THE ED MYLETT SHOW - How To Grow EVERY DAY : Do The Hard Thing

Episode Date: April 26, 2025

👇 SUBSCRIBE TO MY YOUTUBE CHANNEL - so this show can reach more people 👇 https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIprGZAdzn3ZqgLmDuibYcw?sub_confirmation=1 Click the Link Below to Subscribe to my email list to MAXOUT your life (all value, no fluff) https://konect.to/edmylett 💥 Get my exclusive Monday Motivation training in GrowthDay, the world’s #1 app for advanced mindset and personal development. Visit https://growthday.com/ed. This show is sponsored by GrowthDay. Are You Really Growing — or Just Staying Busy? The truth is, most people aren’t actually growing. They’re just repeating the same day over and over again, calling it progress. In this mashup episode, I brought together some of the most driven, focused, and self-aware people I know — Tony Robbins, Rob Dyrdek, Steve Weatherford, Brendon Burchard, Tom Bilyeu, and Christina Pazsitzky — to get brutally honest about what it really takes to grow every single day. And let me tell you, it’s not just doing more. It’s doing what matters most, consistently, with heart and with intention. I start the episode by challenging the idea that achievement alone brings fulfillment. I’ve done the grind. I’ve chased the goals. But if you're not working on your identity — that internal thermostat — you’ll keep cooling your life back down to the same old temperature. That’s the truth. You’ll hit a new level, then fall back into old habits if you don’t reset who you believe you are. That’s why I talk about blissful dissatisfaction — the art of being grateful for what you have while staying hungry for more. You’ll hear Tony Robbins talk about the difference between reading affirmations and conditioning your state through incantations. He shares the story of literally running 13.5 miles, fueled by sheer belief and a burning desire to never go back to the pain. Then Brendon Burchard breaks down the science of high performance, the exact habits and mindsets that separate the top 5% from the rest — things like deliberate energy, efforts of impact, and the power of tracking your intentions daily. Rob Dyrdek opens up about systematizing his life around his family — not the other way around — and shares wild stories of pushing past fear, including a moment he thought he might not survive. Steve Weatherford talks about chasing greatness while secretly hating himself, and what it took to finally look in the mirror and love the man staring back. Christina brings it all home with her story of forgiveness and healing after a traumatic past, and Tom Bilyeu shares how failing publicly became the best teacher of his life. Key Takeaways: - Why you keep “cooling down” after momentum, and how to permanently raise your life’s thermostat. - Tony Robbins on rewiring your state through incantations and immersive change. - Brendon Burchard on the real habits that separate top performers — and how to apply them daily. - Rob Dyrdek’s radical approach to building life around priorities, not just productivity. - Steve Weatherford on loving yourself before any achievement can matter. - Christina Pazsitzky’s moving story of choosing meaning over pain. - Tom Bilyeu’s wake-up call: talent isn’t enough — it’s earned through obsession and relentless reps. This isn’t about hype. It’s not about chasing empty success. This is about building a life you're proud of — every single day. The guests in this episode didn’t just share ideas — they shared the raw, unfiltered truth about what it costs to grow for real. And now it’s your turn. No more waiting. No more playing small. Let's go — your future is waiting. Thank you for watching this video—Please Share it and get the word out! 👇 SUBSCRIBE TO MY YOUTUBE CHANNEL👇 https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIprGZAdzn3ZqgLmDuibYcw?sub_confirmation=1 ▶︎ Visit My WEBSITE | https://www.EdMylett.com #EdMylett #Motivation Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

So hey guys, listen, we're all trying to get more productive and the question is how do you find a way to get an edge? I'm a big believer that if you're getting mentoring or you're in an environment that causes growth, a growth-based environment, that you're much more likely to grow and you're going to grow faster and that's why I love Growth Day. Growth Day is an app that my friend Brendan Burchard has created that I'm a big fan of. Write this down growthday.com forward slash ed. So if you want to be more productive, by the way, he's asked me, I post videos in there every single Monday that gets your day off to the right start. He's got about 5,000, $10,000 worth of courses that are in there that come with

the app. Also some of the top influencers in the world are all posting content and they're on a regular basis, like having the Avengers of personal development and business in one app. And I'm honored that he asked me to be a part of it as well and contribute on a weekly basis. And I do. So go over there and get signed up.

You're going to get a free tuition free voucher to go to an event with Brendan and myself and a bunch of other influencers as well. So you get a free event out of it also. So go to growthday.com forward slash ed. That's growthday.com forward slash ed. The all new all electric Can-Am Pulse motorcycle is your cheat code for the city. Light, agile, and stylish for all you smart commuters. Find your pulse today. Learn more at CanAmMotorcycles.com. This is the Ed Mylet Show. Hey everyone, welcome to my weekend special.

I hope you enjoy the show. Be sure to follow the Ed Mylet Show on Apple and Spotify. Links are in the show notes. You'll never miss an episode that way. You are one decision away from changing your life. And you have to accept that. You're one new meeting, one new relationship, one new contact, one new action, one new decision away from shifting your life from where it is right now to a totally different place.

So what's the decision? You already know I could go backstage now. There's something you've been hesitating on. There's a contact you need to make, isn't there? There's a job you need to quit. There's a relationship you need to engage in. Maybe there's a relationship you need to leave. I don't know what it is, but I know there's a decision that you need to make to take you to the next level, just like I know that's true for me. Because decisions shape our destiny when they're backed up by some massive ass action.

Okay, but you can't take the action if you don't decide. Everyone say yes. People avoid being desperate. Think of the fact, they come here tonight and they're down, they're not where they wanna be financially. Their relationships aren't what they want. Maybe they're in a desperate place and you might think that's a negative thing.

But when you're in a desperate place, you take the best actions. Desperation is a great place to be. Those of you that are achieving, one of the reasons the achievement is slowed down is you've allowed yourself to feel less desperate. When you were broke and starting your business or when you were brand new in your relationship and you were desperate to get her to love you or desperate to get him to love you, you took massive big action. How many of you are moms in the room? Raise your hand.

You moms, if you woke up tomorrow morning and your baby wasn't in their bed, would you be desperate right away, yes or no? Big time desperation. You wouldn't be thinking about what you need to do. You'd be acting, wouldn't you? You'd immediately make the decision. You'd take massive action.

You'd search the house. You'd go into the street. Would you worry if your makeup was on right? How you looked, what people thought about you? You wouldn't, would you? Have to have the perfect plan to go find your baby that's missing. You wouldn't need any of that because you are desperate.

So when you remove desperation, all this bullshit creeps into your life where you think you have to have the perfect plan and look the perfect way and have the perfect thoughts and be all zen and perfect. What you need is to be desperate. What you need is to get after it. And I want you to get desperate to make that decision.

Why? Because our obsessions become our possessions. What you obsess about most regularly you will eventually possess in your life. The challenge for most people, sisters and brothers, is that we obsess on the things we're fearful of. What we don't have, what we're worried about. And then we end up possessing those things

over and over again, rather than programming ourselves to become obsessed with what we want, what our dreams are, what we believe we deserve. When we become obsessed about those things, long term, we end up possessing those things. Can I get an amen for that, yes? Yeah, most of us don't replace the external parts of our lives, because those things happen naturally

without thought. The external results of our life, in order to replace ourselves with the next best version, requires intention, requires obsession, requires desperation. Everyone with me on that, say yes. So it's not unnatural to change. Your friends that think you're crazy

to have started your business or come to a seminar or spend money you don't have, they're the crazy ones. It's unnatural to be the same person you are right now next year. For all of you in here, the 35-year-old you should be gone next year forever, and there should be a brand new, better 36-year-old. You 20-year-olds, there should be a better 21-year-old

next year. You 20 year olds, there should be a better 21 year old next year. You should constantly be replacing yourself just like your bones do, just like your lungs do, just like your cells do. It's natural to be replacing ourselves, but we're around people who aren't so we think it's natural not to. So the way that I changed my life first is I worked on my identity. Your identity is the thoughts, concepts, and beliefs that you hold to be most true about yourself. Stay with me. Here's how it works.

This is how life works. I can teach you all of the mechanics of winning, but winning is about 75% psychology, about 25% mechanics. And if you can't get the psychology part right, you can do all the actions perfectly, and you've proven this to yourself several times, and still not produce the results you want. Here's why.

Your identity is like a thermostat setting for your entire life. So there's a thermostat in this room. It's set the room to a temperature. Let's just say it's 75 degrees. Guess what sets the temperature for the entire room? The thermostat. It's how life works too.

It's not the external things that enter our lives that dictate what our life is like. In this room, if we open the door and hot air blew in here, 90 degrees of air blew in, right? What would the thermostat do? It would regulate the room, turn the air conditioner on, and cool the room back to 75 degrees. Am I right or am I right?

That's what happens in your life. You have a thermostat setting for your relationships, for your faith, for your money, for your wellness, for your body, for your spirituality, for your life. You have a thermostat setting for your relationships, for your faith, for your money, for your wellness, for your body, for your spirituality, for your business. And what's happened to you over and over again is you start to get your, you're a 75 degree, or let's say in business, and you start to get it going, don't you?

It's going better than it's ever gone before. The results are incredible. And then all of a sudden, 90 days later, you've cooled your life back down to 75 degrees again. You've had great relationships in your life, but you're at 75 degree or inside, the relationship's beautiful, it's wonderful, everything's incredible.

90 days later, you've cooled it back down to 75 degrees. In your body, you had a 75 degree identity physically, and you got in shape, you started eating good, you were working out, you're in 90, 95 degree body. 90 days later You cooled it back down to 75 again this regulates everything in our life So you can't get out over your skis you can't exceed your identity long term. It'll never happen This is why people's lives yo-yo up and down because they always work on the external mechanics and not the internal

Identity of their lives and this governs your happiness, your peace, your fitness, your money, all of it. I'm standing up here because I'm great at adjusting my thermostat setting. I believe in something called blissful dissatisfaction. There's a misnomer in the world that, man, for a lot of competitive people, drivers are like, hey, if I enjoy myself right now,

I'm gonna lose all my drive. I'm just gonna delay my happiness. Number one problem in the world today is people say I'm gonna delay my happiness until a future time. Once I get that relationship, then I'll let myself be happy. Once I have the house, then I'll be happy. Once I have the car, then I'll be happy. Once I have the promotion, I'll be happy.

Once I have a certain amount of money, then I'll be happy. The problem is you have to bring you to all those places. And people think if I lose, if I let myself enjoy my life right now, I might lose my edge. The athletes I coach think that all the time. Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, if you don't enjoy the victories as you go,

your brain doesn't produce any dopamine, and you actually lose the desire to continue to perform. There's a direct correlation between celebrating your wins and wanting to do more of them. See, when I was broke, and I was broke longer than I've been rich, you know what I'd always do when I'd walk into a store? I'd never get what I wanted.

I'd always check the price tag. What's it cost? What's it cost? What's it cost? What's it cost? And when you're always looking at what it costs, you never get what you want. And a lot of us do that in our lives. Every day we're repeating to ourselves, what's this costing me? The sacrifice I'm going through, I don't know if I can go through anymore. And you

lose what you want. You've got to quit negotiating the price. Right now make the decision that any price is worth it as long as it's legal, ethical, and moral for you to make your family proud of you. For you to make your dream happen. Stop negotiating the price. This negotiation you keep doing in your mind, is this really where I'm supposed to be? Is this what I'm supposed to be doing? Steals all your energy, it steals your focus. But those of you that get laser focused, that become totally immersed in your dream, that know those babies of yours, your parents, guess what? They're worth the sacrifice. Probably when you were a little one, I got three minutes

guys, probably when you were a little boy or a little girl, here's what I'll bet. There was somebody in your life at some point. I pray that made you feel special Maybe one maybe they've even passed away Maybe it was a grandma or a grandpa or a parent. I just got chills or a coach or Somebody that just they made you feel special mine was my papa I'm named after my Edward the third we'd ride in his van on Sundays to go get donuts and I'd sit there and he'd just look at me,

he goes, Eddie, you're the special one. And I'd look at him, I said, I am papa. He goes, you're my favorite grandson. He had 15 grandkids, he'd always tell me, you're my favorite. He probably told all of them, but I get chills right now. He made me feel special. Can you remember that person in your life

and how they made you feel when you were a little boy or a little girl? You just felt something with them, didn't you? You just, man, I was born for a reason, I'm special, I'm supposed to be somebody, I'm supposed to make a difference in my life. Let me tell you something, whoever that person was, if you were blessed to have them,

listen, they were right about you. And maybe over the time of your life and your childhood and grade school and you get into the world and business doesn't work and a relationship and you forget. But I'm here to remind you tonight they were right. And what you're really after is that feeling. What you're really after is that the way they made you feel

is living up to it. Because at the end of our lives, I don't know whether or not you're going to live, but I know for sure you're going to die. And I don't know whether or not you're gonna live before you die. Most of us are not living because we're so worried about what everybody thinks about us. Or maybe what we don't feel about ourselves. Let me say something to

you real clear. If you spend the rest of your life worrying about everybody thinks about you, someday you'll never have to worry about it again because when you die nobody will remember you were here. Stop worrying about what these people think about you. Live your dream. Worry about the people you love. By the way I know some of the very people you're doing it for are the ones not supporting you. They're the ones telling you to quit. They're the ones giving you heck.

Just do it anyway. I have this theory that someday when I die, and as a Christian I believe I get to meet the Lord, I don't care if you believe it's energy, ala I don't care. But I have this belief that when I die you'll say well done good and faithful servant. But here's what I think happens.

I think he introduces me to the man I was born to be, the destiny version of me. I think you get introduced to that woman someday. This is who I made you to be. This is who you could have been, man. These are the experiences, the people you could have helped, the contribution, the moments, the memory, the magic, the way you could feel about yourself.

Meet him, meet her. This is who you were born to be. To me, heaven, heaven, I don't know what it looks like, I don't know if it's energy or a place you go, but heaven to me is when I meet that man, we're identical twins. I did it all and he goes, man, I've been watching you. And I go, brother, I've been chasing you all my life.

He goes, you caught me, I watched you, I'm so proud of you, you did it all, right? Hell would be meeting that person someday and you're total strangers with them. I don't want you to have that happen at the end of your life where all these things you were capable of, all the possibilities, all the moments, all the travel, all the trips, all the help,

all the contribution, none of it happens because you won't fight for your family. You won't get obsessed for what you want. You won't transfer energy to people. You won't stop negotiating the price. You won't program your reticular activating system. You won't work on your identity. All that's on the line is your dad gum life. That's all, just your life.

That's all we're talking about here is just you, your precious soul who's enough, who's got greatness in him, who can do whatever he or she ever dreamed of, if they'll just start believing it, if they'll start taking massive action, you were born to do something great with your life. You were born to do something magic in small ways,

in big ways, in quiet ways. Maybe it's not gonna be millions of dollars. Maybe it's gonna be one person you inspire with your story, what you overcome. One kind word, one message, one moment, with one person can change the world. And I know you're capable of it. And whoever made you feel special,

and if there was nobody like that in your life, I apply for the position. If you're with me daily in my podcasts, in my media, in my social media, I apply for the position to believe in you because I know how great you are. I know what you're capable of. I know this, your dreams gonna be tattered all the time. Sometimes you just got to hold it together with hope. Sometimes you got to hold together a little Velcro, right? I don't know what you got to hold it together with, but here's what I know about you last. Listen to me, you were born to do something special

with your life. You're not invisible, you're loved, you're cared for, you're cherished, you're believed in. You came here with a purpose. I don't say that to inspire you, I try to give you some tools to help you. I've got hundreds of other tools I can help you with if you follow my stuff.

I'm existing in the world for the next 50 years just to serve people, just to help you, just to hopefully contribute to your life, to be a tough guy and tell you to fight, but to be your biggest advocate and your biggest believer as well. So I'm over on my time. God bless you and max out the rest of your life. Thank you. My guest today, he's been a friend of mine for almost 30 years. I was thinking about as I was prepping for this.

I've known him for 30 years. Holy cow. So Tony Robbins, welcome back to the show, brother. Good to see you, man. How does someone condition change? So you used the word patterns earlier, right? And in both of our work with different people, they've got where they've got because they've developed these patterns and maybe they do read a book or they come to a one day event or something like that.

And there's change, but how do you condition change in somebody? Is that what you would call immersion over a three-day window? Or is it some habitual change when they get back that's task or routine oriented? Conditioning change is kind of the rub. I think it's like the next level of advice that's given to somebody that I don't see being discussed very often. I think it's a hard question. So I'm curious as to what your answer is about conditioning a change. Well, let me give you two quick answers to it. One is how I did originally, because I didn't know how, right? I started reading all these books. The first book I read when I was, you know, just,

you know, 17 years old, my mom kicked my dad out. She chased me out with a knife. I knew she wouldn't kill me, but I wasn't going back in that house. And I was like, okay, I'm walking in the rain trying to figure out what to do. I stayed in the laundry room on the second night, first night on the hill and it rained, so the next night in the laundry room of a friend's. And I had a small amount of money, like, I don't know,

19, 20 bucks, and I took the bus and I went to this bookstore I'd seen years before, and I got this book called The Magic of Believing by Claude M. Bristol. And in the book, it talked about conditioning your mind, and that it talked about not affirmations, I'm happy, I'm happy, I'm happy, and your brain goes, yes, you're not happy, but incantations is when you speak it, you engage your body with such intensity. Now today I understand when you want to

change something, you change the body, you change your focus, and you change your language. When you change all three of those things radically, somebody who's depressed uses their body a certain way, they talk with a certain tone of voice, they focus on what they can't control, they focus on things in the past they can't shift, they focus on what's missing. It's not hard to figure out what's going to happen. They use words like I tried, I can't, I don't know. There's what I call a triad. These three things are done a certain way when you're depressed. If you change that person's body radically, the tempo they speak, their voice, you change their focus to what they are in control of,

you change their language, everything shifts. Well, when you do incantations, think of like affirmations only, speaking aloud with total intensity over and over again with repetition, it's like conditioning your mind, your body, and your emotions at once. So I was working in these two banks, mom kicked me out, and they were in San Marino, California near Pasadena, California, and I worked there. I was still in high school and I would take the buses there because they didn't have a car. My mom kept my car, it was a 1960 Volkswagen bug, and I got there and I cleaned the banks

because it wasn't by the hour, it was by the result. So I cleaned two banks, I was really good at it, I did a really good job and by finished by two in the morning, I get on the bus, by 3.30 in the morning, I'm home, I go to sleep, wake up on four hours sleep and go to school, it was pretty brutal. One night I come out of the bank, changed my entire life. I'm waiting for the bus, waiting for the bus, waiting for the bus.

45 minutes, no bus. There's nobody around. It's three in the morning. I gotta get home. What the hell am I gonna do? I know I can call and do this. I'm million miles away. So all of a sudden a guy comes creeping down the street and he rolls down his window and goes, hey buddy. So I'm at the bus stop. He goes, didn't you see the paper? There's a bus strike. There's no way to get home. So what did I do? Part of it was initially anger

with my mother kicking me out and I'll show her. But then I remember I read this book. So I was doing these things every day and every way. I'm getting stronger and stronger every day and every way I'm getting stronger every day and every way I'm getting stronger and stronger every day and every way I'm getting stronger and stronger. I did that for the first 20 minutes then happier and happier healthier. I ran 13 and a half

miles and never run two miles in my entire life. It became the power that I still tap into this day. I literally found a part of myself by demand by conditioning by the end of that like I was utterly certain what I can do. You know when when you see an athlete, a kicker, you know, on a football team, a basketball player about to do a free throw and you think they're going to miss it, you can tell before they release the ball or kick the ball, they're going to miss. You see they're lacking certainty. When you look at somebody like Steph and he releases that ball and he turns and doesn't even look and it's already a swish, people go, oh my God, he's a genius. No, he's being rewarded in public for what he's practiced a billion times in

private Steph told me he shoots I've seen him 500 shots every single day of his entire adult life from the time he was a teenager but just take his 15-year career 500 shots a day it's 14,000 shots a month 168,000 shots a month, 168,000 shots a year, 15-year career, that's 2.52 million shots he's taken to make 3300 to be the greatest three-point shooter in history. That's conditioning, right? You do it, you do it, you do it, you do it. But there is a way to speed it up.

When Stanford came to me and wanted to do that study on depression a couple of years ago during COVID, they wanted to see, they saw the results, they couldn't believe it, right? People that get depressed, they had two professors that had gone, no more clinical depression whatsoever. So they wanted to do the study. The most people, 40, 60% of the people that get treated with drugs or psychological treatment are still depressed. That's the meta studies. 40% improve, average improvement 50%. They're half as depressed. They did it with us, 100% of the people after five days from date with destiny, not a single

person. A year later, 11 months later, nobody does. 17% of the people had suicidal ideation, none with suicidal ideation. How did that work? Well, we changed the perceptual filters, what people focused on, what things meant to them, what they do, but we did it for five or six days and nights of total immersion. And since they followed me for three years biochemically, they were interested because

they discovered this biochemistry that Tom Brady experiences, that the Tampa Bay hockey team that's won so many Stanley Cups, you know, the Lightning have done. They go into a state, if Tom Brady's down in the fourth quarter by 10 points, and he's got two minutes, there's no way you're gonna win the game. Something happens to him biochemically that happens to me every time I'm on stage,

because they measure me for three years. They call it the championship biochemistry. My testosterone surges to a level that's insane, but so does my audience. They follow me. So at that level, anything you think about, you remember. That's why the retention is so high. You remember where you were in 9-11,

you don't remember where you were in 8-11. You don't remember those moments because there's not enough emotion. There's so much emotion. Secondly, normally there would be a huge amount of cortisol. That's the stress hormone that gets in the way of your performance. For Tom, for Tampa, for me, my cortisol drops through the floor while my

testosterone is rising. That puts you in this state of absolute push, certainty, and drive. It doesn't guarantee you're going to win, but it increases your chances about a hundred fold. My audience, not only my live audience, my live audience, when we went during COVID to digital, where I had people in 195 countries participating, like we're going to do, for example, for the three days, they went around, sent people to 15 different countries, took their blood just like me, took their saliva,

measured them. Every single one of them went through this exact same pattern. And that's why, 11 months later, 72% decrease, and I've never seen them again, 72% decrease in negative emotions, 52% increase in positive emotions. In business, it's all engagement. They measure engaged, disengaged, actively disengaged. Engage you're really into it, disengaged is like quiet quitting, you do the minimum.

Actively disengaged are people that are angry and actually trying to screw you over in your own business. COVID's four years destroyed engagement more than any time in the history of the measurements at levels no one could even dream of. The one that grew the most was active disengagement, people actually angry trying to mess up the company. We did in six days, they're doing a one-year study. Most studies like this are a month to three months. Largest one they've ever done, 750 people at the end of the six days of Date with Destiny, five and a half days, every single person was higher than they were before COVID, meaning their engagement was through the roof, but what was really cool is they're measuring it. The year ends this month,

but I saw the six month review. Every month they increase their engagement and their effectiveness and I never spoke to them and I never saw them again. Why? Because it's in their biochemistry. Why? Because they have whole new filters in their brain. So you can do it through incantations or you can do it through some form of immersion. Well, they took the best professor at Stanford, won all these awards, had him teach my exact content as a contrast group word-for-word but without the things I do to change biochemistry and he still got 300% increases in retention that he's never seen before on the content but mine was 3,000 percents right and his were off after I think was eight weeks and mine a year later was still producing the

results so there is a science to changing your conditioning so you can do it the rote by incantation, do it rote by having new rituals. There's so many ways you can do it. But the most powerful way I know of is total immersion where we engage your biochemistry and your emotion. And what's so cool about it is time disappears. You know, when you ask people what's a long time, some people say a century, some people say two minutes, right? A long time is anytime you're not enjoying yourself. You know, a minute can feel like eternity

if it's a horrible experience. But if you're having a great time, time disappears. And you know, even the events, we go 12 hours a day, literally around the world. When I'm doing my events here, like the last event I just did here, Date with Destiny, we had people in 195 countries, so it's every country in the world.

We had like, we'd start here at 10 a.m It's already midnight in Australia They go from midnight to about 1 in the afternoon for six straight days in a row and we lost 1% of the people Give you an idea. It's that engaging right there in a whole different time zone. It doesn't matter They're in the zone and our biochemistry is changed and so that's why I love books But the reason I still do seminars is because there's nothing like an immersion experience like that. And now people can do it from anywhere on earth or they can come in person and do it

too because now that COVID is over, we do both. Yeah. And that's by way, this event at jointony100.com, I want you to go. It's just, that's because you have immersion over three days. Here's what I just want you all to do. So I'll give you a, my simple language from that success, bliss, achievement, ecstasy is a biochemistry. It's a neurochemistry and a biochemistry. And so if you want to find those states of being, it's a biochemistry. And so just for a lot of you, something really simple to do

when you're training physically, if you work out, you run, you walk, these are times where you should be anchoring your goals and your visions of your life. When you're training physically, if you work out, you run, you walk, these are times where you should be anchoring your goals and your visions of your life when you're in that elevated state of neuro and biochemistry. It's just a much more powerful anchoring and conditioning for you to create a change in your life. And so elevated emotional or physical states and anchoring the things that you want in your life, your visions and your goals and your ambitions, now you're anchoring the biochemistry and the neurochemistry, the likelihood of those things happening and repeating themselves becomes that much higher. This is important stuff for you guys. The man to my left is literally one of the most interesting men in the world. This is Rob Dyrdek.

Thank you for being here brother. Thanks for having me. I've seen it in video now to experience what it's actually like to be here live, it's so much more beautiful and remarkable than I could ever imagine. My goal is to be known for the life that I created, the life that I lived, and the way that I systematized it and built it, that ultimately people could replicate in their own lives in the future. The example is going to be bananas. I actually admire the diversity of your success. It's been a lot of fun. I mean, it's like... Brother, come on.

And I'll tell you another moment too, man, after I got attacked by that shark. Yeah. Because I'm like, this is so dumb. Like, this isn't even going to be good. Like, why am I doing this? That's every stunt. Every stunt. It's like, this isn't even that... This. Like, why am I doing this? That's every stunt. Every stunt. It's like, this isn't even that, this is so dumb. And afterwards, like, no one in the world.

No one in the world. Right. But I remember swimming up off of the, looking down on that boat and stopping as I was swimming up and there's like 50 sharks swimming around telling myself, just look and soak this into your mind because you will never be back here again.

You know, and I have that to go along with the great photo of that like shark on my arm, you know what I mean? Like, but that. For all the achievers though, and for me, like I just want you to know something, you take, you mention it, but I gotta be honest with you,

it's one of the things you're supposed to say to me. I don't think I personally, and I'm an achiever and I enjoy my life and people come to me for advice on how to live better, but I think I could do a better job of telling myself, hey man, stop what you've said, the flight to Catalina, the shark thing, like stop. I think achievers have to do that once in a while. Stop, appreciate this moment for a second, man.

It's not coming back again. And you and I are talking about your kids at their ages and it made me think, did I appreciate all those moments when they were two, when they were infants, when they were three, when they were eight and 10, and I didn't. And I wish I could go back in those moments again. So think about it too though.

Think about how optimized you are as a man today versus when they were born. True. Right, and the lucky thing for me is I had evolved to a place where being super efficient and using my energy for what I'm only passionate about and having clear goals and vision for life is the foundation that I started with for the family. So I've never missed a

pediatrician appointment. I've rarely, I've never missed waking them up, very rarely when I'm gone or putting them to bed, right? And that's by design. That's by moving out of a fantasy factory in downtown and living in Hollywood to a home in Beverly Hills and an office in Beverly Hills and being super close as you're developing this life and creating a plan for how I use my time and my schedule. You know what I mean?

Everything is systematized around full balance. I take my first meeting at 11 a.m., my last one at five, it never changes. I don't compromise my schedule and my time with my family and wife in my pursuit, right? I fit it inside it, you know. Whoa, so say something about that. So I wanna get into this life thing now because I love the word about optimizing your life.

Since the second we talked, the first time we talked was gonna be five minutes just turned into a really long phone call, we actually together talked about these things. These very topics are what you and I discussed when we first connected. Of all those stunts you had though, I'm just curious because it leads to life. We're gonna go into life stuff now. So you had the deal with the tiger chasing you down and mauling you. That to me, even for me, I don't know why, that's even scarier than the shark thing for me.

Seeing that sucker run after you, dude, like. They're trained. I don't give a crap. Sharks in the ocean aren't, but he was biting my neck and they kept saying, put it down, put it down. Cause I was the it. You know what I mean? Like I'm like, is this guy supposed to be doing this? Like they're a millimeter away from some artery like there's just come on man

That's I'll say the scariest thing of all of them was jockeying a horse for a race Like that was the scariest of all of them because the car stuff you're in a cage Okay, like you're covered in the mesh here train tiger Like when you're on the back of a horse going 40 miles an hour, like if you, when you can barely, if you get shot off that thing, you're basically in a, like a car wreck with no car, right? Like that was the scariest thing. Are you hearing what we're saying to each other right now?

Like, you know what was scarier than getting bit by a shark? It wasn't the tiger, it was right in the heart. But then for me, I think- And it feels good to be able to say it. You know what I mean. It must feel good. It's like, I don't think about it so often, but then just even talking about, comparing them and thinking about it,

and the fact that I own that as a highlight rear forever, it makes me happy. Yeah, and it's also like, hey man, look, being on TV all that long for some people would be scary. Staying at the top that long can be scary. Not wanting to fall off the totem pole you've climbed up, the flag pole, all those things. But I wanna ask you about one of the stunts you did,

because I think, at least for me, it would cause me to do a little reflection. So of all of them you did, the one that captured my heart the most was the one where Laird drags you on the, I think it's Laird on the Sea-Doo, into riding the wave. Okay, and so you ride this wave and you crash and you thought you were gonna die.

Of all of them, is that the one that you were the most sure you were gonna die in the middle of? I'm curious. No, I mean, it's the only time in my life that I was dying. So tell me about what happened there and what it did to you. The trippiest thing about it too is like, it was pouring rain and I swear, the moment I stepped in the water to do it,

it stopped raining and a rainbow went right over it, right? And I'm like, what? Like it was freaky enough, we're like, what is going on? Like it was just this freaky sort of moment in time. So it like already had this like weird tone. And if you can imagine, like,, and then some of the local Hawaiian guys were asked where I was getting towed in, and they were like, ooh, it's real sharky out there.

So I'm like. Sharky? Was this after the shark thing or before it? This is way after, but it doesn't, when you're getting a Bahamas reef shark with a metal thing, like it's super controlled. When you're laying on your back in the deep ocean and all you can think of is like sharks coming up

from underneath to get you, I didn't even, I wasn't worried about what was gonna happen in that wave. I just wanted to get up so that I don't get attacked by a shark, right? And if you can imagine this, you know, I've grinded a 20-star handrail and flipped a car ramp to ramp and done all these crazy stunts and you face them, you face the danger.

On getting towed into a giant wave, it's behind you. So like you, like I'd never surfed before, it was literally the only time I'd ever surfed in my life. You had never surfed before. Never surfed before. And it was like the first wave I ever surfed was like 18 feet, right? And so it's the most peaceful, amazing,

like, you know, cause you can't see it and like you're like, whoa, you know what I mean? Like, what do we do? And then it's like a house crashes on you and you don't like, you can feel something coming. You can start to hear it and then just wham. And now you're in like this fight, everything in you to can start to hear it, and then just wham, and now you're in this fight, everything in you to just get to the surface, right?

So, I was like, you know, it's really weird management of emotions and experiences as it's related to when you get into kill mode for stunts, right, because you have to shift into a mindset of like, where you basically, you get to a deeply calm place because you literally, nothing else matters, and you understand that for this moment in time,

you have to put everything you have into making sure that you do everything for this to work. It's a different level of mindset, right? Because your life is on the line for this moment. And it's so much easier when you're facing it and you go, go, go, go, go, you know? And in this one, so as I did it and fought back up and then I wanna get out of the water,

I wanna get back up, you know, all this, it wasn't as bad, right? So it was like, okay, it got up pretty good. Like that didn't, you know, it's still water. You know, I got spun around, but it wasn't too bad. Okay, let's try to get a bigger one, right? Like, so you get into that zone. And now the problem was, I got a bigger one

and one right behind it. So not only did I get annihilated, but then as I was trying to find the surface, another one came down and now I'm so deep and have no idea where the surface is. And believe it or not, this is a viciously vivid memory. Just out of death. Wasn't trying to, you gotta remember this. You gotta die here, you wanna remember this.

You remember, hold on to this one. You know what I mean, no, no, this is like, you're like, like, eyes open, spinning, it was just all white, and I just, remember, kept trying to push to what I thought was the surface, and I kept going nowhere, and the light kept changing, and I kept trying to find what I thought was the surface and I kept going nowhere and the light kept changing and I kept trying to find what I think was the surface

and it all kept looking the same regardless of where I went and I was, could not, no more breath, no more breath, no more breath, like as far as you can hold, as far as you can hold, as far as you can hold, as far as you can, if you can't, you can't, you can't, you can't. And right as I like had to like pass out to take the breath,

I popped right up. And then he come flying and he was so freaked out, right? Because it's all fun and games. You're Laird Hamilton, you're gnarly, you literally don't even have the gene to even be scared of water. You're literally Aquaman. So you're like, of course you can do it, Rob.

He just looks at me as like, you're a stunt guy, you So you're like, of course you can do it Rob. Like he just looks at me and he's like, you're a stunt guy, you can do this stuff easy. He thought I died for sure. And he just, we are done. He ripped me out of that, threw me on the back. We are done. Like he was so freaked out. And of course we made that whole episode,

we wrote that episode around testing your man level. And we had decided I had reached it. Yeah, you reached it. And the joke was like, man, you don't wanna get to the edge of your man level, because you really lose some layers of your man level if layers gotta give you mouth to mouth. Oh my gosh, yeah, right. But yeah, that was.

I think if people rewound that, and they were listening to your description of what it was like during that time, some people feel like their life's in that place right now. They're just, everything looks the same. They can't get out of it. They can't get out of it. Really what you eventually is, you just kind of surrendered, right? And then, thank God you popped up. Yeah, I, uh, that's my favorite story, by the way, of all the stunts is to think that you, that was the one where you thought you were dead. I mean, that's, it's insane.

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Very short intermission here, folks. I'm glad you're enjoying the show so far. Be sure to follow the Ed Mylett show on Apple and Spotify. Links are in the show notes. You'll never miss an episode that way. This jacked up dude right here to my left is a Super Bowl champion. And I have a funny feeling that today will be a life altering conversation for many of you. So I'm so excited you're here brother.

This is Steve Weatherford everyone Thanks for being here, man. That means a lot to me, man Are you telling me that even that day you make the Saints you're not feeling great about yourself? Oh my god So this is a good that's actually we didn't talk about this just everybody listen and watch and realize this we didn't talk about this Off-camera and it's funny that you said that because the day that I realized that I actually made a pro football team, I walk into the locker room and they rearranged everybody's locker. Cause in training camp, you have 103 people on your team. And then they trim it down to 53.

So he's a lot of the buddies and friendships that you made during training camp. The guys are gone. And so I walk in and I'm looking for where my locker used to be and it's moved. And now they moved it to numerical. And so I walk in and I'm looking for where my locker used to be and it's moved and now they moved it to numerical And so I'm number seven. And so I look to the right of my locker and it's number five Reggie freaking Bush Oh my gosh, I look to my left and it's drew freaking breeze I'm thinking to myself that I'm like I Don't belong here. Oh my god. Yeah, Like literally, that's the first thing I said to myself that like, I don't belong here.

I'm in between the greatest, one of the greatest college football players of all time and Drew freaking Breeze. Yeah, one of the greatest NFL players of all time. Right. So it's, and I'm in between them. Man, dude, this is a lot of pressure, but it wasn't, it wasn't a, I don't belong like,

let's pack the bags and go home. I always learned, you know, it's, it's the imposter syndrome. Like, like right now I played in, I played 10 NFL year, I played 10 years in the National Football League and we have 16 games a year. So let's say, you know, you include some,

some playoff games in there. I played about 175 NFL games and I puked 175 times before the game. You're not serious 100% serious and I actually shared a vomit bucket with Chris Snead who's in the ring of honor for the New York Giants We shared a puke bucket before the game and he was one of the greatest at his position That's ever played in the NFL and especially for the Giants and we shared a puke bucket before the game and he was one of the greatest at his position That's ever played in the NFL and especially for the Giants and we shared a puke bucket Yeah, like I want to have a conversation with him now that I feel like I have a higher level of consciousness And I actually like really see myself who I am you have no idea how much like self-torment

I've caused myself and I've been able to take that self-torment and turn it into achievement Yes but every single achievement that you get you know, you get, you're 108 pounds and then you get to 200 pounds and that doesn't make you feel any better and then you make it onto the varsity and that doesn't make you feel any better and you thought it would. So you were talking about continually pushing

the point of happiness past the cognitive horizon because it's just like, once I get here, I'll be happy. And then you get there and you're like, well, you know what, well then once I get here and then for people like. And then you get there and you're like, well, you know what? Well, then once I get here, and then for people like you and me that are just like disgustingly ambitious and motivated for life and for impact and for income and for influence,

you look at all those things and be like, how are you not happy? Like you set a goal, you achieve it, you set another goal, you achieve it, not to say like I haven't had a ton of failure and a ton of bad decisions and spent a couple nights in jail during that process, but I feel like it's really, really pertinent

for me to share that on this podcast because I know there's a lot of people out there that want to live the life that you're living, that want to live the life that I'm living, but I'm here to tell you right now, I made $15 million kicking a football for a living. I made another couple million dollars as an entrepreneur. When I walked away from that, money doesn't make you happy.

A marriage won't make you happy. Having kids won't make you happy. Winning a Super Bowl, a Pro Bowl won't make you happy. A 10-year career won't make you happy. Until you look into the mirror and you brush your teeth and you love the person that's looking back at you, which is honestly, I'm in the infancy of actually being myself.

I love that you're trying to talk. Like 22 days that I've been able to look in the mirror while I brush my teeth, and some days are a little bit easier than others, because you have to think about it. I'm fighting 30 years of instincts of hating myself. So it's just like, if I look at a new goal that I set within my business, or a new fitness goal that I set for myself, or a new family goal that I set for myself or a new family goal

that I set for myself, my instinct is to go to a place of self-hatred in order to motivate myself to achieve that goal. And I'm almost kind of like, I'm trying to like reprogram the system to pursue those things from a place of love of myself. And like you kind of alluded to it earlier, and this might be the only time I ever disagree with you,

that we all need that affirmation from other people. But I've had so much affirmation in my life, and I'm not telling you this to seem any certain type of way, but I've had so much affirmation in my life, it's desensitized myself to it, so much so that I don't believe any compliment that anybody ever gives me, or at least I didn't used to. Now when people give me a compliment,

I have to stop my instinct of like, sluffing it off to the side, or giving that acknowledgement to somebody else, and actually accepting that gift from people, and believing it for myself. But, that's a scary place to live, because you can't escape your own mind. You got it You know

so whether it's it's the depression that sets in after achievement because it didn't make you better and it didn't make you feel better or Maybe it gave you a brief break from hating yourself but as soon as you leave that ecosystem of people telling you how wonderful you are or people were in your Super Bowl ring or people You know you taking a bunch of kids shoe shopping because they can't afford it and you want them to go back to school in Newark, New Jersey with brand new kicks because you know how much confidence that gave you

and you got new kicks. Whatever any of that stuff, it might make, it might put a bandaid on the gunshot wound for the time being and make you feel like you can cover your wound and feel a little bit better. But at the end of the day, when you go sit in your car by yourself and you're driving home,

the hate machine turns back on because I'm like, now I don't feel any better about myself. So it's like, it's the difference in between, there's two types of happiness. There's the instantaneous happiness that we get from food, we get it from sex, we get it from drugs,

we get it from alcohol, and you know, or lifting weights. And So my entire life up until about three weeks ago was filled with Chasing the high chasing the high of achievement chasing the high of you know when I worked out I feel better for a brief amount of time and then once those endorphins roll off It's just like I hate my see you know yes And I didn't even really realize that I was fueled by hate up until, you know, going through this process called hardcore leadership

that Shanda Sumter put together, and she's a friend of mine, and she just, she saw the pain in me, you know? But she also saw like the beauty and the love and the tenderness and the sensitivity that I have, that I give to people unconditionally, but I don't ever accept it. You're soft.

When people love me back, I don't accept it because I don't love me back, I don't accept it because I don't love myself. And so I've given my wife, I've given my five kids, I've given my friends, like new friends that I'm making like you, like I'm giving you the greatest gift ever, because I'm gonna be an amazing friend to you.

You know what I mean? And the reason that I can be an amazing friend to you and love you and support you and everything that you're doing is A, because I believe in you, But I've stepped into myself. And so I finally can truly love people unconditionally. I couldn't fully see my friends or accept any gifts from them until I could see myself.

It's harder work to put the other face on, bro. It's harder work to be Steve Weatherford than to be Steve. You alluded it right to it, because I can show up here and I've never ever shared this with anybody ever before, but I ended up winning the Walter Payton Man of the Year Philanthropic Award, the most philanthropic guy in the NFL,

and it wasn't like I was some Super Bowl quarterback or quarterback, I was like the least respected position in football, but I was able to earn respect because of my work ethic. I was able to earn respect because of my philanthropy and the way that I genuinely and authentically showed up for people. If one of my teammates got hurt, I was the first person to go to the training room

after practice and be like, hey, can I drive you home? Like, hey, can I take your kids to daycare the next day? Because I knew how much physical pain and emotional pain that they were in because when you're in the NFL, man, you're only as good as like your last play and if you can't play another play, then they will discard you.

There's no guaranteed contracts. There's nothing's guaranteed. And so that's why they call it the not for long league. You know what I mean? And I was just super blessed and super fortunate and so thankful that I was able to play at the most elite level long enough to achieve every single goal that that I had set out for myself in addition to Being able to not walk away from the game when I wanted to I skipped away from the game like I was happy

I felt achieved and everything in that industry, but I wasn't happy with myself Yeah, you know it's amazing someone like you, cause there's people watching this, there's a nurse watching this right now, right? There's a school teacher, there's an entrepreneur watching this. And they are connecting. And a lot of military people watch this, man. I know because they always tell me like,

dude, you need to go on Ed's show, I love it, he's gonna love you. Like even people that don't know you and kind of don't really know me, they're like asking me to go do your show because they know that you're gonna crack me open. And it's not even something where you've even had to try. No, because I love you the way you are.

Yeah, you see me, man. I do, and what's amazing about you, bro, and that you have this gift to many of you too, the beautiful part of being wired like you are, and I'm wired this way too, is that we have such great empathy for others, we don't give it to ourselves. But like you-

That doesn't hit me like right in between the eyes, it's sick. It's like so many of you are watching this, you're like I am the person who kinda cares for people. When someone's sick I am the one who bring them dinner, I am the one who visit them, I'm the one who sends the text. And you don't look like it though.

And you don't either. And you don't either. We're tattooed, I'm tattooed. Buff dudes and you know. I can hide all my tattoos. You don't look like it though. And you don't either. We're tattooed, I'm tattooed, buff dudes. I can hide all my tattoos. By the way, and guys like many times everybody, when you see mega achievers, we are hiding things. And so, because what this show's really about

isn't you maxing out your wealth, although I want you to have it maxing out your career. I want you to max out your bliss. I want you to max out your faith. I want you to max out your giving. I want you to max out your faith. I want you to max out your giving. I want you to max out your love for yourself. And maybe, Steve, honestly, maybe you're gonna get through to people

in a way that nobody else can. There's no maybe, dude. And by the way, there's no maybe. Yeah, you are. I speak it into existence. I will have such a massive influence. People forget that I ever touched a football. You look at every, like all the different things

that we keep referencing, the different achievements that I make. And I, like, I want to make sure that people know, like, we didn't come on here to talk about the different things that I achieved. We came on here to talk about different, the different things that I've achieved and the way I felt about myself, despite all of those things. Brendan Bruchard, welcome back to the show.

And my let, it's an honor, man. It's really an honor. Someone says, I kind of got all that. I kind of know where I'm going. I know what I want to do. I'm pretty damn focused. I got that obsession thing you're talking about. And you did high performance habits,

which separates the really high performers from the ones that perform pretty well. Right? And so someone says, I want to be the damn best at whatever I'm doing. I'm open in a chain of dry cleaners. I'm training horses. I've got a, I'm going to be the greatest mother in the history of the world.

Whatever the thing is, what separates, I know there's a whole book that's been written on this, but give us a few things that people may not think about that separates people go that I am focused. I am on my mission. What could separate me? What are some of the things that I must be doing to be the best? Yeah, first always frame that as habits. It has to be habits.

A lot of people think it's just mindset. Like mindset is a habit of thought, right? It's like, well, it's how you deal with people. That's a habit of interaction. Like, so always just like realize it's a habitual pattern or practice that you're doing. But what separates people is not the habits that everyone wants to talk about So always just like realize it's a habitual pattern or practice that you're doing. But what separates people is not the habits

that everyone wants to talk about in the popular literature or books. It's like, you know, these small habits or atomic habits or automatic habits or, you know, unconscious habits. Those are valuable. Those are very important. But high performance requires deliberate habits. But deliberate habit means

you kind of have to force yourself to do it. It's not easy. It's not automatic. It's not tiny. It's like, you know, it's like, that's going the extra mile thing. It's never going to be easy. You're never going to condition it to be automatic.

It's like, no, it's the tough work of life to go to another level. You want to be at the top. It's really frigging hard. It's hard. You have to accept that. And so what we did is we studied, we said, what is that difference maker?

We spent a million dollars on research. Like the largest research study that's ever been done on high performers worldwide, 90 countries, 90 different countries that we surveyed the highest performers. These tend to be not the top 15%, they tend to be the top 5%. And the difference between the top 15

and the top 5% is this, it kind of falls in the definition of high performance. High performance means succeeding over the long term in any industry or endeavor or whatever, while still maintaining positive wellbeing and relationships. I wanna hear about this. How do you, what high performers have answered

is how do you succeed over the long term without wrecking your health, your mindset, your positivity and your relationships? We know lots of successful people, but they ruined all their relationships. We know successful people, they ruined their health. They're not high performers, they wouldn't qualify. So what do they do?

It's different practices, we call them high-formance habits. So you mentioned these people, they already have clarity, clarity, developing clarity and constantly revisiting to become clear every day. What is my intention? What is my intention? What is my intention? That revisit of clarity is supremely important to them.

Revisiting it. Yes, not setting a goal on January 1st and forgetting it. It's literally consistent. It's literally consistency in intention. Like every day you hear about high farmers, they look at their goals. Every day you set your intention. When I work with Oprah, she taught me,

every meeting you have with Oprah, she starts with, what's our intention of this meeting? Every meeting, because that's seeking clarity. So high performers seek clarity more often. Second habit is generating energy. They generate the energy they want to experience in life, and they want other people to experience. They're not waiting for joy, they're not waiting for happiness,

they're not waiting for positivity, they generate it. They are so much more conscientiously designing the energy around them. And you feel it, right? By the way, everyone should know this. It is, I would say, in the very top keynote speakers on earth today. Thank you.

Like what you can do on stage is unbelievable. It's not even, I mean, you're talking to a handful of humans who can do on stage is unbelievable. It's not even, I mean, you're talking to a handful of humans who can do this. Thank you. And what you do is you generate and move the energy, the room way more consciously than the average speaker. The average speaker is kind of insecure a little bit. Doesn't mean you don't have insecure your doubts up there.

What it means is he's moving the room. Like he's taking them on a wild ride. He's generating the energy. That's the difference between an underperforming speaker and a high performing speaker. Good point. Another piece is the productivity piece, which I know is so basic,

but most people are so unbelievably not productive. Yes. I mean, it's stunning. It is stunning. The average person is losing an hour a day to Facebook or Instagram, and then watching four hours of television. That's five hours a day of consumption.

If you can turn those five, let's take one hour, let's say, no, no, we're talking high forms. If we can get you one hour a day back, one hour a day of focus back, that's 30 hours a month. Crazy. That 30 hours a month, that's seven hours a week. But that means you got an extra day. Yeah.

That's an extra eight hour work day that you got. That's an unfair advantage. Yes. So getting people their focus back in a world that has the highest paid engineers in the world paid to strip your attention away. So you consume versus create and be and live. That is a primary differentiator right now.

Stay on that a minute. I so agree with you. And the more I've started to coach people and I actually get into their lives, how not only do they waste time, but how little time, Brendan, and this is huge for everyone, that they do on things every day that move the needle. Like move the needle in your company, move the needle in your relationship,

move the needle in your body. It's like you're just doing little things. All the good, sometimes do stuff that moves it right. Like I'll give you one small example. My relationship with my children, they're both away at college. I have great relationships with my kids, but they're both away at college and I'm busy and they're busy and there are days where we just text. Their mom's on the phone with them all the time. And I thought, am I moving the needle in this? It's okay. I did what I'm supposed to do today. I'm communicating with my kids. I know that sounds very, you know, organized or methodical,

but does that move, does Bella know I love her a lot more when she gets my text message? Does Max know I believe in him a lot more? What would move the needle? I gotta call them. Now this may sound silly to all of you, but I'm trying to, the most high performing thing I could do in my relationship with my children is to call them.

In a lot of relationships, the text doesn't move the needle. The call moves the needle. The thing in your company that you're doing all these little, what's the thing that gets the big account, that moves the account, that creates the most leverage, that get, move the needle more often, right? Yeah, another phrase of that is, another exact phrase of that is efforts of impact.

So in the research, high performers, this is great for all those who are like, oh my God, Bren, yeah, Ed, you're right, this is overwhelming, it's a lot of stuff to do, oh my God. Well, the research showed in 90 countries around the world that high performers spend 60% of their week there, efforts of impact, needle moving. Needle moving things.

So when you look at their calendar each day, it's not, are they a hundred percent high performing all day? Look, they got to answer emails. They got to reply to dumb DMS. They got to take that stupid call once in a while. We think they're perfect. No, it's just that 60% of their effort is directed to activities that actually make an impact.

They got to do 40% of administration or household work too. It's just that most of their effort, 60%, is geared towards what moves that needle, gets that significant impact. What a powerful question to ask yourself if you're listening to this. In whatever area you pick, pick your area, your relationship, your company, your money.

How much of your time is efforts of impact? Moving the needle stuff. And if you just tweak that by 11%, 16%, how much different would your life be three years from now? One year from now? This is why you listen to the show everybody. It's like, I got something there. I'm not moving the needle off.

I mean, your habits aren't efforts of impact. Your habits are like, I checked the box. I did the text. I did the email. I made the call. I made the box. I did the text, I did the email. I made the call, I made my contacts. I drank my protein. I had the water. You did the stuff, but how much of it moved it, right?

Yeah, it's so easy. So it's like start with what I said first about that hour day of distraction. And I always tell people, if I could get you three more months of advancement this year, would that make a difference? They go, oh my God, yeah, three more months. I go, great, that's an hour a day.

Gosh, one hour a day, seven hours a week, right? Over the course of the month, that's 30 hours. That's basically a whole work week, really. And then you apply that by 12 months. It's like, we just got you 12 work weeks back for one hour a day. So we're not asking for a lot. And then the joy is I thought it was the 80, 20

Pareto principle. It's like, oh, like 80% of the time I gotta be, I mean Superman 80%. No, you don't even need Superman 80%, try 60. It's nice. It's so good. Back to the data shows you say. The data shows, this is a 60, 40.

I was like, oh, that's a relief, you know, cause I was wondering all these other people. Cause you think all these successful shows, this is the 60, 40. I was like, oh, that's a relief, you know, cause I was wondering, all these other people, cause you think all these successful people, they've got a million assistants running around doing everything and- You're right. I tell my kids all the time, I tell them since they were little, I said, when you grow up a little bit,

you're going to find out, everyone says winning is hard, okay? I get all that. Well, I tell my kids all the time, the more, even once you get into college, you're going to figure out, you're not competing against that many people. You're really only in life competing against yourself, but you know what I mean when I

say that. And now that they're there and they're like, Dad, you're right. Some kids don't even go to class every day. Some kids don't study at all someday. I'm like, you're gonna figure it out that it's a very small group of people that do things in their life that are efforts of impact on a very regular basis. Life, if you want to change your life right now, it is really possible. You could really do it. You really could do it. Is there anything else you want to change your life right now, it is really possible. You could really do it.

You really could do it. Is there anything else you want to add to it? Cause I feel like I interrupted you on that. Is there any other area of high performance people? I know there's a bunch, but give us one more. Practices of self-awareness. This is why everyone loves growth day. And I didn't know, I knew it would be powerful.

I didn't know it would be this powerful at all. You know, we want to make the world's number one mindset journal. So that's in growth day. We want to make the world's number one habit tracker. So you can track your high performance habits and other wellbeing and achievement habits in the app. And then it gives you recommendations.

We built in the goal setting tool with reminders. So you can remind yourself and push notifications to yourself to meditate, to work out, to flirt with your wife, you know, all this stuff. And those were just coming from the research and also high performers just telling us what they do. They journal, they meditate, they pray, they think. They're doing more practices of self-awareness

to figure out themselves. You know, like a lot of people go to the gym, but a high performer go to the gym and you say, what are you thinking about at the gym? My man, I'm thinking about my goals. And I'm thinking about that deal. Man, I'm thinking about that date night with my wife this Friday. Oh yeah.

Right. They're in a different, like they're using their time. You know, some people hate driving. They hate a car trip. Other people, they're like, oh man, that's my lab. Put me in that car. I'm gonna drive, I'm gonna think of about the next dream, the next vision, the next sale.

There, I mean. I do. Right? I love driving. That's practices of self-awareness. You are thinking, right? I think therefore I am, you know. This is so good.

This time that they spend ruminating, thinking, envisioning and brainstorming, it's significantly bigger than the average person. And so in growth, they've said, we're gonna build the tools to enable that. And that became the most popular thing in there. I thought the most popular thing would be have, we've got the biggest motivational speakers.

These guys search 50,000, $100,000 a speech, Mel Robbins and Jenna Kutcher, lots of our friends in their teaching. And they're popular and people love that because we're live every week with them. But it's the tools. People love to think about their life and they love to track it

and they love to look how to improve it. And that's the high performance edge. The ultimate performance edge isn't talent, right? It's how much does that person think about improving that thing? It's the practices of growth, right? The great Olympians who you worked with and I worked with and the people who are, you know, the highest level CEOs

and they're thinking. You're right. They're thinking and they're thinking about growth. They're thinking about success. They're thinking about impact. Instead of thinking about what she wear at that dinner last night. Did you see her on that internet?

Did you see what he does? Do you hear what they're doing? Oh, those people over there, and oh, the left and the right, there's a difference. Are you thinking growth or are you thinking gossip? We just change your life. By gosh, brother, this is so good. You know, it's funny, it's the absence of things

in your life you're unaware of, but like you just described me, I don't ever spend any time on that stuff. I mean, brother, this is so good. You know, it's funny, it's the absence of things in your life you're unaware of, but like, you just described me, I don't ever spend any time on that stuff. I mean, literally less than one millionth of 1% of the time. Me too. And I love, I'm addicted.

I have an addiction to thinking about growth. I have an addiction to thinking about that next scene, that next emotion, that next thing. I can, I literally am addicted to it. I actually love shutting the car door alone. So I'm like, all right, here we go, brother. I love that. I love working out for there.

I love taking a walk on the beach for that reason. I love it. I actually love the end of my day. I love getting into bed at the end of the day and just reflecting on the day and then dreaming about the next day. Like I love that stuff, right? I don't always love waking up

because you're in a different brainwave state at that time. But I love when I go to bed at night and dreaming and you're right on the money man with that stuff. Okay. And you have practices that force you to do that, right? Yes. You go to the gym and you're thinking about those things. Some people pray or they meditate or they journal.

And that's where the, see, you have to put yourself in that place to open the gate or to what I always say, to be able to receive. Yes. Like, if you're filling your brain with a bunch of stuff that you're downloading from social media, then who can't download into you? Gosh, that's so good. God can't get in, right?

You've blocked the antenna with a bunch of gossip and a bunch of garbage. You gotta stay in an open state. Where are you in open state? You're in an open state in a seminar, in a conference. You're in an open state when you're driving. You're in an open state in the shower. You're in an open state in bed.

You're in an open state at the gym. You gotta stay in that open state when you're driving, you're open state in the shower, you're open state in bed, you're open state at the gym. You gotta stay in that open state so that you can receive guidance as much as you also can envision it. Because some of the best ideas might not even come from anything you and I just said, but because someone is listening to this podcast right now, they're in an open reception.

And that open reception, all of a sudden, they've got that new business idea. They're like, where'd that come from? You were in a learning environment, you were in a self-awareness practice. That's what podcast listening really is when it's good. And ideas come to you. I listen to your podcasts almost every day

that I work out. Thank you. And when I'm listening to it, I get all these crazy ideas. It didn't come from what you said or the guest. Right, it's uncorrelated, you're open. I was in a place of openness of self-awareness. And so if you want to become a high performer, you have to place yourself there.

You have to do the thinking, the rumination, the dreaming, the visioning. And when you do that time and time and time and time again, again, it becomes who you are. You don't have to force it anymore. It just becomes who you are. That's brilliant, by the way. One of my favorite things at the end of the day,

actually my favorite thing is my prayer time. And I do it on my knees. And I have just, people say to me all the time, is it a my favorite thing is my prayer time and I do it on my knees and I have just people say to me all the time, is it a lot like when you're really tired? And I know I actually really look forward to that time because sometimes my prayers are four minutes and sometimes they're 45 minutes, depending on how open I am, what I'm receiving, what I'm getting. I've loved today, by the way, everybody make sure you go to growthday.com or go

to the growth day app and get it. You're you will thank me. Hey guys, I've been talking about netSuite now for I don't know seven years on the show we've had such a great relationship because I believe so deeply in the company and quite frankly thousands of you have decided to become a NetSuite client and that's because right now I don't know if there's a bull or a bear market I don't know what's gonna go on a business I wish someone had a crystal ball I don't but until someone comes up with on 41,000

businesses a future proof their business with NetSweep by Oracle, it's the number one cloud ERP, bring in accounting, financial management, inventory, HR into one fluid platform. You get everything for your business in one place. It gives you visibility, control you need to make decisions over everything. And so when you're closing the books in days, not weeks, you're spending less time looking backwards and more time on what's next. Whether your company is earning millions or hundreds of millions or less than that, NetSuite can help you respond immediately to challenge and seize your biggest opportunity. Speaking of opportunity, download the CFO's guide to AI and Machine Learning at netsuite.com slash my let. The guide is free to you at netsuite.com slash my let. NetSuite.com slash my let netsuite.com slash my let. Hey guys,

like my shirt? Guess where I got it? Quince. Yep, Quince is an awesome place to go get first-class quality stuff, first-class suitcases, clothes, gear, you name it, at affordable prices like lightweight shirts and shorts from $30, pants for any occasion, comfortable lounge sets with premium luggage options and durable duffel bags to carry it all. The best part, all Quince items are priced 50 to 80 percent less than similar brands. What they do is they partner directly with the top factories, cuts out all the middlemen, you get the discounts and savings. Quince only works with factories that use safe,

ethical and responsible manufacturing practices and premium fabrics and finishes. So here's what I would tell you to do. For your next trip treat yourself to the Lux upgrades you deserve from Quince. Go to quince.com slash ed for 365 day returns plus free shipping on your order. That's quince.com slash ed to get free shipping and 365 day returns quince.com slash Ed. That was a great conversation. And if you want to hear the full interview, be sure to follow the Ed Mylett show on Apple and Spotify.

Links are in the show notes. You'll never miss an episode that way. I reached out to this woman to be on my show after I experienced her work. And I haven't done that in probably two years. I was telling her, I said, I want you to come on my show. She has a special out on Netflix right now called Mom Jeans, which I've watched four times,

including last night with my kids, and we were literally belly laughing, falling over. And I cannot wait for this hour, because I want to know you, and I want you to help a bunch of people. So, Christina P., welcome to the show. Oh, my gosh, thank you so much for having me. For anybody listening to this,

I think the most powerful tool that changed everything for me was my mind. This is everything, and I know you to this, I think the most powerful tool that changed everything for me was my mind. This is everything. And I know you know this. Because we read the same books. Phyllis Stiller, I read one of her autobiography, um, The Magic of Believing. The Magic of Believing. Read that book. And I started to read that when I was like 28.

But before that, I had read Existentialism in a philosophy class. And what is that about? when I was like 28. And before that, I had read existentialism in a philosophy class. And what is that about? Self-determinism. You can choose your life. This idea is radical. Sartre, choose choices. And I went, Oh, you're right. Life can push me around, or I can move the ball. And to me, this is the biggest lesson

that I try to teach my boys. Hey, man, if you don't take charge of this whole thing, it's going to take you away like a current. Man, that's true. And they don't teach you this in school, really. And it makes me nutty. Like, you can choose. Everything is a choice.

Everything. And read it. Read a book for it. And that makes me sad, other than, of course, the power of more. Hello. That people, the reading is like, guess that makes me sad other than of course the power of more, hello. That people, the reading is like, guess what? Humans have existed for thousands of years

and we've had this luxury of writing it down. If you've got a question, it's in a book, not Wikipedia, bro, not this Google, the whole thing, homie, cover to cover. Focus, read, use your mind, this will save you. Why don't you write a book? I know I've been, you know why? mind. This will save you. Why don't you write a book? I know, I've been, I've been, um... You know why? It's a lot right now.

I've got two kids I'm trying to raise and my husband is... And podcasts and... It's a lot right now. I'm gonna, I'm gonna, like, I will. Yeah. I don't know about what. I don't know what. I hope it's this stuff. You think so? I think this is, so here's what I think.

I think that, like, you've been given all these amazing talents, and your talent has given you this platform where you are well known now. And I just feel like you could write a book about how you're funny, or you could write a book about all that, but the truth of the matter is, is you're like really... You're... The guy who was on my show recently said, you're uniquely qualified to help the person that you used to be.

Ooh, man. And in your case, there's a version of you and me, and about 99% of the people that are listening to this. Some version. Maybe not to the extreme of having a parent who's schizophrenic like you had, or alcoholic like I had, but there's something where they just don't feel right about themselves,

or they don't have direction, or they just... There's life have purpose. Like, what's gonna make me happy? Why aren't I happier? And I think that, like, that's why it's incumbent upon us to always grow, because then there's another person you can think that, like, that's why it's incumbent upon us to always grow, because then there's another person you can go help, the one that you were before you grew. And so for me, that's why I keep working on me,

is like, I wanna be able to help someone who... The one that was me when I was 15, the one that was me when I was 18, the one that was me when I was 30, the one that was me when I was 40. I just had a guy in here that... very, very successful young man at 32. Well, I had that too, and I also know that doesn't fulfill you.

And I know when I'm looking at him, I know what he's really wrestling with this. Is it worth it? Like, what will really make me happy? And so I want to grow through that. And in your case, like, you've had such an amazing... I knew within about 10 minutes of watching you that you've had a different life. I just knew. Because let me say something about you.

People feel energy and like you can make me really, really laugh. But what you really do is you make people feel emotion and and and you're doing it today. There's a part at the end of her special, everybody, where she talks about this ketamine trip that she went on. And I want to go back and forth here, but it's one of the most... I don't know why I really... When I speak, sorry, I get emotional on this.

When I speak, what I attempt to do when I'm speaking is to give people who I really am, but also not just one emotion. I want to give them the gift of multiple emotions and also like the contradiction in them. So if at some point I can have them crying and really thinking about their life and then wanting to run through a wall and achieve,

or in your case, laughter, and all of them, I feel like I've done a service where I've moved that human. What is incredibly rare to do is to do both in like one moment. Like in the same moment, somebody's feeling reflection and sadness or empathy and also laughter. And this bit you do about the ketamine trip, I've watched, we've talked about different,

I mean, you have tons of friends in comedy and I have some. I've never seen that before. There's this moment in the end of your special where it's some of the most amazing art I've ever seen before. Because at the same time that people are... moved... so emotionally by what you're talking about and watching you be emotional, the next second they're laughing, and then they're back to this other moment. So, just a little bit, give them the gift.

I want them to see the special, but like, now they have a pretty good sense of what you went through as a child, I mean, they have 1% of it. You have a pretty good sense you've turned this around, which we'll talk about in a little bit too, and where your life is now and the lessons you've learned, but like, let's go there just for a second, so... Oh, that moment?

Tell them what happens. Oh, my God, so... Yeah. So I fell down the stairs, getting to my kid at two in the morning. I just come back off the road. I was so tired. I was like sleepwalking.

My baby's crying. And as a mom, you know, you're just like, I gotta get to my baby. Anyway, I fell down the stairs, broke my ankle in four places. And I had, I didn't even know it at the time. I thought I could just get up, so I called my husband. I was like, babe, get over here, help me. And he's like, oh, you can't get up.

You're broken, homie. So I get into the ambulance, to put fentanyl and all these drugs, they straighten me out. But before they straighten my leg out, they give me ketamine. I've never done, have you ever done it? I have, it's pretty amazing. You've done the therapeutic kind. Yes. I've never done... Have you ever done it? I have. It's pretty amazing. You've done the therapeutic kind.

Yes. I want to do that. Because what they did is they give you enough to dissociate you so that you don't remember it. And apparently it's a terrifying amount that they gave me. Because that's what they're like, usually people are screaming when they give this to you. But Christina, you were sitting there smiling the whole time.

So anyway, so they give me this ketamine, and I have this wild trip, basically. And the crazy part is, is that happens in real life. And I'm looking for an end to my special. And I was like, oh, that's the end of the special. Yeah. That's the end of the special, because it was my realization that everything that had happened to me,

I don't buy this shit that it happens for a reason. I hate that. That's Pollyanna nonsense. But I think if you attribute meaning to tragedy, attribute deliberately, then it's redemptive. And like, also this whole ride of just trying to be a kind of successful comedian. And then I have my children. And then you're like, oh, it doesn't matter.

Like, I saw my kids' faces literally. You know, you make me cry, I just talk about it. You know when you're like, oh, this is it. This is all that matters, like, all this other stuff can go away tomorrow. And... my kids don't care that I'm famous. They don't give that I'm famous.

They don't give a sh... And, like, they're the only things that really matter to my husband, you know? The unit. Yeah, now you're getting me crying, man. But I often think back to that ketamine trip when I'm getting hung up on nonsense, like show business.

And I'll be like, oh, but it doesn't matter. This is what I learned. Like, it matters. Don't get me wrong. I don't want to be broke tomorrow. I don't want it to all go away tomorrow, but I'm not gonna stress out. Right. Right. Been there, dude.

Me too. Yeah. I'm not gonna try to cling. Ugh. Like I did. Because then you find there was a time in your career where it's all you cared about? Yeah. It's a really difficult thing to teach because you should have goals and outcomes, and it's what's made us successful

when we didn't have some. But at the same time, it's kind of letting go of an outcome and letting things come as they might that actually brings us the most joy, because the things that are the greatest blessings in life aren't things we have to force through force, like our families. They're the things that are the greatest blessings in life aren't things we have to force through force, like our families. They're the things that, you know,

that are the greatest blessings are our children and our families. And yet, you still want to be able to provide for them and do significant things. But I also think you said something I want you to stay on that story, is that it's not the events of our lives that define us, it's the meaning we attach to the event.

And if you can attach the right meaning to something, or a meaning that serves you, or change the meaning, you can change how you feel about it, ultimately change how your life works. And it feels to me like almost in that trip you were on, that the meanings shifted a little bit for you. Yeah, because I saw my parents and I was like, I can see this person is a big, bad villain,

and I'm the little girl. Or, hey, what can I glean? What's the lesson here? Because I'm the mom now. And you see your broken parents as toddlers. I really see them as children now, who just didn't get enough love, who didn't get what I, well, what I didn't get too, but what I'm able to give

my kids now. So I just flood people and everybody walking around. You know, I didn't get to, but what I'm able to give my kids now. So, just flood people and everybody walking around. You know, I don't get mad at people nearly as much as I used to, because you're like, oh, you just didn't get love. Like, oh, you... Your mommy, your daddy. But you actually on that trip, like, thanked your mom

and your dad. Tell them that a little bit. You don't want them to see it. Yeah, you have to see the bit for it to make total sense, but, yeah, I end up thanking them and forgiving them. I did. Tell them that a little bit. You don't want them to see it. Yeah, you have to see the bit for it to make total sense. But yeah, I end up thanking them and forgiving them in the trip. And you know, I think, for some reason, I'm thinking about my mom's fur coats,

because she hoarded like jewelry and like fine items. I think she was convinced that World War III was coming soon, and she had to, I have to trade these things to get across the border. You're going to need, you know, she wouldn't put her money in one bank. It was in several, like that kind of nutty stuff. But now that I'm wealthy and I always was like rejecting wealth, I was always like rich people are bad.

Me too. Yeah. That's why I was raised believing. And it's nonsense, cause guess what? Poor people are bad too. It's the same deal. And actually, rich people can do really good things to help a lot of other people.

And your wealth is a blessing on many, many people. So anyway, the fur coat thing too, I was like, yeah, what's so bad about owning a fur coat? It doesn't make you a bad person. Right. Right. It doesn't. Unless it's the only thing you care about. Yeah, I'm watching you right now. That's garbage. I still think you a bad person. Right. Right. It doesn't. Unless it's the only thing you care about.

Yeah, I'm watching you right now. I still think you're working through thinking about what all those events of your life meant, just as I'm watching you. Oh yeah. I had a really huge blessing happen that I was with my dad when he died. I was in the room with him.

And it's weird that we're all this is going here today with you and me, but when I was with my dad in the room, uh, I got to see... I got my version of the ketamine trip to some extent, because when I was with him, I was literally holding his hand just a little while before he passed away, but... because he wasn't able to talk,

and he's just... it was actually wonderful to this extent. I got to just look at him. Like, you don't... Even with your parents, you have a dynamic. There's like this thing you do with people in your life. You do it with Tom, I do it with my wife, we do it with our kids. There's just like this pattern

of how we kind of just interact with each other. Yeah. I don't know if you've ever done this with your kids or with Tom, might be different with Tom, but you ever just watch your kids sleeping? Oh, my God. Like, every night. Right? It's different. You see them differently.

Yeah. And even your spouse, if you just see them sleeping, it's just different. They're not talking. They're not being them. They're just them. Yeah. And my dad, I had these hours with him. Mm. It was just him.

And I got to thinking about, like... I got to think about him as a little boy. This is a man whose life's about to end. Kind of like what you've done. And I'm... He's an old man now. And I remember him when he wasn't an old man. I remember him when he looked like my age, right? I remember when he was even younger than that.

And I could go back and think of him. I wonder, my dad at 10, my dad at five, my dad at two. And there's this love you can have even for someone who didn't treat you perfectly the whole time, that you have this sympathy, this empathy for them. And I just think he's just, he's a man that had a life, and he did his best to live it his best way. And then I start thinking about myself. I will be him.

Yeah. What do I want when I'm him, when I'm there? Who do I want to have achieved? Who do I want to have helped? What do I want to have felt? What emotions do I want to have had? What memories do I want? We're all fair. You're talking about taking your kids to, if you're, you know, you're blessed enough

that you could take them somewhere on a vacation. And, like, being in that moment with my dad gave me a different meaning to him. Gave my life a different meaning. And that's just a real powerful thing for everybody. Listen, this is like all the events. Maybe you should evaluate what they all... The things that don't serve you, what do they mean?

What did your divorce really mean? Right? What did this experience with... What did having your children really mean? What did this person who hurt you, what did it really mean? If you can change the meaning, you can really ultimately change how you feel, experience with what having your children really mean. What did this person who hurt you, what did it really mean? If you can change the meaning, you can really ultimately change how you feel and then you'll take different actions in your life. And when my dad passed, I literally you're doing this.

I thought, oddly, I'm going to honor my dad. I'm going to talk about it more. I'm going to talk about what I learned from, I'll talk about how he hurt me. Put it in my book. It's in my book. All my speeches lately involve my dad. And in a very beautiful way, you honored your mom in that special, and your dad. You started out by telling the truth, right?

But you honored him. Did it ever dawn on you that you were doing that? No. It's unconscious. No. No. I think, no. We're looking at you right now and he's dawning on you. No, because, yeah, I'm like, oh yeah, I guess I.

No, because when you create something, it's all really unconscious. You just kind of throw stuff out and then you hope there's a through line and like, what's that gonna be? And what I really wanted to express as well as honoring, I think, now that you mention it, is just that I'm not, I don't hate you, man.

I ain't mad at you. Because the anger, we all go through it. And like, also, one of my pet peeves about the self-help movement is like, just be happy, be happy. Look for the joy. It's like, no, and no. Sometimes, the suffering, and you did a great podcast about this recently, about the suffering that must come

in order to have the joy. The suffering. And I just didn't want to leave people thinking I'm this rageful adolescent, because I'm really, I'm not mad at them anymore. Because once you become a parent and you're like, oh, okay, yeah, I got it. Me too. I'm mad at my dad sometimes. Yeah, but sometimes, yeah. I'll think of parent, you're like, oh, OK, yeah, I got it. Me too. I'm mad at my dad sometimes.

Yeah, but sometimes, yeah. I'll think of something like I can't believe he did that to me in some situation. But my overall view of him isn't that way. This gentleman to my left, just to give you a background, this guy parlayed a 990 SAT score into a multi-billion dollar company that he built. We're going to get into your head about how you did that. But I'm overwhelmingly impressed with Impact Theory, which is an organization that he and his wife, Lisa,

started the last few years that is really making a difference in the world, just like his company Quest Nutrition did. And so, Tom Bilyeu, thank you for being here today, brother. Thank you for having me, man. I'm so excited to be here. We flipped the script before, so. I've been on his program, and now finally I get you here

Were you like this young so I know you didn't have the best at SAT scores in the world But I've been around you enough now. I Consider you a freak which is a which is a compliment coming from a guy like no, no, I take it I think you know what I mean You're uniquely driven and wired to pursue greatness and to make an impact, no pun intended, in the world at a level that most people have not yet realized they're capable of, even though they are. That's right.

And so did you know this young? If we went back and looked at this kid who grows up in Washington state, was there already these obvious insights and clues that you were going to turn into this guy? What were you like as a young guy? There definitely were not clues. So when I was a kid, I didn't show any signs of promise to be really fair. And my own mother, when I left for college, like she, I almost chickened out and I was like, I don't want to go, I want to just stay home. And she was like, no, no, no, you need to go, you need to go, pushes me out of the nest. And then literally every day since,

she's tried to claw me back. So one day, like, I don't know, three or four years ago, I said to her, mom, like, you were the one that kicked me out. Like, I wouldn't have left if you hadn't pushed me. So why did you push me? And she said, with no malice whatsoever, I just always assumed you were gonna fail. Oh my gosh.

And now that was, she had never been like, always my biggest my biggest cheerleader always rooting for me telling me I could do it But quietly just inside she was like you didn't show any drive. So the one thing I will say is I was Grandly ambitious. I always said I'm gonna be rich. I'm gonna do this. I'm gonna do that Always always since the time I was a little kid, but I didn't have the drive to see it through so I really really was an empty dreamer when I was a kid, and it was learning to hate that in myself, if I'm completely honest, and to not allow myself to be an empty dreamer, to force myself to get the skills to actually execute against it, to not be in any way, shape or form pacified by saying I'm going to do something, which is actually super dangerous.

Most people just thinking about the fantasy of what they're going to do gives them some partial sense of, oh, I've done it. Whereas I stopped letting that be okay for me, which largely came down to embarrassment I felt around my wife working when I had no job. And that was the time she was my fiance at the time. But that was when I really started to go, okay, you've made a lot of promises to this woman and you're not on a path to keep any of them Well, I got our stories are unbelief. I did not know that and our stories are unbelievably paralleled I was in the same situation by the way where I was sort of an entrepreneurial unemployed guy

Yeah, well, she was paying our rent right so I relate to that too. How does I'm just curious I want to make sure I just I think you're one of the great American business stories. Wow man, thank you. And not only because of the wealth that you've accumulated, but because of, and this word's overused, but it's so true with you, because of the impact you're making in the world because of your success. That's what I admire. As you know, that's what I'm trying to do with the Max Out program too, and just with my life. So what I don't get is this connection, so just help me understand it, because you know that I know your story what I'm trying to do with the Max Out program too, and just with my life. So what I don't get is this connection. So just help me understand it,

because you know that I know your story, I'm fascinated by it. How do you get from a 990 SAT into USC? How I got into USC itself, this makes me a little sad. This is one part of the story I wish were a little different. I cheated all through high school. So the one thing that, yeah. So I graduated in the top 10 of my class.

And the thing- You were a good cheater. I was a good cheater. And this is one thing I will say, people talk about network and they talk about charisma it's just real. And so I was nice. And that got me a long way.

I remember in seventh grade, so one of the guys I would later cheat off of in high school becomes my absolute best friend in the universe, but he's on the spectrum, right? The autism spectrum. And in seventh grade, he wouldn't talk to anybody. And so I turned around one day and I was very outgoing at that time in my life,

which I consider myself now just a dyed-in-the-wool introvert. But at that time, the role in the family that I played was the jokester. So I was used to getting laughs and getting my self-esteem from my ability to make people laugh. So I turned around to him in seventh grade, I point at him and I'm like, my mission in this class is to get you to talk.

And so inside he was thinking, oh my God, somebody actually cares. And so then it became like, we just started attracting to each other and he is still to this day probably the smartest person I've ever met. And so it just became this sort of unlikely pairing but to give you an idea of like how weird this kid was and but we're still close to this day so he talks of himself like this. My mom said if he doesn't start acknowledging me

when I say hello to him he's not allowed to come over anymore. She would literally say straight up to his face, hi, and he would say nothing. It was super weird. And so I was like, dude, you just got to say hi back. And so he credits me with teaching him social skills, and I credit him with helping me graduate high school, basically. But I always believed- He credited you with graduating high school.

Literally. And I always believed that I could do the work, always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always,

I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always,

I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, I was always, It's total BS. I'm well aware of that now. But at the time it really felt totally justified. And I was like, they're not teaching us things that are gonna help anyway.

Nobody can answer why algebra is gonna be useful to me. And so I just felt like that was fine. But when I went to college, day one, I said, okay, I'm gonna be taking on a massive amount of debt. I'm learning the thing that I love. This is what I wanna do with my career. So I better actually know how to do it. So the phrase that I repeated in my head over and over and over, it was ARF, sink or swim, I will not cheat, not even one.

It doesn't matter. Either one of those is acceptable. The only thing I care about is that I do every bit of work myself. And so, and I stuck to that. So my grades in college are reflected, and I did better in college than I did in high school. And you didn't, is this true that you went, you want to be a filmmaker? Yes. Right? Very much so. But you didn't know that there was a difference

between USC film school and USC? Dude, welcome to growing up in Tacoma. So first of all, like nobody really knew how this all worked. So I went to USC because my dad had a friend who made almost an offhanded comment. My dad was like, oh, my son wants to go be a filmmaker. And the guy was like, oh, USC is the best film school in the world.

And so my dad comes home and goes, I hear USC is the best film school. So I was like, well, I guess I'm going to USC then. Literally, I didn't even think beyond that. It is the only film school that I applied to. I applied to one state school and then to USC and that was it. And I got into USC and I just thought the way college worked

was you tell them what your major is Right people thought you declare your major, right? So I thought cool. I'll go declare my major and then in the prep So I've already committed I've already said I'm going to USC. I've turned down the other offer that I had at the state school It's done. I'm going to USC taking the financial aid package all of it Then they come to your town and they they orient you to like what it's gonna be like and they show you pictures and all The stuff and I'm so excited. Then I don't know if I asked a question or if it just came up, and they said something about how to get into the film school,

it's a separate application process. I was like, what? You're heart dropped. What do you mean? Literally, my heart dropped through the floor. I was like, oh God. Then I was like, what are the requirements? They said, well, we'd like to see a 1300 on your SAT. I was like, what do I do now And they said, well, we'd like to see a 1300 on your SAT.

And I was like, what do I do now? And that was the beginning of like real panic. So what did you do? So I go to USC and I'm like, somehow I'm gonna figure this out. And you have mandatory counseling. And I go to the counseling and they look at what I've signed up for.

And I've signed up for a film classes like I'd already been accepted to the major. And they said, Tom, listen right now, you're gonna end up spending a fifth year at this school because statistically you are more likely to get into Harvard Law than you are into USC film school. Do not do this. We see people do this every year. Get out of these classes, take normal general education requirements. And I was like, no, no, no, I'm going to get in. I'm going to get in. And it's the one time in my life where someone looked me point blank in the face and they said, you are going to fail. Like it's not

a question of if you are going to fail, you are going to spend a lot of money and they were doing it from the position of like look I don't want you to waste the money. But they were so aggressive about it and there was something in them telling me that I couldn't do it that was like I'm definitely doing this. And so I found there was a guy that was on the admissions committee who offered like you could go join him for lunch. And so I went, he made the offer to like a class of 350 people and I was the only one who showed up. And I was like, how is this possible?

So I say to him, look, I got a 990 on my SATs, what do I do? I really wanna get into film school. And he said, Tom, SAT stands for Scholastic Aptitude Test. It's supposed to tell me how well you'll do on college. You've already missed the freshman class. You're not gonna get accepted then. So you can only get accepted as an incoming junior,

but as an incoming junior, I don't care about your SATs because I have two years of college to look at. So he said, if you don't want me to worry about your SATs, just get good grades. So I said, cool. For the next two years, all I'm gonna do is get good grades. I didn't date, I didn't party, I didn't drink. I literally didn't leave my dorm room. I worked. I put my head down next two years, all I'm gonna do is get good grades. I didn't date, I didn't party, I didn't drink.

I literally didn't leave my dorm room. I worked, I put my head down for two years and I just worked. And I got, if it wasn't a 4.0, it was like a 3.95 or something, so. It's never that clean. Like, I want my story to be, hey, I learned that if I just put my head down and work my ass off,

I can get whatever I want. That is unfortunately not what I learned because I believed at the time, you're either talented or you're not. So I wasn't in film school to become a filmmaker. I was in film school to learn the technical side. How do you turn on a camera? Where do you put a light?

Things like that. But I thought you either have the ability to tell a story or you don't. So I believed myself to be a natural filmmaker. I just believed I had talent. And so I go to film school and everything is proving. So first I gamble, right, and I take all the film prerequisites, even though they tell me not to, I get into film school, so that feeds my ego. Then second, so you have two classes that are like testing

you to see where you're at as a filmmaker and I smash it. First class smash it and your second class you have to team up and basically everybody wants to direct and anybody that wants to be a Cinematographer that's good all the directors are fighting for them And so not only did I get the cinematographer everybody wanted but I got to direct and then we killed our film It was amazing. So now I'm like I'm the shit right like literally every Egotistical belief that I had about myself being naturally talented is just happening for me. It's effortless, I'm not even putting that much energy into,

I mean other than the physical production, which is exhausting, but I'm not like trying to be more artistic, I'm trying to learn how to turn on cameras and stuff like that, but I'm just a naturally talented filmmaker. So everything in college is leading towards only four people in your class get to direct a senior thesis film.

So all the people, everybody else crews, but four people get to direct and I was chosen as one of the four. So literally the narrative in my head is I am naturally talented. You either have it or you don't and I have it and I'm very grateful that I have it. And then I make my senior thesis film and it is the most catastrophic, horrific, crash-and- burn, embarrassing thing I've ever gone through. The class is making fun of me, they're cutting up reels of my film to make a joke out of it.

I mean, it was abysmal. And in that moment, I realized the cold hard truth. And this is, when I tell this story, people think, oh, now he's just being hard on himself or being overconfident. I'm telling you right now, I didn't have talent. And so in that moment, I realized, I don't know how to tell a story. So whatever natural talent looks like, I didn't have talent. And so in that moment I realized, I don't know how to tell a story.

So whatever natural talent looks like, I didn't have it. It was so bad I stole the master from the school. No way. Yes, because I never wanted it to be seen again. So like that, like this is a really, so that leads into the darkest period of my life. So I graduate and you would think, hey, but you worked so hard to get in film school.

Why isn't that the ringing narrative? And it just wasn't. The ringing narrative was you thought you were talented, you're a fool, you don't know anything, and I couldn't afford to furnish my apartment. So I was literally laying on the floor of my apartment. I had an air mattress, but I was laying on the floor of my apartment.

With a degree from SC. With a degree from SC, taking every remedial job that I can get, because now my ego is so crushed smashed I need to be the smartest person in the room. It's like the only thing I have left. Well, at least I'm naturally smart. So I just put myself in dumber and dumber rooms, which means I'm making less and less

money. I'm selling video games retail at one point. I mean, it was really bad. You're putting yourself in dumber and dumber rooms so that you were the smartest person in the room. Got it. I wouldn't interview for a job unless I knew this person at some point in the interview will say, why are you interviewing for this job? You're better than this. It's

interesting to me the takeaways you have from experiences because in life it's not the experiences that happen to us, it's the meaning we take from them and it's interesting to me that even you getting into film school, even your takeaways are deeply unique and very self-aware. This is the Ed Myland Show.