Professor G: This is Why Millennials Are the Most Anxious & Unhappy Generation

27:37You know, we're here for, we're here for no time. Why wouldn't you register those emotions? And I find that it's really healthy. And unfortunately with men, there's just this weird orthodoxy that's evolved that the less emotion we we show the more manly we are i just i haven't found that to be the case yeah when did you start to tap back into emotions then was it something that you were self-aware of does someone you know give you feedback and say hey you really don't show any emotion except for maybe anger or frustration or like nothing it wasn't purposeful or it wasn't planned it wasn't anything learned it was kids like i there was just certain things you know when my kid would come in to the room we were stupid we didn't let our our oldest sleep with us in the beginning and he'd come into the room with this little basket of cars like as a peace offering if we'd let him into our bed with us and i think about that now and i get very you know i get emotional and i think about my mom and all the like the sacrifices she made i get emotional but instead of having a screen that immediately checks it back i feel it and it makes me feel that love for my kids.

28:46It makes me feel really wonderful about being a dad. It makes the sacrifices I put up with from these little things much easier. So for me, the thing that really sort of pulled the finger out of the dike, if you will, or broke the seal was kids. Really? Yeah, 100%. How old were you when you had your first kid? I started late. I was 42. I'm 41, and I'm starting the process of - You're just getting on it? getting started with thinking about when in the next year or two there's no perfect time let me i'm very good at running other people's lives just do it just do it it's it's it's really tough yeah the first few years there's just no good there's never a good time to have kids is what i found what was the uh the biggest thing you learned about yourself after having kids and what was the biggest thing you learned about money after having kids well it's sort of relaxing to, I mean, up until the point I had kids, my general thought every day was how can I be more awesome and be around more awesome people and experiences?

29:48And I want more money. All right. That was a big focus of mine. I didn't grow up with a lot of money. I was very focused on economic security. I didn't want to change the world. I didn't have any desire to be a good person. I don't want to be a bad person. I wanted a lot of money. That was really important to me. And growing up in a household that was financially strained, kind of created those embers or that fire um the what did i what did i learn about myself having kids um it's relaxing to all of a sudden not be thinking about yourself it's so much sort of cathartic because on this is friday on fridays when i was single it was like how can i hang out with more fabulous people how can i meet more people where i can make more money how can i be at a cooler place how can i be at a cooler place with hotter people making more money and it was just sort of never enough that was like conscious or unconscious thinking just lizard brain just and we're a competitive species the reason that we're all smarter stronger faster than our ancestors is we're competitive some of it's built into us some of it is healthy when you have kids it's like i'm not worried about how fabulous the place i'm having brunch on sunday is and who's going to be there it's like okay i know i'm going to soccer practice and the first few years it's tough because I'm a selfish person and that didn't foot well to being a new father and also I think there's a bit of a myth that having kids like you know bright lights and angels singing I really didn't enjoy having babies I thought babies were awful and I'm like what is everyone everyone's lying this is awful wow and then about two or three when they start recognizing you they become less awful and then it kind of flips and they actually become fun yeah and then before you know it it's just sort of for the first time in your life you care about something other than you or for me more and that's cathartic and wonderful and it gives you a sense of purpose that once you're gone maybe if you've treated this child better than you were treated and you provided surplus love it kind of checks an instinctual box and there's i've never felt say to say it across anything you said off mic before i got here oh you're everywhere i'm like pissed off I'm not more everywhere.

31:57My book was number one on Amazon two days ago. That's not what I'm thinking about. I'm number nine right now. Why did I fall to number nine? So I've never been sated and something's broken in me, fine. The only time I ever feel satisfied, there's a few moments they happen randomly. I'll be on the couch watching Premier League football or something. My kids, my boys will roll in. They sit down and they automatically throw their legs over mine. the dogs come in they jump on us and i'm like okay this is it i can't imagine i can't imagine more kids i can't imagine more just like this is it it's the only time i ever feel that way only time and i'm an atheist i think a lot about the end and i i believe that i'll look into my son's eyes and know our relationship is coming to an end i do not believe there's an afterlife but I also know I'm going to just feel more comfort.

32:53Like I actually did something. Like I checked a really big cosmic box because I've tried to be and I am, you know, I tried to be a great father. I'm not, but I know I'm a good father. What did I learn or what did I feel? The first thought I had is I need more money. Really? The U.S. becomes more like itself every day. It is a loving, kind place for people with money. It's a rapacious, violent place for people without money. Low-income homes, the kids have higher resting blood pressure than the kids in middle or upper-income homes. This is a violent, ugly place for poor people and for the kids.

33:30And one in five kids live in a household that is food insecure. So I didn't have these romantic visions of self-worth and happiness. When my first son came marching out on my girlfriend, I was like, I need more money. do you feel like when you that sounds awful i mean it's i don't sound awful do you feel like it's i think it's your instinct saying okay this is going to be more of an expense it's going to take more time you know i've got to invest in this how do i go find more resources to support and provide for this family that i'm building yeah um when you do you think something unlocks in men when they have a child to support them in becoming more financially abundant 100 i always made enough money to have the perception of wealth uh you know i was made i'm talented and i'm hard working and i was made enough money to have a nice place to live nice clothes head to saint bart's for the holidays but once i had a kid and it was a kind of a strange time in my life economically as referenced before i'm like okay it's no longer about me and there's no faking it when you have kids when you're young and you're single you can crash on a friend's couch you can move to houston and do crazy work on a whatever, an oil platform or what have you, and make a bunch of money.

34:42Once you have dogs and kids, there's just certain expenses and responsibilities you have. And I do think it's important. I'm writing a book on masculinity now. I think a decent place to start for a man is to take economic responsibility for your household. And sometimes that means getting out of the way of your partner who's better at this whole money thing and being more supportive of her career. That's also part of taking economic responsibility. It's about having honest conversations with your partner about what economic weight class you expect to be in and who's responsible for it and what's your approach to spending.

35:13Young people almost never have those conversations. But I think that that stuff is incredibly important. And what I say to young people is they can have it all, they just can't have it all at once. I made huge trade-offs when I was younger and even in your age. I didn't see my kids much before the age of five because I got very motivated, but having kids really focused me on doubling down or really knuckling down, bearing down, whatever the term is, so I could have economic security because I felt a very healthy sense of obligation to be a provider and a protector. I think that's a good thing.

35:53I think men should feel that way. And I embraced that and I said, okay, I'm going to stop drinking as much. I'm going to drink less. I'm going to get very focused on work. I'm going to be smarter. I'm going to start saving money. I moved to Florida to avoid, to lower my burn so we could start saving more money. And then the typhoon-like winds of an unprecedented bull market just literally launched me into space. Really? But if I hadn't had some of that maturity that I think was forced on me by having a kid, I'm not sure I wouldn't have recognized the same prosperity so for me it was very very focusing interesting so you feel like for most men that you've connected with who have kids they get focused when when they have a kid on their career or their finances or saving or investing and they just get a little bit smarter on that I mean a lot of it is a lot of it is specific or individual and the key question is what's your relationship as it relates to kids what's the relationship you have with a partner.

36:55So I have a very competent partner who makes good money and has really thoughtful, like I'm the spender. She's much more frugal. Yeah. She was born in Poland. So she was, you know, waiting in line for fish when she was a kid. So she's, if we're up to her, we'd have just Krugerrands buried in the backyard and maybe take a huge risk and buy like Deutsche Bonds. I'm the more risk aggressive one. I'm the one that likes to spend. I'm more of the YOLO. So the best households are households that bring together, and both of those things are good, a mix of personality traits. But having a competent partner who can help you with the kids and the immense responsibilities you can partner with around not only the family, partner with romantically, partner with financially, I think that's important.

37:43So I wouldn't just tell everyone have kids. What I would suggest is if you got a great partner, and a lot of people, specifically women, are deciding now that they don't need a partner. And I think that's actually quite liberating, good for them. But do they have people in their life that can help? Because it's a lot. It's a lot of work. It's a lot of financial responsibility. But I would tell almost anyone that is making a decent living on up that having kids is incredibly rewarding. Incredibly rewarding. And for me, it was focusing. Yes. We're talking about the algebra of wealth, a simple formula for financial security.

38:20On page 49 in your book, you say that the most important economic decision you'll make in your life is not what you major in, where you work, what stock you buy, or where you live. It's who you partner with. And when someone is wanting to choose the right partner, a lot of people, my past, was choosing based on chemical bonding. bonding, sexual attraction, chemical bonding, feeling good, and not really asking those courageous questions about the future, about financial decisions, about spending, saving, all these different things. What would you say are three questions that young people should be asking each other when they're entering a relationship to see if the potential for a healthy and happy long-term relationship is even possible, knowing that money challenges uh cite for 37 of the problems in divorce is around money challenges yeah well you sort of got to one of the answers so the the first is and young people are very good at asking this question over and over is sex and affection that basically says i choose you it's really important and young people are very good at determining whether that works or not the second is values weird stuff like where do you expect to be living in five years or do you know my ex-wife expected to be or wanted to be living very close to her parents i had not considered that i did not think about that do you want to live in a city right what's your approach to religion you know there's just a lot of questions around values and then the third one you referenced the people young people talk about is money 70 of divorce filings are filed by women we have a tendency to stereotype women as being these doughy victims that have no agency.

40:10And men is like dopey predators, right? It's Marge Simpson, incredibly high character, never makes a mistake. And it's Homer Simpson, who is an idiot, but deep down an okay guy. And the whole, all life is Homer coming over his idiocy while Marge is just this incredibly high character person. And I can statistically prove that there's a lot of good women and there's a lot of good men. And there's some bad women and some bad men. But women, I believe, and we don't like to talk about this openly and honestly, value economic security more in a mate than men do. 75 % of women say that economic viability is a key criteria in a mate.

40:48For men, it's only 25%. Wanting the woman to make money or have security. Or that it's important. In the relationship. Yeah. In some, women are much more attracted to a man because of his financial security than a man would be to a woman because of her financial security. And then it gets speedball and online dating, which is where everyone is meeting now. And the problem is that people don't give each other enough chance, especially, quite frankly, women who, if you talk to married couples, 75 % of them will say that initially one was less attracted or interested in the other. And it's almost always that the woman was less attracted to the man.

41:25Women have a much finer filter than men because the downside of sex is much greater for women, and they have a much stronger instinct to find someone who can protect their young. And so they are much choosier than men. So guys are driven by aesthetics initially online, but they're less choosy. Oh, she looks cute, or she looks nice, or she looks like she works out. Swipe right, swipe right, swipe right. Women are choosier. In addition, we have this unfortunate trend in society where young men are falling further faster than in any time in history, and women, generally speaking, mate socioeconomically horizontally and up.

41:59I'm sorry, women mate horizontally and up socioeconomically, men horizontally and down. And the pool of men horizontal and up is shrinking. Meanwhile, and this is wonderful, no group of people has ascended faster globally than women. There are more women seeking tertiary education now than men globally. And when you look at some nations don't like women going to college, that's a remarkable stat. The number of women elected to parliament globally, the elected body, has doubled in the last 30 years. There are more women, single women in the US now that own homes than single men. There's going to be potentially nearly two to one female to male college grads in the next five years.

42:42And by the way, we don't want to do anything that gets in the way of that. That's amazing. But what we also have to acknowledge is that if we don't figure out a way to produce more economically and emotionally viable young men, we're going to have a lack of household formation. Because regardless of the Hallmark Channel movie you see, women, generally speaking, aren't interested in men who aren't socially or, excuse me, aren't socioeconomically at the same level or superior to them. Interesting. Oh, there's all kinds. When the woman starts making, or the wife in the relationship starts making more money than the man, the guy is three times more likely to be on erectile dysfunction drugs.

43:20Really? And a lot of that is his own issue, his own weird sense of masculinity, and his own insecurity. But again, those 70 % of divorce filings filed by women, and we never want to have an honest conversation about this, right? Because anything that in any way might portray one sex as not being our vision of how the sex is portrayed in media means you're anti-women. I don't think that's true at all. 70 % of those divorce filings and the number one source of that divorce filing, there's really three things. He has an emotional breakdown, he loses his business, or some story declares bankruptcy.

43:53That's the biggest cause for women wanting to file for a divorce. When he's no longer a viable provider. Wow. People think it's values or infidelity. It's not. It's almost always related to money. Wow. Money creates kind of opportunistic infection. It's sort of like there's just more likely and most anger, most households coming apart, financial stress usually is creating the context of anger and disappointment. It's the underlying issue behind why someone's resentful or angry or stressed or overwhelmed. It lowers the immunity system of everybody around the household. Wow. So when a woman is with a man that makes less than them, can they truly be sexually turned on and feel emotionally safe as well?

44:37I think so. But the data shows it's not as easy. Guys can find and partner with... Guys have no trouble being attracted to a woman who is not financially secure. Now, some men are like that. I'm making huge reductive generalizations here, but there's some data around this. Women, if you're on Tinder and you're a guy who's making$80 ,000 and is 5 '9", I'm sorry, making$130 ,000 and you're 5 '9", you're as attractive to a woman as a guy who's 6 '2", making$80 ,000. So it's about$10 ,000 per inch. So if everyone talks about height, your ability to signal... Women are attractive, generally speaking, the research shows to men based on three reasons.

45:28The third is kindness. They don't want someone who's going to be a good person. They're impressed by men who are good to their parents and kind and go out of their way to help people when there's no reciprocal expectation. The second is intelligence. Because the smarter you are, the more likely you are to make good decisions and protect your family's offspring. And by the way, the fastest way to communicate intelligence is humor. I've always said if you can make a woman laugh, you can kiss her. And then the most important thing though to women, and people don't like to admit this, is the man's ability to signal future resources.

46:05It's not even he has to be rich now, but he has to have his act together such that he looks like he will be a decent provider. And the number of people, the number of men we're producing that qualify in this category is shrinking as women get tired. It's the high heels effect. Just as 50 % of women say they won't date a man shorter than them? I bet it's 80%. They're just not as drawn to men who are smaller than them because it's very instinctual. I need someone who will protect my young. Metaphorically, women are getting taller every day. They're killing it. Financially, education, intelligence, opportunities, resources.

46:41Women are killing it. And it's amazing. We shouldn't do anything that gets in the way of that. The question is, how do we lift up men? Who wants more economically and emotionally viable men? Women. Why are men not doing as well in today's society? And why are, versus women continue to thrive, which is a great thing, but why aren't men thriving equally or at the same pace? So I'm parroting Richard Reeves' great work of boys to men. There's a lot of reasons. Biologically, men mature later. Their prefrontal cortex is literally 18 to 24 months behind a girl's. So, two seniors applying to college, a boy and a girl, 17-year-old boy and girl, essentially, the girl is competing against a 15-year-old.

47:29Oh, my gosh. So, think about school. What are the behaviors we promote in school? Be organized? Be a pleaser? Sit still. Basically, education is set up for girls. I couldn't do it. And there's a lot of shame when boys just - Man, it's so challenging. My 13-year-old, the idea of my 13-year-old sitting in still for an hour and a half and listening to French verbs, I think it's literally torture for them. Yeah. You also, so they're biologically inferior. They're also emotionally and mentally less strong. While boys are physically stronger, they're emotionally and mentally much weaker. So we have the second most single-family households in America as any country in the world.

48:09We're second to Sweden. Wow. And when we say single-family home, single-parent home, 92 % of the time, it's a mom. What's interesting is the girl in that household has similar outcomes, college attainment, self-harm. They seem to be doing just fine with just a single mother. A boy falls off the tracks. The moment he loses a male role model, he becomes much more likely to be incarcerated, addicted, or kill himself. It's also a really, really scary stat. Two 15-year-olds sexually molested a boy and a girl. The boy is 10 times more likely to kill himself later in life. that's not to say either crime is any less heinous but what it ends up is that boys are emotionally and mentally much weaker yeah than girls and the single point of failure is uh when they lose a role model a male role model and there is an entire generation of men the dad's gone 70 to 90 percent of people in schools are women there's more female per capita fighter pilots than male kindergarten teachers.

49:12There are just very few men in primary education. So you have a whole generation of boys who are growing up with absolutely no contact with men. And so when I think about what it means to be masculine, you take care of your stuff. You're together. You have a plan. You're kind. You have surplus value. You begin to take care of your family. You're a protector. You're a provider. You start to contribute to your community. I think the ultimate expression of masculinity, it's more a call for action, is for a man to get involved in the life of a kid that's not his. And there's especially a huge need for young boys.

49:50And my mom was always really good at this. Her boyfriend stayed in my life. I had a guy across the hall come over one day and introduce himself to my mom. And then the next weekend he came over and said, And would your son like to learn how to horseback ride? And I used to go out to a ranch in Calabasas with this guy for the better part of two years every other weekend. And he taught me how to ride a horse. And he talked to me about stuff. And the thing is, you don't have to be a baller. You just have to be a guy trying to live a virtuous life. And quite frankly, Michael Jackson and Catholic Church have screwed it up for these men because there's an air of suspicion when a young man wants or a man wants to get involved in a boy's life.

50:28There's a feeling, well, what's wrong with him? And here's the thing, 99.9 % of men have a feeling of paternal and fraternal love. Yes. And sometimes they don't have a place to give it yet. And what I would urge all men to do is there's an enormous cadre of young boys who need men in their life and aren't getting it. This whole monologue you just shared was very powerful for me because I grew up experiencing sexual abuse by a man that I didn't know when I was five. I struggled all through school. I mentioned this before we started talking, just in the special needs classes, feeling like I was laughed at, made fun of.

51:08I was also very young for my age, so I could have been in the year prior. So it was even like, just even harder for me to learn, comprehend, remember things, sit still. Like reading a page in a book, it just felt like I had to read it over and over again for an hour. And I still didn't know what the book was saying in one page. Standing in front of a room and just stuttering, reading aloud. It was just always like, it just felt humiliating. And like, I was never going to learn anything. It was kind of like the school years. And also I got a 760 on my SATs. And I remember we grew up or we lived in Ohio, both of us for a period of time.

51:46And Ohio State, I think today still is the largest university in the country or maybe one of the largest in the world. And they, their acceptance rates is probably 99%. And I didn't even get into the own, to Ohio State. My grades were so bad. My SATs were so bad. So I just kept remember thinking, then my dad at 21, he got into a car accident that left him in a coma for many months. And for 17 years, kind of brain dead in a sense where he was alive, but emotionally and mentally not all there. Yep. So I kind of lost that male mentor figure. Yep. And I remember just thinking, man, this is really challenging to overcome these things.

52:22Now as an adult, I look back and I'm grateful for all these things and I've found meaning in them all, and they've given me a sense of purpose to overcome these challenges. I've learned great skills through the pain and the sadness. I've had to adapt in other ways, and I've had to really find value in other ways other than school, right? But those things can shape men, the feeling of insecurity, self-doubt, not good enough from school, when women tend to be thriving in school settings. So women are thriving in their youth where men seem to be struggling. How can men in general overcome all the adversities and challenges they face?

53:04And I can already see that people are just be saying men have it way easier than women. And men have been, you know, probably oppressing women for so long. So why even talk about trying to help men when women need to have the platform for the next thousands of years and men can figure it out on their own? What should we be talking about when it comes to developing young men? And how can we do it in a way where everyone is on board for men's growth while continuing women's growth? Well, first off, thanks for your courage sharing that. I didn't know any of that about you. Look, so to your last point, men have had advantage.

53:45It's entirely true. But the problem is young men are now paying for the sins and the advantage that I registered. because if you look at young men, I just got, I hit the lottery being born a white heterosexual male in sixties, California. I hit the lottery. 76 % admissions rate at UCLA, basically free, came into professional age when the internet was coming online. I mean, you know, I'm successful. You know, a lot of my success is not my fault. I was in the right place at the right time. You know, the best strategy for being successful is, where you're born and when and how you're born, right?

54:22So I had the right skin tone, the right sexual orientation, and I was born in the right place at the right time. None of that was my fault.

54:31The notion that empathy is a zero-sum game really reduces the quality of the dialogue. So civil rights didn't hurt white people. Gay marriage didn't hurt heteronormative marriage. And having empathy for young men who are four times more likely to kill themselves, half as likely to go to college, three times as likely to be addicted, 12 times as likely to be incarcerated, that in no way should take away from the challenges that women still face. Women still see their earnings power decline dramatically once they decide to have kids. That's an issue we need to be thoughtful about. Social media is preying on girls.

55:07Self-harm has gone way up among teen girls because of just as they're coming into puberty, they never got to leave the high school cafeteria. My colleague, Jonathan Haidt has written, I mean, we can have empathy for different groups and it's not a zero sum game. But to not acknowledge that young men are struggling is just to ignore the data. And unfortunately, because people have a gag reflex around having empathy for this group that has had so much advantage, we don't have a productive conversation. And then you have families and young men who see what's going on. they see this void and into it, unfortunately, have stepped some really unproductive voices.

55:50Because a lot of kind of the manosphere, if you will, it's really just thinly veiled misogyny. It starts off fine. Be fit. Be action oriented. Make money. But then it turns into this kind of feel that women are property. I would never let my girl go out with her friends, get a supercar. you know just it turns into just this weirdness where it really is just anti-women and so i think a lot of people when you start talking about young men they have an understandable gag reflex so i think we just need to have a more productive conversation one of the things you talked about richard reeves suggests that we hold boys back a year that girls enter at five and that boys enter at six but i think you've had more obstacles and adversity i was raised by a single mother but i grew up in a loving household at the university of california ucla was 76 percent admissions rate i had to apply twice but i got in i didn't struggle with dyslexia i was an underachiever but i i was tested well i would put it back to you like you are successful despite the odds you had some real serious.

57:05Yeah. My brother was in prison also when I was eight years old for four years. So I wasn't allowed to have friends during that time, small town Ohio, because everyone knew that your brother was in prison. Yeah. And so, okay. And so here you are by all, by all exterior standards, you're a baller and you're a success. Guys look at you and think that's the guy I want to be. What are the two or three things? If there's two or three things that you felt help you address and overcome these very real obstacles that you face? Because I don't feel like I have the answer. Two things that come to mind as you say that number one is seeking out male leaders and mentors and coaches.

57:44I think sports, I don't know if saved me, but gave me a channel and a platform to channel anger, resentment, shame, frustration into productivity, I guess. Developing myself and having the right coaches every season, having a really strong coach for the most part, except for maybe a semester or two in college, having someone that I could look up to and respect that gave structure. Every day you got to be here at the right time, otherwise you're going to get in trouble. That gave us positive energy, positive attitude. That gave us goals for the next three months. That celebrated and acknowledged us and also gave us some tough love.

58:22I thrived off of that. When my dad got injured, I think I had the, I don't know the intuition or just the survival strategy to say who are the men who are around his age that I can reach out to for support yeah so I had a few key kind of like male leaders who had you know married with kids who had money who had just stable jobs I was like what do I do right and they were fortunate enough to mentor me for periods of time so I kind of had that intuition to seek mentorship and coaches in my 20s and 30s and I continue to do that today I think this podcast has been helpful for 11 years, finding men like you and saying, Hey, we're doing this 11 years, 11 years every week for 11 years.

59:06Wow. So I think finding coaches and mentors and, and really being coachable to the best of my ability. It doesn't mean I haven't made tons of mistakes in my twenties and thirties. I'm 41 now, but that would be number one. The second one, I don't know if this is an unpopular answer, but is allowing myself to heal and diving into therapy, emotional coaching, and allowing all the shame and insecurity and doubt inside of me that drove me with anger and frustration to make it, transforming that or alchemizing that into a more peaceful, harmony, forgiving energy towards self and others. Kind of like you talked about in the very beginning is like learning forgiveness and this emotional regulation, I think being on a continual journey of healing has allowed me to feel more at peace about myself and allowed me to transform what is the reason behind all these things?

1:00:01What's the meaning behind all these things? And how can I make sure that my life is purposeful and lean towards purpose and service rather than destruction? Because I could have easily done that and had periods of time that I was more destructive energy, competitive versus collaborative angry versus loving and it got results but it didn't give me peace and harmony so for the last 11 years i've been transforming that energy more into healing love versus anger and resentment that's encouraging because i i share a little i wasn't nearly the athlete you are but i played sports and i got a lot of that camaraderie and guardrails and coaching from coaches.

1:00:44It also teaches you that when you think you're at your wit's end emotionally or mentally or physically, that you're not even close because you push yourself so hard. You find, wow, my limits are way, are much greater than I'd ever imagined. But something that gives me hope, I'm 18 years older than you. The self-awareness and the confidence you speak about seeking help, that just didn't happen in my generation. You didn't, we didn't even call it, we called it when someone was struggling mentally, a woman was struggling mentally, we called it a nervous breakdown. Right. It was a breakdown, a nervous breakdown.

1:01:23It wasn't, oh, they're mentally ill or they're struggling and they need help. They're weak and they're women and women have nervous breakdowns. And strong men do the right thing. They just kill themselves. but they're not allowed to like be like i'm i can't even imagine when i grew up in 70s california like a man saying i'm really struggling emotionally and mentally and i have these insecurities and i need therapy it was more like this kind of s bull that was real self-absorption and i i don't know i yeah well that's how i grew up too in the 80s and 90s in ohio i couldn't express how i felt to the to my peer group i couldn't put my arm around a friend of mine without them saying like get off you fag what are you doing don't touch me yeah you know and showing any type of weakness or emotion wasn't allowed yeah and so that drove my competitive edge to be like okay i'm going to prove people wrong i'm going to be great in sports i'm going to be driven and succeed but i'm definitely feeling very emotionally angry and kind of empty in a lot of ways when i would succeed i was even more enraged i was like why isn't this giving me the peace that I feel like I'm supposed to have, the love, the self-respect.

1:02:37And I just hated myself for decades. And I was just like, okay, there's only a couple of ways you can go. I can go into drugs and destruction and breaking things and hurting people and thinking of self, or I can go inward and try to heal in some ways or transform my energy or emotions to try to create a more harmonious environment inside so that I can hopefully create a harmonious environment around me, the friends, family, the business I create, whatever it might be. Otherwise, why exist? Why be here? Might as well take my own life. So I think that's probably what a lot of men think about. It's like, if I don't know how to get out of these emotions, why am I even here?

1:03:21And I know growing up for me, I would say that so frequently. Why am I even here? What's the point of my life? I would get in trouble. In school, go to the principal's office and just say, I wish I were dead. I wish I were dead. Over and over again. And I think that's more common with men, young men, young boys, who maybe don't have healthy male figures in their life or don't know what their purpose is or behind or getting made fun of or haven't hit puberty, all these different things. And what you're saying about men having great male role models and reaching out and supporting them the best way possible, I think is for you, it was encouraging.

1:03:57And for me, it was encouraging. There must be something in the water and the valley because you and Rich Roll are literally the most self-actualized men I've met in the last few years. But the fact that you are even self-actualized enough to know these deficiencies you have and how to address them. When I was 41, I thought the answer to everything was I just need to make more money and be more awesome and have more women in my life and just be more of a baller. That's going to solve everything. I just, I never had the self-actualization you have to say, well, there's some going on here and I need to be thoughtful about it and try and pull it apart and then reassemble it.

1:04:37So I think it's nice. I, I trust and hope. I mean, that's the reason I think you're probably so successful at this is I think a lot of guys probably don't have that skillset and sometimes aren't even able to recognize it. But I didn't, I just, I'm just sort of blown away listening to you talk about this at your age because I didn't think this way at all. Yeah. I thought money and just kind of more was going to solve everything. I did that. I mean, when I hit 30, you know, I was a multimillionaire. I was successful. I had a personal brand. I had followers, all these different things 11 years ago.

1:05:08But I was in complete breakdown in my intimate relationship, a business partnership that I had. My health was getting out of whack. And I just felt like all these things were hitting against me around the same season of life. Yeah. And my best friend, who's actually here right now, he was like, I don't want to hang out with you anymore if you're going to act this way. like something's off right and that triggered me maybe it was my fear of being alone or not having friends because I didn't have many growing up but I was like oh let me take a look at this where I thought I had the answers because I was successful I was making money I had a beautiful girlfriend all these things that I thought I was supposed to have but I was the common denominator of all these big breakdowns in my life and I was just really reactive in interactions if I felt like someone was taking advantage or abusing me, I wanted to fight them physically.

1:05:55I wanted to yell at them. You know, if someone cut me off in the street, I was like, get out of my car, scream at someone like those type of triggers. I never saw. I get that. That I felt like I needed to defend myself. Yeah. And I think it was the only way for me to not go down a destructive life was having a great friend say, I don't like the way you're showing up. He had the courage to kind of confront me in a loving way, but he was like, I don't want to hang out with you if you're going to be like this. And that concentration or just conversation and me being like, okay, maybe I don't like myself either.

1:06:31And I've done the things that I thought I was supposed to do. I was a pro athlete, made million dollars, got the girlfriend, moved to Los Angeles from Ohio. Why am I still not happy? Becoming more of a baller didn't make me happier. It created more destruction. So I was like, something has to shift. And that's when the journey started and it's still continuing 11 years later. But there's a couple of things in there. One, you were smart enough and a lot of men don't have this to have guardrails. It is really hard to read the label from inside of the bottle. Yeah. And we're raising a whole generation of men that don't, one in seven men in America doesn't have a single friend.

1:07:07One in four can't name a best friend. And you have these tech companies, some of the most deeply resourced genius individuals are basically trying to convince young people that they can have a reasonable facsimile of life behind a screen and on an algorithm in their basement. You don't need friends. You have Discord and Reddit. Yeah. You don't need to go through the pain of trying to get a job and the discipline required. You can trade stocks and crypto on Robinhood and Coinbase. You don't need to go through the humiliation and expense and drama of trying to find a mate and getting your act together and being attractive.

1:07:44that's hard that stuff's hard um you've got you porn and so you have a whole group of young men who are sequestering from society and they never have those guardrails yeah and these individuals they're prone to conspiracy theory they're much more prone to misogynistic content they start blaming women they start becoming nationalists and blaming immigrants they're less likely to believe in climate change and in some they just become really citizens yeah but you know it's it's what you're talking about, I mean, quite frankly, it just gives me more hope for young men that that is even a conversation a lot of young men are willing to have.

1:08:24Because it was a conversation we just didn't have. We didn't even think of having it when I was younger. I didn't have it either. And I think I probably would have gone to death or destruction or prison had I didn't learn how to have that conversation and look within. Because it felt like there was no way out. I felt suffocating. I either have to make more and still be miserable, or what's the other option? Be destructive. I've got two final questions. I've got a lot of questions, but if people want a part two, comment below that if you're fascinated by this, as I am, leave a comment below on YouTube or on social media that you want more with me and Scott.

1:08:59I'd love to have you back on sometime. I appreciate that. Back here in town. Before I ask the final question, Scott, I want people to get this book, The Algebra of Wealth, A Simple Formula for Financial Security. I went through a lot of this already, and I just love your approach. And I love how simple you make challenging things understandable. But there's just so much. I love it when I can read a chapter on a page, and that's what you pretty much do throughout this entire thing. So for me, I love that because I can dissect it better. But it really talks about more than just money, but relationships, stoicism, discipline, friendships.

1:09:34Make sure you're hanging out with rich friends, having financial conversations often. All these different things that I think a lot of people struggle doing. Rich, high-character friends. Rich, high-character friends. Not just W2. Exactly. So the next time we come on, we'll talk more about it as well. But people can go get it. Take it from number nine on Amazon back to number one. Let's go get that back up there. You're everywhere on social media. So people can find you everywhere. You've got your own podcast as well. You're on YouTube channel. but just search Scott Galloway anywhere and you'll see your content.

1:10:06The final two questions for you, Scott. This is a hypothetical scenario that I ask everyone at the end of my show. It's called the three truths. So imagine you get to live as long as you want. You get to continue to create the life you want. You see your family, friends grow up. You write more. All the things you do, they come true. But it's the last day. For whatever reason, in a hypothetical scenario, you have to take all of your content with you. This book, this interview, every piece of content you ever create is gone from this world. But you get to leave behind three final truths or three lessons.

1:10:41And this is all we would have of your content left in this world. What would be those three truths for you? Three truths. Wow.

1:10:52I'll go in reverse order from least important to most important. Um, physical fitness, feeling strong is really important. Develop a sense of just how important it is to be strong and healthy and really focus on your physical and your mental health young, because at some point, regardless of no matter how hard you tried, it starts to diminish. So do you want to diminish from a nine or from a four? Amen. So this is not a dress rehearsal. This is not a rental. this is it um something that gives me tremendous power is knowing or believing it's going to be over soon that you are going to die it's going to happen sooner than you think and i said this earlier i do believe at some point i'm going to look into my son's eyes and our relationship is coming to an end that gives me tremendous not only courage to try and be more expressive with my emotions, but also helps me recover from embarrassment and trauma because I realize in 50 to 70 years, everyone I'm worried about what they think about me is going to be gone and I'm going to be gone.

1:12:10Yeah. I find it quite liberating to have a sense of the finite nature of life. And the last one is don't have a scorecard. Decide the dad you want to be, decide the spouse you want to be, decide the friend you want to be, decide the business person you want to be. When I was your age, if I wasn't getting as much from a business relationship or a spouse, I was upset, angry, back in their face. I was that guy like you. Someone honks at me, disrespects me. I got to restore the world to its natural equilibrium and speed up and honk at them. Someone disrespects me at the airline counter. Do you know who I am?

1:12:53I mean, just all that bullshit. Put the scorecard away and think like, at the end of the day, what kind of citizen, what kind of man, what kind of husband, what kind of friend you wanna be, and live up to that. And the whole point is not to have equivalents, the whole point is to cash out with surplus value. Wow. And to recognize that the objective isn't to wait for the apology, but to forgive the perceived debt, right? And so something that was liberating for me and I wish I'd figured out sooner was to put away the scorecard, to just envision the man I wanted to be and live up to that and not keep scoring for anything in terms of how people treat me or respond to me.

1:13:40Because you naturally are going to inflate your own contribution and diminish others. And it was just so liberating to think, okay, this is who I'm going to be. And that's my North Star. Wow, that's beautiful. So, Scott, before I ask the final question, I just want to acknowledge you for your evolution, your journey, and your service to the world. Oh, thanks, Matt. You've got so much great content out there. Appreciate that. You know, not just your books, but your teaching. And your perspective of living in relationships and money and how to be a good man is a beautiful reminder that we all need.

1:14:14And I'm just so grateful that you're leading the way. And you're using your story and your message in service to so many of us. So I appreciate that. Thank you. Final question. What's your definition of greatness? Greatness. For me, a different way of answering is a tombstone. You get three words on your tombstone. I want mine to be generous citizen dad. I want to be someone who is patriotic, who really loved America. I want to be someone

1:14:45that no matter what happens, he was a great dad.

1:14:56and that I was generous. Yeah, that's beautiful. I love that definition. I hope today's episode inspired you on your journey towards greatness. Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a rundown of today's show with all the important links. And if you want weekly exclusive bonus episodes with me, as well as ad free listening experience, make sure to subscribe to our Greatness Plus channel on Apple Podcast. If you enjoyed this, please share it with a friend over on social media or text a friend. Leave us a review over on Apple Podcast and let me know what you learned over on our social media channels at Lewis Howes.

1:15:33I really love hearing the feedback from you and it helps us continue to make the show better. And if you want more inspiration from our world-class guests and content to learn how to improve the quality of your life, then make sure to sign up for the Greatness newsletter and get it delivered right to your inbox over at greatness.com slash newsletter. And if no one has told you today, I want to remind you that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter. And now it's time to go out there and do something great.