The Resilient Mind - Master Your Mind & Transform Your Life - Steve Harvey

Episode Date: January 20, 2025

Broderick Stephen Harvey, Sr. is an American television host, actor, writer, producer, and comedian. He hosts The Steve Harvey Morning Show, Family Feud, Celebrity Family Feud, the Miss Universe competition, Family Feud Africa, and the arbitration-based court comedy Judge Steve Harvey.Take action and strengthen your mind with The Resilient Mind Journal. Get your free digital copy today: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Download Now⁠⁠ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to the Resilient Mind podcast. In this episode, you will be listening to, Master Your Mind and Transform Your Life with Steve Harvey. Get access to the Resilient Mind Journal by clicking the link in the show notes. Enjoy. Last year, I spoke at the Salt Convention. The Salt Convention is where billionaires from around the world gather. They gather in Vegas once a year to talk about how they're going to change the world.

There's a couple hundred billionaires in this world. They all come to Las Vegas once a year to Salt Country. I was asked last year to be the keynote speaker. And I'm tripping because I'm not a billionaire. And I asked a guy who asked me to do it. I said, I'm not a billionaire. You do understand that. We said, Mr. Har, we know everything about you.

We know your net worth and everything. I said, well, what can you all learn from me? He said, everything. He said, the reason we want to hear your story is because the majority of us at a billionaires, we inherited some money and we grew it. A couple of us inherited a billion, we automatically, some of us inherited 300 million and we turned it into a billion. You come from nothing.

What we want to know is how you got to where you are after coming from nothing. How did you live in a car for three years and wind up on more TV shows than anybody. How did you survive flunking out of school? How did you survive all of that? We want to know that because in case something happens to us, we don't really have the information that you have, or how to come from the back to the front or how to come from the bottom to the top. So I get asked oftentimes to speak. And so when I was telling them how I made it, I was telling them about the fortitude that I developed. And then I told them about the faith that I had. And that was really startling to them.

Now, a lot of them are people of faith. But a lot of people who were born with a lot of money ain't really had to have a lot of faith. You understand? You have an idea of what it feels like. You've seen some kids get put in foster care. You've seen child protective services come to somebody's house. You've seen kids come to school with less.

You might have been one of the kids that went to. school with less. You have struggled to give your kids a better life than the one you had. They don't hear this. But I'm going to tell you something right now. You can be successful without an education. You can be successful without coming from a rich family. You can be successful. I don't care what color you are, what faith you belong to, your sexual preference. I don't care what's wrong with you. You can be successful. Everybody in your life will have a turn back moment. no matter who you are you're going to have

such a period in your life where it seems like it's not working you're going to have doubts you're going to have a lot of trials and tribulations and challenges and everybody has what's called a turn back moment you always have a moment in your life

where the direction you're going you will have to make a decision to keep going or you turn back the sad thing is the average person turns back but think about this. If you're going somewhere and you turn back, you can never get that. If you wake up every day and go get in your car and say, I'm going to the store and halfway to the store,

you turn around, and then the next day you go to the store and you turn around, you do realize that you'll never get to the store. So whatever you need it from the store, now is even a greater need because you turn back. And every time you turn back, it does not change. the need. So what kept me from going was, what kept me going was, I created, I made turning back, giving up, never an option. And I had really dark moments, man, where I thought I was going I just didn't think I was going to make it. I mean, where I am today, I didn't see it clearly at all. I had a lot of turn back moments. But you know what it was for me, man? Being successful is so hard, but I realized that not being successful was hard too.

The difference between not being successful hard and trying to get successful in hard. If you're trying to get successful, then it's hard. At least there's some payout. There's a payoff. If you hang in there, there's payoff. When you're not successful, it's hard. It's hard not having money. It's hard never knowing how to come up with your mortgage and your bond and your rent.

It's hard not knowing that. How are you going to feed your children? How are you going to pay your bills? It's hard, ain't it? So if it's hard that way and it's hard being successful, I might as well deal with how hard it is to be successful because at least one day, that could be a payout. If you just stay in the hard part of life of not being successful,

ain't no payoff. I have failed far more times than I've succeeded. You will never succeed more than you fail. That's not how it works. You know why? Because failure is a wonderful teacher. It's the only way to learn. You have to fail.

Failure is a part of the process to become successful. I tell people this all the time. Michael Jordan, the greatest basketball player in the world, he took 946 game-winning shots. 946 times since he was in high school, the ball has been in his hand to take the game-winning shot with no time on the clock. He has only made 146 of those.

He has missed over 700 times, but he has made 100. You know what they write about when he make it. They write about when you make it. So guess what? When you get through failing, failing, failing, failing, failing, all you got to do is make one. I've had in my career probably a total of,

I've been to over 200 pitch meetings to pitch ideas in Hollywood. Out of those 200, they have picked five of them. 200 meetings, 200 show ideas, they've picked five of them. But you know what them five was? Hits. In 33 years, five ideas got picked.

All I need is five hits. Y'all don't even know I was in them other meetings. They don't write about it. They just write about my hits. You just need a hit, man. So when you fail, it's a part of the process. Keep going. You're supposed to fail.

Shit, who you know that gets it right all the time. That's impossible. You have to fail. Matter of fact, when you fail, be glad about it. Every time you fail, you one step closer. Every time you fail, I said, whew, got that out the way, go to the next one. Fail again, okay, I got two out the way.

What's gonna happen is if you just keep swinging, you're gonna get a hit. Through all the things I've gone through in my life, I had a lot of downs. How did I keep the faith? It was a couple of reasons. Number one, I know, from living that if you quit whatever you're trying to accomplish, if you quit, whatever you were

trying to accomplish can never happen. There's not even a remote possibility. If you quit, there is no chance of it popping back up again, coming back later. Quitting is guaranteed failure. Now, when you're trying, you're going to fail. But quitting just, just, stopping? That was the number one thing I understood. And then number two, you have to make sure that your dreams, your aspirations and goals are so big that not accomplishing them is not an option. You have to want something so big that it wakes you up in the middle of the night. You have to want something so big that you think about it all the time. You have to want something so big so big that it drives you to wake up when you don't want to.

It keeps you up at night when you long been sleepy. It makes you show up, do things you wouldn't normally do. It requires extra. If you want to be extraordinary and not ordinary. If you want to be ordinary, live your life. But if you want to be extraordinary, you have to be extra. If you put extra on top of ordinary, that word is extraordinary. it requires an extra effort.

Now if you don't want to do the extra effort, you're gonna be regular. It's nothing wrong with being regular. A lot of people are happy being regular. I just wasn't. I ain't wanna be regular. If I didn't want no regular house, I don't want no regular car,

I didn't want no regular clothes, I didn't want no regular checking account. I just didn't want it. I wanted to have an exceptional home. I wanted to have an exceptional bank account. I wanted to travel exceptional places. Now, if you don't want that, it's perfectly fine. You can be really happy being ordinary.

But if something's burning in you, you got to deal with it. If you don't deal with it, you're going to be disappointed, man. See, being right, there's nothing wrong with it. Discipline determines your destiny, not your desire. You've heard me say this how many times on the show. Okay, here we go against you. I got it. Faith without works is dead.

But let me tell you something. To be a hard worker, you've got to be a hard worker, you got to be disciplined. That's one of the hardest lessons I'm trying to get through to my sons, that an undisciplined man is headed to a life of just, I can't even tell you, man. You're going to throw yourself down a cliff if you're not a young man or a man that possesses discipline.

Because they got something for undisciplined people. They got some street laws for undisciplined people, and they got some federal laws and state laws for undisciplined people. That's why them signs is outside on the freeway. We're going to let you go fast, but 70 is the limit. If you're disciplined enough of a person to leave your house at the time you're supposed to leave your house, 70 miles per hour is absolutely enough. But if you're an undisciplined person, if you don't have the wherewithal to leave your house on time,

to go where you want to go, see, the desire is where you want to go. The discipline is how you get there. You know, you understand. You can want to go to see your family in California all you want. But the flight leaves at 118. You leave your house at 1230. They told you you must check in one hour before your flight. Now, if you ain't got the discipline to get to the airport to check in one hour before your flight,

leaving your house 45 minutes before the flight departs, what you think going to happen? Your desire to go see your family in LA is going to be thwarted because you lack the discipline to prepare yourself and get yourself ready to do the things that you have to do to make your desires come true. I'm telling you, discipline determines your destiny, not your desire. You can write down a list of stuff you want to do all day. But if you don't produce and show the discipline necessary to get there, what you think going to happen. Huh? Okay. I want to be ready. Okay, I want to make $400,000 a year. Okay, I want to be the best player that there is. Okay, but you don't want practice. See, the cat that's disciplined enough to show up at practice, the shooting jumpers when everybody going home,

that's the guy that's going to be the best. The guy that puts us, that's never late for practice, the guy that study the playbook, that's the guy that's going to make it. That's the guy that's going to make it. Not the guy that's talking crack. I just talking that smack. I'm going to make the Pro Bowl. I'm going to make the All-Star team. I'm going to be All-American. That's just what you're saying. But discipline determines your destiny, not your desire.

So now let's talk about this discipline. What is that really, Steve? That's your work ethic. That's your hunger. That's your will. That's what you do. That's how hard you're willing to demonstrate. See, it's a live demonstration now.

Discipline is how hard you're willing to. to demonstrate the attributes and the traits to be what you want to be. Did you hear me? It is your willingness to conduct yourself in a manner that is above and beyond what they say is necessary. When you have a massive goal, something that's big, you must first make it something that not reaching it is unacceptable. Me not living my dream was unacceptable for me.

Now, when you get faced with a challenge, like living in your car for three years, what happened was I had a dream that was so big, my dreams were bigger than all my problems. If your dreams aren't really big enough and your problems are bigger than your dreams, then your problems will be bigger than your dreams. But if your dreams are so big, I had no problem that I was not willing to endure to get to my dream. Now, the key you said it, though, was,

step by step. Remember this saying, inch by inch, anything's a inch. inch by inch. See, so you got to set incremental goals along the way. On your way to, let's say you want to be a millionaire, but let's say you only make $5,000 a year right now, but you want to be a millionaire. Then you have got to take whatever you did to make $5,000 and duplicate it so you can make 10. But when you make 10, that should be as minor celebration. Then when you make 20, that should be another minor celebration. Don't stay frustrated because you haven't reached the million

because it take a long time to make a million dollars. But let's just say you're making $250,000. There's another celebration you should have. So you have to enjoy the journey because the journey is not going to change. If you wait until you reach your goal to celebrate, it's mentally debilitated. So you have to have monumental steps along.

the way and just make inch by inch anything's a sense. Set very doable goals as you're trying to reach the impossible thing. Stress is necessary. So you got to be willing to go get it every day. There's a story my father told me all the time. Now I've heard it's several different ways, but I'm just telling you the way my daddy gave it to me. He says, son, he said every morning

on the plains of the eastern Saragetty desert that arises a gazelle that realizes that he was run faster than the fastest lion, or he will be eaten, and he will die that day. On that same desert arises in the morning a lion that realizes that he must run faster than the fastest gazelle, or he will starve, and he will die that day. He says, son, the moral of the story is,

no matter who you is, when you wake up in the morning, needs to be running. What he taught me was a work ethic of how to work in order to get to where you want to go. But you got to put yourself under some stress, though. See, stress is necessary. See, I'm a seed. I really am. See, but a seed has to be planted. A seed got to have dirt put on top of it. If you take a seed and throw it on the concrete and walk off, the sun just burn it up. But guess what? Logically, in my mind, it doesn't make sense that to grow something, you should dig a hole, put it down in there, and cover it with dirt. Logically, that don't make no sense to me. But hold on. See, dirt is necessary for growth and development. If you want to

kill a big dream, tell it to a small-minded person. I told everybody a 10-year-old. I told everybody a 10-year-old, old I was going to be on TV. I had a little problem when I said that. I had a severe stuttering problem. I could not talk outside of my house. I went to school, church, anywhere. I locked up. I couldn't go to the store. I just studied profusely, man. It was a horrible experience for me. So when I wrote on that paper, the assignment was right on a piece of paper what you want to be when you grow up. I'm 10. I wrote, I want to be on TV. That was that faith. The belief in things that you cannot see. I ain't see no way I could be on TV, but I wrote it down. I didn't know no better. I just, I'm 10, I wrote it down. Teacher called me to the front of the

class. I thought I'm going to get me a gold star because she had everybody stand and read their paper in their name. She called me to the front. I'm thinking I'm going up here to get a gold I ain't never had one before. This must be my answer must have been really good. I can't tell you how wrong I was. That lady didn't call me up there to give me no gold star. She called me up there to humiliate me. And when I got up there, that lady led into me. She said, why would you write something like this on your paper? First of all, why you called me up here? You know I can't talk. You already know I can't talk. And she just, you just, said, why would you write something like this on your paper? And I'm standing out. I'm trying to get that. She said, who in this school ever been on TV? Ah, ha, ha, ha. Who in your family ever been on TV? Ah, ah, ah.

Who in this neighborhood ever been on TV? Ah, ah, ah. She's saying, look at you standing there. You can't even talk. How are they going to put somebody like you on TV? So every Christmas, I send her a flat screen TV. I want her to see what God had done from me. I wanted her to see that no matter what she's saying about.

Attitude determines your altitude. If you're a positive person, positive things happen to you. If you're a negative person, negative things are going to continue to happen for you. If you can put that in your scope this year, just change your attitude. Wake up and smile. How about just wake up and be grateful? Life is really 10% what happens to you and 90% what you do about it. Look, everybody in this room, everybody watch it.

Everybody got something they got to deal with. Get to dealing with it. Stop complaining about it. Complaining about it only makes it stay present. Don't give up when reaching your dream is difficult. Listen, if success were easy, you've heard it a million times. Everybody would be successful. It requires a grit and a toughness to be successful.

But I got news for you. It's something that all of you have in you. Now, whatever you've been through, whatever that is, guess what? you still here. Whatever you think riches is, that's your definition. There's a survey that says riches and success is being happy. Well, all you have to do then is determine what is it that makes you happy and start down that path.

Now, to find true success, I believe that you've got to do some work because it's not free. Everybody would love to wake up and just be happy and bubbly, but it requires some work. So I want to share with you something from my book, Chapter 11. There is no self-made man. Now, most of us want to believe that we're independent, that if we set our minds to do something, simply it can get done. Well, I got news for you.

Unless you look to others, you can work twice as hard to get half as much. Sometimes you need a partner in a deal in order to aid you along the way. There is nothing wrong with asking for what you want. You know, for a long time, I used to think that the path to success was going at it alone. Because I was always busy priding myself on not asking for help. I was homeless.

I didn't want to ask for help. I lived in a car. I didn't want to ask for help. And I almost missed out. I didn't realize how many people were willing to have discussions with me about success. You know, most people that are successful, if you ask them for help, they'll give it to you. I'm talking about advice, principles. solutions, not money.

Don't walk up to a wealthy person that just ask for money. You know how many times they didn't got that? But if you're interested in learning how to fish, a lot of people that teach you how to fish, as opposed to giving you a fish sandwich, because they know if they give you the fish sandwich,

you're going to eat it, you're going to have to come back. A lot of people have helped me along the way. Magic Johnson, Oprah Winfrey, the president. I've had some conversations with some people who have it together, and they've taught me many things about succeeding. Now, you might think that requesting help is a huge ask, but it's not. People don't mind sharing knowledge.

What is knowledge unless it's shared? If you have knowledge, but you never shared, how we know you got it? And just remember, there is no shame in wanting something. This whole world is based on wanting something something. You know, don't sit up and listen to some group, you know, wanting something is a sin. No, it's not. You got to want something. The scripture says a man without a dream or vision shall perish. So the day you quit wanting something, you might as well push your chips up to the window. It's a wrap.

So lose the shame and you'll have access to more power. And so here's the key that I want to tell you about. Success is all about building relationships. It's not what you know, it's who you know. Some people might not step up when you ask them for help. They might not. But guess what? The worst thing can happen to you.

If somebody refuses you, you didn't have it anyway. What are you worrying about that for? Well, they might say no or they might turn me down. Ask people. You never know. Suppose they say yes. That could be the turning factor. But, you know, there are some principles that will increase your chances of getting a success.

Know your worth. Don't let nobody else determine it. And don't assume anything. People aren't mind readers. They don't know what you're thinking. And don't assume they know unless you ask with specifics. And then recognize that no is not a rejection. Every time you hear no, it moves you one step closer to a yes.

Everybody can't say no. Now, unless you got a hairbrain idea. And just remember that success is about building a world that looks the way you want it to. Nobody else. Never be afraid to reinvent yourself. My career, my entire career, is a study in reinvention. You know, I started out as a comedian, that was it. I never planned on hosting a radio show,

hosting a game show, or hosting a daytime talk show. I never did. Writing books, none of it. Making movies, none of it. Reinvention happens when you diversify your gift. There lies your greatest secret for success. You've got to discover your gift, and when you discover it, you got to soak it.

You got to wring it out, man. You got to diversify it. Most of us only have one talent. But do you know that that's all you need? Mine happens to be to take information and immediately transfer it into other kinds of platforms. Now, when I was younger, I actually thought that I could only do that with comedy.

But as I've gotten older, I discovered through diversification that it was a little bit more than that, that I could also take information immediately transfer it into inspiration. I could turn it into motivation. I can offer it as guidance. So now, sitting on a talk show, I actually have something to talk about,

all the failed marriages. I got something to talk about, to being homeless, I got something to talk about, being dead, broke. I got something to talk about, having bad credit, tax problems. I got something to talk about.

Whatever hole you've been in, I'm just about drug myself through it. but I came out of all of it because I was not afraid to diversify my gift. One of the other tricks for reinventing yourself is not letting your background become a limitation. If you take that background that you're from and never let it define you, but allow it to redefine you, all that stuff works for the good. Do you understand that you needed everything that's happened to you to happen to you in the exact order that has happened in order for you? in order for you to be the person that you are today.

Thank you for tuning in. Continue strengthening your mind by listening to our other episodes.