THE ED MYLETT SHOW - Access Your Unlimited Potential w/ Matt Higgins

Episode Date: May 9, 2023

On this powerful episode of The Ed Mylett Show, we dive deep into the extraordinary journey of MATT HIGGINS—a true embodiment of the RAGS to RICHES story. Growing up in poverty, Matt defied all odds to become one of America's most brilliant and accomplished businesspeople.Prepare to be inspired as Matt shares the pivotal experiences that shaped his life, humbly positioning himself to impart invaluable wisdom for your own journey. Join us as we uncover the remarkable lessons he's learned and how you can apply them to unleash your full potential.Matt is not only the co-founder and CEO of RSE VENTURES, a highly successful private investment firm he established alongside Stephen M. Ross, the visionary owner of the MIAMI DOLPHINS, but also served as Vice Chairman of the team for an impressive nine years. His groundbreaking book, BURN THE BOATS: TOSS PLAN B OVERBOARD AND UNLEASH YOUR FULL POTENTIAL, is now available and serves as a master class in conquering life's challenges with tactical strategies.During our engaging conversation, we delve into:The transformative power of TAKING CUSTODY of your own life.The vital questions to consider when embarking on significant life changes.How to stop living in the pastHow to harness your DEEPEST FLAWS and transform them into ASTONISHING TRIUMPHS.The importance of embracing discomfortThe true measure of a meaningful lifeAnd unveiling the wisdom of Warren Buffet and the compounding effect of success.And that's not all! We'll also dig deep into Matt's personal journey, including his battle with cancer that you probably haven't heard about. Plus, we'll wrap things up with a raw discussion on mortality and why it's important to remember our limited time on this planet.This conversation with MATT HIGGINS is gonna make you think, challenge your assumptions, and leave you fired up! Trust me, spending an hour on this episode will be one of the best decisions you make. 

This is the Ed Milach Show. Hey, welcome back to the show, everybody. I'm so grateful to have this man here today because of the timing of his visit and the economy in the world. I have found him over time to be one of the brightest business minds in the entire personal development space. And when he first reached out to me and he had reached out to me to come on the show, I said, let me just really look into him. I'd seen him before. I'd seen him on Shark Tank. I knew a little bit about him. And the more

I dug into his work and his background, the more impressed I became and the more I was really hoping they'll be able to share his wisdom with the millions of people who listen and watch the show. And so he's a co-founder of RSE Ventures. He's got a book out right now that I love called Burn the Boats, Toss Plan B Overboard, and Unleash your full potential. This guy dropped out of high school. Now he's a fellow at Harvard Business School. His background's incredible. He's helped run the business side of the Jets before and the Miami Dolphins, and he's been successful in investing in many different businesses. And so the timing

is perfect for Matt Higgins. So Matt, welcome to the show. Thanks for having me. Hi, praise come. So thank you. It's good to have you. I want to start out not on the book. I want to start out on the economy, if we could.

I've watched you on some TV shows recently. And I want to know where you think we are. So many of my listeners and watchers are worried right now. They're starting to hear rumblings like this could be Tony Robbins, for example, is on and said, I think we're gonna be in an eight to 10 year winter. And we've had some banks fail recently. There's just some stuff starting to brew, the dollar

and some stuff happening with Saudi Arabia debating whether they're gonna stay on the US dollar and the stuff going on in China. Where are we right now in your mind? Yeah, that's great. I feel like I've been Dr. Doom going on interviews a little bit early on CBC and I'm feeling like nobody's leveling with the American public because there's a lot of people have a vested interest in the consumer to continue spending.

Yes. And because 70% of our GDP is consumer spending. And so once the consumer puts their credit card away, everything begins to unravel. And yet at the same time, if you're in middle America and you're being told by the White House or Wall Street that it's going to be a soft landing, which is a euphemism for soft pedaling, it's to keep you spending. And I think we are under a mountain of debt right now, and it has to be reckoned. And that is going to unwind over the next, I don't think it's six years. I think it's the next, you know, 18 months. I think it actually will be relatively violent. Let's just do the math. The feds already said that unemployment, they believe, will get to 4.4% by the fall. That's a million people. Most economists and experts believe in order

to get inflation to 2%, which is a stated goal, that we have to take unemployment to 6% to 7%. That means another 5 million Americans are going to lose their job in the next 12 to 18 months. And so the bottom line, my message to everyone is saying, put away the credit card. Do what the private equity firms are telling their portfolio companies, hoard cash, stop spending, make provisions because you never know if you're going to end up being one of those five million people. I don't think it takes six years, though. I think there's going to be a massive, deleveraging event with banks, with companies, corporate debt. And once that happens, which will happen pretty fast, then we can get out the other side. The moral of the story, as you know, free money is never free.

Five million of, five trillion of stimulus money is now being washed through the system. Yeah. So in addition to being conservative with your money and not spending right now, by the way, I'm so happy to hear that. You say this because I don't go out that much, but when I do, I've been shocked at how crowded the malls are on the weekends. And I'm like, does everyone understand what's happening right now, right? Doesn't it feel that way? It's like it's like those tsunami videos where the water is coming in at the shore and you're saying, this is probably pretty bad. And people for whatever reason are not getting the message. I think it's probably what you said,

if there's a gigantic incentive to get people to continue to spend money and really no one's been punished for doing it for the last eight or 10 years. So why would they be punished coming forward? Is it because of the think, even though we both know something's brewing. And also, you know, I worry a lot about the housing market

right now too. Yeah, I think the housing market in particular, I get to ask this a lot too, what do you think of housing? Housing's held up. Do you remember the last crisis when the brokers were always saying, this neighborhood's different? It's like, I feel like the entire banking industry is like this country and time is different. The reason the housing market is held up is because it's been no selling pressure and no incentive. You're probably

saying, well, I locked in crazy rates under these terms that you would have to prime the out of my house in order to sell it. So if you're a typical American, where 99% have a mortgage rate that's lower than the prevailing rate, there's no reason to sell because you can't trade up because you're carrying costs. But once those layoffs start happening, the one million to five million people, they will have to sell their house. And that's where housing corrects, in my opinion, 10 to 15% from here.

Okay. Good. I, uh, I'm not allowed to say what I think, because I'm licensed, but I can, I'm in, in securities and insurance. What can you wink maybe? No, I can blink if I agree with you. So now listen, let's talk a little bit about how we then equip ourselves to be successful at any time in the world.

That's one of the reasons I like burn the boat so much. So it's different than what you would think when you say burn the boats. Doesn't necessarily mean like abandon everything in your life to do one thing. It's almost a metaphor for burning the things in your life that may be holding you back to some extent, right? And so in your case, why'd you write the book number one? And number two, I know the answer to this, but I want you to share it. What was the boat you needed to be burning? Yeah, no great. It is a degree of a Trojan horse. Maybe I'm too clever for my own good,

but the reality is I wrote this book for the angst ridden those with anxiety who self-select themselves out of this idea of full commitment because they think it's not for me, it's not for going all in. So I want to appropriate this phrase and we can get into the history if you want. I want to appropriate this phrase that's the OG life hack that goes back to the beginning of recorded history.

This idea of sabotaging your own escape that military leaders intuitively understood is what's the best way to get the most out of us. I want to take that, jingoistic term and use it for everyone else who maybe doesn't have a support system or infrastructure around them to teach them how to be fully committed to your goal. So I do think the book is leading you to believe one thing and then you'll pick it up and realize it's entirely different. It's entirely different, but in your case, it's very different than what I expected. Like what give them an example of the boat you need to burn? Yeah. All right. So on the boat, this picture, which could look like a pagan symbol depending on how you see it in reality,

it's a paper boat floating in a child's bathtub. So my metaphorical boat that I needed to burn were the legacy issues that were hangover from childhood. And I could give you a little bit of context of that. Please. I grew up in a Queen's New York and really tough circumstances, abject poverty.

Those words lose their meaning. So you have to explain what does that mean? You know, it would eat government cheese. My mother would take us on a bus to go to an hour away to a church to get food so that the neighbors wouldn't see us. So my whole early childhood was shame and then defiance. So from an early age, I would sell flowers on street corners. I was that little kid knock on your door, you know, trying to guilt you into buying flowers

for your wife on Valentine's Day and scraping gum under tables and McDonald's. So my context was poverty was no cavalry coming, constantly frustrated. Why is the system set up to do something? My mother deteriorating physically, she was obese but brilliant and had no education. And I watched her go leave my father, raise kids and squalor, but still aspire for something better, get a GED and go to college. So there was this convergence of all those variables

happening. And around, you know, 14, 13, 14, I found myself increasingly desperate, frustrated, becoming self-destructive, not for any particular, because I didn't want to be here, because I didn't want to be in charge. And I was like, why is no one coming to help?

And then eventually, capitulation, it's on me. Yep. And I don't know where, thank God, the universe gave me this innate sense that I can take custody of my life. And I came up with a life hack and I'll get to the my, my, my, burn the boats moment, which is, I was making maybe three, 75 an hour at the time of McDonald's, 5 bucks an hour or Delhi. I would read these little ads in a newspaper and say college students only $8 an hour. I was like, what is it about a college student that suddenly 2x is my income? But I was like, I have to have it. I came up with this idea, what if I dropped out on purpose? And if you did well enough on

the GD that you could go to college because in a slightly condescending way It's like we you know we love redemption stories nobody ever chooses that path And I remember so excitedly telling you know my guidance counselor everyone. Hey, I got a plan I have a way out, you know I'm gonna get my GD and of course they said you're gonna be a loser The entire system was set up to convince me to stay the course. Now, I was hiding my true life. I never had a single person over my home until the day my mother died

and they came and they took her body out. So no one knew the extreme deprivation and I was concealing it. And so my burn the boat's moment came, when I realized how am I gonna resist all this pressure to execute this plan that I know works for me, but the all conventional wisdom is trying to talk me out of it.

Police picking me up at McDonald's to bring me back to school. Guidance Council calling, I mean, the state collectively was trying to get me to stay the course, but not fix the problem. And then I realized sabotage. If I dropped out and failed every single, if I failed every single class and got left back for two years in a row, the system would transition from trying to make me conform to get rid of me. And that's what happened. So I called it the land of misfit toys,

me with the kids with the beepers and the drug dealers, and failing my classes, sleeping on the desk. I did typing, because typing, I thought would be useful to this day, I type 100 words a minute. And then I had to execute. And I go into the book a little bit about how, because I don't want to glorify it. Like, look at me, I was full full of doubt anxiety. This is a crazy plan

But I executed dropped out and this is the most important lesson on my life The look on the teacher's faces went from Derision and a judgment and a shame to when I came back a year later as president of the Bay team to my own prom I remember going up to Mr. Rosenthal who who the last day of high school tells me, I'll see it McDonald's, what a waste. Yep. And I told him as I walked out the door, if you see me having McDonald's, it's because I own it.

Now in fairness to Mr. Rosenthal, statistically probably a pretty good projection, but I came back as president of a team and the look on all their faces was begrudging admiration. Yeah. And it was like, I tell the story always because it contextualizes and encompasses everything about this book, right? Had a strength in your conviction against the weight of conventional thinking, how to put yourself in a position that you have no other alternative, how society responds when they wish to put you back in that box, how the input you get from people is corrupted when they don't have the full story because you're concealing it. So the metaphor that I've extended from the military context to here is the boats are

all the things in our life that you so eloquently talk about, the prison of our own making, how to fully commit, just beautiful, how to burn those things down. And the book is written for anyone out there listening right now who feels like you self-selected out because you don't have what it takes to achieve your true purpose. And I don't believe that's true. I just think no one's taught you how to do it. Very good. You know, you said something in there in the very beginning, this is to term I've not heard before, but I love you said, take custody of your own life. And so many of us sort of surrender custody to conform, to just conform. like this is the direction supposed to go is what everybody expects me to do. And it takes a lot

of courage and I'm watching you even as you speak, you know, your face breaks a little bit a couple different times. It's still an emotional thing for you. Oh, it's raw. And when you talk about it, I actually picture you as that little boy, a picture this little dude like wanting to be somebody, wanting to do something great, you know, everybody should remember one thing, you know, as Matt's talking. And we're going to go through some real detailed things now in a minute. But there's a lot of tests that can measure IQ. You can measure someone's height, their jumping ability, their speed. We can look at someone and determine whether or not they're physically attractive.

There's never been a test designed to measure somebody's heart. They're will, they're desire. That thing inside of us. And that's the thing that's invisible their desire, that thing inside of us. And that's the thing that's invisible about you, that when you're getting feedback, you're getting advice from people telling you what to do. They can't measure that. And they don't know that about you. And that's why most advice is not good advice, because they don't know your heart.

I'm similar story. Everyone has become successful, has something similar in their life. And what they didn't know about me, what they didn't know about you was that will to win that heart to overcome things and and be resilient and overcome adversity and also make good decisions. And so there's something I was watching an interview you were in and because I do something similar and I would surprise me because I think most people think successful people have this abundance of confidence. But you ask yourself a cup, when you're going to about to make a difficult decision, right? Because it is a difficult decision to go.

I'm going to make a career change. I'm going to leave this relationship by man. I'm going to start a part-time side hustle. I'm going to drop out of high school, right? These are difficult decisions. You kind of go through a series of questions with yourself that help you make the decision. And I think it's brilliant So would you start by sharing that? No, I love that setup because the book when I wrote the book

I kept thinking okay, what are the natural objections to the book right? I knew a vast you know significant percentage of people would hear burn the boats and think that's risky You know and you know, what if it doesn't work out all the things we say to ourselves so so I, so I, I want to underscore for anyone listening, like, I am the most paranoid risk taker you're ever going to meet. And burning the boats and fully committing to your true purpose does not mean you don't process risk. It's the opposite. It's actually you need to process risk at the beginning of the journey.

So, so my, my process is, and I'll make it less abstract with the book itself, but it's fourfold, right? Number one, I ask myself, okay, what's the worst that will happen if I fail at pursuing my true purpose, my plan A? Now, usually that answer is reputational. It helps me audit. I realize I'm worried about judgment. Yes. I also catastrophize that little boy and never left that apartment. So still worried that somehow all the money's going to get taken away. And I won't be able to take care of my kids. So it makes me confront that, that's number one. And too, I try to put a probability on that. What would I do if the worst thing were to happen?

How would I mitigate it? Humans vastly underestimate our ability to respond to almost anything. We are terrible at anticipating what will go wrong. We're great at being able to handle it when our back is against the wall. So true. Right, we, if I were to end the beginning of the month,

I've done this before. I put all the things on the left hand column that I'm worried that are gonna happen this month. And man, my mind goes to terrible places. It's like, if you were in my head, you're like, mad, how you're not gonna end up at landlord, tenant court? I was like, you don't know.

You know, I'm one bad decision away from that happening. But I say, how would I mitigate this worse thing that I'm imagining? And then my third step is, let's put a percentage handicap on the likelihood that that might happen. Even my irrational brain knows that that's like a 2% remote scenario, the worst thing, right? And then the last thing is so important to me. And I keep all this very raw to me. I don't want to heal over some of these things because that's

the gift. The pain is the gift, and I don't want to get over it. I said, so the last thing I said, what would I be willing to do to endure to suffer, to be able to achieve my planning? So in the case of this book, what pain and suffering and aggravation or would I not be willing to subject myself to in order to reach somebody out there who doesn't have a parent or support system or self-esteem and make them believe that they could pursue their true purpose? Like that is almost breathtaking. And usually my wise are so grandiose teaching in Harvard Business School. How does a kid with a GDT go? Crazy. End up a teaching in Harvard.

What would I not do? And the answer is usually walk on glass, come within an inch of my life, stay up straight for days, lose almost everything. And I think, and here's why that matters, to make this less abstract for those listening. When I did the book, use an example, and now I fully committed to writing a great book, and I was excited about the title, you know. But there were a couple of things I put in the book

that I feel very uncomfortable with that are hard for me to read. And the biggest one is about my divorce. I did not want to put that in there, and it kept repeating on me like acid reflux. And I get a call from a magazine, excitedly. We love the book. We want to do an in there. And it kept repeating on me like acid reflux. And I get a call from a magazine excitedly. We love the book. We want to do an excerpt.

Yay, great. We want to do the section on divorce. Oh, that one seconds. So then I rather than follow the own advice in the book, I revisited all the anxiety about why I didn't want to put it in there. Now, when I before I wrote it, the reason I did it is I was feeling so desperate and alone in a really dark place when I was going through it.

And I know that if I wrote it a certain way, somebody out there who was going through that would read that paragraph and feel like how they had been seen. And so I had already did my four-step process before I wrote the book. Now, the book was already at the publisher. I didn't let them publish the reprint. So let's talk about consequences of me not following my own advice of being all in on burning the boats, right? I do an interview and I talk about some of the themes in a book and I get a note from

a guy and he says, I just heard you talking openly about the book. Tonight is the first night I'm alone with my kids and I sent him a book and I circled the page and I said, this page was written you. And he sent me a note saying, you changed my life. Like you saw me. So look at your face right now. Yeah. Yeah. So it's beautiful, you should be very proud of that. So my point is, I'm actually trying to be critical, not emotional. I did let the Rudd the reprint. I could have reached more people. You know what I mean? And that's what Burn the Boats is about. It's a waste of mental energy to revisit the things we already did. And that revisiting of the decisions we've already made, because we didn't process risk,

is enough energy leakage to go ahead and make you never ever able to achieve your plan. And so I like that little case study, and I need to be able to tell without getting emotional. But it is a beautiful thing, right? I mean, you have enough wealth and success. I don't need another accolade. I want to use that what I saw when I was 16 and what I've been through to redistribute that knowledge. And so that story of the guy, you know, reaching me, I was like, oh, you're such an idiot.

Why did you let the run the excerpt? Well, the other thing you say in the book, I want you to talk about this a little further, you say, turn your deepest flaws into your most astonishing triumphs. And I've found, like, for me, like, you know, there's this tendency to want to just impress people all the time. And I don't think you connect with anybody when you impress them. John Maxwell said this to me many, many years ago, he said, you know, Ed, if you're really want to impress people, tell them how perfect you are. But if you want to connect with people, reveal to them your imperfections.

And I think there's this stuff in our culture right now, where the things I say this often lately, probably too much. But we think these things disqualify us. Our mistakes, our divorce, our bankruptcy, our sins, our average-idness, our invisibility over our lifetime. We think, ah, because of those things, I'm disqualified from a future that's different. And the truth is, ironically, maybe the pathway to getting there isn't to revisit them necessarily, because I agree with you on that. But there's

something pretty powerful to vulnerability. Like I can guarantee you out of this entire interview, apart the people are going to be the most moved by as what just happened. Because you are, you're vulnerable, you're saying, let me meet you where you are. I see you. I was just like you and you are not disqualified. In fact, you're most qualified to help the person you used to be in your life. And so what do you mean when you say turn your deepest flaws

into your most astonishing triumphs? What does that mean? Yeah, so 100% agree with you about the sharing of the vulnerabilities, what's great space for self-awareness. People always ask me, Matt, you talk so much about how self-awareness is the greatest arbitrage and personal and professional life, but how do you cultivate it? I say you cultivate it by modeling it. Right.

You model the vulnerability and then others, now you're there as sociopath, you won't meet me, or you're a real human and you're, you're thinking, oh, thank you, giving me a relief. So, I talk to students at a homeless shelter who are getting their GD. So imagine being in a homeless shelter and you're trying to get a GD when you have no infrastructure, right? And when I walk in the room, they, you know, and I always asked this question, I said, so, you know, what do you think about me? What do you perceive? And they're like, yeah, you loaded, you got a plane probably. Look at your suits. You know,

you're like, I grew up, went to Harvard and all that. And then I tell the story in a non-airbrushed version that is not in the book and they get the real, they get the full story. And you know, kids end up crying or saying, and I say, okay, now let me tell you something really excited. Everyone likes to feel good about themselves. I love to do right by somebody who overcame hard circumstances. You're getting a GD in a homeless shelter. That is like a weapon of mass destruction. That will make people admire you for the rest of your life. You feel like the die is cast. And I'm telling you, you're sitting on such an incredible asset.

You just need to get to the other side. And that's what I'm talking about, right? That, fortunately, I think you feel the same way. I don't have any problem talking about it. The only problem I have talking about these things is I keep them raw so that they are useful. I don't have any problem talking about it. The only problem I have talking about these things is I keep them raw so that they are useful. I don't wanna like, I don't wanna package it

so that they lose their power because I think that's why when we read Instagram posts it's a failure is great. Like, okay, what does that really mean? Well, let me show you, let me show you what bleeding out looks like. When I tell those kids that story, their framing goes from one of feeling

like they are less than or discarded to one of things like it is an asset because I'm able to make them understand. I think it gives you a level of belief, even me listening to you. And I'm already 52 years old and have had some decent stuff happen in my own life, right? But any time I ever hear somebody's stories about what they've had to go through to get where they are, What they've had to go through to get where they are. It frankly, in an odd way alleviates my worrying and anxiety about where I currently am. Because at any given time in your life, no matter who you are, you're doing it today. I guarantee you there's something on your mind to know.

No question. That you're like, I'm really worried about this. I have anxiety about this. I think people think that, man, if I can get to a certain point, those things sort of dissipate, I'm going to let you both in. There's two very wealthy men talking to each other, right? Now, let's be real fun in it. I drove here today, and I had a two-hour drive here to the studio.

Today was a long drive. I was excited to interview you. I have a couple other interviews today. But in all candor, I spent the majority of my time processing a problem I have right now. I'm processing it. And what helped me process that problem was two things. One, I actually prepped for this interview and I was reading about some of the things you've been through. And then me reflecting on other places I've been in my life and I do just what you do. I have that same process,

what's the likelihood of this happening? If it happens, what would I do, et cetera, et cetera? How bad would it really be? But I think it's important for people to know. You're worth several hundred million dollars. So am I? Do you still have problems and things you worry about at an anxiety and fears? And they're just probably as pronounced as they were when you were younger, I would imagine. I mean, it's endless. And for a bit, I would judge the presence of them,

as an indication that I'm not evolved or I would condemn myself. Like, when are you ever gonna feel that you got it under control? And the answer I realized is never because I am constantly putting myself in uncomfortable positions. Yes. You know what I mean? Would you worry?

I'd have to interrupt you. No, please. I would worry. This is so weird. I keep using a word worry. I should stop that. I would have concern if I didn't have concerns. Right, you're complacent then.

Like, I'd be like, there's nothing vibrating around me. There's no frequency. There's no expansion happening. There's no expansion happening. There's no growth happening. I, I, the presence of some level of anxiety. Now, having like you teach in the book and I teach in my work, tactics and tools and strategies to deal with these things and flourish when they happen is important.

But when I was young, I thought, I'm going to get to a point in my life when I have enough money and good enough friends. And this or that, that I won't have worries or anxiety anymore. And I think that's the picture, the world sort of paints for us. And never in any interview, I said this out loud. It's just with you. I just realized it's driving on your day. This is not going to end. All right. This is the 52 years old.

A different kind of prison of our own making. It's a different prison of my own mind. But by the way, I like the escape. I enjoy the escape from the prison. It's okay for me in my life to have issues and problems. I rather enjoy the escape from the prison. And then just I just finally surrendered the false belief system that there won't be another one eventually present itself

in my life. I just want you to acknowledge that because people look at you like Shark Tank, Harvard, different football teams, a lot of really well-known people admire and respect you. It's just gonna be there, right? And it's having the tactics and strategies to deal with it when it appears.

No, that's so funny. We're talking about this. It's never ending. It's every date. It's almost like the movie 51st date. So I'm like, we're gonna do this again. And it's always a constant refrain of like this time. It'll be clear to everyone that the other times

we're bullshit to. There's a little bit of like, and then when I audit, I'm like, oh, well, this is a painful hard fact pattern that most people would never be able to engineer a door where they try. And then every time I indulge myself in a new version of my life, like, you know what, though, I'm gonna reef the rewards. It's time for the harvest.

You know, and that lasts about 48 hours. And actually, I realized that is a feedback loop of saying, you need a little healing. Like you're taking it to the edge. But the premise of the book, I'm glad we're talking about this. I wonder, does this my confirmation bias? I do think the joy of living is in this driving, that we don't know exactly why we're here or where we're going.

And we seek out what's the ceiling on my potential. And that's what brings us joy. It's why marathon runners feel melancholy afterwards and Olympians have depression. It's because we enjoy the training and we enjoy the pursuit, but we don't talk about that a lot and we don't kind of coach each other about how to say, all right, well, how do we endure

in the life of perpetual pursuit? You're, here's our right you are. I love where we're going with this here today because I have to tell you, Andrew Huberman, I think you know who Andrew is. Well, of course, yeah. Andrew and I were talking, and one of the things he shared with me is he said,

they've actually proven that the dopamine hit and I were talking and one of the things he shared with me as he said, they've actually proven that the dopamine hit is actually greater in the pursuit of the goal than the actual moment of achievement. That the the benefit in our brains, that great feeling that we get is actually higher and in greater abundance in the pursuit and the journey of the goal or the achievement or the moment or the date or the whatever, then it is when we actually get it. And there's actually a perpetual precipitus drop off after the achievement, which is why

a lot of times when we achieve things like, ah, it's not what I thought it would be. It actually was. You just have to reflect on the pursuit of it. That's the feeling of the fact of those little wins. It's funny. You said, I feel much more boosted by the little breakthroughs when I've lost hope on doing something. I'm going through something now, and it was like I had a breakthrough.

And I'm like, wow, this is some of my finest work. And of course, that'll fade within 48 hours. But I have actually come to accept that premise, that at the end of this, I will not feel that big payoff. I do wonder where joy and celebration fits in. I don't think I have that fully calibrated. I don't think anybody does. I think I'm much further along than I used to be. I actually really work on celebrating. And the reason is, is that I want

to convince my neurochemistry, frankly, that this is worth doing again. How do you do it? I'd love life hacks because I, even with the book on the way here, I was like, you know what I'm going to do? I haven't experienced the joy of having a book in an airport. And I used to fantasize about this moment. And yet I haven't done it. So I went in the book and I waited for somebody to walk by the section. It was a woman and she's slowed enough. I said, Hey, do you read these kinds of books? And she said, I never would bother reading these books.

I'm like, Okay, let's do it. Has her ever check while I read the atomic happens. I'm like, Hey, you might want to buy. I go to her. Can I buy you my book? And she said, Absolutely. And then she asked me where I'm from. She's from the same neighborhood.

Oh, see. She's my neighbor. And I'm like, this must be the universe trying to reinforce the attempt. But how do you experience joy? Well, my experience of joy is very similar to what you just said. For some reason, for me, it's the reflection in other human beings, eyes, hearts, messages, et cetera. I allow myself to accept those compliments now. Whereas before I'm like, yes, thank you, but you don't know, I could have done better. And so I would rob myself from I could have done better thing. And now I accept that what I did was the best I could do in that moment. And I allow myself to feel the embrace from other people. I gain I've learned in my life I gain significance. I feel

significant when I contribute to the lives of other people. So I found my recipe so I don't rob myself from that. The other thing I do is I allow myself to celebrate. Now, they're not long windows of celebration. I'm not any good at that yet. But when something great happens, I'm good at having a cigar or a bottle of wine or a dinner with people or saying, wow, and reflecting for a moment. And I've built that muscle of bliss.

I talk about something called blissful dissatisfaction. People can flate bliss and happiness and satisfaction. They think, oh, if I allow myself to have a bunch of happiness or bliss, I'm gonna lose my drive. I'm gonna lose the recipe. So because I've kept myself in misery all my life, if I just stay in misery, I'll keep achieving. I found not to be true.

I've actually found that as I finally started to celebrate. So I do that with reflection, I do that with receiving the gratitude from other people. Also for me, we talked before we came on about my faith. For me every time it happens, just my personal thing is to go just thank you Lord. Like I ran your work in my life again. So it's an acknowledgement that it's not just me and that I'm somehow glorifying a power greater than myself for me. That's Jesus for whatever anybody listening to that. That's fine. I'm not here to convert you today. But what I am saying to you is that it's a validation of my faith that there's something greater in life

than just me or just this time here. And that's really a big deal. That is that part. That last part is the part that I've realized brings me bliss. I've always wondered why do I like to be surrounded by a pain or, you know, I can't handle small talk. And yet when somebody brings up, you know, pain or suffering, you know, I get animated. And I realized I like to be reminded about my smallness and your relevancy of all things. It's very peaceful. And I had the most incredible experiences over the last year and a half, meeting with Pope Francis at the Vatican.

Yeah. My these, these private visits with the Pope to talk about refugees and human rights. And then I went to a refugee center in Italy and it was meeting with what I would believe are my versions of LeBron James, like a dad who would go through, you know, figuring out how to flee in a trunk of a car

to give his family a better life. And I always look at refugees and migrants and think we ask, you know, why are they coming here? Instead of what are they running from? And but I realized what is it about me that takes such peace and joy of being around that I always look at refugees and migrants and think we ask, you know, why are they coming here instead of what are they running from and? But I realized what is it about me that takes such peace and joy of being around that because it reminds me that oh, this just doesn't matter. The stuff, the accolades, you know, the attention. What really matters is alleviating suffering like you saw in that little apartment in Queens. And so like I went to when I went before I went to see the Pope, I was like,

I'm such a bad Catholic. I really feel like I need to unburden myself. I said, can you send an MSR for me so that I can do a confession? And I was like, that was great. And I was like, but it needs to be really close, like three steps from God, you know, like I have someone. I need someone really high up. And I meet with the, I be with it. It's in the book, but I be with the, the scallop greenies are the order that takes care of refugees in my green, so I was like, that will do. And I send the head of the head of the head,

fatherly or near, to meet me and little Italy. And we meet for three hours. It was like the books opened up. I mean, because when somebody is that high up in the church, they actually have PhDs and it's all this collected wisdom. And I was unburdening myself, tears are flowing. And I was like, you know, I don't agree with this. And it's like, it's okay, my child.

You were given free will. You know, it's like everything got the right jet I answer. But then I was talking about the shame I was carrying. This isn't the book was just getting started. And I was saying, I don't know how to deal with that. And I don't know why I keep trying to, he's like, number one, you're trying to go back and save your mother, but the way to save your mother

is to save those save others You know any and but then also tells me the story of a diamond ring. So let me tell you a story of a diamond There was a diamond and it slipped off a one's finger and it went into the sewer and for years There's where it remained covered in sludge and mud until one day a little boy was playing in the street And his ball went down that I'd sewer and he saw it and him and his dad came out and they put a little boy was playing in the street and his ball went down that I'd sewer and he saw it. And him and his dad came out and they put a little, you know, hang her down. They were able to bring it back up. And it was dirty and whatever. And they washed it off. And there was a beautiful diamond. He's like, no matter how much sludge and mud we cover ourselves up, we were always a diamond. And it was. So I had, there's the point to that

story is only having gone to the Vatican and spending time around when I'm not particularly religious. I was, oh, I need to be reminded of the Eurelvency of all these other things. I want to stay in that place of a 16 year old boy who witnessed suffering and Paralysis because that is more important than anything in my life, any possession and anything I'll ever do. But the achievement having said all of that. The achievement and the success gives you the platform to reach those people. Right. That's why it's important. And that's why sometimes you say, well, that means I don't have to achieve anything wrong. No, the authority. I say I'm collecting

authority. The book is just my resume is an incoherent collection of authority to reach people at dispara places. Oh, you admire people on TV. Well, I'm on Shark Tank. You admire wealth. I have a lot of things. You admire sports. I ran a few of those. Yep. But I truly mean it. It is a degree calculated because not one of these things, particularly resonate, but collectively they give me the authority to rewind the clock. You're 100%. And by the way, what you've discovered and I've discovered is whatever human being who finds some measure of bliss, a discovery, is that you were put here to help contribute to the lives of other people. That's really why you were put here. In your own very unique and beautiful way.

And sometimes for achievers, we're the last to figure that out. Sometimes often it's people that work in a church or someone who's dedicated their life like my sister to being a schoolteacher. She figured this out a lot sooner than I did. And although I've got a lot more money than her, she's had a lot more blissful moments, and joyous moments in her life.

And so sometimes us achievers, it takes us longer to figure it out. However, when we do, we have a platform on a stage and a reach that can make an impact. It's even more modern. I would, I always would want Warren Buffett once at he, he came to a dolphins game and I got to spend a whole day with him walking around. And I got to ask him about, you know, compounding interest and all a lot of his views. But one of them I had asked him about how did he handle waiting until later in his life to make those big contributions to philanthropy. And he told me I took a lot of criticism for that. And I would struggle with it. But in my mind, I thought going back to compounding that the ability for me to compound that money in my possession

would mean that there would be a lot more of a redistribute by the time I got to the end. I sort of thought that was fast because I'm sure you feel this about accomplishment, right? I'm a human being, I have aspirations and ambitions, I want to keep playing with my capacity, my potential. So I want to keep creating, and then I want to also ameliorate suffering. And sometimes they can feel attention. So it's like what I've tried to say is I'm allowed to be intentional about my boundaries. I don't have to be a saint, but it and I'm still accumulating power and resources while redistributing concurrently. And then it's okay, right?

I still, because you know how sometimes I would say, I'm not here to go on a rescue mission. I'm here to make a trajectory change in your life. Very good. A deposit, but don't ask me to take custody over you. You know that. The word custody is really powerful, and I'm gonna use it after today,

because I think a lot of times people are waiting for somebody to take custody over their life They're waiting for the government to do it. They're waiting for one seminar. They're going to go to or one book They read and as good as my book is and as good as your book is they still have to take custody of their lives And and waiting for someone to come along and save you you will be waiting until the day you die And hopefully you've done well enough in your life that you are saved having Having said all about, okay, insight versus invention since we're on this topic a little bit. You talk about that. And when does insight beat out invention? You mean proprietary insights. And well, I think mostly actually, like if I look at some

of the best businesses, and over the last, you know, 20 years, think about Airbnb. What is Airbnb? Other than a hundred billion dollar company, whatever it is right now, Airbnb is a guy who slept on a futon in 2009. It was like, you know, I think the sharing economy is going to be a thing. I don't know how he came up with that insight because I would have said everyone's going to steal

everything. I think sharing economy is going to be good. Chew, I think there are more people like me who feel this way, even though they don't know it yet. So I'm going to put a product in front of them and I'm going to build a business. That's a what I call a proprietary insight. It's an insight that you glean from the context

of your life or your job that could be one a path to a better way to do something or a promotion or your own business. And so the reason why I'm passionate about this topic is when you look at Shark Tank America's world's favorite show in business, which I was lucky to be on, Everything is a patent or a bill, mostly an invention usually.

Yes. And I think that causes people watching that saying, I don't have a good idea. Billion percent, right. Right. And I think that's actually not the reality of the world. It's just Shark Tank isn't able to show the conceptual businesses like Airbnb

couldn't have been on Shark Tank because they would have laughed them off the stage. Yes. And so I, you know, we're gonna be on Shark Tank. So I try to show off the stage. Yes. And so I never couldn't have been on Shark Tank. No, we were going to be on Shark Tank. So I tried to show people in the book, what does a proprietary insight look like? There's one great story in there. And I'll make this quick.

Michelle Kratera Grant, great female entrepreneur, she was working at Victoria's Secret as the vice president of marketing. And she felt alienated from her own messaging, saying all this marketing seems designed to appeal to a man's aesthetic about what is beautiful for a woman, but does a woman have her own idea about what sexy that maybe deviates? And so she said she started doing basically community sourcing of saying, what are some words you would use to describe your undergarments? And they said they prefer undies more than panties. And like there were all these little insights. So she's like, she dips her toe in the water to create a few products that she dropped,

crushes her site overnight. This is 2015 launches Launches what's called lively, this line with a totally different female aesthetic and sells it for a hundred million dollars five years later. And that's a proprietary insight. It's not a business. So nailed it. So I gave words to these apps. What's fun when you have your own book? It's like a sociologist. I get to make up words. By the way, I want to jump in and say something here. This is so important what you're teaching right now because I have a son who's going to be graduating college next year. Hopefully we'll play some golf afterwards. But what am I going to do, Dad?

What am I going to do? He doesn't really want to have a job the rest of his life. Oh, he's probably going to have to get one to support himself because I'm not taking care of him. He's talking to you that I got teenagers. I don't talk to him. Yeah. It's good to know that on the other side of the other side, 2021, you're smart and cool. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Yeah.

Trust me. I know the other part too. And I keep telling him, Max, most successful entrepreneurs are not inventors. They have, and do you use your terminologies a different term? They find insights. They find out how to make something that already exists better, or they find different insights and breakthroughs that they have. And a lot of you listening to this that have a job and you're like, man, I would really

love to become an entrepreneur. I'm not going to invent an idea where some places you can improve in businesses that already exist or insights you can find to do things differently. If you currently have a business that you want to scale, it may not be an entire new invention to scale that business. It can be insights into the marketplace that you're already in. It is really only from a real entrepreneur that that type of insight is revealed.

But I'd say 95% of my most successful friends that are entrepreneurs had insights, not inventions. Now, I will say some of the big inventors are the really wealthy ones. Really make a crazy well. Right. Elon Musk, kind of type of a deal. Right.

But for the most part, it is people that come on the trail with different insights. Now, you just did another term and I want to ask you about, what kind of resource has industrial psychology been in your business career? I know that's a bizarre question, I don't know if you know that. I love that. But I'm curious about that. Well, anyone knows, I get made fun of a lot for this because I'm being obsessed with it,

but I'll tell you the genesis of why, when I was running the New York Chets, had a pretty big job and the CEO at the time wanted to promote me, overseeing huge swath of the business. But before we do that, we're gonna have you meet with these industrial psychologists. It's gonna be an all day long thing.

Now back to the anxiety triggers and landlord tentacort. I come this far and now I have to, you know, talk to the shrinks and I didn't want to be pro. I'm tough, you know. And I remember I had to go into a fake company that they had created called Panda Corporation. And the CEO had just died that day. And I had to take over his email inbox and they were going to monitor me. This is a painting of very terrible picture. They're going to monitor my behavior for the next, you know, uh, 12 hour and they had actors come in playing employees. It was like, Oh, anyway, the whole thing. Anyway, the, the, the, the best part, the report comes back and it comes out that I'm in the top 1% of all executives. Yeah, me and of course, the, the owner of the team was like, this is self serving and tossed it. All

that work. But here's the part that really that, that, that I thought when I, when I was getting close to my end of my tenure there about to create my own company I thought this is probably the last time I'll ever get real feedback from anybody and I brought those same psychologists in to do a 360 and when the report came back I was Harnified that everything that I had thought I had concealed about myself was completely visible to anyone who spent any meaningful time around me So there was this massive disconnect of me putting so much energy to conceal, manage, show up a certain way, and it was on display. And I thought, wow, if I just give you,

eight thousand dollars and you spend some time, you could give me the answer to somebody's wiring, including my own, and I became addicted to the feedback. And so my entire career, I bring in, my partners, my industrial psychologists, and they help in different ways. They help someone feel safe so they can burn those metaphorical boats that have been holding back.

I tell the story in the book, an amazing story of a bartender from Ireland who had come to the United States and had hussled his way into these different businesses. I had bought his cybersecurity business and he was struggling. His management style, unwilling to face conflict and turn over staff that wasn't appropriate for the job, couldn't do that. So he was a classic martyr taking everything on his shoulders and it wasn't scaling.

And at the same time, he was taking on incoming at home, had a disabled child. It was all falling apart and I tell a story in a book. He calls me one night and says, crying, I failed you. I'm gonna resign.'m going to, I'm going to resign. And I said, first of all, the call will be outbound. I'll make that call to you when it's time. It's not time. This is the moment I've been waiting for. I was like, let's go to work. I've never seen a transformation like this. I bring in the industrial

psychologist. He goes ahead and goes does the work gets to report that's supposed to be private because it's very personal. Excuse us in the meeting, walks into a staff meeting in the next room and said, drops it in the middle of the table and said, Hey, you might want to read this since you already know everything that's in it. And by embracing self-awareness and facing his demons and creating this culture of transparency within two years, he sells the business for nine figures and changes his entire life. So I know I'm very evangelical about the importance of therapy and psychology because I think

the greatest breakthroughs are within our self-control. And we tend to outsource our judgment to TED Talks and my book when the first stop should be you. Right? Like, why am I not doing what I want to do? Why am I stuck? Why am I blocked? And by you and I talking openly about how we struggle or imposter should dream everything in the book, it creates space

for somebody to look within instead of looking without. And psychologists, industrial psychologists can, if they're the right ones, can help you do it. Yeah, all psychology, you know, um, I really like you. I like you too a lot. Honestly, you, I watched your video, those you have to watch this video, or Ed does this talk, 20 minutes talk, about the difference between suffering and pain that is one of the smartest pieces of content. I have ever seen somebody put out in this genre, like because I hadn't thought how to differentiate it.

It is the pursuit of being uncomfortable, but you shouldn't suffer in that process. Suffering comes from not accepting it, that that's what's required. Suffering comes from not taking care of yourself, all these other things. And then talking about the prison of our own making, I literally watched your video

and I thought, you could have saved me three years of my life. I didn't even need to write the book. Thank you, bro. That was my book. I'm very efficient with my time. You told me that when you walked through the video. I did because you had me in tears. And I was like, this is so beautiful.

And the mansion with the houses. And I literally, I had this longing of like, could it give me three years of my life back? Well, I feel like you're doing that for a lot of people here today as well. And what the point though that you've made and thank you for that, by the way, everybody go listen to it. No, it's true. It's one of my Thursday podcast releases. One of the, it's the first one. By the way, are you doing that because even in this context, you hear it's a little constrained because we're not getting the right. That's what I feel the yearning to sometimes I'm doing interviews and talks and I'm like, well, I want to give dissertation so that I think you should I this show originally was that format that's how it caught on was me, you know, basically every single week coming up with some sort of content or topic to improve your life in some way and then it morphed into doing more conversations with people that could do that. And just for me, from self-expression, I want to be able to express myself and I'm different than I was eight years ago when the show started. I want to start to express myself again. However,

you said something really important. One of those prisons is not understanding why we behave the way we date. It's one of the great prisons of life. So whether it's an industrial psychologist where you're doing therapy, where you just begin to pray and meditate and reflect and walk and think more about you and who you are internally, that's the prison we live in. It's like, look, I don't love all the things I've learned about myself. I don't love all of them. But I'm really glad that I'm learning about me because that way I can contribute to more

other people's lives is really the game here. But becoming more self-aware, however you might do that, I really believe is the key to prospering in your life. And it's just this taboo thing for some reason that I'm just gonna consume things. Yeah, and to consume a book, consume a podcast, consume alcohol, consume weed,

consume a drug, consume porn, consume whatever there is out there. And somehow I'm just gonna get through this life instead of starting to say, who am I? What are the patterns that I have? How can I approve? How can I begin to change some of my wiring so that I'm my life reflects the one that I know I was really born to have? And some of that's not tactics and strategies. It's reflection and audit to use the term you used earlier.

Well, but maybe though, if we think about it, this is what there's, there's an effortless philanthropy about your messaging and how you put the words out there. We talked about this when we first started, it's because your motives are pure. But if we think of, there's a whole culture around pushing consumption. So there isn't an advocate for the self, you know, and you are that. You are truly handing out information without an intention to force somebody to consume it, right? But most of society is now this is sort of a whole culture about doing it. I had cancer. I want to talk about this. Yeah, I want to

Because it dovetails to something you just said right now. So for those who don't know when I was 32 I had testicular cancer and I My first reflex was concealment like when I look back at some of the behavior, it's so cringey. Because all I wanted to do was make sure that those of the jets didn't think I was defeated. And it was like an us versus them instant. And I was on the brink of getting a big contract. And I remember meeting my HR director on a street corner, so no one would see. So I could change my beneficiary for my health insurance, like real crazy stuff.

And then I go through the surgery, and I go ahead, and I now feel incredibly vulnerable. Testicles gone. It's a pretty violent, you know, act, right? And then I say, how am I gonna represent to the team and everyone else that I am not defeated? There's a dinner happening the next day with all the coaches, and it's a macho culture.

And I'm like, I'm going to show up to that dinner. I'm going to roll out my new motto. I just had made and I go to this dinner. It's in the book, but spoiler alert. But I go to the dinner and I say, I have a toast and meanwhile the bag on my groin, right? And I said, I want to tell you my new dog tags I just had made half the balls twice the man. Now, I do still love that phrase, because I think it does

well, it's, well, it's, it's owning it, right? I'm probably the only guy in America with the GED allot degree in one testicle, but, but, but, but after I, I, I, I reflect it on that moment, not as one of her hero, her heroism, but as bad leadership, because I realized that anybody who worked for me is actually going to have to have a greater suffering or trial than having a body part removed or else you better suppress it because I showed up to work two days later, right? And that's actually terrible leadership. But the point of the story is more, I began to yearn for the time when I had cancer and

I would go to slow and cuttering because I felt such peace and relief. And I was like, now why? I wasn't self-destructive. Why did I enjoy that period? And it was because it eclipsed all worldly concerns and put me in touch with my mortality. I was like, why did I enjoy the awareness of my own mortality? And I realized how much of my energy was about filling the void to distract myself from why I don't know why I'm here, where I'm going. And then I embraced this app that's on my phone. It's called We Croak. So five times a day, I'm reminded that I'm here, where I'm going. And then I embrace this app that's on my phone.

It's called We Croak. So five times a day, I'm reminded that I'm dying. In very eloquent ways, from Socrates and poets, from, you know, it's always said differently beautifully. But the purpose of that is when we get in touch with our mortality, it actually brings us peace. That a lot of the things we're worrying about every day, don't hold up against the juxtaposition of death and death is upon us eventually for everyone and so it's similar to my point before about

you know the work with the Vatican and whatnot and so I doing research right the happiest people in the world are in butan and they remind themselves five times a day that they are going to die and so I just wanted to talk for a second for anyone listening, thinking, ask yourself, how much of you actually subconsciously afraid of death? And when you actually confront it and be reminded of it, it makes you zero-win to the moment. And the present is the greatest gift where the happiness is found. It's where your spouse lives. It's where your children are. You know, it's where your joy is. And so cancer taught me that. And but as time goes by, you know, I drift away and the app brings me back. So that's a plug for a crazy app that I have nothing to do with, but I just have on my

phone that brings me a lot of joy. One of my favorite things I've ever sent on the show. Really? Oh, thank you. I'm going to tell you why. I'm a big believer. All gold books tell you begin with the end in mind when we set goals. And I found some time early in life

I had the whole hard issue when I was like 30. What was the issue? Some plaque accumulation already and I had an uncle that had passed away at 50 and so sort of an alarming thing. But I reflect on my own passing very regularly and deeply. And I have found that it is the one thing that causes me to be fully present now. Is that amazing? Yes, and that's why what you just said is so. There's no advocate for it. Right. Right, even what we're saying right now, I know that others have said it, but it's not said often. It doesn't show up on Instagram posts, right? Right.

Like, that's why I talk about it because it's so counterintuitive and I am 100% convinced that could bring you so much more joy. Even you and I talking about this right now makes me I like that. This is fun me too. I'm present I'm enjoying this interview. Yeah, you know, and my and my blood pressure drops and a context and perspective and by the way I don't think about my death in the context ever of like legacy. I don't think of it that way I don't think of like what are people gonna remember me to care like I don't think about it at all What I do think about is like it just gives you perspective to what this time is and how precious it is and present it is and how really the things that we make into a big deal at that point in our life won't be. That's the benefit though. It's not, I don't know why there's no school

of thought around this of saying, hey, if you want to deal with your anxiety, the number one thing is to actually contemplate mortality. You're right. In a safe, peaceful, beautiful way, not in a morbid way, like not the pain you're going to endure or how, what will happen or not legacy legacy. So irrelevant. It's almost, that actually actually feeds the wrong impulse because you won't be cognizant of your legacy.

Anyway, so who are you, who's representing you? Right. Statue they're going to tear down exactly 20 years. Exactly. Well, anyway, I'm glad we're talking about it. I am too, because let me say something to you. It's never been talked about on my show. I believe the frontier of human behavior and psychology. We're gone to something right here. And the next level of our understanding of this life will be a healthy contemplation of the end of it more regularly and a culture that does that more regularly.

We would treat each other very differently. We should start that. I mean, we should, like, we should this conversation with maybe the reason we're in this room is to start that because I feel so passionate about it. And I need more friends. So I can't feel like the alarm goes off. I can't tell you're so crazy.

But you get a little gift of it. And you said about your mom's passing. The But you get a little gift of it. You said about your mom's passing. The God gives you a little glimpse of it and tries to tempt you with it when he gives you cancer. God gives you a little gift of it when you have a friend you love pass, or when your mother passes, or when my father passes,

he's giving you that gift then because anytime someone else dies that you love, for a second, you reflect on your own death. It happens instantaneously. You almost feel guilty when you do it, but you do. And so there's these gifts throughout our life that should do it. Even a divorce, there's a part of your divorce. You're like, Oh my, the end of my life didn't turn out the way I thought it was going to. It's a gift to just think about that time and your life. I had no

idea we were going to talk about this. Well, it's interesting. And why don't we respond to it when in those contexts when somebody dies? Because there's almost a degree of to talk about this. No, well, it's interesting. And why don't we respond to it when, in those contexts, when somebody dies, because there's almost a degree of lecturing about it. Like, gather your rose buds while you may. It's a little bit warning, right? It's implicit in this, like, you're going to die. You're going to regret a lot of crap. Nobody's doing it in this context of like, it's actually very beautiful.

It is beautiful. It brings a very, very, very, very close friend, died. Not that long ago. And it was crushing. And I just was, you know, but that did bring me back to like, let me honor him by by by celebrating the day, the thing that he no longer has. But we lose sight of it because that we don't have a culture that reinforces it. So if there were actually a culture of it, it would be a lot easier because it would

be within the rhythm. We're such outliers, even having this conversation. So five times a day, like let's just everyone could just take a moment to recognize our death. It is a little bit extreme. Five times a year. You're gonna die. You're gonna die. By the way, just in case you forgot an hour ago, you're still gonna die. But that's why the app is beautiful because the app and I sometimes post it on my Instagram. No one even knows what I'm doing and I'm just trying to populate the thought. But it's always in the abstract. It's beautiful. It's day card. It's, you know, it's just something that it takes you a minute to unspool. Like, what's this related to death?

I'm like, oh, you know. Well, I think the other thing that it does is that it causes at least me to go, man, I need to stop delaying my bliss and happiness now. I need to stop delaying the things I want to go do, the memories I want to make. I got to stop delaying the emotions I'd like to experience. Cause I just think,

here's the thing most human beings think. They think everyone else is gonna die. It's hope not you, right? Except them. Wait, wait, I want to redo what's on my phone then. This is my screen, it's just like it just popped up and I was like, oh right, life is not lost by dying.

Life is lost, minute by minute, day by day, day by dragging day, all in the small uncaring ways. Jesus. That's what I'm saying. So that's more, but it's not more. That's actually beautiful. Thank you, Steven Vincent Bennett. I don't know who you are. But I love you. I love you. I love him too. And that's my photo is at least the app called again. It's called We Croak. Okay. We croak. I think I can get on with crew. All right. Last question for you.

Um, by the way, I've enjoyed today. Tremendously today tremendously. Me too. Yeah, I bet you would do it again. By the way, everyone get burned the boats and go follow Matt Higgins on Instagram or anywhere else that you want to follow him. All of that you've achieved. So from that little boy who's, I picture not the cell in the flowers, little boy. I picture the boy cleaning up the bubble gum

under the tables at McDonald's. And I picture this little boy trying to not let the world know that he comes from this place and he's got this mother who's kind of disabled at home and he's caring for her. And just probably afraid and wondering what his life's going to be like. I picture that little boy. And then the whole journey all the way to Shark Tank and the Jets and the dolphins and partner with Stephen Ross in your business in the beginning and all the different things that you've done. And now public notoriety more with the TV shows and

Your book out and the friends you've made and VaynerMedia and all the other stuff you've been involved with Has it been worth it? I mean be honest, too I want the actual honest anthem some of us is is going through everything you've gone through to get where you are, is it worth it? Or is the path of least resistance potentially more worth it? And do you ever wonder that? Do you ever look at someone who's led a much more simple life and thought to yourself, wow, wonder, wonder which road was the right road? And I'm curious, because I think a lot of people think about those things as they're listening or watching us today. The honest answer is, I never question whether it's worth it, except if I have to make compromises as it pertains to the kids.

It's my worst nightmare if my epitaph doesn't read their in lies. The great dad did the best he could or if they don't ratify that epitaph. You know what I mean? And so that is the only moment because we all make choices. I so desperately want to get that right. But otherwise, I do, I feel like it was 100%. I feel like I'm painting. I feel like this is what life is about,

and this driving and the perpetual pursuit of figuring out what I'm capable of. It's always felt very natural. And for me, like, why am I here? I am grateful that I responded to what I went through, not by feeling like, well, no one saved me. You know what I mean? Which a lot of people could feel like I had to do the hard work.

I don't, the mind take away from watching my mother slowly die. And she died on the first day. I became press secretary of the mayor of New York, which I put in the book to be like, there's no happy endings guaranteed. And no one came in and saved us. Is that I deliberately keep that experience very raw and unhield. Like if we started talking about it, I would weep. Like an 48 year old man, like get over it already.

I don't wanna get over it because it was the most important thing I ever witnessed that if somebody had had interseeded, she didn't need to die. She was a great person, she was very smart. I didn't need to grow up and squalor, right? So the ameliorating of suffering is the highest and best use of my energy resources and power. So I have been on a mission since a little kid cutely aware that if I could accumulate that authority, those resources, but if I stayed

connected to the pain, I would always be empathetic and that would be a life worth living. So to be honest, it's all quite calculated because of that one moment, but that's why that one moment must stay raw and unhealed. So the answer is, is it worth it when I get those messages now from people read the book and say, like, I know why you wrote it. I know what you meant. Want to meet a feel and I feel it. And I'm ready to do it. That feels incredible. When you're just talking, I'm just thinking so far, life really well lived. Yeah, I hope so. I think so. Very intentional at least, except for, you know, the anxiety and the,

the, you know, but that's, we all have trauma. I talk also the other thing I want to talk openly in the book about. Like even Shark Tank having a posture switch or a Mont Shark Tank, if you saw the tape of me on Shark Tank, you'd say he's a natural, right? Just objectively, they said I was, right? They brought me back recurring shark, but I think that's a disservice, you know, and so I have a choice to make. If I pull back the curtain and show you how I really feel, now you don't feel less than or other than, you can meet me there and we could go together and cross to threshold. My book is not an act of lecturing or teaching. It's an act of commiseration.

And so I think it's a life worth of it. It feels that way. The book, I can't see past the book now, which is weird for me. People say, what's next? I don't think there needs to be an ex. I think this was the point. Well, I can tell you that it feels that way now, but that is okay. Okay. Okay. I can promise you. That's probably fatigue, right? You have fatigue, and you have too much momentum and too much to give, and you're growing and you're too

self-aware. Because in 10 years, it'll be a completely different dude there, an improved version of him sitting in front of me. I just hope we're both here in the 10 years of the conversation. Like guys, me too. been amazing. Yeah. Yeah. I love today's conversation. Guys, this is why I do the show right here. This is why I do the show. Conversations like today. It's why you guys share the show. It's the fastest growing show on the planet for a reason. And it's because of all of you, but it's also because of people that sit in that seat, deliver in ways that it's just supernatural. When we do this together, and Matt did it again today. God bless you all, max out. This is The Ed Milach Show.

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