The School of Greatness - Scooter Braun On Healing Past Trauma, Building A Business Empire & Finding Peace EP 1244

Episode Date: March 23, 2022

Today’s guest is Scooter Braun, one of the most prolific entrepreneurs and innovators in entertainment, music, tech and beyond. Braun is the Founder and Chairman of Ithaca Holdings LLC., co-CEO and board member of HYBE, and the Founder of SB Projects. In addition to managing a robust roster of some of the biggest names in entertainment, including Justin Bieber, Ariana Grande, Demi Lovato, J Balvin, Idina Menzel, Ashley Graham and Tori Kelly, SB Projects has grown their film and television division to include a prolific slate of projects. Scooter joins me today to discuss his incredible journey of self healing in the last couple of years and how his newfound mindset has improved his life on a business, personal, and spiritual level. In this episode we discuss:How to begin healing your past trauma in order to free yourself.What it means to have unconditional love.Three core philosophies and values to building and growing a business.How to not be afraid when investing your money.And so much more! For more go to: www.lewishowes.com/1244For Scooter's last episode: https://lewishowes.com/422Check out SB Projects: https://scooterbraun.com/Mel Robbins: The “Secret” Mindset Habit to Building Confidence and Overcoming Scarcity: https://link.chtbl.com/970-podDr. Joe Dispenza on Healing the Body and Transforming the Mind: https://link.chtbl.com/826-podMaster Your Mind and Defy the Odds with David Goggins: https://link.chtbl.com/715-pod 

I've been able to be a part of so many great companies, investing-wise, because I wasn't afraid to lose the money. Really? I always told myself, I believe in this, but if it goes to zero, I'm okay. How do you get to that place, though? Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, a former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur, and each week we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin. I think it's a great idea to keep learning new skills. And it's one of the reasons I keep pushing myself to learn Spanish, train for a marathon, and even picked up boxing.

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It's no wonder ZipRecruiter is the number one rated hiring site in the U.S. based on G2 ratings. And now you can try ZipRecruiter for free at this exclusive web address, ziprecruiter.com slash greatness. That's ziprecruiter.com slash greatness. That's ziprecruiter.com slash G-R-E-A-T-N-E-S-S. ZipRecruiter, the smartest way to hire. Welcome back, everyone, to the School of Greatness. Very excited about our guest, my friend, Scooter, Scott Braun in the house.

Good to see you, brother. Number three, man. People have been begging me to have you back on. We used to do kind of like an annual thing, a recap of the year, and people were like, I can't wait for the next one. But COVID. COVID hit. Yeah, we missed it.

We missed our window. We missed it. And so now we're back i'm curious so you got to start with your three biggest lessons business personal spiritual of the last couple years to start it then what is the the biggest awakenings biggest eye-opening things that have happened for you to you in these areas of your life which one first business okay funny enough the business lesson that I got over the last couple of years that was the most significant happened because my life got taken away from business for the first time in 20 years.

My personal life became such a priority. My spirituality grew from me doing self-work. And because of things in my personal life, I decided to step away from business for the first time and really focus on my personal life. Instead of looking at it as, oh, balance, balance, or what I like to say, harmonize, because I don't think you should have to weigh one versus the other. I had a decision to make. I was going through a very tough time.

And friends had recommended me to go to this place, Hoffman, that you and I have discussed before. Hoffman Process has been around for a very long time. And I was kind of like lost. Lost in what way? Internally, spiritually, personally? I was going through stuff in my personal life that I was confused. I couldn't understand what was happening.

And I hadn't done the work yet to have the foundation to handle it, to be honest with you. So I was really lost. I got depressed and I hit a level of depression that I had never hit in my entire life because I couldn't fix it. I couldn't find the answers. And a couple of friends recommended Hoffman, which I had avoided for four years. I was like, what do I need this place for?

I had a good childhood. Like, I've had friends who suffered and, you know, gone through stuff. Like, I was fine. And in this confusion, I finally just surrendered to this idea of I'm going to go to this place. And when I called up, my friend connected me with this amazing woman, Liza, who runs the Hoffman Process. And we got on the phone. She said, I can take you in three weeks to our next process, October 24, 2020. And I started to laugh because that was the release of my client and family to me, Ariana Grande's album.

And I'm thinking, this is my biggest album release of the year. There's no way I can't be there. This is what I do. I can't leave. And I started laughing in the parking lot of one of Ariana's music videos. And I started laughing out loud. No one was even around me. And I just looked up at the sky and I said, OK, God, OK, universe, I see what you're doing

here. I can choose to stay on this path that I've been on that's very successful, but now I've hit this wall and I'm depressed and I'm hurt and I'm alone. Or I can choose me for the first time, truly me, be selfish about it and leave. And I went to Ariana and I told her and she said to me, you were there for me in many different times. It's time for me to be there for you. You should go. And I went and that week changed my life.

I realized that I had built Scooter Braun since I was 18 years old because I didn't think Scott was strong enough in the world. Wow. And I didn't know that. That was a subconscious thing from my childhood. And it wasn't like I didn't have wonderful parents. I do. But they passed on to me what had happened to them. Like that's what we do as parents. One day, I hope my kids go and do this process. And when they come to me, I'm going to say, thank you for finishing the work that I didn't get to. You know, thank you for fixing things that I wasn't able to

address. And when I came back, I started to get answers to that darkness, but I wasn't able to address. And when I came back, I started to get answers to that darkness. But I wasn't depressed this time. Interesting. I was at peace because I went back and got little Scott. I would left him for so long that when the foundation of this story I had told myself of what my life was going to be, what Scooter Braun was going to become,

when that foundation was cracking, I didn't know what to do. Because I had so invested in a story of my own manifestation, my own will, going to become. When that foundation was cracking, I didn't know what to do because I would, I so invested in a story of my own manifestation, my own will that the universe was saying, oh no, no, we're going to show you who's really in charge. And you're going to have to learn to surrender to this and actually understand what life is about. And Hoffman was the beginning of a very deep transformation for me. I was, I. I never loved my name Scott since I was seven. Why not?

I don't know. I now know. I was because I didn't trust Scott. Scott, I felt, was a popular kid and played sports and was fun and cool and everything else. But deep down was highly insecure because he was overpowered as a kid. You felt powerless. I felt powerless at times. Gotcha.

And I felt transactional love from people who actually love me unconditionally, but they were doing what happened to them. They were doing what was, they were taught. Repeating a pattern. Exactly. And by doing that, I created deep empathy and deeper love for those people in my life. But also I, I went and got that kid and said, Hey, you created Scooter. You were actually strong enough the entire time. And I loved my name again for the first time since I was seven. And I realized that Scooter was a part of me, but Scott had to be in charge again. Gosh, this is so fascinating. I think I saw you a couple of months ago at your new place.

I believe I showed you my phone. I still have it. It's out there on my phone. I have a photo of myself when I was about six shortly after I was sexually abused by a man that I didn't know. And for years I had abandoned the inner child inside of me, the little Lewis, right? And I've been going through my own process over the last couple of years of kind of reconnecting, reclaiming, getting the power back and being like, I'm here for you. I got you. Holding the little Lewis inside of me, the little Scott inside of you

and developing a new relationship and integrating this healing process. And I'm so glad that you're in the process as well and talking about it because if this was us 10 years ago talking about this on a podcast, people would have been like, who are these guys? They're crazy talking about little Lewis, little Scott, you know, inner child work.

You and I weren't ready to do that. We come up with this athlete, male, masculine, don't show your fears, don't show your hurt, overcome, which is, by the way, important. Which helped us get to certain places. And by the way, it needed to be part of that journey. And I also think that telling someone to overcome things and toughen up is important. However, the entire conversation needs to be had and you need to know that you're enough. You know, I was reading this other book, Fifth Agreement, and it was talking about this lie that we're told, hey, nobody's perfect, but we actually are. Your image is perfect. My image is perfect. You lose a limb,

you're still perfect. You mess up, you're still perfect. That's perfectly part of your journey. You are perfectly imperfect. And where this all led me, interesting, because I said the first thing was business. I had the best year of my life in business not working. When I stepped away, now it wasn't like it came out of nowhere. I had had, you've been building momentum for years, but I think what the universe was trying to say to me was you think you can't walk away. You think you can't step away and take care of you, but we're actually going to show you that when you step away, we were always in charge. This, the idea that what happened to me in my life was because of me is ridiculous. It's statistically impossible,

what happened to me in my life. From the day I was born, someone would look and say, this is statistically impossible. You mean statistically impossible, meaning like the opportunities that you were able to manifest and create in the career and the business.

Lewis, if you were to look at me and you, from the day we were born, and someone's going to say, this person's going to end up here, and this person's going to end up here. And they brought a statistician and he'd say the odds are very, very small. Right, right. Yet we thought it was us because we go through life.

I'm manifesting this. And yes, your willpower and your free will plays a very large role. But the universe plays a bigger role. There's 13 billion years of this universe moving without us, always being able to survive and move on. But the universe plays a bigger role. There's 13 billion years of this universe moving without us, always being able to survive and move on. Yet we come into the world as individuals and go, it's because of me. I did this.

Well, guess what? I'm born in 1981 in New York City. First person in my family born in this country. I won the lottery. I won the lottery of privilege, being born in this country at that time. I should recognize that. It doesn't mean I don't work hard.

It doesn't mean I don't earn things. But I should admit that the universe gave me certain things. They gave me advantages. And I should acknowledge other people that don't have those advantages and show them respect. And also acknowledge the universe that it's doing this for me. And that's what happened to me in business. I had this amazing year where I stepped away and I started to learn surrender. And then it led me to my personal life of you got to surrender.

And I struggle with that. But my spirituality grew and grew. And you know this. I did ayahuasca in the last two years. I did ma in the last two years. I went to Sedona and worked with amazing healers and did incredible breath work where I actually went deeper

than I did on ayahuasca on my own breath. Really? Which was insane. Without plant medicine. Without plant medicine, I went deeper on my own breath with this amazing teacher. I mean, this is a whole other subject.

This is why I think that we don't necessarily need plant medicines in order to go as deep as we want to go. We do not. It doesn't mean that you can't use them. I in order to go as deep as we wanna go. We do not. It doesn't mean that you can't use them. I mean, they can still be powerful, but I think you can do it without it as well. I can tell you, I was not expecting it.

I thought we were doing some breath work. And- You're like hallucinating. Fully hallucinating. And we started to do this breath work and he had warned me that my hands would turn like raptors, over-oxygenating, and I was like, oh, like getting through it. And because, but funny enough,

because I had done plant medicine, I understood what was happening to me. And I was able to navigate it better because I had done plant medicine. Sure, sure. And then I had what could only be described as really a DMT dump from my own breath that was massive.

And I was fully hallucinating. I had a massive healing and an understanding. What's the biggest lesson you learned from plant medicine work, but then also breath work, the intense breath work you did? Which I call it more of a spiritual breath work experience, probably. Look, I think the plant medicine was the first time I understood that I have trauma from my childhood and that I'm allowed to acknowledge it and that we all have it. No one gets away unscathed. It doesn't mean that someone did something malicious to you or anything else, but we all have, even we interpret things as a child that are different

from the reality because we don't have that rational thought yet. And when was the first time you acknowledged you had trauma in your life? During my, I did mob before I went to Hoffman and it was 45 minutes. I found out the next day I was uncontrollably shaking because I was working through that trauma. Um, but I was able to actually Through the plant medicine understand it and have a deep healing and I acknowledged it But I think the beautiful thing about the Hoffman process was when you're in plant medicine, you're not here You've done it. You're in a different world. I've never done plant medicine. Oh, really? I've done emotional intelligence training like Hoffman. So plant medicine brings you to another plane. I have many friends who've done it, yes. And with Hoffman,

I think doing the work here was really important. I think the breath work was kind of the same thing. I think the breath work, I really struggled with this idea of surrender. With the plant medicine, it helped me surrender. You had to. You had to. Yeah. But then you come into your real life and I'm not built to surrender. I'm someone who makes it happen. Yes. So this idea of surrender also to me in my programming was giving up. And I would do it for a little while, but then I'd be like, but no, I got to. And one of my teachers said something really beautiful to me.

He said, yes, you're trying to make things happen because you see things others may not see and you love them. Yes, you're trying to make things happen because you see things others may not see and you love them. But also part of you is fearful that if you give someone else the space, they won't choose you. They won't see you. They won't agree with you. And that's okay. And I had an amazing teacher named Chess in Sedona. And before we talked, we talked about my intentions.

Before we did this breath work, which I just thought was going to be some breathing. I was shocked by what happened. And what was your intention? I wanted a deeper understanding and healing. I wanted to be able to surrender. And he looked at me and he said, maybe just change the word. And he said something that changed my life forever. He said, maybe allow. As opposed to surrender? Allow. He said, because you're choosing to surrender you're allowing it why don't you just allow still your choice right and when he did that everything changed for me i think life is a lot about allowing you know about understanding that

you might exert your will on something but if it doesn't go your way doesn't necessarily mean it was supposed to uh one other friend said to me, it's something I love. He said, rejection is God's protection, you know, which I loved, you know, this idea that you get rejected and you think, oh, we've all had it in our lives. Oh man, I wish that went that way. And then a week later, something happens that if that didn't. Right. You're like, thank goodness it didn't go that way.

Exactly. And the universe does these things. And, you know, I want to say this to you because I'm sure people who are watching this, you know, they'll hear my story. They'll you'll talk about my business at certain points and they'll be like, oh, it's easy for this guy to say, you know, you you knew me when I wasn't successful. But like they're like, oh, now he's successful. So he can. I want to admit that I have the freedom of having the time to do this self-work. I have the freedom of not having to worry about a mortgage.

I have the freedom of being able to pay my medical bills. I have that freedom and I don't want to not acknowledge it. I am privileged in that respect in what has happened in my life. But I've also had the opportunity to ask one of the most successful men in history, a question of what does he want? And I'm going to say who it is because he usually doesn't, people misconstrue different things. Jeff Bezos cares deeply about people. I've had an opportunity to spend time with him. He cares deeply about people. He's provided more jobs than anyone during COVID. He raised minimum wage when the government wouldn't do it for all his employees. He does a lot of good for the world. And because he's so successful, sometimes people want to assume certain things, but the man himself cares.

And when you asked him, what do you want? What do you say? I got a cheat code that I want to share. I looked at him and I said, Jeff, what do you want? Like one of the most commercially successful people ever. What do you want? And he told me he wanted to evolve. Personally. Personally. He wanted to be a better friend, a better father. He wanted to grow in intimacy.

He said, I want to evolve as a human. And I realized you don't need $200 billion to do that. Because when I was at Hoffman, all walks, shapes, and sizes. When I go to Sedona, all walks, shapes, and sizes. When I go to Sedona, all walks, shapes, and sizes. It is a personal decision of choice to choose yourself to do self-work. And the most gratifying thing of the last two years for me is I've had a lot of success and I've had more hardship and pain than I've ever had in my entire life. But I've grown more than I've ever grown since I was a little boy. Wow.

You mentioned something in there about learning to love yourself or accept yourself. Yeah. Did you not think you were lovable or did you not think you were enough until recently? I didn't know, but yes. Really? Yeah, because we've done these before. If you watch my other interviews, you'd say that's a very confident everything else.

Here's the interesting part. Scooter was enough. Scooter was confident. Scooter was, I can conquer the world. Wow. But I forgot somebody. I forgot Scott. I left him back there. somebody. I forgot Scott. I left him back there. Wow. And I didn't realize that if Scooter's world crumbled a little bit, because we would talk and you'd be like, Midas, touch, and you got all this success. Everything was rolling. So I didn't have to address the past. And when that foundation cracked, I found out a deep, deep, deep lie that was in my soul, which is I'm not enough. Wow. And I'm Scott. I created something that would be enough.

So when you presented me or you met me in the world, you were meeting my creation to protect me. Wow. And when that thing broke, I was left with something that I hadn't rehabilitated or looked at in a long time, which was myself. You hadn't accepted yourself fully. I hadn't accepted me as a kid. I had accepted a part of me. I accepted my intellect. I accepted what I had built.

And by the way, I'm proud of that. I've done a lot of things in the world that I'm extremely proud of. And anyone who said things about me, I'm not going to go into details on that, but I would say that those just aren't true, you know, and to each their own. But I'm proud of what I've done in the world and how I've treated people. And I've definitely made mistakes like all of us, but I've never done anything malicious, but I hadn't taken care of that little boy because that little boy didn't understand how to be taken care of. I didn't, it's hard to do self-work. It's hard to look back and have empathy for those that hurt you, have empathy for yourself, that you made choices that hurt yourself,

you know, to realize that the way you saw the world and you built it to protect you might be wrong. You know, so spiritually that surrender and allowing was a big part of my spiritual journey. Allowing is probably the most important thing spiritually that's happened to me. And also just believing. Like, why not? You work with a healer and he says, I'm going to take you somewhere on your breath. Sure, let's go. Let's go.

Let's try it out. And then you ask me family-wise. I think the greatest lesson I've learned is that Family should have unconditional love and you shouldn't be afraid to say it You know, like I grew up in a family with unconditional love But I think because of certain fears and everything my grandparents Holocaust survivors my dad grew up with parents who had such trauma you know, my mom's dad died when she was 11 her mom really had nothing like they grew up with a lot of trauma in a really hard world and

I refused to see that I was getting any of that because they gave me a better life So I just thought I'm first generation that has this good life So I should shut up two generations ago was worse than it was better. I got it the best But no we passed this stuff on Rashi says the greatest trauma that we have is not our own you know and i just feel like that's what i learned i learned that i don't have to hide i can look across and even if people don't see or they're afraid or they're going through their own stuff love people where they're at and love them unconditionally i've had so many friends talk to me about their parents or their relationship with their siblings,

and they're so mad at them for not understanding them. But are you mad at them for not understanding? Are you mad because you're triggered by something that they're doing that you haven't settled inside yourself? And I've just gotten to this point where what my work is with my family is just to love unconditionally and and to be OK where someone else is at and allow them to be where they're at and and let them love you. You know, and and when you make mistakes, because you will, you'll be triggered and you'll you'll burst and you'll screw up and everything else. Just give yourself the grace of, of course, that's my human experience. Everyone in the world is suffering. I'm allowed to suffer too. Yeah, you know What's something that you say to your little Scott on a daily basis now that you never said before so I do a meditation One of my daily practices where I talk to different parts of myself

it's actually something I learned at Hoffman and I talked to my emotional self and Sometimes that person's five. Sometimes I'm 27. Sometimes I'm 14. Sometimes it's right now. Sometimes it's right now. Sometimes it's a bunch of them. But I always like to give them a hug, especially when it's a kid.

That's so beautiful, man. You know, pick them up, hug them. Yeah. Just be like, you're enough. You know, you always were. You're strong. And this teacher, Chess, he said something to me really beautiful. You know, when I went in, I'd done some work with other healers in sedona i did a week of heal

like working with healers and i've decided actually you were one of the people inspired me i never got to tell you this i saw you do wim hof and i decided that why should i just do hoffman this one year i should do something every year absolutely one week no phone no emails where i just do something for my betterment of myself so this year I went for a week to Sedona and I did this program, Sedona Soul Adventures, this amazing woman designs program where you can meet up with different healers that she knows are good. She saw me and she's like, you're younger than most people who come here. Most people usually figure this out later. But I think I want to do Wim Hof next year. I want to do something to betterment myself. And when I got to this breathwork session,

I was of the mind of, I have to kill the ego. And Scooter must be my ego. I have to kill it. And when I leave here, I'm only going to be Scott. And then we started to talk. And he said, why? Look at how beautiful this life is that this part of you built. Look how much good in the world this part of you has done.

Look how many people depend on you and you depend on them. And there's a beautiful part of this. The ego has to be cleaned, not killed. You have to forgive yourself for things, these deep down secrets that you have, that you're carrying your shame. Just clean it and let it go and then love what this part of you is however

and this is the most beautiful thing he said to me the ego must be cleaned but the soul is perfect and he said in the soul should never be humble he said when you get to a place where you're seeing your true soul love it like a king love it like shine. Yeah, like don't have any shame. Doesn't mean you're better than anybody else. But embrace yourself like Fifth Agreement talked about. You're perfect. This idea that nobody's perfect so that we can live in our shame and use it as an excuse. No, let that go. A child walks into the room and they mess up and they cry and they scream or they get into a fight with another kid.

They don't come back the next day and hold a grudge. They don't hold, they don't even talk about what happened. They're onto the next one. And if you look at every major religion from Buddhism to Judaism to Christianity, I'm not Christian, but let me tell you something. I love learning about it. Jesus was asked, show me God. He said, look at the child. Every major religion says the same thing. We get away from this. And then we spend like the first 40 years of our life or 50 learning, learning, learning. And then we spend the second half of our life, if we do it right, unlearning, shedding all this stuff, cleaning it.

Right. And then getting back to the kid like you were talking about, because it's always about that little kid not feeling enough. And it's crazy. Sorry for going on a tangent, but I just want to say this We hold a grudge with ourselves. We carry so much blame and shame on a child, right? Yet if there was a five or six year old sitting in front of us We'd be like that has nothing to do with you you but we do it to ourselves

We carry this deep. I've heard you do so many interviews where you talk about what happened to you. Mm-hmm But it's still to this day affects you. And you carry that shame a little bit. We talked about it. Like the wave will come in. And it's this constant work to tell that kid you didn't do anything. Like you were enough from day one. Absolutely.

What do you think is the biggest shame that you had to heal or are in the healing process of? Because my therapist says healing is not a one moment and you're healed once you realize it. It's an integration process over time. It's a journey of healing. What do you think is that biggest shame that you're healed or you're in the process of healing? I blame myself for things. I'll say I've released myself. I will speak them out and no longer carry the shame. We all have things Deep dark secrets that no one knows but we know right right we know Oh, I did that that one time like Steve. I refuse to carry those anymore. That's good I refuse to be ashamed of anything that I've done because even when I've done things out of character and these are things

Long time ago. Yeah, they were so out of character that I hid them. I said, that wasn't me. And I don't want to be judged by anyone else because that wasn't me. So I'm not going to tell anyone that even happened. We all have that. And if you're saying to yourself, oh no, you got that and I don't,

you're lying to yourself. We all have it. And it could be the smallest thing, could be the biggest thing, but we have them. I don't want to carry that shame anymore. However, the thing I'm working on in healing is I blame myself. I say, it's almost like a voodoo. Like I tell myself if I'm being punished later on

for that, and I knew it was going to come, I'm carrying it. And instead of doing what I actually know, which is there's no such thing as a punishment. I think the best way to explain this, the story of Adam and Eve. When we're kids, we're told they were punished. They bit the apple, they listened to the snake, and they were cast out. Punished. But God's supposed to be like a parent to us, right? I have three beautiful kids now.

Think I've ever punished my kid because I'm mad at them? No, because you love them. I love them and I'm trying to show them something they don't understand yet. I'm trying to teach them something. A punishment is actually a lesson. Same thing with the universe and with God. He didn't cast us out. He didn't punish us. He said, oh, I have to give you a human experience so you understand that you were beautiful naked. Yeah. I need you to go out there and understand what shame is and releasing shame so you have perspective that you were always enough right here. Yeah. So you can appreciate this. And that's what I'm working on.

I'm working on letting go of my blame and my shame for everything in my life as if I can control them and understand that everything is a gift. And it's easy for me to say, but then those demons, they come in and you work through it. And where do you feel the most naked in your life currently? My family life. It's funny, in the last couple of years, I've been attacked publicly in my business life. First time that's happened. It was interesting. It was like before, it was like nothing. It was only good stuff. And then overnight that changed. And it was an interesting lesson

because at first you can choose to be angry. You can choose this and, oh, that's not true, or all this other stuff. But you can choose to say, well, what role did I play in this moment? What role did I play in this coming about? Was I arrogant enough to think this wasn't going to happen? And where I choose to look at in business is I've kind of released that of like,

okay, it is what it is, but I also know that it isn't true. And I'm loved by so many people in my business life. And I have great relationships. And when other people are saying something about me, it usually has more to do with them or a story that they know that isn't my story. But when I did my most recent deal with my company, I took those lessons. And what I realized is I need to include every single person in the success so that everyone feels good. There can't be seven out of 10 that feel good. 10 out of 10 have to feel good. So I've known you for, I think, eight or nine years,

I think. I think we met originally on South by Southwest in Austin, which would be this week, like nine years ago or something. Maybe it was 10 years ago, I can't remember. But Adam, your brother, introduced us. Yeah, we played ball. And I've known you and seen your career and your growth and the things that you've done in business for the last nine years.

And you were extremely talented and on the rise then, but you weren't worth as much as you are now, obviously, financially. And you did many deals over the last nine years, right? There were many deals you did a certain way. And then now it's public that you just sold your company for over a billion dollars to the, what's the brand? Hybe? Hybe. Hybe, which kind of owns the K-pop conglomerates and all that stuff. Sherman Bang, great guy.

Yeah. And so you had been building for years. What were the ways that you were doing deals before versus the way that you did them now? Because I also know that you gave 50 million of stock to your own employees once you did this deal, which I'm not sure if you did something like that before. Well, I never sold the company before. I had sold pieces here and they bought it back and stuff and sold other things. I think in the past I had done deals where some people knew what was going on and other people didn't. Meaning like some people knew like what the deal was? Yeah, exactly. Like, like for example, when I gave stock away, when I gave my,

some of my stock away, I gave it to my artists and my employees and former employees and friends who helped me get there. And former employees and friends. Yeah. Wow. It was just people who helped me build the company. For example, Kenny Hamilton, right? Great guy. Hasn't been part of the company in years.

Right. But he was a part of it. And then you have artists like Justin and Ariana and Demi and Jay Balvin and all these people, Tori Kelly, who've been there. So you gave them a piece too? Yeah. Wow. And the reason is as follows. When I had done other transactions in the past, what I learned from them when people got upset, where I was assuming that I would have an opportunity after the deal was done to sit down and be like, I'm excited to work together. This was the vision of why I did this.

But that didn't happen. And I thought to myself, when I do this deal, before I close it, I'm gonna go to every single person that this might affect and I am going to make them a part of this in a positive way. That's cool. Because I want them to feel a part of this success, whether they are here still or not. If they were just a part of the journey, I want them to look and say, I feel good. I was a part of this family. That's cool. And you can choose when people don't agree with you to say, screw them. Or you can choose to say, what can I learn from this?

I always look at the story of Joseph and the Technicolor Dreamcoat. You know, his brothers were jealous that he was his dad's favorite. So they pretended that he had died and actually sold him into slavery. Later on, really hard life in and out of jails. He was a seer. The Pharaoh of Egypt hears there's this seer in the jail. They bring him out. And with the famine, he tells the Pharaoh what to do. He becomes number two to the Pharaoh. All right. It's crazy.

I mean, this guy was one of those powerful people ever at that time. And then his brothers come into Egypt, try to do some business. And he sees them and he has them arrested, knowing the rest of the family would come. And he brings them in front of them. They're like, why are we in front of the number two guy they're so scared and he says you don't recognize me but i'm your brother joseph wow and they're like we are screwed we destroyed this guy we sold him into slavery and he said if it wasn't for you and what you did i would have not had the hardships and the life and learning that i had and i wouldn't be here. So I'm not going to hurt you. I'm actually going to take care of you and your families forever. Oh my gosh. And it's

just how you choose to look at life. You know, I'm grateful to those that hurt me. I'm grateful. And I have to acknowledge that in some ways people feel hurt by me. It doesn't mean that I did it on purpose. It doesn't mean that they're trying to hurt me on purpose. But I'm grateful for the role that they play in my journey. And trust me, there are times in certain people that I'm like, you know, like that fire comes out. It doesn't mean I got to be best friends with them. I don't have to take care of their families. But it doesn't mean I have to hold that hatred in my heart.

And it doesn't mean I have to look at them and say, oh, you wronged me. No, you did something that helped me in my growth. Absolutely. You know, so. You can appreciate it even though you don't need to be best friends with someone. Yeah, I could just say I can choose to not carry that. And when it goes to my family, I want to give that to my kids. Like, my kids are my greatest teachers.

You know, Yale is, you know Yale, mother of my children. One of my greatest teachers in my life, if not my greatest teacher. What's the greatest lesson she's taught you? How to really love somebody. It's easy to love somebody when things are going well. Yeah. It's hard to love each other when things aren't going well. Right.

And I think that we've shown we can do that. Wow. You know, and I'm grateful for that. That's beautiful. And what about your kids? Greatest lessons they've taught you? You know, part of this loving myself again, I see myself in them. You know, I see parts of myself in every one of my kids.

And I see the parts of myself that got hurt. And I saw myself before I started this process, starting to pass on those patterns based on fear, based on, oh, I need to protect because you're too sensitive. You're like me. You can't be as sensitive as I am. Tough enough. Yeah. Because I was a sensitive kid. One of my friends, Molly, she calls me HSP. And I'm like, why do you call me that? She's like, you're a highly sensitive person. People think you're tough, but you're highly sensitive. But my kids are like that. And I just want them to know they're enough.

And they're going to have their trauma. No matter what I do, they're going to have their stuff. But I'm going to be rooting for them every step of the way. Unconditionally. I drove my kids to school the other day and we were talking. I was talking about accountability. I was explaining what accountability means to a seven and a five-year-old. And did they get it?

Yeah, because we've talked about it before. And I was talking about the importance of accountability. And Jagger, my oldest, is very funny. He's like, you also got to learn about flexibility, dad. And I was like, what do you mean? He's like, like, if I want my iPad, it should be flexible. He's seven. But, you know, we talked about this idea of accountability.

And then I just told him and I said, I want you guys to know beyond accountability, that's to yourself. But I will tell you if I think you're doing something wrong. But it doesn't mean I love you any less. I will always be here for you and love you no matter what. I will never leave you no matter what you do to me or anyone else. If you make any mistakes, I will always be here. And that was something, a talk I had with my father. My father loves me unconditionally.

But when I was growing up, he used what he was taught. And one of the things was fear. If you do that, you're out. You do that, I'll leave you. That's all he knew at the time. But I had a walk with him. You told me about this. Yeah, I had a walk with him and I looked him in the eyes. And I want to be really clear. My dad is an amazing man. Great guy. I looked at him and I said, dad, you love me so unconditionally that I see you would have never left. And he looked at me and he's like, but it worked. And I said, no, it didn't, dad.

You and I were great despite it, not because of it. I want my children to know that. I always was a good dad, but there was something inside of me that I knew was lacking and I couldn't place it. What was that? It was this. It was now that I've done this work work i'm the dad i always wanted to be wow you know that's got to feel good it does it feels really good and it's good you learned this when they're you know five and seven and not 25 and yeah really i mean they were four and six when you know i was coming out of this and it was and my daughter is you know two at the time so you could look at the things and be like oh i, I can't believe this happened or this.

And, and there's two things I came out of it. One, I played a role in it. Yeah. Okay. Well, for taking accountability and responsibility. I played a role in this. It's always 50, 50, whether you want to admit it or not, it's always 50, 50. Every relationship in your life, you play a role and choose to forgive yourself so you can forgive

someone else. And I had to learn that in business and in my life, like all these different things. And then the other side of it is love more. Well, the universe keeps going without us. So why not join it that way? Right. Didn't you get a tattoo? Yeah, I got love more tattooed right on my chest. Yeah. But it's, uh, it doesn't mean you can't be tough. It doesn't mean there aren't going to be times where someone doesn't deserve a punch in the face. That's a human experience. That's part of the journey, too. I'm talking about for a kid. I'm not going to sit here and say I'm like some Zen.

I'm going to have moments. And maybe I deserve a punch in the face a couple times. You know what's funny? A funny story. We're at a charity event for Yale. It must have been seven years ago, six, seven years ago. I don't know. Uh, at Bootsy Bellows, I think it was, we're at some event for F cancer. I go, tell me why you love Scott so much. And she says something that I always remember. She said, I don't know. It's just something about him every day. I can't see myself without him in my life, but every day I want to punch him in his face. She said that to me and I thought that was the funniest thing but it was like, maybe sometimes you need to punch in the face, but she was like,

you know, I can't not see him in my life. I mean, look, here's the thing. We're in each other's life. Yeah, exactly. We're tied to each other and three beautiful children. Yeah. So I got, you know, and by the way, that's what real partnership is.

You know, my brother always talks about this idea that he never will call Pencils of Promise his nonprofit a nonprofit. He'll call it a for-purpose. And I have no interest in calling anyone what they aren't to me anymore. You know, that's my partner. You know, so that's the way I look at it. That's beautiful. Going back to the business stuff, there's a quote that Jim Carrey says that I love. I'm going to, I don't have it exactly, but it's something about, I wish everyone became

rich and famous and realized that it's not the key to happiness. From your journey, you know, since I met you, you know, you were worth tens of millions probably nine years ago, but now you're worth a lot more. You know, you were worth tens of millions probably nine years ago, but now you're worth a lot more. And on your journey of accumulating more wealth and bringing more money into your life, what have you learned about money? What does it actually give you versus what does it not give you? And does it bring you happiness? It's how you choose to see money.

Like everything in your life. If you wanted to go swimming in the lake and the next day you come out and the lake is frozen over, you can choose to be mad or you can choose to go ice skating. You know, like it is how you choose to look at what you're given. Money is an avenue to freedom if you allow it to be. If you are obsessed with accumulating more and more and more and more, then you are trapped by money. If you are obsessed with not allowing it to leave you, then you are trapped by money. If you look at money as this is my avenue to actually implement more time into my life, more joy into my life, then money can be very freeing You can say I have enough money to go to Sedona this week and work with healers. Wow, I

Have enough money to take my loved ones on a vacation. They can never have and see joy on their face. Mmm you know, I have enough money to Surprise somebody and buy him some merch, you know a show or show or do something out of kindness. Giving is an incredible thing and you can do a lot of that with money, but you don't need it either because a lot of these things, you don't need money to implement them.

Money just takes other pressures off if you allow to look at it that way. I also truly believe that when I give money or lose money, as long as my intent is correct, it will be returned to me. I actually saw that in the breath work. Really? What do you mean if you lose money? In the past, if you like,

you're doing a deal and you feel like you're overpaying somebody. But if you go inside yourself and you say, I'm at peace with this, then I truly believe the universe will return it to you. Interesting. I don't believe I can lose anything at this point. Because the more you do work, the more you realize you have enough.

My kids, that's my priority. I mean, it's them and continuing to learn myself and get my kid right inside of me. The inner kid. Yeah, the inner kid. Gosh, man, that's so key. And find more joy and keep learning. I think one of the mistakes I made over the last year since leaving Hoffman is I depended on it too much. I had all these amazing tools, and I was like using them and using them and using them.

And when I read Untethered Soul by Michael Singer, he talks about this concept that we almost sometimes overuse self-work as a mechanism to continue touching the thorn, continue to stay close to our trauma. As opposed to process it and move on. Yeah, so if you hurt your ankle and you put a brace on your ankle and you play basketball with a brace every single day for the rest of your life, you're thinking about your ankle every single day.

But if your ankle's healed, shouldn't you take off the brace and stop thinking about your ankle? But if you're like your ankle's healed, shouldn't you take off the brace and stop thinking about your ankle? But if you're like, no, I gotta keep it on just in case. You're a prisoner to this ankle injury. So with our bodies, when we're not hurt or we're not sick, we just go through life not thinking about our bodies. We're enjoying ourselves, we're eating, we're having fun,

we're doing different things. But then our intellect is like taking over. That voice inside our head is constantly putting us down, putting us all over the place. So we're battling with it constantly. He said the same way you treat your body when you're not thinking about it is how you should sometimes treat your mind.

So I realized I was relying on it too much. I was staying close to trauma, I was talking about it all the time. I don't have these conversations all the time. I'm just going out and enjoying life, being present. That's been probably the greatest gift that I've gotten, of everything, allowing all this different stuff. I didn't know how to be present before.

What were you focused on as opposed to being present? Ask for the future. My trauma, I mean, Holocaust surviving families, is you hear stories since you were a little boy of all these people dying, and little boy or little girl, like all these people died, and it's on you never again wow i was five i can't even remember not knowing about it so every single day in my life i woke up and i said today's the day it might be taken away every single day i woke up saying how could it be

taken away so i had to keep building to protect to protect i wasn't building for me i think certain people didn't know me misunderstood. But I was building because I felt like I needed to be prepared to protect. So like- Protect what? Anything. Any trauma, any bad things. When Manchester happened at the Ariana show,

a lot of people were sad and crying and everything else. But I wanted to go do a show right away. I wanted to strike back. Because right away. I wanted to strike back because my entire life I've been preparing for moments like that in my trauma. That was good for me in that moment to be someone who could do that. And Ariana's courage in that moment was beyond. But I also, I'm allowed to live in a world where there isn't that coming. also I'm allowed to live in a world where there isn't that coming. My kids need their dad to just be there and not be saying we need to prepare for the storm. Doing this work allowed me to just say bad things might come, but they're not here right now and they don't exist yet.

So you can be present and prepared. Because the present is the only thing we have. That's true. You know, it gave me the gift of being someone could be prepared, but i've learned to be present I've learned to put down my phone and enjoy the day and understand Yeah, I could tell myself a story and compute it all and something scary might be coming But it's not here right now. Why am I not enjoying this? Because I don't know if tomorrow's promised. Yeah And I got that for the first time in my life,

to be present. And it's been interesting seeing how many people have come up to me over the last few years and be like, man, have you changed? You're so present. And I don't feel like I've changed. I feel like I've reclaimed myself. I feel like I'm more me than I've been in years. That's why I'm grateful. Yeah. There used to be, not all the time, because we have a lot of time where you're not, I used to see you a lot when you weren't working,

we'd play basketball a lot on the weekends, which we got to start doing again if they do. By the way, that was my release. That was my meditation. Saturday morning. That was being on a basketball court, I'd forget everything. Because you weren't on your phone.

Well, I think it was just that court, it's just a game, like there's something about sports. You have to be present. Yeah, I think it was just that court. It was just a game. There's something about sports. You have to be present. Yeah, you have to be present. And it took you away from it all. That was probably the only time every week where you could really be present, right? Was then.

And by the way, now, I'm telling you, I'll send you these places. You can be present all the time. So it's great. We gotta get a game going soon. What, you know, I've seen you over the years. And again, there's times where you're present and times where you were in like,

thinking about the next deal constantly. Yeah, we're thinking about anything. Yeah. Anything but there. Right. How does here feel now? Great. And you know what's interesting?

There are problems in the world. And sometimes they're now. And I think because I was the way I was built, I was protecting against a future that hadn't existed and I was too distracted to see when things were actually breaking now. And those are the regrets that I have that I couldn't see when the present was not working

because I was like, oh no, the present's good. Like we have to worry about tomorrow. And there's nothing more important than the present. There's nothing more important than being with people now. It doesn't mean you can't have a brain that can go there and acknowledge. But then take yourself out of that story, slow down, surrender, allow, and just be like,

hold on a minute, what's in front of me right now? Is it really that scary right now? Why don't I address now before tomorrow comes instead of addressing tomorrow? And it's been, you know, your guys love, the last time I was here, I talked about the baseball. I made up that thing about- CeCe's Bathia's. Yeah, CeCe's Bathia's pitching to you. I'll say it again. I said,, I talked about the baseball. I made up that thing about... CeCe Zabathia's. Yeah, CeCe Zabathia's pitching to you. I'll say it again. I said, you were talking about what makes someone successful. And I said, imagine Cy Young Award, top of his game at the time of his career, he was top of his game. CeCe Zabathia was pitching to you and

whoever could hit a home run out of Yankee Stadium wins... A million dollars or something. A million dollars, a billion dollars, whatever it was. And I said, everyone gets to hit as many times they want. You can line up as many times you want for free. So obviously a lot of people don't even come because they see the lines. They're like, screw it up. I'm not waiting in line. They're those people. Then there are people who wait in line and then they quit. Then there are people who get there. They take one swing. They realize how ridiculous they go home. Then there's people who take two swings. People are screaming at them. There's a million people in line. Get million people online. Get out of here.

Get out of here. And they stop. Someone takes 10 swings. The person who's successful, I said, is the person who keeps swinging, drowns out all the noise of everyone telling them, what are you doing? Give someone else a turn, everything else.

And they keep swinging until they hit that home run because no one remembers how many times they swung. They remember they were the one who hit the home run. And I said that to you. And now I want to add something to it. The reason why that person is successful, and I didn't realize until right now, is because not only are they shutting out the noise of that moment, but they're realizing as soon as they swing and they miss,

they're still standing and the only thing present is CeCe Sabathia in front of them again. The next moment. The next moment. They're present to the next moment. They're not thinking about, what if I miss again or anything else? They're shutting out the loss of the past and saying, I have an opportunity again right now. And this is the only thing that's real. And they keep showing up. Keep showing up consistently.

Well, tomorrow, you and I, whatever we talk about five minutes ago, we're never going to be able to go back. We can watch it, but we can't go back. Whatever happens five minutes from now, can't go back. But I can do this. That's the only thing that was real in that moment. You know, and there's a really beautiful book you can read to your kids called The Precious Present. You know, I think it's called The Precious Present.

It's all about this idea of the greatest present you can give someone is being present. Uh-huh, that's true. That's probably a good book to read to a kid at night. I think so many people are fascinated by your business mind because you've built up this incredible empire again, just sold your company for a billion. And you have multiple other projects and companies as well that you're building up, partners in a lot of different companies. If you could share with someone your philosophy on your business mind, the way you've been able to think, the way you've been

able to strategize, the way you've been able to think, the way you've been able to strategize, the way you've been able to build over the last, let's call it the last decade, what would you say are the core philosophies, the core principles on building a business at scale, you know, and really making a splash with the business that you might have? And maybe not everyone has the opportunity.

In my way, like I said, there's things I've learned that I perfected along the way. But I can give you what I would say. Looking back from all the stuff, the mistakes you made, the things that worked extremely well to where you are now. Even things that have worked extremely well

that I would do differently now. Yeah. I'd love to hear them. Because I think people are really fascinated by this. I don't think you want to dive in. Here's the thing. I actually, when I was in Sedona, I did this deep meditation on the Red Rocks, right?

Interesting place, Sedona. And I realized I started to litigate my past. Oh, if I could have done this differently, I would have done this differently. And I realized, but if I had changed anything, I wouldn't be in that moment with all that knowledge. So I don't regret anything. I think everything is part of your process and part of your growth and everything that you need. I think I can do things differently in the future from what I learned.

I think the first thing I would say is be curious. Be curious, why not? Why not look in that direction? And by the way, why not you? Why not you? Someone, you hear the story of if you're intimidated and imagine them naked. No, some people look fantastic naked

That's it. It's even more intimidating Someone's that good-looking in front of you and they're naked you like geez come on I actually like to say imagine someone's taking it Right because we all do yep Everyone has had that and it ain't pretty and it's vulnerable and if you can imagine everyone on the toilet just like you you'll realize we Were all humans having a human experience like you, have you seen the show Succession? Oh, it's a great show. So when he goes to the bathroom and he's a badass,

but then he goes to the bathroom and he can't pee. Yeah, yeah. And he's falling down. Yeah, he's peeing on the carpet. Peeing on the carpet. It shows he's human. He's vulnerable. It's so funny.

I went to a speech of the Dalai Lama, I don't know, five years ago. And one of the first things he said, someone said, how are you feeling today? And he goes't know, five years ago. And one of the first things he said, someone said, how are you feeling today? And he goes, ah, not so good. It was hard for me to go to the bathroom just now. It was like the funniest thing because we're sitting there in front of the Dalai Lama thinking here's a spiritual guru. Man, I couldn't go to the bathroom just now. It kind of hurt. And it was like this funny moment, but he probably does that a lot to try to bring it back to like humanizing himself as

opposed to everyone just thinking he's this God or something. But yeah, so being curious. Being curious, telling yourself, why not me? Why not me? Why not me? With your business success. Anything. Why not you? Why can't it be you? You know, what about you is less than that you are telling yourself is less than? Why not you? You know, every one of us is so unique and so special. Why not you? And then building a family. I think loyalty is important.

Doing right by people. You know, I've been blessed to build a company that people try to poach my employees all the time. It doesn't happen. And when it does happen, it's because we talk about it and I'm happy for them. And they're part of the family still. We have a beautiful family relationship within the company. Even though we've gotten big, we still created that dynamic. And I think that's important because when it's late at night and someone's with their family, they have to choose to take time away from their family to help the company. Yeah, so create something that they can be proud of yeah something that they can say I

Want to do this and incentivize them to do so That's why I did the giveaway with my stock because I was like you're all a part of this. Yes, and then Don't hold on so tight To what? Maybe fear. I've been able to be a part of so many great companies, investing wise, because I wasn't afraid to lose the money. Really? I always told myself, I believe in this, but if it goes to zero, I'm okay.

How do you get to that place though? And were you always like that in your first few investments or was it more like? I got to that place. I think I've always been kind of built that way, but I'll give you something that can maybe help someone else get there. How much money,

I don't know if you and I've done this before, but if we've done it on another podcast, I'll do it again. Yeah. Who do you love? My family, my friends, my girlfriend. Okay, your girlfriend. Yeah. You get a call, you leave this podcast podcast i'll do it again yeah who do you love my family my friends my girlfriend okay your girlfriend yeah you get a call you leave this podcast and your girlfriend is sick and they need you to give ten thousand dollars to help her do you give it of course they need you to give a

million dollars do you give it yeah they need you to give her for her live every dime you have to your name. Absolutely. No questions asked. Yeah. Same with me. Yeah. Is she healthy? Is she healthy right now? Oh, yeah. Is anyone asking for that?

No. You already have it. Right. You would give everything away right now to have what you already have. Your health. Yeah. And the health of your loved ones. Of course.

Everything that you have right now, if life changed, have your health yeah and the health of your loved ones of course everything that you have right now if if life changed you would give it all the way to have what you have right now and I think that's been one of the hardest lessons for me because I was able to do it with business and my trauma made me really good at business but sometimes what makes you good at business doesn't make you the best at intimacy with your friends and your family. Because I felt I needed to protect everyone. So it made me really good at business.

But I didn't show people who I was because I didn't think I was enough. So I was there for everyone else, but I wouldn't let anyone be there for me. And what I think I've come to realize is that if you ask me, you know, you ask people, what do you want in life? You know, people would say,

oh, I want to get this or I want to get that. Funny enough for me is I think I already had it. I just didn't know. I was so busy protecting for tomorrow that I couldn't see what was right in front of me. So what do you want now? I just want to keep growing and learning and I want to trust the universe that I've become see what was right in front of me. So what do you want now? I just want to keep growing and learning and I want to trust the universe

that I've become the best version of myself because of all this and I'm trusting the universe that it's bringing to me where I'm supposed to be. I'm gonna keep leaning in. Like I just finished Michael Singer's second book, The Surrender Experiment. And he talks a lot about this, about so many times in life he'd feel this resistance

of no, I gotta get back what I thought I needed, or we can't do that. That's change. And he just said, there's too many signs here. I'm going to surrender to it and see what happens. And that's where I'm at in my life. I'm surrendering to it. I'm seeing what's happening. And I'm telling you, if I don't go into my story of tomorrow or my story of the past, my present, the person sitting right in front of you and the life that I have right now is really beautiful. I don't have much to complain about that's pretty nice man what would you do if you lost all your money today i have my health my kids have my health yeah i'd go rebuild and go do another adventure what do you think you would create would you start a partnership

with someone would you start a new business you're not sure you know that's a story for tomorrow yeah hopefully it never happens i mean if it does happen it happens i mean it's not even hopefully if it happens it's supposed to happen right it's a weird thing tomorrow. Yeah. Hopefully it never happens. I mean, if it does happen, it happens. I mean, it's not even a hopefully. If it happens, it's supposed to happen. It's a weird thing to say. Really? But it's just gotten to this place now where money has become very, the last two years was self-work and personal. So for me, I realized how much that doesn't matter.

How much can be- The money and the business stuff. Because the things that matter can be taken away. And that's just an avenue to freedom. Right. You know, so I look at money and the access that I have to money is an avenue to freedom and an avenue to giving. And I can enjoy life and I can put together a beautiful life for my friends and my family.

And, you know, I have friends who are like, well, it's not like you live a simple life. I do live a simple life. He's like, well, you have a really nice house. I like to live in a nice Zen house. I want a house with a view. I've earned that. I can do that. But I can also make sure my friends and my family are good. I can make sure a stranger is good. And I think that we get into this weird place where why do we belittle someone else's success? Why do we assume someone else's success has to be negative? I call this vacation theory. I want all my friends to be successful

because then I don't have to pay for vacation. They won't get paid for their own. Why should I want to be the only one who's successful? That is such a selfish and not productive for my own life. If everyone in my life is successful, if my best friends I grew up with, they hit it. I'm happy as hell for them because it not only benefits them, it benefits us. So I'm rooting for everybody when the world when you're the only one. That's not a good thing.

Yeah, you want to live in a society where everyone's eating. So that's kind of like my mentality with it now. It's why I wanted everyone to do well in the transaction because I want everyone to do well. There is a selfish part of giving. Yes. It feels good. Not only does it feel good, it feels great. But you're also in a weird way buying your own freedom when you give how so if you are in a society Where everyone is in need? You will always Be pulled on If you are giving to a society and helping change that society

So that other people can survive my brother what he did so beautifully with pencils of promise Is he said I'm not just gonna go build schools for these third world countries and these communities. I'm going to give them the opportunity to build a school. I'm going to give them the money, but they have to contribute labor. They have to be a part of this process. And by doing that, they took ownership. And those schools are pristine 10 years later. And you want, it's like, it says, it says in the Torah and the Bible, it says, when you're getting your crops, leave the end of the fields so that others can come with integrity and take what they need. So that's giving tzedakah, that's giving charity. And I just think it's so important to give, but also do so in a manner that lifts everyone. When you're giving,

you're lifting yourself because you're lifting your community Absolutely. One of the things I learned about a decade ago when I started to make money for myself, I Started interviewing people that had made a lot of money and I was like what has been the key for you to continue to grow? In your wealth year after year. They say give this link and they say a lot of them say giving it's like the more I gave Even was that's a lot of money to give this year kind of uncomfortable if we give this it's like but next year it grew or it stayed the same at least Lewis I want to tell you you do great interviews but now I want to speak about you okay I want to talk about how I met you yeah I've done all this work and trust me at that point in my life when you and I met, I was grinding it out. I was grinding. And I was

skeptical of people because it was a grimy world I was in. You didn't know what people were after. I didn't know what people were after. And I wasn't in this place of just trust, of like, you know what, you can't. I have friends who are just like, you know, you got to watch out. And I'm like, I didn't get to this point by not knowing if someone's taking advantage of me. And sometimes if someone's taking advantage of me, I'm good with it. Like I'm aware. But when I met you, the reason I met you is there was a guy who just kept paying for schools in third world countries. He just kept putting 10,000, 20,000, just one after another. He kept building schools. And I said to my brother, who is this guy who keeps building schools and asking for nothing in return?

And he said, he's this really great guy. His name's Lewis House. And I was skeptical. I'm like, who is this dude? And I got to meet you and you are as genuine as they come. You are a salt of the earth good dude. You check on me. I check on you. You give without asking for anything in return. And you actually believe in that premise that if you give, you will receive yeah and you are the real deal you actually back it up and when people support so the school of greatness and they do everything else you don't i see where that money goes and you're allowed to give a good life to yourself but you give you give a lot and i wanted to say that on here because people should know that about you they should acknowledge it and i've i've received nothing from you. I've seen you give and give and give and give. The only thing

I've ever received from you is friendship. I truly appreciate you. Of course, man. I appreciate it. Thanks for saying that. I think it's, especially something like yourself, is getting pulled on, like you said, by so many people in your life or businesses or whatever. They want your time. They want your money. They want access to something. And I never wanted anything from you except to be a friend and just be able to hang out and have fun and play some basketball and help each other in any way we could.

And I think you could probably feel that out from a lot of people in your life for the last decade of like who's wants something from me. So hopefully you never felt that from me. I never felt that, but I'm also, I would say this to any friend,

have a little trust in me. I'm an adult. I can navigate that. Exactly. You know, and I think, um, if I want to have people in my life or if I give a friend something, allow me to give it. Of course. You know, and, and, and, and I, and I've had to learn on the other side, how to receive. Receiving is huge. Yeah. Receiving is tough. You know, especially when you're, when you're trying to earn it yourself and you want, you don't want to be seen a certain way. Receiving is really, really hard, but you know, that's you're trying to earn it yourself and you want to be seen a certain way. Receiving is really, really hard. It is. But, you know, that's the human experience and working together and our traumas all meeting up.

But it's all perfect. Absolutely. One of the things I appreciate about you is that you have been consistently giving since I've known you as well to charities and nonprofits. And, you know, hence the promise you're a big investor in in terms of funding that as well every year. I believe you've been doing that for a long time. And I think it's really cool to see someone who continues to earn a lot and have a lot of success financially and keep giving back or paying forward, whatever you want to call it. Why do you think that's so important for people to be thinking about, even if maybe they're only making $100,000 a year, for them to give something? Why is it important to have that mentality of giving service

paying I think I've been doing it since the beginning when I was just throwing parties and like every fourth party would go to charity and I have much I believe it on a spiritual level I believe when you get told as a kid you get what you give I actually believe that I believe karma you get told as a kid you get what you give, I actually believe that. I believe karma is real. And that's part of what I said earlier. One of the things I'm working on is blaming myself. Then when I've made a mistake in my life, I believe karma is so real, I'm like, I'm going to be punished.

And I'm realizing, no, it's part of my journey. It's part of my lessons. It's part of my release of unlearning and getting back to my core self. But I think with giving, I think it's the most selfish thing you can possibly do. Oh, it is. If you are a truly selfish person, you will give because there is no better feeling. It feels so good.

How good did it feel to give all that money, 50 million in stock to your employees and friends? And artists, who are my friends. It felt fantastic. It felt really good. And some I heard heard from some didn't even say anything to me like i didn't care it was i knew it was the right thing to do and i think in the past because i didn't love myself i would do it because it was the right

thing to do but then a part of me just wanted to see a little bit of acknowledgement because i wanted to be loved i've i've had that in the past too yeah i wanted to be a little bit of acknowledgement because I wanted to be loved. I've had that in the past too. Yeah. I wanted to be loved. I wanted, and it was a little kid. It was just because you wanted to be seen by mommy and daddy, you know, and, and you just wanted to be seen by someone for who you were. And it wasn't like you needed them to say, you're so wonderful. You just wanted to be seen. We all just want to be seen. I read something the other day. I loved it said, if we could all just look at human behavior as people choosing love or craving love, we'd have more empathy for each other. And I would give, and now I'm giving from like, I it's non-transactional because now I'm just knowing I love myself and man, that's awesome. I love that. You know, whether it be

giving away tickets or buying somebody merch or You know doing something anonymously or you know, and sometimes you give people like that's not enough like, okay Sorry, that's I wasn't doing it for your acknowledgement anymore I'm doing because I want to give and I think what I would say to someone who has Someone who says I don't have enough to be given like that. Go on YouTube right now and watch how many videos of homeless people giving away their change. That's crazy, isn't it? I was just sharing some recently on my Instagram of- Constantly. Constantly. You're going around, hey man, can I borrow money? No, no, no, no, no. To a homeless person, can I borrow money? What do you need? Boom. And it's always the same thing. It's someone who has nothing, who understands what life is with nothing,

who's willing to give. Because they're like, like look I just want to be treated the same way and and I think that that's what's beautiful about it when you give you do receive and sometimes people are like well I've given in my life isn't where I want it to be wait wait because then maybe there's something going on in your life that you that resistance that anger you have that's what the universe is wanting you to deal with and when you get past that's what the universe is wanting you to deal with. And when you get past that, look at what you receive. Go towards the darkness, go towards your triggers, go towards your trauma and ask yourself, why am I angry? Because behind anger is hurt, behind hurt is fear.

And behind that is honestly, in my opinion, that's where all the beauty is. Man, this is really powerful. And I think a lot of people are going to get a lot of value from everything you're saying here. You talked about your parents for a moment, the conversation you had with your dad. I've met your mom many times as well, an incredible woman. What would you say is the greatest lesson after having these experiences in the last two years and having a reflection of childhood and little Scott and all these things and having conversations with your parents about all the beauty and maybe the stuff That was hard as well

What is the greatest lesson that both your your dad and your mom have taught you? I? Can say it a couple different ways when I'd say my parents taught me unconditional love even when they were being Transactional because they loved me so deeply I felt it The second thing I could say that I I learned from them is over the last few years doing this work I finally saw them as people. What were you seeing them before as? As my parents. And I saw them as people.

I saw them as children. And I saw them as children who were going through the same things I went through and then passing on some of those things onto me. And the greatest gift they gave me is the perspective. They gave me the opportunity to break those patterns by knowing them. I think one of the hardest things, when you look at groups of people that know their heritage,

they have deep wisdom. And then you look at groups of people that had their heritage taken away or they don't know their heritage and they're struggling to find their place. And I think that the greatest gift my parents have given me is an opportunity to deeply know them so that I could do that work to know myself. That's beautiful, man.

That's really beautiful. We're two years out from now. You've had this two-year kind of experience and it's going to be continually going for a long time. What are you, 40 now? Yeah, I just turned 40. Yeah, I'll be 39 this week. By the way, can I just add something before we go on?

Sure. I know you just lost your dad. Yeah. And he was a big part of your life. And he raised an amazing guy. The way I would describe what I just described to you is as much as you miss him and he's gone, he gave you everything you needed absolutely you

know and now that he's not here he gave you the gift of him you know and sometimes when people leave us we want to grieve so much and we should but there's also a beauty in realizing like when i lost my grandmother i was so sad but i realized i was sad for my kids i know i was sad for my kids that that she wasn't going to be able to give that to them. But she gave me everything that I needed from her. And more. And I just wanted to say it to you because I know we were going to do this and then you lost your dad. And I just want to say the beauty of the man that you are, he gave you him.

And I think that that was an amazing gift. You didn't lose anything. Yeah. Thanks, man. It's been a crazy month. It was a month ago, a little over a month ago. And it's been a journey, man. I'll tell you what.

I mean, it's definitely a lesson that we're all going to have to learn at some point if we live long enough to witness our apparent passing. And there are still moments almost every day where I'm just like I get very emotional and I'm you know it's a complex relationship from childhood to then he had an accident 17 years ago where he was a different person because of the trauma of the accident and so it was it's healing it's healing from the going back childhood and then the loss emotionally that I had the last 17 years and now the physical loss. But it's been interesting. I feel more spiritually connected to him than I did in the last 17 years in the last month. And it almost feels like because his soul, I felt, was trapped in this

body that was limited. And now his soul is free. So I feel like I can have an actual conversation with him where he had memory loss. So I couldn't really talk to him that much without him Saying a lot of the same things over and over And I think one of the first things I was really sad about I was like I'm really sad that my girlfriend doesn't get to meet him because we were supposed to go see him the next day We were supposed to go The next day and see him and I was really sad because I wanted her to meet the man that you know Raised me and taught me so many lessons.

But I kept thinking to myself, what would my dad want? And I'm not sure if you thought about this with your grandmother passing, but I kept thinking to myself, what would my dad want me to do after him passing? And I was like, he would want me to continue to live a joyful, loving, peaceful life. He would want me to express my uniqueness. He would want me to express my uniqueness he would want me to love fully he would want me to go after all the things

that bring me the most joy and and serve in the highest way possible the way that he did the way I watched him serve and so that's been my

I've I've been so focused on just like I gotta be as present as possible like you said cause tomorrow I may not be here

just like he was gone. It was quick when it happened. You said that's a gift he gave you of that realization, but also everything you just described was his gifts of his life. Absolutely. You know, and me and you talk a lot about books we read. Yes.

Many Lives, Many Masters. Yeah. Brian Weiss. You read that book and you're not that afraid of death because if you choose to believe that, he came here to learn and give what he needed to give. And he's going to go back and do it again. And so you and I, and we just keep learning and keep growing.

And you'll see him again. And you'll talk to him tonight if you want. Yeah. You know, and no one can escape the pain. No. But there's beauty in it. There's beauty. Yeah, there's sadness. There's gratitude.

It's kind of all of it. What was the greatest lesson your grandmother taught you how to choose life i mean this is a woman who was in auschwitz this woman who lost 23 members of her family in a day and she was 15. wow 14. and she still was the joyous most happiest person i ever met And she went through the worst of humanity, but she chose to love deeply. And I think about that all the time, the perspective, how she chose to love, how she chose to laugh after everything that she had been through, all the pain. And it didn't mean it escaped. It didn't mean she wouldn't wake up in the middle of the night crying or missing her sister her mother father but she made a conscious choice to show us love and to be loving in the

world and i think that's the greatest lesson that she taught me yeah i seem like a beautiful woman amazing woman she was special love dance too yeah it's good i was about to ask you about the last two years have been very transformational and a lot of awakening and healing and processing. What do you think you'll be saying to little Scott in two years? What's the lesson you're going to be learning and realizing two years out from now? I'll probably say you didn't see that coming. Really? What do you think that'll be?

I don't know. I just know that every single time I think I got life figured out, it surprises me. Interesting. And I'll say I didn't see that coming. I just know that every single time I think I got life figured out, it surprises me. Interesting. You know, and I'll say I didn't see that coming. I'll say that was fun, that was exciting, what an incredible learning experience. And I'll tell you, even from doing the work in Sedona

versus a year ago at Hoffman, so many more realizations, so much more growing to do, so many more things I need to give myself grace for. So I just think two years from now, I'll say my, what I hope to say, you're better now than you were two years ago. Keep going. That's good.

And what lesson do you think you'll learn? What do you think will grow into? I just want to be the best version of me. You know, I just want to keep looking in the mirror and saying, let's keep going. And I want to just have more joy with the people I love. Yeah, that's beautiful, man. I always love doing this with you. What's something we can do to support you

before I ask the final couple of questions? You've got, you're always doing something big. I see Justin launching his, relaunching his tour. You see all your artists are just exploding. What is something we should be excited about or be aware of right now? I'm good.

Honestly, like it's, I'm looking for what's next. I mean, after selling the company. Yeah, I mean, I'm still running the company. It's, I'm looking for what's next. I mean, after selling the company. I mean, I'm still running the company. It's, you know, it's still our company, but I'm just talking about life and, you know, what's, whatever comes next. So I think if the best way you could support me is doing what you do, I feel comfortable here.

I like having these conversations over the years. You and I have both gotten messages that these conversations help people. And like I said said giving is selfish so the way you're helping me is by allowing me to be a part of your platform and hopefully we help some other people absolutely so I think if I was to make one ask which which camera could I look at to talk right here okay my ask would be actually the person who's watching this I said earlier why not you and i would honestly like to look in the camera and say all these things you're hearing if you're having resistance towards them or you're saying oh that's not for me ask yourself why you're having that resistance because why can't

it be you why can't you grow and learn and live your dreams and stop beating yourself up and stop creating a story that creates that resistance and just stop listening to the voice in your head. In Untethered Soul, it says for there to be a voice in your head, there has to be a listener. You're the listener. You're the soul. So shut out the human experience voice and realize you're perfect and go do it. And don't be disappointed if it doesn't work the first couple of times. Just be present in the moment and realize you have an opportunity and keep doing it. So why not you?

Absolutely. Yeah, you didn't sell a billion dollar company overnight. No. Took a couple of decades to get there. Lots of lessons and successes. And I'd actually argue with you, and I think it's easy for me to say this now from this financial point. The greatest achievement of my last two years wasn't that.

It was reclaiming myself. 100%. I think when you find inner peace. And by the way, don't have it yet. Working on it. There you go. When you have moments of it, it's still worth more than any money you could ever have. When you have silence.

Oh my gosh, it's unbelievable, man. Yeah, it's very special. Inner peace. Or you're just in a moment when you realize how joyous this moment is and you're present to it. You're not stressed about the next thing. Yeah, that's good. I'm happy you're on the journey.

A child's laughter can do that. Yeah, that's beautiful, man. I've got this question I've asked you a few times before called the three truths. Okay, let's do it. And now you're at a different perspective

in your life. Imagine it's your last day many years away from now on this earth. You live as long as you want to live, but it's the last day. And you've accomplished everything that you want to accomplish, whether it's taking over business world or being present

with your family, whatever it is, you've accomplished it. You've lived it. But for whatever reason, all of your work has to go with you or go somewhere else. All your content, your message, social media, this interview, it goes somewhere else. No one has access to your information anymore but you get to leave behind to the world a piece of paper and a pen

and write down three things you know to be true from all the lessons you've learned and this is all we would have to remember you buy from your

your knowledge your wisdom what would you say would be those three truths well I'm dying so it's less about me and what I need

and what I can give to the world so i would number one would be i love you okay i want the people left behind to know that i love them that's nice number two i want them to know that they are enough and number three i would tell them the journey is perfect enjoy the journey beautiful. Beautiful. You know, it's funny when you asked me that question. I thought it was going to go in a different direction. And it actually led me to one of my deepest, darkest fears. What's that? I thought you were going to say something to the effect of like, you're on your last day.

And what do you hope happens in that last day? Like, what do you hope someone gives you or you give someone else? What do you hope? I was thinking about it. And that's where the I love you came from. gives you or you give someone else what do you hope well i was thinking about it and that's where the i love you came from but i realized that saying that i told you earlier that we all are doing something from either love or craving love and i think my hope on my last day is without me having to say i love you someone looks at me and truly says i love you that's beautiful you know

it's that i don't want to have to ask for it. I hope that on my last day I'm I'm seen and loved for exactly who I am. Yeah, we all just want to be that's all we want We want to be seen celebrated and loved and you want to be able to give that same level of love and intimacy to somebody else. Yeah, well, I'm acknowledge you Scott for reclaiming the inner Scott the little Scott. Thanks, buddy. And knowing that Scooter has been a big support for you. The alter ego, the personality, the brand of Scooter Braun has been amazing for you and it's helped you and a lot of people. But reclaiming the inner Scott and bringing that back into presence and connecting it to your heart and really

loving the inner child within you, I think is one of the most beautiful things I've heard you say that you've been doing over all the business success and all the celebrities you work with. For me, when you love yourself, I know that you can heal people around you and heal the world in a bigger way. So I'm super proud of you, man. And I acknowledge you for doing that work. This is probably the hardest work for me that I've ever done in my life. And I'm assuming it was extremely challenging for you. I'm still in it. You don't stop, the work continues.

I still have a photo of my inner child on my phone that I look at every day. Lewis, I'm gonna say something to you to really think about. Yes. Because as you're telling me this, I appreciate what you're saying. Thank you. First off, before you say this,

you gotta learn to receive. So let me finish the thought. Okay. Because you gotta be in receive mode because I know what you're doing learn to receive. So let me finish the thought. Because you got to be in receive mode because I know what you're doing. The strategy. So I want to acknowledge you again for doing the work. And you're not perfect.

You make mistakes. You're going to continue to make mistakes. You're going through stuff from personal life, business, all these things. But I acknowledge you for constantly showing up and being willing to do the work. And I think that's a powerful thing. And it's extremely challenging for someone who has it all financially, career, business-wise,

extremely challenging specifically for someone at that level to say, I'm going to do the inner work of healing. Because most people in the world say they have everything I want financially, business, career, and you can get away with it. You know what I mean? You can keep getting away with it if you wanted to. So I acknowledge you for doing the work. One of the hardest things to do, I think, for a human being is to heal the inner child. So I acknowledge you for that. Thank you.

Now you can go. Thank you. The only reason I was going to add in was because you said this is the hardest work for me. So I wanted to offer you something that a teacher of mine said to me that really made me think about how you get through this work. Thank you. I do receive it, but I also want to acknowledge not only the people who helped me see it, but the ones who hurt me also,

because the only way you really get there is by acknowledging and appreciating, truly appreciating everyone in the process, the ones who hurt you and the ones who helped you equally. And I think acknowledging yourself when you hurt yourself. Correct. I think that's the hardest to do is forgive yourself for all the things that you did to yourself or to others or whatever.

So what a journey, man. I'm excited to do the next one at the end of the year. You're a great man. I always love being here. Final question. At this point, what's your definition of greatness?

Other than Lewis Howes? Yeah. The mindset I'm in right now is my definition of greatness is being present. Mm-hmm. Is being here. You know,

having the ability to truly be here. Yeah. My man, Scooter Braun. Appreciate it, man. Appreciate you. Thanks, buddy. Thank you so much for listening.

I hope you enjoyed today's episode and it inspired you on your journey towards greatness. Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a full rundown of today's show with all the important links. And also make sure to share this with a friend and subscribe over on Apple Podcasts as well. I really love hearing feedback from you guys, So share a review over on Apple and let me know what part of this episode resonated with you the most. And if no one's told you lately, I want to remind you that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter. And now it's time to go out there and do something great.