Locked In with Ian Bick - Ex-Crack & Heroin Addict on Hitting Rock Bottom & Finding Success | Michael Chernow

Episode Date: April 15, 2025

Michael Chernow talks about the depths of his addiction to crack and heroin, how he lost everything, and the difficult road back to success. #AddictionRecovery #CrackAddiction #HeroinStruggle #OvercomingAddiction #RedemptionStory #TrueCrime #SuccessJourney #inspiration Connect with Michael Chernow: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/michaelchernow/?hl=en Website: https://kreaturesofhabit.com/ Hosted, Executive Produced & Edited By Ian Bick: https://www.instagram.com/ian_bick/?hl=en https://ianbick.com/ Presented by Tyson 2.0 & Wooooo Energy: https://tyson20.com/ https://woooooenergy.com/ Buy Merch: https://convictclothing.net/collections/convict-clothing-x-ian-bick Timestamps: 00:00:00 Discovering the Podcast Genre 00:05:39 Podcasting: The Pandemic-Proof Medium 00:11:50 Early Life and Escapism through Friendships 00:17:53 Struggles with Drug Addiction 00:23:39 Overcoming Heroin Addiction 00:30:07 Overcoming Addiction: A Personal Journey 00:36:35 Choosing Upstate Over NYC 00:42:44 Lessons from a Dangerous Delivery Service Encounter 00:48:54 Decision-Making in High-Pressure Environments 00:54:46 Growing Up with Sibling Rivalry 01:01:26 A Turning Point: Facing the Struggle with Addiction 01:07:10 Transformative Morning Routine for Success 01:13:00 Overcoming Addiction: A Personal Journey in Sobriety 01:18:59 The Journey to Culinary School and Business Vision 01:24:24 From Restaurant Technician to Owner: A Journey of Growth 01:30:22 Lessons from a Failed Westport Restaurant 01:36:20 Peanut Butter Banana Recipe Tips Powered by: Just Media House : https://www.justmediahouse.com/ Creative direction, design, assets, support by FWRD: https://www.fwrd.co Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Intro rate first three months only, then full price plan options available. Taxes and fees extra. See, full terms at MintMobile.com. Michael, welcome to Locked in. I think you saw a clip of me on Hopaholics. Was that how we found each other? You know, I actually, so I was listening to Johnny Mitchell, the Connect podcast. And once I started, once I found him, I started to kind of go into this genre of podcast.

And I immediately found you. And I also loved your podcast because there were so many episodes, right? And I was just like, I just started. listening to it. And then one day, I don't know if it was, I sell you on Hoboken. I was like, you know, I'm just going to DM, Ian, and just see if there's a connect, especially because I, because you're not that far from me, right? I was like, oh, it could be an easy trip. And I did, and you like got right back to me and that was that, you know. I run my socials and check my DMs regularly. I've gotten some of my best episodes just looking at the DMs. Totally. And other people

could have got those episodes, too. They just had to look in the DMs. So I never passed down an opportunity. And I saw that we had like a lot of like a lot of my friends from high school were following you that are into fitness and stuff. And you have some incredible brands one, which you know, you brought with us here today too. If you want to explain the audience what these are. Yeah. So Creatures a Habit and we'll get into that story because this brand is really just sort of an extension of my life story of overcoming some pretty significant adversity. But basically Creatures A Habit is a, it's a wellness brand rooted in nutritional, healthy habits. We launched with that product called Meal One, and it's a high protein overnight oatmeal, super clean ingredients.

It's made with chia seeds, flaxseeds, pumpkin seeds, pink Himalayan salt for electrolytes. It's made in 30 seconds, and it's a full, complete meal to get you started on your day. So a lot of people struggle with nutrition. I feel like especially now with the wellness sort of world and industry, starting to really, really take shape and becoming a little bit more mass market, the word wellness is no longer. longer like this highbrow premium thing, everybody wants to understand and or be in the world of wellness because people just want to be healthier in general. And so I just, you know, when I was thinking about my next move after the restaurant industry, which I spent most of my life in, I was like I've got to figure out a way to introduce something that's pandemic proof, you know,

because the world of restaurants in real life business, brick and mortar is not, you know. And, you know, we'll get into my story. But when I was, when I got sober at 23, I had a couple of guys come into my life who really introduced me to the world of fitness and nutrition. And they told me to eat oatmeal every morning as part of my journey, right? They were like, you need to start putting positivity into your body. And starting your day with a big bowl of oatmeal that you can add. anything to. It's super accessible. Financially and everything is a great way to get your day started

nutritionally. And so over the years in my journey of coming from this like super dark, very scary place to living a life way beyond anything I could have ever imagined, nutrition plays such a big role in that man. Like what we put into our body really does dictate how we feel and perform. and I knew when the pandemic hit and I had to step away from, or I made a decision to step away from the world of restaurants, I said I have to do something that's aligned with my passion for wellness. And there's nothing that I've done more than eat oatmeal every morning. I mean, I've been eating oatmeal every morning for the last 20 years.

You know, I'm 44 years old, arguably in the best shape of my life, but I've been in this kind of shape for like the last 15 years. Wow, you're 44. You look damn good for 44. I'm 44, man. That's incredible, man. Yeah, and I owe it to my commitment to nutrition. So, like, and I do honestly believe, well, I know for sure anybody that's, like, scrolling on Instagram and they see these, like, beautiful bodies and, like, all these, like, ripped jacked males and females, 95% of that is in your success in being able to commit to your nutrition.

You can work out as hard as the rock, but not have a nutrition protocol or not have a nutrition plan and not see the results. Nutrition is one of the hardest things to help people with. And so, you know, me sort of being able to help people along their journey, giving them an easy habit to start their day with, it's been awesome. Do you do one of those packets yourself every morning? Every day. Okay. Every day. And sometimes I'll do two a day, especially when I travel, because it's a thing.

350 calorie meal. It's a full meal for 350 calories. So it's not a lot of calories, but it's super satiating and you're getting 30 grams of protein. So when I'm traveling, you know, nutrition for me is really important, man. I'm always down to have a meal where I indulge. Like I don't, I don't, you know, refrain from eating burgers and pizza and ice cream. But 80% on the time, I'm dialed. And if I, if I can, commit to that, which I do, I'm traveling, and I travel a fair amount, it's hard to make those decisions, right? Like when you just have no other options, sometimes you're just like, oh, I'm just going to grab whatever I got. So I always have those with me because I can make them in a pinch,

and it's just super easy, and they fill me up. You know, it's interesting what you said about pandemic proof, because that was kind of my mindset too, because I wanted to get back in the nightclub industry when I got out of prison and then the pandemic hit a year later. And, you know, what I do now is kind of like that event business, but digital and in a way, podcasting is pandemic-proof, because a lot of this blew up because of, you know, COVID and the pandemic, like other people's podcasts. It's 100% podcast, pandemic-proof podcasts, right? Like, I think human beings in general, since the beginning of time, have craved story, right? It's part of our human condition. It's part of our makeup. I believe human beings love listening to stories. And there's a

only a handful of people that are really good at telling stories. So if you're a storyteller and you'll know because other people will tell you and typically people will want to kind of circle you in a lot of areas in your life, kind of dictate you're a good storyteller. That is what podcasting is and that cannot get replaced and it's not going anywhere. You know, and I think similarly in a business like creatures of habit where people got to eat. You know what I'm saying? We all got to eat.

So if I can create this environment where people rely on our brand to deliver healthy, really delicious, simple, inexpensive nutritional habits, you know, we've got something special. I love it. So where did you grow up? I grew up in Manhattan.

Manhattan, okay. So I grew up on 87th Street between 1st and 2nd Avenue. I was born in 1980, so I experienced New York City kind of in that really interesting time where, you know, I mean, I was a baby in the 80s. But towards the, I remember the end of the 80s and the 90s is really sort of when I, when I grew up, New York City was like the epicenter and potentially still is. But then there was so much going on in cultural kind of shifts, right? And I was right in the heart of it. I was right in the heart of it.

You know, it was a pretty incredible time. What do your parents do for work? So my dad was an electrician, but he was very sick, super sick. He had juvenile diabetes, also known as type 1 diabetes. But he just didn't take care of himself. So he was on permanent disability after 1990, and my mother was a secretary. So my mom worked into dentist's office. Did they stay together throughout your childhood?

They did. And it was really, really difficult. We lived in a small, tight-quartered apartment. I shared a bedroom with my sister, and my father was incredibly abusive and violent and angry. And a lot of it was because of his experience in life. You know, his father was a military guy, really, really, really tough on him. But I think because my father was sick, he just took it out. on everybody, specifically me. I, like, bear the brunt of the majority of his, of his aggression, you know, it sucked. Why do you think that was? Um, I think I was a male, right? It was my mother and my sister. I think I fought back. Like, I didn't, I, you know, I wasn't, when I was a young kid, there was not, there wasn't

a lot of fighting back. But I think my father didn't really. have the ability to express love in a way that you and I would would understand or want to receive right he you know I somebody bought me as a psychic reading a couple years ago for Christmas and I'd never done a psychic reading before but I was like all right fuck it um can I curse on this yeah okay and so I uh I get on the phone and I call this woman and you know I had no idea what to expect, but she was like, hey, you know, we can do it a few different ways. You can ask me questions or I can just start channeling. And I was like, I mean, I don't know what to ask you, so why don't

you just start channeling. And so she immediately brought up my father, like immediately. And she said, you know, your father loves you and always has loved you, but he has a block. Like she's like, I could see a block between his head and his heart. They didn't connect. He didn't know how to express what was going on in his heart to his brain to be able to communicate that to you. And that was like, boom, super emotional for me, right? Like, because I, you know, most of my life, I didn't,

I just didn't think my father. He died a long time ago. But I would, you know, in a lot of work that I've done on myself over the years, specifically like deep breath work in the last couple of years, I found out that a lot of the decisions that I made in my life and make in my life both good and bad were in an effort to get my father to tell me he loved me. And, you know, it didn't happen.

So, you know, living in that environment was really, really challenging as a kid. Like I rebelled hard and gotten to just an ungodly amount of trouble as a kid and a teenager and early 20s. Did you have friends that had, you know, maybe normal families where they had like the entire loving home and you kind of envied that at all? Oh, like that was my, so how I figured out that I had this ability to connect with humans, which is arguably my, I would say, not only my passion, but my superpower is the ability to sit down with anybody anywhere and connect. you put me in prison or you put me at the White House, like I am going to make friends. You know, I just have that ability.

And I'm confident in it. Like it's part of how I've built my entrepreneurial career. It's like that emotional intelligence that people talk about. And so when I was a young kid, I hated being at home because it wasn't safe. There was nothing safe about it. It was uncomfortable, dysfunctional, and scary. and so I would ask to sleep over at my friend's houses all the time. That was my first form of escapism.

That was my first like Houdini style life. And so I would go to my friend's houses and, you know, apartments. And I remember in first grade I had a friend, this kid Ross Delafield, who I'm actually still friends with today. And I remember being there and they let me stay over for dinner. And they all sat around a dinner table and had dinner. together. I had never done that. My family had never sat around a dinner table to have dinner together. And they were so nice to each other. And like it was like this comforting, warm thing. And I remember

very clearly saying to myself, I have to make Ross's parents like me so they'll allow me to sleep over. Like I have to sleep over here and like make it like a regular thing. And so I did that. You know, like I remember very, very strategically at that young age figuring out ways to make them like. me. And that became an MO for me over the years. I've got to make them like me to get what I want. And so, yeah, I definitely did. I was a regular at all of my friends' houses all the time. You know, I did not sleep at my house a lot. Are you tired of the same old nicotine experience? It's time to elevate your routine with Lucy Breakers, which I have right here. 100% pure nicotine always, tobacco-free and packed with a unique flavor capsule inside each pouch.

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Nice, kind. Got along with everybody. Not a bad kid in elementary school. Like kind, good kid. An athletic. You know, like I was, like I dove into sport too at a young age. So that was sort of another area of escape for me. but yeah I think generally in my in my in my in elementary school days I was a good kid you know did you go to public school your whole you know elementary middle school high school I went to I went to public school and I ended up going to LaGuardia high school for the performing arts so I was that was like the fame school I got in there for the most ridiculous instrument on the planet but in my junior high school there was band and I was a small small school.

kid in my class. And the teacher thought it would be really funny to put a tuba on my lap. And they gave me the tuba and I was like, fuck it. I'm playing the tuba. And I played the tuba and got like really good at it. And then got into LaGuardia High School for tuba. And then, you know, I mean, high school is a blur for me. Once I turned really 12 years old was like the beginning of a of a journey into a not so great place for me. Were you actually passionate about instruments? No. Okay.

But I just was there and, you know, I was good at taking direction. So what happened at 12? That kind of set a different path for you. Well, I mean, at that point, it was very violent at the household for me. 12 years old is really kind of when the violence really started to escalate because I was now fighting back. Like if my father would get in my face and shove me, I would shove him back. And those shoves escalated to fist fights eventually. And I had, it was so painful for me.

I mean, it was really, really tough. And I was in social, I mean, the social worker was my, like, co-pilot. And, you know, I was in therapy. And one day it got so bad at home that I was, like, trying to figure out a way to show my father how deeply painful the relationship between he and I was. And so we had gone to a big fight. I called him into my bedroom. I had a knife in my hand, and I just slipped both of my wrists in front of him.

And I was thinking in my mind, this is going to get him to tell me he loved me or give me a hug and be like, oh my God, I can't believe that this is what it's come to. And he beat the shit out of me. And obviously I didn't cut myself deep enough to, you know. But when I went to school the next day, the social worker saw, you know,

I had to go see the social worker pretty much every day and she saw that I had had bandages on my wrist and she asked me what had happened and I told her the story. And so they put me, they mandated that I go to pain money mental institution to get evaluated. And that's when the child services got involved in my family household.

And at that point I was kind of like ready, like I didn't want to die. but I wanted to find another way to live. And somebody, you know, I already been to smoking cigarettes at that point. Somebody had given me weed that summer between, I think, 7th and 8th grade or something like that, 7th and 8th or 8th or 8th or 9th grade. And I smoked weed and I was like, boom, that's it. This is it. This is where I'm going to live for a while.

And that weed ultimately ended up very quickly, you know, turning in the, to psychedelics and, you know, crystal meth and cocaine. And, you know, it just got really ugly. And it got really ugly at the house, too, because I was now high. And my father would get in my face and I would just straight lay and punch them, you know. And the police were showing up all the time. And finally, at 15, they, child services, you know, we had gotten to a big blowout. Cops showed up.

Child services also showed up and told my mother that they were going to put me in foster care. if she didn't take me out of there. And I heard that. My mother also reinforced it and she said, this is what they're going to do. And I was like, well, are you going to stay? Are you going to take me out of here? Because if you take me out of here, we're golden.

If you stay, I'm out. And you might not see me again because there's no chance I'm going into foster care. And my mother was afraid for her life too for my father. You know, my mom was diagnosed with something called Abused Wives Syndrome. where my father was very abusive towards her as well, verbally, physically, not, like, I never saw my father actually strike my mother, but he would shake her and throw her and, you know.

And so my mom was very, very scared as well, but he would threaten her life pretty regularly. And, like, one of the earliest memories I have as a young kid was sneaking into the kitchen. And my parents, so in our apartment, it was a one-bedroom apartment with a little dining room alcove. And the dining room was connected to the kitchen. My parents had a Murphy bed that would come off the wall and they would turn that room into their bedroom at night. And then during the day they'd lift up the Murphy bed and it would be like a little dining room. And in order to get into the kitchen, though, at night, when the bed was down, the only way to get in there was to go underneath the bed. So as a little kid, I would like wake up, you know, in the middle of the night.

I had like an orange juice addiction. So I would go under the bed and I'd go into the kitchen to like grab my orange juice or apple juice. And I remember one night doing that. I couldn't have been more than five years old. And I like walked in and I saw my father and my mother in the kitchen. And my father had a knife to my mother's throat. Devastating memory, you know. So my mom was really afflicted by that, of course.

and so she couldn't leave. She was terrified, right? So I did. I left. And at that point, I had already been out and about, you know, and I was already selling drugs. I was using an enormous amount of drugs. And I was already with the wrong crew. And just, you know, trouble was like everywhere.

And so it just got worse and worse, you know, once I left the house. Why do you think you turned to drugs ultimately? Did you have like a group of friends that were trying it? Or did you just, did you watch something that kind of, you know, put the two together that, you know, I'm feeling bad. I need to try drugs or what was that for you? Yeah, I mean, I think it was definitely a combination of the two because drugs were so easy to get, it's a lot easier to get drugs in alcohol as a kid, right? You got to buy alcohol at the liquor store, you buy drugs from the drug dealer. Isn't that crazy?

Yeah, the drug. dealer doesn't really check your ID, you know? And so it was a lot easier to get drugs. There were kids that, you know, I definitely was, was hanging out with that were using drugs. You know, I typically also was, was a lot younger than the people I was hanging out with. At 12 years old, I got my, I got a job in a restaurant for the first time. And so I was definitely the youngest person. And it was just like, I was exposed to a lot, you know. Also working in the nightlife in New York City from 12 on basically. I mean, there was drugs and alcohol everywhere, right?

So I think I gravitated towards it because I saw these other people doing it and I also, the first time I did it, I felt free. So like drugs really worked for me for a long time.

Like I, I mean, if you were to take a snapshot or if you had like a camera following me around, you wouldn't say that they're working for you, kid. They'd be like, that's not, that doesn't look so good. But in my mind, because of like the stuff at home, I certainly felt a sense of freedom and a sense of security in my drug use, you know. What drug did you tend to cling to the most at all the ones you were mentioning? After all was said and done, there was probably about three to four years where it was a lot of party drugs.

but at about 1617, it became cocaine, and then ultimately smoking cocaine. And then at the end of my drug days, heroin, because I was, the, the coke or the crack or whatever I was doing wasn't working anymore. And I was essentially in psychosis and paranoid all the time. And the only way to really come down from that was pills are. heroin. And this is before really OxyContin kind of came into the mix. I got sober in 2004. So I've been sober 20 years now. But it was, yeah, I ended up overdosing on heroin. And that was the first real, that was the, that was like the, when I OD'd and came very, very close to death, but basically died. I got sober too.

weeks later. But that two-week period of time, I had consciously made a decision to die. Like that was like, I'd overdosed. I'd left that apartment in the East Village of Manhattan. I was walking west on 13th Street after just basically dying. And the girl that I was with terrified to call the ambulance. So she helped me get into a bathtub, put me on my back, and just turn the cold water on and let the shower hit me for like 30 minutes cold shower. And that's what saved my life, honestly. And when I left that apartment like three hours later, I swore to God that I would never use drugs again. I was like, this is it. How could you possibly have let it get this bad? Everybody's been telling you you're dying. You know you're dying, yet you still continue to do this.

Like, how is this possible? I wanted to be sober so bad. But I just didn't know it was possible. I didn't know how. And I swore that that afternoon that I wasn't going to use again. And then three hours later, I was using again. And when that happened, I was like, okay, this is how you're going to die. Let's make it as quick as possible. Because you don't have anything to really live for. You've burned almost all your bridges. You hate yourself more than anything on the planet. it and you should just, you should just end it this way, you know. You came so close, you might as well just continue down the path. But that didn't happen.

I'm sitting here across from you, you know. So, yeah, so I mean, you know, cocaine and, you know, eventually crack and, yeah, and then eventually heroin to come down from that. Why do you think so many individuals get to that point that you were just describing of, okay, I'm done, this is my breaking point, only to use a, again, you know, hours, days, months later and have that relapse, because I see that all the time on the show. It's a disease. It's a mental, it's a disease. You know, there's a, there's a, I mean,

I just had a really interesting guest on my podcast, this guy, Dr. Russell Saraski, who is a double board certified neurologist and addiction specialist. And he has spent his career, uh, sort of distilling this idea that addiction is very similar to diabetes or cancer or high blood pressure or heart disease or similar disease, right? Like people say, you know, I'm an addict, but it should be reframed to I have addiction. I have addiction. even though I'm sober a long time, I have the disease of addiction

and my brain simply cannot use drugs or drink alcohol. And if I do, I will, like, it fires off these dopamine receptors that are different than potentially yours because I don't, maybe, I don't know your story

well enough to know if you're an act. or not, but I would assume you're not. And my brain fires off these dopamine receptors way more severely, like to the tune of like 10, 10x of what your brain would do if you ingested alcohol or drugs. And so it's actually a disease. And unfortunately, the, you know, mass population doesn't see it that way because they know that people can get sober. or can stop using, it's very, very difficult. It's very, very difficult. And the success rate of people getting sober is low.

And unfortunately now with fentanyl, the death rate is incredibly high, like, catastrophically high to the tune of hundreds of thousands of people a year. I think we record something like 100,000 fentanyl overdoses in 2024, something like that. But that's like, in my opinion, a fraction because there's so many people out there that are just dying that are not getting, you know, that they're just not throwing into this number, you know. Fentanyl is, it's a grain of sand of fentanyl and it's in everything. It's in Adderall pills, ecstasy pills, oxy cotton, Purgocet, all of it. It's in everything.

It's in cocaine. It's in heroin. It's in, you know, ketamine. It's in marijuana. It's everywhere. It's insane. And kids are dying around the clock from it, you know. So addiction is something, the part of my mission in life,

is to share my story like I'm doing now with the hopes that one person hears it and questions their belief that there's not a solution for their problem. I know there's a solution. I'm sitting here, former crack addict, heroin addict, 20 years later, got sober, young, 23,

and in my journey of sobriety, have put together shit that no one would have ever, ever in a billion years. You take the most famous betting men on the planet, and you put them in a room. You take a picture of me on August 1st of 2004 and a picture of me now. You put those two people together and say, would you bet that that guy becomes this guy in 20 years? Not a single one of them would place that bet. because of what I was like and what I looked like then, you know. So I guess if you're listening to this podcast, you know, this is my little plug to say,

it doesn't matter how far gone you are. It doesn't matter how bad you think it is. It doesn't matter how unique you think you are and all the problems that you have. There is a solution to get sober and live a way better life. Like just a way, way better life. I didn't think it was possible. But it's... Own it all.

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It is. You know. So do you think some people are born with addiction? Others aren't. And the ones that are born with it, it just takes something to trigger it. And it may or may not be triggered in their lifetime? I believe 100% that it is, that we are, there are certain people that are predisposed to this. Genetically.

Right? So, like, they know that there are genetically, there are, sequences that will point to being prone to or more susceptible to addictive behavior. Not everybody that is born that way necessarily, you know, gives in to the addiction. But I believe certainly I was born with it. And because I know how I am. Take the drugs and the alcohol away. I know how I am with everything else I do in my life.

with business, with family and, you know, I'm married, I've got two kids, I love my family more than anything on the planet. Like, my, the, the, the household that my kids are growing up in is literally a complete 180 of where I grew up. And that's because I, I put so much energy into it. Like I, with business, a similar thing. Like, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm an animal with fitness. savage, my nutrition, fully committed, you know, and I believe I was the same way with drugs and alcohol. You know, like, you look at a drug addict and you, you know, a lot of people will go, oh my God, what a waste of space. What they don't realize is that that person has an unbelievable ability to commit and be loyal and be responsible to what they want. You take away

the drugs and the alcohol from that person, that person still has this inherent ability to commit, be responsible to get what they want and be loyal. That's why there's so many successful former addicts in the world, right? Like a lot of, a lot of athletes, you know, a lot of these ultramarathoners, a lot of people in business, a lot of people in Hollywood, their career skyrocketed once they get sober because they're like, oh my God, I can channel this energy that I used to put into this. Into this, game over, you know. Were you hesitant to raise your kids in the city

because of your childhood? Because you live in the city now. No, I wasn't, actually. I was like really kind of looking forward to it because I believe the city gave me my grit, you know? I mean, I know it did. I know it gave me this sort of entrepreneurial hustle that I have. And so I wanted to, like it was,

I kind of like felt raising kids there under the kind of household that I wanted to provide for them would be awesome. Because they, you know, I also should say that I was terrified to have kids. I was terrified. I met my wife eight months after I got sober. And she's my soulmate. We've been together 20 years. We were together for 10 years before we had kids. and there's a bunch of reasons as to why, but honestly, I was terrified to have kids

because I knew that I didn't have the anger since I got sober, a lot of my anger kind of dissipated and my aggression dissipated. Towards the end of my drinking days, I was very aggressive and violent. And once I got sober, like, it kind of just vanished because I also picked up Moitak kickboxing.

But I never, like, you know, I knew that I didn't have what my father had in terms of that just like, just inexplainable anger. However, I was still scared to have kids because there was like this part of me that thought like, well, maybe if I have kids, like, I'm just going to follow suit. And maybe I don't have the ability to break the chain from my grandfather to my father, father to me. So I was really scared.

But thank God, knock on wood. There's been none of that. Like, I'm happy to say, like, I'm, I'm an awesome dad. And I'm proud of shit of that, you know. But yeah, you know, the, the, the raising kids in New York City was something that I was, like, really excited about. And then the pandemic hit. And, you know, we decided that taking the kids out of the city to our house, we had a weekend house. was like, let's give it a shot.

I never thought that I would live in the country. I just never thought it was going to be something for me. I just didn't think I would, like, I didn't think I would, you know, city guy. But then we did. And I fucking love it there. Like I, you would have to pay me a lot of dough to move back to New York City. And my kids love it there. My wife loves it there.

We've got space and, you know. So, yeah, you know, I think knowing what I know now about, living in upstate, I would choose it over the city all day. Going back to your high school years working in nightlife, were you still taking school seriously at all, or was that, you know, kind of on the back burner? You know, I mean, I found my senior report card not long ago, and I had 172 class cuts my senior year of high school. So I guess to answer that question, no is the answer. But the one thing, again, that I have is this ability to connect with people and the gift of gab.

And I had all of my teachers kind of like on speed dial. You know, like all my teachers liked me, even though I was a fucking fuck up, falling asleep in class, coming to school on no sleep, not going to class, you know, showing up late. Like somehow, some way I was able to like, I guess I would. call it, like manipulate my teachers to give me a pass. And so I went to summer school every summer. It's kind of crazy that I still went to school and I didn't live with my parents, you know, but I finished high school. I didn't drop out of high school. And yeah, I mean, that, that is, I'm so happy that I did that, you know, because I don't even think I was consciously thinking about it. As a matter of fact, I sold a lot of drugs at high school.

so like that was motivation alone for me to be there but all my friends went there so like you know we would we would check in for school and then we would then we would dip we'd spend most of the day in the meadow and central park because we went to high school just down the street from that you know were you thinking of the future at all

did you have plans or were you just so consumed by your addiction you couldn't even think of that no no no thought of the future in those days you know I mean I was you know I thought that at one one time I thought I'd be an actor. Like that was like, that was it. I was like, all right, I'm going to be an actor.

You know, everybody told me I should be an actor. You know, and so I was like, all right, it'll be an actor. Fuck it. Like, that's what I'm going to do. And I went to the school of performing art, so I used to like hang out with the drama students. But, yeah, no, not at all. You know, I lived basically life a day at a time.

When you were hustling drugs, did you know what the word entrepreneur meant at the time? Definitely not. No, no, but I learned, I would say, all of my entrepreneurial skill set in that world. Yeah, there's a clear translation, you know, from a drug dealer to someone that owns a business later on in life. 100%. It's almost like a prerequisite. Yeah, I mean, I know a lot, I mean, I bet, well, maybe not, but there's definitely, for me, a direct connection to how I learned how to move in business from that.

And I started really young, you know. I started selling drugs at 14. So I spent, after I got sober, I still sold drugs. And my now wife came into my life about eight months in. It was the one thing I couldn't shake. I couldn't figure out how to shake the drug dealing part of my life. And at that point, I had never touched product ever. I had my connect

and my Custies handling business and that was that like I didn't touch a thing and I wasn't making as much money as I was when I wasn't more involved but I was cool with that because literally

there was no smoking gun ever and so it was so hard for me to shake because I was making a fair amount of cash without doing anything and I'd set it up that way. And I really only got my game tight like that after I got sober. Like after I got sober, I was like, I put it together so that I was not never, ever going to be caught with the bag.

And my wife knew, she was my girl at the time. She knew that I had done that, but she didn't know that I was active. And then one day she was at my apartment. and she found a big old duffel bag of product. And it was like the one time that I had had something sitting in my house. And she was like, it's me or this. And that was when I had to make the decision, you know, to stop. But there's a lot of dudes that I know that come in to sobriety

or come into the world of recovery that do that. That's the hardest thing to shake if you're involved in that world. world, you know. What do you think are some like traits or characteristics of drug dealing, that translated into your business entrepreneurial mindset now? You know, it's like the greatest form of marketing in general is word of mouth, right? And you can't really market in the world of drug dealing outside of word of mouth. Right. Yeah. So for me, it was making an experience, like, you know, I'm not a big, scary guy. Right. And for me, I'm like kind of like this like disarming kind of character.

I developed a really, really great network of people both on the plug and the and the custody side because of how I conducted as a, as a just as me as a human, the emotional intelligence piece. And so, you know, I just, I basically just parlayed that. And, you know, when I was 19 years, old. I was living in the East Village on 9th Street between Avenue B and C. And I had a delivery service with one of my roommates. There was two roommates. One of my roommates and I had a delivery service. And the other roommate knew that we had a delivery service and he wanted to get down, but it was just, he wasn't the right guy for it, you know, and we made that clear. But I had a delivery service and I was in my apartment and it was very, you know, the rules of the house were like no one comes

here, right? Unless you got a girl, like gravy. But aside from that, no one comes to the apartment. Unless it's like a friend that we all know. Anyway, I walk into the apartment one day. I see the other roommate with like four dudes in the living room of our apartment. And they were unsavory characters, you know, dudes that like I would never invite into my apartment, period, ever. I walk in, they're smoking blunts, talking all this shit. And I'm like, oh, damn. And the house is like, you know, there's two safes bolted to the ground. The fridge is filled with shit.

Like, it's just, you know, at any moment could get real ugly fast. And I like go into my bedroom and I can hear the conversation from my bedroom in the living room. And this dude is like, I do this. And I'm like, what is this guy thinking? Anyway, they leave. I approach them and I'm like, yo, homie, like, what are you doing? Are you out of your mind?

Like, you just blew the whole spot. You don't know these guys. He's like, oh, no, I went to high school with this dude. I'm like, I don't give a fuck. Who? Nobody knows him. Nobody knows him. And he's here with three of his friends that look like

they're ready to pull a burn around and just like rob the place. What are you doing? Anyway, nothing happened. A month later, I'm in the apartment with a friend of mine who everybody knew. And he didn't really, he wasn't like up on the serve and the things that we were doing necessarily. He was just a friend of mine that we were all, he was friends with everybody in the apartment. So anyway, we're sitting there and the buzzer rings.

And I had this runner, his name was Adam. And I answered the buzzer and I was whose. And he goes, Adam, let Adam up. Adam comes up and opens the door and it's not Adam and it's three dudes with guns out and they put a gun in my face

whip me with it take me into the bathroom with my friend con pistol whip us duct tape us throw us in the bathtub and they're like you know we got set up essentially it's a Friday afternoon at like 4 o'clock though

so in my mind I'm like these dudes aren't gonna murk us, but this is obviously a fucking scary situation. And if I had a gun right now, I'm not pulling it out to shoot these dudes. That was the first, that was like a first realization for me. Like, this game is above my pay grade. Like, I'm not ready to do what potentially is necessary to protect the business if it comes down to push to shove, right? So these dudes robbed me. They got me for like 40 grand in cash and like 10 pounds of weed something like that and uh you know I knew that I got set up and you know but like it's it's just interesting it's interesting because when shit goes down in that world it's very different than when shit goes down in my

entrepreneurial life you know what I'm saying like but it's but it's not dissimilar in the sense that things get really bad really fast in both worlds Like, things can get really, really scary, really fast in the world of entrepreneurship, and you have to figure out how to navigate, right? Like, what I've learned from that world, the dark side is, you know, if you get back up, you'll be fine. You know, like, unless somebody wants to kill you. But if you get back up, you could rebuild quick in the world of entrepreneurship. If you get back up, that is what is going to dictate the difference between you and 95% of the rest of the entrepreneurs that quit when it gets really scary. You have to keep pushing forward.

It's endurance. It's endurance and resilience. Right. For me, those are the two words that I commit to. Resilience, I'm always going to get back up. No matter how hard it gets, no matter how scary it is. like I'm the guy that will never, ever quit. I'm just not going to quit.

And then resilience for me is basically not only just getting back up, but learning from what happened and applying systems so that not saying it's never going to happen again, but that we stave away from those things happening again. And I believe that is what resilience is. It's not just about getting back into the ring. It's getting back into the ring after watching the tape, you know. And the tape is so important in the world of entrepreneurship, in business in general.

You know what I mean? Like I'm a gut guy. I really do sort of believe that every time I go against my gut, every time I make a decision that I'm like, oh, man, I don't know. Like, it looks really good on paper. The interview went really well. But there's something. if I say fuck it I'm just going to make the decision

nine out of ten times it blows up yeah I've been getting the gut feelings after I've already made the decision though which sucks like you think about after you're like ah that was a bad deal I shouldn't have done that

or like that's just the I don't know I used to have a better gut decision like before I did something but I was also in way different high pressured scenarios like with the concert business and nightclubs and stuff but now I'll like make a decision

because you're not necessarily under pressure and then you realize because you have some time to think about it wasn't the best. So I'm working on taking longer to make a decision. I think that that'll click, you know. I think the age old saying, right, like, and it can apply not only to hiring people, but like hire slow, fire fast, right? Like, take your time with making pretty, take your time with making decisions in general is kind of like my motto.

But once you feel that it is a bad, once you feel like things are not going well, it's got to be fast. Because the longer you stick it out, the longer, the more of a chance you give, even though your gut is like, this is not the right person or this is not the right path, the longer you're going to suffer.

You know, I've like figured out how to make quick decisions when things aren't going the right way. And I think a lot of people try to hold on to their initial gut instinct. And sometimes your guts off. You know, you just got to make a decision to change direction.

And that's okay. Like I think also a lot of entrepreneurs, specifically younger entrepreneurs, feel like changing your mind is a bad thing. Changing your mind is a great thing, right? Like feeling like you need to change your mind and not doing it is a bad thing. Yeah, I mean, in entrepreneurship,

you're constantly making decisions, changes. I've done so many changes to the studio in just like a year from moving in here. you're always changing things, you know? Yep. And you never know what it could lead to or who you can meet. Yeah, and there's no, and like, you know, you write a business plan, right? A business plan to raise money for a new company.

Typically investors want to kind of see like, what is this company going to look like in five years? So you do your absolute best to say, okay, this is what we're going to do, you know, and you're one and your two and your three and your four and your five, and this is what it's going to look like and this is what your return is going to be. And, you know, it's beautiful. I mean, it never pans out like that. No, we're close to that, you know. And but, but I, you know, I do believe in, in a business plan and a deck.

You know, I think that's important stuff to like actually do the exercise of what, what it could be. But just know, from my experience, I've founded and I've founded three companies. I've exited two successfully. I'm in, you know, I'm building my third now. If I, you know, telling you what is happening. now compared to what I initially had proposed to my investors? Very, very different story. Totally different story, you know. Yeah, I learned that the hard way in life. I used to over promise under deliver. Now you got a, you know, under promise over deliver. I try my best

not to do that, you know. Why do you think you didn't walk away from the drug game after that setup? Because I was deep in the throes, you know, like I was deep in the throes of it. And the money was still good, you know, like, um, I think that part of it is just like a, it's just part of the, that world, you know, and especially in that time, like, so many people in New York city that were selling drugs in, in the 90s and early 2000s, if you didn't get robbed, it was weird, you know, like if you didn't have a gun put to your head and stuck up, it was weird. Everybody was not only doing it, but getting it done to as well. You know, like people were constantly getting robbed. And I definitely got away with like,

I got away lucky, you know, for sure. I mean, the fact that I didn't go to prison, it's crazy. I mean, when in the 90s, oh, well, let's see, let me think. Late 90s, early 2000s, late 90s, early 2000s. One of my connects, I mean, this is crazy to even say, but he moved everything out of an apartment on 20th street

between either first and second half or second and third half. Right across the street from his apartment, right across the street was the precinct. Literally. He was moving thousands and thousands

of pills of ecstasy. Hundreds of pounds of weed, mushroom, like just an enormous amount of movement in that apartment. And it was directly across the street from the police precinct. I would walk out of there with a backpack filled with ecstasy. Got adrenaline rush. Oh, my God, crazy. I don't even know how I did it.

I don't know how I did it. It was insane. It was insane. you know, really. When you're at the peak of your addiction, how is your relationship with your family, your sister, your mom? It was pretty bad.

You know, my sister and I had a really, really rough relationship growing up and honestly only up until about five years ago did we really develop like a very, very tight bond. My sister and I are super close now, and I'm so grateful for that. But, you know, we shared a bedroom, my sister and I

until I moved out. Now, granted, I rarely slept there after 12 years old, but like sharing a bedroom with your older sister is tough, man. You know, we were on top of each other, literally. And we were close in age. We're 15 months apart. But she's older. So like her friends and my friends were kind of convoluted a bit.

She didn't want my friends to be her friends. And, you know, we just had a lot of drama, my sister and I. my mother has always been a loving mom, you know, even though there's a lot of, a lot of shit there, you know, my mom has always loved me and I've always loved her. She's, she is, uh, she, she, she did, she didn't get the easiest hand, you know. So my mom had been supportive of me, um, in my teenage years, trying to help me get sober because by the time I was 1516, I was a full-fledged addict and everybody knew it. You know, I wasn't hiding it, you know.

But after a certain point, my mom kind of gave up trying to like help me get sober because I was just a loose cannon, you know, like it was just not, there was nothing she could do because I was completely off the rails. And, but, like, I would call her, you know. But it wasn't like we had, like, the greatest relationship because I was a complete, I was out of my mind, you know. And then I got sober, and I changed very quickly, you know. Like, when I, I mean, I can't, I still pinch myself today,

you know, the fact that I've been sober for as long as I have. but my relationship with my family now is great. You know, my mom and I still struggle a bit, but my sister and I are like, you know, she. Crack a Cayman Jack Margarita with real lime, blue agave nectar, and real margarita taste. Taste your escape.

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LilyRX or 1-800-545-979. She's the best. Yeah. When you were in full-blown addiction mode, what was a day like for you? Well, I would stay up for two to three days at a time, most of the time. So I was, I, and I worked in nightclubs and restaurants. And so for me, typically if I did fall, if I did sleep, it would be waking up at 4 o'clock in the afternoon. and typically going to work restaurant or a nightclub and drinking immediately.

And then, you know, using drugs. And like, that was my life. You know, it wasn't, you know, there was a crew that I rolled with in the city. And we were not, you know, we were bad news. And when I wasn't working, it was a lot of partying, you know, drug dealing, a lot of fighting. And constantly trying to scam, constantly trying to figure out how to scam in any way, in big ways and little ways. You know, I think at that, in my life was basically, and somehow, some way, I always kept a legit job. Like I always worked in a restaurant.

And I think that, I think for me, that was the one thing tethering me to life, to like reality was that I had a job. And towards the end, it was a restaurant. Like, I really do think that that was what was tethering me to life. It was like, what kept me there? Because all the other friends that I was with that I rolled with did not have a legit job. Everybody was straight drug dealers. And I always kept a legit job. But it was also for me a way to, like, build my, my Rolodex, you know.

I wasn't ever selling drugs out of the restaurant, but I definitely acquired customers there, you know. Was college in the cards for you? I did a year at Hunter College and slept through it and realized that this was a waste of time for me. There was no way I was going to, you know, get through. college at that age. I eventually ended up going to culinary school once I got sober. Oh, you went to culinary school? Yeah.

Where'd you go? FCI. Oh, where's that? It's in the city. It's down in a, yeah, so there's CIA, right? Which is like a four-year program. The French Culinary Institute is down in Soho, and it's a two-year program for the most part. Do you feel like you needed that to help you with your restaurants that you had later open?

Well, so I worked at this restaurant, Frank, in the East Village, for you. years. So I got hired there when I was 20 and I was definitely not sober. And I worked there until I was 28. And, you know, I was the crazy bartender that like this restaurant that I worked out was like a super hot spot. There was always, I mean, it was a small little joint, but there was always always filled with like models and actors and, you know, it was like one of those spots. And I loved working there. Because I could be high all the time. I could drink. I could be high all the time.

Nobody was up my ass ever. Until finally, you know, my boss fired me. But if it wasn't for my boss firing me from there when I was 23, basically the story of how I got sober. I had been up for two days with a couple of dudes that I, you know. And they had called it quit. So this is August 1st, 2004. They had called it quits.

They were like, all right, man, we're done. You know, we're going home. We were on my roof in the East Village. And in my head, I was like, I'm not done. I still have a ton of shit to take care of, you know, meaning drugs and alcohol. So they left. I went down to my apartment and I caught a glimpse of myself.

and when I walked into my bedroom there's always a like a wall mirror right there like a behind the door mirror closed the door, caught a glint to myself in the mirror and I had been up for days right so like I looked like a zombie and that was kind of my that was kind of how I looked towards the end anyway

just like gray in the face puffy hands swollen to double the size they are now just just you know terrible and I caught a glimpse and I looked at myself and I was like, wow, like you, you really are the biggest piece of shit on the planet.

Like you don't deserve. This is the end of that two week period of time that I sort of committed to just like killing myself through drugs and alcohol. And I really kind of like made eye contact with myself in the mirror. And I think that might have been the first time ever I've done. that. I do that a lot now in a much different way. But then I looked at myself in the mirror and I was like, you should just jump out the window. Like, you should just end it, dude. Like, it's not, it's not happening as fast as you want it to happen now, the way you're doing it.

You know, you should just jump. You're on the fifth floor. It'll be fast, you know. And then you'll get the love from the people that you want the love from because they'll be sad that you're dead. just do it and I continue to use drugs that you know right after that like crazy conversation I remember having with myself and then I blacked out

I blacked out and I came to 16 hours later and I had slept through work I was supposed to go to work that day and Frank you know I called Frank I was like I'm so sorry man you know he was like Mikey that's it's like it's too much

you're dying everybody knows you're dying and I love you but I can't watch you do this especially on my dime like you're fired can't there's nothing i can do for you you have to fucking get sober you have to change your shit because you know like i can't i i don't want to have to call anybody to tell them that you're dead and i kind of looked at frank as like kind of like this fatherly-ish kind of figure even though we partied hard together like i just kind of thought of him as

that like any opportunity i got to feel like somebody was like a fatherly figure that would show me love like I would like gravitate towards because I wanted that you know and um I begged him for my job dude I begged him I was like please just please give me another chance and so eventually he was like look I'm not going to give you a job working in the restaurant but you can come here at 8 o'clock in the morning and clean with the porters if you want um if you get sober you can show up every here every day at 8 a.m call me when you get here If I find out that you're, you've taken a sip of alcohol or a single speck of drugs, you're done. You got to get sober.

And that was it. I never drank or used drugs again from that day. I, like, called somebody I knew from this nightclub that I worked at. This woman, Karen, who was like an older sister to me, took me in when I was down and out in my teenage years. And I knew that she was sober. And so I called her, she called her boyfriend who was also sober. and told her told him to come and meet me and he did and for the first time of my life i i you know i thought that i was like surrender i thought i was just i thought my life was over i was like sober

i'm going to be like you know living in a library for the rest of my life like i had no idea what the hell to expect but i saw this dude who was covered in tattoos tough guy and uh he wanted to hear my story story, you know, and he, like, listened to me for four hours just, like, blabber. I probably lied about everything. Everything that came out of my mouth, I'm sure it was a lie at that time. But he literally just listened to me talk for four hours. And then he said, I can help you.

It's up to you if you want to take the bait, but I can help you. I know exactly where you're at. And that guy, he, you know, he, he was a Muay kickboxing competitor. I had no, I didn't even know what to fuck. Muay Thai was at that point. But he was basically like, I'm going to write a plan for you. This is going to be what you do on a day-to-day basis. And he's like, you don't have to do any of this. But if you do it, the way I tell you to do it, your chances of getting sober and living a happier life are great. And the chance of you living a life beyond anything you've ever imagined are possible.

as long if you stick to this thing. And that plan was simple. He basically said, wake up as early as you can in the morning. As soon as you get up, turn around and make your bed. As soon as you're done making your bed, drop down on your knees and pray,

ask God for help. I don't care if you believe in God or not. You need help and you don't know how to ask for it. So the best way to start is on your knees in the morning in a humble way. And then right after you're done with that, do some push-ups. and then go into the bathroom, take a piss, brush your teeth, wash your face, and immediately get on a pair of sneakers and go out for a walk.

Hopefully that walk will turn into a run at some point. But I want you to move your body first thing in the morning. As soon as you get back from that walk or run, have a bowl of oatmeal. You can add anything you want to at fruit, berries, nuts, protein, whatever you want to. Just have a big bowl of oatmeal to get you satiated so you're not obsessing about food and you're eating something healthy. And then go to this sober community meeting. get there, introduce yourself, tell them why you're there. And the reason why you're there is because you're a drug addict and an alcoholic.

Just let everybody know. When you're done with that meeting, come down to this Chinatown gym, and I'm going to teach you how to be a man in the ring. And I'm going to train with you for two hours. And if I'm not there to train, you still come and train. Once you're done training, you're going to have lunch, and that lunch is going to be chicken and broccoli. and then you're going to take a nap

and then you're going to go to work and then you're going to have chicken and broccoli again and you're going to go to bed as early as possible and right before you hit your bed you're going to drop down on your knees and say thank you. And he was like, that's it. That's your life right now. And it might sound boring and crazy

hearing that like it might sound completely impossible for you to potentially commit to something like that. But if you do, and I know you can, your chance of living an awesome life are great. And I believe them. And that's what I started doing.

How long do you do that for? Today. All the way through until today. That's what I do. That's my plan, you know. My morning routine is definitely enhanced, and I've added a lot of shit to it over the years. I believe that a morning routine is arguably one of the most powerful things

any human being can commit to. you know, we start our day every single day with an opportunity to win, right? And the difference between getting out of bed or hitting snooze is fucking massive, massive. It's huge, huge. The difference between waking up at 5.15 in the morning and 9.15 in the morning? Huge. You cannot buy time. It is not available for money.

So you have to sacrifice for it or earn it. And for me, waking up a 5.15 in the morning is a sacrifice and I'm earning those hours, right? Like adding hours to the backside of my day or unproductive hours. Like what great happens after 10 o'clock at night, realistically? Nothing. I don't, dude, I put up a post last night on Facebook about talking about how when I was younger, even just a couple of years ago, I thought it was cool to stay up late, get very little sleep. grind, you know, do whatever and not prioritize sleep. Now, I'm, you know, I try to be in bed, nine o'clock, 9.30. I'm waking up as early as I am now. Like when I was working at Whole Foods

back in the day, I'd get up at 4.35. Now I'm getting up at like six, and I'm disciplined where you've got to go to the gym. You got to get your workout in. I go for a walk with a weighted vest now, 20 pounds with my dog, two mile walk in the cold, rain or snow. And I'm in a good routine. I don't do any business until I'm done with everything. And then I can, come, I'm setting my interviews for like 12 o'clock or 1 o'clock. So I do this whole routine before I even start the day and I'm just feeling so much better. It is anybody listening here, you know, like you don't have to go do a whole long list of crazy things like I do, although maybe you eventually would want to because the things that I do

in the morning now set me up for like, I'm like bulletproof, you know, honestly. But even just getting up, you know, one little hack that I've shared a lot of, is, you know, you don't have to set an alarm to wake up in the morning if you were set an alarm to go to bed. So if you have an alarm in your phone for you, it would be 930, that's your go-to-bed alarm. When that alarm goes off, if you commit to going to bed at that time, you don't need an alarm to wake up in the morning because you are naturally going to wake up early in the morning. I believe rising before the sun is you there's no I don't think that there's anything more powerful than those early morning hours and the only way to achieve those successfully is to go to bed early right and for me it's 9.30 every night and I don't have to have to have the alarm anymore because it's just my routine but going to bed at 930 and waking up between 5 and 530 is a game changer because A, you're up before most people.

B, it's uninterrupted complete control time. Like you don't have to worry about other people in your life. You know, my wife and kids don't wake up until 6.37. So I get a full hour and change every single morning to do whatever it is I want to do. And it all is selfish and self-indulgent and typically self-care actions, you know. And, you know, it used to just be straight to the gym. But now I do all sorts of things that I don't, you know, like, because I'm an entrepreneur, I can make my own schedule. So I'll work out at 4 o'clock now and get, maybe I'll get some fasted cardio in.

But like, I'm definitely doing meditation in the morning. I'm definitely doing red light therapy and breathwork. I'm definitely doing some sauna and cold plunging. Like, I'm doing these things that people will roll their eyes at. Now they're like, oh, you're one of those guys. And I'm like, yeah, dude, I am. Guess what? Like I, by 7 o'clock in the morning,

it doesn't matter what gets thrown my way. I handle it well because I take absolutely good care. Like, I take very good care of myself. And I show up as a father better, show up as a husband better. I show up as a son and a brother better. And it certainly as a business owner better. You know, like I sacrifice those hours,

the sacrifice that sleep time to just be a better human. And that all started when Marcus gave me that plan, straight up, you know. How hard was it to work in the restaurant industry while sober? I'm sure that's very relatable to a lot of people. You know, it's interesting. Somebody asked me that the other day. You know, I was done, man. I was just done.

You know? Like Frank didn't make me clean the restaurant. You know, he actually gave me my job back very quickly, pretty quickly, because he saw that I was committed. Like, I dove deep into this thing. I wanted to get sober. And I just had that moment of grace, man. You know, it's hard to describe that.

It was like, it doesn't come around often for addicts to get that, like, that moment of grace where, like, you let people help. you where you feel like you can actually change. But it was the right, it was, it was like perfect timing for whatever reason. I can't describe it. But I worked right back, I went right back to the restaurant. And I worked behind the bar, early sobriety. I worked in a restaurant as a technician, as an employee, from, from 23 in sobriety all the way

till I was 28 when I opened up my first business. And I didn't have any desire. It's weird. Like I was done. You know, like I did not obsess over drinking and using drugs. So, you know, sometimes it's, it's, and that's why I make myself available for people that are struggling. You know, I raise money every single year through creatures of habit to pay for people's

treatment. So we, you know, we do a ruck. said you go out with a weight vest. Like we do a ruck every year. It's called we'll wear the weight. And I get 100 people to join me on this ruck where we, last year we rucked around Central Park. The year before that, we rocked all of the bridges that connect Manhattan to Brooklyn. And, you know, we raise a bunch of cash and we partner with a foundation called the Release Recovery Foundation. And we get really great discounts on treatment facilities across the country. And I just post on social media. if you're struggling with addiction right now

and you're ready for help, I will pay for your full journey. Soup to nuts. I'll fly you to the facility. I'll pay for your time there. I'll pay for your post, for your aftercare, everything. You just tell me you're ready.

You know? Like I make myself available. And I do that because it was given to me free. You know, it was that dude Marcus didn't have to spend time with me. This other guy, who was there, didn't have to do that for me.

But these dudes saw this person, not an addict. They saw a person that was dying and wanted desperately, but didn't know how to get help. And so last year we got, last year we put five people through treatment. Four of them are still sober. I speak to all of them living. Their lives are saved, man. You know, it's crazy to think that, right?

Like, I personally was involved in really helping someone see that there's availability for sobriety. You know, and I see it in AA, you know, I'm not even supposed to say A, but I see it in the rooms of recovery a lot, the 12 steps, right? Like, I see it all the time, you know. But to be able to say, hey, like, I'm going to walk, I'm going to hold your hand through this. I'm not going to fucking chase you. I'm not going to force you. You have to want it. but if you want it, I'm here for you.

And that's what has been like one of the most gratifying parts of not only creatures a habit as my company, but just like being a sober dude, you know. Share with us that transition from, you know, working for someone else to building your own companies to where you're at now with that. Well, you know, so Frank, about two years after I got sober, I asked Frank, if you're, he would sit down with me, I wanted to tell him I was ready to open up my own business. And, you know, I'm 20, I'm like 25, 26. But I had been working in restaurants since I was 12. So I'd worked every position, front of house, back a house. I really understood the restaurant business.

And when I got sober, like, I really did kick it into sixth gear. Like, I became pretty responsible and in the best shape of my life. Like, my life changed fast. Like, within six months, I was a totally different person. you know like I was literally in a fist fight two to three days a week before I got sober you know like I was I was not the guy you wanted to hang out with because at any moment I was going to fly off to handle I had I have not been in a single fist fight since I got sober outside of a of a controlled environment and my life just changed very quickly you know and so I really did feel in my bones that I had what it took to be a business owner. So I asked Frank if he would sit with me, and I was like, dude, I think I'm ready to do this.

And he looked at me and he was like, no, you're not. I don't know if you'll ever be ready, Mikey. I don't know if you have it in you. And it just crushed me, dude, crushed me. Like this guy that, like, I really wanted to emulate because he's got such a great thing going. And he was like, I don't think you have it in you. and I was like kind of crushed and mortified.

But as I was leaving that meeting, he was like, but if you really want to take it seriously, you should go to culinary school. And I was like that night online, enrolled in French culinary for the next entry and went to culinary school. And while I was at French Culinary, Cornell and FCI had collaborated on a restaurant

management program. Cornell is like the greatest hospitality program in the country, arguably the world. And so they, a lot of professors from Cornell came down to the FCI and they put this like three day a week restaurant management program together that overlapped with my culinary arts thing. So I apply for a scholarship for that. I got the scholarship and I did that. And when I graduated, I was like, I just, there was like no, there was no doubt in my mind that I was going to open. open up a business. I was like, I kind of had a fearless mindset towards it. I was like, I'm just going to start. And so I started writing a plan, you know, I didn't know what the business was going to be necessarily, but I knew exactly where I wanted it to be. I knew the kind of

vibe. I knew the kind of food that I wanted to do there. And I just started writing it. And my childhood best friend, Dan Halsman, he got me my job, he got me my first job in a restaurant. He's a little older than me. He's a couple years older than me. And he got me a job there as a delivery boy. He went into the kitchen. Like when we both worked in restaurants through high school, he gravitated towards the kitchen.

I gravitated towards the front of the house. And we worked in a couple of the same restaurants together. And we always said, like, one day we'll open up a restaurant together. But like I got deep into the drug world. He didn't, right? So when I kind of surfaced, I like tapped him. And he was the only friend, really, that stuck by me. from the not, from like the not tough, tough guy crew.

And, uh, and I was like, dude, we're going to do this. I promise you. I don't know when, but it's going to happen. I graduated culinary school. I called up Dan. He was living out in San Francisco working in all these fancy restaurants. And I was like, dude, come home. It's time.

I'm telling you. Just come home. We're going to do it. Like, I'm going to fucking do this shit. And I need you to do this with me. And it took me a year of convincing to get him back. But ultimately, I got him back. And I can't.

up with this idea for a restaurant concept called the Meatball Shop, which is I'd worked at this Italian restaurant for eight years and there was a dish on the menu called the Rigitone Ragu. Everybody ordered the Rigotoni Ragu. It didn't matter what else you had on the menu. There was always a Rigotoni ragu in the center of the table. It was like a famous dish in the restaurant. Everybody loved it. It was a $13 bowl of pasta.

Rigotoni pasta with meatballs and sausage. Fucking amazing and delicious. The best red sauce you've ever had in your life. Literally. People would like, you know, this little restaurant had an amazing wine list. People would come in, they would order a $13 bowl of pasta and a $1,000 bottle of red wine and sit at the bar with me. You know, it was nuts.

So I was like, there's something about this pasta, this bowl of pasta, meatballs and regatoni. So I always used to order late night for my meal, two to three nights a week, a bowl of meatballs and sausage and tomato sauce with a side of broccoli and a side of spinach. I was like sans rigatoni I wasn't really eating pasta then right and people would be like what are you eating I'd be like I'm just having a bowl of meatballs you know they'd be like oh man that looks good

I would dip the broccoli in the sauce and then one day I was like this is the fucking this is the business this is it I can make I can make meatballs out of anything chicken pork beef lamb venison like anything meatball veggies like I can make

tons people love meatballs and so I I came up with this idea called the meatball shop where you'd get to, we'd make five different kinds of meatballs. You'd choose your meatballs. You choose what kind of sauce you want. And then you choose your sides. And we had, you know, six starchy sides, rigatoni, spaghetti, polenta, risotto, mashed potatoes. And then there would always be a special. And then we had six veggie sides. A couple of different salads. You can put your meatballs on top of it. You can put your meatballs on the side. It was a full choose-your-own-adventure experience, right? And we had a menu that you just

check it off. Say I want my chicken meatballs with pesto on a bowl of spaghetti and a side of mashed potato. It's like, you know, it's just like an awesome experience. People loved it. And you'd walk into the restaurant and it was this old school New York vibe, like, like kind of like old schooly Italian restaurant, but with like a little flare. And there'd always be Biggie Smalls, Nas, whatever, playing in there because I grew up in the 90s and that was my music. So we will come to this restaurant and it, we opened. So I got Dan back. We put this thing together. 14 regulars from Frank restaurant wrote me a check to start the business.

So we raised money from the regulars at that restaurant. And we opened it and it took off like wildfire. Like we projected doing about a million bucks in our first year and we did four million. Wow. We were cooking meatballs live on Jay Leno, Jimmy Fallon, Chelsea Handler, Good Morning America. It's at today's show. Every single news broadcast you can imagine.

It was insane. And it was a phenomenon. and one of the initial investors was like, you guys hit gold, like, I want to scale this thing. Now, mind you, you asked the question, what was it like transitioning from being a restaurant technician to a restaurant owner? I had no idea what I was doing.

Zero. But again, I just put the right foot in front of the left, ask for as much help as possible. Continued, and at that point, I was like insane fitness guy. So my foundation for everything in my life, but then for sure, was my commitment to fitness because I believe that fitness and sticking to my nutrition kept me from having the need to want to derail with all the stress, right, and escape in other ways. I escaped in my fitness.

I escaped my commitment to nutrition. And my body was like, I was like in the best shape of my life, right? And so I stuck with that and, you know, we scaled that restaurant concept. to six units. I sold a bunch of equity in 2014. And that was life-changing experience for me because I never had money. So, you know, like that, you know, I mean, a big check. And that gave me some freedom that gave me an opportunity to start my next business without needing anyone, you know. And so I took, I knew that I wanted to open up another restaurant concept. So I took a corner on Broome and Mulberry Street right at the heart of Little Italy. And people were like,

you're opening up a seafood restaurant, like across the street from, you know, the mouth of Little Italy. Like, people go down there for Italian food. I was like, yeah, but I'm going to be different. I want to, I want to have, I want to be like a, you know, an option there, right? It's hard to open up a restaurant in New York City and be different. But if you open up a seafood restaurant in the middle of Little Italy, you're going to stand out. You'll be the only seafood restaurant with a vibe in Little Italy. And so I was kind of like the first guy to do something like that. Now Mulberry Street is covered with cool restaurants. All the, like, you know, there's a bunch of cool shit on Mulberry Street now and I kind of started it on Broome Street. So I opened up that business in the same

exact thing happened, man. You know, we were number one restaurant, New York Magazine, for almost nine months straight. Um, and I ended up taking out a partner, raising some cash and, and scaled that to six units. And so at this point now, I had six, I had 12 restaurants in the city and I had a pop up in the Hampton, in Montauk on this, in the summer. Oh, wow. And it was nuts, you know? Like I had, I mean, I got very good at business, but I didn't go to college, dude. You know? I learned how to do that stuff purely on emotional intelligence and, and, like, believing in myself and in my gut. And then I think another component, which I, I think is important to, to articulate is, You know, you can, you can, there's really like two kinds of people when it comes to trust, right?

You can meet somebody and get a good feeling from them when it comes to business and then give them 100% of your trust out the gate. It's their job to keep it. There's other people that meet someone, even if they get a good feeling from them, and they make them earn their trust out the gate. I give you my trust out the gate. and I think that that makes for a really comfortable work environment. Right? Like I'm not like constantly looking at you sideways expecting you to like earn my trust. You already have it.

It's your job to keep it. You fuck up? Ding 10%. You fuck up again? Ding 20%. You fuck up again? It always doubles. You ding 40%.

You've lost 40% of my trust. It's over. And I'm and that happens kind of fast if someone's going to do that. but you get my trust 100% out the gate and I think that that gave me an opportunity to have, I mean, at that point, there was 700 employees. You know, there's a lot of people.

I had to get comfortable with trusting people. So, yeah, dude, it was nuts. That's incredible. It was nuts, you know. And then I sold a bunch of equity at Seymour's right before the pandemic and created Creates Habit, which is my company now.

I got to try. Seymour's. I know you don't really own it, right? I mean, I own about 9% of it. Is it worth going? Should we check it out? It is 100%. For our Connecticut listeners. Yeah, dude, you should. It's in Dary Ann, right? That's the one that's near here. That's like 35 minutes. Yeah, so they opened up. I left Seymour's day to day and sold a bunch of my equity in 2019.

Dary Ann and Arlington opened up over the last three years. So, you know, they're newer restaurants. But Seymour's is great. great. Underutilized, fun. It's like a, it's a sustainable seafood restaurant. Good crab cake? No crab cake, actually. What? How do you not have a crab cake? I think it's seasonal. I think the crab cake will come in seasonally.

But you got to, you got to go there and try the menu. The menu is bomb. You guys have like a nice outdoor area there? Yeah. Okay. Cool. Well, for the summer. How far is it from here? 35 minutes? Yeah, you should go. You should go. I'm going to Dary Ann too much. I go to Westport a lot for dinner. Westport, South Norwalk.

I had a restaurant in Westport for a minute. What was it called? Meatball shop. They were in Westport? Yeah, we did a pop-up there for like a year, and it ended up not working out. We were directly across from, what's that taco spot? Oh, yeah, Bar Taco. Bar Taco.

They crush it. Really? No, I know, like, they crush it, but they beat you out? Oh, yeah, dude. That concept that, for whatever reason, Meatball Shop did not work there. I wasn't with Meatball Shop when they opened it, but they, yeah, meatball shop, like, did not succeed, not nearly as well as Bar Taco. did. I think bar taco is just more of like a it's a vibe. It's a vibe. It's a vibe. Yeah, yeah. It's a drink.

Yeah, it's a drink vibe. Yeah. That's crazy. So what do you think is the biggest learning lesson, you know, from your story? I think at the end of the day, it boils down to we actually can do anything. We put our mind to. Actually. Like, I'm a, I'm a real, true example of that. and the only person standing in our way from us and our dreams is us. Developing a positive relationship with myself was really, really hard to do after the years of

destruction, you know? I mean, it really, and I still battle with it, you know, those, those, those, those, that negative self-talk still just kind of, you know, whispers in my ear. It doesn't scream like it used to, but it. it still is there, you know. I really do think that the idea, the message that I try to put out there is anyone can change at any time.

It all depends on how bad you want it. And that's like anything in life. Like, how bad do you really want it? How bad do you want it? You can, if I'm sitting here across you, I'm 44 years old, and I said to you, you know what, Ian? I want to be a surgeon. at 44 years old

I'm going to start the journey and I commit to it it's a 15 year journey right I have to go back to college go to med school residency 15 years so 54

59 I could be doing surgery if I really wanted to do it it's totally possible why not why not there are a lot of people that don't feel

they can change and what I think the where I think think the problem resides is they're thinking about changing the past. You can't fucking change the past. No one's ever been able to do that. So stop putting all of your energy and your brain power towards what happened in the past

and what could potentially happen in the future and think about what the fuck is in front of you right this moment right now. And I've literally trained myself to think that way. The past is history and the future. mystery. It's the truth. If you're not focused on what's going on in front of you right now, it's going to pass you by. Everything happens in life now, not yesterday, not tomorrow, right now. And so you have the ability to harness that shit. I'm not saying you need to meditate and do red light therapy and breath work and fucking work out like a savage, although it would probably

be great for you. But understanding that, every single day is an opportunity to win. You have the power. You have the control. You know, especially if you start early in the morning. I mean, it sounds ridiculous, but, you know, it's my story, man. You know, I went from overdosing on heroin and doing everything in my power to get over on everyone around me if I could to people throw on millions of dollars in my path to, to build with, you know, straight up.

Very inspirational. Thanks, man. Well, I appreciate you coming on the show today, Michael. I appreciate you DM and me, man. It's been a pleasure to have this incredible conversation. Thanks for having me. And I think it'll be really inspiring to our listeners. You know, not everyone that's in your shoes success-wise shares their stories about the past like you have.

And I think you know that kind of in your world too. There's very few that do that. Hopefully more people in the world start to do that. Yeah, I mean, I think that that is why I've been able to build a community because I think the authenticity of our story is what people resonate with. I think the business is storytelling. It's your business, actually. But like, I've always thought about businesses.

Like, if people don't actually feel something when they interact with the business, and ideally feel like the story that we're trying to tell, it's never going to work. So I always think about storytelling and business and I build this personal brand on my story. Everybody check out Quech's a Habit. It's good stuff. Yeah, and your podcast too.

We'll have it linked in the bio with your product. And to our listeners, hopefully we'll hear some promo soon about these with an exclusive discount. Yeah, we got you 100%. That's going to be cool. And you just add water to this? Yeah, so basically the way you make it is you just grab a jar. Pour five ounces of almond milk, oat milk, regular milk, or water, but it's better with milk.

Into the jar, pour in the pouch, mix it for 30 seconds, cover it up, throw it in the fridge overnight, pull it out in the morning and it's ready to rock. I always loosen it up with like a little extra splash of milk. Only five ounces, huh? Yeah, five ounces of liquid. I'm excited to try this tomorrow I'm excited for you You said the peanut butter one first right

Peanut Butter banana is definitely my favorite Okay Yeah I will be posting about this regularly Awesome Well thanks again brother I appreciate you coming on Thank you man