The Bossticks - Secrets Of The Worlds Most Successful People Ft. Alex Banayan, Author Of The Third Door

Episode Date: July 27, 2023

#593: Today we're sitting down with Alex Banayan, author of "The Third Door" and the youngest bestselling author in US History. Banayan hacked The Price is Right, won a sailboat, sold it, and used the money to fund his quest to learn from the world's most innovative leaders. Over the course of his unprecedented journey, Banayan interviewed Bill Gates, Lady Gaga, Larry King, Maya Angelou, Steve Wozniak, Jane Goodall, Jessica Alba, Quincy Jones, and more. Alex joins us to talk about his experience learning from the world's most successful people, the mistakes he made along the way & the one thing that every successful person has in common. He also gets into his stories: how he chased down Steven Spielburg in Italy, his unsuccessful experience with Warren Buffet, his rejections and his successful interviews. Finally we get into what he's learned after 12 years of studying success, and the common denominator of both successful and unsuccessful people. To connect with Alex Banayan click HERE To connect with Lauryn Evarts Bosstick click HERE To connect with Michael Bosstick click HERE Read More on The Skinny Confidential HERE To subscribe to our YouTube Page click HERE For Detailed Show Notes visit TSCPODCAST.COM To Call the Him & Her Hotline call: 1-833-SKINNYS (754-6697) This episode is brought to you by The Skinny Confidential This episode is brought to you by Harmless Harvest Replenish your electrolytes and keep yourself cool so you can avoid losing yours. Go to HarmlessHarvest.com and use code SKINNY for 20% off your first order. This episode is brought to you by Just Thrive Pair the award-winning, gut nourishing Just Thrive Probiotic with the stress-busting, mood uplifting power of Just Calm. Use code SKINNY90 at justthrivehealth.com to get 20% off a 90 day bottle of Just Thrive probiotic + Just Calm. This episode is brought to you by Pillsbury Whip up a delicious, kid-pleasing dinner that's as easy as FIll, Roll, & Bake. Find more weeknight dinner recipes at Pillsbury.com This episode is brought to you by the Clean Simple Eats Clean Simple Eats protein powder is non-GMO, gluten-free, 3rd party tested, always grass-fed and made with zero artificial ingredients. You can get 20% off your first order by using code SKINNY at checkout at cleansimpleeats.com This episode is brought to you by eBay Ensure your next purchase is the real deal with eBay Authenticity Guarantee. Everyone deserves real. Visit ebay.com for terms. This episode is brought to you by Vegamour With Vegamour, you're able to have visibly thicker, fuller, shinier, longer hair, all without the harsh ingredients. Vegamour's products are 100% cruelty free and not formulated with any harsh chemicals. Visit vegamour.com/skinny and use code SKINNY at checkout to get 20% off your first order. Produced by Dear Media

The following podcast is a dear media production. She's a lifestyle blogger extraordinaire. Fantastic. And he's a serial entrepreneur. A very smart cookie. And now Lauren Everts and Michael Bostic are bringing you along for the ride. Get ready for some major realness. Welcome to the skinny confidential, him and her.

Aha. I lived in this fantasy of if I just work hard enough, eventually I'll hit the tipping point. And most of my frustration, pain, and agony on this journey came from not accepting life on life's terms. I was waiting for this magical tipping point where everything would just get easy. I was banging my head against the wall wondering how come things even after the Bill Gates interview. Oprah said no. Michael Jordan said no. Stephen Spielberg said no.

Three times after I went to France and tracked him down on his yacht in the French Rivier. What I didn't understand is the difference about persistence and over-persistence, is that persistence is not about knocking on one door a hundred times. It's about knocking on a hundred different doors. Welcome back, everybody. Welcome back to the skinny confidential him and her show. That clip was from our guest of the show today. Alex Benayan, who is the author of the third door.

He is one of the youngest best-selling authors in U.S. history. And he also hacked the prices, right? That's correct. This is one of the wilder stories we've heard on the show. He's got a lot to offer on this episode. we're mostly diving into his book The Third Door and why he even decided to go and hack the price is right. So on this episode, you'll learn about the third door. What he got from interviewing the world's most successful people, including Larry King, Lady Gaga, Bill Gates, Stephen Spielberg,

Warren Buffett, and many more. We talk about the concept of over persistence if there is such a thing. And we also talk about the importance of resourcefulness. So this is really an episode all about perseverance, resourcefulness, success. And to end it, we talk about the common denominator of successful people. So for anybody that wants to level up, this is an episode for you. It's an incredible story. It's crazy. It's got everything we love in a skinny confidential him and her podcast episode. So strap in, buckle up. Alex Benign. Welcome to the skinny confidential, him and her show. This is the skinny confidential, him and her. You hacked the price is right. What does that even mean? What is that even? Walk us through that. It was less Albert Einstein and much more Forrest Gump.

When I was 18 years old, I had this dream to go on this quest to go interview the people I dreamed of learning from. The only problem was, I didn't have money to go on this dream. Flying around the country, I figured would take money, money I didn't have. I was buried in student loan debt. I was all out of bar mitzvah cash. So there had to be a way to make some quick money. So two nights before final exams, I'm in the library doing what everyone does in the library right before finals. Crabbing.

I'm on Facebook. Oh, okay. You're the smart student. I'm the one who's procrastinate. You were at a kegher. You'd be the first person. Yeah, I never even went to the library. You were in my text message.

I figured that's what people do in the library because I never went, but we keep going. No, we're all just scrolling Facebook at that time. So I'm on Facebook, you know, the night before final exams. And I see somebody offering free tickets to the game show, the price is right. And I was going to school in Los Angeles, not too far from where the show films. And my first thought was, what about? I go on the show and win some money to fund this book. You know, not my brightest moment because

I'd never seen a full episode of the show before. You know, I'd seen bits of pieces when I was homesick from school, but I'd never seen a full episode before. Plus, I'd final's in two days, so I told myself it was a dumb idea and to not think about it. But I don't know if you guys have ever had one of those moments where, no matter how ridiculous an idea, for some reason, it keeps clawing itself back into your mind. And I remember, you know, sitting there and deciding to do the logical thing and an all-nighter to study. But I didn't study for finals. I studied how to hack the prices right. So how does, so, so again, similar to you, I've seen the show on and off, but I've never sat down. Like, how does one go about thinking about hacking the price is right? All right. So this is what I did.

I didn't know how the show, you know, I'd seen bits and pieces, but I hadn't seen a full episode before. So the first thing I did, I remember at that time, I was 18, I just finished reading a book called The Four Our Work by Tim Ferriss. And they talked about the 80, 20 principle in there. So I remember thinking, okay, what's the 20% of things I can study tonight that will give me 80% of the results? And I realized with the game show, the price is right, there are 300 people in the audience, but eight get called down. So the hard part of the show isn't being one of the winners of the eight. It's actually being one of the eight out of the 300. The odds are way harder just to be called from the audience. So I pull my all-nighter researching

how to get selected on the show from the audience. And what I found out, you know, I pulled an all-nighter. I was on like the 23rd O of Google, and I found out the price is right is not what it seems. You know, they make it look like they're like, you know, Michael, come on down, as if they pull your name out of a hat. But what I learned in my research

is there's a producer who interviews everyone in the audience before the show begins. And then on top of that, big secret I found out is there's also undercover producers planted in the audience who then confirm or deny the original producer selections. So like many things in life,

they make it look like random luck, but there's a system to it. So, you know, I show up the next morning. You know, I'm wearing this like big puffy jacket, a bright red shirt, you know, neon yellow sunglasses. I look like a chubby too can. And I get to this Price is Right Studios.

It's in CBS, right next to the Dear Media Office is actually in LA. And I show up to the studio and I realize I have no idea with undercover producers, so I'm just going to assume everyone is. So I'm like flirting with the custodians. I'm dancing with the security guards. I'm like breakdancing on the phone.

I don't know how to break dance. Just doing anything to stand out. Just whatever I can because I realize it's not a 10 second interview. It's a four hour interview. They make you wait outside for four hours. And they're watching you the whole time. But finally, you stand in this line and eventually I found the guy, Stan, the casting producer. How did you know what was the guy?

So I had done, you know, I just did every Google search I could about who's the casting producer, the Price is Right. And I by that point knew where Stan grew up, where he went to college. I pretty much knew like what he ate for breakfast that morning. And I knew he had a clipboard, but it's never in his hands. So he has an assistant who sits about 20 feet away from him. And if Stan likes you, he asks you a few questions. And if you really likes you, he'll turn around, wink to his assistant, and she'll write your name on the clipboard. So if the Price is Right as a nightclub, stands the bouncer. And if you're not on his list, you don't get it. So sure enough, he's in front of me. And he's like, you know, what's your name? Where are you from? What do you do? And I'm like,

hi, I'm Alex. I'm, you know, 18. I'm, you know, premed at USC. And he goes, oh, a premed, you must be, you know, really busy studying. How do you have time to watch the price is right? And I was like, oh, is that where I am? You know, it was a really bad joke. It didn't land. And I could see him getting ready to move on to the next person. So I'd read in one of these business books I had read recently that human contact speeds up a relationship. So I had an idea. I needed to touch Stan. But the only problem is he's like 20 feet away. So I'm like, Stan, come over here. I want to make a handshake with you. So he's a bit reluctant. I like, you know, beg him to come over. So he comes over. I teach him how to pound him, blow it up.

And he laughs a little. And then he wishes me good luck and walks away. Doesn't look at his assistant. She doesn't write anything on the clipboard. And just like that, it's over. And I don't know if you've been in one of those moments where it feels like everything you want is slipping right away from me, almost like sand going through your fingers. And the worst part is I felt I didn't even had a chance to really prove myself. So as he's walking away uncontrollably, I started yelling at the top of my lungs. You know, Stan! And, you know, like the ex-examble.

Marco is like going off the walls and the whole audience turns their hand around thinking I'm having like a seizure or something and he runs over. He's like, are you okay? Are you okay? What's going on? And I had no idea what I was going to say next. All I knew, he's right in front of me. So I'm just like looking at him, looking at him. And he's very like typical Hollywood wearing like, you know, a turtleneck and a red scarf even though it's like 70 degrees outside. And I'm like, you're a scarf. And now I really don't know what I'm going to say next. And I just look at him with all the seriousness I can. And I'm like, Stan, I'm an avid scarf. I have 360 pairs in my dorm room and I'm missing that pair. You know, where did you get it from? And he starts cracking up because I think he finally realized what I was trying to do. And he gave me a scarf. He's like, look, you need this more than I do. And he turned around, winked, and his assistant put my name on the clipboard. So you think that he knew that you were trying to get on the show.

It's impossible to tell, but it was a very knowing laugh. So you can't tell as an outsider that he is a producer. You thought he was just like a person in the audience. So Stan is the main producer and he's very clear. He's going around and interviewing everyone. But what happened next is about five or ten minutes later, I saw this young woman walking throughout the audience line. And I saw she had a badge sticking out of her back pocket that was sort of like tucked away.

And I saw she would look at everyone's name tag and sort of like make mental notes. So I just sort of, you know, I was 18 of the time. I was like blowing her kisses and dancing and she started laughing and I was dancing more. And she took a sheet of paper out of her pocket and made another mark. And, you know, at that point you would think that was undercover producer. So I'm on top of the world. I finally got on the list. But it was right then that I realized I had spent my entire all-nighter

realizing and studying how to get on the show. I still didn't know how to play. But I thought like how hard could that be. So I took up my phone and I Googled how to play, the price is right. And about 30 seconds later, security taps on my shoulder and takes my phone away. So now I'm, you know, completely, you know, useless at this point. Were you not allowed to use your phone or were they looking at what you were Googling? They were taking away everyone's phone before they enter the studio.

Okay. Which makes sense in hindsight. They don't want people filming. Yeah. So I literally, I'm sitting on this bench sulking next to this old lady and she sort of looks at me and she's like, honey, what's wrong? And I sort of tell her my problem. You know, I have this big dream.

I have finals tomorrow. I didn't study for finals. I'm here and now I didn't know how to play. She's like, you remind me of my grandson and sort of like pinches my cheek. and I ask her, do you have any advice on the show? And she's like, honey, I've been watching this show for 30 years. And she gives me like 30 years of wisdom in five minutes. And this light bulb goes off.

I give her a big hug. And I start jumping around the audience, asking everyone if they have any advice for the show. I'm like, hey, I'm Alex. I'm 18. I've never seen the show before. Do you have any advice? And I end up crowdsourcing about half the wisdom of the audience over the next 30 minutes. And then finally, the doors to the studio open.

And, you know, you step in there. and the place smells like the 1970s. You know, the chairs are the same. The ghost of Bob Barker's in there. Exactly. There's like disco lights. Bob Barker was long gone by me. Yes, this is Drew Carey at this point.

Yeah, people are like, who the hell's Bob Barker? No, I wish it was Bob Barker. Yeah, yeah. So I get in there, and, you know, sure enough, you sit down on the chair and it's time, you know, and you hear the famous voice, you know, live from CBS Studio in Hollywood, it's the price is right. And, you know, they called down the first person, and it's not me. and they called on the second person, it's not me, and the third person's not me,

but the fourth, you know, I feel it coming. So I literally get out of my chair, and it's also not me. So I pretty much, you know, sulk in my chair thinking, you know, maybe it just wasn't meant to be. But, you know, as you know, with the Price is Right,

they, after someone wins the opening round, there's now space for a fifth contestant. And that's when I hear, you know, Alex Benayan, come on down, and I lose my shit. You know, you cannot be cool and calm when you're walking down to the prices, right? I'm hugging strangers.

I'm dancing and I get there and they're like a new billiards table. I'm an 18 year old in college. I don't even know how much milk costs. So I'm like $600. And you know, the audience laughs at me because they know I have no idea what I'm saying.

And of course, I was way under so I lose that round. And then the next round, you know, a leather chair and ottoman. I didn't know what Ottoman meant. So again, I'm like $300. And it was such a horrible bit. And the audience laughed so,

loud that all the other contestants bid so high. And if you know the show, if you bid over, you're out. So I won by default. So I'm jumping up and down. I run onto the stage. I'm so excited. And now the host Drew Carey is like, it's time for your bonus round. And they open the big doors. And there's a giant hot tub. You know, waterfalls, LED lights, 12 jets. And all I can think is if I win this hot tub, I am the king of college. So, you know, all the pressure's on. And I think I guess like $2,000 or turned out to be, you know, $8,000. So I lose the hot tub.

What were you planning to do with the hot tub? I didn't even have room for a suitcase in my dorm room. So I don't think my long-term thinking was very much developed. But sure enough, you know, I think I'm done with the show. And they say, we'll be right back with Alex with the wheel. And during the commercial break, I asked, excuse me, you know, what's the wheel? And they're like, what's the wheel? Do you guys know the show well?

Sure, I know the wheel. I know the wheel, but I don't know how to play the show. So I'm learning as you're telling you. You and I are in the same place. Yeah. So, Michael, you know how the wheel works. Yeah, yeah. You spin it and then there's one that's like a million dollars.

Exactly. Yeah. Or it's like a hundred, but you get extra bonus money on it. And can you spend it more than once? Yes, it's like blackjack. Yeah, okay, okay. So sure enough, that was the explanation I got. It's like this giant.

in slot machine. It's like 20 feet tall and it has lights and glitter on it. And sure enough, after commercial break, the three contestants go and spin the wheel. And the first lady spins and you know, 80. And the audience goes nuts because everyone knows that's an insane spin. And then it's my turn and I give it a spin. Tick, tick, tick. 85. And the audience loses their shit because they know I have no idea what's going on. So I end up moving to the winter circle. I'm freaking out. And then the final woman goes, gives it a spin. Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick. She spins over 100. She's out. And I start freaking out because I think I just won the whole show. And then Drew Kerry says, we'll be right back with the second half of the price is right. Don't go away.

And sure enough, I get sent to the side and I watch the second half of the show go by. and I find out who's going up against me in the final round. And her name is Tanisha. And she blasted through the second half of the prices right as if she had been walking through Costco her whole life studying price tags. She knew, she won the opening round. She won the bonus round. And on the wheel, she spun a perfect 100. This was like David going up against Goliath and David forgot the slingshot.

So now it's the commercial break before the final round of the show. you know, I believe in karma to a degree. So I put out my hand and I say, you know, good luck. And she looks me up and down and goes, yeah, you'll need it. So the whole audience is like, oh, shit. So now it's like really heated on the stage of the price is right. It hit me right then that she was right. I got a bunch of advice before the show began, but no one gave me advice on how the final

round work because who would have thought I'd make it that far. Right. So now I realize I have no idea how to even play the final round. There's a minute before it begins, and I just am freaking out, and I look at the host Drew Carey, and I just throw my arms up, and I'm like, Drew, I loved you on whose line is it anyway?

That is a great show. I was like my whole childhood watching that show on Friday night. So I give him this big hug. He like awkwardly, like, pats me on the back, and he goes, you know, what do you need? I'm like, so how does this showroom showdown work? And he goes, first of all, it's called the showcase showdown.

So, like, clearly I didn't even know what it was called. And he ended up giving me some great advice. And a minute later, there I am standing behind this podium. And there's, you know, six blinding white lights in your eyes. There's, you know, seven machine gun size cameras pointed out your face. You know, I'm sweating. Tanisha's dancing. And now it's time for the final round.

And I didn't know that you have to listen very carefully to the announcer. And they don't give you an ear set. So you sort of have to hear it over the cheers of the audience. So this is what I hear. You know, Alex, your first prize is. a trip to Magic Mountain theme park, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I didn't hear the details. And, you know, you have to add up the prices of all the prizes.

And I thought, I grew up in L.A. I know how much a theme park costs. It's like 50 bucks with a can of Coke. You know, I know how that works. So in my head, I think 50 bucks. What I didn't hear is that it was a trip in a limo, VIP, all you can eat food for six people. But I'm thinking 50 bucks easy, next. And they're like, your next prize is a time.

trip to Florida, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. You know, I'm a freshman in college. I don't know how much a flight cost. I never booked my own flight before. So I thought, you know, how much does that cost? Like, $200. What I didn't hear is that it was first class tickets, rental car, hotel for two people. So I'm thinking, okay, $200, easy.

Next. While you're in Florida, a trip into zero gravity, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I'm thinking this must be another theme park. So I assume another $50. what I didn't hear is that this is how NASA trains their astronauts. I would find out later that every 15 minutes in zero gravity

is about $5,000. But I'm thinking $50 and I'm feeling really confident. I'm really on one right now. So I'm like, okay, 50 plus 200 plus 50. Like I'm feeling really good right now. And they go, your grand prize and the big doors open, a new sailboat. And, you know, of course I'm really excited,

but, you know, from where I'm standing across the stage, it looks really small. Sort of looks like a dinghy. And I'm thinking how much does a dinghy cost? I'm thinking maybe $4,000. Was it just a model? No, it was the actual sale, but I would win. So I'm thinking, I don't know, maybe $4,000, $5,000. I don't know how much the dingy cost.

What I didn't hear is this was a Catalina Mark II sailboat with a trailer and a cabin inside. So I'm thinking, okay, you know. And if there was ever a time to listen to your intuition, it felt like it was then. Like this is what Oprah talks about. I can't listen to the voice. So sure enough, the audience is cheering and I'm just, you know, trying to hear the voice. And I just, one number feels right. So I literally grabbed the mic and I go, $6,000.

Dead silence. It's as if somebody had passed away on the stage. And I was very confused because the audience knew me by that point. they had been cheering for me the whole time, so I'm looking at them really confused. And then I realized the host, Drew Carey, is supposed to say, we're walking in that answer, but he's not saying anything either. And I look over at Drew Carey, and he's looking at me like, and it finally hits me. So I grabbed the mic and I go, just kidding? And everybody starts cheering and laughing. And he goes, oh, college students these days always joking around, what's your real answer?

And I'm thinking, fuck, that was my real answer. So I just turned to the audience and I start like pounding on the podium saying, I need your help. And like a miracle, they start chanting the same number. But is that allowed? Yeah, you're allowed to talk to the audience. But they sort of like came together and started chanting the same number, which is very rare. But it was a mob, so it's hard to hear it clearly. So I could, but I could hear like the TH sound and the producers are trying to cut me off because I'm taking way too much time. So I hear the TH sound. So I go, Drew, I'm going with the audience on this. $30,000.

And he grabs the microphone and literally goes, you know, there's a difference between $30,000 and $30,000. And I'm like, oh, yeah, just getting $30,000. And he goes, great, we're locking it in, $30,000. Moving on. Tenisha looks at me like she's going up against someone in preschool at this point. So now it's Tanisha's turn. She gets like a car and an ATV and a vacation and she guesses, I think, $35,000. And now it's time to reveal the winner.

Tanisha, you guessed $35,000. Retail price. 36,400. And Tanisha jumps up, puts her arms to the ceiling. Thanking God, she just won the prices right, essentially in her head. And I agree with her. I'm, you know, they're like, Alex, you guess 30,000.

And I'm just thinking, okay, I have to go back to finals, go to the library. I have two hours for bio tonight, three hours for chemistry. I'm just doing crisis management in my head at this point. I've already moved on. You guess $30,000, retail price, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

And I see the audience just losing it. And I look at the producers and they're telling me, smile. What are we talking about? And then I see my podium is flashing. So I literally turn around to check it. I had guessed $30,000. The retail price was $31,200. I beat Tunisia by $200.

And my face literally. goes from this to jumping up and down, like dancing on the sailboat, like hugging the supermodels. I'm like, oh my God. And I end up getting the sailboat,

selling the sailboat, and that's how I funded the book. So the in between for a minute. When you win, what happens right after you win? Do they just hand, they're like, take this sailboat,

we'll ship it to wherever you are? The first thing they actually, I've never told this, is they make you sign a release that you'll never come back onto the show for the next 10 years. Okay. Wait,

has it been 10 years? It has been 10 years. You need to get back on. Sounds like we're doing a field trip. Yeah, you need to go back on. The funny thing is I actually have gone on a second game show right before the book came out because I needed some extra money for the book launch. And I just copy paste of the price is right strategy to see if it worked.

And me and my two best friends went. And four hours later, I walked away with a brand new car. Oh, my God. What game show was that? That was called Winsanity on the game show network. And I never heard of the show before. I just found tickets the next morning. and I used the same strategy and ended up.

I feel like a lot of people are going to start trying to get on these game shows. I'm a big believer of not going to the bank for a loan and going to a game show and using this strategy. I mean, hey. I've trained three friends and all of them I made it on to the final round. Wow. So wait. So when you win, they make you sign a contract that says you'll never come back. And then how quickly do they send you the sailboat?

Are you celebrating with them after? What does it look like afterwards? So they end up. Reality hit me very quickly. quickly. I said, okay, I cannot fit a billiard table in this dorm room. I can't fit a leather chair in Ottoman either. Did you get the hot tub too? I lost the hot tub, so I didn't get that. But I got the trip to Florida. I took my mom. That's cute. I went on to the zero gravity, which is fun. I took my cousins to six flags, which was fun. But with the sailboat, that was the big

one. I got a call from a boat dealer saying, okay, where would you like us to deliver your sailboat to? And I'm thinking like, there's not even enough room on the bike racks on my college. Like, we're going to put a sailboat. So, and I knew the reason I was going on the show is I wanted money to fund this dream to go interview the world's most successful people for the book. So I just told the guy on the phone. I said, look, you're a boat dealer, right? He's like, yes.

I'm like, so you sell boats to other people. He's like, yes. I'm like, how about you just like pocket a couple thousand bucks? Keep the boat and just send me a check. And he's like, done. So I got a check in the mail the next week. And I pretty much sold it to the person who was giving it to me. And I used that money.

Do you get like a full? Do you get like what, 25,000 or 20,000 bucks? I think for the sale boat, I ended up selling it at like 17,000. I got 17,000 in cash, which for a college student is a million dollars. Oh my God.

I'm taking all my friends out to launch a Chipotle, you know, free guacamole for everybody. You know, I was a real baller at that point. Did this boat dealer hose you or he did right by you? In hindsight, I probably could have negotiated and asked like, can you do better? I said, what's the best? I said, what can you do?

He said, 17,000. This guy's pocket in the, But again, like, I think the most money I'd ever had in my life was like my bar mitzv cash, which was like a couple thousand dollars. So 17,000 was like, I thought I needed like a wealth manager. Like I was in a really good place in life. Because again, I'm like flying spirit airlines. Chipotle's my fancy dinner. So I was like, this is going to last me a long time. And it did last me a long time. And that's how I ended up going and traveling and tracking down all these people, literally using prices right money. One non-negotiable for me,

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So what I like about these is you can add anything. Like you could make whatever you want. You could make, I don't know, pancake crescent rolls. You could do chicken, bacon, ranch, crescent rolls. You could do ham and cheese. You could do pepperoni pizza. You could make them sweet. You could stuff them with berries.

So what I do is I have her add all the stuff and then we bake them. It's so simple. And it's just so cute. If you're looking for something to add to your weeknight dinner rotation, this is a way to get interactive with your kids. I also just find it really fun. You can go to their website and there's like so many different simple ideas. that you can do to fill your Pillsbury Crescent Roll.

And also for me, Pillsbury is just so nostalgic. I mean, it brings up all the feels. If you want dinner prep in 30 minutes or less, you can find Pillsbury in the dairy aisle. The ones I like are the Pillsbury Crescent Rolls. If you want dinner prep in 30 minutes or less, you can find Pillsbury in the dairy aisle. And again, the ones I like are the Pillsbury Crescent rolls.

So cute for you and your kids. So they're a fill, roll, and bake. Find more weeknight dinner recipes at Pillsbury.com. That's Pillsbury.com. So you had the idea for the book before you did the prices right. And once you get the money, you decide that you're going to figure out how to uncover the most successful people and how they launched their career. So how do you start? Like, who's the first person that you get and how do you get them?

So the way I came up with the list. And the context is important because I. I entered college as a pre-med. And to understand why, you have to understand, I'm the son of Persian Jewish immigrants, which pretty much means I came out of the womb. My mom cradle me in her arms, and then she stamped doctor on my ass and sent me on my way. And to the point where I wore medical scrubs to school for Halloween and third grade and thought I was cool.

You know, I was that kid growing up. And I understand why I wasn't invited to parties or to parties because I was literally, my nickname was the doctor as a kid. And, you know, when you're a little kid, whatever. your parents and grandparents applaud you for, you lean into whether you know it or not. And in high school, I checked all the boxes. I took all the biology classes. I volunteered out of hospital. I even went to pre-med summer camp. So by the time I got to college, I was the pre-med of pre-meds. But very quickly, I found myself lying on this dorm room bed looking at this towering

stack of biology books, feeling like it was sucking the life out of me. And at first I assumed, you know, maybe I'm just being lazy. but eventually I began to wonder, maybe I'm not on my path. I think this happens to a lot of people, right? Especially with people whose parents put that kind of pressure on them, right? There's a lot of parents that do that.

Yeah, and if you're lucky, I didn't feel lucky at the time, but you'll find yourself in bed staring at the ceiling, wondering, is this my path or is this a path somebody else placed me on and I'm just rolling down? So not only did I not know

what I wanted to do with my life, I had no idea how the people who I looked up to how they did it. You know, how did Bill Gates sell's first piece of software out of his dorm room when nobody knew his name? How did Spielberg become the youngest director in Hollywood history without a single hit under his belt? How did the lady Gogga get her first record doing? These are things they don't teach you in school. So I just assumed there had to be book with the answers. So I'm going to the library and ripping through business books and biographies

and assuming there had to be a book, not on a particular age in life, but really a stage. you know, when you have a big dream and you have a big goal and no one's taking your calls, no one's taking your meetings, how do you find a way to break through? And eventually I was left empty-handed. So that's when my naive, 18-0 thinking kicked in. I thought, well, if no one's written the book, I'm dreaming of reading, why not write it myself? And that's where the idea of the book came.

And the way we came up with the list of the people to interview is, you know, I don't believe in the Forbes 500. I don't think there's an algorithm for success. So I did the only thing I knew to do when I was in trouble. I would call my best friends and we got together and brainstorm. And I asked them, if we could make our dream university, who would be our professors? Then it became really easy. Okay, you know, Warren Buffett would teach us finance.

Maya Angelou would teach poetry. Jane Goodall would teach science. Pitbull would teach Latin American studies. We were just like goofball kids. But that's how we came up with a list. Beelberg would teach our film class. Bill Gates would teach business. So we wrote down that list and that became the list for the journey over the next seven years.

Seven years. It took two years to track down Bill Gates. It took three years to track down Lady Gaga. When you say track down, first, let's just start with your first person that you tracked down. Who's the first person that you were like, holy fuck? And did you have to start like, you know, how do I say this? Lower down the list, like meaning maybe you can get to, listen, no shade pit bull. Maybe you can get to pit bull easier than you can.

get to Warren Buffett or Bill Gates? Or did you not have a run? No, I was such a knucklehead that I started off like first. I've never talked about this. The first week I actually emailed press at Microsoft. com thinking, you know, Bill Gates loves, you know, has a whole charity of helping people. Why wouldn't even want to help young people? Because you have to remember, this was right after the Great Recession. There's what, 2009? 2010. So, you know, people were going to college, spending 250, thousand dollars to get a math degree and then they were scooping ice cream across the street. So I knew very quickly when I entered college, this system isn't what they promised in the brochures. That still happens, but that's the whole point. It actually never went back.

Was it ever there? It was there. It was there. You're right. It never went back. No, but like for longevity, was it ever there? For longevity, I don't think. So I think there was a period after the, you know, World War II where you could go to college and get a job at IBM and stay there for 50 years. As soon as the banks realize and then like a product size. No, no. I mean, listen. get to do what you really wanted to do.

As soon as banks realize they could productize... They don't put that in the brochure. No, they don't put that in the brochure. No, as soon as the banks realize they could productize loans and get people to sign up, you know, very easily. So, okay. So go ahead. You're emailing press.

And it's 100% no. So I'm thinking, okay, I need a different approach. So I realize, okay, I know all the things I don't have going for me. I don't have connections. I don't have, you know, my parents are immigrants. You know, they know, like, the local carpet dealer down the street. We're not plugged in, but I thought, okay, I live in a city and, like, people must come for book tours events and things like that. So I started out just going to events.

I didn't realize there's things called security. So, again, I'm sort of like figuring this out, and I realize my best chance was sort of to, like, pour my heart out to people. One by one, every situation was different. But they did all have a thing in common. And one of the craziest interviews I got was the way I got it was about a couple years in, and it was with Larry King. And it's by far one of the most ridiculous of the stories. Go for it. That's a legit interview, especially since he's passed.

Yeah. The context of this was important, because I had already spent at this point now two years pretty much just getting rejected over and over and over and over again. And, you know, all entrepreneurs you know, when you're getting rejected for three months, it feels like there's a cloud above your head. When you're rejected for six months straight, it feels like you're ready to cough up blood. And I had been particularly at that time writing letters to Warren Buffett trying to get an interview.

And of course, the answer is always no. Side note, I heard that to interview him, you have to write the letter. Is that what you did? That's what I did. I hand wrote the letter. And he actually responded, no, or his team.

He hand wrote his response back to me, which I naively thought he must love me if he's handwriting a response. That's a thing if you do your research, as you know, on Warren Buffett, he actually reads his own mail. So he hand wrote a response like, dear Alex, you know, it's beautiful what you're doing, but I have too much on my plate right now to grant all requests, you know, wishing you the best Warren E Buffett. And I naively thought, if he is handwriting me a response back, I just got to keep at it until he eventually relents, which was one of the biggest mistakes I could make. So I spend the next six months writing letters. And eventually it gets to the point where I'm on the phone with Buffett's assistant every week.

Every Wednesday morning, I'm calling Debbie saying, hey, has Mr. Buffett changes mine? And for some reason, that Wednesday morning I called her. She's like, look, Alex, I can't keep taking these phone calls from you. But how about as my guest, you come to our annual shareholders meeting? And I was like, oh, my God, I knew all about it. I was like, that's incredible. thank you so much. And she goes, look, you can even bring some friends? And I was like, wow. Can I bring five friends? She said, yes, I'll send you six tickets as my guess. And while I was on the phone,

I said, hey, Debbie, isn't it true that during the annual meeting, there's a Q&A portion where people in the audience get to ask questions to Mr. Buffett during the meeting live? She goes, Alex, Alex, Alex, I know what you're trying to do, but it's not possible. There's 30,000 people there. And only 30 get to questions and it's a random lottery, I wouldn't get your hopes up. What Debbie didn't understand about me is I am the king of hopes up. You know, there's one thing I learned from the prices right is, you know, there's always a way. So sure enough, me and my boys, who I grew up with, like my rider dies, we fly out to Omaha. You know, we have no money. We're six of us staying in one room at the motel six. We have my friend Andre sleeping on the floor. Like, but there, again,

no complaining, we're all in. And we show up the next morning at 4 a.m. in front of the stadium so, you know, we can get in there. And I can save this story for another time, but what's important to know is I ended up hacking Buffett's lottery. And out of 30,000 people, the odds are one in a thousand out of six of us four got winning lottery tickets. Hold on, hold on. You got to give us a little taste of that. Okay, I'll tell you this whole story. And then we'll get into Larry thing. What do you mean?

Okay. So it was a real preposterous situation. So you have to visualize this. You know, we're in Omaha, Nebraska. It's blistering cold. It's 4 a.m. We're like right in the beginning of the line. And about three hours later, at 7 a.m., they opened the doors to the stadium

for the annual meeting. And for people who know finance, they know the Berkshire Hathaway annual meeting is like the Coachella of Finance. You know, it's Buffettcella. Like people are going nuts. People are spending the whole year thinking about this event.

Because it's for a capitalist, it's like the ultimate festival. So sure enough, Big Coca-Cola sponsorship there. Big Coca-Cola sponsorship. And you know, Warren Buffett is the most successful investor in American history. No one's come close.

So people look up to them a lot. So sure enough, me and my friends, you know, we're 20, 21 years old. We're right in the front of the line. The doors open at 7 a.m. And at that point, there's thousands of people already in the line, all in suits and ties. And the second the door's open,

it is a mad rush. you know, people are pushing and shoving and ties are flopping in the air and their briefcases and they're like, pardon me, pardon me. You know, it's a business casual running of the bulls. And we get in there and me and my friends are fast. We're sliding down staircases, jumping over railings, and we get right to the front and we get chairs right in the front row. But we realize that, again, we had spent all this time just trying to get there. We didn't know how the lottery worked. So again, similar to the price is right, I just started running around the stadium. talking, people asking for advice on how the lottery worked. And sure enough, we found a loophole

to Warren Buffett's lottery system. And again, they say the odds are one in a thousand out of the six of us four pulled winning lottery tickets. And did you guys have a specific question? I had, I had questions lined up for the past six months. I was ready for this interview. So I had no cards. And I was like, okay, Andre, you're asking the question about the C's candy acquisition. You know, Kevin, you're asking about how to start your own fun. You know, I was pretty much doing a live book interview at Warren Buffett's annual meeting. But using your friends? Correct.

Correct. Because you usually only get one. Correct. Everyone can only ask one question. I had each friend going up with a different question that I had researched. And I had read every book I could on Buffett. Turns out Warren Buffett is a lot smarter than I had figured because he figured out exactly what we were doing. And by the time, my fourth friend went up to the microphone, he cut off the audience.

I said, you know, we're going to end the meeting right here. Thank you all for coming. Do you guys all look the same? How does he know that? Are you all getting, you guys are all given the same energy? You're in the same room in Motel 6. You guys are all giving off each other's fair rooms. We're all wearing our nicest white t-shirt and our best pair of like old jeans. Like we're we're like tucking in our shirts and like everyone else is in a 50 year in a suit and tie.

And we're asking everyone else is asking normal questions about financial things of that year. We're saying, 1967 when you were opening your first five, you know, I'm asking. detailed questions about his childhood and early career. And he caught on. And so what, and so did he actually end the meeting? He ended the meeting. Again, who knows what was going on in and maybe he had to go to the bathroom? Who knows? But he ended the meeting. He didn't even let my fourth friend ask the question. They cut off the audio right then. So you got three questions. We got three questions, but he did not answer any of the three. He sort of laughed them off and sidesteped all three. And it was a giant train wreck to the point that it backfired in my face more than I

would know. Also, if you did get the answers to the questions, you have to have him sign off to be in a book, correct? At that event, it is public. So you wouldn't need him. And he's a public figure. So as long as I, if you put his name on the book that you have to have him sign off, but to just say this is what he told me. Okay. And so why is this the biggest mistake? Well, it got it got worse than I could have expected. How? So sure enough, as life happens, a couple months later through a completely different avenue, I got the interview with Bill Gates confirmed.

They're a complete miracle on its own. And they're like, they're close. Exactly. So Bill Gates and we're about for best friends. So I go and do the interview with Bill Gates. I fly up to Seattle and then Bill Gates's private office and we do the interview and it ends up going so well that at the end, Bill Gates' chief of staff says, Alex, we love your mission and we love what you're doing. How can we help? And let me tell you, when Bill Gates' office

is, how can we help? You take out a very long list and you hand it over. And I handed them on my whole interview list. And the guy looks at it, he's like, oh, we can take care of all these next week. And it is like an entrepreneur's dream to have someone essentially say, we'll wave the magic wand. And he's like, oh, Warren, we'll take care of that one tomorrow, but the rest will probably take about a week. Now I'm like about to cry from happiness. I'll never know exactly what happened. But a week later, I get an email from Bill Gates's office saying, dear Alex, please no more contact to Warren's office. Thank you. You creeped him out to say the lead. I found out not only was the answer, no, I had got myself blacklisted. Maybe he thought you were like stalking him. I'll never know what

happened, but I will always remember the pain I felt in that moment where I realized there is a such thing. as the dangers of over persistence. Right. It's almost, you were so, I appreciate the hustle. Like personally, I appreciate the hustle and I, I get it.

But like what you're saying is you also, like if you would have toned it down a bit, you would have probably got it through the Bill Gates. For sure. So, so in retrospect, you, the learning lesson was that you felt like you should have toned it down.

By a long shot. What I didn't understand, you know, I had read all these business books that said persistence is the key to, to success. You know, every book. Gary B.

Everyone says it. Persistence is the key to success. Persistence is the key to success. And when you are a knucklehead, 21-year-old like I was, you take it really literally. So I thought if I just persisted long enough, I'll win. What I didn't understand is the difference about persistence and over-persistence, is that the secret to persistence is that persistence is not about knocking on one door a hundred times.

It's about knocking on a hundred different doors. 100% that's a really smart thing what you just said that is that that's a very eloquent eloquent way to put it that is no it is I mean that's you're exactly right it's not over and over and over and over it's a hundred different doors it's the same thing I know this is going to be a weird analogy but in the dating world like if you're exactly exactly you're you're a single guy you're out you know if you hit on the same woman a hundred times in a row and she said no 100 times like you know someone's calling the cops right Right. Right. Right. But if you hit on a hundred... Should I have called the cops on you?

Maybe up for debate. But yeah, to the point, like if you're out and you hit on a hundred different women, odds are a couple of them will say yes. Yeah. No matter what. And it's not creepy because you're not, I mean, you don't want to do that in the same night, but you know what I'm saying? It's not creepy because you're not overly... Like there's a difference between energy that's persistent and desperate energy. And I'm not, I don't know what the situation was. No, I was desperate. But it sounds like you made the line between that. But that's a really great learning. And desperation clogs intuition. You know what else? One other thing I would say, sometimes when you're young, and I think this is important for people to hear, you think that persistence enables you to jump ahead of the line.

And what it does is it makes you think that you don't have to put in the work. Like, for example, I'll just use the podcast world. You know, we produce a lot of podcasts. I will see new podcasters start and they're like, I need to go and interview this A-list or this serial entrepreneur or this person that's at the top of the heap. I'm like, hey, why not start, like, putting some notches in the belt and, you know, proving your chops and proving that you can actually, like, carry a show and carry an interview? But because when you, when you shoot for the top and just, and you try to jump the head of the line, it doesn't work out all the time. Totally.

And I think persistence is essential. But if you don't understand the nuance of over persistence, where I dig myself, I dug myself into such a deep hole, even Bill Gates couldn't pull me out. And that was one of the hardest lessons I had to learn on the entire journey. So do you think that Bill Gates' team went to Warren Buffett and said, we have this guy, Alex, who's writing this book. And Warren Buffett was like, fuck, Alex. Whether it's Hamers assistant or the assistant was like, oh, here's the assistant cock blocked you. Who knows? Who knows? I'll never know, but that that's my assumption. Listen, if you're going to learn about persistence, like, let's learn about it through Warren Buffett. So, so after does Bill Gates help you with the rest of the list? What's funny is, oh my gosh, there was, look, I'm very grateful.

I'm very grateful. He didn't. They were very, very helpful. Oh, they were. They made introductions. What I had to learn, which is such a weird mind fuck, is that asking interviews of people who have that much demand on their time, an introduction from Bill Gates' office is not a magic wand. Right.

Because I think what people need to understand, and this is actually a learning moment, I think, with emailing too. When you come into someone's space with an ask, you're taking someone's time. So if the person who's very busy, they're giving up their time, that's their most important currency. Well, it also is someone... In my opinion. I mean, that's so, so I could see why some of them are so big. So time and the reputation. Well, yeah, I mean, the reputation, though, this is, I think it's, if you came to me, I totally do this.

It's a great idea. Like, I could see why people would want to do it. But you are asking for their time. So maybe that's why they said no. I think a lot of these people too also when they give interviews, they want them to be impactful, thoughtful interviews. And if they know, like, hey, I don't really have the time to fully dedicate to this. Like, they also don't want to do it. It's not about like carving out three or four minutes. It's about actually like using the time wisely and having an impact. And how long were you proposing the interview? you would be. An hour. And what's also tricky too, and to give some compassion to these people, I had no prior experience. I wasn't at CNN. I didn't have any books out at the time. I was an 18-year-old college student. I kind of love that, though. I kind of, personally, I kind of love that. Like, that's something that I would want to do as opposed to like something with more background.

If that makes, I would, I would be like down. I appreciate that a lot. So, so out of the list did you get anyone with Bill Gates or no one? not I don't think his office directly led to a yes but his involvement definitely changed the energy yes

because you already interviewed him and you had that one of the back and one of the hardest lessons for me to understand is you know we all know that book called the tipping point

right and I lived in this fantasy of if I just work hard enough eventually I'll hit the tipping point and most of my frustration pain and agony on this journey

came from not accepting life on life's terms. I was waiting for this magical tipping point where everything would just get easy. That's self-aware. And, well, at the time, though, I was banging my head against the wall wondering how come things,

even after the Bill Gates interview, Oprah said no. Michael Jordan said no. Stephen Spielberg said no. Three times after I went to France and tracked him down on his yacht in the front room here. Like, the amount of noes even after Bill Gates

are so outrageous. You fly to South of France yourself to just, track him down on his yacht? Not myself with my best friend Corwin. We went together. You have some great friends. I have some phenomenal friends. Did you know you were tracking down Michael Jordan when you flew there? No, Steven Spielberg. Oh, Steven Spielberg. That's why we went. We went for Steven Spielberg. Oh, Stephen Spielberg. For some reason, I thought you just said Michael. Well, I said Michael Jordan, I sent that request in. Got it, but the yacht is

Steven Spielberg. The yacht was to Stephen Spielberg. And I know this sounds ridiculous. But at the time, I thought it was the best possible route. I was going to say, why don't you just go to like Ranch of Santa Fe or L.A. where he lived? Well, I had already met him. Okay. So the story with Spielberg, this is like opening up like the old memories of trauma.

So with Spielberg, he was actually one of the first people, to go back to your earlier, there was one of the first people I met. When I decided I needed to emailing press on Microsoft doesn't work. I need to go find these people in person and sort of like, tell them my dream. Because my dream was that this isn't about promoting a product.

This isn't about, you know, launching a website. This is about all these people coming together for one purpose to share their wisdom to help the next generation learn more and do more and be more. And I believe that all these people came together, again, not to promote something, but to really help young people, the world would be a lot better place. sure enough, I was 18. And my best idea was I would have a list of all the people I wanted to interview in my pocket. So whenever I would meet an adult, because I assumed adults know things that I don't, whenever I would meet like a smart looking adult, I would hand in this list and say, do you have any advice on how to get to any of these people?

Nine times out of ten people would say no. But one time out of ten, someone would say, oh, I know someone who knows that person or I know that person's going to be at this event. So one out of ten is actually great odds. That's persistence. Right. And you know all about odds. So go high.

Thank you. You really see me at this point. So sure enough, this is one of the first people I talked to. So I found that Steven Spielberg would be at a fundraising event on the USC campus. But it was no students were allowed. It was just a VIP fundraising. event for the film school. But I found someone who was working the event and said I could essentially come along

if I wore a suit and be like an assistant and not say I'm a student, just say that I'm like a hired freelance assistant. You should have dressed up as an ET. Right. That would have got his attention. It would have gotten attention also be thrown into a cycle. Go ahead. So you would have been a very fun person to brainstorm over the beginning.

Tricorotops. What the fuck it's called? What? TriSterterterter. Jurassic Park. Fucking Raptor. Oh my gosh. Yes.

So I'm wearing a suit. And again, at that time, I did all my research. I studied. I had questions ready. And sure enough, I sneak into this party. And there is Steven Spielberg standing like 20 feet away from it. And I have this thing that I sort of called the flinch, which started when I was little kid, which is when everything you want is right in front of you, for some reason, your

body thinks now is the best time to completely freeze, wire your mouth shut, tighten your throat, and turn your feet into stone. And he was literally 20 feet in front of me, and it felt like my entire body was paralyzed. There's something about actually building up a goal so much in your head that you psych yourself out. And sure enough, I just stood there completely frozen. And he left and walked away and fell lost in the party. And I completely lost. And it wasn't until the very end of the event that I saw him finally leaving the event. And he was talking to this other person who I couldn't recognize was a little shorter and bald.

So I thought, okay, this would be a good time to sort of like interrupt and go talk to him. I don't understand until later, but that was Jeffrey Katzenberg. The CEO of DreamWorks. I'm like, oh, he's talking to his assistant. Then now's a good time. Like, move, assistant. This little intern. This is very embarrassing.

So, sure. Sure enough, I go up and I literally go like, Mr. Spielberg, can I ask you a question as you walk out to your car? And he turns out, I think he's like going to yell at me. And he ends up, he just has the softest, kindest look in his eyes. And he goes, absolutely, come with me. And I didn't have an elevator page. I didn't know what I was saying, but I just sort of like word vomited this dream. And for some reason, I remember this very vividly. We stood out, right? He stopped in front of us. car. And he looked up as if he was, I don't know, it's impossible to say for sure, but he looked up to the sky and then looked back in my eyes and said, I don't know why I have this feeling, but I think you're actually going to make this happen. So instead of a no, which I would normally say for something like this, because I don't do interviews unless it's for a movie launch, I'm going to give you a maybe. And you go out and do all the other interviews. And when you're done, come back to me

and we'll try to make it happen. Well, that's cool. So I thought, I, that. So I really, I really felt empowered by that. So two years later, after I had the Bill Gates interview and things had moved along, the book was like sort of rounding a corner. I thought, now is the time to go back. He asked me to come back. So I sent a letter to his office. It got rejected. I sent a letter to his house. It didn't get responded. I sent a letter to his PR person didn't get responded. So I thought, what am I going to do? He, this is how naive I was. I was like, he wants, he wants to talk to me. Just these people don't believe me. They weren't there.

You had to be there. I thought like it was one of those things like he, he would want to hear from me. Like, he's waiting. I love it. So I was, at that time, I was just like, I think I'm like 21 or 22 at the time. And I still had like the end of the price is right money. It was sort of running out. I was scrolling on Twitter, just sort of like trying to think of ideas of how to get to Spielberg

because I got rejected by every possible avenue. So I saw on Twitter that he would be the judge of the judge of. the Cannes Film Festival. He would be the head judge. And I was like, oh, if he's the head judge, that means he has to be there the whole film festival. And it's in the south of France. And I'm like, how big is the town of Ken? He must be like walking the streets. It must be a lot easier to run into him in Cannes than in L.A. So let me go to Cannes and find him so we can make this interview happen. So I call one of my best friends Corwin and we go to the airport, by the next available ticket on standby.

We go to the south of France. We're sitting in like the back last row in the middle C by the bathroom. The worst. What do you mean to me at that time? It was the best. No, I'm saying it's the worst to sit next to the bathroom. Oh, yes. Where everyone's shitting and pissing and throwing up.

Especially a little. This is my first seven friends. I think I'm a baller. I'm on cloud now. You're like, where's the penis? Me and Corny are going to the south of France. You know, we're doing it big. We're staying at a motel like 45 minutes away from Canber.

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but of like terror that I'm completely lost my mind. And sure, enough, we, this is the one story that's not in the book because it was so preposterous. My editor thought it made me look crazy. So this, this got cut out. Perfect. Well, if you were my editor, we would have a lot more crazy stories. Oh my God. Oh my God. So yes, this is the uncut version. So we get to the south of France and I start doing my thing, walking around saying, excuse me, do you know where Steven Spielberg is? Sure enough, someone says he's staying on a yacht. And I said, thank you so much. I should have thought of that. Thank you. So we go to the yacht dock in Kent, and we start walking around saying, excuse me, which yacht is Steven Spielberg's

yard? We have a letter to Deliverton. And eventually someone goes, his yacht does not fit in a dock. I was like, what do you mean? And they go, his yacht is so big, you take a small boat from the dock to the yacht. The yacht is in the middle of the French Riviera. So me and Corrin spend the next three days tracking. You know how you can, there's like, just for like government purposes, private jets have to declare where they are. If a yacht is so big, it's not a yacht, it's a vessel. So he had to register the location of the vessel. I do not, I just want to say, I do not recommend anyone doing this. I don't endorse this. This is. I love it. I hope you took a boat out to find him. We did. Oh, Jesus Christ. It was even worse, though. It started raining. And, and, and, you know, and,

And it started in the south of France. The rain can turn into a storm. And no boat dealer would give us a boat because it was so dangerous. But we were so thick-headed. We thought nothing's impossible. We'll just find someone who believes in us. These people are trying to help us from like killing ourselves. So me and Corwin end up going an hour away from Kent and find a boat dealer who barely understands English, gives us a boat.

A little small dingy with a little motor in the back. But, and this is one of the Hall of Fame moments of friendship, I get a call right as Corrin and I are about to get onto this boat to deliver this letter. I get a call from someone I met a couple days earlier saying, hey, I'm meeting with someone right now who's meeting with someone who's meeting with someone with Spielberg. And they want to deliver your, they want to pass the letter along the chain and make sure the letter gets there. And I, of course, had sort of hope for something like this because I carry two copies of the letter in my pocket.

So I said, this is much more of a sure thing than trying to track a boat down in the middle of the ocean. And I will always remember this. My friend Corwin, stepping onto that boat and looking me in the eyes and saying, dude, you do your thing, I'll do mine. And takes a copy of the letter and turns on the engine of the stingy. And I, like, pray to God that he would be okay. And he is just the greatest and gets on the boat. boat by himself while I like take a taxi back to Can to deliver the second letter. Corwin goes into the storm on his own.

Oh, Jesus Christ. And about an hour and a half later, I get a call from Corwin. And this is what I hear on the phone. Dude! I'm like, are you okay? It's been an hour and a half. He goes, listen, my phone's almost out of battery. I don't have time to explain.

I'll meet you at the boat dock and can. but if you don't hear for me in an hour alert search and rescue and hangs up. Corwin! I'm like, what the hell is happening? So I'm sprinting on foot to the dock.

This is, I cannot believe I'm telling you guys this. I'm sprinting by foot to the dock and can and sure enough there is Corwin, drenched in seawater. There's water in the dinghy. And he's just like sitting there

defeated. And I say, what happened? And he said, well, the water's out there are a lot rougher than by the shore. And it turns out Spielberg's boat was a lot further than we had expected. So it turns out what happened is Corwin, being the greatest of all time, takes the dinghy out through these giant waves all the way to Spielberg's boat. And the waters are really rough.

They're so rough that when the crew on Spielberg's boat sees a little dingy this far out, they all rushed down and throw a rope to pull him in, thinking he's in danger. So Spielberg's crew is pulling in Corwin and tying him up to the back of their boat. And sure enough, they're like, are you okay? What's going on? And Corrin, like straight into his shirt and goes, I'm here to deliver a letter for a Mr. Benayan to Mr. Spielberg. Hand them this letter that I wrote in like my little dorm room.

Oh, my God. And as life happens, the crew actually loved it. And they said, look, we will get fired if we do anything. The person who can make this decision is the captain. So the captain of Spielberg's yacht comes down to Spielberg's, I mean to Corwin's dingy, which is tied to the back of Spielberg's $250 million yacht. All the crew is lined up. And the captain hears the story.

Corrin explains me that the captain said he's so moved by this. But the number one rule in maritime law is you do not accept foreign objects onto the boat. And he said, even a sheet of paper, we cannot accept without a client approving it. And then the captain said, if I were you, the sun is about to set. And these waters are about to get exponentially worse over the next 30 minutes. Coran knew that he was right. except Corrin turns on the dinghy again and sees the gas tank is now on empty. It took all the gas to get there.

There was now no gas to go back. So that's how I found Corwin sitting on this dock in can completely out of gas and drenched in water. And sure enough, we found one of those red jerry canisters of gasoline. And we're going to go fill up. We just hope that we're allowed to do this and we start filling up the gas tank. And a wave hits the dinghy and Corrin trips and spills the gasoline on the electrical circuit of the boat. I literally texted my parents saying, if you don't hear from us in the next 30 minutes, please call the American embassy in France and ask them to find us.

And I sent a pin of our location. My poor parents had a heart attack. But Coran, before I knew it started the engine, like wiped it off with his hands, the gasoline. It worked fine. And we made it back to the original doc. The only difference, though, is this time we had to pass Spielberg's yacht so I could see it with my binoculars. This time when we passed it, they had security boats surrounding the vessels with binoculars tracking us the whole way through. So what ended up happening is, again, it ended in complete disaster.

But the story was so ridiculous that someone who I had told it to told it to someone else who knew the president of Dreamworks Television, Spielberg's company. And the president of DreamWorks Television wanted to hear the story firsthand. So me and him end up having lunch. And I tell him the whole Price is Right story, the whole Spielberg story, the whole Fran story. And he goes, I'm going to call Steve to make this happen. And it happened. So Spielberg said no. Oh.

And then I call the co-president of DreamWorks Television. And I say, look, how many times in your life has someone said no and someone went to bad for you a second time? And it was the second time that made it happen. Please think of all the kids who will learn from this experience if you can just do it one more time. And sure enough, he went a second time back to his boss and Spielberg's office. I know a second time. And it was a very humbling experience. I'm so grateful for him.

I don't think it was personal. But again, it goes back to that lesson that there is no tipping point. What I know for sure is I am a lot prouder of myself, knowing, that I tried and failed instead of wondering, whatever. Wow. So, before we go, I mean, everyone's running to buy your book. What is the third door? So the biggest thing I've learned over 12 years of studying success,

and particularly the seven years of interviewing some of the world's most successful people, is that every single one of them treated life and business and success, the exact same way. And it didn't matter if it was Warren Buffett in Omaha, Nebraska, or Lady Gaga from New York City. Every single one of them treated life and business success the exact same way.

And it didn't make any sense to me. It was almost like in music, there's a common melody, even though the song is different. When you say they treated them the same way, in what way did they treat them? So the analogy that came to me is that it's sort of like getting into a nightclub.

There's always three ways in. So there's the first door, the main entrance where the line curves around the block where 99% of people wait around hoping to get it. Right. And you all know that line, people standing on the cold, crossing their fingers, hoping the bouncer lets them in. That's the first door.

And then there's the second door, the VIP entrance, where the billionaires and celebrities go through. And for some reason, school and society have this way of making you feel like those are the only two ways in. You either wait your turn or you're born into it. But what I learned and what I'm sure you all know from your own journey, is that there's always, always the third door. I call it the chimney.

Right, exactly. You run down the alley, bang on the door a hundred times, go through the chimney, go through the window, there's always a way in. Always, every single time. And it doesn't matter if that's how Bill Gates sold that first piece of software, how Lady Gaga got the first record deal, they all took the third door. Huh. So that's not only, you know, the title of the book and the thesis of the book, that's really

the energy I'm trying to inject to the next generation. I completely agree with you on that. I think that is a very, very, very, very. accurate. The problem is that most people, though, they see successful people and they think, obviously they didn't go through the first door and wait in line. They went through the second door and they were given it or they were born into it. And they don't realize that most people. And they use as an excuse of why they haven't done anything. Yeah, they don't realize that most successful people went through the third door. I have met the children of some of these people who

wait around hoping for life to hand them, and nothing happens. And I've met people who, one of the people I interviewed for the book, grew up in a village outside of Shanghai, China, with no running water, no electricity. By the time he was 27 years old, he was making the most money he had ever made in his life. $7 a month. Fast forward 20 years later, he's a president of Microsoft. So what's been mind-blowing for me is that resources are real. You know, if you're working three jobs, your mom has cancer, and you're still paying off student loan debts, those are real.

But what I have seen time and time again, and you two are the perfect example. If you have the right mindset, you will find the resources to make something happen. Or you can have all the resources at your disposal. And if you have a limited mindset, nothing goes. It's funny that you say this because Michael and I have a lot of conversation about how we want to raise our kids. And one of the things that we think is the most important thing by far is resourcefulness. If you're not resourceful, the rest doesn't matter. You have to be resourceful. You have to go figure out a way to kill the tiger yourself, by yourself, and bring it back. It's much harder for people

to look at successful people and admit to themselves that, hey, those successful people probably did something and put in some hard work to make that happen. Because if you admit that, then you have to also admit to yourself that maybe you could be doing more. But I don't just think it's about the hard work. It's about finding the chimney and finding where that entrance is. It's also, it's being crafty. Yes, but what I'm saying is people, it's easier to make the excuse and say, oh, well, I don't have those resources. I don't have those upbringing. I don't have that funding. I don't have that connection because it gives you an out to not go and try. Yeah. And listen, resources are real, right? Some people get born with a leg up. Some people leg down. But everyone knows

the story of someone coming from absolutely nothing and becoming an absolute Titan, right? And vice versa. know the stories of people born on top of the world and just completely driving it into the floor. So I think it's important to point out this third door because you're right. So many people think it's just one way or the other way. They don't think, hey, I can maybe go around back or go on the side or go down the chimney. The biggest thing that I've learned over 12 years of studying the mindset of success is there is a single reason why most people don't go after their dreams. In the beginning of my journey, I had misunderstood the answer. I had always thought, as you said, the hard part would be taking the third door, finding the chimney, having the money,

having the skill, having the resources. What I've learned over the years is that most people are smarter than they give themselves credit for. The number one reason most people don't take the third door is their fear of leaving the line of the first door. Yeah, you're 100% right. I also think people are addicted to the narrative or the line. They're addicted. They're the illusion of safety. The illusion of safety, they're addicted. And to step out of that narrative and not maybe play the victim gives them anxiety. To give compassion, because I've been there.

I've been in that line for the first door. It's where your family raised you to be. It's where your school taught you to be. It's where your friends are. And by the way, if you're a smart person and you have a good job, that's how you're paying your rent. Right. So to give compassion, that's your sense of belonging, your sense of safety. so it's almost counter to everything your brain is programmed to do,

to leave where you're being fed, where you're being housed, to run down a dark alley with uncertainty and bang on a door and find that chimney. What a lot of people don't realize is that they can always go back to that first door. They feel that if they leave it, they can never go back. Like I always say, like, most likely when you start working, you had zero experience.

Maybe you got out of college. Maybe you were just out of high school. Maybe you didn't even go to school. You got that job. You worked where, like you can always. You can always go, you don't start at square one again. Like if somebody that works with one of the companies we run quits and goes and chases their dreams, like worst case scenarios, they can always come back, maybe not to this job,

but to an adjacent type of job or an adjacent career, right? People just, I think they get scared. They think if I leave, I'll never be able to come back. I'll never be able to start here, right? They think they have to start all over. That's not necessarily true. Yeah. So helping people with that fear, that fear of uncertainty, which is a natural part of the

entrepreneurial experience. is one of the most important parts of this mission. I think everyone should go run to buy your book. It's a national bestseller, the third door, The Wild Quest to uncover how the world's most successful people launch their careers. If you want to hear the story of how you chased Larry King through a grocery store, because you didn't share that one.

This is correct. Go read this. I have it in person, but I'm also getting it on my Kindle too because I like to highlight on my Kindle. I think this is genius. I think it, I can't wait to see where you are even in five, ten years. Maybe you'll be speaking with Warren Buffett at the shareholder meeting. I think that this is, you definitely went through the chimney.

Let's put it that way. You went through the chimney. I appreciate that. Alex, where can everyone buy your book find you, pimp yourself out? I appreciate that and that means a lot because I know you've been through the chimney more times than you can count. So it means a lot coming from you. She lives in the fucking chimney. Well, I don't like to be bored.

I have to be stimulated. So the chimney is interesting. I'm the same way. I'm the same way. So I appreciate that a lot. And yeah, if you like hardcover books, which I like, the books are everywhere you like to buy books, Barnes & Noble, Amazon. If you like Kindle, it's there.

It's also on Audible. And I read the book myself. So that was really fun. And if you ended up getting the book from this podcast, let me know on Instagram or Twitter. It's at Alex Beny. Can we give away a copy that's signed? 100%.

Okay. If you are a business owner, tell us your business on my latest Instagram at Lauren Bostic and make sure you're following Alex on Instagram. And we'll get one of you guys a copy of his book that's signed. Alex, thank you so much for coming on. I love that. Thank you. I can't wait for you to come on in five years and tell us which game show you hacked or what you're doing now. Thanks for doing this, man.

Thank you. Thanks, Alex.