The Resilient Mind - Are You Holding You Back? - Eric Thomas

Episode Date: December 9, 2024

Eric Thomas, Ph.D., is a critically acclaimed author, World-renowned speaker, educator, pastor, and audible.com Audie Awards Finalist. As he is better known, ET has taken the world by storm with his creative, common-sense approach to living a successful, satisfying professional and personal life.Take action and strengthen your mind with The Resilient Mind Journal. Get your free digital copy today: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Download Now⁠⁠Download Mindset App for free and listen to 5000+ of the World's Greatest Motivational Speakers and Thought Leaders: https://bit.ly/mindsetxTheResilientMind Special thanks to Lewis Howes, subscribe to his channel here: https://www.youtube.com/c/lewishowesWatch the full interview on Lewis's page: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1zcPtPuR0sA Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to the Resilient Mind podcast. In this episode, you will be listening to Are You Holding You Back with Eric Thomas. Get access to the Resilient Mind Journal by clicking the link in the show notes. Enjoy. Yeah, so I'd say, it's the mindset. Like I had a victim mindset. You know, it was, my mom got pregnant at 17. You know, my biological father wasn't in my life.

You know, I didn't go to the best schools in Detroit. you know, I wasn't in this environment. I didn't have, like, everything was about somebody else. You know, it was like the outside, inside theory, you know what I'm saying? Which is terrible. It's like everything that's supposed to blow me up and take me to the next level has, is somebody else's responsibility. Like it's something that is going to happen or somebody and it's going to.

And it was like, yo, E, like, why are you in this abandoned building? Like, your mom's not here. your biological father. No, he's not in your life, but he didn't get pulled over by the police officer. And the police officer doesn't know the counselor or the principal that kick you out. It's like, but there's a common denominator here. There's a common denominator. And you homeless, your mom's not homeless. Your biological father's probably married with a family somewhere. Like, yo, is that right or or wrong? Who cares? You are living in this abandoned building. High school dropout. You're on your way to. And so when I look back,

all the anger and the frustration and the hurt, it was all blaming. Everything was about this person or that person or this person. Nothing had anything. I never even realized I was where I was because of who I was. And I was actually getting the physical manifestations of my thoughts of my feelings, my emotions. Like I was creating this and didn't even realize. I thought my mom created it.

I thought my father created. It's like, no, you created this. And I'm going to tell you, the moment I realized, you are the greatest common denominator. You're probably the least greatest. Like, you're the common denominator. Once that realization hit me, it was like, oh, okay, you got some confessing to do, bro.

Like, and I'm going to tell you the hardest thing that I've ever done. Somebody asked me the other day, like, what's one of the hardest things you ever done? The hardest thing I've ever done was look in the mirror and tell myself I was sorry. That was a hardest thing for what? I was sorry for what I've gotten myself into, the choices that I made. You know, okay, yeah.

You, you, you, 12 years old when you find out that the person is raising you is not your biological father and your mother lied. Absolutely. Brought, that's not necessarily best circumstances, you know, for a child to be born in. Like, your mom lied about who your father is and you know your father. And don't even know you know your father. Like, you've been around your father. But he didn't know he was your father. I didn't even know he was my father.

I'm with his mother. My grandma and me like this. I'm with his sisters. I'm with his brothers, my aunt said uncles. I'm hanging out with them every day. And so the realization of like, yo, not only you get lied to, like, it's been manipulative.

It's been deceitful. But what do I do? How's, I run away from home at 12. And I'm living in garages and living in my friends' homes. And this vicious cycle of every time something goes wrong or every time, you know, I'm confronted by this reality, that's not your father, is run away from, home. It's run away from home. And at 16, it's like, okay, mom, you just flat out lied to me.

Everybody told me you lied. You keep telling me you didn't lie. You go tell me when I got older. I'm like, I'm out. But it's like, e. When I looked in the mirror, it's like, why did you have to take, why did you have to leave? Your mom, you had counselors. Why, why when you sat on with a counselor and they tried to walk you through the tools and the strategies to get on the other side of this? Why were you in, don't talk to me. You ain't my mom. Don't talk to me. You ain't my daddy. Don't talk to me. I don't want to talk to y'all. These are professional counselors who are saying, yo, we can't. You're going through a lot. But we're here to help. I don't want counselors at school, principals, teachers. I'm just now insubordinate. I'm an evil, mean, mad. And I looked at myself in the mirror. It was like, why was that the choice? No, no, no, no, no, no, no. You got to talk to me. I know why you made the choice, but why did you make that choice? We know what the choice was. You're right. You right. You're wrong. You always run from conflict. You always blame somebody, but why?

And the reason why is because it was easier to put it on my mom and my dad than for me to have to do the work. And so the Eric Thomas that you've seen, the NFL, NBA, commercials, whatever. That dude is the dude that looked himself in the mirror. It's like, yo, you owe yourself an apology. And not only that, you owe yourself correction. You owe yourself change. Wow. You need to be taught.

You need to be trained. you need to become a better human. And now that was one of the most difficult days of my life was looking at myself, correcting myself, telling myself I was sorry, and then moving forward saying, now what are we going to do from this point? So the growth you say is the response to,

are you repentful, meaning you're about to change or are you sorry? And I'm like, no, I'm not sorry. I want to repent. And I want a better version of me because I shouldn't. What's 16-year-old? should be living in abandoned buildings. Eat not a trash cans.

Like that's not, it's not healthy one. It's not safe in Detroit to be in abandoned buildings walking. It's not safe. And I put myself in so many situations where guns were pulled out on me. You know, people would break into the abandoned building and take my belongings from. It's like, what are you doing? Like, come on, bro. This version of me had gone all the way.

It was like, if you don't, if you don't stop. Okay, so I always think it's a combination, right? So it is. It is a rock bottom. But this is a blessing because rock bottom turned into go to church with my boy, right? And go to church with my boy turn into I start dating this girl, right? And I fall in love with this girl, you know, and this girl becomes almost like my first coach, you know, and she's saying to me, man, I never forget. She called me to her home.

She's like, my mom's not here. I'm like, praise God. She's like, can you come to the house? I was like, well, sure. I'm 16, 17. I was like, we're like, finally like you, man, this church girl. And finally, you know, so it's like, yeah, come to the house now. This is a pay phone day.

I get to the house and she comes outside. I'm confused. Like, why are you coming outside? And she's like, I want to talk to you. I was like, okay, we could talk, but can we talk inside? In the bedroom. You know, and so she's like, no, no, I'm serious. I'm like, I'm serious.

She said, do you love me? And I was like, whoa. Like, we kids. I'm like 17, almost 18, like, do I love you? Like, I don't have no other girlfriends. If that's what you were asking me, but I don't, do you love? She said, no, no, no, do you love me? Like, is this serious?

And I was like, yeah, serious. She said, well, I just got my acceptance letter. And she showed me. And she said, when I go to college, if you don't come up, come with me, I'm breaking up with you. And so it was twofold. It was, I was rock bottom. But this relationship was like hope.

Like, when I was with D.D., it was all. almost like I wasn't homeless for that time frame that we were together. Wow. You know, we were in church together. You know, I got a job because she made me get a job. It was just, you know, we would do stuff together concerts. We would do stuff together as kids.

We were downtown Detroit. It's a restaurant called Nickies, right, Greek town. So we were in Greek town on the weekends. Like, I was living life and I was like, whoa, she's elevating your life. I'm like, bro, you rock bottom. And the only light you have in your life is saying they're gone. And they're not And look, bro, I'm just being real.

I'm not the smartest guy in the world, but I'm not stupid. She's not going to go away and get a degree and come back looking for a homeless kid four years from now. It's not going to happen. No. You know, and so it was rock.

She saw a grader senior. Oh, bro. But you had to do the work. I had to do the work. And I did the work. I went to night school. I got the GED. I followed her to Oakwood.

And we've been married over 34 years. Crazy, man. You feel me? And so it was like, it was a combination of rock Rock bottom and hope. And when you put those two together, it was like, I had something to wake up to, something to look forward to.

So I'm going to be real. That's why it took me 12 years ago to 40 degree because I never went to college for college. I went to college for Dedi. Wow. That's why I went to college. And so once I got to college and we got married, I was like, yo, I got what I wanted.

And she was like, okay, we're going to have to do this again. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I can't be with you if you don't finish what you start. Wow. So I had to go handle this business again. Wow. And I started the speaking career, you know, in the middle of that as well.

So here's where I went with that. One of the dangerous things is the outside, inside theory. It's dangerous. Because what you're doing, whether you know or not, you are comparing your journey and your life to somebody else's journey and somebody else's life. Like, you don't even have, let's just be honest. You don't even have the right context to do that. You don't know why they're doing what they're doing. You don't know, like, what their strengths and weaknesses are.

So you compare yourself to somebody that may have strengths that you don't have. Like they're nowhere near who you are. Yes. And so you're comparing yourself. So this is why I believe for those of us who finally get it, it's the inside out. Like everything we do starts from the inside. And then from there, we kind of say, oh, okay, I'll see my boy, Louis. He's doing X, Y, but I'm not doing it because you're doing it.

But I'm calling you. You're kind of saying, E, and the industry is. And so I'm using the information you're giving me to build my journey, not I'm trying to be you. And so what I realized was, yeah, there's some kids that can come and graduate. in four years because they took K through 12 series. Or not to be disrespectful. There are some kids that can come and graduate for four years because they're going to get a job. You can't come and graduate in four years, one, because you didn't take K through 12 series.

And you're about to be one of the greatest speakers ever. It's going to take a little longer. Right. It's going to take a little bit longer to develop you. So my man on a four-year plan, but he might, no disrespect, but he may settle into a traditional life. And so for the four-year, that's all the days. but if you are about to be Eric Thomas that I didn't even know I had the capacity

you're talking about the school of greatness God was like you have to be in the school of greatness a little bit longer. You have to be in a school of greatness a little longer. Why? I always say, you know, and everybody knows it, but when you're doing a swing shot, the further you pull it back, when you let it go. So for me it was like, I was like,

it's going to take 12, not because you're behind. It's going to take 12 because that's how much time it's going to take to develop you. Wow. So once I release you into the world, now you're going to be able to do phenomenal stuff. Let's go. So I can't prepare myself to the dude that's just going to get a job somewhere, who's just going to settle.

And all he's caring about is his life. You know, he's not necessarily creating content or writing books that are going to change the world. He's just trying to take care of his family. So 40 years works for him. So now I'm comparing my life to a person who is not even trying to accomplish what I'm trying to accomplish. That's dangerous. Okay. So I got you.

So that's the outside inside. So that's the, you had everything against you. No, the greatest problem was I was against me. Oh. That was the bigger challenge. But most people, most people have both of that. I wouldn't say most people, but a lot of people might be listening or watching who might feel like the outside has been holding them down. No question.

Right? Their parents have been holding them down. Their school, their teachers, their coach doesn't give them the opportunity. No question. Their boss is holding them to whatever it might be. The economy is holding them. down. One thousand percent. Where I live is holding me down. The president, the government. It's all holding me down. How does someone get to a place? And maybe it's true that things are holding them down. They're absolutely true. Right? Maybe it's true. Yeah. But what I'm hearing you say that living in a

victim mindset or living in an outside, inside theory will not help you get to where you want to be. All I'm saying is this. They, have the potential only to hold you down because you're allowing them to hold you down and you're seeing that they're holding down. Let me tell you the one thing I wish I can go back. All my mentor was everybody. Everybody told me and they were right. Look, bro, I'm not saying today we're wrong. You need to get a degree. You need to make some money. You need to do whatever. But what they taught me was that my greatest assets were real estate. My greatest asset was a degree or a career. Nobody ever told me I was my greatest asset. I'm my greatest. I'm my greatest.

asset. It doesn't matter. Look, people act as if if you grow up in a house where your parents are rich, you're automatically, bro, we can look at people who grew up in wealth and are messed up. They own drugs too. They make bad decisions too. Unfortunately, they take their lives as well. They check out. Brah, it does not. So people think of money environment or you have both your parents in it and you get, so you think your story is, it doesn't matter where you come from. If you don't activate you, the environment doesn't matter anyway. Great environment, bad environment. If you're not activated, if you, I sit here sometimes and I could whip myself.

My grandma used to whip. I could whip myself. And why do I say that? Well, I'm sitting in the School of Greatness. Like, no, we were together 10 years ago. I'm still standing. I'm mad at me because I, like you said, I got a PhD at 44. I could have got one when I was 34.

I just didn't. I thought, you know, and when I go into the schools, I tell all this, everybody leave, principals, counselors, everybody leave. Listen to me, kids. This is 2024. Y'all got the internet. Y'all on TikTok. Y'all blew TikTok up.

And I knew it because adults are on LinkedIn and LinkedIn. Instagram made no money. TikTok, billion, Instagram, why? Because these young people are there. I said, when you show up to anything, it blows up. Here's my problem. You're in the school and you're failing. Why?

Because you're waiting for the teacher. teach you. The teacher didn't teach you TikTok. The teacher didn't teach you how to play. YouTube or call duty. You didn't teach you how to do that. You did it on your own. Why? Because you wanted to do it. And anything you activate, anything you do for you, it's going to blow out. But you're waiting for some teacher to teach you.

When you can pick up a book, you can go online and learn on your own. So in this environment, you are absolutely you're not reaching your fullest potential because you're sitting back, well, it's the teacher's job. It's the counselor's job to tell me when I'm supposed to graduate and work. classes I'm supposed to take and then what degree to get and then what what job to get and put me in the

right job but she's not call the duty there's no school council there's no teacher there's no principal and you own there with people from all over the world and y'all plan and communicate competing yeah and listen to me these kids are so dope and they don't realize how dope they are they did something with video games that we never did they turn it into a career you can make much but i'll play a video game you could i hate to date myself but joy I know it was joystick. I know it was joysticks, you couldn't make millions doing it now because of these kids and they're taking this thing and giving it a life that it never had me before.

Anything you touch when you know who you are, believe who you are. I could have PhD. I don't say that like on the bragging. I say that because if I got a PhD, that means I could have finished high school. But I wasn't in school. I was just there because my mother dropped me off. Like I wasn't immersed in it. I wasn't excited about it.

about it. I wasn't enthused about it. And so it's like, now I'm enthused about life in my life. And now I realize, yo, your mom don't got no, whatever she did. That was just to get you start. It's like on the swing. When somebody push you and get out the way, you, they don't, the swing doesn't work if that

person keeps pushing you back and forth. It only works if they push you, they get out the way and you do your feet. And so it's like when I showed up and said, Eric, the government, the way you come from, your dad not being in your mom, Like your mom being young, that has absolutely nothing to do with why you can't read.

You can't read because you are lazy. You can't read because you don't take it as serious as you take playing airmental football. You shouldn't be playing in a middle football. He should be studying. And so when I started taking my life serious, wow. Again, I mean, I say this with all, you know, sincerity. I'm in one of the best podcasts in the world. And not only that, when people were asking about it, I was like, oh, no, I got a relationship.

Like this ain't what you think it is. This is not, to your point, I don't do podcast. Like, I don't have that media schedule where I, you don't see Eric Thomas on different shows. And I remind people, don't get a twist. I can't be on shows. That's just not my thing. So I'm not here to date just on some. I'm going to, I'm going to hit.

Louis Biden, then I got this podcast, that's not what this is about. This is about a friendship that I'm tapping into and saying, man, it's good to see you alive. It's good to see that we made it. It is good. I still remember the red shoes with the red shorts. Yeah, man. And we're in there. It's just kicking it.

And now I'm like, yo, this is, this is an enterprise now. This is on a whole other level. Not saying what you did two years ago with me was nothing. Sure, sure, sure. I'm saying this and it still be alive and it still be welcome. Yeah, man. It's like, yeah. It's beautiful, man.

This is what happens when you realize you're your greatest asset and you tap into you. Nothing wrong with real estate. Yeah, yeah. nothing wrong with investing, the S&P 500. But at the end of the day, you have to be the first thing that you invest in. And if you invest in you, I just believe there's nothing that can stop. You need to be more disciplined about your minds. What do the people need to be thinking about with their minds? So here's the deal. You're already in pain. Get a reward for it. It's just like, look, do we favor? Everything you say, you're right. But why go through life with whatever people

did to you when you were younger or a young adult and then you have to live with it for the next 40, 50 years. Like, why would you, why would you sit here and all the stuff that you said was absolutely right? My daddy wasn't there. My mama did this person did to me. Why would you let them destroy your life? Let's go. Why would you let them own you? Why would you allow that thing they did to hurt you now define the rest of your life? Yeah. It's like, no, I was in pain. It's real, but get a reward for it. So for me, walking into First of all, driving here in a car service, getting to L.A., walking in this beautiful facility, seeing the other businesses that are here.

I'm like, I'm proud of you, bro. You made it, E! You could have stopped. That's the homeless boy. And nobody would have tripped. Your daddy wasn't there. Your mom was 17 when she got pregnant. All the negative that happened to you, Eric, we understand.

Bob, understand. Let me tell you, one of the things that just blew my mind the other day. So, you know, we were fortunate to own a home in California on the Hill, right? So we got this property. We got the basketball court with the logo, all the companies that, whatever. And I go outside yesterday and I see my wife and my son playing basketball. And I'm thinking to myself in California, on the Hill, looking at all these beautiful properties. Yeah, man.

My wife and my son are outside Hoopin. Dream life. My wife was like, I want to work out. My son was like, I didn't even know. She was like, I'm going to play basketball. I'm like, I can't do it right now. And I'm listening to a voice. He came home, heard the basketball, went out with his mom.

I'm like, yo, my son, 29 years old is spending time with his mom as an adult male. Wow. He could be anywhere doing anything. He's with his mom. Her firstborn, they got this bond that I don't have. And they're out here hooping. And as I look at the property, I'm like, yo, what if the 16-year-old Eric Thomas would have stayed the 16-year-old Eric Thomas. So I'm saying for those who listen, get a reward for it and then do me a favor.

Don't just think about you. Like, do you know that my son and his mind? This is where you, like this is where you start. Like he got the sign of the pool to walk him. He's starting somewhere I never started. The cars, the Rose Royce, the Escalade. Like he's starting somewhere I didn't start. Why? Because I didn't stop where I started. I didn't stop. I was like, okay, this is where we started, but this is not about to be my end. And so. So his beginnings looked told. My man went to Michigan State and was a general manager for Inzo. He traveled the world.

He's got a final four winning, the elite eight ring. He's got the jack. He sat under Coach Izzo, Hall of Fame coach for four years. Coach OG. He sat under these guys. Some of his boys went to the league. There's some of them still in the league. Like he got that because I didn't go.

I quit because my mom, my dad did. So I quit. I give up. This is worst thing ever happened. I was like, you get a reward for it. And so to see my son, I'm coming to a concert tonight with my daughter.

Listen to me, like, I didn't give out. And so I'm saying to everybody, we all go through pain. Some of us go through pain, and it becomes our tombstone. Some of us go through pain, and it's a scar. And we live a life of reward. So I'm just going to say, again, 2025, do me a favor. Check you. So you're in the ballot box, and you're looking at all these options,

Dr. Lloyd, teacher, whatever, whatever you see, president, mayor, governor, do me a favor. Before you check off any of that, S&P, 500, real estate, before you check any of that, check you. Before you check anything, check you and go look at yourself in the mirror and go, yo, I'm my lottery ticket.

I'm my ticket out of the neighborhood or, you know, I'm the broken curse. Like, whatever you want to call yourself. But the day I stopped saying, my mom, my dad, this person, the police, the comp, the day I stopped doing that, The day I said, you, do you think anyone can have a beautiful, amazing life if they live in a blaming mindset? No, no.

You know why? Because what I didn't realize as a young adult is that when you say it's somebody else, whether you mean to do it or not, you give them the keys to your life. You give them power over you. They got your whole life in their head because you said it. You said it. They didn't do this because they didn't because they got the keys. Now, I'll be honest. the reason why we don't want to take the keys because we got to drive.

We got a drive. Today, I was like, I got too much to do. I normally drive. I'm like, I got too much to do. And it felt good to be in the car driven. It felt good. Yeah. Like, I'm going on the phone, talking to my wife.

We haven't worked on doing our thing, making a couple business calls. Like, I don't have the responsibility of traffic. Pay attention. I got bad attention. He moved over and got, I was like, why is he stopping in the middle of him? But it was a truck. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So you had to move up.

I didn't know what was going on because it was the first time of my life that I wasn't really like responsible because I normally drive. And that's why people don't want to drive in their lives. They don't want to be responsible. It's so much easier to say, my life is messed up because you did this. Wow. And you did that. Once you take the keys now, you got to go anything. But I'm going to tell you this.

This is why I like it. While it's more responsibility, it's more freedom. Ooh. It's more independence. It's more independence. It's more opportunities. It's more opportunities. They limit it.

With the limitless when you take the keys. And so I took the keys in my life and said, my, thanks. Dad, thanks for not being there for me. You gave me a dog. You gave me a passion. You gave me a resilience. You taught me how to make it when the very thing that's supposed to be there for you isn't there for you. And I tell people, what I want.

Some key asked me the other day, he's like, man, when you say your son is lucky because you're in his life and his mom is in his life, I said yes and no. I said yes, he's blessed to have his mom and dad but he ain't got that dog he doesn't have the hunger he ain't got that dog my son is a great kid

but he doesn't have the drive he ain't got the same drive I got and that drive came without some stuff that I like that stuff came from lack and so I say to anybody you got to you got to understand it could go either way

but when you take the you take the it's like I walk into a school and I ask how many of y'all 50 kids How many kids in here? A thousand kids. How many of your dad's one in your life was not living in the house?

90% raised in the house. And guess what? I automatically can relate to him. That's the Genesei qua that my daddy wasn't there. That's the it factor. If my father had been there, I might not be able to go in here

and relate on my videos that go viral. People are like, okay, maybe if I just had aired voice or if I just scream and I just look at it. Bro, that's not what it is. It's when I speak, you hear it because I've been through what you've been through. And so you recognize that voice. You recognize the pain.

You recognize the struggle. But you recognize I overcame it. And that's why you're like, I want to rock with this dude. Because this one ain't some kind of way Eric ain't the one that's making us feel like, oh, it's okay that you went through this. And it's okay that this. And it's okay if you don't want to grow. And it's okay if you don't want.

No, what you hear from me is a coach that's saying, Jordan, you got six rings in you, butts. You got to stop playing this way and you got to start playing this way. Kobe, you got great, but you got to do it this way. Serena, you got a Venus, you got to, Richard Williams is saying. He's not out there just, he's teaching, training, but he's also correcting. And so for me, they hear my voice. I'm not letting you get away with murder because greatness is in you.

The greatness is in you. And now it's time to go to school. It's time to go to work and bring that greatness. So just anybody, anybody could be successful. But as long as you're playing the blame game, you have given permission, the license, registration, the keys, you give it all over to somebody else. And the day you take it is the day that you can start deciding which direction you want to go. Thank you for tuning in. Continue strengthening your mind by listening to our other episodes.