The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk - 271: Phil Hellmuth - From Poker Brat To #Positivity. 15 Time World Champion

Episode Date: August 19, 2018

The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk Episode #271: Phil Hellmuth - From Poker Brat To #Positivity. 15 Time World Champion The Learning Leader Show "Therapy is very helpful.  I want to know what I am doing wrong." Show Notes: Commonalities of sustaining excellence: They believe they can do great things. That have energy, buzz, and confidence They have drive, intelligence, and the will to get it done Elon Musk, Bill Lee are examples Phil is known for having a legendary ego... He shares why that's not true Why didn't he have friends for many years? His midwest roots and being ridiculed for having an ego Why does he verbally berate people at the poker table? "That is 1% of what happens, but it always gets shown on TV." Most great poker players never tell the bad players they are bad, they just take their money.  Why does Phil tell them how bad they are and how good he is? "It's because of my own insecurity." I asked if he goes to therapy... "Yes, if I can get 2 1/2 hours a week, that is great.  Therapy is very helpful.  I want to know what I'm doing wrong." How Phil felt that he could never live up to his Dad's lofty expectations (get good grades, be good at sports... Phil didn't do either) and how that impacted him "I'm like Draymond Green and John McEnroe... I lose it sometimes" "The poker brat made me famous" His friendship with Daniel Negreanu... And how it's grown over the years How to tell if someone is lying? "It's instinctual. Everyone has physical tells." "Look for thumbs and pinkies together as a power move" "There's always a full story.  I put it all together and rely on my instincts from that story." Your instincts can be developed with a lot of repetition "The art of reading people is lost on the new generation." "Look into their eyes!" #Positivity -- New book focused on being in the right place at the right time Write your goals and tape them on your mirror Write your blessings and tape them on your mirror Why joining The Learning Leader Circle is a good idea Use the "Get To Know You Document" "The art of reading people is lost on the new generation." Social Media: See why over 270,000 people follow Phil on Twitter: @phil_hellmuth Connect with me on LinkedIn Join our Facebook Group: The Learning Leader Community To Follow Me on Twitter: @RyanHawk12  

And so some guys, they don't want to hear what they're doing right or wrong. Are they just like they become defensive? But I want to know because I want to get better and better. And because my primary relationship has changed, because we've been working hard in therapy since 2002, because I've gotten smarter with relationships, it's extended to every relationship I have. I think that I'm one of the most authentic people. I think my authenticity is 99%. For better or for worse.

And there's some bad stuff in there, too, about being too authentic. But people like that. They're not going to deal with any backhandedness. They're not going to deal with any BS. They're not going to deal with any, oh, I love you and then tell everybody else I hate you. I'm just straight up. And I think people really like that. This episode is brought to you by Gusto.

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That's g-us-t-o.com slash leader. Welcome to the Learning Leader Show. I am Ryan Hawk. Thanks so much for being here. It is Mindful Monday. Text learners to 4-4-2-2-2 in order to, to join thousands of other fellow learning leaders from all over the world. Text learners to 44222.

Now, on to tonight's featured leader. It's with the infamous Phil Helmuth. He's won a record 15 World Series of Poker Braclets, the winner of the main event of the 1989 World Series of Poker, and a 2007 inductee of the Poker Hall of Fame, one of the most accomplished professional poker players of all time. He has sustained excellence. He's also known for his temperamental poker brat personality, and we talked about that at length.

If you're the other topics we got into, how to build your gut instinct and intuition, what specifically you can do to build this. And then why he feels the need to tell others how good he is all the time. And I was impressed with his willingness to answer this question and his level of self-awareness. the things he admitted that really surprised me. And then how to know if someone is lying to their physical tells. Phil discusses how he reads this on and off the poker table. Ladies and gentlemen, this one is fascinating with Phil Helmuth. All right, Phil, thank you so much for joining me here on the Learning Leader Show.

Welcome. Thank you. I watched poker for many years. I've spoken to a few different poker players on this show. always have learned a lot. Annie Duke, Liv, Boree, some really good ones. So obviously, when I saw that there was an opportunity for us to talk, I was excited to have you on, man. I love them both. Live and Annie. Yeah, they're great. They're great. So I'm curious from your perspective, there may be no better example in the poker world of someone who has sustained excellence over an extended period of time than you. And in addition to that of you sustaining excellence at your craft, you also spend time around a lot of others who do the same, whether it's poker or other business ventures.

I'm curious from your perspective, what have you found to be the commonalities among those who sustain excellence? Well, I don't, oftentimes I don't understand why some of the biggest influencers in the world, influencers are viewed differently now. but my friendship base has been absolutely amazing. And then sometimes I pinch myself. I was writing my autobiography and the editor is like, oh my God, how did you meet so many amazing people? And then you have to figure out what attracts someone who's great in one field to someone who's great in another field.

And then the flip side of that, why didn't I have any close friends for 15, 20 years? And now all of a sudden I seem to have this amazing friendship group. And so, you know, I struggle with those questions. I do know this. A lot of the guys that I hang out with think they can do great things, have done great things. So they've already climbed all the mountains, a lot of mountains, and striving to climb more. And I like that. I like that. I like that energy. I like that buzz. I like that confidence. But as far as trying to identify specific characteristics,

other than to say that, you know, they think big and they do big. And, you know, and there's an intelligence there. I'll say that. And there's a drive there. I'll say that. So they have the intelligence. They have the drive. And the will, the will to get it done.

And those are a couple of the things that I'd identify. You know, it's been absolutely amazing. Chimoth Polly Hopatia is one of my best friends. Bill Lee is one of my best friends. His best friend is Alon Musk. I saw Alon last week and we had a nice talk. He's under attack from the short sellers. And I told him that my friend, the CEO of Taser, was under attack.

And one time I asked him, just he and I, we were together for an hour. And he said, no, things aren't great. these short sellers started shorting my company, Taser, and then all of a sudden investigations popped up, negative press from the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times. And I thought, wow, that's something I didn't know anything about it. It was kind of an eye-opener. And now, you know, to talk to E and, you know, and hear about some of the mysterious electrical fires and the sabotage on the software and all of the negative articles had come

out. And, you know, I believe they shorted him for like $10 billion. dollars. And so it's almost like you're under attack. I think that, you know, Elon was, was very, was very happy to hear from me. We spent 15 minutes talking because, you know, he's in a similar position. How did you guys become friends? Through my friend, Billy. Okay. And so, you know, occasionally Bill will say, hey, come on over. Elon and I are having some tequila. I'll be right over, Bill. Or we'll go to parties or whatever. Yeah. You mentioned at the beginning of that answer that for 10 to 15 years, you didn't have these friends. And now you seem to have them.

Why? That's a good question. You know, I mean, I think that I don't understand because I consider myself, yeah, okay, I'm legendarily known as having a big ego. But if you actually knew me, you would see some flashed. of it, but you'd also see a lot of humbleness. You know, you'd see a lot of a guy who has never cheated on his wife in 30 years. You see a lot of a guy who is a good companion who's fun, who's smart, and, you know,

isn't always about himself. And so, man, I just, I don't know, you know, it was, it's, so then the self-selection of friends, you know, birds of a feather flocked together is, is a weird concept, right? And so I don't understand it. I mean, I know some of the guys in the poker world, I wouldn't see them often enough. And some of the guys who I kind of aligned myself a little bit, they like to drink a little bit. But I was never a huge drinker. And so they might be drinking constantly.

And then I'd see them once every three months or something. And so, you know, because I live in Northern California. So for whatever reason, those solid connections weren't formed. And then when, you know, Chimoth invited me to his game and, you know, Rick Thompson's in the game. Bill Gurley, who was just voted VC of the year by the New York Times. And I brought some of the NBA players in from the Golden State Warriors to play with us and some of the team owners. And so it's just been this amazing group of people, you know, David Sacks. You know, were you saying that maybe part of the reason that you didn't have as good of a peer group is you weren't as famous?

and now that you're on TV constantly, if poker's on, your Phil Helmuth is usually on. Whether you're commentating, you're playing, they're showing your highlights of you blowing up, whatever, they're beeping the, you know,

every other word, like that type of stuff. Do you think that's part of it? No, I don't think, I don't think becoming more famous. I think meeting, meeting people that are like-minded.

Yeah. You know what I mean? That's what it is. Meeting people that are like-minded. And sure, I knew a fair amount of people from the Bay Area, but for some reason, those bonds weren't formed.

And I think, you know, one of my friends who we lost a few years ago, Dave Goldberg, an amazing connector of people and man, you know, and Shamath Polyhapitia. And that's kind of how I came in. And then I became really great friends with Bill Lee and David Sachs and Jason Calcanus and a lot of the tech guys. And so, you know, and these guys, it's been really fun to watch them fly. You know, it's been really fun. I mean, you look at some of their funds and they just are having hit after hit. This company went public for 20 billion. This company, you know, almost all my friends were able to get out some money, you know, out of Uber at 48 billion.

You know, I think it was soft bank that came in and bought. And so it's just been fun for me to kind of have this amazing friendship. And they're very different. Yeah. You know, Billy was not working. I mean, he was taking meetings. I mean, he's the best angel investor in history, good friends with Elon Musk. So when E flies over to, you know, do.

climate change conference bills on the plane with them was it fame that that made me you know uh connect with these people maybe that made that was the initial connection as wow we we want to hang out with phil and i started playing poker in their game five five blinds no limit hold them which was painful for me five bucks yeah it was very painful for me um to play in that five five blind game and uh you know because you don't must place five five he doesn't play with us oh okay okay but But why would these really rich guys play $5 blinds? I mean, that's just, that's how we started. Okay.

It's pretty, you know, I mean, you know, I mean, Bill Gates plays small stakes poker. It's usually when you introduce an element of, usually what happens in these games is the games end up getting bigger. We played 5-5 for three years. I didn't go and play with these guys on my weeknights when I was traveling a lot. Once a week, I didn't go play with these guys because I was trying to make money. In fact, I lost like 25,000 playing in that game, and they just laughed at me and laughed at me and laughed at me and I was defensive, but I was fun. And I just like the energy of the table. You know, I mean, people are selling companies.

You'd hear somebody say, hey, I raised a couple hundred million dollars for one of my stadium projects. And then, you know, and two other guys had, you know, raised 600 million that same week. And I'd be like, hey, that's great. You're in third place. You know, we tease each other hard, have fun. And so, you know, I don't really understand. I don't understand. I don't think it's fame, but I think the fame introduces you to people.

And then I think, you know, so it's so I ended up with this amazing friendship group. And, you know, we'll see, we'll see how long it holds together. But anyway, playing five, five blinds with those guys, the stakes were painful for me. But I was there because I loved the people. And so then you asked about the stakes. then we started one day they're like well it's just too boring there were just eight straddles on every hand so they went to 2550 and then all of a sudden my instincts kicked in a little bit more and then one day we went to 100 200 blinds and then i and then i and then i won like a million in a year in the game

once we got to that stake then do you give them that money to invest for you is that part of uh i did i did put some of the money in some of their funds but as a matter of fact i should have put all of it in their funds because they're just crushing it. But it was a really good year. But once we got to 100, 200, it's like 5-5, it's just so easy to not play great. And so I was never hustling. I was there just having fun, and I never imagined the stakes would get to 100, 200. And then when they did, so, you know, I'm just a member of the group. I'm locked in. They're mad at me if I don't show up to a game. It's not about money. And of course, to these guys, you know, they're all. worth billions of dollars and so or hundreds of millions at least and so the money's completely

irrelevant even at the stakes we play but anyway I was able to find this amazing friendship group and we do stuff outside of poker we hang out you know we we take trips together um you know I'll go to Tahoe you know I'll go to and so it's just been so I've been very lucky to end up with this amazing friendship group I don't but I can't explain to you exactly why we connect with it. Well, you know what's interesting. People are probably listening to thinking this too. I sent you truly thinking deep about your answer here and then kind of finding your way towards the end of that answer. I really appreciate that. I think that's interesting as someone who's obviously a thoughtful guy. You kind of thinking through and getting to understanding

drive and intelligence and the will to get something done and that they just go and go and go. I I think that's interesting. You know, it's the struggling to get the answer. This is something I've been doing for a long time because I'm a Midwestern guy. Me too. So being from the Midwest, you know, I don't think it's like being in England. You know, I gave a cocky speech once there and half the people hated me. And so ego is kind of frowned upon in the Midwest and it's frowned upon in England.

And so to me, I've tried to understand, listen, why is it that you're friends with all the ballers, but you're not friends with people that are a little bit more normal. Is there something wrong with you for that? And that's the way we, you know, a Midwestern, as we ask ourselves that. No, there isn't something wrong. It's just that's the way the connections happened. And there's something for us to be around each other. And we make fun of each other hard at the poker table.

That's a huge aspect. And so when somebody's ego's little big, like when I won Brace at 14, they just made fun and made fun and me mercilessly. And, you know, but if somebody else has a couple of, company that goes public for a couple billion and that person gets whoever has too much ego it's like it's like uh that that that that board where things pop up and you keep pounding them you know what i mean yeah that game has been good for all of our egos because we can really just make fun of each other hard and if tapes got out of us playing making fun of each other people might say these guys are jerks

until they kind of understood that that's just the code we have to tease each other kind of hard especially when we feel so there's been an aspect of that but it's very healthy for me, you know. And also, I'm the poor guy at that table by far. Yeah. But, but, but, but, but, but, but, but certainly the high, had the high, have the high, had the high, had the high, had the high, had the high, had the high, had the high, had the high, had the high, you mentioned about people getting on you and, and, and, and, uh, have taken your fair share of criticism. And sometimes it's, it's, it's, it's quite warranted based on some of your reactions at the table. What's your response that when you think about, let's be clear. I've been the

most criticized poker player on the planet. For sure. Oh, oh, oh, oh, I'm, I, I'm a I mean by 10x, by 10x. But would you say, though, when you think about why, there's an incident that the 2018 main event that I think you openly admitted you were out of line and made a mistake. And then you apologize and you bought the guy in for next year's main event. So I think you did your best to make it right by speaking when there were multiple people in a hand. But I was watching the clip of you and live because I had live on the show. She was a fascinating guest. She's so smart.

And she, you had pocket aces and she had fives and she turned to set and won the hand. And you didn't necessarily berate her, but just you said, I knew what you were going to do. And basically, you know, you dropped a ton of F bombs. And I don't think it made you look particularly good. And Liv stayed pretty quiet for most of the part. I'm curious, how do you, because your book, positivity is really, interesting, thoughtful book, but then when you juxtapose that with some of the outbursts at the table and the F-bombs towards other people, it seems in a way that that doesn't jive all the time.

So I'm curious your thoughts on that. Well, it's interesting, you know, that very night, Liv and I went out drinking together. So, I mean, she and I have hung out all over the world together. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, I mean, for her, she was like, yes, I finally got, I finally got Phil to berate me. You know, and so it's funny the way the young players are like, I made it. I'm in the club. Phil berated me. It's weird. They've taken it to that extreme. Most of these guys grew up fans of mine, the younger generation. But is it an actor? Is it real? I mean, is it now an act? It's real. Okay. Because in that moment, you know, Phil Locke is continuously, you know, pressing your buttons trying to get you to go. You know, he's like chying you a little bit and pushing you. And I think people, everyone wants to see it. The TV viewers want to see it. But at times, it can see it, whoa, you know, because I've listened to him without the beeps. And you're like, wow, this is, this is pretty. intense. Definitely intense.

You know, so I mean, if people are criticizing me for being the poker brat, then of course I'm guilty. I admit it. I own up to it. You know what I mean? It turns out that it's good television, you look at, if you go and look at clips of me at YouTube, there's tens of millions of hits. Oh yeah. Yeah. Tens of millions of hits of watching me blow up, lose it, swearing, knocking stuff over, you know, going off. Tens of millions of millions. And I think I saw one had hit 100 million, but I don't track that stuff closely. But it's been crazy to watch the number of people. So if you want to say, hey, listen, Phil loses it.

But then let's drill down on that. Let's say, okay, Phil loses it 1% per day at the poker table. Okay. And that's the 1% the whole world sees. Yeah. So they don't see the 99%. They don't see Liv and I drinking afterwards. They don't see us hanging out before having a coffee.

You know, they don't see us, you know, at the clubs in London, you know, having fun. So all they see is at 1%. Yeah. And so am I guilty of the 1%? Yes. And the incident you're talking about, in 2018 World Series of Poker Main Event, that was the swingiest of my life. I'm playing in the main event and I start swearing out of turn. And I was completely clearly guilty.

and arguably cost another guy who's a really good guy, a firefighter from the East Coast, arguably cost him his tournament. You know, I may or may not have. And so then what happens is the next day when I bust out, when I had Ace King and the other guy at Ace 9, and a 9 comes on the river to eliminate me, poker players at the win,

there's a couple hundred players there are cheering. There's a couple hundred players at the Belagio. They're watching it as they're playing other tournaments. And they're cheering, and I'm like, what is going on here? Have I become this big? bad a guy in like 24 hours. And so, and when I read that the next day, uh, that night, I was just like, oh my God. I knew I was out of line here. So then I immediately, so I had like 300

negative tweets. And then, and some people, a lot of people said stuff that wasn't true, but I was going to, but I'm going to fight. I'm coming back at those people. You want to say something that's not true. We're going to fight now. You're not just going to be able to say stuff on social media without a response from me. All right. First things first. How do you? How do you? do I make make this right. Okay, I'll offer the guy from East Coast, the fireman, a free buy-in. He handled himself well to next year's main event. I'll give him $10,000. Okay. And buy him into next year's main event. Okay. The minute I announced that, now I had 500 positive tweets. And so it was the weirdest thing to go 24 hours, 300 negative tweets, which I've never had, to 500 positive

tweets. And then a few days later, I won a bracelet. And I had really 3,000 positive tweets. And I'm just like, this is just weird. You know, I was the enemy, but people also understand there's a character there. There's a poker brat character there, you know, and that's, so it's, I try not to take it personally, but I mean, it really, really hurt. I mean, I was almost in tears when I was reading all the negative tweets. And then you can't, and, you know, that's the lesson that, you know, that I'm trying to learn all the time as to not take this stuff too seriously one way or the other.

I mean, I'm not exaggerating when I tell you that I had people come up and tell me that they loved me, used the word loved me for months on a daily basis. It was just scary. And I probably let that in too much. And then when all the negative tweets came, it hurt too much. And so, you know, there's been some swings just in the last month on my, you know. And so if you want to say, hey, Phil really needs to clean up his act at the table. he needs to not be a poker brat, then you're right. But if you come out and say stuff,

some of the kids said some stuff that wasn't true, and I took the opportunity to fight them and say, you know what? Sure, I was out of line, I admit it, and I'll pay the penalty, I'll buy this guy in, but I absolutely didn't do this or this, and I'm sick of you two attacking me. So, you know, and then what can they do?

Now they're caught. Yeah. Now they're caught, and of course, I have a million things of fans. all over the world. And so when I put their attacks out on Twitter, it's another thing I'll do is when people attack me in a super bloody, like mean way that doesn't make sense. I'll retweet it.

Yeah. You know, it's like throwing red meat out there because you know what? If you're going to be like that, you probably deserve a retweet. Yeah, you deserve, you know,

you started it and I'm just saying, all right, you want the world to see this. Here, let's make the whole world to see this. Well, one of the, I've,

it's shining a light on it so people can see how people respond. But one of the, the feelings I get is, you'd say something like, go back to the live one or there's other ones, but basically, like you said, your generation doesn't understand how good I am. And I feel like at times you have a need to tell people how good you are and how bad they are. Whereas I've seen other poker players, when they're playing against bad players, they don't say anything. They don't want to tell them how bad they are. They just want to take their money. So I'm curious where this need to tell them how good

you are and how bad they are. Why? Why is that part of your strategy? Well, it's, it's, you know, it's, well, I want to say, I wanted to use the word obviously, but it's not obvious because people ask me about this all the time. But I mean, obviously, when you strike the word obviously and start over. Okay. I want to say that, you know, it's, it's my own insecurities. Yeah. And so, I think that's really self-aware, by the way. I have to say that is, I, I think, that's just there's a lot of awareness have you been to therapy a lot i've spent a lot my wife's a therapist right so my wife's a doctor at a local university i don't want to mention names but um she's she's you know move way up and she's crushing and you know we go into couples therapy together

and it's the best i mean man if we can do two and a half hours a week i'm in heaven because you have somebody who's really smart tell you what you're doing wrong i don't like the way you handled this i don't like the way he handled that now sometimes she's wrong but most time she's right. And then I sit there and I think about it. And so some guys, they don't want to hear what they're doing right or wrong. Are they just like they become defensive? But I want to know because I want to get better and better.

And because my primary relationship has changed, because we've been working hard in therapy since 2002, because I've gotten smarter with relationships, it's extended to every relationship I have. I think that I'm one of the most authentic people. I think my authenticity is 99%. For better or for worse. And there's some bad stuff in there, too, about being too authentic. But people like that. They're not going to deal with any backhandedness.

They're not going to deal with any BS. They're not going to deal with any, oh, I love you, and then tell everybody else I hate you. I'm just straight up. And I think people really like that. And so that's one of the things that's come from this is authenticity, not to the point where I'm just going to, you know, or I'm going to be mean to somebody or go off on somebody other than occasionally at the table, you know, where I just lose it. over a hand. But those attacks, so what am I trying to say?

I worked really hard. Yeah, you're talking about, I asked about your, this. It's self-esteem. Yeah, this need to tell others that they're bad at poker and that you're great. Liv, you don't understand. So imagine, you know, I covered this really well in my autobiography. Just imagine, imagine yourself, all right, I'm the oldest of five and I'm a guy. Yep.

Okay. Now you have a father with a PhD, a JD, and an MBA. Okay, that's more letters than anybody I know, basically. Yeah. And I have ADD growing up. So I can't, what's important to my dad is grades. What's important to my dad is being able to play an instrument. What's important to my dad is sports. Well, I was one of the shortest kids in my eighth grade class, believe it or not. So I was never great at sports. My grades suffered because I have ADD. And so I was a constant, you know, my dad was, so how am I ever? And then yet my brothers and sisters saw me fight my dad, you know, every day. I mean, we had, we would sometimes

have screaming matches when I was in high school. No, no, like verbal fights. We said, we'd get in verbal fights and my dad had reason to be upset. Let's not paint him as a bad guy. Yeah. But I was just particularly difficult to deal with as well. And so I'm this really strong person who's fighting, you know, and my brothers and sisters are like, screw this. All we have to do is study an hour. hour or night and we'll get A's. We can avoid dad's wrath. All we have to do is work on our instruments 15 minutes a day. And so my brothers and sisters all got my brother and three younger sisters all ended up with great grades, honor societies, crushed it. And part of that was, you know, was my dad and I fighting so much that they just said, wow, I can spend all this energy fighting

or I can just actually do the work. And so, but then imagine now, now you're 15 years old and every one of your brothers and sisters is basically getting straight A's. They all play instruments. You know, they're all self-sufficient. And your grades are like a C. You know what I mean? And so, you know, when you're not an athlete and you're not playing an instrument, so then you start to really become, feel inferior. So the one thing I had to cling to was games. So when it came to playing Scrabble. Any game that you play when you're growing up, I became amazing at learning strategies. And I would just study and study and study. And if I ever lost at a game against my brothers and sisters, that was the beginning of poker, right? I would go crazy. Because

what did I have left? It crushed me at everything else. And so if I ended up losing a game, especially one where I played perfectly, I'd be like, oh my God, the only way you could have won that is double fives and double sixes. You know, I can't believe you're old double fives and double six. It's unbelievable. If there weren't luck involved, I would win every time. Yeah, and so that's kind of the origins of it. The whole famous quote. Then, unfortunately, if it weren't for luck, I'd win them all.

I love that. It was such a good quote, man. It was so funny. And I know it was authentic at the time. I think you truly believed in that moment when you lost. If it weren't for luck, I would win every time. Well, it wasn't like that was for the benefit of any cameras. I know.

I was on the sidelines talking to my sister. even though they had the cameras on. It was on a break. I know. That's what made it better. Yeah. It was great. And so, you know, I mean, most of these lines are just authentic in the moment. And if you want to compare me to somebody, I mean, I look at Drainmond Green, who's one of my friends. Yeah. But I look at him just lose it on the court. And he's just walking around with just fire in his eyes, losing some logic, losing some reasoning, and just wants to. And that's, that's the state that I'm in when I'm on tilt and losing big pots. And so there's, There's a similarity there. Most of the people that seem to don't watch the NBA.

You know, John McEnroe is somebody who I've talked to about this, you know? McEnroe would just lose it. There'd be one bad call, and it might cost him the match. And he's just like, how can they screw up a call? You know, it's obviously this ball was in or out. You know, these guys have amazing eyes. And so, anyway, the poker brat is kind of what made me famous, and it's kind of the thing I've been trying the hardest to get rid of.

When you talk to TV guys, I would imagine no. If I'm producing a show on a poker show, whatever, ESPN or After Dark, all the, I love the cash games the best. Those are the most enjoyable for me to watch because there's a lot of, I think there's a lot of skill involved in the cash games. And I've enjoyed watching you play in those. But I don't, I don't want the tame Phil. I don't want the guy who's just going to sit there and check and call. And we all want to blow up. That's what the TV guys want, I assume.

I mean, how much of that do you guys talk about when you're thinking about a show with the guy running the show? So I used to write for Card Player magazine, and the woman behind it said, well, if you're going to have outbursts, we're going to take your job. We're going to stop letting you write columns. And she'd call me and say, I heard you lost it and so-and-so. It's such and such a place. And I was like, yeah, I feel bad about that, you know. I go from that, like two or three years of that to these TV producers coming and saying, Phil, we want you to be yourself.

Well, I'm a smart guy. I'm going to make them say it. I'm like, what do you mean? Like, I know exactly what they mean. Well, we want you to do this or be your... And I'm like, oh, you have to be more specific. And, you know, these are really smart TV producers, but they know they're getting trapped,

but they have to keep going. And they're finally like, well, you know, the poker bread is great for ratings. Your ratings are like three times anybody else's. And so, you know, we love it when you lose it. And so, you know, on the one hand, I heard for years, you have to clean up your act. And all of a sudden, now the TV producers are like, please give us some fire.

Yeah. Yeah. You know, the interesting thing about that, I think from afar, I don't know you guys personally, but from afar, it feels like you and Daniel Negranu have a good friendship. It seems like at least on Twitter and other things, I think you both promote each other and speak highly with each other when you're on TV. And Daniel's, you know, he's the opposite of that. He, everybody loves them.

He's very talkative. He's very nice. I don't know if I've ever seen him blow up. Maybe he has, but I don't know if I've ever seen him blow up at somebody at the table. And yet you guys have this, it seems like this kinship, this friendship over maybe just the shared, maybe it's your longevity, your sustained excellence. I don't know what it is. But how did that relationship bloom so much? Well, Negranyu is one of the few that, you know, happens to be one of the leading lights in poker that also has been winning since the 90s.

So, I mean, since he came into our game in the late 90s, he's been winning tournaments, winning tournaments, winning tournaments, you know, he has a fantastic record. And so I give him respect. Now, Daniel is also someone who wrote, and I'm not exaggerating, at least 80 blogs on how badly I play poker. Now, this is not an exaggeration, but he never attacked me personally. It's not like Phil is this person or that person. It was always just how bad I was at poker. And so, you know, here's a guy, one of the leading lights in poker, one of the two or three biggest guys who's just always attacking the way I play, the way I play. That also leads to your defensiveness and wanting to tell people, you know what, I'm great, you know, I don't suck.

Daniel's wrong, you know? Yeah. And so Daniel, then him kind of attacking me and coming after me on television, on ESPN, it just became one of the kind of, hits of so the first thing i did is i made him kind of eat all of his words so that felt good to me because if you're going to attack me daniel then and then so then what happened is all those negative blogs were written 2011 i had three second place finishes of the series and 2012 two first so no one was even close to that i mean these are huge fields and so it was like all right daniel you know cut up your words we're going to add a little salt we're going to make soup for you and he backed

off and so then last year he started attacking me me again. Oh, you're not one of the top 40 No Limit Holdem tournament players in the world. But this was right after I finished second in a 700 player field and won a heads-up championship. And so even our shared agent is like, wow, is he delusional? And so, you know, I kind of think

Daniel can be a little delusional, but it's also fair for him to come back and say Phil is a little delusional because, you know, Phil thinks he's the greatest poker player in the world. And I don't think that's the case. So, you know, we'll accuse each other of being delusional, but not seriously, psychologically delusional. And so then that leads to some really good television segments.

He and I do the panel at ESPN together. And so he's just making fun of me the whole time. And so there's a shared respect there. So I'm going to, the difference is I'm going to give him respect and credit because I know he's a great player. I know what he's accomplished. Yeah. But he won't give me the respect and credit for whatever reason.

I feel like he has. I feel like he's spoken. I mean, you probably pay more attention. to it than I have. But I feel like that's why I brought it up because I remember I read a lot of those blogs. I don't know if I read 80 of them, but I read a lot of them over the years. I think he's a really

thoughtful guy. Interesting way that he looked at the game and life in general. And I think that's good for all leaders. That's what this whole podcast is about. I feel like he's come around to where there's, and part of it is because you've won. You've had success. And a lot of them. Well, back in October,

he attacked and said, you know, there's 40 people that are better at me. Nolm and Hulham tournament at least in the planet. He said I wasn't even the top 100. So winning a bracelet, Nolan would hold him this summer. Yeah, I was just going to say, that bracelet won the year 15th, which is the most of all time. And then we kind of like, kind of like I didn't ask him this. I didn't attack because I'd rather just have him drive me.

But I wanted to ask how many of the 40 guys you picked won a bracelet this summer? You know, because I said, I told him, I said, listen, I'll bet $20,000 per player that wins a bracelet. So if I win one, I get $800,000, and if three of your guys win one, I'll give you $60,000. He passed on that, which turned out to be kind of smart for him because, you know. Yeah. But he keeps me honest. He keeps me, you know, and so there's a lot that I love about Daniel. And again, I'll give him all the credit.

He and I are terrific together on television. We have respect for what the others has accomplished in the past. He doesn't necessarily respect the way I play today. But nor did he in 2011, 2012. It's really hard because they have all these elegant mathematical theories on how to play the game. And I don't fit into their mold. Well, speaking of that math, okay, I talked to live a lot about this. So I think this can apply to hiring managers, CEOs, to leaders of business.

And this is where I'm really curious to your thoughts in this, Phil. So it's for those of us who have been in hiring business, I have for years hired hundreds of hundreds of people and now I work with people who do this. And so it's really important. And part of what happens through the interview process is you have people come in and you have obviously conversations and interviews. And you have to judge if somebody is telling you the truth, the whole truth throughout that interview so that you can understand who it is that you may be hiring. And in poker, you're trying to understand, does this person have it? Do they have it or not? Are they bluffing me or do they have a big hand? And this is something you've, you've obviously done well

over many years is understand if someone has it. And Liv talked me a lot about Liv Bury, earlier episode, about the fact that it is primarily a mathematical equation. And very little of that is built upon physical tells. I'm very curious to get your sense on how to tell when somebody has it. Or as an interviewer or someone who's a CEO hiring people, how to tell if somebody is telling you the truth. It's all about methodology, I think, when you're hiring people.

And, you know, my wife every year at her local university she works at, they have to, they have, you know, kind of 200 people apply for whatever, five or six residency positions. And sometimes the people that shine the most in the interviews are actually the worst tires. And so then the question is, you know, how do you correlate that? You know, and then sometimes people that interview very poorly are very hardworking, humble, we'll put in the time and effort and turn out that they get along with people. well, you know, if I'm looking at that problem of hiring people and I have to hire people for my businesses as well, what I'm really looking for is, you know, usually when you get to the top like 10 candidates, they all have similar qualifications. I want somebody that gets along well with everybody because if the boats, if there's a lot of drama involved in the business ventures, it's just that much more difficult for me. It's me making an excuse for this person, me make an excuse for that person, saying, but they're great at this.

And so just having people that get along well, once you get to candidates that are equal, equal, I think is a key thing. And we've hired people that don't get along with everybody. And that's, you know, but they've been great at their jobs. And, you know, and then my wife and I will have the argument, well, when do we get rid of this person, if ever? Yeah.

So what about at the poker table when somebody, how do you, is it more, Do you understand or gain physical tells? When I say a physical tell for those non-poker players, meaning somebody does something. The movie Rounders, Teddy KGB ate his Oreo is a little bit weird. I know you're a friend of Coppillman. And so I'm curious, what's your process for understanding if somebody's got it or not when they put that bet out there on the river? That's completely, for me, it's completely instincts. Okay.

I am on the cover of a book called Read them and reap. read him and reap. And we sold a lot of copies of that book with Joe Navarro. Now, Joe Navarro The FBI or CIA guy? Correct. He's still a stories he can't talk about where they just, you know, when someone, when your pupils dilate, you know, when you have to pay attention to all of this little stuff. There's there's the happy feet, you know, when someone's feet are bouncing, they're very happy. They have a strong hand. That's kind of an obvious one. The other one is the steeple. So imagine. And your hands perfectly aligned in front of your face with your thumbs and your pinkies touching each other. And you know, you kind of look like you're steepling, you know. And when someone is steepling, they feel like they're extraordinarily powerful. So if you're in an interview, you know, and someone's doing that, you know, it might be natural if you're the one being interviewed that that person is showing a lot of power. And so there's all these physical tells that can add up that we talk about and read them and reap.

For me personally, there's a story from start to finish. All right, they have to bet before the flop, on the flop, on the turn, on the river. You know, there's actions on each of those streets. And for me, I trust my instincts. My instincts have been really, really good to me. And when I'm on, you know, it just seems like I'm folding hands that no one else will fold or that very few people will fold. It's interesting that the art of reading people is,

somewhat lost on the new generation. They recognize it, but since they can't teach themselves to get better at reading people, you know, it's kind of, I'm not sure it's a learnable star quality. And so, and so then the best thing is learnable? I'm not sure how much, in my opinion, so I've tried to teach people to read people. And it's one of those things you have it or you don't. You can only improve. You can, you can, in my opinion, you can't improve from, say, 20 to 80. You can improve from 20 to 40, you know, and so just dealing with all the players I've tried to coach since the 1980s, I immediately understood that it's one of those things. You have the reading abilities or you don't.

Now, you can use books like read them and reap, and you can look for specific tells that will help you a lot. But if you're talking about just the pure ability to sit down and read people, that's not. something that most people have. What about developing your instinct based on your experience, meaning you've got a ton of reps. You've seen a lot of hands. You've won the main event in 19, or in the 80s, 90s, you're having success. You've played for a long time. You've got a lot of reps. Do you think you can develop or how do you feel like you can develop your instincts over time through just seeing a lot of hand? And physical tells you can't do that playing online. You have to be at the table, literally looking at somebody. You have to be at the table. Yeah. Yes. And, and, and so, I mean,

that's something, that's something which has been fun for me because imagine that your living depends on how well you play poker. Yeah. You know, it's your whole living. You have a wife and kids to support. You're paying close attention to that stuff. You're really intensely studying that stuff. And so then my friends, I'd see them, you know, study for a few seconds. And I'm like, man, it seems like they have nines, tens, or jacks. You know? And at that, point, I would throw out a guess and say, I think you have pocket tens. Okay. And they'd flip their hand up and go, oh my God, how do you know? How do you know it was Queens? How do you know? And so I'd come up with kind of a range of what I thought it was based on the way everybody was playing and thinking based on how much time they

studied, based on whether they had that look, I'm ready to make a stand. But were they ready to make a stand with like the best possible hand or the fourth best possible hand? And so then sometimes, sometimes it's pure guesswork, you know, at the end where, all right, it's one of these three hands. And when you guess the exact hand, it really freaks people out. So, yes, you can use your experience to get better and better and better. Getting the repetition can help you. And whatever is your, whatever craft you're trying to master that. But I think you said there comes, though, there is some innate talent that some people have for doing that better than others. Correct. Which just like, just like Drummond Green's tall, you know, I mean, you know,

that gives them a better chance to play basketball. Most of the business owners listening to this podcast are not trying to be professional poker players. Right. And so, you know, can they use one or two things? Can they, you know, study that I would tell them to look at people's eyes, whether they, you know, whether they open or close. When you ask them a question, looking them right in the face, and you can tell right then and there, it's a super reliable thing. You know, we as human beings, you look at primates. They all act the same way in a cage when they're happy. They act the same way when they're upset. It's a natural normal instinct. It's

ingrained in us for millions of years. And so if you ask somebody that question, you know, and then the other thing is I tell people when I'm doing these podcasts is, you know, be ready for the answer you don't want because if you're, if you want to, if you want to go and ask your husband or wife, have you ever cheated on me? And you're looking him right in the eyes. And it goes a direction you don't want, you know. What do you mean looking in the eyes, open or close? What do you mean by that? Well, here's the thing.

I have to refresh. I have to actually leave the interview for a second to double check whether the eyes open or close. One is a lie and one is a truth. Gotcha, gotcha, got you. You can find that two seconds on the internet. So what I'm saying is, if you ask your spouse, have you ever cheated on me? Yeah.

And you're looking at them eye to eye, you know, and you have their attention. And they say no, and their eyes go one way. You've just been lied to. So it's a very powerful tool. You know, be careful how you use it. Yeah. I know we've got to go, but I wanted to hit real quick. We just, I am fascinated by all of your story.

Positivity, you are always in the right place. So could you share a little bit about why this book, why you wrote this book and what it's about? Well, yeah, to me, positivity is the book that I've been meaning to write since 2000. one. So it's basically it's eight life lessons, but I'm so proud of it because Cheryl Sandberg gave me an amazing jacket blurb. She loved it. She read it. It was 70 minutes long. Tony Robbins gave me an amazing jacket blurb. And Tony gives my book, hashtag positivity away in his classes. He tells, he's recommending people right now today all over the world to buy my book positivity, buy Philhielmuse book. And that's about the biggest praise you need. It's one thing to have somebody

give you a jacket blur, but it's another to have them recommend it. And so what is positivity? It's eight simple life tips. I'll give you three chapters super quick. One, write down your yearly goals and tape on your bathroom mirror. Okay, you just read chapter three. You know, write down your blessings and tape on your bathroom mirror. Okay, that's two chapters done right there. And so it's super simple. It takes 70 minutes to read. There's an audio version of it too. But really I'm kind of teaching people that they're in the right place at the right time and I show them exactly what I mean. You know, all my friends, it's all I heard when I moved out to Silicon Valley, these billionaires. I was in the right place at the right time. I kept hearing it. I'm like, there's got to be more to

it. I'm a thoughtful guy and I'm always staring inward. I'm always working on myself. And so I kind of realized every one of us that's listening to this is in the right place at the right time every day. And so I show you why that is, how that is. And then I help you kind of move forward. So I believe this book is going to sell millions of copies and it's going to help millions of people. And I started doing stuff, you know, I started talking about this stuff on the Tim Ferriss show. And so, and he's released a bunch of stuff. And so it's been really kind of great for me, you know, to feel like, I mean, I know that I've inspired millions of people as a poker player by people saying, wow, I could never have folded that. That's inspiring. And, you know, then I watch somebody like Tiger Woods hit the ball to two feet. I watch Michael Jordan. I'm not saying I'm in their league, but I'm doing things that the greatest in the world do in their profession, and people are blown away. They're like, oh, my God, how does he do that? How does he do that? And so from the time of understanding, I could be inspirational, then it was just like, okay, then why not write a book sharing what you've learned about life?

And so hashtag positivity is that book, and it's starting to take off millions of copies. And And what a great thing to use my platform to help millions of people think bigger and achieve more. Love it, man. It's cool to see what Cheryl put on Instagram after you won your 15th bracelet too, man. That was really great. I didn't know you did that about Dave and her husband. And I thought that was a really good story. Yeah, that was pretty terrific stuff. Cheryl. Cheryl's amazing. Yeah. Yeah. Awesome, man. Well, Phil, thank you so much. Where would you send my listeners to learn more about you online? Well, the book hashtag positivity is, you know, only available at Amazon. You know, and there's philhelmuth.com, pokerbred.com.

You know, I've had a very blessed life, you know, and so sharing with others, you know, I've also, I also emcee charity poker tournaments. I did want to the Kardashians last week. And I've raised $53 million at events I've emceived. And so, you know, I want to get to 100 million. I had big goals. I want to continue to help the world, but I also want to be the greatest poker player of all time. Love it, man.

Well, thank you for being a part of this. I really appreciate it. And as well as you being able to kind of look inward a little bit and figure some things out as I'm asking you some questions that I know, you know, you didn't fully know the answer to until the middle or the end. I think that I like that. I think that's interesting. So I appreciate it, man.

Thanks, Ryan. It's been fun. Awesome. Thanks, thanks, Phil. Take care. All right. What an interesting conversation. I felt like Phil did a great job of figuring some things out near the beginning of that conversation,

and it got really good the second half. I appreciate those of you who are still listening to this point at the very end. I hope you enjoyed it. If you did, I would love it. If you would write a review, subscribe and rate the show in iTunes Apple Podcast. That's write a thoughtful review. you rate the show, hopefully five stars, and subscribe in iTunes, Apple Podcasts. It really helps spread the message and continues to give me the opportunity to do this

on a day-to-day basis, and I love it so much. Thank you for giving me that opportunity. See you next week. Can't wait. This episode is brought to you by Gusto. Gusto is making payroll, benefits, and HR easy for small businesses. Modern technology does the heavy lifting, so it's easy to get things. right. PC MAG and fit small business have called Gusto the best payroll for small businesses.

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