The Rich Roll Podcast - Never Fear Failure: Jesse Itzler on Living With A SEAL, Tackling Life Plateaus & Getting Comfortable With Being Uncomfortable

Episode Date: November 30, 2015

Jesse Itzler fast-talked his way right out of college into a recording contract, ultimately taking his music all the way to MTV, the Billboard 100 and even an Emmy. Jesse Itzler then took an entrepreneurial left-turn, creating and selling big companies — companies like Marquis Jet, the world’s largest prepaid private jet card company, and Zico Coconut Water — before wooing Spanx founder Sarah Blakely (worth over $1 billion) all the way to the altar. Jesse Itzler eats only fruit before noon. And when he's not raising three kids, he runs 100 mile races, raises millions for charity and can be found court side supporting the Atlanta Hawks — the NBA team he recently purchased with some friends. What I'm trying to say is that Jesse Itzler is a quite the character. An amazing life highlighted by one predominant theme: never be afraid to fail. But there is one thing that scares Jesse Itzler: stagnation. Despite all his success, in 2010 Jesse felt his life had settled into a too-comfortable routine. So he did what any rational human would do: he invited a Navy SEAL to move in with him. But this was no ordinary SEAL (as if any such thing exists). This was David Goggins — perhaps the most intense, taciturn individual walking planet Earth. A one man metaphor for adversity destruction, Goggins' example and words formed the original inspiration behind my own journey: When you think you are done, you've only accomplished about 40% of what you are truly capable of. Goggins military record is astonishing. As a Navy SEAL, he was one of an elite group of men regularly sent on some of the toughest missions in the world. He is the only member in the U.S. Armed Forces to complete SEAL training, Army Ranger School (where he graduated as Honor Man), and Air Force tactical air controller training. Not only has he faced combat in Iraq, he served as the body guard for Iraqi Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari. To honor his brother soldiers felled by battle and to raise money for charity, David lost 100 pounds in 60 days and went on to tackle the 10 most rigorous ultra-endurance challenges on the planet, compelling his 260-pound frame to top finishes at races like Badwater– a 135 mile jaunt across Death Valley in 130 degree heat (finishing 5th as a novice) — and Ultraman– 1 320-mile 3 day triathlon circumnavigation of the Big Island of Hawaii he completed with his tennis shoes duct taped to the pedals of an ill-fitting loaner bike to a 2nd place finish overall. He even completed 203.5 miles in the 48-Hour National Championship endurance foot race, earning a spot among the top 20 ultra-marathoners of the world. Just another training day for Goggins, topped off with a recent Guinness World record for most pull ups in a single day: 4,025. Goggins accepted Jesse's invitation with just one rule: for 31-days, Jesse had to do every thing David asked him to do. No exceptions. What happened next would change Jesse's life forever. An adventure chronicled in his new book, Living With A Seal: 31 Days Training With The Toughest Man On The Planet*. I found the book super fun and highly entertaining. So when my travels took me to Atlanta, I jumped at the chance to meet up with him. Enjoy! Rich

The only way to really get better is to experience pain, to get uncomfortable, and to go to places that you don't want to go and improve. That's entrepreneur, ultramarathoner, and author Jesse Itzler. And this is The Rich Roll Podcast. The Rich Roll Podcast. Hey, everybody. How are you guys doing? What's going on? How was your Thanksgiving? Did you overeat? Did you get along with your family and friends? Maybe you're out on a trail working off those extra pounds that you put on yesterday. Whatever it was, whatever it is, I hope it was great. I want to thank you guys for all the great feedback on the last episode, which was all about navigating the emotional and financial pitfalls that are incident to this heightened time of year, the holiday season. Really glad you enjoyed it, and I hope it was

helpful. My name is Rich Roll. I am an athlete, an author, public speaker, wellness advocate, husband, dad, student, and, of course, podcast host. And this is the show where I go deep with the paradigm-shifting outliers, the big forward thinkers across all categories of positive culture change, health, fitness, nutrition, academia, medicine, entrepreneurship, tech, mindfulness, consciousness, and spirituality. The goal is simple but worthwhile to help all of us unlock and unleash our best, most authentic selves. So thank you so much for tuning in today, for subscribing to the show on iTunes, of course for leaving us a review on iTunes. That helps us out a lot. And for always using the Amazon banner ad at richroll.com for all your Amazon purchases. With the holiday season upon us,

you might find yourself having to buy a gift on Amazon. It would mean a lot if you click through the banner ad on our site first. It will not cost you a cent extra. It doesn't really take any extra time, maybe a little awareness. That's it. And Amazon kicks us some loose change from their

voluminous coffers, and that helps keep our bandwidth flowing. It really helps us out a lot. So thank you to everybody who has made a point and a habit of doing that. I'm really excited to bring you Polymath Jesse Itzler today. He is a rapper turned very successful entrepreneur, philanthropist, a rapper turned very successful entrepreneur, philanthropist, ultra runner, husband, dad, and now author. And I got a ton I want to say about Jesse before we launch into the conversation. But first. All right, Jesse Itzler on the show today.

Jesse is quite the character. Let's paint the picture. This is a guy who only eats fruit until noon, has been doing that forever. He's never had a resume. He fast-talked his way right out of college into a recording contract, rapping under the name Jesse James all the way to MTV and the Billboard 100. He then produced the New York Knicks anthem, Go New York Go, which I think they still play at all the Knicks games.

And he parlayed that success into a business creating music for other sports franchises, including producing the NBA Emmy Award-winning I Love This Game music campaign. We've all heard that song, right? I Love This Game. At one point, the guy even managed Run DMC. And then in 2001, he took like this entrepreneurial left turn when he founded Marquis Jet, which went on to become the world's largest prepaid private jet card company, which he and his partner ultimately sold to Berkshire Hathaway and NetJets. Not enough for you? He then helped pioneer the coconut water craze as a partner in Zyko Coconut Water. Meanwhile, he married Sarah Blakely, who is the founder of Spanx.

You know what Spanx is? It's a huge business. She's worth over a billion dollars. And when he's not raising his three boys, in his free time, he can be found running ultra marathons or courtside at the Atlanta Hawks games. Why courtside? Because he, along with a few friends, happens to own the team. And I recently came across Jesse's new book. It's called Living with a Seal, and I really loved it. It's a super fun, entertaining, easy read all about what

happened when he invited David Goggins into his home. For those who don't know, David Goggins is this extraordinary human being. He's a Navy SEAL. He is an ultra endurance machine. He is the pull-up world record holder. He's one of the most intense, taciturn people I have ever come across in my entire life, as well as being one of the most inspirational

and influential people in my life. He was the one who originally inspired me to tackle Ultraman to begin with. And in this book, he invites David into his home to come and live with him and his family in New York City for a month. And the book is kind of about the experience of having this guy live with him and putting him through the paces of what kind of a Navy SEAL experience would be like. So it's very kind of iconoclastic for a guy like David to move into essentially a really fancy New York City apartment and shake this guy's life up. And what he learned from that is really what the book is all about. So when I was in Atlanta the other week, I made a point of dropping by Jesse's house

to converse with him about the book, about his life, about his success equation, and why it's important to never settle, never stagnate, never be afraid to fail. Why it's crucial to continually force yourself out of your comfort zone to get comfortable being uncomfortable, so to speak, wherever you find yourself in life, and to always be seeking growth. So it goes without saying that Jesse is an incredibly dynamic, super interesting cat, full of life and stories. So let's get to it. Thanks for doing this, Jesse. Oh, it's my pleasure. Yeah, it's really nice to have you welcome me into your beautiful home and uh spend a little time with you we just did a podcast before the podcast i have this thing where i'm like i should just do set it up so that i don't talk to the guests until they sit down so i get all the nuggets so i'm going to ask you to repeat one or two of

those stories but um yeah i'm i'm uh i've been wanting to meet you for a long time, man. So this is super cool. I feel like you're, uh, you're like this, uh, sort of Gen X version of Zellig. You've lived all these different lives, different chapters in many different ways. And it really, uh, we have that in common in a cool way. You know, I mean, I, I, you know, I think like I was trying to think as I was driving over here, I was like, what, what is like the overarching, you know, sort overarching theme or marching order of your life? And it really boils down to, I think, and correct me if I'm wrong, but being fearless, not being afraid to fail, and allowing yourself to get out of your comfort zone,

which is obviously a predominant theme in the new book. Yeah, no, definitely. I think that sums it up pretty good. And doing things differently, just not intentionally differently, but just looking at challenges and saying, you know what, that would be a great on my life resume. Uh-huh. The resume that you refuse to write down though. Correct. You're like, that's the thing, right? You've never had a resume, right? Right. A life, a life resume in your mind. Yeah. Yeah, cool. So, I mean, where do you think that, where does that germinate from? I mean, were your parents like that?

Where did that kind of sensibility come from? Well, first of all, it's a lot more fun living outside of your comfort zone and trying different things. But I just, you know, I was just, I've always been a check the box guy. You know, finish one thing and not really dwell on, oh, that was a good accomplishment or whatever and just look for the next challenge. I've always just always wanted to kind of keep going and keep trying to find new things that would excite me.

I get bored easily. So I like to just, I need, I'm one of the, I guess so many of us need a goal or something to train for. So I'm always looking for the next thing, whether it's business or physical or whatever. Were you, were you like hyperactive as a kid? Do you have trouble like sitting down in class? I didn't recognize that at the time, but now that I look back on it for sure.

Yeah. You would have probably been medicated if you were a kid now, right? Like for not being able to focus and everything like that. Well, I mean, there's, you know, we can track back and go through the music career and all your kind of entrepreneurial ventures, but you know, let's camp out, um, uh, in, in the book right now. Sure. Tell me a little bit about, uh, about the book and kind of how this whole thing got sparked. Sure. Well, the book's called Living with the Seal. And I was at a 24-hour race in San Diego a couple of years ago. And I was running the entire race as part of a six-person relay team with friends. And the guy next to me literally set up his little station next to me,

was running the entire race alone. And he caught my eye because he was about 265 pounds, which is a lot of weight to carry in a 24-hour race that you're running by yourself. And the race was unsupported, so we had to bring all of our own supplies. And at the time, I just sold the company and I probably overdid my supplies. I had a tent, a masseuse, bananas, I think Whole Foods pulled up. And this guy next to me literally sat in a folding chair with a bottle of water and a bag of crackers with his arms crossed with this like don't even think about messing with me look and I was just like who is this guy and at mile 70 he had broken

all the small bones in both of his feet and had kidney failure and I watched this guy literally just on pure guts finish this race and I was like who in the world is this so I googled him he had a fascinating backstory which we can get to if you want and I decided I wanted to meet him I cold called him and I literally just picked up the phone called him he wasn't super chatty so So I said, you know what? Let me get on a plane and come see you. And after about 10 minutes of just sitting with him, I said, my life would be a lot better if whatever he had psychologically, whatever made this guy tick, rubbed off on me a little bit. And I invited him to move in with my family and I. And three days later, he was at our breakfast table. And the idea was he's going to

live with you for 31 days. And the only rule is that you've got to do everything that he says or he asks of you. Yeah. And I wanted to get in great shape at the time. I was in I was in a good routine or I thought it was a good routine. And so many of us live our life on routine and routines are great, but there definitely could be a rut, and I wasn't getting better. My routine was great, but I wasn't improving in any of the buckets in my life. But you're such a high performer

in so many other areas of your life. Your bar is already set pretty high in comparison to the average person. So to me, it would take some, it takes a deep level of self-awareness to go no i can still there's still room there yeah i mean at the time i was i was doing a bunch of marathons my times weren't getting better my training wasn't i was just doing it i was going through the motions but i wasn't at all giving it my all and i couldn't get that mojo it's hard

you know the one thing that he really taught me, and you can, I'm sure you can relate to this through everything you've done, is we're all disciplined in our own ways. But to be consistently disciplined, consistently disciplined is so hard. That's the hardest part. purely like, I just want to get in physical, great physical condition versus, you know, beyond that, like sort of the, the, the mental discipline, the emotional discipline that would spill over into other areas of your life. Like, were you thinking about that at the time or was this purely like a fitness bootcamp? At the, when I first kind of put my hand out and shook his hand across from the table and said, let's move, you know, he'll move in with me it was predominantly i wanted to get in great shape but after two hours of him at my house it it flip-flopped and the psychological side of it

and what makes him tick and how is he so driven became 80 to 90 percent of it so i knew i was going to get in good shape that was unavoidable i mean he's a he's a machine but i really wanted so much more because you know you go in and out of shape you go through these peaks and valleys up and down but the mental side of it you can really can last a lifetime right so i i and i got all these different little sound bites and tidbits of living with him i mean the first day that he came here in two hours into our journey we went down you want to see how many pull-ups I could do. And by the way, he has set the Guinness Book of World Records

for most pull-ups in a day. He's done 4,030 in 17 hours. So pull-ups for him weren't that difficult. Pull-ups for me, a 200-pound guy that doesn't do any, was very tough. So I squeezed, I did like eight. He said, all right, get off the bar,

try it again in 30 seconds. Got back on the bar, I did like maybe six. I get off the bar and try it again in 30 seconds. Got back on the bar. I did like maybe six. So I one more time, wait 30 seconds and try it again. And I barely got four and he turned and I was done. Like lactic acid built up. My arms were like at a 90 degree angle. And he turned to me and he said, all right, we're not leaving here until you do 100 more.

And I said, I can't possibly do a hundred like impossible for me to physically I might want to do it I can't do it I said no you can do it and we're gonna I'm gonna prove it to you we're not leaving this gym until you do it so I would do one walk around the gym do another but what he taught me and I did it but what he taught me is we all have so much more in our reserve tank than we think we have. And his saying, one of your saying that you've, you know, it's resonated with you is that when your brain tells you you're done, you're really only 40% done. And he, and he taught me that right there. He kind of, he,

I had heard him say that one time and I never forgot it. And as we were kind of chatting before the podcast, that's really, you know, that's something that I use in the talks that I give. And, and also, you know, it was a big sort of mantra when I was doing Epic Five, when I would hit those low moments. And it's so true. It's so incredibly true. And it's incredibly powerful. And when I'm reading your book, you refer to him as Seal. He's anonymous. But to me, I'm like, I know immediately this is the only person this could be is David Goggins. Right. Like anybody in the endurance community would identify him immediately because there is no other human being like this guy on planet Earth. Right. But I'm interested in, you know, why it was anonymous. I know that now it's public,

I think maybe a week ago or whatever. He was cool with like coming out and doing press about it. it's public, I think maybe a week ago or whatever, he was cool with like coming out and doing press about it. But was he, you know, reticent to participate in this on a media level? Or like, what was the, you know, reason why he was anonymous throughout until recently? Well, when he moved in with me, I decided to keep a blog of our training regiment. And I sent it out to just 3040 friends. And during that time, I just referred to him as Seal just because I thought it was funny. It resonated with guys. And the blog really caught on. And it led ultimately to this book.

And I just wanted to keep it consistent with the blog. There wasn't like, you know, anything deeper than that. But I also wanted people that didn't know like you, David Goggins in the name or could Google him or whatever to get their own mental vision of of what this guy looks like and is right uh yeah it's so interesting and for people that are listening that don't know who he is uh he's a navy seal he's been a navy seal for like i don't know over 20 years probably at this point um who uh has suffered the loss of many a fellow soldier. And around, I want to say it was around 2007 or so,

to honor his fallen brethren, I think he had six friends of his who died in a helicopter accident or something like that, decided that he was going to tackle the 10 most challenging endurance challenges on the planet. And he just set about like checking the boxes. You know, he'd never been a runner. The guy's enormous, right?

Yeah. Like he is not like a, the typical triathlete runner. He never owned a bike. You know, like on sheer force of will, he won by one, like knock these things off. And he, you know, by, I don't know how he got into his first hundred miler. I think he had to do something on a track to prove that he could do it. And that was another instance, I think, where he broke all kinds of bones. Well, that's the race that I saw him at.

I saw him at his first one. Unbelievable. And on a personal level, you know, when I was going through, like, my transformation and my journey, I was trying to think of a challenge that would get me excited and scared and all of those things. And I was contemplating an Ironman when I picked up a magazine article. And I talk about this in Finding Ultra. And it was a story about this race Ultraman. But really it was a story about this guy, David Goggins, who had come off bad water, had never really –

I don't think he'd ever even done a triathlon at all and had gotten into this Ultraman race, didn't own a bike, borrowed a bike, didn't have cycling shoes or cleats or anything like that. He actually taped his tennis shoes to his pedals and through this incredible, you know, mental acumen that he has and, and, and force of will still placed relatively high in this race. And I was so amazed by that, that that was like the seed that, you know, was planted for me to contemplate the idea that perhaps I could try this race. And so he's sort of, you know, a spirit animal to me, even though I mean, I've met him a couple of times. I wouldn't say that, you know, I know him well, but truly a remarkable human being in every category and unlike any other person you're ever going to meet. And an unlikely roommate for my wife and I, perhaps the most taciturn, uh, and, and serious,

gravely serious, uh, person, you know, I've ever encountered when he walked into my house and this is in the book. Uh, I said, you know, look, go ahead, take your bags, make yourself at home. And he said, nah, he said, I don't have a home. This is your home. And I said, none to make yourself at home as an expression. And he turned right to me. He goes, I don't have a home. This is your home. And I said, no, the make yourself at home is an expression. And he turned right to me. He goes, I don't operate in expressions. I was like, you're like, I'm like, okay, be a long 31 days. Cause you're like a jocular fun guy, you know, you must be thinking like, there's gotta be a way into this guy. Like, how am I going to crack his, you know, emotional core and get to the, get to the

reality of like who this person is. Right. I also thought, look, we'll run. We'll watch some football games. We'll go to some dinners. You know, that got thrown out the window. He literally took, we lived at the time in New York City in a great building on Central Park West.

He took all the furniture in the guest room where he was sleeping, moved it to the side, and blew up an inflatable tent that takes the oxygen out of the room where he was sleeping moved it to the side and blew up an inflatable tent that takes the oxygen out of the room to increase your like red blood cell whatever and slept in a tent in our apartment like an altitude tent yeah yeah no there's amazing uh anecdotes in the book there's one story where i think you come in and he's just sitting in front of the window like looking out the, like his ability to just patiently and quietly sit without, you know, encountering or any distractions. Yeah. Yeah. Is is quite amazing. So how did it go when you crack this news to your wife? Like, hey, here, I got this idea. This is

what's going to go down. So, well, my wife is an entrepreneur. She owns a company called Spanx and she's always lived her, her, her life way out of the box. She's put herself out there. She's a huge risk taker. That's a theme in her life. And, um, I always say she's 50% Einstein and 50% Lucille Ball. And I think when I told her that we're having a guest move in, I got her to Lucille, Lucille Ball moment because she didn't really register with her. So I immediately went on to the next thing. I kind of got like a half approval and went on to the next topic. Yeah, it's not really registering what that's actually going to mean. And I said it really fast.

Like, we're having a guest. You know, like subliminally kind of snuck it in so I could tell her that I gave her the information, but I didn't give her all the information. And so tell me the first thing that happens when he comes in. So, well, first of all, he only had a nap. He came for 31 days with nothing. All his belongings were in a small backpack, which was amazing because it was the winter. And I showed him to him. Like I told you, we went down and did these pull-ups, did that pull-up challenge.

That was right when he arrived? Right out of the gate. And then that night, he told me that I'd be sleeping in a chair to get out of my comfort zone, and he wanted me to start to feel what suffering is so I could enjoy it, as he would say. But no, every day, you know, he had an expression every day we have to do something that sucks. And we did. And, um, you know,

he just wanted me to, he wanted me to take my baseline, which I thought I was operating at a high level and just really reset it and raise the bar because once it gets reset, your baseline just gets raised. You can't really go back. And all the challenges, all the workouts, you know, we did some crazy stuff. Jumped in a frozen lake. We did insane runs and blizzards and all this other stuff. But it was all about raising the baseline to get better and getting out of your comfort zone. You know, that term is overused, but you really but the only way to really get better is to experience pain, to get uncomfortable, and to go to places that you don't want to go and improve.

Right. And it's interesting for a guy like you because, I mean, literally, you have choices most people don't have. Like, you could choose to spend your time however you like without really a concern for resources. And most people in your scenario would opt for, you know, sort of lavish vacations and, you know, whatever, like the path of least resistance and sort of only doing things that sort of pique your interest. And here you are kind of welcoming this person into your life that is going to completely shake that up and force you to, you know, confront yourself in a way that you don't really, you could go to your grave without

ever having to do and be none the wiser or, you know, suffer nonetheless. And I think that's why he decided to, to, to move in with us. And that was my next question. Like, why would he agree to do this? I think that he, he recognized that I, you know, that there was authentic passion for wanting to get better. There was a strong appreciation for him. I had so much respect for what he was doing and what he's done for our country. And I think part of him, too, I think, you know, to live with two entrepreneurs, I think there was a little bit of like, let me see what another world looks like. That's about as uncomfortable for him as it is for you to jump into a frozen lake. Absolutely. Cause I can't,

it's hard to even picture that guy in New York city at all, let alone like sort of in your fancy apartment building. I know. No, I mean, it's comical. It was the books fun. I mean, that's the, that's the whole fish out of water part of the book. It's really funny. But yeah, I mean, women with poodles in their pocketbooks or in the elevator, with him, he's probably jumped out of parachutes in foreign countries and done things that we, you know, some other stuff that I don't even know about that helped our country and this and that.

And here he is in this fancy building. about that helped our country and this and that. And here he is in this fancy building. And he was just, you know, he was just so determined at everything. I mean, everything was perfect form, perfect execution, you know, on time. And a lot of that rubbed off on me, you know, not just physically, but even at work. You know, I've lost many deals to just negotiation fatigue. I don't have great negotiation endurance.

I'd rather run. A lot of times I'll just be like, you know what? It is what it is. I'm not going to – let's just – I want to go run. Fine. Done. Shake on it. And he just – everything that he did in his life, even the way he cleaned his room in the beginning or made his bed was perfect.

It had to be done. In fact, this is really interesting. I asked him now, what else is left on your bucket list? You've done all these amazing things. He said to me, literally, this is two days ago, he said, there's nothing left. He's done everything he wants to do. What he's doing now is he's going back through the things that he's already done, like Badwater, that he thinks he could do better and trying to improve the things on his bucket list that he's already done.

Interesting. Yeah. There's one of his kind of pearls of wisdom that's peppered throughout the book is this idea that it's less about what you're doing. It's when you're doing it and how you're doing it. Yeah. That commitment to doing whatever you're doing, however mundane it is to do it the best that you can do with this relentless, like focus, like the ability of him to like be super present in whatever he's doing without any

distraction. Right. Now, part of that is he has, you know, the luxury of having a super simple life, right? He doesn't have a lot of distractions and um he's not on facebook or twitter no no why would he do that yeah then he could be doing push-ups exactly um so but that's part of it but you know he i always felt like during our days that we had we were operating with 27 or 28 hours in a day. I was so more efficient at work, even though I was doing so much more physically and we were training so long, I was getting so much more done at work because all the non-essential things

that he would just be like, eliminate them. Meetings that maybe I would take that I didn't need, lunches, this and that. And he would find, a lot of us think, if we don't work out in the morning, ah, I missed my workout, I'll do it tomorrow. If we had a 15 minute break during it, he shadowed me everywhere I went. He came to every meeting, every meal, everything. And, um, if they'd be like, let's take 15 minute break to check emails and go to the bathroom, he'd be like, how let's

go do as many burpees as we can in 10 minutes. Right. And then take five minutes to do, to do your stupid emails. Yeah. And there was that time where he made you do that during a break and like a negotiation or a business meeting and you're in a suit and you have to come back. Just finding that little sliver of extra time throughout your day. You're always working out. It's not like you worked out and you're done. It's a, search for that little moment of time that you could maximize and use more efficiently. And he did, you know, we would, if we were traveling and we would get home at 11 o'clock and he felt like the day wasn't complete, like we didn't get enough done. He would say, all right, we still have 50 minutes left.

We're going to maximize those 50 minutes in the day. Were you game throughout? Was there ever a moment where you're like, all right, man, come on. Like, or a breaking point where you're like, it's too much. Or you thought you weren't going to make it. Several times, several times.

And I just didn't want to let him down. You know, he was, it was just so motivating. It's one thing to read about inspiration. It's another thing to live with inspiration. And when you, when I was just being around him and knowing what he's done like you said taping his feet to a bike and you know

all this crazy stuff i i can't go out for a 50 minute run i mean it was just impossible to say no to him um and then after two or three weeks when it became habit it i would look forward to it i'd be like i can't wait for it to suck today. So it was really interesting. And I would bring him to these business meetings. And I remember specifically we went to meet with Kevin Garnett, who at the time was playing with the Celtics, who was a Gatorade endorser for Gatorade. But he was also really into what he puts in his body.

And his contract was coming up. And we thought for my coconut water company, Zico, he'd be a great fit as an endorser. So I brought Goggins with me. And we go to pitch in Boston, Garnett. And I introduced them. And I said, oh, this is David Goggins. He's a Navy SEAL. He's living with me to train me.

And for the next two hours, those guys just went back and forth about fitness, what they put in their body, food, this and that. And in the end, they gave each other a bear hug and said, all right, great meeting. And I'm like, what about Zico? And Garnett turned to me and he said, look, whatever you guys are doing, I'm in. So he was like the ultimate without question. Guys were so fascinated with him. I was like, I wish I could bring them everywhere. Incredible accessory that you could bring into the boardroom. Uh, no, there's, you paint that scene really beautifully. Cause it starts off with your, you being nervous about, you know, how this is going to go in this negotiation. You bring David in and immediately like Kevin is in

this sort of staring contest, like trying to figure out who this David guy is. He's not hearing anything that you're saying. Nothing. Right. It's really great. It's hysterical. I'm going through a whole pitch, and then he just turns to Gog, and he's like, so what do you do during a day? You know, that was it.

Then the floodgates opened, and those guys had their conversation. I don't think there was anybody who could beat David in a staring contest. No. No way. No. Right. conversation and I don't think there's anybody who could beat David in a staring contest no no way no right um and also I love the part about like sort of just walking like walking across midtown and you're wearing like 50 pound weight vests and he's got his eyes it's like he's in Fallujah you know he's like spotting we got across the street you know like looking for you know enemy sight lines the whole time yeah he had these we got

two weight vests that we would wear when i walked to work i would wear a suit some days not often you're wearing the you're wearing the weight vest underneath your suit yeah underneath it and some days over it but usually under but but sometimes we'll be exposed and we look like we're gonna go blow up a building right i mean he looks anybody ever stop you people they couldn't stop us because they run to the other side of the street. I mean, they were freaked out. I was freaked out. I thought, you know, like it was unsafe.

And this is 2010, right? Yeah. When this was happening? Yeah. Yeah. So it was... He loved the weight vest. He would wear the weight vest like it was,

you know, he would put it on like he just... He was putting on the jacket after he won the Masters. I mean, celebrate it. He would welcome it. like he just he was putting on the the jacket after he won the masters i mean celebrate it he would welcome it he would sleep in it he loved he just loved challenge right it couldn't be hard enough and he as i recall i think he had a heart thing that was going on with him that took him out like because he didn't compete for a number of years yeah he was kind of gone like i didn't see him anywhere i didn't see name anywhere. I think that might've been around 2009 or something like that. Did that, did he have surgery or they got rectified or how did that get? So he's, he's, he accomplished all these amazing physical feats with literally, I believe like 60%, only 60% of, um, capacity of

his heart. He had a, he had a huge hole in his heart and he has sickle cell. So he's, yeah, he has sickle cell. So he, um, it's just an amazing story. I mean, I, anyone listening should Google David Goggins and get more about his story or, you know, a lot of it is in my book, living with the seal, but, um, it's just, you know, guys like this are rare. And when you can pull things out of their, their journey to help your personal life, whether it's training or work. And when you can pull things out of their, their journey to help your personal life, whether it's training or work. And I was fortunate. I got both out of it. Um, it just makes you so much better. Yeah. It's a, uh, you know, it's a lost sensibility in our culture. You know, now it's all about the life hack or what's the shortest route to get, you know,

to get to the end game. And here's a guy who's so fully committed to the process, the journey. He's actually seeking out the most difficult route as opposed to finding the shortcut. And in that, finding the thing to celebrate is overcome. It's like if it's easy to do, then what are you gaining out of that? It's only through confronting and overcoming

and getting to the other side of that thing that you thought you could never do that enriches your life. And also I would just add one thing, you know, so many of us have finished lines. I'm going to run the New York marathon. And when you train for that one specific thing, you celebrate it with a party, with your friends, you hang the metal, the metal up and the pictures up. And you said, okay, it's on my resume. I did the New York Marathon. He has no finish lines. No. It's like once that's done, what's the next race?

What's the next thing to do? Yeah, he hasn't dwelled for one second. I think when he did Ironman World Championships one year, he parachuted into the swim, did the whole Ironman, and when it was done, he went out for a run. He's like, it's just another workout. He doesn't make too big of a deal out of anything. Right. Right. And so it's, it's a valuable lesson as well. So, so what are like the biggest, you know, lessons that you take away from this? Like, you know, how has this impacted your life post David? I mean, it's been five years now. You know, what are the biggest changes that have stuck with you that are still

part of your daily life? Well, for starters, you know, definitely the same, just to reiterate, what you dwelled, you tapped into on one of your races, the 40% rule, something that definitely resonates with me, I always think about. But just on a daily basis, it's, he's just been, he's just motivated to live a lot more, with a lot more grit. Grit is a great indicator of future success. And he was the grittiest. But just to live my life with as much grit. Look for challenges that maybe stuff that I don't think I can complete and try to do it. Always have something on my calendar that I'm looking forward to, that I can train for. And then what's next after that? I'm building out a schedule. I'm way more efficient with my time. I've eliminated

a lot of the non-essential stuff in my life. I'm trying to live more simply. My life's a little complicated. His life was so simple. And I think he didn't really want what I had, and I wanted a lot of what he had without getting rid of what I had. Like I didn't want to downgrade my, my house or my apartment, but I wanted the simplicity. So I'm trying to, to live a real, you know, simple, as simple as I can. And what would be an example of something that maybe you, you cut loose? Well, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not a fancy guy. I'm not into fancy dinners. We talked about not only fruit until noon, but even just wardrobe, you know, I'm not a fancy guy. I'm not into fancy dinners. We talked about I only eat fruit until noon.

But even just wardrobe. I mean, in my closet, as soon as he left, one of the first things I did was go through and say, you know what, I only want to have 20 things in my closet for this season. Instead of having a couple of jackets and a couple of this, I'm like, I'm going to take the two that I like, the two sweaters, the t-shirts, the running shorts, and that's it. I loved it. It felt so clean. It felt even that one little, small little change opened up stuff at work.

It just opened up a theme that stuck with me about just simplifying things and not... I didn't feel like i had to return every email i didn't feel like emails owned me i took control of my own email so i didn't feel like i had to respond in five minutes to every email and be beholden to that or or you know oh this guy's gonna get mad if i don't respond to the emails that's a big one what gives someone the right that someone emails me what gives that now they don't can what gives someone the right that someone emails me? What gives them the right to think that I have to email them back immediately? Why do I have to stop what I'm doing with my kids or my family and return that email? Shouldn't that answer be on my terms?

And, you know, pre-Goggins, I would be like, oh, man, so I got to get back to them right away. Post-Goggins, I was like, you know man, so I got to get back to him right away. Post Goggins, I was like, you know what? I'm going to go get, I'm going to put me first. Putting me first was a big, a big takeaway from him. Yeah. So you've kind of created this pie chart about how you allocate your time every day, right? Yes. Tell me what that looks like. Well, I, you know, I, I, um, I draw a circle and I start with, okay, I need seven hours of sleep. That's kind of where I'm comfortable operating on seven. Six isn't good for me.

Eight's probably a little too much. And I said, okay, I have 17 hours left in a day. How do I want to spend it? And I literally put three hours for me. And that three hours of time could be a run. It could be sitting in a sauna. It could be doing emails. It could be watching TV. But the sitting in a sauna it could be doing emails it could be

watching tv but the jesse time is something that i definitely prioritize and then i have time a certain amount allocated time with my wife and my family and and the rest is pretty much work and that's how i break up my day and i approach it it's pretty much the same breakdown every day but i do change it depending on what's going on. But I always make sure that I have three hours for me and a certain amount of time for my wife and my kids. And so does the training fall into that three hours if you're gearing up for a race?

If I'm gearing up, I might extend it a little bit. You know, I usually, training I usually actually keep as a separate, the three hours usually doesn't even include the training. Because again, if you're efficient I usually training, I usually actually keep as a separate, the three hours usually doesn't even include the training because again, if you're efficient with your time, 24 hours, try to fill up on a pie chart, 24 hours. If you have seven of it's sleep, you still have 17 hours. If you're efficient at work and you work, you know, X amount of hours, you still have a lot of time. Right. And you know what? Get up an hour earlier. Right, right, right. Yeah. That's, you know, that's something that I'm, I'm always trying to find balance with that, you know what? Get up an hour earlier. Right, right, right. Yeah, that's something that I'm always trying to find balance with that.

I feel like I vacillate between extremes. Like in the meta, there's balance. Like if you look back over the course of a year, my life looks really balanced. But on a day-to-day basis, trying to get that mix right, like to achieve that pie chart every single day is something that is always eluding me. But even if you're working a full-time job and you work eight hours a day and you sleep six, you have 10 hours. You have 10 hours to allocate. So even if I – I'm trying to just figure out now how I even do it. Even if you ran three hours a day and spent three hours by yourself and three hours with your family, you still have an hour.

I mean, there's a lot of time if you don't dilly-dally. And, you know, he didn't dilly-dally. There was no dilly-dallying. The dilly-dallying would be like, you know what? I got downtime. I'm going to do some sit-ups. Everything was maximized. Now, of course, it's unrealistic for us to all live our life to that extent.

But there's pieces of it we can pull out to get better. Do you feel like you were able to crack his exterior and figure out what it is that drives him? What's behind that that has created this person? Well, I talk about it with him. I talk to him about it because it's just so unique. And his motivator, we all have our own motivation. His motivator was anger. He had a really tough childhood.

He has a lot of anger inside, but he's been able to channel that on a daily basis whenever he needs it and that's really what drives him he likes to look at his life as like a wet rag you kind of squeeze out all the water and he looks at the rag

like it's his soul and he wants to squeeze out every single drip drop of water out of his soul to know that he's maximized his time on earth. But I think in some respects it can be said that when your fuel is anger, that's an unsustainable fuel source, right? You're going to burn out. At some point, is there a way to confront that fear,

work through it, get to the other side, and be able to operate from a different place? And did you sense that he holds onto that? If he was actually to confront that and work through it, that suddenly he wouldn't be the person that he is anymore, or he wouldn't have that drive? I think he definitely still taps into the yang he might be the exception to the rule he might be that one asterisk like on the bottom of the page like you know this doesn't apply to everyone asterix it does apply to david goggins um i think he's also set up just he's can he's he has such control of his mind he's convinced himself that he can just do it or he's gonna try to do it no matter what and again it goes back to being the

consistency and the discipline he's consistently convinced himself that he's up for the task that he can do it that he was put on earth to see what he's made of and you know you know so um, you know, so I, for him, maybe the anger is something that, you know, that he can still hold onto. And maybe it is something that won't go away. I don't know. And maybe that's channeled with other emotions or other things, or just the will to be the best or whatever it is, but whatever that potion is inside of it's working. Yeah. Yeah. Well, the other thing, interesting thing about the book is that it's, it really is peppered with a lot of business advice. You know, it's not just,

Oh, here's how I got in shape and here's the workouts that I did. And here's the pearls of wisdom that David was dropping on me. And, you know, sort of aside from, you know, him kind of being your, your accessory in these, in these business meetings, there was some wisdom that you were able to kind of call from hanging out with him that has applied to your entrepreneurial life. Yeah. You know, I've, I've, I've had multiple gigs. I had a private jet company called marquee jet, and I had no experience or background in private aviation. I was in the music business. I had, um, I was a partner in Zico Coconut Water. So multiple, and there's always

been a big learning curve. I didn't study to be in any of those fields. I don't think you can. And like we said, I've never had a resume. So I've always been like, had a combination of, let me get my foot in the door and kind of figure the rest out later. Let me get the deal and I'll figure out how to make the deal work. So the first step has always been for me getting the deal, getting the right partners, hiring my weaknesses, surrounding myself, you know, and filling the positions that I didn't want to play. But it's always been mixed with a real passion for stuff that I wanted to learn more about or or you know get better at or whatever so um but there's no secret sauce you know it's the ability to not be scared to fail to call audibles um and just uh you know when you do fail just know that you're just getting a little nudge that you're off course and

and get back on course somehow yeah i mean tracking back to the beginning of your career, you have this sort of audacity to, I guess, is it fair to say, bluff your way into the music industry as Jesse James, the rapper, and then take that opportunity once you're in the door to then translate it into, you had a song that was on the Billboard 100, right? and then realizing there was this niche in the sports arena field of writing these songs for these franchises and turning that into like a full blown business. Yes. Um, so, you know, do you think that, that, uh, I'm trying to figure out how to articulate this, that, uh, that your kind of audacity is just innate, or do you think that that can be taught? I mean, that fearlessness,

you know, to be able to kind of walk into a room without a resume and sort of secure the desired result. Well, I had, I always had the confidence that if I could get into the room and connect the dots and put myself in the game, that I could figure out how to get to the fourth quarter. And when I got my record deal, I faced rejection probably 20 times.

I sent out, like everybody trying to get a record deal in the 80s, a cassette with a three song demo to all the various record labels in New York and LA and didn't hear one single word back. And then I would call these labels and nothing. And I didn't have a lawyer. My dad owned a plumbing supply house. I didn't have a powerful lawyer. I'm like, how in the world am I going to get a record deal? Like, this is crazy. And one night I was at the studio in New York,

and one of my favorite rappers of the 80s, a guy named Dana Dane, had an advanced cassette of his second album that no one had sitting on the board, the music board. So I borrowed it, put it in my pocket. Hey, I just wanted to hear it. I was a fan of his. But when I went out to L.A. after college, I had read that the owners of a record label called delicious vinyl, which is a big independent probably the hottest

Independent label in the early 90s a song called bust a move young MC and wild thing from tone low the founders Love Dana Dane. So I when I called up I basically through a lot of confusion, convinced them or led them to believe that I was Dana Dane. And I set up a meeting with the owner who was a huge fan of Dana's. And they were referring to me as Dana on the phone. And I was responding like, yes, Dana, you can come in at 2 to see Mike. I was like, great, I'll be there.

And then when I rang the buzzer, I said, I'm Dana, here to see Mike. Dana's an African-American guy from Brooklyn. I'm a white guy from Long Island. So obviously they didn't know what was what. But anyway, I get all the way into this guy's office. So the goal was to just get in the office no matter what? Get in the office and handcuff myself until I get a deal or something, something. So first you've got to get over this hurdle of this guy being upset

that you're not who you said you were. Right. Right. So how does that go? Well, so he comes in. By the way, he's now a great friend of mine. He signed my wedding license. This guy has become a great friend.

And Dana is also a great friend. So I'm sitting in the office and the secretary comes in and says, Dana, can I get you some water? I said, thank you. That would be great. They bring water in. And I'm waiting for Mike Ross, the owner of this label, to come office and the secretary comes in and says, Dana, can I get you some water? I said, thank you. That'd be great. They bring water in. And I'm waiting for Mike Ross, the owner of this label, to come in. And he comes in.

He says, who the hell are you? Where's Dana? I said, oh, you know, Dana's running a little bit late. I said, but I have his cassette. Why don't we put it in? I said, in fact, I have my cassette too. He's like, what are you talking about? I said, oh, so I've been making music with Dana for years.

It just started really confusing him even more. until finally he let me put my my cassette in and i had a song called college girls and he listened to about 30 seconds of it i'd already which is a long time that's a long time and i'd already built a little bit of credibility because i had this cassette i knew a lot of the right names and you know I'd been around the scene a little bit and, um, he stopped my song and he said, you know, this is great. Would you be willing to give this song to Tone Loke, one of his artists? And, um, and that led, I didn't, but it led to dialogue and, you know, going down the path and ultimately my record deal. Right. That's amazing. And is it that same, you know, sort the path and ultimately my record deal right that's amazing and is it that same you know sort of spirit that you that you took to marquee jet everything you know how did

that how did that happen everything in my life has been like that i um marquee jet similar thing you know um i was a guest on a private jet loved the experience my partner and i were literally sitting in the back of our a friend of ours who invited us on a trip on one of his partner and I were literally sitting in the back of a friend of ours who invited us on a trip on one of his planes. And we were like, this is unbelievable. How do we fly like this more often? And came up with this idea for a 25-hour flight card, which ultimately became Marquee Jet and had this great, you know, we really thought that there'd be a huge market for people that would want to buy this 25-hour prepaid card. Problem was we had no airplanes.

So we had to go to NetJets, who was the 800-pound gorilla. And I got in a call about a year prior to that from a friend of mine who wanted to put one of his friend's daughters, wanted to get tickets to a Christina Aguilera concert and knew that I knew the manager from my days in the music business. So not only – and I didn't know who the guy was. But not only did we get this gal, this 16-year-old, for her birthday tickets, she had the opportunity to be a background singer on the stage. The guy was going to do me a favor, the manager.

And it turns out that the fellow who was whose daughter it was was this guy jim jacobs who was the president of net jets so when we had this idea a year later i called now he doesn't know me i was like the behind the scenes guy that facilitated this thing i get him on the phone i again just he had no idea what i was talking about i'm like christina aguilera he's like you're aguilera i'm'm like, no. I'm like, no, your daughter. Harry Truman has this great line, if you can't convince them, confuse them. So that's kind of been my – I'm starting to get that this is your tactic. Get everyone super confused.

Yeah. It led to a meeting. We took a meeting and presented our plan for Marquee Jet. We were faced with a no. This is not for us we're not going to give two 30 year old kids 30 at the time um our fleet of airplanes to try some kind of jet card program and um we ended up going back a week later and instead of just taking that no we brought in our own focus group of athletes and entertainers and agents that talked about one by one, got up,

literally set up chairs like it was a focus group and discussed why they would never buy a share of an airplane or their own airplane, but they would buy what we were proposing, this 25-hour card. And it ended up being a really big business. That's interesting. I mean, why didn't, with that knowledge, why wouldn't NetJets just create that internally? I think two reasons. Take's interesting. I mean, why didn't, uh, with that knowledge, why wouldn't net jets just create that internally? I think two reasons. I think one, they didn't, I don't

think they really thought it would be as big as it became. And two, we were, we were in that demo. We, we, we could reach that young customer and the athlete and talk to that guy better than they could. They were set up really to sell corporate and to high net worth older individuals. We were selling to a much younger, we were selling to the Kobe Bryants of the world. And I think that they thought, well, if there's going to be any success, let's see if these guys can sell to that world. And we did. Yeah. The one thing that you really seem to get is the value and importance of having that kind of celebrity endorser. And that seems to be like a cornerstone of every business that you really seem to get is the value and importance of having that kind of celebrity endorser.

And that seems to be like a cornerstone of every business that you get into is making sure that it's sort of cool with those people, right? When they're signing on for it, that creates this ripple effect that then, you know, drives demand. Yes.

And no, though the note of that is the product has to be great because celebrity will get someone to buy the product once and it'll get you on the shelves, but it won't get them to buy it twice. So you really have to, you have to win them with great product. Marquee jet was a great product and Zico coconut water was a great product. I love that story of how you chased after Matt Damon and Ben Affleck. Yeah. I found out they were going to be flying on some, some other client of yours of yours' share on their way to Sundance, right? Yeah, we had just started Marquee Jet. And every day I got a manifest of who was on the planes, who was flying with us.

And Matt was a guest. And Ben were guests of somebody else. I saw their name. And I was in New York. And I was like, we were trying to build out the Hollywood vertical. So I was like, I have to get them to sign up to our program. So I literally was in a cab and at the time I was running a lot. I was wearing shorts.

It was winter. I was in shorts. I'm not even kidding, going to work. And I said to the guy, take me to LaGuardia and I just got on a plane to LA because their plane was flying from LA to the Sundance Film Festival. So I flew to LA. I met him on the plane.

I introduced myself as Jesse, one of the co-founders of Marquee Jet. And coincidence, I'm going to Sundance also. Do you mind if I guys, they had a huge upgrade scheduling just on a fluke. They had a big plane. So I could actually sit

and kind of like with the staff, where to sit or on like a jump seat. So I told them I was just gonna quietly jump up if if you need me and then once we got in the air i started talking to them and um matt said to me that that they were having a nice to meet you he said look we're going to this project green light release if you want to come you can come meet us um love to see you at the event at sundance now first of all i had, I had no clothing. I had no hotel. It's Sundance. Everything is sold out.

It's freezing. I'm in shorts. You have no hotel there or any place to stay. Nothing. And I'm like, oh, I got meetings, you know, this whole thing. And I get off the plane. So I get some stuff. I check into the hotel like 20 miles away. I'm like, you know what?

I didn't close the deal. I got to go to this thing. So I show up to the Project Greenlight event. There's 2,000 people online. I'm like, how am I didn't close the deal I gotta go to this thing so I show up to the Project Greenlight event there's 2,000 people online I'm like how am I gonna get into here so I went right up to the front of the line and I said hey guys I'm here with Matt and Ben I'm on their advance team to make sure that the tables are set up

the guy opened up the velvet rope walked right in and then I went upstairs to the VIP table and I took a black marker and I wrote my last name, Itzler, on a piece of paper and I wrote reserved, another piece of paper. And I put it on one of the – on the tabletops next to Matt's table where it said like the VIP thing. And I literally walked in there and sat next to those guys and I asked asked them when they were flying home they said you know we don't have anything booked yet i said why don't you guys fly home with me which i wasn't flying

home and uh on the flight home i sold them a card right there you go that's a great story man yeah we laugh about it still like balls of that is incredible but they did you tell them that whole how the whole thing oh yeah they know the story, yeah. Now, when I talk to those guys about it, they crack up. Yeah, that's fantastic. I love that. When we got back on the plane, Matt's manager said to me, he said to turn to Matt on the plane ride home, and he goes, what's the manager from the club doing on our plane?

No one knew what was going on. That's great, man. So ultimately, you exit, um, marquee, it sells to, to Berkshire Hathaway, right? Um, and at some point running enters the picture. Like when does that start to creep in? So I decided, um, you know, I ran this relay race, um, years ago, um, in San Diego, a 24-hour relay. And it was wild because I got to see people run 100 miles by themselves, which I never thought was even possible.

And I just was always planted a seed in my head that it was something that I would love to see if I was capable of doing. And I decided I wanted to raise money for a bunch of foundations. And I just signed up for this 24-hour race with 100. I was going to stop at 100 if I got there. So I took 90 days off from work. I wouldn't say off, but committed 90 days during work to train for this race. And I trained like, I mean, I was going berserk morning, night.

I would work and then I would, just to prepare for the sleep deprivation, I would work till 11 and then run till 6 in the morning and go back to work. You know all this stuff. And so that was really where I got the bug. And then, you know, running takes a lot. I'm a big 6'2 guy and I'm not really built like a runner. six two guy and i'm not really built like a runner but um i got the endurance bug and started doing some stand-up paddle races and anything that would you know just looked exciting right and so so how did that 100 miler go for you it you know um i had a really good game plan going in i i spent i spent these 90 days talking to anyone that ever run 100 miles, reading everything, hydration, nutrition.

I had a great game plan. And I stuck to it until I couldn't stick to it because, as you know. And 100 miles, it's going to break loose on you. It broke loose around 60. And 75, it flew away. But I gutted it out. But it put me in a wheelchair i was banged up my hips and joints were really banged up and my feet were battered i mean

totally battered um but i you know it's the best thing i ever did in my life and you raised a bunch of money right like a million and a half Yeah. And this is for the foundation that you started, right? Yep. And I distributed it to 10 different United U S based charity, charitable organizations. And does that, does the foundation still exist? It does. What's, what's going on with that? You know, um, I'm, I'm new to this whole philanthropy stuff, you know, I'm still trying to figure out what the best way to deploy resources is. So I'm going to a lot of conferences and listening and talking to a lot of people. But the foundation still exists. 100 Mile Foundation.

100 Mile Man Foundation, yeah. And since then, I've done multiple 100 Mile challenges to raise money for the foundation. And I also put my own money into the foundation. But we did a 100 Mile bike ride called City to the Sand from New York City to the Hamptons. And we had 100 CEOs that each raised 10 grand, so a million dollars. We've done a 100-mile spin thing in Central Park.

I've done a thing called Hell on the Hill in my backyard. I have a really big incline in my house in Connecticut. It's about a 35% grade that's about a little less than 100 yards. And we go up and down 100 times, about 8 1⁄2 miles. But it's hard, really hard. It's really brutally hard. It only takes about, you know, actually Goggins won it this year. He won it at 155, but it takes a regular human anywhere from three to four hours.

But it is brutal. Right. And so what does running mean to you, like in your life equation? Like how does that impact your family life, your entrepreneurial life? Well, it's my form of meditation. So, you know, if I don't run, I, I feel way worse. It's not a good day if I don't run. I'm just not connected to myself. I'm not, you know, I'm a little grumpy, but it's become habit for me. It's just, it's worked into my pie chart. It's one of the things that I have to do.

And it doesn't have to be a run. It be a paddle it could be burpees it could be something but the running I don't listen to music it's a very spiritual thing for me and I just like to it's just my way of clearing my head and starting my day never any music never

and in the 100 miler I had a playlist that I knew I would probably need to get me through some part of it, and I put it on at mile 93. For the last couple of miles, I took it off. But no, I don't like to listen to music. I like to be totally clear in my thoughts. I do my best thinking when I'm running.

Lately, I've been walking too, which I love and um that's my time where's the best place to run around here well now i'm in atlanta i live in atlanta full time and um there's a great you know my neighborhood there's a ton of runners it's um it's hilly there's rolling hills there's a nice four mile loop so i do that a couple times times. There's some good hills, and I love running steps. So I'll go to the stadium, and I'll just run steps for an hour or something, and I love that. Well, that's a good place to segue into the Atlanta Hawks. So this is new for you, right?

Yeah. You're a part owner of the Hawks. Tell me what that's like. What does that mean in terms of your involvement and your participation in the organization? Well, I'm a huge basketball fan. So there couldn't be anything more fun. And I love our organization and our team. I've been a season ticket holder here in Atlanta for a couple of years.

So I've been around the organization. And it's just such a pleasure and honor to work with the players and the staff we have. It's just, and the community, it's great. And, you know, we're new to this. We bought the team, a small group of a bunch of guys that I knew, friends, and a couple guys here in Atlanta. And we've only been on board for about three or four months, so we're still learning. There's a lot of work to do. But it's been, I can't even explain it. It's just been phenomenal

it's so crazy that like the guy who's writing these theme songs for the teams I mean if anyone would have said like this guy one day is going to be an owner of one of the franchises

I mean you can't script that man no it's unbelievable it's impossible it's so crazy and lucky and fortunate and believe me I appreciate every minute of it. And, uh, you know, it's just, it's, it's, it's been great. It's been great.

So what is it your involvement entail? Like, what does it look like in terms of your input or lack of input or your relationship with the players and all of that? Well, because I'm here in Atlanta, a big part of it is community related. We've built five basketball courts in the inner cities here in Atlanta recently, and we have 25 more in the works. And so a combination of community efforts, a combination of some of the marketing stuff. I've done a lot of work in the past with the NBA. So that's an area that I want to focus on and that I think we can get better in. But all the basketball stuff, we leave for the coaches and the coaching staff and guys that have a lot more experience and expertise than myself and my partners.

Well, these guys must know you have this book, obviously, out, right? Oh, yeah. So is your kind of lifestyle habits wearing off on any of the players? I'm lucky because one of the guys, Kyle Korver, one of our players, does a thing called the Masagi every year, which is a Japanese term. I don't know the exact specifics, but basically basically you do something that you do not think you could possibly finish that can completely test your will and challenge your soul. For example, and this is a guy on our team, right?

So he loves right up your alley. Last year, he and a friend took, I believe it was like 60 or an 80 pound boulder and dropped it in five feet of ocean water. And they would dive down one by one and move the boulder for three miles. It took them like 17 hours. And, you know, of course, there's all kinds of challenges, physical, fatigue, mental. And every year this guy.

So when I heard this story, I'm like, this is perfect. Perfect for me. So I gave Kyle the book and he loved it told me he started doing you know some of these push-up and pull-up challenges and and this and that so the guys you know look i think they can relate to the whole hundred mile experience and what the preparation that it took and the will um and their professional athletes they go through their same challenges like how do you get up for a game 80 times a year i mean it's a lot what these guys go through you don't realize it you say oh this is these guys are getting paid to play basketball but no it's grueling it's physical

it's exhausting there's travel there's other life stuff going on family um and they have to get up and perform every night and we have a we have a team of guys that do that. I mean, they're diving for loose balls and jumping in the bleachers. So it's great to see. Have you ever thought about bringing David out to talk with the guys? Absolutely.

They all know the story and it's in the works. And he'd be a great motivator for these guys. I love that, man. That's fantastic. Very cool. All right, well, you're married to an amazingly successful entrepreneur between the two of you, you have, you know, very rich business lives.

You also have three kids. How do you, how do you like find that work life balance in terms of making sure that you're attending to your relationship? You know, she's busy, you're busy, you're doing all these things. You've got this, you know, great family, young kids. So how does that work well i'm not gonna lie it's hard you know um i would be lying to say that it's not challenging sarah's got her business and a lot of responsibilities and her foundation which is a lot bigger than my foundation and um you know trying to to manage all this stuff with our kids is hard but we know we are um we're very mindful of our time. We make sure that

we have a date night and we're date nights every week. We eat as a family all the time. We share ideas all the time. We carve out time for walks and try to make it work. Are you on each other's sort of board of advisors, you know, in terms of like bouncing ideas off each other in a business way? Or do you guys have rules around like when you talk about business and when you don't? We, you know what, we bounce new ideas off of each other a lot. We don't, I don't get it too into Sarah's business and she doesn't get too into mine. However, what better person to or advisor than my wife? I mean, she's, she's just an incredible business mind, incredibly creative. So I had the luxury of turning to my left in the morning and saying, sweetie, what do you think of this idea? And getting the advice of a consultant,

of a high paid consultant. If she's like, no, it's a terrible idea. And then you go and do it anyway. She doesn't happen. She trumps everything. In fact, if something is fully baked and she's like, you know what? This should be blue, not red. It's blue. Uh-huh. Yep. That's a smart man. That's the marriage secret right there, right? Yep.

I learned two things in this marriage. One is I'm never going to question my wife's decisions when it comes to business or business decisions. And two is I'm not going to compete with her on anything because she's too good. Right. And sitting, like for those that are listening, right to my left are two pictures hanging on the wall. One of her on the cover of Forbes and the other one on the cover of time magazine. So I think she stands from a place of authority on this. Yeah. She's unbelievable. Cool. Well, let's talk about the diet a little bit and then I'll, you know, we can, we can wrap it up, but, um, you got a really interesting take on,

on nutrition. Uh, only fruit before noon. That's what sort of grabs the headline, but there's a lot more going on there too, isn't there? Yeah. I mean, I read a book called Fit for Life and I was fortunate enough to get this book early in my life when I was running my first marathon. And the book was written by a guy named Harvey Diamond and his wife, Marilyn Diamond. And I don't know what attracted me to the book, but I couldn't put it down. And one of the principles was to only fruit until noon because, you know, digestion takes more energy than anything. And we want energy. We don't want to use energy. So the more efficiently we can digest food and obviously the more processed foods, the more meats, the more animal

products, et cetera, the harder it is to digest the less energy, the bigger the breakfast, the less energy. So, um, that was one of the big takeaways for me. And I tried it for 10 days. I said, you know what? I've been eating bagels every morning. I've been eating cereals. Um, and I just switched over to fresh cut fruit. When was that? How long ago was that? 92. And I was getting ready to run my first marathon. And after about 10 days, I said, you know what? Let me go back and have my old breakfast. Let me make some bagels and eggs and this kind of thing.

And I felt terrible. And I was like, holy cow. This is unbelievable. And I lost weight. I got lean. I was running like a machine. I was recovering better. Everything is unbelievable. And I lost weight. I got lean. I was running like a machine. I was recovering better. Everything got better. And then there were other takeaways in the book, not to mix proteins and starches, not to, you know, other takeaways. And it's been something that

I've been unwavering on. I'm a vegetarian. I'm a vegan. I pretty much 80%. I'm, I'm a vegan 90% of the time. I'm raw 80% of the time. Um, and it's just been, you know, people ask me the same questions. They probably ask you where to get your protein, all these things. Um, but also right now with this kind of low carb crab craze, like the idea that you shouldn't be eating fruit, that's like bad for you. I'm sure you get a lot of questions like that. I eat 15 bananas a day. I've never missed a day of work.

I run all the time. I have crazy energy, at least in my opinion. I've never met anyone that's protein deficient. I just got all my blood work done. I came back like I'm 18 years old. I'm 47. Not to jinx anything. Anything can happen.

But on a daily basis, I feel good. And I would say to everybody, there's all kinds of theories, right? Have milk, don't have milk. Have fruit, don't have fruit. Too much sugar in fruit. Too much this. Try different things and see how your body reacts and how you feel. For me, this worked great. And I haven't changed off of the deviated

from the path in 25 plus years. And how does it work with your wife and your kids? My wife eats French fries and cheeseburgers and eats like a linebacker. It's not rubbing off on her. But that's what works for her and no for my kids i i have a couple of rules one is you know the first thing in the morning for my six-year-old he has to eat something that's alive so i don't want to need something processed and then if he wants to have a waffle he can have a waffle but i really encourage him to have a piece of fruit or fresh squeezed orange juice or a banana before the waffle.

And I just encourage him to make healthy decisions. I mean, he's around me, so he knows my commitment to it and how important it is to me. And I try to teach him as much as I can, but he's six. And in this country, it's hard. And I'll tell you, the hardest thing for me as a parent because of my passion for food is when my son goes to school and you know other parents are deciding what my parent or my son is going to is going to eat that day right and especially at this age when the habits are just forming right and you want to be able to exercise some influence and control over that with an eye towards the long term but then knowing that like you know most of their day or half of their day is at school where you're not involved in that.

Right. And, you know, you guys, we're going to have. Right. So we're going to have a celebration for Thanksgiving or Halloween or whatever. You know, why do we have to have everything? Like, I mean, it's just crazy to me. So anyway, that's challenging and frustrating. Do the best you can.

All right, I want to wrap it up with one final inquiry around relationships. Because I gather from you and just poking around the internet, getting a sense of who you are and how you function, that relationships are really at the center of your kind of success equation. Like not in a sort of conscious way of building a network, but just an appreciation for the value of relationships, like in your life in business and outside of business. Yeah, I mean, it is very important. It's the single most important thing for me in business. I didn't over-index in any category as it relates to,

not, you know, as you would think it would relate to business. But I've been able to get, I think, to advance and move the ball downfield based on just authentic relationships. And really just, you know, one of the best things about being successful or having a little bit of money or whatever is being able to spoil your friends and family and those that you care about and to help people and i i think i had that in me before i you know anything when i was living with my parents in my house i think i've always had that and i think that um you know it's translated into real good relationships and um you know in your 20s and 30s you never know who's going to be in a position of power in your 40s and 50s. But the guys that I've come up with in my 20s, you know, there's always a couple of guys or gals that are in really big decision making positions. And, you know, if you have those relationships, you maintain them and they're authentic, they'll be very rewarding. I feel like you understood that your 20s are a good time

to really explore yourself and figure out what you really want to do before committing to anything, as opposed to just getting on a train and trying to sort of move up a corporate ladder. But I had to rely on meeting people. I had to rely on, you know, I didn't have an Ivy education or anything like that. I had to rely on those relationships.

My 20s were spent meeting people and cultivating relationships, staying in touch, You know, I didn't have an Ivy education or anything like that. I had to rely on those relationships. My 20s were spent meeting people and cultivating relationships, staying in touch, inviting people, including people that I liked, getting rid of people that I didn't like, and maintaining those friendships. And that was a huge part of my 20s. I mean, spending my nights, you know, I tried to own the nights more than the days. What do you mean by that? Those were key hours for me in the 20s. That's when people were going out, making friendships. It wasn't about work. It was just about who you got along with.

And I would go out all the time. I wasn't a drinker. I wasn't a partier. But I would go out. I was out. I was active. I was getting phone numbers returning calls meeting people inviting them connecting dots um and then i would lean on i would lean on people

when i needed you know people people generally like to help people um i'm seeing it with my book now you know so many of my friends have been so supportive even people from 20 years ago um so you just don't know you're getting like crazy like tweets you know you got maria shriver tweet it was trump tweet your book trump lebron i mean yeah that's insane man yeah yeah but you know i i and also i think you know look the book is a fun read it's a fun funny read it in like two hours, three hours. Yeah. One sitting. It's really easy and fun to read. But people are doing it on their own. And I think it's out of a true appreciation for our genuine friendship, you know. I think most people are, you know, we're habits of routine and routine has its place. And, you know, I like routines and I'm productive

in routines. But, you know, really the call to action of this book is, is to shake up your routine, to get out of your routine and to really, you know, take a look in the mirror and, uh, and, you know, challenge yourself to, you know, do something that makes you uncomfortable in a culture that values, you know, sort of security and comfort above all, you know, so there's all of that to overcome. Um, and I love that about it. And, you know, the, one of the things that, that really stuck with me that I think I'm going to spend a lot of time thinking about is that the Goggins accountability mirror. Yes. So tell me what that is. Well, he, I mean, he, he would always, he's been shaving his head and his face

every morning since he's 18 years old because he wanted to be comfortable with the reflection in the mirror. He wanted to see his whole face and look into his soul and be comfortable with what he saw. And if he wasn't, he was going to make changes. And I think, you know, Goggins' whole thing is, you know, he's sick of people feeling sorry for themselves. It's like we have to be accountable for ourselves. There's an accountability mirror. That's what he looks in every day. And you got to be comfortable

with your reflection in the mirror. And I agree with him. You know, we all, we live in a world of a lot of excuses and blame. But where's the accountability? You know, like if you didn't run today, whose fault is that? You don't blame it on your schedule.

Go and do it. So if someone's listening to this and they are one of those people that fall into that category of, you know, being in a rut or, or, or perhaps stuck in a job they don't like or circumstances that they feel like they don't have control over, you know, what is your call to action as the first step to, to shift that? It's just, you, you, you have to be willing to get uncomfortable to get better. And you have to just take that first step and, and to reap the rewards. And it really, you know, there's no silver bullet. It is nothing. There's nothing. It's you. And you have to just do it yourself.

No one could tell you to do it. You can't read a book or this. You have to want to do it for you. And when you want to do it, you'll do it. You did it. Look what you did. You turned your whole life around from the bottom. But pain is the motivator.

You know what I mean? Like being in, I was in a sufficient enough pain that I was ready to make that shift. You know, how do you make that shift without the elevator going all the way down? And you were sick of you. You wanted a different you. That's the truth. You wanted a different you. So you got to want it.

You got to want it. But you got to authentically want it, not just say you want it. Thanks for talking to me, man. Appreciate it. Yeah, really appreciate it. The book is Living with a Seal. Yeah, really appreciate it. The book is Living with a Seal.

If you're digging on Jesse, the best way to connect with you is you're at the 100 Mile Man on Twitter. Yeah. And the website is? The 100 Mile Man, the number 100, the number 100mileman.com. Yeah, and you're on Facebook and all those other places, right? You're an easy guy to track down on.

Yeah. All right, cool. Congrats on the book, man. It's really a great read. Everybody should pick it up and check it out. And it will improve your life, I think. And at least make you think about stuff, I think, a little bit more deeply. So thank you.

Thank you. Peace. Plants. Great for the ladies. Shave my head, baby. Great for the ladies. Hey, Babaluba, seal team, baby. Hey, Babaluba, seal team, baby. All right, I hope you guys enjoyed that. That was really fun. It really dug sitting down with Jesse and getting to know him a little bit. Don't forget to pick up a copy of his new book, Living with a Seal.

Do that by clicking through the Amazon banner ad at richroll.com. Everybody wins. And don't forget to check out this week's comprehensive show notes at richroll.com on the episode page for this episode. Lots of stuff to delve in there to take your edification to the next level beyond the earbuds to learn more about Jesse and his life and wisdom. And don't forget to subscribe to my newsletter at richroll.com and download the free iOS app to access the entire RRP catalog for free. Because as you know, only the most recent episodes of the podcast are available on iTunes. Only the most 50 recent, I should say. If you like online courses, I got two of those at mindbodygreen.com. The Ultimate Guide to Plant-Based Nutrition and also The Art of Living

with Purpose. The first one's all about dialing in your plate, how to get more plant-powered in your life and lifestyle. The second one is all about setting goals and achieving them, sort of the inside work that's precedent to getting you on the proper trajectory for your life. Both of those courses are multiple hours of streaming video content, and they are on sale right now at mindbodygreen.com at 30% off through December 1st. So you've got to act fast to get that. Really proud of those courses. Just go to mindbodygreen.com, click on Video Courses, and you can find both of them there. For all your plant power needs, go to richroll.com. You can check out The Plant Power Way, our new cookbook and lifestyle guide.

We've got signed copies of those as well as signed copies of my memoir, Finding Ultra. We've got Julie's Guided Meditation Program. People love that. We've got nutrition products. We've got 100% organic cotton garments, sticker packs, fun stuff like that, fine art prints, basically a whole bunch of cool stuff to take your health and your life to the next level. If you happen to be in the Los Angeles area, make a point of dropping into Joy Cafe. That's our plant-based restaurant out in the Westlake Village area. And as I've said before, and I will say again, it feels really good to sort of put out a healthy message across the globe,

but it also feels good to invest in my local community. And that's what Joy Cafe is all about, as well as Karma Baker, which is a vegan, gluten-free bakery that I'm also partnered in, also in the Westlake Village area. You can go to joycafe.com or the Karma Baker. You just search that. You can find it online. All kinds of good stuff to learn more about that. And I lunch at Joy Cafe most of the time during the week. You can find me there if you want to connect with me in person. What else can I tell you? Thanks for supporting the show, for telling your friend, for sharing it on social media. I really appreciate you guys. I love you guys as my audience. Of course, thank you for using the Amazon banner ad at richroll.com for

all your Amazon purchases. I hope you guys are enjoying returning to work after a happy Thanksgiving weekend. And I will see you guys back here in a couple days with another epic extraordinary awesome episode of the rrp until then make it great and uh take care of yourself you guys peace plants Thank you.