THE ED MYLETT SHOW - Struggling To Keep Going? How to Recover From Burnout Symptoms | Ed Mylett

Episode Date: September 14, 2024

In this powerful Saturday Mashup, we tackle one of the most common struggles—burnout. This episode brings together an incredible lineup of guests, including Sebastian Maniscalco, Rob Dyrdek, Alan Stein Jr., Inky Johnson, and more. Together, we dive deep into the symptoms of burnout and share strategies on how to recover, rebuild, and push forward when you feel like giving up. From Rob Dyrdek’s insights on finding harmony in life and business, to Inky Johnson’s message on learning from both good and bad examples, and Alan Stein Jr.'s emphasis on loving what the basics produce, this episode is packed with practical advice for anyone feeling overwhelmed or on the brink of exhaustion. You’ll hear me talk about the importance of keeping promises to yourself and how each time you follow through, you build a reputation with yourself that fuels your confidence. We cover it all—from scheduling rest to finding a balance between pushing hard and recuperating. Whether you're at the top of your game or struggling to stay motivated, this episode will inspire you to regain control and get back on track. Key Takeaways: - Why it’s critical to love what the basics produce in your life and career. - How breaking promises to yourself erodes your confidence and self-worth. - The importance of balancing rest with pushing through tough times. - Rob Dyrdek’s formula for creating harmony in life while still achieving massive success. - How to find a way to win even when the odds feel stacked against you. Tune in, and take away the tools you need to get through burnout and come out stronger! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Hey everyone, welcome to my weekend special. I hope you enjoy the show. 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. The question was, Ed, I'm listening to one of the people that I watch on social media on a regular basis. And this influencer woke up that morning and said that they just did not want to get out of bed

that day and they wanted to pull the covers over their head. And so they did. And they canceled the entire day. And they basically told us that some days you just don't have it. You should give in, put the covers back over their head. And so they did. And they canceled the entire day. And they basically told us that some days you just don't have it, you should give in, put the covers back over your head, that's your body talking to you. And cool it. Do you agree? No, I don't agree. That doesn't mean I don't think you should rest. I think you should rest. I think you should

schedule your rest. I have a weakness where I over schedule. And that's a huge mistake because I just have an inability to say no to people and I want to help so many people. But I over schedule myself to the point where many days I wake up and I'm going, I just don't want to do this. So I really relate to the thought. I think the solution is to schedule your rest. You do need to recuperate. You do need to reenergize, recalibrate, reassess, re-audit your life and just fill your tank back up. So those are things that you need to do proactively and obviously don't over schedule and don't take a page out of my book, get a better ability to say no. You know, a lot of times when I cover things with you on the show, these are things that I'm struggling with myself or I've struggled with in the past

and I'm working through them or I can tell you how I worked through it and I became you know I over I overcame the ailment or the proclivity to do the wrong thing and I wake up a lot of mornings quite frankly even to this day where I want to pull those covers back over my head and cancel my day but I don't and let me tell you why I don't because every time you do that you kill a part of yourself. Every time you break a promise to yourself, you're eroding your confidence, you're eroding your spirit. Remember this, I know I said this before, but self-confidence is the process of keeping the promises you make to you. You know, you're always building a reputation with yourself. Are you somebody you can trust that does the things he or she says they're going to do? Or are you somebody

just when they don't feel like it willy-nilly pull the covers back over your head and pack it in for a day? I do not recommend you do that. You are losing part of yourself every single time you do this. Remember this. The longer you stay somewhere that you know you don't belong, whether that's in bed all day long, or in a relationship you don't belong in, or in a job you don't belong in, or in anything you don't belong in, the longer you stay somewhere that you know you don't belong, the more you begin to believe you don't belong anywhere. You don't belong anywhere. That's a dangerous place to take yourself. Secondly,

when you break promises to yourself, you erode that internal self-confidence that's so requisite in becoming happy and successful. So no, don't pull the covers back over your head. I do not agree with that advice. I'm, I'm sure whoever this person is, or these people are that are dispensing this advice are well-intended people, but they're just wrong about that. You should schedule your rest. You should not over schedule like dummy.

I do all the time, but you should definitely keep the promises you make to yourself. Let me ask you a question. I want you to think about this very clearly just for a second. What if you committed to pick your children up from school? You probably do, many of you that have children. You said, I'll see you at three o'clock. And then just at some point during the day, you're just like, I don't have it. I don't want to do it. No way. Would you pull the covers back over your head and not pick your kids up? Of course not. Why? Because you love them so deeply. Maybe it's your parents. What if you had committed to take your mom or your dad to a doctor's appointment that was very important to them? And then as it got closer that day, you're going, no, I just don't feel it. I got to rest.

I'm going to pull the covers back over my head. Would you ever do that to them? Would you do that to your child? Would you do that to your parents? Of course you wouldn't, why? Because you love them. So the only reason you would do it to you, the real, see the symptom is, I wanna pull the covers back over my head. The disease is, I don't love myself enough

to treat myself with the respect and the love and the care that I would my children or my parents. That's the truth. That intention, that proclivity, that notion of giving in and breaking that promise with yourself, the root of it, that's the symptom. The symptom is fatigue. It's being down. It's being tired. It's not wanting to do your day. The disease is you don't love yourself enough to keep the promises you make to yourself. You would never do that to somebody you love. So don't do it to you. You got to love yourself enough to say, no, I'm going to change my thinking. Let me tell you what I think when I have those mornings. And for the record, I have them often.

I have them more than I should at this stage of my life. I have too many mornings where I wake up and I go, oh my gosh, I don't want to do this today. Maybe I can cancel a few of the meetings, right? Maybe I'll cancel all of them. Yeah, maybe I'll just pull these covers back over and try again tomorrow. That's not who I am. And when those things come up, let me tell you what I do when I get to that point. Here's what I say to myself. This is where most people give in. This is where most people quit. This is where most people settle. This is where most people settle. This is where most people rationalize. And I don't do that. This is where most people roll over.

And I'm not most people. This is literally, Ed, where winning begins and losing ends. Or is this where losing begins, Ed Milet, and winning ends, and winning's not gonna end, and losing's not going to begin and one of these little tiny decisions to give in we know in our spirit and our heart we've started to hurt our self-confidence. Self-confidence is a process of keeping the promises we make to ourselves. It's a reputation with ourselves that we can trust us when we give

ourselves our word like we would to pick our kids up from school or take our parents to a doctor's appointment when we commit to us. it's not the meetings that you have that day that you've committed to them. That's not who you're canceling on. You're canceling on you. You committed to you that you would do that appointment. You committed to you that you would get up at a certain time. You committed to you, you drink a certain amount of water. You committed to you, you'd make a certain amount of contacts. You committed to you, you do something in a given day. Don't break those commitments you make to yourself. Keep the promises that you make to yourself

because every time you do that, part of your spirit, part of you, part of who you're capable of becoming dies with that decision out of weakness. Decide out of strength. And here's what you're gonna find out. Once you get moving, once you get up, once you get in the flow, God sends you the energy you need. You're not gonna die from overwork.

You're not gonna, but what you do need to do, this is an indication, maybe you need to get smarter about how you schedule your time. Maybe you need to get smarter about what I don't do well, which is saying no to people. You've got to keep these promises you make to yourself and you've got to make it a game. Listen to me, you beat 90% of the people in your life

by doing two things, showing up, giving it everything you've got and being a good person. Let me say it again, you got to show up and that's not enough. You got to do the second thing. The second thing is you got to give it everything you've got and you got to conduct yourself as a good human being. When you do that, you'd be 90 plus percent of the people. That last 10%, that's a dogfight between plus percent of the people. That last 10 percent, that's a dogfight between the best of the best. And we'll see who's got what it takes. But you have this consistent process of your life. If I show up when I say I'm gonna, when I get there, I give it everything I've got. And I act in an ethical, moral fashion. I'm a good person.

My intentions are good. You'd be 90% of the world. Believe it or not, I tell my kids this all the time. I told my daughter this yesterday. I said, Bellebou, we're sitting out in the backyard talking about life and what college and what she's gonna do after. And I said, you just remember this, the older you get, the more you watch how human beings behave, you're gonna find out winning is not nearly

as difficult as you think. Because most people can't even keep the commitments they make to themselves. Most people think showing up is all the battle. Showing up is half the battle. Showing up is not half the battle. Showing up gets you in the door, but then you got to give it everything you've got on a consistent basis. And that has to be your habit, your ritual, your identity is to get everything you got. I'm to the point now where if I were to pull those covers back over my head, I have violated everything I believe to be true about myself.

I violated my love for myself, my belief in myself, and I'm not willing to do that to me, not the other people. By the way, I would never do that to another human being either, but I'm certainly not gonna do it to me because every time you give into there a little bit, you crack open the door for it to get a little bigger and a little bigger and a little bigger.

And before you know it, you're walking through that door all the time. So I would say that that is terrible advice with all due respect to people. By the way, I actually think people that have never done anything outside of social media could probably still help people. I really do believe that.

I think everybody has something to give and something to offer, but you have to be very careful giving in to the weaker side of you, giving into really the devil in you, instead of your higher angels, your higher calling. And there's gonna be lots of you, giving into really the devil in you instead of your higher angels, your higher calling. And there's going to be lots of days. Listen, if you're going to win, there's going to be lots of days where you just don't want to do it. And that's where winning

begins and losing ends. Or if you give in, like I said, it's where losing begins and it's insidious. And some people, by the way, have done pretty well for a number of years. And they get to a point and they go, no, I'm entitled now based on what I've accomplished, based on what I've been through, based on my story, I'm entitled now to cool it if I want to, you absolutely can, but that better be committed to everybody else. You better not be telling yourself and other people that you still want to climb the ladder, you still want to win.

You still want to contribute. You can't do both. There's nothing wrong by the way, at any point in your life, and just going, that was enough. If it truly was enough, if you truly don't want more, if it's truly everything you need, in terms of your emotions, your growth, your well-being, your wealth, whatever it is, your body, great. But if there's an incongruency between what you say you want and what you're doing and how you're behaving, that's a real problem. Every time you're doing something like that, you're either making a deposit towards your success, your peace, your wellbeing, or you're making a withdrawal.

In the minute you allow yourself to make withdrawals prematurely, eventually that account becomes overdrawn. And it's very difficult to get out of it. And you have to start all over again. So why would you do this to yourself? You'd only do it if you didn't love yourself enough. So it's an act of love to keep your commitments. It's an act of caring for yourself. It's an act of nurturing yourself. And so I want you to look at that for a second Why would I do that? I wouldn't do that to anybody else. Why would I do this to me? You would only do this to you if the truth is you don't love yourself and oftentimes we can't love ourselves if we're not being ourselves We have to be ourselves and to be ourselves

we have to conduct ourselves and make the decisions in our life and take the actions that are consistent and congruent with who we say we are and where we're going. Now I gotta say this to you, I think it's paramount in your life that you give yourself a break if you've made these mistakes. I am not here to tell you that I have never done that before. I don't know that I've ever pulled the covers over my head for a whole day, but I've certainly pulled them back over my head longer than I should have. And one of the things I have struggled with all my life that many of you probably struggle with is I'm my own worst critic. I'm my own worst critic. I was talking to a young man the other day who's struggling in his life and he's in therapy and just had some thoughts that really were pretty dark.

And one of the things that this is real subtle, but I want you to hear me on this last. One of the things of always analyzing yourself, there's a danger to that. People that are in therapy, or they consume a lot of personal development content, it's healthy to want to grow into want to get better. But there's a flawed thinking for many people that are in therapy or consume self-help or personal development or entrepreneur or wealth content. And here's the premise, I'm screwed up, I need to get fixed.

I messed up, what are the things I need to do so I'm not messed up anymore? And when you do a lot of therapy or you consume a lot of personal development content, you can almost become too self-aware, too self-reflective as opposed to just being and taking action. It's healthy to be self-aware. It's healthy to audit yourself, but there's a point like everything where too much of it becomes unhealthy.

And when you're constantly in reflection, you're constantly evaluating yourself. You know, you do something like, well, that's just my pattern. That's just who I am. That's why I'm screwed up. That's what I'm trying to overcome. I better go to another event, another seminar, another this. And you really have built this premise that you are flawed,

that you are screwed up and that you need to fix you. But what if that's not true? What if that belief in it of itself that you've been convinced of is your very issue, that the very flawed thinking that somehow you're screwed up in a mess and need fixing all the time, and you're always evaluating the mistakes you make to the point where you repeat them or evaluating why you do things or why you don't things do things or beat yourself up all the time.

What if that's the real problem? And what if the truth is, you're pretty damn amazing already. You're pretty awesome already, but you wanna get better. You wanna grow. See, at some point when I was raised by an alcoholic dad and trying to turn my life around, I was always like, well, that's why I don't do things

or that's what I gotta fix about me. And I'm the one who always quits. I'm the one who always starts and stops. I'm the one who gets too upset. I'm the one who worries quits. I'm the one who always starts and stops. I'm the one who gets too upset. I'm the one who worries too much. I'm the one who lacks confidence. I'm screwed up. I'm in personal development because I need to fix me.

You don't need to fix you. You're pretty damn amazing as you are. You're just trying to grow and get better. Very few of you need massive fixing. And it's this flawed belief that you're all screwed up. Because let me say something to you. If you're screwed up that you're all screwed up. Because let me say something to you. If you're screwed up, we're all screwed up. The rest of us are just better at pretending we've got it figured out.

You want to know the truth? You want to know the real truth? I've had the top people in the world on my show. I've been blessed to coach some of the top athletes, entertainers, business people, politicians on the planet. Some might even say I'm one of them. And let me tell you something, we're all just trying to get better and grow. We're all faking it a little bit. We're all acting like we got it together more than we do.

We're all acting like we got more answers than questions. The difference is the majority of the people that you see succeeding, that you see growing, don't spend too much time in analysis of themselves, analysis paralysis. The vast majority of the people that are succeeding have the same issues you do, but there's a subtle difference they have inside, which is that I love me, I'm pretty amazing, but I want to grow, I want to contribute, I want to get better. I want to improve That's different than I don't like me. I don't believe in me. I'm screwed up. I need to fix things in me

Boy, oh boy, that's hard to overcome and let me tell you what's likely to happen You'll spend your entire life trying to fix yourself entire life in analysis entire life coming from a place of lack of almost self disrespect, self loathing, as opposed to self belief and self love. The premise is you must start with self love and belief, and then do things that reinforce that love and belief by the way you behave. It's not good enough to go I love myself, pull the covers over your head. All you got to do is love yourself. That's the other thing here. So yeah, just self

love, man. No, self love. No, no, no. You got to act in accordance and treat yourself with love, with respect. If you were in a relationship with another person, not enough to say I love you and then treat them in an unloving, disrespectful way. Both need to be required. You have to love them and believe in them and then treat them with love and belief and caring and respect. So it's not enough just to love yourself. You have to love yourself and then be willing to treat yourself with the way you act, the way you decide, the way you think with love and respect and admiration for you. But too many of you that are in the personal development consumption space think you're screwed up. If you are, we all are.

You think there's human beings that don't wake up today and don't want to do their day, that aren't sad, that aren't down, that don't feel lost, that don't feel invisible, that don't feel valued? You don't think people like me are very aware of what their weaknesses are, their mistakes. Of course I am. I wish I wasn't so darn aware. But because I'm in this space, because I've done a lot of work on myself, here's the truth. You asked me to make a list right now of 20 things that are pretty amazing about me, it would take me a while. But I can make you a list of a couple hundred about things I don't like right now. This is at 52 years old, the blessings of a lot of, you know, great things in my life. But the truth of the matter is underneath that though, there's this belief that I'm pretty cool. I'm all right. And I'm going to grow and get better. I'm committed the rest of my life to the expansion of my being.

I'm committed to the expansion of who I am as a spirit and a soul and a man. I want to give. I want to contribute. I want to love. I want to improve my life and improve other people's lives. I want more peace in my life and the lives of other people. I want human beings to treat each other more kindly, a little bit more gently, a little bit more love, a little bit more candor, like what

I'm doing with you right now. As a friend, I can tell you, more than likely, you aren't that screwed up, not that much more than the rest of us. But because you think you are, you will spend your entire life trying to move away from who you are, as opposed to move towards who you're capable of becoming. I want to recommend to you're capable of becoming. I wanna recommend to you that you stop that. And guess what? You won't wanna pull those covers over your head anymore.

You won't, because you're moving towards who you're capable of becoming. You're expanding your being. You're not where you wanna be, but you're heading there. And that's where self-love begins. If you have this premise that I'm messed up, I'm screwed up, I'm so bad that I've got to fix me. You'll spend your entire life fixing these other things because ships don't sink because of the water that gets around them.

Ships sink because of the water that gets in them. This is an internal gain. It's an internal gain. You got to keep the water off the inside of your ship and believe that you're worthy of sailing to something great in your life and that you deserve it. And once you change that slight premise right there, that little premise, your whole world's gonna change. And so no, don't pull the covers over your head. Take them off, roll out of the bed, hit the floor if you have to, get moving, get up and take some type of action.

And when you begin to take that action towards growing to the new you, towards keeping the commitments towards treating yourself with love and respect by keeping what you've said you were going to do in your daily schedule and doing the things you've said, you will find more and more days where you can't wait to get up as opposed to have to pull yourself out of that bed. I have a really good friend here today. I love my conversations with him. He's one of my favorite people I've ever met in my life to talk with. I thought today I'd just let you sit in on one with us. We're going to talk today with the great Rob Dyrdek. Welcome to the

show, brother. Hey, thank you for having me. One of the things in addition to all of this that we talked about when we were down in Mexico was this notion of momentum. Here's what I do. I'm going to tell you what I do. I go, I got all that and I'm going to get to it in Mexico was this notion of momentum. Here's what I do. I'm gonna tell you what I do. I go, I got all that and I'm gonna get to it. But right now I got momentum. And so I'm gonna throw fuel on the fire. And I think this is what burnout is. So I've got momentum.

I mean, you've had momentum in your career for freaking 25 years, maybe more, right? So, and by the way, that's the other lesson from Rob. He said sustainability and consistency in the public world or in the entrepreneurial space, it is extremely rare to have duration of success or expansion of success like what you've had. And I was telling you, maybe we were both talking about my, yeah, but I got momentum. Yeah, but I got momentum. Yeah, but I got this

Yeah, but I got that. Yeah, so I'm gonna get to this but that'll be like I see it and you're right and I'm gonna do some of it but what I'm realizing is that momentum was generated from a space of Creativity of rest of a particular vibrational frequency and I'm almost running on the fumes of it now, rather than, and it, so it will run out if I don't get back to this creative state where I'm in that presence problem solving or present creativity state. So what would you say to someone who's listening to go and I got all that, but I'm finally got my business moving. I'm finally, we're rescaling,

we're finally getting this and the economy is changing and I got these other things coming And so man for me to think about this theoretical stuff you're talking about is really good But man, you know like supply chains going on interest rates are going up You know Unemployment may start to get higher again. They're national debt and I just getting it going So this is really good and I'm gonna remember this podcast for three years from now. What would you say to them? It'll always be like that.

It's never not going to be like that. It was the startup version when it was a startup. Oh, now it's working. And there's more to even worry about. Oh, now it's like scale. And it's even, guess what? It's always like that. So if you don't build a harmonious system, your goal is to lead with harmony. If you don't build harmony in your system from the very beginning, you won't have harmony when you find the success, right? And this is why I preach designing life and business at the same time. So when you find success in your business, you find success in your life.

And to me in 2016, when I designed the plan for the way that I wanted to live, I designed a balanced life that would make me healthy first and then I fit work into it. I created hundreds of millions of dollars with using a small percentage of my time living a fully balanced harmonious life. All of the success that I have created since we sat down in 2018 was done from this beautiful peaceful place. I got

better and better and better at being more efficient with my time and my energy and got healthier and healthier and my output got higher and better and better at being more efficient with my time and my energy and got healthier and healthier and my output got higher and higher and higher. And like all of the things that you can worry about that drive you down, you continue to clear them out to where you're only dealing with incoming stress rather than all these things that come in and then break you. stress rather than all these things that come in and then break you. Right. Then you got to reevaluate all this stuff and do all this stuff again. But you know, that's, that's my passion for, you know, harmony over hustle. You know what I mean? Like you, you know,

build a harmonious existence and then get better and better at living in a harmonious way. But I want to say this to momentum, right? Is why it was so profound when we were in Mexico because I, I'm, you know, it's this, it's the pursuit, right? Like I look at you as like, this is the ideal way of life, man. You want your island, you want to be fine on your jet. You want to head out to the golf course. You want to go to the beach house. Like it's really like, you know, and now I look at the world through, I look at how much travel time it's involved in that, right? Forget about like,

how could you possibly, you know, do the show, do the book, do, uh, the podcast and then still have time to get there. Oh, the kids are going to college. Like I can, I see the strain and sort of the use of time just in the structure. And so then I know you have more than enough money to live peacefully and happily. I know that your mission is really more on like how can I reach people and impact people. And when you say momentum, it's like, man, you know, as, I, as the world was changing, then I, as I was changing, I saw an opportunity to share my voice on social media. Then I saw an opportunity to share my voice on a podcast. Then now I got momentum. Now it's like, now I'm like,

so many more people want to talk to me. So many more opportunities. I got momentum. Now it's like, I want to make a book that impacts people and what it is. Oh, now I got even more momentum. Like, oh, what about this television show? Like, I saw that as like, man, I know what that's like. Right. And to me, I also know that, boy, man, you can get caught up in that and trapped by that momentum. Listen close, everyone. Yeah. If you don't understand sort of the, the second and third order consequences of capturing that momentum. Let's stay on this. I want to, I won't say what it is with you, but you, because we don't want that,

but there's been some significant opportunities come your way. Some things that could have been, you think your brand is big now, you're like really different. I'm talking about a public brand. And when those things came your way, you declined and you know what I'm talking about, right? We won't get into what those things were, but you have learned to say no because your decision making process has a process. And I think one thing I want to say to everybody that I think Rob has that I

don't that I'm developing because I want to say to everybody that I think Rob has that I don't, that I'm developing because I know him, is a process and a philosophy through which I make decisions rather than just emotionally. Because I will, if you let me, I'll just keep helping more and more and more people with no process to make the decision, no evaluation of what the consequences are, and no evaluation of what maybe looks like I'll help more people will cost me to plead the energy that could have done it in a more efficient and productive way so you have also learned to decline to say no to different things in your life and I think that's probably something everyone should know yeah and

look it's it's one of those things that you could read it in every single personal development book mm-hmm gotta learn say no You know me and we know it yes as as guys who lived are lived out on the edges of Saying yes to everything right because you know the the early process for me is like, oh man This this might be the one. Oh, this might be the one. Oh, wow This might be the one and the, wow, this might be the one. And the problem was, is I hadn't defined what is the whole. And once I finally defined what the whole was, and now I'm, I'm like, and I refer to every, to it as like the human, why,

where we all have the same, why we want to live a harmonious, high quality life. Right. And so you have to define what that is for you. And for me, that was how I used my time, the type of things that I did, and ultimately, the amount of money I had, where I invested that money and what that money did for me and the lifestyle that I lived. I had a certain way of living that I wanted, that I connected to my identity, that I needed to create enough wealth that would provide me that lifestyle in a sustained manner forever, before I would be truly harmonious. Right?

And when I finally did that, right? And I defined it and I built the plan backwards. And when I finally got to there, I changed. I changed because I now have this extraordinary security, right? And that security now allowed me to get even more efficient with my time, make even more decisions that are based on, is this going to affect my energy? Like, and continuing to build my life around what gives me energy, anything that takes energy, Anything that slightly takes it

address it and get rid of it create a system or a solution to solve it or just Completely get it out of your life and and now you will never compromise Especially doing something that that's just for money or some higher level of fame, if you will. Because I don't want to disrupt the harmony that I've created because it's unnecessary. I am as happy and balanced as a human being could be. I am excited to continually evolve into my limitless potential in a controlled manner that is done on a consistent basis of joy. Because what I realized is well, man, what is happiness? Well, happiness is really just consistent joy. And

when you go from day after day after day where thing after thing after thing is filled with joy and an extended period of time, that's when you're feeling what it feels like to be truly happy all the time. When you listen to him, everybody, this is a dude from Ohio was a skateboarder and now look at this. I mean, I quit high school. Look, you keep in mind this. I didn't even understand personal development or even read until I met my wife who was in the, who was in, who was like super into personal development and like I read Think and Grow Rich back then and it like was like, whoa,

like I had read it when I was younger, but it was like the beginning of unlocking like what is the human potential? And then my mind thinks in this sort of systems way and I just keep as I'm living it and finding the success in life that I envisioned and planned you know five years earlier and are realizing it I'm doing it while I'm thinking about how one day I can share it so it's almost like this meta process of your learning lessons thinking of how they integrate together, and then how you can articulate this and easy to understand the way that you can share with people one day. It's this interesting process I've been in.

It's really deep what you just said. So one thing I've, I've began to do, I did a lot in my entrepreneurial life, but I didn't do it in my personal life. So my entrepreneurial life, I was always like, well, we need a process or a system for that. Cause nothing can be related to just a personality or emotion. So in all my entrepreneurial ventures, well, we need a processor system for that. Because nothing can be related to just a personality or emotion. So in all my entrepreneurial ventures, we need a processor system for that. It wasn't until really you and I connected that like, you know, you're like, that's

what my life is. So everybody listening to this or watching, are you going to ask yourself this? Do you have a processor system for that? Because if it's not a processor system, it's probably not going to be sustainable over a duration. You have to have a process or a system. You are a, you probably could have been some type of engineer and another lifetime, I think, cause you do think systematically and process wise,

but I think all of you, if you're trying to pull, extract things you need to ask yourself is do you have a process in a system for it? Is there one? Cause if there isn't, you need one from your time, from your family stuff, from your entrepreneurial, from your entrepreneurial part of your life. Here is Ed Milet appearing on Dave Heavy D Sparks YouTube channel and Ed will be interviewed by Dave and his friends. I've never said this out loud because I forgot. And we were walking about a hundred yards from here. I said, Hey man, let's take a walk. Cause my sister and our family was there.

And we started to take a walk and I was about to get the words out of my mouth. I was going to go, Hey man, you got anything for me? I was, I couldn't say the words. I swear to you brother. Instead I said, Hey man, how long are you going to stay at this shitty job? And he goes, what? He was making like 200 grand at the time. I said, you should come to work with me. And I remember it was like an out of body experience. It was completely not why I went there, completely not the reason I took the walk with him. And for some reason I couldn't get my being to ask him for this job. Instead I recruited him to come to work for me. And two days later, he quit that job, came to work with me and he still works in

my firm to this day. That happened right on this beach, and I completely forgot about it till we were sitting here right now. That crazy? That's cool, that's cool, Kenny. I love that story because you turn doubt, you know, fear into faith.

Yeah, in an instant. And it's like sometimes that's just a calling on your heart because he had running water, I didn't. He owned a house, I didn't. I had bankruptcy, or not bankruptcy, I I never filed bankruptcy I had foreclosure and repose he hadn't have any of that stuff and I go when are you gonna quit that stupid job crazy that came out of my mouth I love it not at all bro I went there I went there to go with my hat in hand say help me yeah crazy I just

remember that right now that's a huge turning point bro massive that's probably the turning point yeah it, massive. It was the intervention they did and then that walk. And by the way, my brother-in-law's probably listening to this, he remembers it very clearly. I roped him into the business. He's been doing it now 25 years with me. Dude, that's cool. Yeah. That's really cool. What else we got for Ed, guys? Alright, sorry, I'm hogging the mic here. I got so much. With all your prodigious talents and your assets and the accomplishments you've done and the people you've influenced,

you're kind of ostensibly at the top. People look at you and say, Ed Milet, he's at the top. The pinnacle of the Zenith, he's achieved it. He's done. What keeps you hungry? Mm-hmm. You told a story about Ray Ray, right? Yeah.

The fight that your dad made you go have with Ray Ray. Who or what is your Ray Ray today? What mountain do you have yet to climb? Yeah. Well, I your dad made you go have with Ray Ray. Who or what is your Ray Ray today? What mountain do you have yet to climb? Yeah. Well, I don't feel like I'm at the top. I mean, until you say something like that, I don't walk around every day going, oh, wow, I'm at the top.

Well, this is incredible. So I don't ever think that. If I'm like, I'm not gonna give you the stuff that's like, I'll just tell you, I still am afraid to be broke. I mean, there's things I want to do, I can tell you what they are, but like, I'm not just tell you, I still am afraid to be broke. I mean, there's things I want to do, I can tell you what they are, but like, I'm not gonna tell you that I don't have any fear about like,

that I need to keep working hard for this not to go, and I don't want that kind of boogie man to go away, I kind of dig him. I've talked with Dwayne Johnson about this, I've talked with different really top athletes about this, like there's a little bit of a fear that it could go away, and that's not unhealthy to me, it keeps me sharp. So, it does keep me hungry. And so, I mean to me, it keeps me sharp. It keeps you hungry.

It does keep me hungry. And so, I mean, it's nonsense. I own this place free and clear. I own my jet free and clear. I own the island free and clear. I own my desert house. I own two other ocean front houses down the street. Free and clear.

Like, I don't, there's no debt, right? I have no debt. That's not something to brag about. Sometimes debt is really, really good, right? A lot of people made a lot of money with debt the last few years. But there's this thing in me, man, that's like, hey, I still wanna prove something.

And then the other part of me is like, I'm addicted to growing. Like, I'm addicted to it. You were talking about earlier, we were just getting ready to record, you're like, I can't sit still. I have a hard time sitting still, and I need to learn to sit still.

Yeah, you probably do a little bit, but like, I wasn't born to like sit around and watch Netflix. I like doing it a little bit, but like, I was born to do something great with my life. So were you guys. Like I kind of know that and great isn't like every day I'm making millions of dollars. It's like I care about people. Like I want to help people. Like I love that y'all were here in my home. You know I mean like I wanted you to come here

today. I don't I didn't want to do it in some studio or whatever. I want you to be with my family and in my house. So I think that's part of it. And then I just don't have this muscle where I'm like, this is, yeah. It's not for me like a destination. It's like a process. It's the process of growing. It's the process of meeting my other self.

I kind of like meeting the other self. It's, I kinda like meeting the new me. Like, my daughter is the one who picks on me and we were at dinner for my 50th. And she goes, daddy, are you in a midlife crisis? And I'm like, why would you say something like that? She goes, come on, like Instagram, you're taking selfies all the time. I think you're dying your beard now, I'm pretty sure.

You know, she was ripping on me. And I said, Hey, you're dying your beard now, I'm pretty sure. She was ripping on me. And I said, And are you dying your beard? No, I can't confirm that. I can't confirm that. My son's in there laughing, and so is my wife, because they know this conversation.

And I said, Yeah, I am. But I said, Bella, I was in a young life crisis. And you know what, if you come back in five years, I'll be in a 55 year old crisis. I'm in a crisis every year to be a different me by the end of that year, to be a better me. And I said, Bella boo, all the cells in your body pretty much regenerate themselves every year. Your lung tissue is about every six months. Like there's all parts of you

physically regenerating themselves and becoming new. Shouldn't the inside part of your spirit and your mind become new? And I said, so yeah, I'm in a midlife crisis and I'll be in an old life crisis too. I don't want to be the same person. I already lived that life. I was already that guy. I want to be the next one. All the same character, all the same principles, but living a better expression of them. I've already expressed this version of me. The world's already got that. I don't want to change my principles or my character or what I stand for, but I wanna express it better. I wanna express it differently.

Maybe that sounds like one of those podcast answers, but it's like totally legit. It's actually what I think about. Ed, there's a lot of high profile people, guys like Jaco, guys like Andy Frazella. Love both of them. Amazing guys. They're getting pressure right now

since the world seems to be turning to shit in certain ways. I'm not a doom and gloom guy and I don't like to talk about that But they're getting pressure to get into leadership positions. Yeah, it is politics anything that could ever happen to you The world needs a guy like you and I'm gonna sit here and say I'm gonna say you should If Ed ran for anything, king of whatever, I mean he'd have my vote. But are you completely opposed to that or is that, if the world needs it? I would say pretty much opposed. Because I've had some heat to do that recently from people who help people do that.

I think if I thought like that expression, I think if I thought I could do more to help people doing that than what I'm doing right now, then I would do that. I think if I thought like that expression, I think if I thought I could do more to help people doing that than what I'm doing right now, right, then I would do it. But I think there are people probably that would rather go raise all the money that I don't want to have to go raise to do it. Although I wouldn't need that much, I could use most of my own. Right now no and I don't think that, oh shoot, well I got two votes, me and you. I think right not right now and I don't think probably I will but if the time came and I felt like hey man I could really make it and no one else could do it you know then maybe that I

would I would not run for something small or local I would run for something national if I did it but I don't know that I have the temperament to keep to say the political things that are required that's why I admire some of the people recently they've gotten into politics, they're like, you know, I'm gonna tell you what I really think. I think both the guys you listed would be wonderful dudes to carry that baton. I'd love to support people and help them with as well.

I can help them write their speeches. Yeah, absolutely. That kind of stuff. But I can't say that I would never do it. If you'd asked me five years ago, for sure, no way, no how, impossible. And my wife definitely doesn't want me to do it. But there's an opening. I mean, if it really was needed and I could help, no way, no how impossible and my wife definitely doesn't want me to do it but

there's an opening. I mean if it really was needed and I could help, I might do it. This show is sponsored by Airbnb. I gotta tell you, I get tired of staying at hotels. I travel a lot in hotels, no offense, but they're getting noisier and noisier and noisier and a lot of things that used to come with the hotel rooms like room service and other benefits like that, they just don't do it anymore or not like they used to so my last couple of trips I told my team let's just stay at an Airbnb. We stayed at an Airbnb and I'll probably never go back again It was the coolest experience ever privacy luxurious. The space was great. All of it. I loved it And then when I'm there, I was like, wait a minute. I have a home that simply sits a lot

I could be generating revenue on these places. I wonder how this works. So when I looked into it, I'm like, I'm going to Airbnb my place. So now I'm only staying at Airbnbs when I travel, but other people are staying at my house as well when I'm gone. It's awesome. I'm generating revenue when I'm not there. So, hey, I'm telling you, your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much more at airbnb.ca slash host. This show is sponsored by better help. So, you know, as an adult, are you carving out time, you know, on a weekly basis to

learn new things and to grow or do it as often as you like, or is the day to day kind of getting you so busy that you, you forget to ever recapture that kind of childlike joy and enthusiasm you had in your life, just like the wonder of being a child again. And one of the things that you know, if you really want to change things in your life, you should look at therapy. What I love about BetterHelp is it can be done online. If you don't vibe with the therapist, you can switch it anytime. And therapy can really help you connect with kind of your sense of wonder again. Get back to that childlike joy and enthusiasm you had. Therapy is helpful for learning different things

about life, but also learning about yourself and becoming more self-aware. So here's all you got to do. Just fill out a brief questionnaire to get matched with a licensed therapist and you can switch therapists anytime you want for no additional charge. Rediscover your curiosity with BetterHelp. Visit BetterHelp.com. slash EdShow today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp. H-E-L- month. That's better help. H e l p dot com slash ed show. Very short intermission here folks. I'm glad you're enjoying the show so far. Don't forget to follow the show on apple and Spotify links are in the show notes. Now onto our next guest. I know you deserve the best in your life.

You deserve more. You deserve abundance. You deserve increase. And I think my conversation today with my friend, Brendan Bouchard, that you'll hear here is going to give you some insights and some ideas and just some tactics that maybe you've not heard phrased the way that we phrase it here today. And by the way, if you enjoyed the conversation, he's got an amazing app that I always promote for him called Growth Day. If you go to growthday.com forward slash ed, you could get more of the types of content like what he and I are talking about here today. But this one today is just for you on the Ed Mylett show. So I hope you enjoy this conversation on self-confidence. Here we go.

Ed, good seeing you brother. Love you brother. Good to be with you Brennan. Man, I'm so excited to be talking about personal development with you because every time I do, I get fired up. And if I think of something you're known for, especially when we see you on stage or you're on your podcast, you have a certain kind of confidence and energy and presence that I think draws people in, but also builds that kind of trust and assurance that you kind of have it, you know, and I'm going to guide you, I'm going to help you through this. You have it too. We both reflected a little bit differently, but even when we started today, when you came on the camera, I said, I'm instantly smiling when I'm with you. And that's because you

radiate that type of confidence as well. So it's such a great topic because even when I work with athletes, you know, like when we're done today, I'm working with one of my UFC fighters and people what do you really work with? Is it their visualizations? Is it, and I do do those things, but if you, even with the top of the top athletes that I work with, the number one thing they struggle with is their confidence level and it's building, building it back, gaining the momentum of it again, remembering where it came from initially. And I think one of the reasons so many people and even myself to some extent, the last couple years lost a little bit of it is our promises we were capable of keeping to ourselves were taken from us. So I see self-confidence almost like it's a reputation that you have with yourself and if you have a reputation with yourself

where you keep the promises that you make to you, you begin to stack those promises on top of each other. You develop what we call self-confidence. When I have not held self-confidence, if I look back 90 days or 120 days or even a year, at some point I stopped keeping the promises I made to myself. And they can be small things like, what time I get up in the morning,

how much water am I gonna drink every day? How many contacts am I gonna make in my business? How many pages of a book am I going to read? And those things seem very small, even making my bed, they seem very small. But when you start stacking up these little things like, Oh, I do the things I tell myself I'm going to do. And when, when the stuff happened the last couple of years, our opportunities to deliver on promises we made to ourselves were for the most part taken away from us, the normal routines and habits we had about going to a gym, even as simple as things like that,

or even contact in business, going to an office every day. And so these things changed and then we wake up 90 days or a year later and we go, I don't really feel like I've got what I had before. So I always go back even with the athletes I work with, or even myself, where can I begin to build baseline self-confidence? Baseline self-confidence is keeping these promises. Superhuman self-confidence, no pun intended, is right behind me if they're watching the video. It's keeping the promises you make to yourself and then doing one more.

Oh, I love it. So I say I'm going to make 10 contacts in a day. I make my 10. I do it one more. Now I've not just kept the promises, I've elevated the standard because in our life, you know this, I believe we don't get our goals most of the time.

What delivers on our goals are the standards we set. And so the higher the standard, the deeper our self-confidence goes. So one of the keys for me has been rebuilding the structures around which I keep the promises I make to me. And the duration in which I keep the promises I make to me. And the duration in which I do it is causing the depth of the self-confidence level that I have. So for me, it starts with basic habits and routines and things that I commit.

This may seem really small. My daughter, by the commitments I've made to myself is I will talk to my daughter every day. She's away at Clemson in college. You think, what does this have to do with business? It has everything to do because I'm a really busy dude. It's easy for me to just text her. I actually call her, hey, Bella boo, it's daddy. I did it this morning. Except now I do it and I do it one more time a day. Now I'm like a super human confident dad because how many dads are doing that, right? And I also, and I'm gonna let you jump in because I'm curious for you. I actually believe there's a part of us that goes, I'm getting what I deserve. I'm getting what I deserve. The external results I'm producing have a lot to do with internally what I believe I'm worth and what I believe I deserve. And if you're like me, I don't naturally have

a proclivity to believe I'm worth a lot. I wasn't raised with a bunch of praise and belief being poured into me. I'm very self-critical when I make a mistake on my own worst critic, even to this day, I have to really battle that. And even when I'm winning sometimes candidly, I'll be vulnerable. Is this a fluke?

You know, like am I fooling everybody right now? And so this stuff we're talking about has been fundamental in my life to changing my life is me believing, man, I'm doing things most people aren't willing to do. I deserve to get stuff most people end up getting. And so for me, it's the beginning of keeping those promises you make to yourself.

And then I've got some other stuff too when we come back to it, but do you relate to that? Is that part of your recipe too? 1000? 1000%. And I think researchers find that, like, they might use other language. It might be, hey, that's keeping personal commitment. Same thing. Hey, that's integrity. That's self-trust. And the language I use for that, that's just congruence. I say I'm going to do it, I do it, I was congruent. If I say I'm going to do it and I don't do it, I break that congruence. I say I'm gonna do it, I do it, I was congruent. If I say I'm gonna do it and I don't do it, I break that congruence and the more breaks then the more breaks in my psyche,

the more breaks in my identity, the more breaks in my rhythm. And I a billion percent agree with you on that. There is a rhythm, you know, some might call it a vibrational frequency or a rhythm to success. There's a rhythm to confidence. And when you're in that rhythm, the words flow a little bit different. Yes.

Places and things flow to you a little bit differently. And you have a rapport with yourself and with other people when you're in that rhythm. It's funny that you say it because my son had to take a bunch of time off from golf. He had a knee injury and he lost that confidence in that rhythm. And even myself, when I've lost it, it's almost like, and you can be so close to the way you were before, but it's just not what it was. It's almost like you ever be at a wedding and you watch that dude and he's got the moves, right? But he's dancing to the lyrics, not the beat of the music. So it's just not. Oh, that's neat.

Yeah. Well, that's just what I've heard. Okay. But it's that lack. And that's why you could say, man, I'm saying the same things I was saying six months ago, but I'm not producing the same result. It's that rhythm is off. You're dancing to the lyric, not the beat of the music. And there's a beat to it. And I think you're a million percent right about that, Brendan. And I think once you find that groove, it's like, you know, momentum is a magnifier. Momentum is a rhythm. Momentum can take a person who's pretty average and ordinary like me, and you start getting enough momentum on enough rhythm, you're like, whoa, you have these superhuman things you begin to achieve. What's important about what you're also saying is that here's what's really important. Both of us are saying this is an internal game. It's not contingent on the

external praise or even producing the result to generate confidence. In other words, the game I've set up isn't outcome driven, it's process driven. Did you engage the process today as a win? Yes, that's the, for me, it's like all I can control. I can control my attitude, my activity, everybody knows that. But I'm linking that to my confidence, not the production of the result. If your confidence is constantly contingent on the result, you'll be chasing your tail most of the time. Be chasing your tail. So it's an internal game. It's

also not I don't need the affirmation of another person to get self confidence. selfconfidence means it has to do with one's self. I'll give you another big key for me. And this really flipped things. I've talked to you about these conversations I had with Wayne Dyer. And a lot of times my confidence is not even predicated on my ability because there may be somebody smarter than me or better than me, a better speaker, a better marketer, a better whatever. So when I walk into even today, I'm confident today. Let me tell you why. I give myself credit for my intentions. So my confidence, I've linked to my intent to serve, my intent to do good, and not necessarily my ability to.

So even when I speak, I mean, I'm a pretty good speaker, right, but I'm not out there going, I'm the world's greatest speaker. My confidence comes from, I've prepared, I've kept the promises I made to myself and my intentions. Yes. Not enough precious human beings say, I'm a good woman. I'm a good man.

I deserve to be successful. I'm walking into this business meeting and I intend to do good. I intend to help these people. I should be confident. Yes. They think they've conflated, go no, no, no, but I'm not as good as I need to be. That's not where your confidence should be linked to or even the outcome. Link it to your intentions because that's something you know to be true about you. I could always go back, Brendan, no matter where I am in the world, no matter what

I'm doing. The one thing I do believe about me is I'm a good man. I intend to serve. I intend to contribute. I generate a tremendous amount of confidence in my intentions, not necessarily my ability or the result. And I think this is something that's never taught in a self-confidence world. Yep. That, listen, your intent matters. You should generate tremendous strength from your intentions.

Yet most good people just sort of, they slough it off. They don't give themselves any credit for their intent. In other words, this doesn't, they think, oh, everybody intends to serve. Everybody's good. Nah, not so fast. And worse, you lose it. You lose it sometimes, meaning people lose the time or the practice of setting the intention. So even if they are good, they don't even set the intention so they can't give themselves credit for it. So you'll love this little psychological trick. We call it a doorway trigger. Doorway trigger is anytime you enter a doorway,

you say something to yourself. So mine is when I walk through a door, I always say, I enter this room, a happy man, ready to serve. By the way, the trigger thing is huge. We should talk a little bit more about that too, but because you can make deposits when you are confident that you can make withdrawals from later. So let's talk about that in a second. But like, for example, this fighter that I'm going to work with later today, she has a very major fight coming up. And one of the things I just wanted to have a simple self-talk that gives her confidence. And actually we've been working on it now for three months leading up to this fight. And here's

what it is. I find a way to win. I find a way to win. I find a way to win. And I make her repeat it to me with different emphasis. So she'll say things like, I find a way to win. I find a way to win. She'll say, I find a way to win. And then other time, I'll have her say, I find a way to win. And we emphasize this over and over and over. It becomes like an embedded command if anybody knows any NLP stuff, right? But it's just self-talk that's repeated over and over again. And it's funny how the mind works. We're going to repeat this over and over again. It becomes a believable belief and our mind moves towards what we're most familiar with. So if we're familiar with that thought, I tell you right now in this fight, when it gets down to crunch time and she's in that what I,

they call it deep water. When she's taking out to the deep water, she might be getting submitted. She's tired and she's going to come back to this. I find a way to win. And I believe what we believe to be most true, we end up producing long-term in our life. I just hope it shows up in the fight. Right. You're exactly right with the self-talk. I'm. I just hope it shows up in the fight. Right. But you're exactly right with the self-talk. I'm curious, do you do anything, cause I do, when you, to anchor a state when you have confidence

so that you can make the withdrawal later? Do you do that? Like when you're really feeling it, do you do anything to create that trigger, that anchor? Yeah. Mine's dorky and self-reflective. Like when I capture, I go, oh, I got it. And I'd write it down. And I tell myself, write it down. And it's go, because I know I'll forget that

state or that moment, or even if I do myself physically anchoring, 10 minutes later, the emotion's gone. So I want to know what was the aha, what was the breakthrough? Oh, I got it. And I write it down. So it's almost like a reward or a celebration or refraction. And to me, I have to write it down. Partially because I had a brain injury way back in the day. So, my memory and my cues aren't as easy to reflect, like, consciously. I remember it. I have to write it down. The other thing I just want to say, that coaching you're giving her is so great because I've always defined confidence as the belief in one's ability to figure things out. My confidence is, I believe I can figure this out, which is another way of saying, I will find a way. It's the same. It's literally the same thing.

Right. I will find a way to win is I believe I can figure this out. It's, I like yours better because the deeper level of commitment and adding the wind to it. I think that's so important, but you mentioned you have something that you do. When I really feel something, this is maybe a little bit technical, but I think it's worth sharing for those that wanna experience it.

What I'm feeling, I think confidence is an emotion also. Right. So it's not only a thought, it's not only a state of being, but it is an emotion also. Right. So it's not only a thought, it's not only a state of being, but it's an emotion. And there is a neurochemistry to all of our emotions. And so when I am feeling particularly confident, this is just what most people don't ever do in their life.

They don't take advantage of states they find themselves in so they can go back to them later, to your point about the trigger and the anchor. So when I am in a state of achievement, let's just say, or confidence, I like to just do something very simple physically that anchors that state in my body. It's not really dramatic either. It's kind of nerdy and dorky also. But for example, if I'm on the stage and I'm just being crushed, or I'm just feeling the flow in a podcast or I'm in a beautiful moment with my daughter where I'm feeling particularly confident as

a father, whatever it is. My daughter this morning, when I called, she called me back Brandon. She's like, she had a major test today. Her roommate called, said, dad, they're going to the test. Dad, we need words of wisdom. We need some motivation. My daughter. And by the way, it's bizarre to me at the stage of my life, bro, that my daughter now seeks this from me because I got eye rolls her entire teenage years when I'm giving her the same talks, right? Your club life right there. Absolutely. So, so I started out and what I, she caught me off guard.

So the first thing I said was like, okay, dad, thanks. You know, I was like, but then I kind of crushed a couple other recommendations that I gave her. Right. And I, when we were done, I'm like, that was a good dad moment right there. I crushed that as a dad. And so when I'm feeling a particular level of confidence, I'll anchor it with just some type of physical move. So like it might be for me, it's a lot, it's like a finger snap. I'm on the stage, I'm crushing, boom. And what I'm doing is I'm depositing that confident state into my neurochemistry. I'm making a deposit. And so when I'm feeling it, I deposit it with my athletes.

You just hit a home run. You better, when you're running around those bases, give me the finger snap or slap your chest or pull on your ear or tug on the helmet. You better anchor this amazing state. Now it's anchored. And the more we repeatedly do the same physical, simple move in a particular state, those are deposits.

Then when I need to make a withdrawal and I'm feeling a bit insecure when I'm about to walk out on stage, bam, finger snap, puts my neurochemistry back in that state again. You can even tell as I'm saying this to you now, my energy level is changed. You're opening. Yeah. I'm opening. And so this, for some people that's too much, but for a lot of people it's like, that's it.

When I'm feeling good, do something and do the same thing repeatedly, whatever it might be. That's why you'll watch a lot. You can learn so much from an athlete. You watch an athlete get out of the batter's box and adjust their batting gloves or they tap home plate the same two times, right? Or the golfer does the same two practice.

The pattern of a rhythm, yeah. Right, or Tom Brady, let's go! Or Peyton Manning, Omaha, you know, whatever it might be. These are verbal or physical triggers that are from previous self-confident peak performance states that they're now calling on now when they need the most.

Right. So that's the science part of self-confidence. The other stuff is sort of the art form of it. One of the things that I'm still sort of surprised by when I work with people or they come to events is lack of clarity. And, and if I would add on top of that is a lack of specificity. So, you know, you say, well, I want to lose weight, but you're not going to get a lot of self-confidence coming from that statement. Specifically, what does that mean? Is it about, is it pounds?

Is it body fat? Is it a percentage? Clarity is specificity. And so I want to, you know, I want to have a good year in business. I want to have my best month. What exactly specifically does that mean? So that when you look at that board,

it's their specificity all over it. Almost think sometimes that building the muscle of setting specific outcomes and specific visual things is something people need to work on. For whatever reason, of all the things I'm not good at, that has never been a struggle of mine. I've never been vague. I've always really been very specific because I want to know whether I hit it or not, but that's what creates clarity. It's like, if I'm looking at a golf hole, like we're talking about golf earlier, you and I off camera, if I, you know, I'm my average player. So what I'm really trying to do, which I was just talking about this this weekend in a golf tournament, I'm trying to hit it on the green, which is a big old 60 foot green, right?

Yeah. And that's why I'm an amateur. And that's why I lack confidence. Yes. The truth is a professional player is trying to hit it to a spot on the green that's about six inches wide. Right. Right. And that specificity creates clarity for them in the shot. And so they're far better than me

because the target is so specific. Yes. And even if they were to miss, they're gonna be much closer than me because they were so much more specific in their focus than I was with my wide focus or lack of focus. Some people that are worse than me at golf aren't even trying to hit the green. They're just trying to hit the ball. Right. And that's some, and that's a metaphor for life. And so yeah, you're a hundred percent. And one of the things that also creates clarity is this notion that I've been here before, meaning you were like, take a speech,

you're exactly right. And I know you're one of the greats of all time. You've walked out there in your mind before you've gone there. You walked out for this podcast before you've gone there. You project yourself into that space and see it happening. To the point even when I was in, when I'm selling, I even picture them hugging me at the end and thanking me. It's that level of specificity. It's that level of so that when I get there and that rhythm starts to happen, it's familiar. See, I don't want to end up in, if I can help it, I want to minimize the unfamiliar. And so if I projected, I prepared, I projected, a lot of my self-confidence comes from the fact

that I prepared and I've been there. In my mind, I've been there before. So that helps create clarity for me. And I'll give you one more thing to kick around. You know, it's surprising to me, no matter what your faith is. So if you're a Christian or a Muslim or Jew or Hindu, or you practice Buddhism, or maybe you believe,

like I do, I'm a Christian, but also I believe in energy, I believe in the quantum, right? And people say to me, I believe there's an all-powerful source, or I'm a follower of Jesus. And it's interesting to me, whatever their belief system is, that they don't derive any self-confidence personally from it. Interesting, right? Why would you not link your faith, whatever faith it is you practice,

to your confidence? Like as a Christian, if you're a Christian, like I'm the son of the King of Kings. His DNA is running through my veins. Why in the world would that not give me some dad gum confidence? Right. The quantum and you can plug into an all-knowing knowledge field. Shouldn't you get a little confidence from that? So it's interesting to me how people go, well, I have a lot of faith. I'm in the synagogue or the mosque or I'm at church on Sunday, but somehow Monday morning when business starts, I'm alone now. Right. Alone now. You I'm alone now. Right. You're alone now?

You're not alone now. Your faith tells you it informs you otherwise. And so you start having the combination of anchors and triggers, keeping the promises you make to yourself, your intentions, your clarity, all these things we're talking about. And then you stack on top of that.

I have a faith in something bigger than me that's with me all the time. I ought to have some boldness and confidence solely stemming from that. So, so many of you that have faith, why are you checking that at the door when it comes to your relationships, your body, your business, your money

that should be centerpiece of your self-confidence, should be the most important piece of your self-confidence? And I know it is for you. I love it. My favorite words in my faith, in terms of Christianity is, he precedes me. It's like he precedes me like this, every this has already worked out. Yes, somebody already worked it out. Now I need to find my way through I

need to figure out a way to win. I need to, you know, hopefully figure it out. Yeah, but where it's going to go, I have trust. Since we're being completely real, you know, my people that see me speaks backstage like, so I saw you do your mood where you're snapping your fingers. But what's the last thing you'll see me do? I actually get on my knees and I pray very quickly. Because that's where my real confidence comes from. It's the it's, you know, here's what it's done for me. I've never said this to somebody and maybe you and I can kick this around the last few minutes. I think also we put a pressure on ourselves like am I going to make the right decision or the wrong one? Am I going to say the right thing or the wrong thing? And I have found in my life and I have this rooted in my belief system that when I've come to a place where I have to yield or make a decision, I don't necessarily think most of the time. Now there is right and wrong in life. We all know that. I'm not talking about ethics or morals. I'm not referring to that. I'm talking about if something goes one way or the other. I've really built this belief system that I'll make either one work. So if I decide this way and I might be wrong, I'll find a way to make that work. And if I go that way and I was going to be right, I'll make that one work. There's this

notion that sort of put into us when we're children, like good or bad, right or wrong. And we start feeling this pressure, like, what if I don't say the right thing? What if I don't do the right thing? The truth is in life, most of the time, that path, that journey, both can lead to bliss. Both can lead to success. It might be a different path. It might not be to your point on your schedule. It might be on God's schedule. And if you have a God that's a pro

that created the entire universe, you're probably gonna be okay no matter which turn you take. And that gives you a confidence to go, I'm going to call the shot with the most information, with the, with the best of my ability, but I'm going to make either one of these work. That's real confidence. Oh, I love it. I'm going to make either one of these works because the truth is whichever one you take path A or B turns out good or bad. Most people go, well, one's going to be good and one's going to be catastrophic and it's going to be terrible. And I go, well, one's going to be good and one's going to be catastrophic and it's going to be terrible. Right. And I go, well, the truth is right or wrong, the

next step actually is exactly the same. If you fail, the next step demands that you summon the best of who you are to handle it. If you win, guess what? The next step is going to demand that you summon the best of who you are no matter what. So I always tell people, you want confidence? It's easy, know your job. You have one job. Every day, summon the best of who you are to really work life and at the same time, trust life or God, I think is one of the ultimate secrets of the most successful people I've ever met. I million percent agree and I think actually today's conversation is sort of evidence of everything we've said. We both set out with an intention to serve today. There's been this incredible rhythm between the different things that we've, you know, said here together. And if I'd add one last thing to it, it's also that you could take on an identity of yourself too, which is that I'm kind of a learner. Like, I'm curious, I was curious where this was gonna go today, and I learned. And when I come to these decisions, or these experiences, I'm curious, I was curious where this was going to go today. And I learned. And when I come to these decisions, or these experiences I'm going to have, you know, at

a minimum, I'm going to learn something about myself about how to do it better. You know, even with an athlete, I keep going back to these examples, but like, I'll tell them that at bat, yeah, you grounded out, but you learned this guy's curveball does this. You look so the next at bat, you're more prepared for what he's going to bring to you. This notion of I'm learning. I don't know, for me, it reduces the pressure. It increases the curiosity. And it also I'm almost always winning if I'm learning. Yes, I'm almost always winning if I'm learning. Yes, I'm almost always winning if I'm learning. And so I've sort of adopted in my life this notion that I'm curious and I'm going to learn. It's going to be an experience.

I'm going to learn. I found that I actually produced the outcome that I actually had on my board to your point for clarity far more regularly when I'm not so addicted to the outcome and everything I want to do because addiction to outcome can rob you of confidence, but when I am committed to the process that you've described earlier, and also this notion that I'm going to gather a better me at the other side of this, because I will have learned something about me, the circumstances, the environment, how to do it better the next time, whatever that might be,

I get a lot of confidence when I approach things that way. I wanted to have Alan on our show for a long time. I was just telling him this off camera. I wanted to have him on because he's got a really unique perspective and an upfront view to some of the key performers in the NBA for many, many years. And he's taken the lessons he's learned from these high performers and he's distilled it down in information that everybody can use as an entrepreneur, as a father, as a mother, as just a human being. Alan Stein, welcome to the show, bro.

Oh man, it's so awesome to be here. My pleasure. Finally, man. You know what I want to start out? I want to start out with Kobe Bryant. Yes. So Alan's work with everybody from people like Kobe to Kevin Durant to Steph Curry and many, many companies and business leaders as well.

But you tell this great story. I think it's around a Nike camp or something like that with Kobe Bryant that just blew my mind that I think just personifies greatness and high standards. So tell us that story. Sure, well I mean it absolutely changed my life. So I had a chance to meet Kobe in 2007. It was the first ever Nike Skills Academy and they were building a series of camps around their signature players who of course at that time Kobe Bryant was atop of that mountain and flew out to Los Angeles here, La La Land, to work that event. And I had a chance to watch one of his really early morning workouts, which for those...

Which are legendary. Absolutely legendary. And for folks that are familiar, those have a start time of 4 a.m. Gosh. And, you know, and of course, the most impressive part of that is you're talking about a guy that had already reached the mountaintop You know, he's already a surefire Hall of Famer multi-millionaire 10 times over NBA champion MVP I mean and he's still up in the offseason putting in that type of work and and I remember Being as a younger coach being shocked at the simplicity of what he was doing I mean, he spent the first 30 minutes without even having a ball in his hands.

He was doing basic pivoting drills and footwork drills. And his workout lasted for a couple hours. And I remember vividly at the end of this workout going up to him and saying, Koby, I don't get it, man. You're the best player in the world. Why are you doing such basic drills? And I'll never forget it.

He gave me a really friendly smile and a wink, but he said in a really serious tone, why do you think I'm the best player in the world? Because I never get bored with the basics. And that changed my life. That changed my perspective. You know, I went into that workout expecting to see some sizzle, some sexiness, you know, some flash.

And he just was routinely drilling down on the basic fundamentals. And you know, ever since that day, that has been my core philosophy for performance is Never getting bored with the basics and working on mastery of the fundamentals during the unseen hours Well, they're really good bro. Like we're right there already. We're getting into the good stuff Absolutely, because I think there's a thing in leadership. That's leadership fatigue We get tired of saying the same things over and over again, even though we should.

I think in business and life, there's just a fatigue of the mundane, of doing the things that actually work, and we move away from them. And sometimes the greatest people in the world just don't allow themselves to suffer from the fatigue of the repetition. Yeah. True?

Absolutely. And you hit the nail on the head. That's incredibly insightful. I think we can readily acknowledge that the basics, if you allow them to, can be monotonous, can be mundane, and can get boring unless you have that type of approach to them. And even if you don't love doing the basics, you need to love what the basics produce for you, which is basically creating that foundation to which the rest of the house is built. And guys like Kobe, they never leave them.

And that's the key. And the beautiful part is it's not saying that you don't also graduate to do more advanced techniques and so forth. It says you never leave the basics. And- Are they like the building blocks to allow you to do the great things, right?

Like they're the fundamental things, the footwork and basketball. It's the communication or presenting skills in business. It's the vision stretching capacity of a leader. It's the generosity and kindness and gentleness that requires from a parent that we have to do over and over again and show that love, right? It's the repetition we get bored of.

I don't know who said it first, maybe it was Tony Robbins. I'm not sure, I say it all the time. Sometimes I think I said it first, I don't know. But the complexity is the enemy of execution. That oftentimes we try to complicate things in our life and then we have an inability to execute, true? Absolutely. Simple is smooth and then smooth is what gets it done.

And yeah. And of course in a game like basketball, for your listeners that follow, it's footwork, it's shooting mechanics, it's how well you handle the ball. We all know those are the basics. So the first step for anyone trying to improve performance in any area of their life, first of all,

is to admit that the basics work. But then second, it's having the humility to acknowledge that doing the basics every day is not easy. But what you have to do is get crystal clear on what are the basic fundamental building blocks of whatever it is you're trying to improve. If you're trying to improve your marriage, what are the handful of fundamentals

that will go into a nurturing relationship? If you're trying to be your marriage, what are the handful of fundamentals that will go into a nurturing relationship? If you're trying to be a more influential and impactful executive, what are the handful of things that you... And you could go down the list, whether you want to be a musician, an artist, anything in between, you have to get crystal clear on what those basics are, and then you have to commit towards working towards them relentlessly

during the unseen hours to work towards mastery. Unseen hours. That's the other part of the story that fascinated me. So as I understand it, you ask him the day before, can I come watch this workout? And he goes, yeah, four o'clock. And it wasn't four PM, it was four AM. But you, I'll let you share this, but you're like, well, I'm going to impress this guy and get there early.

So there's a four AM workout, but what happens? Tell them what happens when you get there and you get there early. Well, yeah. And I arrived today early because I believe in making a good first impression. And I believe that getting places early is a sign of respect to the person that you're going to meet. And, you know, as a young coach, I'm thinking what could be better than me leaving my mark and impressing Kobe. So if he thinks he's working out at four, I'm going to be waiting for him at the gym at, you know, 3.30 a.m. and he's going to be blown away. And instead, I arrive at the gym and can see the lights already on, can hear sneakers squeaking and a ball bouncing from the parking lot.

I walk in at 3.30 in the morning, he's going through a warm-up. He doesn't even count that as part of his workout. So he's doing that at 3.30 before his workout actually started with his trainer at four. And he went on for a couple hours, again, sticking to the basics and just drilling down. And he's one of those guys that really understands the concept. If you want to perform well in front of millions, then you have to be willing to put in millions of reps when no one else is watching, which is how we define the unseen hours. And that actually I stole from my friend, Drew Hanlon, who's an NBA skills coach, who he's the one that came up with the term unseen hours.

And I conveniently borrowed that and I use it everywhere because I really believe that success in anything, even the success of your podcast is predicated on the due diligence and the research that you do on each guest before the mics go hot. Very true. And that's the unseen hours. And that's what a lot of people, they don't see.

The standard is different, right? So like this idea that a 4 a.m. workout, look, let's just be really honest, you and I, you know the NBA a lot better than I do, but I know professional sports, and most dudes are coming home around 4 a.m. in the NBA oftentimes, right? Not starting, not having a workout at 4 a.m.,

and then to know that, no, it's not 4 a.m., he was, you're there at 3.30, he had already been warming up for 25 or 30 minutes before. There's just a different standard, I think, with the elite performer. I think an elite mother has just a little bit different standard than an average mother. I think an elite executive, they just set a different culture of standards around. That's got to be part of it, right? Absolutely.

And I don't know if you know the reason that he did the workout at 4 a.m., but it parlays perfectly into your new book, you know, just do one more. The reason Kobe does that he understands that even the most aggressive Players in the NBA they're gonna get in two workouts a day during the offseason First one is usually around 9 or 10 a.m And then they'll take a lunch break and then they'll come back at 3 or 4 So his mindset was if everyone else in the league is going to be doing two workouts a day, I'm going to do three, because I'm going to do one more than they're doing. And the only way I can squeeze that in is if I get up and do it at four. So when he's coming home from his first workout, his competition is just waking up to go in for their first

workout. So then he's doing his second workout while they're doing their first. And then it's the compounding interest effect of, if I do this every single day in the off season for not just years, but in his case decades, he said, no one will ever catch me because every time I wake up, I'm going to do one more than you're doing. You'll never catch me. And I think that's part of what gave him that, you know, that Mamba mentality. Why did I not interview before I wrote the book? Because that would all be in the book right there, like 100% verbatim exactly why I wrote the book and what I believe. So this notion of this, what most people say, well, that's a crazy pace.

And you write in your book about avoiding burnout. So I'm under, there's almost a duality there of, you know, okay, you're going to do this crazy pace. How does one do those things and then still not fry or burn out? What would be a couple of things that you would say? Burnout is the result of misalignment between the work that you're doing and your core values, your interest, your fascination, and the meaning behind your work. I don't know your daily schedule, but I imagine it's pretty immense.

You've been here today. I imagine you work a lot of hours, but the reason you're not approaching burnout is you find meaning and purpose in those hours. You're being of service to millions of people. So that's why you don't experience burnout. If those two things start to splinter, if you were working 60, 70, 80 hours a week for work that you didn't enjoy, work you didn't find fascinating, work you didn't feel was making a contribution to other people's lives, work that you didn't find meaningful, you

would be on the cusp of burnout And that's what a lot of people are experiencing. So it's not just the long hours It's when long hours are not congruent with what it is that lights you up and fills your bucket, bro Very good speaking of congruency Just meeting you briefly mutual friends of ours. I interview authors sometimes and they don't reflect what I see in their book. Or quite frankly, sometimes they don't even really know and understand everything that's in their book. One of the things about you is that you own this information. Like this is your content. This is your message.

It's just reflexive. I'm watching you. It's like, what do you got? Give me the other one. And it's outstanding. And I wonder if that's important to you that you live the things that you're teaching. Oh, absolutely. I would think as a keynote speaker and an author, I'm holding myself to an even higher standard. I mean, I don't know that anything would make me more sick to my stomach than for someone to see me doing something that is not in alignment with what I preach from stage or what I put in my books. And I don't hold myself to a standard of perfection. I'm fallible. I make mistakes, I have lapses in judgment. But generally speaking,

the fact that I'm putting this content out there, I wanna hold myself to that. And I'll also say that the books I write, I write books based on what it is that I'm going through in my life, and I write books that I myself need to read. So it's actually a form of therapy for me to write something.

I've absolutely experienced stress, stagnation and burnout in my life several times. So I wanted to get to the root of it because I figure if it can help me, certainly somebody else out there is going through similar difficulties and challenges. So I want to offer that to them. And the last thing I'll say on that is with any of this stuff, I'm not speaking from a place of mastery. This is all stuff that I am still working on, but the book is what holds me to that standard. So when I find myself getting momentarily stressed, I actually smile, have a kind and compassionate

conversation with myself and just say, Alan, remember, you write about this, you speak about this, now you need to live it. And that tongue in cheek kind of self-compassion actually gets me through those times. Yeah, you talk about being kind and compassionate in the book. So, hey guys, it's been said that we really have two ages.

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So whenever you want to talk shop, just reach out. Call clickgrainger.com or just stop by. Grainger. For the ones who get it done. 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. Today's show is going to be special because by popular demand, everybody, I think you know who this man is if you're watching this, but if you're listening and you don't know yet, this is Inky Johnson.

So thank you for being here, my friend. Pleasure. Thank you so much. It's my honor. And if you don't know Inky's story, everybody, be prepared to be moved and inspired. There's millions of people listening to this right now or watching and they're down. They're you on the football field that day. Everything was great. You called the play, you actually went and helped out on a guy that wasn't your guy on that play, did you not?

Yeah. And they're down and they're going, look, I don't know which way's up. I don't know where I want to go. I want to change my life. I want to be happier. I want to have my test be my testimony at some point. Where do I begin? What would your advice be to somebody, and just in general, relationship, body, business, this is where I should begin.

What would you recommend to them? I would say tie it to something that's real. Like whatever that driving force is, tie it to something that's real, whether that be family, whether that be the life that you aspire to them? I would say tie it to something that's real. Like whatever that driving force is, tie it to something that's real, whether that be family, whether that be the life that you aspire to have, and be loyal, right? Be loyal to what you say you're gonna do.

Like I've heard Tony Robbins say it before, when he said, like I asked him, was the happiness that cheap? Right, like is your drive that cheap? Right, to the point to where when you don't get what you thought you were gonna get. I put it on my Instagram today. I said, man, everybody will tell you

what they're gonna do when things go right. But nobody addresses what they're gonna do when things go wrong. And we both know, in the words of Martin Luther King, character is built in times of challenge and controversy. And so when you encounter the challenge and the controversy, I would say be grateful for it. You say it all the time.

Things don't happen to us, they happen for us. You say it all the time. Hidden blessings, right? All it is, all the tragedy and opposition in that, it's a hidden blessing that you don't know is a blessing yet. So consider it a blessing, grace, right? Consider it a blessing before you consider it a blessing

and watch the perspective that you acquire about the situation and when you acquire the right perspective about the situation, don't look at it and say, why me? Look at it and say, why not you? And just get up and put one foot in front of the other and use your situation to add value to the world. The quicker you shift your perspective to add value to the world, the quicker you'll get through your situation to add value to the world. Higher! The quicker you shift your perspective

to add value to the world, the quicker you'll get through your situation and your circumstance. And this is by the way, from a man who did this. Within hours of waking up from his dream being over, Coach Fulmer, who's a legend, Absolutely. Many, he's the AD now at Tennessee,

comes in and says, hey, Coach, I got this, I'm good. What exactly did you say to him? Was it something right around those lines, right? Absolutely,, hey, Coach, I got this, I'm good. What exactly did you say to him? Was it something right around those lines, right? Absolutely, I said, Coach, I'm good, I'm blessed. I'm blessed. After his dream had just ended. So this is someone who's lived this, guys, like legitimately lived this,

and tying it to something is such brilliant advice because I say often, we say it a little bit different, but I always talk about I'm blown away by how easily someone's will to win can be bought. Yeah, I heard that. Yeah, but they'll say, they'll sell it, right? And so, but you know what most of you won't sell is if you do what this man just advised you to do.

If you'll tie your dream to something you wouldn't sell out like your children, like your spouse, like your God, you'll question selling out your kids. But if you don't tie your kid to your dream, hey, it's easy to quit, but all of a sudden you just sold your kids' dreams? That's harder to do. You just sold God out?

Because you don't have faith something's going to happen? Maybe you'll stay in a little bit longer when you tie it. So there's brilliance to what this man is telling you. I'm telling you. And so there's just very few people who just speak real truth And the reason your truth is so profound is because you live it. It's not speeches you give it's a part of your story Okay last question

Okay, by the way, this is just awesome today. Okay, and I can feel I just hope everybody hasn't run off the road You know saying that are that are in their cars because of the fuel that we're giving everybody But I want to ask you lastly about young people saying that are in their cars because of the fuel that we're giving everybody. But I want to ask you lastly about young people. I asked you this off camera, but I want your answer here. A lot of people here that are listening to this have children or they'll play this part of the interview. And you speak a lot to kids.

And there's something that we haven't talked about here today that I just want to finish on if we're going real. You grew up poor. Now, not poor of spirit, poor of family, but when you got 12 people in a two-bedroom place, there was not a ton of money floating around that house of yours. Okay.

So there's somebody listening to this who goes, you know, I'm poor so I can't win. Or you know what, I think I have a disadvantage because of the color of my skin or my religion or my sexual preference or something like that that they're they're not in the mainstream they're not in the majority there's a circumstance where their dreams ender they don't have a father in their life. What advice would you give that young person who thinks potentially that's a negative, are they right? And can they overcome it anyway? Or should they just be grateful for the blessings that they have? I would say, play the hand you dealt like it's the one you always wanted.

Because we all know, who you run with determines the direction that you run, who you hang around is who you become. And so the way that I feel as if I got through my circumstance, it wasn't all by my might and my power, even though I had a level of focus, and I saw the collateral damage as it happened.

The same way that you can be in a circumstance and you can learn from people that do things right, you can learn from people that do things wrong. But I had people that I respected enough not to disrespect. I had people that I respected enough not to disrespect. My coach, highest level of respect, I couldn't disrespect him. Being lazy would have been disrespecting him.

My mother working a double shift, being lazy, cutting class, smoking weed, I would have been disrespecting her, right? My teachers that went to bat for me and said, son, you got it, right? I would have been disrespecting them if I wouldn't have tried to do my best and accomplish what I feel I could accomplish. And so the thing I would say been disrespecting them if I wouldn't have tried to do my best and accomplish what I feel I could accomplish.

And so the thing I would say to them is, if somebody in life, and this is across the board, not just young people, if somebody in life, that situation and circumstance is a lot worse than yours, and they took their hand and they're winning with it. Their hand is a lot worse than yours. They took it, they pick up the pieces every single day, and they're winning with it. It's only an excuse, it's only a bad situation if you label it that. Perspective drives performance every day of the week. How you view what you do will affect how you do what you do.

Play the hand that you're dealt, like it's the hand that you always wanted. Oh, dude. Thank you. My man. I love today. I'm so grateful that we did this today. It's an honor. This guest today, I chased down, just so you all know. And I happen to think he's one of the most talented and the funniest person in the world today. So this is Sebastian Maniscalco, the hardest name I've ever had to introduce. So thank you for being here, brother. Thanks for having me. I appreciate it. When you wrote Stay Hungry, did that have anything to do with this,

by the way, you guys should get this book, and the tour's also called Stay Hungry also, right? Why'd you write that book? Because it's a best seller. Why'd you write it, and does that have any relationship between all those years at the Four Seasons and staying hungry for your career? It does, yes, and I never thought I would write a book.

I always thought books were for like ex-presidents and people, you know, who had something extraordinary happen to them. You come across like this, I'm this very serious guy, I'm kind of like everybody else. But not everybody, I just think this is a funny story and I want you to tell it if you don't mind. Because I laughed so hard when I heard it, but I think it goes to prove that you're not exactly like everybody else in normal. Can you tell them how you did the air freshener in your car? Please tell me that that's true. Yeah. Tell me that's one of the true ones.

That's true. I just want them to hear this so they know you are a little bit off. I'm off. Yeah. I mean, I never said I was normal. Although this I feel like is something that people should do. So I didn't like the air fresheners that you would go and get at the gas station, the vanilla, the apple, the pine. I like cologne. So what I did was I took a bottle of my favorite

cologne and I cracked it in a bowl and I took like a little dish rag, thin, and I cut it into like little squares and I rolled up the squares and I banded the rolls up and I cut it into like little squares, and I rolled up the squares, and I banded the rolls up, and I let them marinate overnight in the cologne. Now, in the morning, I would put in the vents, the little rags, right? This is when I was like 15, 16 years old. Actually 16 when I was driving. So, I would go pick up a girl on a date

and then just casually put on the air conditioning and she'd be like, man, the car smells like you. And I go, I know, it's beautiful, isn't it? So I would kind of match the cologne scent of the car to what I was wearing that particular evening. Now, is that abnormal? Probably, but I'm sure after telling that story, you guys are gonna go do it, right?

What's amazing to me is you're in your mid-40s and you just proceeded that story by saying, you think more people should do it. My little technique. That's wonderful, man. That's so awesome. So I'm curious, gosh, there's like a million of those, but I had to at least have one. I live in fear that like what's happening for me could go away.

Oh yeah. So you've had this stuff happen, right? So take us in the mindset of someone who's in the midst of, I don't want to call it your prime, but it kind kinda is, right? Like you've hit this stride now, which we'll talk about in a minute, in multiple areas, from the book, from the tour, acting, you know, a lot of different areas, in your family life.

What are you thinking right now? Are you thinking like, I could lose this? I gotta, what's in your head? When's this gonna end? When am I gonna go and look at the ticket counts and they're not what they were the last time I was there? So that is what's driving me to succeed. It's not, again, I don't think in the positive room,

like oh man, I sold four Madison Square Garden shows, the next time I'm gonna sell eight. My goal is to just, yeah, it's more fear-based than positive-based, I guess. I don't wanna let these people down, they pay good money, they don't wanna see the same jokes, coming to a show that they saw 12 or 16 months prior. So it's that challenge of keeping it on a level.

That's what the staying hungry means, kind of like never resting on your success, always kind of wanting more. And that is a big fear. It's just like, you can't, you can't, I believe you can't, you hot, and then you cool off. So my thing is, when is the cooling off gonna happen? Not that I want it to, but I'm aware, I have enough awareness that we have a spike in our career and then there's always kind of like a drop off.

Do I wanna drop off? No, But it's hard to plan too. It's just like I don't have a job where the salary is guaranteed. So if I want to buy a house, what could I buy? Can I buy a house that if I sustain this type of lifestyle? I mean like no nothing is nothing is really I'm not bitching about Finances don't get me wrong, but it's just it's hard to kind of gauge your future Based on a career that you could pitter out at any moment time for me to check in right now The check-in process at the airport they don't want to look at you head down right no smile nothing

I feel like I'm working. I feel like I work at United. Hi, how you doing? Right? The only time they get happy is when the bag goes over the weight allowance. They love telling you, you're gonna owe extra on this bag.

And you know it's heavy. When you're packing it at home you tell your wife we're never gonna make it with the it's okay so heavy you put it up there and you know it's heavy so you kind of try and release it you do that like kind of soft release like that's gonna take weight off the bag. And her mood changes. She's like, ooh, I'm sorry.

Your bag is two pounds over. You're gonna have to take two pounds out of your bag. Now, like an idiot, I gotta open up my bag in front of 187 people. I don't know what two pounds is. I'm taking out a boot, a sock, toothpaste. Is this two pounds? Does anybody know what two pounds is? They're gonna charge me an extra $8,000.

You think the boot's a half a pound? I'm like, where do you want me to put this? She said, put that in your carry-on. I said it's still going on the plane. What does it matter if it's on top or underneath? The guy behind me is 500 pounds, that doesn't matter? 50 successful people in their prime, that may be 10% answer that honestly.

Cause I know what it's like when things are going well. And there is this party that's like, when's this gonna end? What am I gonna do? What would it be like if it did slow down? So would it be- Do you like that? Not so much anymore, but yeah, I think I'm still after,

I think part of my inspiration now is, I have this audio I did called Blissful Dissatisfaction. And what it means is, not to go too deep on it, but I had this audio I did called blissful dissatisfaction and what it means is not to go too deep on it but I had this formula forever like I better not enjoy this because if I enjoy this I'm gonna lose my hunger so I literally linked in my head don't enjoy it just keep grinding because this enjoyment you'll lose all this drive and that's what most athletes most successful people do that's sort of their mindset it's almost like a superstition, right?

Because for so long you didn't enjoy it and you finally got something. I finally figured out after a while that there's a difference between happiness and satisfaction. You could actually be blissful and happy and still dissatisfied. In fact, there's a correlation between the two. The more your brain gets this little dopamine hit,

like that was cool, I love this, I'm enjoying my success, the more you actually want to go take the steps to do it again. And so, it's like biting into a great steak. You break that first bite, it's like, ah, doesn't make you not want another bite. There's no connection between the two. So for me, the formula now is more like,

how can I be blissfully dissatisfied, happily dissatisfied? But I still operate out of fear. There's two motivators, right? Gain pleasure, avoid pain. Avoid pain has been like my mechanism forever. I think it was Michael Jordan's, it was Tiger. But I do watch a guy like Tiger Woods, I don't know if you watch any golf, but like he kind of enjoys the game now for the first time.

Whereas before he was laser vision, tunnel focused all the time. So I work on that with the different people that I work with. So that's mine. Mine is both. I'm still super afraid it's going to go away. And I think your identity starts to get tied up in it too a little bit. So.

It does. So what do you do, are you enjoying this? I could be enjoying it more. You were really speaking to actually how I'm feeling. A lot of people even on my team, whether it be my manager or, you know, I think other people, like my family's more excited when I tell them about something that happened to me than I'm actually excited for about

myself just for that reason. It's like, man, I don't want to get too happy here because this might not, you know, I might not, I might get relaxed. I don't know, like happiness to me would be like being relaxed and content. If I'm never like satisfied, then I feel like I'm always going to strive to hit the next goal. The thing is though, what happens is, now we're doing therapy together here,

the thing happens is you do hit the next goal and then you don't enjoy that one. And then you do hit the next goal and you don't enjoy that one. And then so what was the point of hitting those goals if you never enjoy any of them, right? And so there's this part, especially with you having a young family, enjoy that one. And then, so what was the point of hitting those goals if you never enjoy any of them, right? And so there's this part, especially with you having a young family, there's gotta be

this time where, I also think you want your kids to see dad loving and enjoying his life too. You know what I'm saying? Like- Well yeah, I mean don't get me wrong, I didn't get the call and go, you sold out four Madison Square grounds. I go, what? I gotta get happy about that?

I hear you. But it's just, it's, you know, I'm not like, you know, I'm not like, yeah! That guy. I might like internalize the happiness, I might not show it as much as somebody else might show it, and people think, oh, what's wrong with him? This guy's not, like, happy about all his success. I'm happy, but it's more managed happiness than walking around with a huge smile on my face.