a lot going on. So I just think gratitude. Number three, and we already talked about it, but I can't get away from it. If you can learn that pointing a thumb will lead to ultimate happiness and pointing a finger will compound your unhappiness, you will realize that accountability is the, I almost have delusional, not even healthy accountability.

1:08:15That's how much I like it. Like, I really do believe what I'm about to say. Every single thing at VaynerX and VFriends and VaynerSports and every one of my companies that is a problem is 100 % my fault. I'm at the top. So if Sally screwed up, well, I hired the person that hired the person that hired the person that hired Sally. I did. So, you know, I think that accountability is the anecdote. It's the formula. it's the solution it's the medicine and I believe the reason everyone's talking about a lot of rough stuff right now is we are in the greatest era of blame in a very long time wow it is everyone's fault but yourself right and that's because politicians are f***ing up everything so it's very easy to be like f***ing either this side parenting has definitely gone awry where it goes too far one or another in general there's tons of great parents I just think you know we're in a little bit of a pickle People lack civility.

1:09:16We're just not nice to each other. People are just talking so negative. People being excited about people's downfalls. Right? I mean, I had a real moment on all this stuff very recently with what happened with Kate Middleton, right? What happened? You know, I don't know. I hate talking about things I don't know, so I'm going to go very headline reading. I guess, you know, recently, like, there was some - She was missing or something? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And it was like a cropped photo, and everyone had jokes and everyone had jokes and she made a video and said I have cancer. And everyone's like, I'm sorry.

1:09:52What do you mean I'm sorry? Or I'm embarrassed. What about not doing it in the first place? The thing on people for? I just have a very simple question for people. Explain to me any justification on another human being. Yeah, I guess the only thing I could think they might be thinking is, well, to hold people accountable if they're doing harm to others. Who the fuck are you? Yeah. I have no... I love when people are like... Like, I have... Humility would have been the next... As if I'm supposed to... Who the fuck are you that you're... You're supposed to hold Kate Middleton accountable? Right.

1:10:33Who the fuck do you think you are? I don't think I'm supposed to hold anybody accountable at some level, including... Including employees, children, You're part of it. That's ego. That's delusion. I'm going to hold you accountable for what? That you married into the royal fit? What the f*** does it matter with you? And sometimes when people play this chess game with me, they go, but what if somebody came up at you and punched you in the face? My brain goes into, that person's in a really f***ed up place. Before I, you know, I don't think people have a good relationship with understanding where anger, negativity, and darkness comes from.

1:11:10it always comes from a place of weakness. I struggle to be mad at someone when my first default thought is to have compassion for them. Yeah, that's a superpower. It's a blessing. I see it in my mom. I know she gave me that DNA and then she obviously fostered it. But it is how I see the world and I really wish the rest of the world saw it that way too. Wow. Because I will tell you what happens with that. You don't have the capacity to hate someone for being different than you. Right, right. When that happens. It doesn't mean you have to allow it to continue to happen. No, well, this is what I...

1:11:45Create boundaries, you know what I mean? Yeah, this is what I love you for that. I just feel super in charge. Well, Gary, what if... I'm like, well, then I can stop talking to them. Yeah, yeah. Well, what if it's your mom? You can stop talking to your mom. Right. I don't recommend it. I'd rather you go through therapy, push... Like, I'd rather something... They're being... But you are fully in charge. Gary, everything's... Man, I had this dinner the other night. God, a lot of dinners, as you can hear. I want to be respectful of your time, too. No worries, but I'm getting hyped right now. This guy's like, everything's up in America.

1:12:14I finally looked at him and said, move. Quit blaming. Move. Yeah. You like Canada? Right. Epic. Mexico? Epic. I don't know. Sweden sounds nice. Spain's lovely this time of year. I don't... Shut the... Up. And I'm not saying that negatively. I'm saying that encouragingly. Dwelling and complaining and envy and jealousy are massive weaknesses. I go on Twitter and I look at all of this and I'm like, insecure, insecure, insecure, insecure, insecure, insecure, and left, right, left, right. Insecure, insecure, insecure, insecure, insecure. Bad place, bad place, bad place, bad place. And I'm not with judgment, with deep hope that I and many others that are in a good place can figure out the single word to say, do the single podcast, write the single book, post the single quote, that might help one of those people say, fuck it.

1:13:16Because for me, what has definitely made me successful and was a kissing cousin to my inability to be candorous is I care about positivity. I don't do well in negativity. And so I have this yearning to do it for the world because I'm already full. It's like back to the cup. Okay, my cup is full. well, when you're lucky, and I think you're going through this journey right now, so this is going to be really understandable to you, I'm good. Yeah. So what do you do next? Help others. You don't know what to do with it. It's the only thing that makes you feel good because you don't need any more water.

1:13:51Yeah. Your water's full. You don't have room. I'm good. Now, I'm going to end with this. Multiple times a day, I have micro moments of like, but they don't have sustainability. Yeah, yeah. Got it? You catch it and you move on. We lost two big clients yesterday. One in Asia, one in Europe. There's a lot of work to be done. But I'm not like, I'm dead. There's always something. Two books you've got going on. Meet Me in the Middle. I think everyone should be getting this, especially parents get this so you can have this for your kids. Well, the cool thing with Meet Me in the Middle and the cartoons I'm doing this summer that are going to be launching on YouTube Kids is I'm making them both for the parents and the kids.

1:14:34so what I'm most excited about is when the parents read this I'm poking at them too of course and that that is going to be if I pull anything off if I pull off the dream I have over the next 40 years 50 years of be friends hopefully one of my 48 98 I want 105 so over the next 57 years uh uh is that I got to own both like I'm I dream so hard right now that a parent is laying in bed with their five-year-old reading it. And they're like, yeah. And they're like, oh. I'm so excited about that. I got to read this to myself, yeah. So you guys can get up a copy, go on Amazon or anywhere, books are sold.

1:15:10Meet me in the middle, make sure you get this. Again, I don't think day trading attention is as valuable unless you get meet me in the middle first because then you can appreciate what you're creating in your freelance business, solo entrepreneur, you know, if you're a career, whatever it might be. Day trading attention. That said though, I think about you a lot because I met you when you were the LinkedIn guy in 2009, right? And then you were a pioneer in podcasting. What is exciting about, what tricked me for so long was the advice that's tactical of the moment like this. It works for everyone.

1:15:43It's not sustainable work if you don't do the thing you're talking about. Absolutely. Right? So 2011, you would have read this and tripled. Oh, yeah. And you would have texted me and be like, bro, I love you. I'm crushing it. To your point, you would have still had this day. I still have a problem with me. You still had to get to that place. And then that place becomes where you become the ultimate version. Exactly. So get both, obviously. But day trading attention is about how to actually build brand sales in the new social media world. Again, this is required reading from anyone in online marketing, social media, content creation, business.

1:16:15Make sure you get a copy of this. It's step by step. It's 20 years of experience with Gary on social media and obsessive with data and results and putting it into one book. So this is required reading. Of the moment, right? So this book was called Jab, Jab, Jab, Left Hook until the last moment. It's like, I need to write this book every, I should be writing it every year, like the dummies. But right now I'm every 10 years and hopefully I'll close the gap. But what I'm excited about is it is pattern recognition and expertise, but it is of this second. Yes, absolutely. So get that book. Two final questions before I ask them.

1:16:53I want to acknowledge you again, Gary, for just being a real human being, for being a real friend, for showing up consistently for so many people. Again, personally in your life, but for the world that follows your content, I just appreciate how you continue to evolve, show up. And the thing that I think I love the most about you is how you took your health to a whole nother level. Seven, eight years ago, I think you went all in. 10. 10 years ago. And I think that is, for me, the most inspiring thing because people can see the business success and be like, I want that and then miss out on the health.

1:17:24So the fact that you keep Thank you. Going all in on that and you look better now than you did 10 years ago is something I really appreciate and respect because I think that's what the world's going to need more of is focusing on their own health. I asked you about your three truths before. I'm going to skip this question. I'm going to go to the final question, which is what is your definition of greatness? That you gave more than you took. I really love this talk. I'm excited about this podcast. I think the extra time, usually I do 45 or, you know, I think the extra time slowed me down. I think one of the reasons I'm not good at being a podcast host is that they're very, no really, they're very tight times.

1:18:07I always have a meeting after. And people get frustrated with me because I talk over my guests because I'm not relaxed because I know I don't have a lot of time. And I want to get to a bunch of punchlines for them. But then it becomes awkward and I'm talking over them and I'm interrupting like, Gary, he just wants to talk. and the audience is not wrong that gets frustrated by that version. Some people love it because they have brains like mine. But nonetheless, I really do think we touched on the thing that is greatness, which is like, look, one of the things I've done well in my life is I was attracted to older people my whole life.

1:18:40When I was seven, 10, 13, I'd always go and talk to 80, 90 year olds at the bench, at the park. It was big. And I used to think it was because I didn't have grandparents. Because I lost three of my four grandparents. I had my grandma, Esther, thank God. And I was like, oh, especially grandfathers I would go to a lot. So more specifically, I didn't have grandfathers. I've come to realize that's not true. It's that I'm addicted to wisdom and the actual game. And I think greatness comes in like, I think about, there's been a lot of great athletes. And again, I'm bringing up Kobe again because I'm so glad you got to do that podcast.

1:19:19It's so devastating that he's not on this earth. but Kobe was different because he was more like us in the way that like it wasn't that he was just a great athlete he gave about like higher thinking and like competition as a healthy like it was just more thoughtful yes and you know I think that I think the reason he's revered is he gave to us yes right and I think greatness comes in like what like I think my mom is the greatest parent of all time. And when I think about why I believe that is, she can only, the reason I believe that is, there's others that tie her, but they can only tie her. Because my definition of a parent is, there's many things to it, but my personal subjective definition is, how much did you give to those kids?

1:20:07And I just think my mom gave it all. Like all of it. And I just know that that means for every other mom and dad that has done that, they can only tie my mom for the greatest. but it is a giving game. And so I do a lot of things of gaining, building my companies and dollars and followers and attention. I understand that. But I'm outpacing it with my giving and I think I will continue to do that. And that is where the BeFriend strategy came from. I was like, oh, I can take this. This is what Disney, and actually now I realize this is why Sesame Street and Jim Henson is a legend. And I'm gonna do that too.

1:20:42I'm gonna create characters that people are gonna fall in love with. but I'm gonna do it around collectability, like Pokemon. Because what I know about Pokemon and Marvel is that old G's still like it. Whereas Big Bird and Cookie Monster, we're done with. But if I take what's epic about, the Pokemon doesn't bring the value that Sesame Street does. But if I take the best of Sesame Street and the best of Pokemon and I smash that together and I put my marketing capabilities and my collectible and business strategy and I build something, man, I can really leave a positive impact. The one question I wanted to ask you is, oh, so many of them, but one that's on my mind right now is you've always told me and a lot of your followers ahead of time, this is what's coming.

1:21:30Yes. You know, you are early Twitter, be on Twitter. This is what's happening now. Early Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, you were like always pushing TikTok. You were like the first one on TikTok. Snapchat, I remember you looking me in the eye saying, be on Snapchat. that was the only thing that like didn't work for me but everything else has worked for me who knows what's going to happen with tiktok instagram facebook all these different platforms uh when we're thinking of attention in the future yeah ai and freaking mobile devices and here are the things that have a chance as you know what i'm great at is not predicting but moving so goddamn fast when it happens and then going all in yeah that i have that advantage what What is coming?

1:22:11Here's things that are coming. One, for people like you and I, all of our content in every language at scale. We've got a million subscribers on Spanish on YouTube. In our voice. Oh, yeah, that's the key. That's what we're working on now. So I, and you've seen it already, Dustin, like we're pretty close. We're almost done. I'll be speaking every language in my voice, in my little high pitches, in me. That's going to be huge for every... Through AI. That's right. is there a tool specifically you're looking at that you're we're using re-speech or there's a there's i mean it's moving so 50 of them notice how i hesitated no i'm a big fan of re-speech yeah it may be gone yeah it's that game is ai eating itself up is just like crazy yeah um so ai virtual influencers oh yeah that's coming i've seen the people are blowing up already with you mean just like made up influencers that's right yeah aka very attractive people on instagram that you're like, and that will go, that will go not just, right now the early movers like always are like models and like all that, but it will be full-fledged.

1:23:17Ricky Thompson, 47-year-old marketing expert who's gonna have 14 million followers and it's Joanna Thompson in Australia that actually owns him. Isn't that crazy? Oh, it's gonna be huge. So virtual influencers. Are you getting into some of that too? Yeah, I'm really starting to go deep on that. Live streaming as a more scaled everyday thing. Let me explain what I mean by that. Me saying live streaming is important. It's not for Kysonette and Aiden Ross and Ninja and Clix. Plenty of people are crushing on Twitch and other things. No, I mean what I'm up to now, which is I have a camera in my office on mute for 13 hours a day and I'm just sitting there and it's entrepreneurial ASMR.

1:24:01It's mute. Mute, because I'm having real meetings. So people are watching you? watching me I was like we're not hearing you that's right and I try to unmute and Dustin did a good thing for me he created an unmute counter and I'm like looking at him like oh I haven't unmuted yet hey everyone like literally wow 13 hours a day that's right people making pizza people I predict in five years someone who loves to mow their lawn mow their lawn dyslexic mow their lawn will go from like that's that classic dad who does it to a the modern dad the 28 year old who's destined to be a 48-year-old dad who loves to mow their lawn, like loves it, is destined right now as we're speaking to one time in seven years as he's on that journey, streaming it for some weird reason.

1:24:49Today, every 42-year-old, 61-year-old man or woman that loves to mow their lawn for an hour and a half, a big lawn, does not think, let me set up a laptop and stream live on Twitter. Doesn't cross their mind. I believe it will become known. I believe one of them will do it. I believe for whatever reason, it will crush. And I believe that person will, a year later, retire from being a principal in a high school to making a million dollars a year. Mowing lawns. Mowing their lawn. Live streaming it. Live streaming it. So think about how different that is than what I predicted with Crush It. Remember what I predicted with Crush It, which was insane, which is influencers are going to make money.

1:25:25I didn't call it influencers. We didn't have the term yet. People will make money on the internet being themselves. That was like... Right now, somebody's like, wait a minute. I will literally make a full-time living by streaming making breakfast for my family every morning dude let me just say that you know insane that is crazy man like literally a mom or dad let's say a stay-at-home dad or mom is literally going to start streaming her 6 a.m to 7 30 of prepping breakfast for everybody and it's going to capture a fever and they're going to get millions of viewers every morning and they're going to get subscribers for two bucks and they're going to get merch deals.

1:26:02And cookbook deals. I'm seeing if there's a guy on TikTok who goes live. It must be all day he's live. He owns a little fruit stand. He's just cutting up fruit. And he's got a massive line every day that just wants to be in the stream for a second. Live streaming, cutting fruit. It's crazy. The extreme version of what I saw happening with Crush It is about to happen with live streaming because it takes it to passive instead of progressive. I had to sit down and do the wine show. Now it becomes passive. I will stream while I'm running my wine store. But will people watch hours of content when you need to be five seconds of videos that people are like losing attention?

1:26:42No, because people are watching long form content at scale right now. You know this. You just don't want to be in the middle. You want to either be great at short form or you want to be great at long form. You just don't want to be the middle or you don't want to be bad at long form or bad at short form. You could make people binge watch an entire season of something on Netflix or sit. I have people that sit with me, you know this, sit with me the whole day. That's crazy. They sit there the whole day and talk to each other. That's crazy. Well, that's community. I mean, it's amazing. It's crazy.

1:27:13It's cool. It's funny. It reminded me. You might remember this. When I was coming up the game on Twitter and Viddler and YouTube. What was it, Periscope? Well, that was later. Uh-huh. And Meerkat. Meerkat. But what about before that? Daily Booth. Ustream. Ustream, man. Ustream. And that was big for me. Wow, I remember that. I would have been a huge streamer, but now I'm too busy. Yeah. So my, by the way, a couple hundred people, I have nothing. Because I'm not, there's nothing. Right. Now, to Dustin and the team's credit, now they're playing my recent videos in the top right corner. During the live stream.

1:27:48So, right. So I'm on mute. Wow. But on the top right corner in a smaller box is going to be this. Literally this. Wow. And like, so like, you know, like we're figuring it out and like, and again, I think there's gonna be way more compelling ASMR. I can tell you right now, it would have been much more compelling to follow me tasting wine all day. What I'm doing right now is really boring. I'm sitting in an office for like 12 hours a day just doing meetings. I'm not even in the old DRock DailyVee world where I was moving around a lot. You just sit there. Because I'm in full operations mode on VaynerX and Breds right now.

1:28:20I'm in one of those modes. You know, I'm not in GaryVee land as much. Yeah. One final question then. Be respectful of your time. Three truths. I think you answered this probably five years ago last time you were on. You said you want to live to 105. Yeah. Imagine you get to create everything from this moment until then. Okay. Your vision, your relationships. Yeah, follow it. All of it happens, but you have to take everything with you. So once you leave, no one has access to VFriends, VaynerMedia. It's all gone. All the content you've created, gone. Erased from time. Okay. Hypothetical scenario.

1:28:53No, you got me intrigued. Go ahead. So I die at 105 and everything disappears. All the content you've made, gone. Okay. Everyone lives. What about the relationships I've made? Those are there. Okay, got it. So content. Content is gone. Got it. Business content. Yeah, everything's gone. But on your final day, you get to do one final live stream. Yeah. And all you get to leave behind is three truths. Yeah. Three things you know to be true. If you could go 60 years in the future. I could do it right now. I would talk to them three things and that's all they can have to remind you of I'd say first of all thank you for this journey I'm going to miss every one of you deeply this sucks I really wish I could go to 110 I don't know why I said 45 right but three things you can leave behind I would say to them that like you're in life I would say to everybody I would hope that I would have the entire 8 billion people on earth watching me on this last day if we all knew it was going down the first thing I would say to them is I promise you this is the most truth I've learned in 105 years in life you find what you're looking for.

1:29:53If you are looking for negativity and pain, you will find it. And if you are looking for joy and happiness, you will find it. And I would expand on that in my three truths because that's the game. You find what you're looking for. If you're in a good place, you're gonna find good. You can't imagine, I'm just breaking out of this question for a second. Bro, I consume positive content all day while everyone's telling me the world's never been worse. The world's never been better. like and i read some the other day of like pig liver or whatever something's about to go in our body now like we're gonna cure that one too like we're fixing like the world was worse like they're like it's never been worse i'm like have you heard about the holocaust yeah the black plague yeah like covid was fucked up the black plague wiped out like the majority of us like world war one was nasty yeah like i just don't understand people's lack of perspective so i I really am hot on that.

1:30:51Okay, number one. Number two. That love is worth fighting for. That you must destroy yourself for it. Meaning, not destroy yourself, meaning like, what you think you value if you don't have it. A current relationship that might be comfortable, which is very hard. I appreciate your reaction to that. That's probably the hardest advice I just gave, which is you know that you're in a relationship but it is not the right one but if you have children it's comfortable real stuff you know you like them like you like them that love is worth fighting for wow okay you know and the third one um man it's so funny how simple my brain goes those two really really like choosing happiness and love are so obvious to me you know what I'm gonna go with a funny one because I have a funny feeling that I would go out funny I would go out with a good curse I think I would say this because I feel it very heavily right now until you realize that competition is one of the great traits in life that it is good that like anything out of balance it's bad but the elimination of merit the demonization of alpha skills has really fucked it up telling a six year old that that it's just a game, who was born with the gift of being an alpha and on fire and competitive, is the worst thing you could do as a parent.

1:32:28I despise it, and I don't like that word, despise. Watching parents that are wildly well-intended systematically suck out the magic of a kid who was born a magician is devastating. And one of the real issues, and I hope in the next 50 years it gets figured out. But right now, so I'll use it as an opportunity to make this point. Competition is one of the best things on earth. And we have gotten really bad on the left side of things in understanding it and it's people up because if you're successful in sucking out competition of an alpha six-year-old, if you're successful in those 12 years that you have them in your roof, you've put indifference on a pedestal and so what you've done is you've taken someone who was destined to do some really good and you've actually put a kid into a place of thinking things don't matter and when you don't think anything matters and you don't think anything's worth anything you go down a very dangerous road and I'm going to go very very cautious here because what I'm alluding to is almost inappropriate which is I worry that a lot of the things that we most worried about, I'll say it, suicide and other things, are not a product of social media.

1:33:54They're a product of us not recognizing things out of whack. Competition is one of the great traits in society, and we must, at all costs, stop demonizing it. Gary Vee, love you, brother. Thanks for being here, man. Love you, bro. Amazing. Wow. I hope you enjoyed today's episode and it inspired you on your journey towards greatness. Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a full rundown of today's episode with all the important links. And if you want weekly exclusive bonus episodes with me personally, as well as ad-free listening, then make sure to subscribe to our Greatness Plus channel exclusively on Apple Podcasts.

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