Insight with Chris Van Vliet - Nick Santonastasso Inspires The Hell Out of Me - Born Without Legs And One Arm

Episode Date: January 18, 2022

Nick Santonastasso (@nicksantonastasso) is an author, motivational speaker, bodybuilder, wrestler and coach born with a very rare condition called Hanhart Syndrome. Only 3 out of 12 others Born with this condition are alive. Although he survived, Nick was born without legs and with only a portion of one of his arms. Nick hasn't allowed any of those challenges to stand in his way of living the life of his dreams. During this conversation with Chris Van Vliet at the Blue Wire Studios as the Wynn Las Vegas he talks about why the biggest disability is a bad mindset, why he believes he can accomplish anything, being an inspiration to Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, learning from Tony Robbins, why he loves bodybuilding and more. This conversation with inspire the hell out of you like it did for me! For more info on Justin Schenck's Growth Now Summit that Nick Santonastasso and I are speaking at visit: https://www.growthnowsummit.com/ If you enjoyed this episode, could I ask you to please consider leaving a short review on Apple Podcast/iTunes? It takes less than a minute and makes a huge difference in helping to spread the word about the show and also to convince some hard-to-get guests. For more information about CVV and INSIGHT go to: https://podcast.chrisvanvliet.com Follow CVV on social media: Instagram: instagram.com/ChrisVanVliet Twitter: twitter.com/ChrisVanVliet Facebook: facebook.com/ChrisVanVliet YouTube: youtube.com/ChrisVanVliet TikTok: tiktok.com/@Chris.VanVliet Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

All systems are good. Ladies and gentlemen, Chris Van Blaine! Yes, here we go, my friends. Welcome back to another audio adventure here on Insight. I'm CVV Chris Van Fleet, and welcome back inside the Blue Wire Studios at the Wind Las Vegas. So good to have Nick Santonastaso joining us in person for this conversation. And it's just filled with so much inspiration from someone who hasn't let any obstacle.

get in his way. And if you're not familiar with Nick, he was born with something called Han Heart Syndrome. And he'll tell you more about it, but he was born with no legs and just one arm. And he is a beast. He's a bodybuilder, an author, a motivational speaker, a coach, he's climbed mountains. I mean, literally anything that he puts his mind to, he does. He's so incredible. If you want to follow him on social media, it's just his name. At Nick Santinastaso, if you're not following me and you want to follow me at Chris Van Fleet. And if it's your first time here, please take a second to click follow or subscribe wherever you're listening to the show right now. Our fan of the week is Chichester for Life, who says, Top Man. CWV is the goat of podcasting. Never miss an episode and

love the additional outside of wrestling interviews like this one. flowing dialogue and the guest always seems at ease. Thank you for the great content and looking forward to more in 2022. Well, thank you so much for that review on Apple Podcasts. I read one on every single episode is my way to say, thank you. Thank you for being on this journey with me. So if you haven't left a review yet, leave a few words on there, click submit, and we will shout you out here on the show for free, of course.

And if you're listening on Spotify, Spotify now has ratings on there. So go in, click the five stars there. It'd be so appreciated if you did that. I just can't wait for you to hear this interview. So let's jump right into it. Here we go. Please welcome Nick Santana Nastasso. Thank you so much for coming by.

You got it. Thank you for having me. I've been looking forward to this for a long time. You inspire so many people just by being who you are. And I love the fact that we're going to dig deep into your story today. I'm in. Wherever you want to go, I'm down. If someone is finding out about you for the first time, you know, what's kind of the,

it's kind of the Cliff Notes version? Yeah. I'm Nick Santadisato, born in this unicorn body with no legs one arm, and I help high-level entrepreneurs unwire and rewire their brain through brain exercises. I love it. Removing traumas, limiting beliefs, the conditioning that holds you back. And, you know, and I say that because people look at me and they say, wow, he's disabled, but, you know, I always say the biggest disability you can have is a bad mindset.

It's your software. And so we just help people break out of their conditioning or break out of the box and help them unplug from the Matrix. I think there's going to be a lot of people that are watching this or listening to this that are going, that's the guy I saw on the Rock's Instagram. Yeah. Yeah, somewhere or the guy crawling around Walmart when he was younger doing zombie brains. That too. Yeah, when Vine was a thing.

Yeah. Man. Yeah. Had a lot of identities. I think the greatest thing about you is people see you doing all the things that you're doing. I mean, there's nothing you can't do. And I think there's a lot of people who go, well, if Nick can do it, then why can't I do it too? Yeah. Yeah. That was, it's funny you said that because early on when I started speaking,

like that was my only messaging. When I was like professional storyteller, my story was like, if I can do it, you can do it. And now, after studying psychology and the masters of psychology, it's really breaking it down and letting people know that they've been fooled by mindset. Like the word mindset has been thrown around and jaded so much. And it's not your fault because you hear it everywhere. But when you say mindset, most people think of motivation, right? But the truth is when you really understand what mindset is, mindset is training the body in mind with enough condition, repetition, and intensity to actually change the biochemistry of your body,

to change the emotions you feel, the thoughts you think, the ways you can create. And so it's way deeper than just motivation. It's like training your body and mind to be in alignment so you can get whatever you want in this world. Because people look at me, they're like, how do you do that? I built this person. over time with condition, repetition, and intensity. And so mindset isn't motivation. It's doing something over with enough repetition to get the result that you want. Yeah, and I don't think that people realize there's good mindsets and there's bad mindsets. And whether you're aware of it or not, you have one

or the other. Yeah, I think we all have a little bit of both. That's true too. Yeah. Because the training never stops, right? Regardless of who it is, we always have the ego. We always have the insecurities or anything that comes up. But you're right. But a lot of the times, The majority of the things that are holding most humans back is unconscious. They're not aware of it. You're in your life. You're in the motions. And studies actually show by the age of 35, you're 95% unconscious.

Meaning your thoughts, your actions, your emotions, your focus, your triggers are 95% on autopilot. And the reason being is because the brain doesn't want to use so much energy. And so whatever your habits are habits, it likes that because it's comfortable and it doesn't use much energy. And most of that was then between zero and seven years old. I don't know how deep you want and geeky you want to go into the brain, but... I love it. Let's just, let's go. Let's go with it.

Okay, great. So, you know, most of your beliefs and the way that you view the world was cultivated between zero and seven years old. And the reason why is because your brain was in theta state. And theta state, AK, means you're suggestible. The door to the unconscious mind is open. And as an adult, you can still achieve theta state. With meditation, you go to theta state when you go to sleeping, you dream.

That's when you're suggestible. So, for example, for anyone that's listening, right now. If you grew up between zero and seven years old or your childhood and you've heard money doesn't grow in trees, rich people are evil. You got to work hard to make money, right? All of these different things, or you can even ask yourself, how were my parents managing money? Or maybe, you know, in my life, growing up, money was a hush, hush topic. I don't know if that relates, right? But money was like, you don't talk about money. You don't let anyone know how much money or how little money you have. And so along the line, on an unconscious level, you picked up a

thought and you started to believe money is hard to get. And rich people, they are greedy and they're evil and they probably screwed someone over. And so we have unconscious beliefs that are actually repelling us from the amount of money want to make. And you don't even know it unless you go inward and do the hard work, which most people won't. Yeah. So if we take this back, who is you from zero to seven years old. That's a great question. Zero and seven? I didn't realize I was different, to be honest.

For example, my parents have a great story where when I was born, for those that are wondering, why do I look like this? Can I address that? Why am I so handsome? Why do I look like this? I was born with a super rare genetic disorder called hand heart syndrome. And hand heart syndrome either leaves the babies with undeveloped limbs or undeveloped organs. And so at the time of my birth in 1996, I was a 12th baby in medical history that

they've ever seen this happen to. And that of the 12, eight of them have passed away due to undeveloped organs. Wow. Right? And so, four of you've survived. Yeah. So imagine, you know, as a parent, like, what do you do? And my parents made a massive decision. And the massive decision was that they were going to focus on the 30% chance of me living versus the 70% chance of me passing away. And the reason being, what you focus on, you get more of. Right. So on a deeper level, if my mom always focused on the fact that her son may die, she would have felt more stress, more anxiety. And if she had, has more stress and more anxiety, she may have not had the best environment to host a child, yes or no, right? And so I was born, clearly. I survived. They did test of my organs, and the only

thing that was affected were my limbs. So I'm born with no legs of one arm. But as I was saying, with the story, my parents came home, and I'm all wrapped up like baby Jesus, and they bring me home. And they never warned or acknowledged and let my three other siblings know that I was different. So what they did was they brought me home and everybody was so happy to see their little baby brother and they unraveled me and here's a baby with no legs of an arm. And the first thing that the kid said would, look at his hair. Look at his face. He's so beautiful because they never put emphasis or attention on what was wrong or what was different. So for the kids, it was just normal.

I love that so much. And like Tony Robbins always says, what you focus on is how you feel. What you focus on is what you're going to feel. This can apply to like everything. This is life. Yeah. Let's go back to that. What you focus on you feel, what you feel is your life.

And we see it all the time. You and I probably know millionaires and billionaires who have all the money, the cars, the houses, the watches, alcalades. But they're still pissed off and angry. What's their quality of life? Pissed off and angry. And then you go to a third world country and you see a kid kicking a can and he's happier than pigs and shit. Who's really winning? Yeah.

The kid who doesn't know, but he's conditioned himself to always be happy because he's in that kind of state. And so what you focus on you feel, what you feel is your life. And like my mom, what she focused on, she would have felt. Yeah. It's crazy. So if you didn't realize you were different growing up, at what point was it revealed to you that maybe you were different? Yeah.

Good question. And I think by that time, it was like middle school and high school. You know, I always say middle school and high school, it's probably the most judgmental times of your lives. And other people let me know of it's different. But there was a few ahas where I was like, hmm, I'm in a wheelchair. you know, or, oh, I'm not growing. Everyone's taller than me.

Why am I so short? I also feel like you could be the person who's like, they have to use their legs like idiots. I get to wheel around everywhere. Yeah, right? We'll figure that out now, right? But yeah, so there's a few moments. There's a few moments that I realized like,

hmm, I am different. And in specific, I struggled with, just going into this, I struggled with, like, females. Because as you get in the middle school and high school, like, boyfriends and girlfriends are a big deal. Like, start feeling things, and you want love and you want connection and all that different type of stuff.

And I felt like I didn't receive the same love as my buddies got or I see people with boyfriends and girlfriends and I envied it or I wanted it. And there was a specific moment where I was on a school bus and there was a girl to the left of me and she was making fun of everyone. And I looked over it to my left

and she said, Nick, I don't even have to start with you. You're already too messed up anyway. Look at you. Now what's interesting with human psychology is when a negative event happens like that, your mind tends to stack. And so you can stack thoughts in a negative way or you can stack thoughts in a positive way.

And so, for example, if anyone here has ever woken up on the wrong side of the bed, you tend to focus on all the things that are wrong. Oh, my phone's this, phones, phones, that. I got to go to work. I'm pissed off the traffic. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. You start stacking and stacking and it's unconscious. You're not aware because your brain isn't designed to make you happy.

Your brain's designed to focus on what's wrong. Yeah. And people are always like, oh, I had such a bad day. I like to challenge that. I'm like, because you have a bad day? Pretty even bad like five minutes, ten minutes, fifteen minutes that you let ruin the rest of your day. Yeah. I say that's the difference between shitty.

I have, most people have shitty days. I have shitty minutes. I love that. I love that so much because, look, I think from the outside looking at a lot of people could look at your situation and go, man, every day could be a bad day if you wanted it to be. Every day. When did you make that switch to start focusing on the positives in your life? Yeah, it's a great question. I think there was spurts of it, you know, throughout my childhood.

I was no near who I am now, of course, with all the training that I've done. But I think as a kid, like for example, with my body, you know, there's when you really think about it, when you come, when you look at you're thinking, all you're doing is asking questions. Like, should I wake up? Should I hit the snooze button? Should I eat? Should I not go to the gym? blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And what I'm taught, right, is, like, your questions dictate your focus. And what's pretty interesting is your brain is a problem-solving mechanism, so it's always going to give you an answer to the questions that you ask it. For the majority of my life, I was asking shitty questions, and the majority of humans

ask shitty questions, right? And so my whole life, I would always ask, like, what's wrong with me? And if you ask what's wrong with me, you're going to get a bad answer, you're going to get a bad answer. Your brain's going to give you all the things that are technically wrong with you. And it wasn't until I was 19 years old, I think, roughly 19 years old. And I challenged myself. And it felt weird because I never asked a question before.

And I said, Nick, what's right about having no legs of an arm? What was the answer to that? Yeah. And forcing myself to ask that question, it gave me an answer. And the answer was, well, Nick, if a girl doesn't like you because you have no legs of an arm. If someone doesn't want to be friends or do business with you because you have no legs of an arm, then wait. Maybe the disability or whatever you want to call it is actually working for you. And it's filtering out the type of women and men that you.

you don't want in your life anyway. Maybe this is, your body is a clear filter. It saves you time. You don't have to dabble. You don't have to understand where people are at. They either like you or they don't like you. There's a door. And so when I change the meaning or I change the story about my body, it changed my life.

Yeah, you want a better quality of life. Start asking better quality questions. Yeah. Because your life is a direct result of the questions that you're asking every single day. Every day. And I'm sure that people listening right now, there's a specific question. maybe on an unconscious level, most likely that you're asking yourself over and over again that's causing some sort of stress. You know, when I work with high-level entrepreneurs, for example, you see patterns.

We're all different, but they're all the same up here. Like, we all go through the same things. And so, for example, some of the questions that arose or, you know, came about when I'm working with entrepreneurs is the same one I had is what's wrong with me. How can I protect myself? What am I not doing right? And like you said, you challenge people. I challenge people by saying, well, what is right today? People don't like being challenged.

No, they don't like it. That's the biggest thing. But we do it because we love people. Yeah. And we care for people. And I always tell them, I said, I'm going to challenge you. And I may be the only person in your life that's going to hold you at high standard. I don't care if I'm the only one, but I'm going to do it.

Yeah. I don't care, right? Who challenges you now? Radmir. Right here behind the camera. Challenge me. My girlfriend challenged me in emotional ways with communication, all that different type of stuff.

And I would say, like, surrounding yourself with higher level people. So, like, anytime that I see Tony and I'm in proximity of Tony when I get to work with him, like, that challenges me. I'm like, man, this guy's 60, 60 years old, still teaching 14 hours a day when he does his events. Like, I can do that too, you know? And so much energy. Like, the amount of energy that man has is insane.

Yeah. You built him, built himself. How did you first get connected with Tony Robbins? Yeah. So I was 20 or 21 years old, and I moved to Tampa to pursue bodybuilding, right? A guy with no legs and arm pursues bodybuilding, moves to Tampa. And I had a friend that said, hey, we're having a bunch of people over, about eight people over for a mastermind, come meet some entrepreneurs. I was new to this whole personal development entrepreneur life.

And I went over to this mastermind and everybody's sharing their story. And they were like, what's your story? I'm like, I got a long story. And I started sharing my story. and after I shared, there was a Russian guy, and he said, one day you're going to be on stage with Tony Robbins. I said, who's Tony? Who's Tony Robbins? I don't know who that is. And we laughed, and he's like, I feel compelled to help you. He's like, I know you don't know who I am and we need to build a relationship and build trust. He said, I'm going to work for you for free. And I do real estate right now, but I'll do 50% real estate, 50% you.

If you like the work we do, maybe one day we'll start a company together. And four or five years, two companies later on a world tour of Tony Robbins, was Ratmere. And I always say one of the greatest gifts is someone seeing a gift in you that you may not seeing yourself and that was that was Ratmere. And at that time, he was in personal development and he was attending Tony events and crewing and volunteering. And so we started a speaking company. He got me to quit my job. I was working just some customer service job and I quit my job, the only job I had. And we started this venture of building the speaking company. We had no idea what we were doing. And one of the main goals for Ratmere and I was like,

to work with Tony. If we can get the goat, like, we can get anyone, but like we want to work with Tony because we also wanted to work with people that we were aligned with. You know, there's a lot of people in the industry that I just don't align with so I don't pursue a relationship. And so they took me to my first Tony event. Don and Ratmere took me to my first Tony event. And we were actually so broke that we can only afford my ticket. So they bought my ticket and we got my ticket upgraded to CIS, which is like front row. And then they crewed. They volunteered. So they were like, crew for Tony. And Tony, this is an act of resourcefulness.

So if you listen to this, don't worry. We did it for the best intent. And our goal was to plant seeds and get in front of the right people. And so while I'm learning at one of my first personal development events, which what an amazing first time, ratmiers like coming up. He's like, yo, you got to go talk to this security guard, or you got to go talk to this lady, or you got to tell your story to this person. And we planted so many seeds by the time that the word got around that this guy, Nick, who was a speaker, and was on the come-up was in the room and Tony found out. And this is UPW?

This is UPW. And on the third day, I was sitting in the important section, I guess, the CIS, because we got my ticket upgraded. And then there was a kid to the left of me and he's like, me and he's like, me and my dad are going to take pictures of Tony. Do you want to come? I'm like, yeah? And so he's like, let's go.

And my next challenge was like, well, how do I get my two guys with me? They brought me here. I need to get them in front of Tony. Tony's their idol, right? And there's two handles to a wheelchair. So they both grabbed the handle to the wheelchair and we go and the security guard. We know exactly who he is. He's like, you all can't go in there.

You know, only Nick can go in there. And it was a long pause for like two minutes. We just stared at this guy. And he's like, all right, you know, you guys can go in. And we broke the silence and he let us in. And I met Tony and Tony was blown away. And he's like, I want to invite you to my next event. Invites me to the next event.

I go, have some breakthroughs, have some shifts. And planted the seed to the team. I was like, if there's any opportunity that I can speak here, they're like, eh, that's not realistic. like we're full, Tony's busy, blah, blah, blah. I'm like, that's fine. Right. And so we go on and we're still building the business and writing books and courses and whatever may be. And Ratmere's always planting seeds and sending emails like, hey, Nick just climbed a mountain. Hey, Nick just wrote a book. Hey, Nick just did this. Planning seeds, planting seeds. And then finally

about a year goes by and they say, hey, Tony has a youth leadership event. He's not there. He doesn't run it, but the kids come and would you be up for speaking for the kids? I'm like, absolutely. And they're like, great. Like, but no compensation. We can't pay for anything. none of your flights, none of nothing, will you still come? And I'll tell you initially, probably as like a 23-year-old kid, my ego was like, no, like, got to get compensated for what I want. And Ratmere was the one was like, bro, like, long-term, nurtured relationship. Like, it's not about that. And I'm like, you're right. You know, got back into my heart. And I was like, yeah, we'll do it. Absolutely. And so I flew out. And I knew if I crushed it with the kids that the word would go

around. And so I crushed it with the kids. And then after the kids event, I'm like, hey, is there any time that I could speak with UPW? Like, man, not realistic. It's full. I'm like, great. And so another year goes by, of Ratmira's hitting them up always, nothing, nothing, nothing. And then all of a sudden, over a year goes by, and they say, reach out and they say, hey, Tony and Sage, they're looking for a new speaker, a new addition to UPW,

your first in line, are you ready? Wow. And we were like, let's ride. Yeah. So they were like, okay, you're going to speak on day four. And Tony's not around on day four. It's mostly some of the other facilitators. And so I came and I spoke on day four

and I knew that if I crushed it at Tony's event he would definitely see it and definitely find out and this was after me studying, you know, studying and analyzing him, right? Like, I know I know the call to actions. I know how to gauge the crowd. I'm learning from the master. And so I'm like, I'm going to apply all these tools

in the stadium. I rocked the stadium. And like a couple days later to like, Tony saw the way that you captivated the whole entire arena, how you kept the energy just as high as when he was out there. He wants you to tour the whole world with him. He wants you to go to all his UPWs. And I was like, we're ready.

We're in. We did it. We did Australia. We did Singapore. We did Miami. Now we do all Tony virtual, all virtual events. People have seen me all over virtual. And we did it. Man. Captivating, I think, is the right word. Because when someone sees you on stage, you have this presence like you've been doing it for 30 years. You have this presence like Tony or like an Ed Milet. And it's just this charisma that oozes out of you, but also this incredible ability to tell stories. Thanks. Yeah, it's repetition, right? It's like one thing to have a skill, but it's one thing to do something over and over again until it becomes you. Sure. And to get into the weird brain stuff is you have three brains. And the three brains are the thinking, the doing, and the being.

So I can give you tools and I can give you strategies and I can tell you how to say it, when to say it, whatever to do, but will you do it enough until it becomes you? That's the difference, right? So you can remember the first time that you learned how to drive. Right? The first time you learn how to drive, what you do? You got in the car and you're like, oh my God, put my seatbelt on, check my mirrors, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Thinking about everything. You're freaking out.

And then you're going through the motions, right? You're thinking. You're still in the thinking. And then you have a couple of reps and you have driving. Next thing you know, you put your seatbelt on, you check the mirrors. You put the music on. You're slapping your steering wheel. You're having a great time.

Now you're doing. Right? You're like, oh, I got this. Now what can you do while you drive? Some people do things that they shouldn't be able to do while they drive, right? They're doing their makeup. They're texting. They're sending emails, reading a book.

I don't know what the hell you're doing. But you did it so many times with enough consistency and repetition and intensity that it becomes you. So how many times have you ever driven to point A to point B and we're like, where did time go? Autopilot. Yeah. That's right. Yeah. So you can do that with skills.

You can acquire skills and you can master them by doing them with enough repetition until it becomes you. And so this whole speaking stuff, by the way, like, I've only been speaking for four years, four or five years. I've had a lot of reps in, right? Tony has way more reps than me. Sure. Right. And so if I do something over and over again, and that's how I became this person was I would go on stage and not know what the hell I'm talking about and just share stories. And there would be moments of uncertainty and a lot of unconfidence and people can feel that.

Now I'm just a monster because I've done it so much. Yeah. What do you think is the biggest thing you've learned from Tony that you use every single day in your life? Compassion. Yeah. Compassion. And what compassion really ties to is understanding people's model of the world. And so when it comes to leaders and when it comes to trying to transform someone, the moment someone feels judge, you immediately close the door for transformation.

And so, you know, hearing all these stories, wherever people do, whatever their past is, is seeing them with compassion and trying to understand why they did what they did by understanding their model of the world. But also when it comes to compassion, there's so many layers to compassion is I can come on stage and I can be really intense. And I can be like this and that and this and that. And then I can switch my flow. And I can get into your heart by dropping down into a little bit of compassion.

And that's the way you can take people through an emotional roller coaster because it can't always be, bam, bam, bam, bam. And that's what I've learned watching Tony is it's always methodical. And at first when I started speaking, I was like, eh, this is cool. I get to share a story and people compensate me for it. And then when I learned from the masters, I realized, whoa, this is way more than speaking. This is orchestrating. I get to go on stage and I get to put people through a trance and a dance and ups and downs and reflecting and thought-provoking. and I was like, well, this is way more than just speaking words out of my mouth.

This is, do, do, do, you know, it's really cool. It's really cool. The United States Soccer Federation present the U.S. soccer podcast. My name is David Goss, and I'm joined by my co-host, Megan Clemenberg. And now we're giving people an inside look at the World Cup. Times ticking. I think you can feel the intensity. All the guys are wanting to really take their claim, and they want to be on that World Cup roster.

There's no doubt about it. Hosting the World Cup on the home soil comes with its pressures, but we're just really excited just as the people are. The U.S. Soccer podcast, presented by Henko. Follow and listen on your favorite platform. I think what's so exciting about you, Nick, is I feel like you're living your purpose. And there's so many people who will never even know what their purpose is, or maybe they do and they'll never chase after it.

But I feel like you were born to be the person that you are right now and you are living it. Thanks. I think I feel that way. there's can I can I say something really weird please think I'm crazy as I've went through these trainings you know I'm I'm a practitioner in NLP which is the language of the mind and in one of the parts you know you're taught that the unconscious mind knows everything your unconscious mind knows everything it knows what you're hiding it knows what you don't

want people to know and knows where you are your pain stored all your trauma stored it knows everything and there was a specific exercise I won't go real in the detail where you go back and you eliminate negative emotions in a specific sequence, right? And I take people through this. But I had it done on me. And I went and you go back to specific moments and you get the learnings. And when you get the learnings and you get the gifts, the negative emotion tends to fade. You can liberate yourself.

And you have to trust your unconscious mind of whatever it says and just go with it because your conscious doesn't want you to change. Your conscious mind wants you to hold on to what's comfortable, what's safe. It doesn't want your ego to get destroyed. and why change is so hard is because a part of you needs to die. That's why most people won't change is because they're holding on to the part that they know they need to let go, but they won't do it. And so another addition to this story is there's a thing called neuron mirroring. I don't know if you ever heard of neuron mirroring, but neuron mirroring is the power of visualization.

And what neuron mirroring states is that the brain can't decipher what's real and what's visualized. That's why you see some of the greatest people in the world, they mentally rehearse something over and over again, like Connor Greger knocking out Jose Aldo, he had visualized that over and over again. So when he stepped in the ring, it wasn't his first time thrown the jab. It was 45th time because he mentally rehearsed it. Right? And what the teachings tell us is that regardless of whether the event you go back to is real or not, if the motions get obliterated, it worked.

And so I had gone back. I got into trans and this specific state where they're talking to my unconscious mind. And my unconscious mind took me to two to three lifetimes ago, where I was in a box. and I had full legs. I had a suit on, and I was handcuffed. And they're like, what's the learnings? What's the learnings? And I say, I speak my truth.

I speak my truth. I'll never stop speaking my truth. They put me away because I shared what they didn't want to know. I'll be back. I'm like, whoa. Right? And they asked me, they said, Nick, is the emotion still there? And it was like anger.

And I was like, yeah, it's still there. And what it teaches, if the emotion's still there, there may be a moment even further back. in the unconscious. And so I'm two, three lifetimes ago, and they're like, is there a moment before? And all of a sudden, my whole body lit up. And I said seven, seven lifetimes ago.

And they go, where are you? And usually you're hovering over the event. I was in the event. And the event was me yelling and screaming and pissed off. And I look over to the left, and they're rolling the stone over where they buried Jesus. Now I was raised Christian. but when I was 14 or 15, I was like, why is this right?

I was more open-minded, you know, and so I stopped. I wasn't, not religious. I could be spiritual, but I wasn't religious. And so, like, I never thought about any of this stuff, you know, raised Christian. But the moment that I went to was I was outside. I was bawling my eyes out in trance. I'm bawling my eyes out. And I'm looking over to the left and they're rolling the stone over.

And I'm going, no, it can't be. I was so pissed off. And they said, what are the learnings? What are the learnings? And I said, I speak my truth. I'm a protector. I'll always be here and I'll be back. And they said, are the emotions still there of anger?

And I said, no. And I came back to the present moment. And I opened my eyes and it looked at the person who was taking me through the exercise and he was white. And he goes, Nick, you should have saw how certain your body was. How much certainty you said seven lifetimes ago and exactly where you were. And I came back to that experience. And like I said, whether it's true or not, if the emotions fade, it worked. It liberated me.

But what you're saying is, I've been thrown away for speaking my truth for a very long time. This is my first lifetime. And that's why you can sense that I've been here for a long time and I've stepped into that. And I have that certainty that I've been a messenger for a very long time. And so I think that's why you feel that way because I think I've been around the block a few times. I've heard you tell stories in other interviews where you said your parents didn't raise you any different from your siblings. And they would like put food in front of you and say like, All right, we'll figure it out.

Do you think if you were raised differently, that you wouldn't be the man that you are now? For sure. For sure, 100%. You know, my mom has a book, and she titled it. It was about raising me. She titled it, How We Raised an Adaptive Child in a Handicap World. And what that means is you can have all your legs and all your body parts, but based on your upbringing, you can be handicapped and crippled.

And that's why a man with no legs of an arm does more than some humans who have everything. Right? And that's not your fault. By the way, if you're going back into your child, childhood, like, you can liberate yourself because would you agree, you're, both of our parents, they did the best they could with what they knew and their conditioning. Sure. They were conditioned from somewhere.

They didn't intentionally say, I was going to cast living and believe so my son. I'm going to screw them up for the rest of them. No, they're just doing what they known. And also, as a kid, you believe everything's your fault. So notice, if you were a kid and your parents got divorced, a part of you and said, what did I do wrong? Why did mommy and dad leave? You think it's your fault. And the other assumption that we have as kids is that adults have their shit together.

Yeah, and then you grow up and realize nobody has any idea what's going on here. No idea. We're all just figuring. We're all here in Earth School figuring it out, right? So you can liberate yourself because your parents didn't intentionally make you this way. They were doing the best they could with what they known. But now that you're aware of it, it's your power to strip power away from that. It's your power to break that generational curse, right? That's how you go from victim to victor.

That's how you go from human to superhuman. So your mom would just put clothes in front of you and say, all right, figure out how to dress yourself. Yeah, so when I was a baby, they dressed myself. But when I got to a certain point, of course, right? When I got to a certain point, they would put clothes in front of me and they would give me verbal suggestions. Like, hey, Nick, try this or try to put your arm in first, or try to lay down or try to sit up. And at the time, I didn't understand what they were doing. But clearly I figured how to put my shirt on, I got clothes here on this interview today, right?

But what they were really doing, and I don't even know if they were conscious of it, But what they were doing was, at an early age, I developed a very great relationship with failure because it was everywhere. And a lot of times, if you think about back to your childhood, like your parents, because they don't know, they're doing the best they could. It's like, don't fall. Don't do that, Timmy. Put your helmet on.

You're going to hurt yourself, right? And then you're like afraid of failure. It's like, don't fail. Don't fall. Don't hurt. And that's where all the gold comes from is the grit, is the falling down. It's the scraping your knee and feeling the people. pain and figuring out life isn't all sunshine and rainbows, but understanding what you can do

better when you fall down. And when you look at successful people now in your adult life, the only thing that's standing in between you and the people that you look up to is time and they failed way more than you did. So failure is feedback. And if failure's feedback, the more that I fail, the more that I can tweak and the more that I could succeed. Yeah. So I developed that a great relationship with failure. I just love that idea. It's not win or lose. It's winner. Nelson Mandela. Right? Yeah. I love that. You know, I'm Obviously, we both love great quotes, but it's so true, right? Because you can learn from the things that you did wrong or that didn't lead to where you wanted them to lead.

And that's where you are now. Yeah. And you can even ask yourself, do you learn more from your wins or your losses? Oh. I ask that question a lot when I interview athletes on the show. And more often than not, it's they learn from their losses. Yeah. Right.

and that comes down to the questions you ask because you can fail but ask the wrong question. So for example, you can fail and you can say, what's wrong with me? Or you can say, what did I learn? What did this cultivate me into? Who did I become? You know, for example, it's like I go back to that little girl on the bus and there's a lot of gifts that come from that. One, I wish I can go back and I could hug that little girl. because that little girl must have been going through something so difficult at home

with her own stuff that she had to take it out on a man with no legs of an arm. I wish I could hug her. She was just doing the best that she could. But also, because of the pain that I felt, that's why I wanted to become a bodybuilder. That's why I wanted to become a wrestler. That's why I wanted to work on myself. You know, in human psychology, humans will change because of two reasons, pain or pleasure, but more often pain.

Right? So if you think about in your life, a lot of the times you wait to experience so much pain where you hit a threshold where you say that's it. So for example, it's like most people don't start lifting weights until the doctor says you have diabetes. Or you don't start working out until the girl breaks up with you. You know what I'm talking about?

You experienced enough pain. You said, all right, I got to do some shit. I want to unpack a few things that you mentioned there. Yeah. Bodybuilding and wrestling. You were on your high school wrestling team. Yeah. And I think there's a lot of people that would look at you and go,

how was that impossible? Yeah. Although I also, I interviewed Zion Clark recently. Yeah. Yeah, Zion. Very similar situation where I think people look at him and go, how could you wrestle? Yeah. Doing the same thing.

Yeah. When you first, like, approached the idea of wanting to be a wrestler, what was the reaction from your family? They were all in. My brother, my brother grew up wrestling. You know, he was a stud wrestler, and I always look up to my brother, and he was always testing wrestling moves out of me. And you guys got to realize it's like, my parents treated me 100% normal.

That was my superpower. It's like I got beat up by my siblings. Like, I got spanked, like whatever may be. Like, I got treated just like everyone else. And to give some context is like when I was born, the doctors wanted to do some crazy things. So for example, like this finger is like two fingers fused into one. And they wanted to like split it. So Nick can have two fingers.

And my parents were like, no. And they were like, well, let's just cut it off. The finger's useless. And they were like, no. And then they were like, well, let's put rods in his legs and twist them every day so he can bone lengthen and maybe have prosthetics one day. And they were like, no. And the reason why they said no is because they're, They were like, that's Nick's choice, and he doesn't have a voice yet.

And so when I got into high school, all my best friends were wrestlers, my older brother was a wrestler. And so when I came home and I said, I want to become a wrestler, they were like, it's only a matter time. I mean, his brother did it. But the challenge that I had was this arm was about five inches longer than it is now. And my bone was growing faster than my skin. And it was super sensitive. And the bottom line is, if I would have hit my arm hard enough, my bone when it came through my skin. And so, by the way, one of the things that I developed as a young kid was I became solution oriented.

I was always focused on the solution versus the problem. You see humans focused on the problem, and it becomes massive. Superhumans focus on the solution, right? And so I focused on the solution, and I came home one day. And I knew. I knew I was suicidal. I was depressed. I was unconfident.

I had no self-worth. I was like, man, if I could become a wrestler, the girls are going to like me. If I become a wrestler, I'll be badass. If I become a wrestler, I'd be with my boys more. I'll be labeled as an athlete. I'm so cool, right? And so I came home one day and I said, mom and dad, I want to become a wrestler. And mom's like, oh, no.

You know, wrestling is the most physical sport. God forbid you hate your arm, your bone comes through your skin. What are you going to do then? Right? She was looking out for me. And I looked at my parents and I said, can we cut it off? I'm like, what do you mean? Cut it off?

Yeah. They're like, the right words amputate you're so aggressive with your words. And I was like, whatever, can we be amputated? Can we do something about it? And they said, is this something that you really want to do? And I said, absolutely. And I think because it was my solution to do something to my body that they were very receptive, right? Because doctors wanted to do so many things and are like Nick didn't say it.

But Nick said it this time, and they were like, okay, let's do it. And they knew I was in pain. And so my sophomore year of high school, we went ahead and scheduled the appointment for them to amputate my arm. They lasered about five inches off and did a skin graph where they pull skin from up on my shoulder, pull it over. So I could beat people up with it. And I came out, the happiest kid that just got his arm off. And, you know, I go back to school and I tell everyone, you know, like, they're like, what did you do? I'm like, I come arm off.

They're like, why? And I said, I'm going to become a wrestler. And, you know, people laughed and people supported. But, you know, people are like, how you become a wrestler. you have no legs and arm, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I think I just, I guess from an early age, I just had a natural chip on my shoulder of, like, proven people wrong

or maybe proven to myself. And so I went out for the wrestling team. My junior year, I was junior varsity, and senior year I was varsity. And I was the 106-pound wrestler from my high school. It was super cool. Man, that's so badass.

Yeah. And now bodybuilding, which is how you were able to share some time with the rock. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, so the part between that is like when I was a senior wrestling, the app Vine came out. And Vine was an app where you can post six second videos and you had to be as creative as you can. And I knew what, like I said, I knew what it felt like to be suicidal and depressed.

And I knew other people were feeling this way. And so I was like, man, I want to help. I want to help. I want to feel fulfilled, right? And we're all seeking fulfillment. And so I was like, what can I do that can't be replicated and I could be the best in the world at? And my idea was I was going to crawl around Walmart just as a zombie with blood. of my face and blood of my pants. And so Nick went out to his local Walmart in New Jersey,

which he's not allowed in anymore. And, um, you're banned from that Walmart. They're like, dude, just get out of here. Don't come back. I stick out. So they'll know exactly who I am. And I go in and, you know, I'm looking for my first victim. And I see this guy, he's heavily invested in the paper towels. And I look at my camera guy. I'm going to do it. He's like, you're going to do it. And I came around the corner. I was like, right. And he threw the paper towels at my face. And I'm like, oh my God. I'm like, dude, I didn't think it was work. I'm not a zombie. I'm alive. We're just filming a prank. I'm so sorry. And I looked at my camera guy.

I was like, was that six seconds? He's like, that six seconds. I'm like, is this okay to post? He's like, sure. And they picked me up and took me out of the, took me out. And it was a school night. And I was like, man, if this can reach 500 people, I'll be so happy. And I posted the video and I woke up to school, woke up for school the next morning.

Eight hours later, it had over 80,000 repost and over 80,000 likes. And when internationally viral, it was the number one video on Vine. I go back to school, people are like, dude, you're the zombie king. And I'm like, what did I get myself into? And that was the start of Nick being Nick. Got to start somewhere. Yeah, and like just owning who you are. Yeah, yeah.

And that was kind of the messaging as well as like, regardless of what hand life has dealt you with, whether you think it's shitty, mediocre, amazing, you have to play that hand to the best of your ability. But also the lesson is, don't model me. It's not going to work. And the third lesson is everybody has a unique, creative way to get more eyes on their service

to their product or their business. you just have to be resourceful resourceful enough to find it. How often do people tell you, probably daily, how inadequate you make them feel? Yeah. Sorry.

Right? Stop being such an overachiever. Yeah. A lot of my clients use me as that, that, the antidote to their bitch voice. You know, it's like, what would Nick do?

It's like, oh, my legs are hurting. Well, fuck Nick doesn't have legs. You know, like, right? And I always tell them, I'm like, hey, take a walk today if you could because I don't get to, you know, I got to roll around. I'll mess with them, but that's the thing.

Like, I may make you feel inadequate, but that's your soul telling you you got more to be, more to give, more to serve, more to create. And I hope I make you uncomfortable because if you're comfortable, you won't change. Yeah, watching your videos of how you lift weights is just so inspiring. Like, you figured out a way to do every exercise. Yeah, and that's the power of being solution-oriented, right? And that's the same thing for business. You're getting into business.

Like, you try things. You fail. remember I said failure's feedback and so I went to the gym and I couldn't use all the machines. I couldn't use all the equipment. I had to be very, very conscious of my posture and the micro movements to contract specific muscles on all these different things. And so, but I went in over and over again and I didn't quit and I found things that worked for me. That's the same thing in anything, relationships, body, mind, wealth, whatever it is, go in and figure out what works for you. You have to keep tweaking. So were you in the gym

and the rock was also in the gym working out at the same time? Is that how this worked? Yeah. So I always say, I'm a big believer in moments of being guided. Where you're at the right place at the right time. And how that happens is you have a part of your brain called the RAS, your reticular activating system. And that's the filter that you see life through. And what you focus on expands. And so, for example, I know if you ever want a specific car and you're always dreaming about that car, I have it on the background on my phone, I will, I will, like, randomly like hear that car or I'll see it.

Or I'll see it. Like, my head will snap and I'm like, oh, the Lamborghini. Or like, if you wanted specific shoes or a specific shirt, like, you finally get it. You see other people have it. It's because what you focus on, you get more of. But that's in both ways. If you focus on all the shit, you're going to see all the shit in your life. If you focus on all the good, you'll see all the good in your life.

And so I'm very clear on what I wanted, and one of the things I guess I wanted to do was Meet the Rock. And I was on prep. I was doing a 12-week preparation for a bodybuilding competition. I was 10 weeks in, so I was pretty shredded. I only have two weeks until my show. And I flew to Vegas for Mr. Olympia. And the expo was like Friday, Saturday, Saturday, and Sunday. I went Friday.

I went Saturday and Sunday. I decided to chill. but I still needed to get my lift on. And so I went to a gym in Vegas. And when I got in there, it was crowded, like abnormally crowded. I'm like, what's going on? And my buddy comes running up to me. He goes, dude, the rock is upstairs lifting.

I'm like, that's badass. Like, can I still lift? It's still open. He's like, yeah. And to give you context, I've already blown him up with videos and he already tweeted at me so I knew who I was. And so I climb up these stairs and I look to my right. And I'm like, long behold, I'm like, there's massive dude.

He's bigger thing in his security guards. He had four security guards and it was Dwayne. And he was lifting. I'm like, wow, it really is the rock. and I looked at my team and I was like, don't worry. I looked at my friends. I was like, don't worry. This guy already knows who I am. If he's the rock is who he says, he will come up to me.

Just give him some time. And so at one point, no joke, like, I'm lifting. And he's next to me curling. And, like, you know, like, you lock eyes real quick in the mirror and then, like, look away. Like, we both did that. Like, we were kind of paying each other, no mind. And then he walked away.

And there was, like, other legends in the gym. There was Kai Green. C.T. Fletcher was in the gym at the time. And the rock took off his headphones and everybody bombarded him for pictures. And his security guard came up to me. And he's like, you're Nick, right? I was like, yeah, not many people look like this. You got the right guy.

And he's like, can Dwayne meet you? Can Dwayne meet you? He's like, yeah, is it okay if we bring Dwayne over? He wants to meet you. Wow. And I'm like, yeah, let's do it. And so he brought him over and he dropped down, got on my level. And he was like, I'm such a big fan.

I love what you do. Can have a picture with you. And, you know, like, I always say, you know, on the inside, I'm like, oh, my God. You know, but on the outside, I'm like, sure, bro. You know, let's drop the dumbbells. Let's get a picture. And we took a picture and I looked at him and I started rattling off all my goals to him. Like a crazy man, like a little honey badger.

I was like, I'm going to become the first Calvin Klein model with no legs. I'm going to write a book. I'm going to speak all over the world. I'm going to act. I'm going to do what you did. I'm going to take over the world. He was like, he's like, you're right. He's like, you're going to do it all because people like you and I, we pivot.

We adapt. We tweak. We always find a way. And he's like, I can tell by who you are, you always find a way. Yeah. But also little little business sauce here is like always share your vision. always, and by the way, if you don't know what your vision is, you need more clarity in your life. But always share your vision of what you want to do, the things you want to accomplish,

because I firmly believe you're one person away from changing the trajectory of your life. The Rock knows a lot of people. Playing a lot of seeds, right? But you never know what's going to open up by you casting your vision. And by the way, if you're surrounded by people that you can't cast your vision with, those are the wrong people. It also holds you accountable when you put it down to the world. or like I was telling people did a New Year's resolution episode where I was like, you know, most people quit by January 19th because that's what most people do.

I said, just tweet it. Just if you want to lose 15 pounds this year, tweet it out. So the next time you're bringing a donut into your mouth, someone at the office can go, hey, what are you doing? I think it's important to just put it out into the world. Agreed. Agreed. Because it gives you a form of accountability.

Yeah. Right. And accountability is something that we don't want, but we need. absolutely right and it's its most undervalued superpower right is accountability and so it's like but that's what i'm saying is like get with people where you can share your lofty goals with like going into 2022 the one thing remember nick in his one finger the one thing that you should never do is share your goals ambitions and visions with closed-minded people if i had legs that's like shooting myself on the foot right off the start of the race it just not happening it's not going to work

right and so make sure that you have people in your life that you can share your lofty goals with that you can bounce your ideas off because they think like you. And I find oftentimes just saying it's sometimes it's the closest family and friends that don't align with your growth, that don't align with your vision. And that's okay. They don't need to understand. But you do something what I call love from afar, meaning you don't give them all your time and your energy. Or you just don't have specific conversations with them. You don't bring up specific wins.

But you need people in your life that you could be like, yo, I just close 50 grand. And he's like, badass. I just did 150. And you're like, oh, shit, I need to do that. Right? That's how you get to the next level. But accountability is surrounding yourself with winners, achievers. And what's cool about the world that we live in now is they don't need to be in person.

You can have virtual groups. That's what COVID gave us, gave us a lot of great blessings. Yeah. And I think that there's a lot of people. Look, COVID has been difficult for everybody, right? And I think that too many people are focused on the negative things. Always. Right.

There's a lot of positives that have come out of COVID as well. And I think I'm so glad you brought that up because there are a lot of things like the fact that you can connect with people virtually now. Yeah. And I was telling you before the show, you know, like before I moved to Vegas, I was a road warrior. You know, I was on the road 80% of the year speaking. I'm like, this is amazing. Life can't get any better, right?

And my only sources for the company of revenue was speaking and books, right? And we started to realize that that's not scalable. There's only half of Nick, not even a full Nick. there's only half of Nick to go around, right? Like, you can't, when Nick shows up, that's the only time he gets compensated, right? So how do you scale that? You can't.

And so we were like, well, what we can do is we can move the company to Vegas because all the events are in Vegas and they'll never shut down Vegas. They'll never shut down Vegas, right? And so we moved to Vegas in February, and I spoke once here. God bless.

And then March happened. And then March happened and, like, everything fell through the cracks. Yeah. All the business, gone. And guess what? We still have to pay payrolls. So have a team. Still have people to feed.

So have a business, right? And so we, at first, there's fear. There's definitely fear. At first it's like, an all shit, right? Like, we all have that. It's like, oh, what do we do? What do we do? What do we do?

But it depends on how long you stay in that. And then it's like, right, what's next? We need to move fast. And our whole belief, our whole story was like, well, we can't learn digital because we're always on the road. We don't have time for that. Which we really didn't have time for that. And so now we're like, shit, we're stuck in the house.

We got to learn digital. Like we got to learn this. We had so many living beliefs around digital, the digital space. And so we dived into the digital and we started doing challenges and virtual things, virtual products and programs and for kids and adults. And we would just rip in anything that we can try to create value and see what works. And I was telling you, we're just at this point where we crack the code where like I'm able to serve a lot of people from my living room and like give them really good transformation and then give them continuous training and even bring those people into my world and have small intimate events where knowing. can tell me what to do because it's my event. You know, and so you'll see now, if you look back in the past 18 months, at first it

was scary, but if you ask yourself, what were the gifts, what were the learning? Some of the things that may come out is I got to spend so much more time with my family. I got to slow down. I got to work on my health a little bit more, right? Or I got to pivot my business in a way where I can make money from anywhere in the world because everyone's working from their laptops and it opens up a whole new perspective. imagine someone who their whole life went into a nine to five and went into a cubicle, COVID hits, and they're like, wow, I can work from home and be just as productive or even more and make more money

or I can start my own business. And so for those that want to find the gift, you'll find the gift. And for those that don't want to find the gift, they won't. If there's someone who wants to make massive change in their life, what do you think are three things that they need to do today to start making that change happen? Yeah, the first thing is vision. You need a compelling reason. So for example, example is like I can ask people why do you go to work and they'll say I have to. That's like 90% of people. It's bullshit. It's surface level. And so the first thing that you need to do is by the way you don't have to. Yeah. You could pick another job. Yeah. And by the way you get to

because a lot of people can't get a job. It's true. They live in a certain place where they can't work. That whole have to get to thing is. Yeah. It's so powerful. Thank you brother. And so I would say the first thing is you need to get clear on where you are and where you want to be. And I'm talking about clear. So for example, if you look into my phone and you look at my goals, I know that I'm going to be 8 to 10% body fat. I know exactly where my house is going to be and my other house is going to be. I know exactly what car I'm going to drive. I know exactly how much money's going to come in. I know exactly how many people I want in my programs. I'm clear because the more clarity you have, the easier it is to get there and for you to chunk it down. So the first thing is

get clear in where you are and where you want to be. And then I ask yourself, get some leverage. And leverage for you for humans is a lot of times pain. You see what I've learned about the most successful people in the world is they're more afraid of if they don't take action rather than if they do. What's going to happen if I don't? What's going to happen if I don't build this business? What's going to happen if I don't speak my truth? What's going to happen if I don't serve people at a higher level? What's going to happen if I don't live a life of fulfillment? What am I going to miss out on? Experiences, financial freedom, joy, spoiling people. What are you going to miss out on? So when you're setting your goals, you need to get as much leverage as you can because your brain's always going to try

to pull you back to old you. So the first thing I would say, is vision, right? The second thing that I would say is identify who in your life is pulling you down and who's pulling you up. And I'll tell you this, I do a lot of evaluating in my circle, but for someone who doesn't evaluate their circle, I bet you over 80% of the people in your life are pulling you down in one way or another. And I say that because I love you and it may hurt, but I don't care because I want you to win, right? So evaluating your circle, right? And then the third thing would be is what you listen to and what you consume, you become. Oh, that's huge.

So what are you listening to? I hope they're listening to this right now. Right? Yeah, right? You're winning, by the way, if you're listening to this. This guy's a stud. You're in the right place, right? You're the stud.

Come on. But what are you listening to? Because most humans, they'll wake up and they'll see the news full of fear, killings, robberies, and then they'll expect to have a good day. It's not going to happen. And that's from Jim Rohn. Right? If you don't tend the garden, weeds are going to grow.

And so what you consume, you become, start consuming the content of your future self, of your higher self, of that person who's making $5, $10, $50,000 a month. What would they do? What would that person do? Right. So that would be the three things. I love it. I hope that helped. Oh, that's so helpful.

I just have a few more questions, but this has been so. We can probably go for like eight hours. Seriously. This has just been so inspirational. And it's such a great conversation. Thank you, brother. What's your morning routine look like right now? Yeah, great. So I have a few, I call them non-negotiables, and they're in the reminders of my phone. And what non-negotiables do is they're like the guardrails to my life. So despite what goes on in my personal life, my relationships and my business, if I get these few things done, I feel good. Because humans love the feeling of progress. So I want to make sure that I have little things that even if I do them, I'll feel good. And so my non-negotiables is I'll wake up. The first thing that I try not to do. So I'm not perfect is I try not to look at my phone for the first like 30 minutes. I got that from Ed. You know, it's like the first thing, like, how

many times have we woken up and seen a text message, a phone call, an email that triggered us and set us off for the day. Give yourself the gift of being a human being and just chilling for 30 minutes. And then set intent, like, is this going to be a great day? It's going to be an amazing day, right? Like, I start talking to myself, it's going to be an amazing day, despite what I have going on. And then I pray. And what, when I talk about prayer, it's, prayer is just talking to the higher source. It could be God. It could be the universe. It could be a unicorn that you look up to. I don't know what it is, but something greater than you put you here. There's just no way, right? And so I pray, and I said intent, and I talk to my creator, and I say, thank you for the opportunity for me being a

vessel. It's not me, it's you. I'm just the speaker. I'm just the voice box. I'm just the messenger. Thank you, and whatever I need to say today, please allow me to say, and please allow me to be a blessing in someone's life, and I pray. And that's new for me. That's very new for me. So I said intent, and I talk to the higher source, and then I have incantations. And I learn this from Tony, right? And so everybody's heard of affirmations, and affirmations is where you stare into the mirror

and in your brain, you go, I'm happy, I'm happy, I'm happy, your brain goes, you're not happy. Bullshit, right? But incantations is where you take affirmations, but you say them out loud and you use your physiology and really say them with intensity because what you say with intensity

and your whole soul, you become. So can I share them? Please. Yeah. Real quick. Yeah. And so I'll do it a little bit less intense here. But my incantations, which by the way, my incantations are all the stones that people threw at me and I turned them into fuel.

So some of the things that I heard coming up was he only gets stages because he's disabled. He's not tactical enough. He'll never be over a $5,000 speaker. He doesn't have a college degree. Doesn't have any business experience. He's not a good student. So now listen to my incantations and see how I turn them into fuel. Ready?

I'm a force for good. I'm a student of the game. I'm kind. Abundance of soul through me. I'm decisive. I'm evolving as a leader. Become the man I meant to be. I'm mastering the skill of influence.

Over and over again, a lot more intense, smacking my chest, getting an absolute state of certainty, right? But what you say over and over again, you become. And a lot of you've been saying the wrong things over to yourself. You misdiagnose yourself.

You think you're a shitty student. You think you're not worth it. You think you're not confident. And the more times you say it, the more times you give it power and you believe it. So be very conscious of the words and the things you're talking about yourself.

And I always tell my clients, you probably wouldn't date the person that lives inside your head, would you? because you talk to yourself like shit, maybe it's time to change. I love that. Jim Quick always says that your brain is always

eavesdropping on the conversations that you're having. So if you're saying, if you're saying, oh, I'm a bad driver. I guess I could never hit the dance. I'm a terrible dancer. You start to believe that

because you're telling yourself that all the time. Yeah. And most of your thoughts aren't even your own. You picked them up along the way. Yeah. That one girl told you that you were ugly and you started to believe it.

That one person told you that you can never build a business and you started to believe it. And so maybe in 2022 as well is we disarm or disengage the thoughts that don't serve us. And if you truly believe that your thoughts can make you sick and your thoughts can make you happy, you'd be very choosy of what the thoughts you had. Yeah. And you could change your thoughts.

Yeah. You can always change your thoughts and you can change your focus. Yeah. I'm a big gratitude guy. I know you are. What's the back of your shirts say, by the way? Grateful AF. Yeah.

I love it. I end every episode with gratitude. Good. This is probably so easy for you. It's a challenge for some people who don't think this way. Yeah. But what are three things in your life, Nick, that you're grateful for right now? Yeah.

I'm grateful to be able to see. I'm grateful to be able to hear or to feel. I'm grateful to be in this vessel, this unique vessel that has me the ability to connect with people on a deeper level. I'm grateful for my team, my tribe, my family, the opportunity to be here today. I'm grateful that I can sit in my living room and impact people and compensate myself and have an amazing life and serve people at my highest level. I'm grateful that we're all alive at the same time. You know, we're crazy that is. The fact that you look at your life,

your life is just like a fart in the wind. You know, like just a little fart in the wind. It's a tiny little sliver in human history. That's it. Yeah. We don't even know what's going on. By the way, we're just on this earth. We're on this ball and it's like circling around in the middle of nothingness

and we look up and we think we know. And we think we know what's out there. Like, come on, let's be real. No one has any idea what's going on. I heard some, it's okay. There was something that if the history of the universe was on a calendar, then human history would be like 1159 on December 31st. Like that's how insignificant we are.

Yeah, yeah. And you think the world revolves around you. Dude, I've enjoyed this so much. Me too, brother. Thank you so much. I look for, we're sharing the stage together in May at the Growth Now Summit. So I can't wait to see you again in May. Appreciate you.

Appreciate you. And for those that are listening, make sure that you don't just listen, but you apply. That's the most important thing. Because everyone says knowledge is power. No, knowledge is not power. Applied knowledge is power. It's what you do with what you've learned.

It's important. Yeah, and who you do with as well. Yeah. Send in love. Nick, thanks so much. You got it, brother. There it is. Thank you so much for joining us for this conversation.

Big thank you to Nick for joining us in person at the Blue Wire Studios at the Wind Las Vegas. and I am just always so impressed with everything that Nick has accomplished and everything that he continues to accomplish. Every time he posts a new photo or video on Instagram, I'm just like, man, this guy gets after it. Give him a follow. It's just his name at Nick Santinastaso.

I'm at Chris Van Vleet. And if you want more info about that event that we're speaking at in May, check out GrowthNowSummit.com. The link is also down there in the show notes. And I'll leave you with the words of Randy Pausch, who says, showing gratitude is one of the simplest yet most powerful things that humans can do for each other. Show gratitude to each other.

Show gratitude to yourself as well. Be great. Be grateful. We will see you on the next one for some more insight. The Hammer Alley podcast, an 80s flashback mockumentary. Back in the 80s, there were a thousand bands trying to make it in the world of but there was one band that had it all. Hammer Alley.

Whatever happened to Hammer Alley? How did they go from top of the rock? I'm looking for a music video. They're a band from 1987. Hammer Alley. Ever heard of them? To Rock Bottom. Dude, I was born in 1987.

I can't believe he's doing this. Hammer Alley. Follow and listen on your favorite platform.