Escaping the Drift with John Gafford - The Key to Success- GRIT! EP 42

Episode Date: March 16, 2022

The Power Move Episode 42Learn and burn Entrepreneurship from serial entrepreneur John Gafford and his band of mayhem makers. From stripper poles to the oval office, business lessons are everywhere. This Week:The guys to success the most important underlying key to success in any field ,having Grit. How to know if you have? How to develop it? How to pass it to your kids, we discuss it all this week. With Chris Connell and Colt Amidan

from the art of the deal to keeping it real live from the simply vegas studios it's the power move with john gafford back again back again back again back again back again you know what guys you know this is like episode 42 sure well really 43 but we have 42 on the books because the lost episode as we call it lost episode lost episode is still released in the box release it in the export we gotta have something for the dvd you gotta have something but welcome to the power move my name is john gafford i am your host to the left of me is colt cheese grits amadan how you doing colt what's going on guys and with us as always is the counselor chris connell chris how are you living the dream good man i gotta

tell you we got a we got a cool show today you know what last week i gotta tell you every day can't be halloween you know what i mean every day can't be christmas every night can't be new year's eve and last time we did, I felt like we mailed it in a little bit. I did. At the end of it, I was like, man, I was ill-prepared today. I was not prepared. I felt like the show was bad. Is that old man grandpa advice?

Yeah. I mean, I just felt like it was. It's very vague. It was original at all times. Yeah. I felt like I kind of grabbed something. I thought it was going to be okay, and then it wasn't there. But today, we're going to talk about- The rice cakes came through. Well, they did. But that part grabbed something. I thought it was gonna be okay. And, and then it wasn't there, but today, you know, we're going to talk about came through. Well,

they did, but that part was good. I'm not gonna lie, but we're going to talk about something important today, uh, which is, which is grit. If it's how to have grit, the importance of grit and all of those things. Cause I got to tell you, I saw something this weekend that was, I mean, amazing. It's the only way I can say it is amazing. And I have never been glued to social media, watching social media stories like I was this weekend. And I was sitting there watching this and it was literally one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. And what it was, was Jesse Etzler. If you don't follow Jesse Etzler, Jesse Etzler was a founder of Marquee Jets, now married to the lady that founded Spanx.

Part owner of the Hawks. Blake, part owner of the Hawks. I mean, all around amazing dude. He's entered and done a million companies. Jesse is an amazing cat. He has a mastermind group called Build Your Life Resume. I mean, just the dude is a beast. Written several books and just-

Lived with Goggins for a month. Yes, lived with Goggins for a month, but just all around amazing guy. But he did something this weekend that was incredible. And what it was was he went and participated in an ultra Ironman. Oh, boy. Ultra Ironman in Arizona.

And I was kind of like, you know, Jesse, he runs races all the time. He does stuff like this all the time. I'm just going to do it. But nothing to this level of what he did. So for Ultra Ironman, for those of you guys who don't know, it was in Arizona. Day one, they go out there, and it's a nine-mile swim in this lake outside of Phoenix. And, man, the weather was so bad, it looked like the ocean.

I mean, it was a choppy nightmare. The water was 57 degrees. They only got probably maybe two-thirds of the way through this one before they literally had to pull them out because it was dangerous. Like people were just, you just couldn't, they were going to drown. They didn't pull them out. So they pull them out and they said, you know what? We're going to call that good because we can't complete it. It's fine. And then they jump on the bikes and do a 90 mile ride on the bike, which seems like a lot until you realize the next day they did another 180 miles on the bike. So all in all, inside of 24 hours, they did 270 miles on the bike. Right. And this is not just

flat ground. This is like 9,000 feet of elevation outside of Arizona. And then when that was done, the third day is a 56 mile run. Wow. Double marathon, right? So I'm watching him do this dude. And the level of perseverance and the level of grit that he showed to get this done was absolutely mind boggling what it was. It was just, it was, it was insane to watch this. And I, and a couple of real quick takeaways about this, and then we're going to get into what we're talking about today, which is, which is really a detailed, great book about grip. But when I was watching this, a couple of takeaways, number one is, you know, Jesse's a guy that owns, owns a deal called all day running company, right? The guy is a runner. He runs every single day, I think. And he is a guy that has, you know, is a runner. So when he runs, he looks like a runner. He looked like he was 120 years old, barely dragging his body on those last, on the

marathon. I mean, it was, he, he, you would have thought he was a hundred years old. If you, if you just rode by on your bike or rub by in your car, had no idea what was going on, had no idea what was happening. You would have thought, my God, that is a 100-year-old man running because it looked ridiculous. So my first takeaway from that was people that are high succeeders and succeed at a high level could give an absolute rat's ass how they look doing it because they're not doing it for you. They're not doing it for style points. They're doing it for something internally burning inside of them. And that grit is making it happen. That's why they do it. Ask me about how, uh, how I look during my triathlon. How'd you look during your triathlon?

Not good. Not good. Not good. Right. Cause you're grinding it out. And then, and then here's my second side of the coin, which is this, which is when you see people doing something, you encounter people through life. You don't know if they're on their first mile or their 56 mile. So don't be so quick to judge people. Cause again, if you rode by him in a car, you'd be like,

look at that dude. He barely nice form genius, you know, whatever. Look at that non-athlete. Not realizing the dude had just ridden like 200-something miles on a bike, swam nine miles, and was running 56 miles. It was bananas.

Do you understand what that is? Have you ever done a triathlon? No. Have you ever done a marathon or half marathon? No. A 5K. Yeah. Like, honestly, if you're out of shape, you go run three miles.

Get up off your ass, go run three miles if you're not a runner. It's hard. You tell me about how that first mile looks. that's why you know the guys that were doing it with him he had a whole team of course it was helping him walk away and bring him food whatever else and one of his buddies was doing it and his buddy at one point um was like i trained my ass off for this for eight months to be here right now he has not trained at all other than his normal running and training regiment. I cannot, he goes, I can't fathom how he is doing this. I think I can do it.

He's training. I think I can do it. Here we go. You know what? Funny you should say that, Colt. I'm probably like him. I don't even need to train for it. Hey, I'm going to tell you this.

I'll put this on the record. I'll sponsor. I'll sponsor your next Ironman. Sponsor Colt for the Ironman? I'll pay pay your admission i'll pay your lodging the night before i'll pay your plane it is now a matter of records you have to you have to complete it without walking and it's not impressive just a normal triathlon it is that to be something hard for me to want to iron man yeah not impressed yeah hard one not sorry guys not impressed i would have to uh down an iron man i mean okay wake up i do stuff i do 15 minutes on the elliptical have you ever swam in open water yeah it scared the shit out of me i'm serious i mean like a mile yeah no not

mild but i've swam no no not sharks like a. Not sharks like a lake. I did mine out in Palm Springs. Yeah. In that lake. What lake? The salt? No, no. The one that floats? There's a recreational area out there.

Palm Desert. I don't think so. Thank you for wronging me. Now he's arguing geography. I'm very familiar. Are we going flat earth with this at some point? It's not in Palm Springs. It's just a couple miles north.

It's adjacent. There's a whole lake recreational area. Palm Springs adjacent. Anyway, that's where they run the triathlon out there. And it's got like a recreational area out there and whatever. Even in calm lake waters. First off, when you have all these other competitors around you swimming, it's not calm. It's freaky.

That's why you get out in first place chris you're getting smashed first place and then you want to worry about competitors yeah yeah swim swim half a mile one time in the open water and then we'll see how impressive this is yeah and we'll see how it is you know i think look high level people all possess a super level of grit man you know something else, something else. I mean, not only am I watching Jesse do this this weekend. So shout out to you, Jesse. It was amazing, amazing what you did. But I was at dinner on Saturday.

You're such a dick. But a Goggins will be like, yeah. Yeah, it's a Thursday. Thursday for Goggins. There's just levels to this shit. So never compare yourself against somebody else. I'm naive. I don't know what Goggins is.

I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Because I think think even extreme athletes that's a lot man that is a serious but there are extreme athletes that go yeah i can do two i can do all day there's that bigfoot 250 where they run 250 miles yeah that's a lot the bigfoot 250 i did 5k cam haynes did so i was climbing mount whitney one time again i don't my old man athletic achievements. Cam Haynes in a mountain that takes people usually two days to climb, ran up and down it. He did it in like four and a half or five hours. And just to do it.

The tallest mountain in the continental United States. And he ran up it. He ran it in like five and some hours. What say you, Colt? I think I'd do it in four hours then. Not impressed. Not impressed. Not impressed.

I did have 5K once. Thought the girl was cute. So my thing was I'd always flirt with her. She was a runner. I'd say, kick your ass. That's my flirting, right? And she called me at 1130 on a Friday while I was drunk at a bar and says, Oh, I forgot we have 5K in the morning.

I literally had people running by me going, oh, it smells like tequila. Still won. Fueled by tequila. That's the extent of Colt's athletic ability. That kind of training is not going to get you to the Olympics, Colt. It's not going to get you there. I feel like I got a way better shot being an Olympian than doing a two-day marathon. You know what?

I'd say you're correct in that. I think that's correct. No, that is impressive. There's no way in hell. There's been thousands and thousands of Olympiads, very few beings. I have to psych myself up to get in a car for 300 miles. Well, we're going to find out just how much grit you have

a little bit later, Colton. We actually give you the grit test on the air. You know what I don't like? Yes, grit test. Grits. I don't like grits. Cheesy grits? It's just all grits. I'm not a huge fan of'm gonna give a shout out right now i'm gonna give a shout i went i went to i went

to super frico at the cosmo on saturday with zero expectation of it being good again it was the only cosmo restaurant i could get in too short notice i'm gonna burn that giant comp i have up over there before mgm takes over and dude that was the best Italian meal, with the exception of Carbone, I've had in Vegas. It was that good. Even better than Italian American Club? It was that good. Better than Piero's, better than

all of them. Better than, I mean, better than Ferrara's, better than all of it. We watch your tongue, sir. It was that good. You might be Piero uh pierrot well the good news the good news is i still have over a thousand bucks on comp so we can all go there and i can prove it to you which is not a problem i will i will take this yeah we can make that happen which is good um but yeah but so i did that i did that friday and then saturday you know i went out and

we went to bardot at uh at aria and I went with the top brass at Rocket Mortgage. They came to town and took us out because we are the number one broker for them here. And actually, here being Nevada, not just being Las Vegas. And they were nice enough to take us out, which was lovely. And I got to talk with one of their main guys' names, Mike Fawaz. Great dude, super nice. And he's just kind of telling me a story and he's from North Africa. Um,

where I think it was Senegal was what he was saying, if I recall correctly. But again, this is a guy that moved to the States when he was 17, got off an airplane in the middle of winter in Detroit without a jacket, just a t-shirt security guard. Yeah. Security guard gave him his jacket and you know,

just his family just made their way. And he's one of the top guys in Rocket Mortgage and just hustled his way to getting it done. And you hear those stories, and you're like, I mean, it's like a loud noise in my head, which is, what is your excuse? All of these people in this country that were born and just have this sense of entitlement, it's like, bro, look at this dude. This guy's amazing. And you can be amazing if you just put forth the effort and have the grit. If you just had a bit of adversarial. You just had some adversarial in you.

That's exactly right. So I went back when I was going through this and I was thinking about today because I wanted to be prepared and I did some research and I found a book called Grit on the subject of grit, not grits, sorry, Cole. Not grits.

I don't like grits or cool or real quick speaking of grits the polenta at super frico is another world another world other world you can't keep talking about sorry there we go anyway we're doing tonight so let's talk i'm gonna talk i have some notes here from the book uh grit by angela duckworth angela duckworth yeah and essentially what it is is i'm going to just talk about some key key components of that book and we'll discuss them. But the number one theme with having grit is talent is actually less important than grit for achieving success. People that are talented have a less probable chance of ending up successful than people that have grit. And it's funny because, you know, people with grit

are more likely to succeed at whatever task they set themselves, whether they use determination to achieve good or evil. Colt, you're good there. Talent, on the other hand, seems to have little correlation with overcoming obstacles. And this is the thing that I thought was really interesting because it talked about a study where it said in 2010, 210 child prodigies, researcher Joan Freeman found that only six of them went on to sweeping adult success. So child prodigies, researcher, Joan Freeman found that only six of them went on to sweeping adult success. So child prodigies, either incredible at whatever they were, Doogie Howser playing piano, chess, whatever it was, but all the 210 kids that would be considered prodigies at something, only six of them wound up being old, uber successful

in that field. I thought that was terrible. Now, did they get into it as to why? Cause here's the thing. Now, a lot of times people, I don't want to get into the weeds, but a lot of times these kid prodigies, they have a degree of autism on their spectrum, right? So they're extra super talented in one area, right? But if there's a social, because here's the reality, John, too. People that are good with others are usually successful.

Yeah. People skills are more important than any task skills, right? Yeah. Would you say? Probably true. And that probably comes down to a grit too right people that are that don't give up on others yeah well i think when something comes so easy it's like the straight-a student that doesn't work at it right the guy that's working his ass off for seas is going to be more successful and who was the soccer player back in the day the youngest nike guy freddie adu adu whatever he did nothing he did nothing no but he was like kapraji he was like in every rap song everybody wanted to and then he was playing in vegas did iverson win how many championships did like d rose win we're talking about practice practice practice practice so you

take a look at some of the most talented nba guys arguably still the best quote ever in the nba whatever uh but at the end of the day look at uh dennis rodman yeah you do you think dennis rodman was a talented no dennis rodman said i want to become the best rebounder the game has ever seen and he was that's what i want to do and that's it he i didn't care if he could shoot. I didn't care if he could do anything else. Rebounding is not a talent. That was it. Rebounding is pure grit. All heart.

That guy might be the grittiest athlete ever. Well, I think gritty with him takes a new word now. He's also one of the grittiest people. He looks a little gritty now. But the study on these kids showed that one of the reasons that they didn't do that is because a a couple things number one maybe they didn't love what

they were doing anymore but more more often than that not they became discouraged when their peers started to catch up with their ability yeah at the work that they had to put forward to stay ahead of them so it was easier for them to just quit than it was for them to try to continue to do what they're doing, which I thought was. I saw a thing on social media was Jay-Z actually speaking. And I was like, I'll listen to it. And his whole thing was, you know, I put blinders on. I didn't mind that other people had multiple number ones over me. I didn't care. I was running my own race, which I think that is key sometimes

because, like you said, you look at other people's success and it can make you frustrated. To your point, though, and to John's point about adversity, right, the guy from Senegal, take a look at Jay-Z raised in Marcy Projects, Jay-Z single mom, you know, Jay-Z, you know, all these things, right? The guy from Senegal. Yeah. Take a look at Jay-Z raised in Marcy projects, right? Jay-Z single mom, you know, Jay-Z, you know, all these things, right? So, yeah, no, I thought that was great. I mean, put blinders on, run your own race. Oh yeah, for sure. Um, let's see here. So now what we're going to do is cause the next part of this book, they actually have a grit test. So I thought

it would be fun. And if you want to do this this if you're listening at home you can go to angeladuckworth.com that's angela spelled the normally way angela and then duck like duck and then worth w-o-r-t-h dot com so if you want to listen home to check your grit or more importantly i would say maybe your kids if they're teens this is a good little test for them not a lot of big words so should be easy colt so here's the deal i'm doing it yeah we're doing this on you of course Of course, we're doing on you who are we gonna do it on call? No, it's we're testing you that's the whole point So here's the grid scale test. It is ten questions It is not a time test Although we would like you to move it along because I'm sure the people who are listening to this are like how long is this? Gonna take

So the answers you can answer very much like me Mostly like me somewhat not like me or not much like me, mostly like me, somewhat not like me, or not much like me, or not like me. So you have your five variants, somewhat being in the middle, not much, and then not like me at all. So you have like yes, no, sort of, sort of, medium. What's the highest? What's the lowest?

Five, four, three, two, one? Yeah, yeah. So you have very much, most likely, somewhat, not much, and not like me. So question number one, here. Yeah. So yeah, very much, most likely somewhat, not much and not like me. So question number one, here we go. New ideas and projects sometimes distract me from previous ones. I would say middle on that one. Middle? Somewhat? Okay. That's fine. All right. Cool. I gotcha. Number two, setbacks don't discourage me. I don't give up easily.

Towards the higher. That doesn't bother me. Mostly? Yeah. Okay. So a little over medium? Yeah, yeah. Okay, I got it. Number three, I often set a goal but later choose to pursue a different one. Somewhat, yeah. Somewhat? So right in the middle? Yeah. Alright. Just like lukewarm water, baby. Yeah, no.

Lukewarm water right in the middle. I am a hard worker. I'm a more smart worker. Somewhat. Somewhat? I kind of love the honesty. I know, but I'm more smart worker. Somewhat. Somewhat. I kind of love the honesty. I know, but I'm not. You kind of love it.

I tell people all the time, I am not the hardest working person. I am one of the smartest working people. This is where I'm going to give you credit. Because to me, I read, am I a hard worker? It's one of those questions like, are you honest? Yes. Like, nah, not really that often. Nah, I'm okay.

A little Larry David moment. Everybody's like, yeah. I don't know. I like smart worker. I'm okay. Not like Larry David. Everybody's like, everybody's like, yeah. I don't know. I like smart. I got it. Number five. I have difficulty maintaining my focus on projects that take more than a few months to complete.

No, not really months. I mean, so not much like you or not like you at all. I have not much like not much. Okay. at all? I have not much like me. Not much like you. Okay, got it. I finish what I begin.

Oh, no. That's probably – I nix a lot of stuff once I see where it's going. Okay, so not much like me? Not much like me. Okay. My interests change from year to year. Not really. Not really. Okay, not much like me okay my interest changed from year to year not really not really okay not much like that's fine i mean not just not baby not like this wasn't my 20s a lot different right now i've been doing this 20 years so so not like so we're going not much or not like me uh did my interest

change uh not much like me not much like me okay Not much like me. Okay. I am diligent. I never give up. Uh, I would say not much, not much. Okay. I have been obsessed with certain idea or project for a short time, but later lost interest. No, not much like me. Not much like me. Okay. I have overcome setbacks to conquer an important challenge. Oh yeah. Okay. Very much like me. Not much like me. Okay. I have overcome setbacks to conquer an important challenge. Oh, yeah. Okay. Very much like me. Very much, yeah.

Okay. There you go. So let's see what Colt's score is. You ready? Not ready. You have a score. Not ready. Colt comes in at 3.40, which means you scored 40% higher of American adults in a recent study.

What is that? Out of five or 10? Well, out of five. Out of five. Three, four. And that's brutally honest. Yeah. He was being honest. I would say this. that out of five out of five out of five three four and that's brutally honest yeah that he was

being honest i would say this the test gives each individual grit score of a scale of one to five with five being the most a grit score of 3.8 is about average and a score of 4.9 puts an individual in the 99th percentile for american i'm not that person that's going to put my mind to go run chris is probably way more like it i will yeah like if you sat here and said let's go run. Chris is probably way more like... I'm an idiot. I will push right down. Like if you sat here and said, let's go run a marathon, like, no. Well, I just, I thought it was interesting. I thought, you know, anytime we can give you some

sort of psychological test. That was intriguing. I like it. Yeah, I think that's good. I think that's good airtime to give Colt psychological tests. You're building a case for Colt. Yeah, I know, right? So I was I always had to be So for sports too

You always gotta be a little greedy But I was playing football Tackle football at 12 With 16 year olds Yeah That's cause you were probably like 6, 2, 3 I had to cut weight

To play with 16 year olds Oh Jesus Do you have the X on your helmet Sounds like 180 pounds at 12 Oh my god So Playing with that You know

Bunch of real bullies And assholes My dad would always be like Why don't you quit And it's like Fuck you I will never Yeah I'm not gonna let these kids Oh, my God. So playing with that, you know, a bunch of real bullies and assholes, my dad would always be like, why don't you quit? And it's like, fuck you. I'm not going to let these kids get the best of me. I will never let you know that you got me on something. Not letting you get the best of me. Not a chance.

I'll go to my grave to not let. I want my enemies to live forever so they can see what I'm doing. Fueled by a lot of spite. I think a lot of great things in this country have happened no i am definitely i i had one that i will feel stuff by spite probably more than i'll feel more by spite than now okay well let's let's look okay well let's well let's look right now what's being fueled by spite you mentioned earlier you had no but you had trevor noah actually say shit probably wouldn't be happening if we had Trump in office.

How is the president of the United States not getting phone calls returned? It's embarrassing. That's embarrassing. And sorry, that's not going after one side or another. It's not politics. That's just embarrassing as a country. Like I said, I wasn't a fan. I'll put my cards on the table.

I didn't like Biden or Trump. I didn't like Trump for a lot of other reasons. I don't think he's a wealthy, successful man. I don't a fan. I'll put my cards on the table. I didn't like Biden or Trump. I didn't like Trump for a lot of other reasons. I don't think he's a wealthy, successful man. I don't. But I don't like Biden either because I think he's just as much of a career politician as all these guys, just under the auspices of being a man of the people, right? So that aside, Trevor Noah, the host of the Daily Show, you're talking about very establishment left yeah hard media hard and he goes this is shameful trump would at least get the call because he's a wild card and he wasn't

advocating for trump he's saying trump is such a maniac that saudi arabia has the phone because yeah you may have a preemptive strike happening if that phone no second one well that's well that's that's the point unfortunately and this is you know i don't remember i heard this a long time ago i was talking i'm in a conversation with somebody and they were from the middle east and i was asking them this is right right after 9-11 and i was having a conversation with somebody that i knew that had migrated the states from the middle east and i said you know can you can you break this down as simple as you can? As simple as you can, can you break it down? And their response was, the United States wants to try to negotiate their way out of a problem

with the only answer the other side wants is for you to be dead. And when you're dealing with that, there's no negotiating. If it's an all-in proposition, there's no negotiating. You're not going to give them land. They're not fighting for land. They're not fighting for power. They're fighting for you to be dead. That's it.

Well, that's a very, yes. That does actually explain a lot of this. But the point being is, sometimes the only way to fight crazy is with a little bit of craziness. So do you know who Fisher and Uri are at the Harvard Negotiation Project? Oh, I had lunch with them last Thursday.

I'm kidding. Getting to Yes, though. Getting to Yes. Are they dead or are they alive? No, no. I think they're dead. No, it's one of the seminal sort of books on – Okay, do you know these people, Colt?

Yeah. Yeah, Getting to Yes. Oh, Getting to – okay, I'm sorry. Getting to Yes. I'm sorry. Yes. It's Fisher and Urie. It's the Harvard Negotiation Project.

With me, you need to lead with the book, and I sometimes don't remember the author, but I do know the book. Shocker, I do know the book. I actually did that Harvard course, the actual Negotiation Mastery. Oh, sure. Like you went to Harvard. Strasbury. So that whole course is designed in multiple books, and I've read them all, and it's been a big staple,

not through my MBA program, but as well through the Harvard Negotiation Project, is that getting to yes, when you're negotiating, it's about all these different principles in negotiation, right? How to collaboratively approach. What's your best alternative to a negotiated agreement? The BATNA. The BATNA, exactly.

I teach that all the time. Yeah, and that's a getting the yes principle. But there's this book they put out about dealing with irrational people and irrationality in negotiation. And you sometimes have to understand what your baton is right much better with a sociopath than because you can't come in there and beat up sledgehammers with sledgehammers sometimes you have to just you know cushion the room around a sledgehammer you know you got to figure out okay i i understand i'm dealing with irrationality right now so i can't

use rational thought to try to overcome something that won't have the same logical step up in base. Okay, let me back this up. So one basic honest question, and not because of friends, not because of politics, based on strictly wild card factor. Yep. Okay? If Trump was still in office, do you think this shit's happening? No. Well, I have my own problems with the way that...

Answer the question, counselor. I'm asking you a direct question. The point being is based strictly on the wild card factor of Trump. No, not on the wild card factor because Putin and Trump had a different relationship that was highly criticized as well. And when Trump was saying things like, oh, Putin's so smart and all this other stuff, he said it multiple times. And again, I understand why you don't need to instigate escalation.

But here's the, okay, let me ask you a question about that. Because this has been a, I mean, again, I saw a morning Joe clip the other day where they were just smashing that and where he said how he was a genius and how smart this was and blah, blah. Do you think, and again, this is a media, this is not a pro-republican anti-democrat this is a bashing the media idea i saw what trump said multiple times multiple times i saw what he said right he was making a comment of it was almost like what a man can do he will do so based on that the fact that he had no fear to do it, it made it smart. I don't think he was in support of him invading the Ukraine. No, no, no. And I agree.

I think that gets taken out of context. I think that's a win in context. I'm not saying he's like pro, you know, marching into Ukraine. But I do think that sometimes when, you know, to the hammer, the whole world looks like nails. And so a lot of times Trump, if you read out of the deal and the negotiation strategy and all this stuff. And again, my criticisms of Trump happened way before he was ever the president. Right. I'm one of those people.

It has to do with nepotism. People inherit money that pretend like they're successful. Like, John, you, Colton, I are more successful to me because it's relative to where you start, to where you end. That to me is success. The stretch. Success isn't when my kids losers. You're a loser. Trump is a self-made millionaire the problem is he started off a billionaire and so at the end of the day i i've had criticisms about it from a business point of view but a lot of times people look at strategy

as zero-sum games yeah and so he's playing a game of risk he's kind of watching this dangerous game of risk and going oh that's a great way to take over you know, that's a great way to come into, you know, Uzbekistan and do this or that. And to me, I go when you're talking about domestic relations, foreign policy, we saw Trump was a poor diplomat the way he handled himself around other

diplomats. He doesn't know how to play that game very well. So to him, although I did, I did like the Putin shot that when he grabs him, just yanks him to him like a little rag doll that was that was a power move handshake i think republican democrat whatever it is i think you appreciate that handshake that was a power move putin putin is a he's he's somewhat impressive as a human being aside from being a dictator and a real piece of shit at that right he has a lot of probably grit in his own right coming up through the ranks he's a judo black but i mean like the guy is not um he's not justin trudeau i think we're dealing i think we're dealing with a lot of people running countries

right now that aren't necessarily sharp in the drawer they're not the sharpest knife in the drawer anymore i think there's some senility sipping i think there's some senility sipping seeping in i think this is about legacy for him. It is. He sees the end of what it is. He wants his big statues. And again, I understand the whole issue about Ukraine and teeing up for NATO, right? Yeah.

And Putin has a good point. And let's call a spade a spade. He doesn't want missiles on his doorstep. If he did it to Canada, we'd be just as mad. And again, the United States is a friend of these countries until you're libya yeah so there's been a lot of attack united states has got such dirty hands and everything it does that when it tries to okay real quick not everything it does this is america son well all right i don't like the way you ain't gonna come in here from your canada bullshit talking about this love it or leave it just, love it or leave it, Connell. Love it or leave it, you son of a bitch.

There's been over 250 military interventions. Oh, Jesus. We're going to have a deportee. Where are you? I'm not. Is it sad when I'm looking for you for backup and I'm not getting caught? Hold on.

I'm about to defend it. He's American bashed. I am so mad that Tom Hanks is playing Pinocchio because can we not get an Italian American? Why do I even engage him in this? But to finish the point, there's been over 250 military interventions since World War II.

When we don't like something, we go in there and we fuck it up until it suits our interests, right? Now that has a lot of tertiary benefits in the world through things like hegemony over the seas, which creates safety for other countries. Sometimes having a biggest bully in the yard with the biggest which creates safety for other countries sometimes having a biggest bully in the yard with the biggest stick is safer for other people and i trust the united states not

to use nuclear weapons right but the only country that's ever used them has been the united states so i understand a lot of times if you were russia if you're china you're going you know you don't always have the best record in terms of how we're treated right that's their position and i don't agree with it because they they exhibit a lot of human rights does russia make us look like just so much more amazing i mean like they're supposed to be what the second largest strongest military they can't even take over no they can't even take over i mean they are they have soldiers freezing population and a fraction of our of our economic output yeah we didn't exactly... We have a third of our population and a fraction of our economic output. Yeah, we didn't exactly take over Afghanistan.

We were there. But anyway, all right, we're going to take a quick break and see if we can get Chris deported. When we come back, we'll talk more about grits. United States has freedom of speech. Stop it. America. America.

Canceled. You're the reason. Hey, it's John Gafford. If you want to catch up more and see what we're doing, you can always go to thejohngafford.com where we'll share any links that we've, things we talked about on the show, as well as links to the YouTube where you can watch us live.

And if you want to catch up with me on Instagram, you can always follow me at thejohngafford. I'm here. Give me a shout. Back again, back from the break for part two today on the power move talking about grit I am of course your host John Gafford with me as always Colt Cheese Grits Amagen Amagen Cheese Grits Amagen I can't say the whole word I should have said rice cake Amagen there we go and the counselor Chris Connell back with us this is the moment of the show when every

week I make my shameful pandering. For if you haven't done it so far, whatever you're listening to us on, give us a little like. Give us a little five-star review. If you're watching us on the YouTube, give us a little like and follow. If you like what we do, there you go. That's my little pander. It's all I ask that we do this. And today we're talking about a book we just gave Colt a psychological test.

If you missed that in part one, you'll probably want to go and check that out. But we're talking about the book Grit by Angela Duckworth because, man, this really is the key to your success. If you don't have this, if you don't have this in what you're doing, I don't think you're going to succeed. I think you're going to fail across the board. I think there's luck involved. But, I mean, I don't think long-term success can be had without this. I just don't think so.term success can be had without this. I just don't think so. So –

I think science would agree with you. Yeah, I think science would agree. But this is one of the things that I thought was really interesting about this book. And we're going to pick this back up because I thought this was super interesting when I read this, which is people with grit do not persevere in tasks that they hate. Rather, part of cultivating determination is identifying areas of interest and focusing on them. To increase resilience and willingness to persevere, people should prioritize those tasks that encourage their passions. Grit is as much about quitting the wrong things as it is about sticking with the right ones. Totally agree. That's why Colt's so gritty.

I want to break this down because I think there's a lot of different layers to that thought process. There's a lot of different layers. So the first one I'm going to say is, you know, there's an old saying by the, by the nature boy, by Ric Flair. If you don't like it, you better learn to love it because it's the best thing going today. Now we don't always get to pick things in our life, things in our job, going to the gym. We don't always get to pick things that we love to do. It's not how it works. But I think what it is is you need to, and we've talked about this before, when you do goal setting, when you do projections, when you do these things, is attach those tasks that you genuinely despise

to results and outcomes that you genuinely desire. I think that's where it talks about finding those in your passion. I don't think it means, I don't think it necessarily means like, oh, I don't like doing pushups. I'm just going to be flabby. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I don't think that is a good point. That's the Pete Scott Hall, by the way, with the nature boy. Shout out.

Oh, dude. Scott Hall. The bad. You know what? What was it? Razor Ramon. Was it a dreams? Shoot. Hard work pays off dreams come true bad times don't last but bad guys do yeah scott hall epic wwe bad guy passed away

yeah a little tear on that one dude he was yeah he was awesome he was awesome not to distract you just threw out a nature boy yeah i Yeah, I know. I had to do a razor's edge on that one. I think you need a love. I do think you need a love to go through, right? You're not going to get gritty on something you don't like. To John's point, right? It could be something maybe you don't love. Like that guy doing the ultra marathon, he doesn't love running and all that.

What he loves is the conquering. The sense of accomplishment. The accomplishment. I don't know. I think if you ask Jesse, do't love running and all that what he loves is the the conquering sense of the right the accomplishment i think if you ask jesse do you love running i think he would say i do actually love the endorphins probably runners high probably not that long not that but to your point you're talking about a thousand cold calls will get me ten thousand dollars yes it's ten bucks a cold call yeah yeah i mean i think i think again that i think you know it's easy to say quitting grit isn't much about quitting the wrong things it is about significant ones i think if you hate basketball don't go play basketball sure i think you're like let's be sure i think yeah quit that i think there's no reason to get good at an extracurricular activity well and it takes away

from what you want like i hated baseball but i was actually pretty pretty good pitcher and everything i just like olympic olympic good i probably could yeah i told my dad i go yeah i didn't make the team he's like fuck you didn't stop lying to me i'm like just didn't make the team and i didn't go to tryouts like but then i was able to focus on football and i got really good at what i wanted so i think you gotta get this stuff out of your life that you don't like no i saw your yearbook from high school and said you played left out i did yeah. Left bench, left out. There's a lot of stuff I hate about jujitsu, right? But the things you like about it overcome

and the fact that... No, but seriously, you go and you're always getting injured. You're always getting banged up. So it's extracurricular. Yeah. But there's something in it. It's not like all hatred. Two guys wrestling.

If anything, it's all hatred. But don't quit just because it's difficult if you want to. So it's like America. There's a lot of things about's difficult if you want to. So it's like America. There's a lot of things about America you hate, but yet you push through and stay here. See, the best part about America is you can talk about America. I'm dead serious. My favorite part of America, and I said this during the Iraq war, whenever he was talking about whatever, you can talk shit about America.

I can get up there and burn a flag, and that is what people don't understand what's great about America. Not get killed. Yeah, I'm not going to get killed. That's true. The girl on the Russian TV, she'll be dead for a while. She'll be dead. So they'll send over people to her house because she talks shit about Russia.

Here, you'll talk shit about the United States and get a syndicated television program and be totally safe your entire life. Is that what you're trying to do? You're trying to get a TV program without us? I'm not talking shit about America. I'm pointing out the truth. He is. He's going to leave us for MSNBC. That's exactly what he's doing

the beauty of america is that i don't have to share that guy's opinions and she doesn't have to share my opinions and you have a right to go out there and be free from government tyranny right so talk shit about it sometimes exercise your rights if you don't like it people that think that licking the boot or saying oh all this is that really don't understand what soldiers are fighting for what a flag means freedom is that right i'm not free within your parameters i'm free to say the united states government right oh jesus the thoughts of christopher do not do not reflect those the power move and then you're free to say you're a idiot for thinking that there you go What's the worst state in America, Chris?

Worst state in America is obviously New Jersey. You think so? If you're growing smokestacks, yeah. I don't know about New Jersey. That's a tough call. No, worst state is probably like Alabama. No. Gorgeous.

Yeah, you can't go against Alabama. Gorgeous. Mississippi. Maybe like Kansas. I mean, still, again, you've got like— Nebraska. Wyoming. No, again, gorgeous.

And here's the thing. Okay, what are we talking— Okay, worst state by what? Just everything. Yeah, by what? By humans or by how it looks? Okay, humans. By humans.

Humans, easily. I'm not going to say. I'll get it wrong. By weather. We might— No, let's not do humans because we could have weather. By weather? Yeah, weather's brutal.

North Dakota would be brutal. That's where I moved from. Old Jeepers. You lived in North Dakota? I lived in Saskatchewan. All right, can we get back to what we're talking about? Jesus, you guys. That was like a cult moment.

Look how gritty John is. No, I was about to start. We're talking about American stuff. I was about to start talking about corn dogs. I mean, it's like. Oh, God. There is a good corn dog place in Chinatown. Yep.

Oh, my God. They got the. You know what? The corn dogs suck. But do you know what are amazing? Cheese sticks. The cheese melted. Oh, my God.

A corn dog is awful. No one likes corn dogs. But the cheddar cheese. Wait. Nobody likes corn dogs? No. But corn dogs but the cheddar cheese wait nobody likes corn no but have you had a cheddar cheese have you had a disneyland corn dog no aficionado that is oh my god you know my disneyland i only go and they got a hot link corn dog at disneyland that is next level have you had that cheddar cheese smoky cheddar like a no just cheese that's fried? Yeah. I mean, no. Wait, you've never done that?

No. Holy shit, we got something to do tonight. We are going to. No, I'm not super healthy, but I'm also not trying to deliberately kill myself with my food. Like Jim Gaffigan goes, I got kids. Have you ever had it, Chris? No. What?

Cheese on a stick. Oh, my God. I've had matzo sticks. I assume it's relative. No, tomorrow for lunch, you guys get one bad. That is not lunch. No, it's not lunch. Oh, my God. I've had matzo sticks. I assume it's relative. No, tomorrow for lunch, you guys get one bad. That is not lunch. That is not lunch. Oh, my God.

I bring it to Fibula. I'm disappointed every day going, how can I live longer, Colton? So disappointed in you guys. Oh, not how we do it. All right. Gritty. But back to being gritty. So this is going to be one of those episodes that gets chopped up for the wisdom.

It is chopped up. I feel so sorry for my guy that cuts this up and posts it on Instagram. He's going to be like, I can't. He's going to be like, bro, I can't use any of this. No, there's literally going to be. It's going to be hilarious. There's going to be. Sedition.

It's literally sedition. No, no. There's going to be a whole clip on Instagram that says, why corn dogs are good. And people that follow me are going to be like, unfollow. Like this has officially jumped the shark. It's done shark we got a new venture to go after cobble we'll let the beach your beach yeah our beach body will do it so the next thing i'll talk about is this all right ready and and i think i thought this was very interesting and very true and people don't understand this what it's like what do you think it take colt will ask you what do you think it takes to get better at

something what do you think it takes to get better to get better at something what's it take practice practice but more to the point is there you want to expound on that or what i i guess it would just be depending on what you're doing but i just think practice and experience is proper practice when's the last time you saw a kid practice something by himself by themselves uh i see my kid do it all the time with drums and okay stuff but all right okay so experience is proper practice. When's the last time you saw a kid practice something by himself? By themselves? I see my kid do it all the time with drums and stuff. Okay, so let's talk about your kid and the drums. When he sits down at the drums, what does he do?

To walk me through this, what's he doing? Tell me about his practicing the drums. I don't know. He's got his YouTube up. No, yeah. Let's go guitar because drums, I get mad at them because they're too loud. But, yeah, he's got YouTube. He's learning proper. He's self But, yeah, he's got YouTube.

He's learning, like, proper. He's self-taught. He's teaching himself. And he's just out there practicing where to put your fingers, how to hold them, that kind of stuff. Skills. It's the same stuff I've delivered. Okay. You know, my son, when I come home and he's practicing lacrosse out front, when you practice lacrosse, which is his sport, you've got a repeater,

which basically just is like a net you throw the ball in and it comes right back right and then he's we have a goal that you can shoot and when i and i catch him doing this all the time because he's practicing but he's not deliberately practicing what i mean is there's no thought to any of it it's mindless practice it's throwing the ball against the net and catching the ball without thinking about what he's doing. There's no thought to where his hands are on the stick. There's no thought to placement of where it is. There's no thought to the release point of where the ball is leaving the stick. There's no thought. And so I've got to go out there and say, listen, you got to every rep, you got to think about what you're doing because that's how you get better. You can

deliberately think about what you're doing when you're, when you're shooting goals by yourself and throwing the ball into the net, you're not just thinking about throwing it into the net. You've got to think about where in the net it's landing. You've got to think about the angles. You've got to think about what you're doing, and every single rep has got to get better. When I go out there and I practice with him, it's like, okay, look, I'm not worried about because he plays attack a lot in lacrosse,

which is at the top of the crease, which means he gets a lot of balls, and then you spin and you go to the net. And for me, it's like when he gets the ball, bang him on the pad because he's going to get hit by another kid with a stick. And then I'm more concerned about where his hips are than where the ball, the stick, and where the shot goes. You're 100%. I'm looking at his footwork.

I'm looking at where his feet go. I'm looking at where his hips are. And that's the stuff that we're going over. It's that deliberate stuff of every little rep. When those guys are, you know, like you talked about the guy that shot a thousand free throws after missing that night. He was more worried about where his elbow was and the hand and how

the ball released from his finger. And all of those things. And every single one of those reps, they were concentrating not just on the hoop but on body control with each and every one. Every elite athlete concentrates on body control through every rep that they ever do. And perfecting the rep. Yeah, because if you're not perfecting the rep, if you're not really focused on what you're doing, you're not getting any better. Now, if you're listening to this and you're in sales, which hopefully a lot of you guys are because that's where the money is, let's face it.

Not being a commie-hating attorney, like counselor over there. Commie, love an attorney. Anyway, but no, if you're in sales, like how do you- You're right, I'm a commie-hater. How do you perfect the reps? I'm on record right now.

That insult got away from me. It got away from me a little bit, but I'm not going to lie. But how do you perfect the reps is the question. And the perfection of the reps is the most important thing you can do if you're a salesperson is record your calls. You always hear it every time somebody calls you. This call will be recorded for training purposes, right?

And it's probably just the company records all the calls and maybe somebody goes back and listens to it. Maybe they don't. If you are in sales, you should be going back and listening to your own calls. Don't wait for anybody else. And listen and think about it. I mean, when you get off a call, like, I mean, if it's just like a hello and they're like, oh, whatever, and they hang up on you and you go off, I'm not worried about that. I'm talking about when you have a call that goes on for, you know, call it 10, 15 minutes.

It's a good call where you're qualifying. you're finding out how you can help them. You're finding out what problems you can solve for that person. When you get to a point in that call, maybe it falls apart, stop and break that down in your head and say, what could I have done differently there? What, you know, and really think about it and analyze it and break it down because those are reps, man. I mean, they're, they're, they're game reps. There's there's practice reps. If you are a salesperson, a practice rep would be script reading. Sure, man. You got to go over scripts with people and use that. You've got to treat it just, just like sports. Like when I got out of the playing football, I just turned down some

scholarships. I'm like, I'm done. My dad's like, go figure out what you're going to do. And I ended up in sales. And my dad goes, you need to treat this like, I'm done. My dad's like, go figure out what you're going to do. I ended up in sales. My dad goes, you need to treat this like you treated football. You need to practice. Did Hooters University give you a scholarship? That's you. I'm saying, I don't think you were good enough to get a scholarship to Hooters University.

That's the real you. Look, the real you. You should have had that on his camera. But my dad goes, you need to treat your next step like you treated football. Watch game film. You need to watch what you've done. I mean, when you leave a meeting, you should really sit back and say, what went wrong and what did not.

What was good about that? You know what else that promotes? What's that? Self-awareness. Oh, yeah. I mean, in a very general sense, right? People a lot of times aren't self-critical because it hurts sucks to look at yourself in a light that's not flat of course well ego is the enemy buddy ego is the enemy i would argue that you got to be a gritty person to go no no i want to get in these

trenches and clean up my gutters of myself and you should i just had a meeting a couple of weeks ago i walked out there i'm like jesus i was a jackass like i just because i i didn't read them right you know and then i'm like i was talking too much it was you know haven't had one of those for a long time but that sat there and bothered me i mean yeah but you know we we tried it we try to go into these calls we try to go into the situation i We try to go into those situations. I think everybody has a situation. I don't think that's unique to you. I mean, even Saturday,

I'm trying to get better about self-validation in situations where I feel the need to validate myself. That's exactly what I do. There's no reason to do it. And every time I do it, the second I'm done with it, I'm like, what the fuck was I doing that for?

Like, why did I feel the need to, I mean, and, and, and sometimes some stuff comes up in, in conversation, but the other times you're just like,

find yourself like looking for places to drop stuff in. And it's so painfully apparent when you do it it's it's painful you know and then you're like five minutes later i'm like oh why did i do that i didn't need to validate i thought of you the other day john i actually had hold on it's kind of funny because we had talked about this before on the show about walking around trying to find people to show your egypt pictures too i showed my egypt i showed it i literally met totally randomly with the guy who owns the ramses to exhibit he's in cairo oh my god 30 times you know all the time well you have to show him though he literally if you go in that the cairo museum the pictures of the artifacts of

tootin common yeah that aren't there because he has them and i said you meet this guy at first i think it's appropriate for me to that is appropriate and we started chatting about it the guy was really awesome he goes let me send you a couple things oh i got a couple things for you if you're really interested in this stuff absolutely put together a care package for you because that was the time where you use your life experiences have genuine connection with people yes so i just but you i kind of had a flashback before i grabbed my phone to show him no i'm like i remember that's appropriate i remember thinking like it is a fine line why are you doing it i think i think that's completely appropriate it was kind of fun because i thought about that conversation well i like like even the

conversation i was the guys at rocket from from saturday from saturday it's like look i'm at that dinner because we're the number one mortgage broker in Nevada. We're booming everywhere we go. And we're opening all across the country. And they didn't, they didn't reach my name into a hat, pull it out, take a taste of dinner. That wasn't the point. Right. There was no reason to validate. And then it's like, you know, you're trying to find some common ground. It's like, where are you from? And there's like all of Detroit. Cause that's where their base. And I'm like, Oh, I used to live there. Oh, what'd you do there? And then we talk about Hooters, which isn't a flex,

but it's a table full of guys. It's a fun flex, I guess. And then that goes and then you're talking about some other stuff and this and that and then- Boom, fuck you, Egypt. No, no, no, no.

Egypt came up from Fawaz, who's from North Africa and I was like, I've been to North Africa. Oh, where? Yeah, again, and then that came up so that was cool

and then as we were leaving, know the the main dude asked me where you know why how i got to vegas real quick and i was like ah you know this and that and blah blah and you know one of my buddy you know it's a guy that i was on the apprentice with his parents were already out here and he's like wait you're on the apprentice and i didn't even it just that was part of the story but it's part of your fabric yeah but here's the, but it came off like flex. And it was like, as soon as I said it, I was like, why? I'm used to telling that in the context of that story. Yeah, but there's also a thing about you can't hold back too much either.

Because here's the thing. If you spend your life trying to do flavorful things, why are you trying to serve people water? You know, it's like if you own a bit of flavor in your life, you should be proud of it. He just looked at me and said, man, you've done a lot lot of stuff and i'm like well you only get one spin you know that's it you get one you get one spin so here's the deal if you've ever been around a bunch of people and you've said too much about yourself trying to maybe feel like you need to do it to validate your existence don't feel alone because i do it all

the time and i feel like a jackass every time i do it if i've done it to you i am deeply sorry and if you're self-aware take a moment and ask them genuine questions about this exactly I do it all the time, and I feel like a jackass every time I do it. If I've done it to you, I am deeply sorry. And if you're self-aware, take a moment and ask them genuine questions about themselves. Yeah, exactly. A rebound, a conversation. I got to tell you, my son, holy crap-a-tolla. I'm going to give him like five gold stars because my son's communication skills, he's very bright. He's a great kid. He has been challenging for us lately.

He talks at us. He doesn't talk with us until finally it was like it's like bro when's the last time you asked somebody how their day was how was work how was this it was every day you walk in how was school how was this it's all about you and then he comes down and it's like being on a quiz show where he'll come down because he's very into stats and figures he's probably gonna wind up being a handicapper one day because he'll walk down and say something like hey dad do you know what team in the nfl it's like a quiz show do you know what team in the nfl in 1981 did x and you're like no and they're like oh the buffalo bills and i'm like okay i don't want

to be on your quiz show right i have no interest if you have something that you want to talk about pitch it as hey do you want to hear something cool hey do you know we're here a fun fact whatever that way yes i do and you can just tell me the fun fact without me feeling dumb and getting it you want to know what the five fingers said to the face smack is what it was no i agree and dude and he so we put him on how to win friends and influence people by daryl carnegie and he's probably every day i come home how was work today what interesting thing happened at work today smart that's good and he's he's he is he is a sub he is a creature of of study and he's a creature all of his coaches always say he's super coachable and super easy so that's been that's been good there you know can we talk

about you said five star why is it four star five star what's recruiting no just i i get that why can we not have a scale that's just the same what do you mean but come on you get on like you get on amazon and it's like four star or five star review and can we just not have a hash and oh you're saying like why do some companies have four and why is it five is that not stupid i i don't you know what hate that this is why you should run for office cult right here this is the this is the platform you're talking about countries have meters feet stones pounds kilograms no oh by the way did you did you hear what passed the house today what that everybody else should go to freaking no real no they're trying to make daylight saving times permanent oh god wouldn't

that be so where it doesn't exist anymore no it doesn't change yes why would it change i don't know it makes sense it's the most no it's not the thing no it's totally obnoxious it kills productivity for no reason there's no benefit hey let's put the darkness after you get off work and maybe could have enjoyed an hour of sunlight yeah no it makes no sense in the morning yeah whenever he's still sleeping yeah no no they're they're trying to they're trying it's it passed the house today. I violently hate that. Seriously, if that gets shut down, vote them all out. That is my vote. That should be a unanimous vote.

Those are the issues that matter to me. Congress doesn't set the price of gas, but they do control daylight savings. Exactly. There should be. Take note, people. Whoever votes no against that seriously needs to be out. I'm coming after them. And Halloween should be changed.

Why? To the last Saturday of the month. No. Yes, Halloween should be changed. But it doesn't matter here. Hold on, hold on. We have Nevada Day. It doesn't matter.

We get a holiday. But still, I'm telling you. We do get a day off before anyway. We get a day off, yeah. Nevada Day. It doesn't matter. It just should. It should be every Saturday.

I think Nevada knew better. They were on to what you're spitting. No, no, off. Yeah, Nevada day. It doesn't matter. It just should. It should be every Saturday. I think Nevada knew better. They were on to what you're spitting. No, no. Here's the thing. Because here's the answer. The answer is, Halloween's for little kids, which they should be home by 8.30, 8.45 anyway. Or for chicks that want to dress like whores and go to the all night parties of the clubs. And they don't care about work the next day anyway.

So there you go. Probably don't work until 5 p.m. anyway. You guys not drink when you give out candy? Of course not. We're turning in parties. Oh, by the way, real VIPs. This is almost a cult thing. I'm almost stealing some thunder.

Nice. Real VIPs are the parents that sit outside with coolers and hand out trues. I do that. We do that. VIP. We hand out. Yeah, we don't do candy. We do like.

Very important parents. We do LED like blinky things. We're all in. I mean, yeah, we don't do candy. We do like- Very important parents. We do LED like blinky things. We're all in. I mean, yeah, we do it. Anyway, back to grit. Thanks, Colt. I don't even know if that was you, but I'll go with you. Thanks a lot, Colt.

That was four stars. We just needed to keep it up. All five stars. So this, shockingly enough, it says, Gritty people feel they have control over their fate, and hard work can change their outcomes. Oh, 100%. That's a type A personality.

It's like everything winds back at classic stoicism. It really does. If you are a person that feels the world is happening to you instead of you are happening to the world, I'm telling you right now, in all aspects of your life, that is where it starts. It's about locus of control. That's it. So you ever heard people say that's a type A personality, type B.

Yep. What that is, is actually saying, where's your locus of control? If the locus of control is internal, you're type A. You feel like you can't affect the world. My kids really in church going with my wife, me not so much, but he always comes home like, well, God wants it. No, no, no, no, no. God wants it.

If you want it. God gave you the ability with all your limbs, with the ability to talk, with a working mind. Like, no, that's all God did for you. There's a million people. I mean, there's a million people in harm's way in the Ukraine right now. I don't think God cares if you can do a paradiddle on a backside. I think he's fine. I don't think he cares.

Good call, John. We're going to bring it back full circle. Yeah, right to the prayer. So there it fine. I don't think he cares. Good call, John. We want to bring it back full circle. Yeah, right to the finish. So there it is. I don't think he cares. And that's it. Cheese on steak. But they interviewed a guy on here

that we're talking about, a guy named Tony Krupica, who was an ultra marathoner, meaning he runs those races that are 100 miles plus. And he said, you have to have optimism that you can persevere

and have some control too, he told Deadspin. He said, you have the choice to be tough and not get down on yourself and just hang on because it will turn around eventually these guys that run those ultra marathons a friend of mine here in town named tony grappo um he owned all the outbacks here in town for a long time sold that and then owned some other stuff here uh but tony is is a guy tony's in his 60s, I want to say, and he still runs these like ultra marathons. And I asked him one time, I'm like, how do you, how? They're just built differently.

And he goes, well, you know, you go through, you start running, and then you hit a point where, you know, your endurance starts to give out. He goes, and then that changes into pain. And he goes, if you just get through the pain, eventually you're just going to go numb. Go numb. And then you just have to just get through the pain, eventually you're just going to go numb. And then you just have to just get in the zone and you just do it. You just have to push through.

But he goes, if you can just push through the point of the pain, you're good. But it's all. I think that's also the recipe for how to become a serial killer. I don't know. Oh, my God. I'm going fine for next week. That's going to be my thing next week.

No, you know who I want to have on? And I'm going to call him. Did you say David Ramirez? Oh, Joey. You know who we need to have on the podcast? I think I'm going, you know what? I made a decision. We are going to have, I'm going to get, because I know who I'm bringing him in, I'm going

to get Joey's brother. Yep. We need Joey's brother. For those of you who don't know, they're listening, he's a good friend of mine, Joey, his brother was brain injured at a very early, not very early, but in his early 20s, was brain injured and was having, and has like a lot of uncontrollable things about him. Like if we have one, there's no telling what he'll say, which is fine. But because of those uncontrollable urges, not to do anything weird, but just, you know,

he can't help what he says. He started being interested in serial killers. So he started reaching out to them and actually became like the serial killer whisperer and helped the FBI like find bodies. I mean, it was, it was crazy. So he lives here in town we'll have him on because i know i can always get him on i'll be good um last one you know the book kind of finishes up talking about parenting a little bit which i think is a good

thing if you have kids great if you don't if you're gonna have them someday this is probably for you as well which is talks about if you want to parent your kids to raise grit how do you do that we talked about having sports and stuff with manufactured adversity, which the book absolutely supports that. And it supports it in writing as it says it, but it says ultimately what parents do is more consequential than what they say. Parents who pursue their own passions will encourage their children to do the

same. Like I cannot imagine, I can't imagine your kids, Connell growing up, not chasing, you know, well, just maybe not chasing you know well just maybe not chasing rainbows or whatever else no no no but but i mean all over the world chasing rainbows because they've seen you do it but maybe not the little one because she barely knows who you are

because you're gone so much i mean oh just shots fired no she couldn't give a shit about there anyway yeah she doesn't right i'm there either she's no she just cares about me i need to go see john that's what you said anyway yeah no but that is part of the reason i'm trying to set examples and do these things you see what's out there because i didn't really know what the world even looked like right until i got out on my own and figured it out you go hey you can go become a pilot what do you mean you can go be pilot you can just fly planes if you want to fly planes like yeah here you go here are the keys to some airplanes. What are you talking about? Who thought this was a good idea? Speaking of which, I never asked you,

did you lose your money on your airplane club? Did that work out? No, they're still operating. They're just running from the hangar. They're just running off the tarmac now. No, they kicked them out of the clubhouse. So what we're doing is the planes have all the books in them. They put key locks out for all the keys.

So now I just reserve online, go enter the code for the airplane and take a key i right fly got it i could literally go steal an airplane if shit goes down so god i love that no no let's go somewhere no that's part of my that's part of my disaster that's it what am i getting out yep that's it i think parenting's huge i mean parenting in all aspect you are creating the next generation manufacturing adversity you so i don't i'm not trying to like uh parenting differences and understanding it i still need to figure out what to do in terms of parenting differences because i believe that life should be a little bit more difficult than um the mother oldest believes it should be okay you know because no i get it i get. It is one of those things where you go,

oh, you know, you don't want to be too hard on them. Well, you don't want to, what did Daniel Tosh say? What's that? You want to be hard on them enough that you get the Thriller album but not so much.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly. Yeah, moving on from there. But you got to find a balance. You got to find a line. But, you know, we talked about manufacturing adversity

and this was so cool because this actually has stats which I loved. Oh, nice. Again, they're stats out of a book so I'm assuming they were fact-checked by some sort of a publisher at some point. We do that, but it says that studies that show that children that participate in extracurricular activities do better in school, have a higher self-esteem than those who do not, especially in cases where children participate in extracurricular activities for more than one year. So there's a Columbia University study done in 1988 that showed this. Students that took part in an extracurricular activity sponsored by the school for two years

were 97% more likely to go to college. They were 179% more likely to complete college, and they were 31% more likely to vote in national elections eight years later after leaving high school. Extracurricular activities then were correlated both with higher academic achievement and greater civic and social participation. And for young ladies, lowest incidence of teen pregnancy. Yeah.

So guys, if you don't have your kids in something, ladies too, get them in something. We tell our kids all the time, I don't care what you do, but you've got to do something. I have strong opinions. I think it should be physically difficult. Yeah. I think there should be some. You get banged around a little bit.

That's why I love the lacrosse. Your boy's taking a hit when he goes up. But now he realizes when life hits him a little bit, he can get through it. Yeah, they're going to hurt him. There's always BS in it, politics and sports. You learn to deal with like i was a quarterback forever before 14 years quarterback yeah yeah and then yeah yeah like i was a quarterback i was really good at like 10 year or 10th grade at college is wanting me 11th grade or end of 10th and was like, oh, you're too mean and too fast to be a quarterback. We're putting you at safety.

I'm like, wait, what? I've never played anything but quarterback. Found out his kid's moving in. Damn, like you dealt with politics. Put your quick feet. You dealt with politics. You got to learn just, all right, what am I going to do? Roll with the punches.

Roll and grind. Roll with the punches. Well, the last thing about this, man, I'll leave you with, if you're trying to learn how to get some grit, is this, which is gritty cultures or communities can create gritty individuals. Look at Khabib's. Look at those Dagestani. Khabib, yeah, dude, if you're from the state.

They play full contact basketball. They wrestle with bears as children. It's no wonder they're UFC champions. Did you see the meme of the dude working out, doing push-ups on the tree? The bears just jump up and down. It's like, I don't know what's going on or where this gym is. I'm supposed to go fight that guy? No, you can't fight that guy.

Let me guess. He's a little grittier than I am. Yeah, there's no fighting that guy. But here's the idea. When a team or business has a culture of grit, the people in the culture learn to demonstrate determination and persistence. This leads to both personal and community improvement and success. So here's the key kids. Here's the key folks, which is if you feel like you don't have enough perseverance, enough grit around you,

who you're hanging around with may be part of the problem. You know what I mean? Like, I don't remember which guy it was like, you know, you show me a, show me four dipshits you hang out with and I'll show you the fifth. I'll show you the fifth. If you're not happy with where your life is and you don't, you know, again, perseverance has everything to do with where you are in life. Make a decision to actually improve the people you're around. Make a decision to improve the people that you're around. But keep in mind, you're going to have to change you to do that. Because if you walk into a bunch of people that have a high level of grit and a high level of persistence and a high level of success. And you walk in and start telling us, talking about how shit's too hard or you don't feel like it, or you're going to take a day out, man, they're going to shun your

ass because high functioning people, I'm telling you, it's like, it's repellent to them. People that function this way. It really is absolute repellent. Well, that's all we got for today, man. I hope you guys enjoyed the show. I felt like it was a better show today. We gave Colt a psychological quiz. 3.4. Turns out he's an out of world. Turns out he and Kanye are geniuses.

Geniuses. Have you watched that documentary? Yeah, I started it. Oh, that's amazing. But more importantly, can we talk about some grit? Let's talk about that. Which was before we signed off, Pete Davidson taking a beating for six months and was finally like,

and today's the day I'm done. Today's the day I choose violence. I choose violence. Yes. Where are you at right now? I'm in bed with your wife. In bed with your wife. Oof.

Good for you, Pete Davidson. And then the nerve of Kanye to be like, Come to my church. I'm victimized. Yeah, okay, stop. Stop it, dude. You know what? I just became a fan of Pete Davidson.

Love it. Yeah, I love it just for that like i just thought it was a documentary of kanye his grittiness his grind i'll give him that dude that guy's a nutbag anyway all right well let's uh let's wrap it up remember if you like what we do tell a friend if you hate it what we do tell two because it doesn't matter if they're talking good or bad what's the matter counselor as long as they're talking about as long as they're talking about you see you next time guys hey it's john gafford if you want to catch up more and see what we're doing you can always go to

thejohngafford.com where we'll share any links that we've things we talked about on the show as well as links to the youtube where you can watch us live and if you want to catch up with me on instagram you can always follow me at the John Gafford. I'm here. Give me a shout.