The Shintaro Higashi Show - Branding in Martial Arts

Episode Date: April 15, 2024

In modern society, with so many competing interests, martial arts also needs strong branding to survive. In this episode, Shintaro and Peter delve into effective ways to brand yourself in the martial arts world and beyond. Join our Discord server and start chatting with us and other grapplers by supporting us on Patreon: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.patreon.com/shintaro_higashi_show⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Any amount helps!

Hello everyone, welcome back to the Shintaro Higashi Show with Peter Yu. Today we're going to talk branding and martial arts. What an interesting concept. But we have some sponsors to thank, right Peter? Yeah, Jason Levant as always, and other sponsors too. And Judo TV. Yep. Who else? Fuji?

Yes. Yeah. What is the discount code for Judo TV? I can't even remember it. Shintaro or Judo Shintaro. I can't even remember, I'm sorry guys. But shintaro i can't even remember i'm sorry guys but just check it out it's very good yeah yeah judo tv you can check out all your all your favorite matches and whatnot yeah and that kind of gets into our today's topic branding in martial arts we've been talking a lot about kind of the business side of martial arts lately yep you know uh i think it's part of our effort to grow judo in america

um so yeah branding what's that about yeah what does that even mean branding yeah what do you think when i say like peter you what do i think brand of it's me i don't i don't got no brand dude oh yeah dude nerdy beats up beginners leonard princeton his wife's a doctor yeah that's right great skin great skin you do have good skin yeah yeah i think it's a important thing in martial arts you know because when you hear likeo, what does that mean? When you hear karate, what do you picture? It's about mind space. What is happening in the mind space?

When you say a certain term, like jujitsu or judo or even blue belt, there's branding there. Because that means something to a whole segment of people doing this niche sport. You know what I mean? branding there right yeah that means something to a whole segment of people doing this niche sport yeah like it's a negative connotation or positive connotation or what kind of image image if uh that word invokes all that yeah yeah and you know i think it's more businessy right it's not exactly a correlation if i said like white belt division one wrestler yeah that guy walks into your judo school or your jiu-jitsu school everyone trembles yeah everyone's like you know what i mean and then you throw in heavyweight in there that means something you know that's not quite like branding because you know there's an association with it has nothing to do with business right we're talking about business stuff you know but

that's the kind of idea right right right yeah when you think like yeah so yeah let's uh let's start with i guess uh since judo and bj are uh closest to our heart i guess yeah and then a lot of times when people talk about or people compare judo versus vjj they all branding is part of a part of a huge part of the discussion. It really is. BJJ has done so much better, at least in America. And I'm assuming now it's kind of getting trickled down to other countries also. Yeah, trickled down to other countries, trickled down to judo, hopefully. Yeah.

So what happened? I don't know how you want to go about this. So maybe, I don't know how you want to go about this, but maybe like, I know that judo back in the 80s had great branding in the US. And something happened and BJJ took over in the 2000s. So are you familiar with the history? I thought that would be kind of interesting. I am not. That would absolutely be interesting, but that's really not my expertise, right? Okay.

But, you know, where I want to kind of go with this is if you're in martial arts long enough and if you're listening to my podcast with Peter, right, if you listen to our podcast, you love martial arts, and one day maybe you want to get good enough to start your own school or start a business revolving around martial arts so you can make it your main thing. Yeah. Full-time. Full-time. Yes. business revolving around martial arts so you could make it your main thing yeah and there's a time yes be a full-timer like a true living the life living the lifestyle doing your own thing yeah right so before you even get started on oh let me start the dojo which is there's a certain branding right if you think like the blue basement you think hanzo gracie Jiu Jitsu School in Manhattan oh I've never been there so

yeah well that's what they refer to yeah or even like if you say Kokushikan University oh yeah doesn't mean much for us

in the United States but if you're in Japan you think heavyweights oh yeah hard tough like a grinding discipline

oriented like just a very motherfuckers, really. Can I say that on the podcast, right? Kokushikan has historically had all the heavyweight recruits. Tsukuba, you think, oh, everybody's good at every weight. You know, we want champions in every way. Kokushikan historically, heavyweights.

Look at Suzuki, Ishii. You know what I mean? Yes, we had Uchishiba, who was a lightweight, ways look at suzuki ishi yeah you know what i mean yes we had uchishiba who was a lightweight but historically right saito dad saito jr who's on the circuit now all big dudes you walk into kakushikan university you get 50 guys uh six three six four plus 250 pound plus you've never seen anything like it they're japanese guys yeah which is crazy they don't make them that big in japan right so yes you want to start your journey in martial arts eventually with the thing of like hey man i want to start a clothing brand in martial arts a lifestyle brand

or a judogi brand or rashgar brand yeah or i want to start a dojo and then branding becomes really really important you know right Yeah. So the first thing I think that leads into that, the most important thing is reputation, you know? Because people say, hey,

when I was a blue belt with this guy or when I trained at this dojo with this dude, he was kind of a scumbag. Now all of a sudden, you know,

your brand is tarnished, right? You're not going anywhere. Oh, personal reputation. Personal reputation, first and foremost. You have to keep that

in your mind, right? I mean, it's such a small world, so like, so a few bridges, you know everyone. Yeah, and I think branding and reputation kind of goes hand in hand. And branding, you kind of spend money on it. It's more business-oriented, right? Because you have to kind of construct this thing that has a theoretical value.

You know what I mean? But it really is about what others think about you. And I think you could immediately start building your own brand right by having a good rep in the dojo uh not peter you destroying calves of a guy that walked in he's two weeks into the dog oh my god yeah i remember that he was he was a brown belt i didn't even i don't even know what i really did i threw him with a tile towards cash i don't even know what I really did. I threw him with a tile. I don't know how that happened. Good one, Peter. Good one.

But this is the thing, right? Peter is much smaller than the average guy. I wouldn't say not anymore. He's pretty big. But you used to be a lightweight. Yeah. You used to fight 66. Yeah.

So you would just go after like the big, strong dudes who would come in the room. Beginner or not. Yeah. That was my thing I was just no I had no like qualm about weight class I would just try to go with everyone yes yeah which is a good quality to have but you know you can't just hurt everybody yeah I don't know I probably told you but like I walked into the locker room once and some kid like yeah you told me it was like

man Peter's the worst that's you know I did so that was one thing I changed my branding I

you and I had a pretty serious discussions about that because it kind of got bad so I changed it I switched my

mindset about Randori especially and yeah I don't think i have that reputation anymore i haven't i haven't heard i heard anyone in a long time you have a new thing you have a very bougie thing oh yeah yeah i play golf and go on ski trips now yeah so yeah you know part of like my whole thing with kbi now and my instagram and all this stuff it's partially branding right what do i want the world to see and you, I try to be as authentic as possible. You

know, I try to kind of like, whatever I say here, whatever I say about my friends, what I probably say in front of the, you know, with the few things that I may, I'll filter it and just fill it down just a little bit, you know? But yeah, that's a very important thing. I think building your brand in martial arts is a huge thing. I think it starts with reputation and then little by little, right? People identify you in the circuit. If you're competing, hey, he's a righty. He's an Uchimata guy. He's a nice guy.

He's not a nice guy. He's an asshole. He trains really hard. He doesn't train really hard. He's a good teacher or whatnot. And a lot of that is tied into having an Instagram presence and online now because BJj lives online you know people highlight real their things and it's a community of people commenting on the stuff

you know i think it goes a long way to start building your reputation brand now right even while you're sort of a beginner you're kind of documenting your journey you know and i think judo guys should do more of that to help the overall branding of judo. If you're commenting, oh, this guy sucks or that's not a Hanegoshi, that's not good for the sport. So stop doing that shit. If you see someone doing something good, share it. If it sucks, don't do anything. Just don't watch it, don't like it, don't do anything. You don't need to comment on it and trash the person.

you don't like it don't don't do anything you don't need to comment on it and trash the person you're uh you're supporting this path of building up your organically building up your own personal brand which is your reputation yeah then and then you can do so by like going uh being more active on social media more being positively active, not tearing others down. The judo community is very guilty of that, like Shintaro mentioned. If you do a certain throw a little differently, everyone trashes on you. Oh, that ain't gonna work. That's not what Kano meant. Work you know yeah you know work doesn't you know it's not the spirit please against the spirit of judo

kato is gonna roll over in this in the in his grave whatever yeah yes then yeah when you want to take a step further and make this into your career you can rely on that organic branding your own personal branding. That's why you're saying, right? Yes, yes, yes. And also, you need that lift from the community. Yeah. Used to be you isolate everyone in your group,

and then we don't want anyone coming from over there training with us because they might give us staff, which is like a real concern, or they're too dangerous, and my students might get bad injuries or pick up bad habits that could lead to more injuries. We're going to protect our guys. But now in this information age where everyone's sharing everything, you know, we have to be sort of more community oriented to build the whole community up together. Right. Right. Coming

from the guy that didn't go to the Colton Brown training camp. I'm sorry, Colton, you know, because I had to spend the weekend with my daughter. But if I had time, I would go and support that thing. A lot of the dojo owners did support that. So that's the kind of thing that we need. Positivity, uplifting, togetherness. And then it starts with you having a good reputation first and foremost. I mean, Colton's a great example of this.

He has great branding, right? Yeah, yeah. He's an Olympian. What do you think colton brown olympian he's nice to everybody yeah friendly guy you know he's so friendly he's so friendly so friendly big smiles you know yeah i've only met him a couple of times but i just know that like he was so nice to me and like he's very active on social media yeah so that's you know him he did it went out and did it and then he said you know what i'm a two-time olympian and i'm a you know judo coach out in new jersey and he documents everything and

he puts it out there yeah and you know it's majority positive feedback from the community you know and then he could rely on the personal branding that he's built over the years by going all this you know established relationships with other judokas around the country and the world so that he can and he uh he took advantage of that to open up his gym in new jersey and it's doing really well you know that's kind of a good example right yeah and you know it started with him building his reputation doing what he loved to do the best he did it really well and then now because of his good reputation everyone in new jersey is going to visit him now he does open mats people go train you know i have an open invite you know to go visit i haven't yet you know i'm very busy with my daughter but i'm gonna go

yeah support it you know because right we love it colin yeah colin's a man so you know these kinds of things i think everyone you know not everyone can make it to the olympics yeah i mean but everyone can have a personal good reputation of the guy in the gym that everyone wants to train with and then once you kind of start developing that you can kind of lean into that and then hopefully we have more lifers you know the more lifers we have in the sport the better it is for judo as a branding yeah you know we want people who are going to be lifers who are dedicated to lifting everybody up together. Yeah. You know what I mean?

Yeah. And you too could lift up the community by going to higashibrand.com. It's a new – No, but seriously though. Seriously. You see this? Yeah. Higashi.

I know. It's a shirt that I've created. It's a Higashi brand. I want to do – Yeah. I don't want to do geese and rash guards. You know, I want to do something more lifestyle-oriented, right? Oh brand i want to do i don't want to do geese and rash guards you know i want to do something more lifestyle oriented right oh you want to you want to branch out see if so guys i i know this is it you know we're we sound like we're promoting higashi brand we are we are

we admit that but at the same time we're not like I think the progression should be that you know Shintaro already had a you know good branding to begin with he was running a good gym in Manhattan and he was putting up you know still puts out free content on YouTube all the time 99% of my produces free yeah and you know I'll tell you guys right now when you go to gotcha brand calm there's a slew of instructional videos you don don't need to buy them. I mean, it would be nice if you could buy. But everything I've said in those videos, I've already said in the YouTube videos. I mean, there's some things that are like…

More in-depth or like… A little bit more in-depth. More focused. More nuanced. Because I've taught it so many times on camera, it's a little bit more refined and distilled. Different pieces intersect with different pieces. So it is a little bit of a better product uh but you know most of my stuff is free yeah so that's that's how shintaro built his branding i remember when you started putting things up on youtube you were just like a humble beginning on your iphone you know i i was the one getting

your uke or actually filming with your janky iphone that's right and i had no regard for any ukes yeah i was like all right guy hey can you hold the camera and then can you be my uke and be like oh shit yeah this is how you tire as hard as you get bang it's the worst it's going to look good but now i'm like i don't even i very sparingly sparingly throw the person in my videos because it's like i don't want this you know right you know there's no need for that yeah and then branding it wasn't like he was trying to we we weren't trying to you know hype you up as some kind of a judo master or anything it was that we you just had some videos lying around uploaded on youtube got great reception and you kind of identified that the community needs this you know yeah it just kind of started to the life of its

own you know and i remember the first one i did i was like duck under the arm and then go so day yeah and then when you go so day there's a couple of different tricks you know and the one i like to do is i crisscross my hand wrist and then i hug the the arm to my chest and then lift my shoulder and wedge it into the armpit these details you know a lot of guys do this it's nothing new yeah right but they're never explicitly said yeah all the champions are doing it you know but the champions are showing it like oh this arm goes like that and it's a classical crisscross and then you drop your hips underneath but they're never focusing on the details just the way it mattered just the way kano intended

yes there you go you're going away from the kano way kano way yes but yeah even then man it was like this guy's ducking his head that's a penalty you know no one will let you duck your head like that blah blah blah and it's like yeah

if I'm just going for that it's not gonna work but as opposed to me arguing with everyone on the internet I was like you know what let's just let these guys

just talk shit a little bit and then I got so much reward like good feeling from like people watching myself trying to say

oh man I was able to and I like teaching judo at the gym yeah doing judo teaching judo at the gym but now i have to teach people far around the world the dojo yeah it felt good so i just kept doing it you know right right and then all of a sudden little by little my long hair and the ponytail with my wavy natural asian hair usually asian hair straight very straight i have my hair is straight. Very straight. I have straight hair. But my hair is like very wavy for some reason. You see,

it's like I haven't done anything today. I know. You see how wavy this is? It's crazy. People, Asian dudes will get permed to have

hair like yours. Yes. And women are always like, hey, did you do, I'm like, no, this is natural. Blows them away. Yeah.

Is that another branding of yours? Yeah, not on purpose. Honestly, I cut my hair short and then i have been too lazy to go get my hair cut so i've just been letting it grow out so that's that's why people seem to like it yeah yeah so that's how shintaro built his personal branding but i think again going back we're trying to emphasize that it's branding is not oh, you've got to hire a marketing team and some kind of – you've got to have some kind of strategy. It's more – you can be more authentic and organic, and that's more sustainable, I think. And, you know, I see a lot of guys trying to teach martial arts on YouTube or Instagram, but they're not doing it the way that they do it. They're not speaking the way they normally speak.

They're trying to copy me or they're trying to copy somebody else. So you get the guy like, hey, what's up, man? How are you? He's that guy. And all of a sudden, when you meet your opponent in front of you and you reach out and grab the collar, that's not how you talk normally. And it comes off really inauthentic. Or even worse is how you and Joe you and joe talked about it how

if you put on a fake accent happens happens to the best of us man i've done it too actually what which accent did you put on you know my dad your dad's accent my dad when he didn't want to talk to someone at the dojo he would just pretend like he didn't speak English? Oh, I personally witnessed that. I was at nationals, and I was walking around with him, and then another coach came up to me and your dad, and then he was trying to ask him something, like try to say, oh, your dad did something wrong, but he's just like, no English.

And then the coach just walked away, basically. He's like, oh, okay. He doesn't speak English. He's one of those old Japanese guys. Yep. And, you know, that was the thing of the dojo. You know, you couldn't talk to my dad. You just couldn't, unless he wanted to.

And there was one chair next to his chair. Yeah. And there was a desk separating it for years, right? And then you had to be asked to sit in that chair. To be able to talk to them. Yeah. So if someone like randomly knew, didn't know, sat down, one of the black belts would go up to them and tap on the shoulder and go,

you can't sit there. Yeah. What do you think about that as a branding strategy? I mean, you know, people love the old traditional Japanese martial art like guy. He's the old dude. You know, he's sitting old dude you know he's sitting on the side my dad's kind of jack even when he was like yeah 70s right because he we do you see these traps oh i see it they're not like they're not testosterone traps they're

genetic my dad still has it you know it could be testosterone but like my dad has these traps and he just always had him just this yoked up big neck thing and it's genetic and so like there's this dude who's just like sitting there he's like in his 70s and you know he just you couldn't sit there and then sometimes he'll look at you over the side eye and be like oh come on you know sit and then guys be like whoa you don't want to go and sit and have a conversation and then sometimes they're just like yeah you go now now. But it was like a certain thing about Aura, but, you know, and yeah, I wouldn't say that's a brand, but like. I think it's a brand. It's an authentic brand because it's Sensei.

That's how he is in real life, too. Yeah. Like he is like that. I mean, of course, he's a sweet man once you get to know him more. He's very selective with who he yeah even when my mom has friends over dude my dad scurries into the back room he has no part of it well i'm glad i think he likes me so i'm glad that yeah i'm just like you know so i i mean great he's a such a fun guy to hang out with but i don't know about that but it is authentic it's this authentic personal brand

he could he could pull that off because it's sustainable because that's who he is yeah and it worked for him you know when he was running the dojo wouldn't work for you because that's not you no no it's not you know i'm a little bit more sociable yeah and even though i am starting to go towards the path of my father little by little one time uh recently in the last year someone was like oh my god and i was like oh yeah no yeah i didn't understand what he was talking about the guy's like does this guy speak english i think i saw him on youtube yeah i can't get away with that now because everyone knows everyone knows English. Everyone knows I speak English. Maybe I'll grow to be like your dad too.

Yeah. I'll give you two examples of two guys that I train with consistently at Essential. You know, there's JT Torres. Yeah. You know,

he has his own thing already. But like Marcus is the main guy that runs the gym and he's one of the highly, the most skilled guys in the room always, right? He's so technical. He's so amazing. He's so amazing,

like just inversion fast, you know, his jujitsu knowledge is just unbelievable. So like that would be good for him to just like give that value to the world and people would tune in

to just watch him exchange positions and roll. You know? Not even instructions. Was that? Not even him giving instructions, just like.

He's very good at teaching. Oh, okay. Yeah. But his ability, like, for instance, like, we were doing butterfly guard the other day, and he gave me some tips. I was like, oh, my God, you know? Yeah. He gave me, like, two tips in one roll, and I was like, man, like, I didn't even think

about that. It's amazing. Right. You know? Butterfly, like, sweep, I pushed my bottom foot away to pulse out, and he goes, well, then it's easy to close your feet right because of the way your legs are positioned and you can't switch it all aside you know and i was like oh good tip and then i was framing but my shoulder was bothering me so i just kind of like turned away framed with this

on gave my back just to like recover and i was like he's like why do you always do that i was like oh because like when i frame with this left arm it's my bad shoulder that hurts he goes why don't you just connect your hands and now it's a lot more stable i was like huh oh very good high value like concise like great tips yeah so like that guy is super valuable online like people can learn so much from him that's the guy that should have stuff you know a presence online yeah yeah right but he can't be doing like oh what's up man like hi like what happens when i roll with the bodybuilder like that bullshit that's not the guy that he is so there's no world that he should be doing any of that shit right right there's guys who have personalities like that that should do that yeah you know who's

friendly who's like smiling all the time it's kind of goofy that guy should have his right and this other guy nick he's a technician he rolls but he has a very unique style and he's just a friendly funny guy so like that guy's personality's got to be incorporated into the thing you know he's not inverted and doing crazy stuff right but he has a lot of knowledge he teaches and he's uh and you get presented in a very fun way he's just a fun guy yeah he smiled you know yeah sometimes like i'm his uke in the 10 a.m and then like he'll say something and we were joking earlier then i'd start laughing he's like we're laughing and it's kind of like a funny thing you know but like that sort of like

authentic interaction being on the internet and people to really relate to that you know they're drawn to that right so that should be a thing that he does to like kind of you know that should be showcased to be his brand and then eventually if he wants to start a school to have a video people recognize that about him that's what they get you know so we talked a lot about building your personal brand you know a reputation organically, in an authentic way. And we gave some examples. And so now that you say you've built it, you got some reputation, great reputation, people love you in their local gym, the judo scene or BJJ scene, what have you.

How do you then take the next step? Like say, opening up a gym or starting a youtube channel or whatever trying to become a lifer like as you say like i'm sure there's so many ways but are there any concrete steps that i think you need to have enough in the bank first to have a cushion yeah emergency emergency fund don't give up your day job yet start building your reputation first and foremost why are you doing the training so when every time you walk into the gym right yeah and you're the guy that's going to the bathroom and coming back out of the bathroom without sandals on you're damaging your own reputation right so do all the things right

you know be that guy that everyone wants to be around in the gym that's first and foremost right build up your reputation and then little by little the better you get at martial arts you're going to develop a style right yeah we're going to right oh that guy's a spaz that guy's good he's a flowy guy whatever it is and then you start kind of leaning in and then building your own right so you start identifying with certain things yeah right like a different routes that way yeah i identify something you know that right what i've just been over my head yeah it's a it's a pronoun thing oh my god i see i see all right all right okay it's a joke yeah you know because it's identified this and that you know it's a cool thing you know i'm not making fun of it it's kind of funny i see all right all right okay it's a joke yeah you know because it's identifying this and that you know it's a cool thing you know i'm not making fun of you man it's kind of funny

i see you just pointed out like uh something in the uh you know zeitgeist you know my favorite joke in the dojo you know this all right i mean it's semi-appropriate you know but this is like what i say in the dojo sometimes it's pg-13 ish you know okay all right guys we're doing right side versus left side kenko to position you know so righties try to grab lefties but if you got two righties in the room the your partners are righty you're righty one of you's got to identify as a lefty or identify on the left or the you know yeah the right and the left like politically and yeah i get some laughs but now like i say that in advance when it's yellow and above or the advanced class.

Everyone heard this joke so many times. It's dead silence. We've got a couple of people who support me. Like, ha, ha, ha. I'm like, all right, I'm going to stop. Maybe you should move on from that joke. Kills at seminars, though. Oh.

Kills. I bet bet you know uh yeah because it's a fresh for them i guess but it's risky because you gotta look through the room and see okay the room yeah for that you know yeah you can't you probably can't tell that joke in california well depends on where you are in california i guess yeah yeah like uh California, I guess. Yeah, like bougie dojo in San Francisco or hippie dojo. Yeah, probably not there.

What do you mean by that, Sensei? Destroy my wholesome brand. Your personal branding. It's all in jest. But yeah, so you build up the brand then you can kind of identify your angle right like maybe oh hey I have this my angle is that I have a funny personality maybe I'll start a YouTube channel alongside my gym you

know yeah but you got to have some practical uh considerations like you have to have enough money don't just go and quit your day job you know yeah running it takes a long time to build your reputation it takes an instant to ruin it right yeah and then a long time to build your brand so you know while you're doing it and if you're leaning into the thing like you said right yeah and you're trying to build a business it It takes a long time. So you have to have some reserves. Yeah. Yeah. It's the right thing to do.

Yeah. Yeah. All right. Well, I think that's about it about branding and martial arts. Yeah. Anything else? Like any practical tips you've branded yourself a little bit,

you know, Shintaro Higashi, right? Did you teach a judo? You're the judo guy. That's the, it feels good. You know, when people are like, Hey, you're the judo guy that's the it feels good you know when people are like

hey you're the guy that does takedowns online I got that today I got that today I'm your guest yeah pretty high level jujitsu grappler

he's a black belt on the Lachlan in Australia oh the Australian guy yeah yeah and then he was like yo I learned so much

about my stand up from you from your YouTube you're the guy that teaches stand up you know even the Nogi stuff was very helpful.

I was like, wow, that felt really good. Yeah. You know? Yeah. So, check out Higashi Brand.

Lifestyle Brand. You know, because my whole mentality behind the Lifestyle Brand is like, judo, karate, martial arts

used to be this thing, right, that people kind of did and under the radar. And, you know, even like MMA, you go into the office with a black guy they're like oh what is this guy doing you know and if you're an adult practitioner of like karate or taco no it's like wait wait isn't that for my like son does yeah so there's a level of like where does like the mainstream think like where is the mainstream when it comes in regards to martial arts yeah you know we're trying to go mainstream now yeah but i don't want like dragons

and the crazy stuff that makes you really an outcast you know what i mean i want like the subtle skater lifestyle branding that's like oh that guy likes to skate but it's kind of an everyday sort of it's a if know, you know kind of a thing. What is it? Vans. Yeah, Vans. Vans, yeah. You don't have to be a skater to wear it.

Or you can be like a converse is like that with a basketball shoe. Yeah. But it's not a lifestyle, just regular shoes. Yeah, but if you're wearing JNCOs and you have no skating anything, you're a poser. Yeah. So that's where I'm trying to build this higashi brand thing you know not like oh shintaro higashi kind of a thing but just like a brand like it's a kind of asian ish okay okay i get it i get it ish like because that's where martial arts comes from right like judo japanese jiu-jitsu and then it became brazilian jiu-jitsu and now that's a thing and belts black belt white belt there's a whole asian thing about it and i want it to be a subtle thing if you know you know so when you you know so representing your thing

out in the real world but it doesn't make you too much of an outcast because it's not too loud it's subtle you know what i mean it's like having a little bit of cauliflower here that's what i'm looking for that's a great way to put it yeah a little bit i mean i got neat in the year today and i was like oh my god and then i was like complaining about it and glick's like dude it's not a big deal you already have messed up here i was like but mine is perfect right yeah yours your cauliflower ears are like not bad enough that people go yuck but it's like people who know will recognize yeah it's just like the perfect amount of cauliflower you know what i'm so jealous yeah i did and you know i could hide it a little bit with my hair

yeah and if i'm going on a date or something and you can still use your airpods right yeah my left side pops out because the inside is the cauliflower. Oh, okay. I see. But it's the perfect size. That's what I'm going for, the perfect cauliflower. Follow your wish. And if you know, you know.

That's branding. That's branding. Yeah, that's what it is. That's what it is. So check out HigashiBrand.com, please. Yeah. And let me know what you think. Reach out to usashiBrand.com, please. Let me know what you think. Reach out to us. Give us your tips,

ideas, feedback. I greatly appreciate it. I hope you enjoyed my little rant of 30 minutes just talking about nonsense. No, I don't think it was nonsense. Grow organically. Show us your authentic self. If you want to be a lifer,

be a lifer and grow our sports all that good stuff you know what we should do we should do one episode where you're just talking about programming and AI and all the stuff

that you're getting into and what what should we do that let's do that I don't know Peter Yusho

with Shintaro Higashi let's do a couple episodes like that we'll see so okay if you're still listening Should we do that? Let's do that. I don't know. Peter Yusho with Shintaro Higashi. Let's do a couple episodes like that. We'll see. So, okay. If you're still listening to us, you're pretty one of the few most dedicated fans. No one's listening right now.

So, if you just heard what Shintaro suggested, let us know if that's what you want. I don't know if people want that, but yeah. How about this? If you made it it this far comment something on the thing if you made it this far comment below and if you want to hear me talk about what i do day to day just write peter you in the comments yeah peter you and i'll think about it watch us get get none of that. Yeah. I'm fine with that. I'm fine with that. All right.

Thanks a lot, guys. Thank you very much. We'll see you guys in the next episode.