Your World Within Podcast by Eddie Pinero - Screw Being Shy - With Mark Metry

Episode Date: September 6, 2020

In this episode I sit down with Mark Metry, author, speaker and podcaster to discuss: - How a change in perspective helped transform Mark from anxious, depressed and suicidal to someone able to see the good in life and pursue his passion - Finding the positive during these challenging covid 19 restrictions/lockdowns - The amazing upside/opportunity of utilizing social media... as well as the danger associated with using some of its metrics to measure success - Living a life of authenticity and finding the courage to improve upon the things that matter to you most

And then all of a sudden it went to, oh, wait. So if I understand like at least basically what my brain is, I didn't, I kind of stopped taking it personally. I was like, wait, I'm depressed, not because I'm some like loser who doesn't have any friends. I'm depressed because of X, Y, Z factor happening in my brain. And that's where really things started to look like a science project from. They went from like this moral ethical failure to like,

Huh, this is interesting. I wonder what happens if I experiment. I wonder what happens if I do this or I try this out. What kind of output am I going to have? Welcome to the Your World Within podcast. I'm Eddie Panero. In this episode, I sit down with my friend Mark Metri. Just an insightful, incredible guy.

A lot to share. And you can definitely take a lot away from this conversation. He is the host of the Top Rang Podcast, Humans 2.0. where he's interviewed a lot of exceptional people, you know, from CEOs to athletes to entertainers, and pulls out some great information from them. So make sure you check that out. He's got a new book, a relatively new, I should say, called Screw Being Shy. He's been featured on Amazon Prime's docu series, The Social Movement. He's a podcast consultant, just everywhere.

And it's really fun to sit down and talk about his journey, his, his, progress from someone that was at one point, you know, very insecure, very anxious, battled with depression. At one point said he didn't even have a will to live and completely transform that and find the joy in life and ultimately find a path that, you know, not only is he crazy about and excites him, but helps so many other people. So this is a great episode. I'm sure you're going to love it. Here is Mark Metri. So Mark Metri, welcome to the show. Eddie Panero, thank you so much for having me, man, on this amazing platform that you've been able to build over many, many years that, you know, has inspired people like me to get out there and

inspire other people. So, you know, I really appreciate what you're doing. I love it. And thank you for extending this to me. Yeah. Oh, hey, of course. And you're doing great work. work and we've had a chance to connect a few times before this and you know I'm pretty in tune with the amazing stuff you're doing and it's fun it's fun to connect with uh you know young folks changing the world so um happy to happy to be here so how's everything going up in up in bean town with the corona stuff and how has it affected your world yeah um you know honestly i would say most things are back to normal here for the most part except for obviously like wearing masks um but you know really, man, I think this was a really interesting time, you know, since March that has really,

I think shocked a lot of us, you know, like for me, I was always traveling. I was always go, go, go, go, go. I had a book coming out at that time. I had a TEDx talk, all these different things that kind of happened or got postponed. So yeah, I mean, overall, such a crazy learning experience, really just like put up a mirror in front of me, really showed me like, you know, hey Mark, who are you when you can't go to the gym. You know, Hey, Mark, who are you? And you can't travel and you can't speak at these events that you love speaking.

So it's been such a crazy reflective experience for me personally. And all in all, I haven't, you know, been too affected, you know, economically business-wise. So I'm super grateful and just trying to do my part and help people who, you know, may not be as fortunate than me. Yeah, no, that's incredible.

I mean, if anything, it shows. shows you the importance of being able to adapt, right? Things changed so quick. I remember in March, you were like, you sent something out that it was like TEDx, like canceled or postponed, whatever it was, book release, postponed. It was like your life overnight just did a 180. But I mean, it looks like you got back on the horse and conquered, you know, so it's cool to see, but life is not smooth sailing. That's for sure. No, man, it's not. It's not. And yeah, and you know, it also, you know, like I think personally speaking to, you know, I was putting out this book. It was called Screw Being Shy. It was all about social anxiety. What do you do if you're super shy? And so that kind of,

you know, if everyone's quarantines and there's no social gatherings, then, you know, that kind of puts a dent. But, but, you know, like right now, for example, you know, I'm experiencing increased, you know, people are checking out the book now. And really, man, you just got to make the most of it. because the truth is, is, you know, there's people out there who have lost their jobs.

There's people out there who have gotten coronavirus and I've gotten sick. And I'm just, you know, lucky I'm not in that group. And yeah, man,

I mean, the truth is, it's been super hard. You know, it's been extremely hard. And that's why, you know, I've really learned the important of,

like, balance, the importance of, you know, not just, not just, like, hustling all day

because you can, but really just, like, taking breaks that are productive for your mental health rather than just for productivity sake. You know, this is, I honestly feel like I've become a new person since March and I've like really had to relearn so much of the stuff that I've been doing.

But, but yeah, man, it's crazy. I mean, I love to hear from you. Like, how has it been for you on your end of things? It's been good. I mean, so similar situation, right? It was like in March, my thought process was, you know, as devastating as this is for a lot of people, you know, particularly financially. It's really kick people's feet out from under them. The ones who really find the opportunity in this time period, which appears very grim,

will come out on top because if you finagle stuff and you move life around, you can find small winds that kind of not only push you through, but you can leave a situation like this better than when you walked in. And I know it sounds insane, but you can. You can come out stronger and with something to show for it. And, you know, that's why that one post I referenced really resonated with me when you were talking about all the checklist of all the things that, you know, the curveballs you just got. And then, you know, just to see you overcome that and, you know, release that book and continue, you know, with the podcast and all these great things you're doing. It's just, it was really cool. So it inspired me. I'm sure it inspired a lot of other people as well. Yeah. Thanks, Ben. I appreciate it. And,

And yeah, you know, it's also super inspiring to, you know, just like be okay too with, with like not having things to work out the way that they worked or like the way that we thought that they would pan out. And so, yeah, there's been a lot of transitions. There's been a lot of curves. Like, for example, like about a month ago now, I launched a new business, which, you know, a lot of people would say is probably not the best idea. but the truth is, like, you know, I've learned that even economically speaking where you may be

living in a recession or there's a lot of people who are unemployed, I mean, there's still just so much opportunity out there. And like that may be hard to understand it. It may be especially hard to understand if you are, you know, maybe on Twitter all the time looking at the news. if maybe you have people around you who maybe have lost their jobs or don't really speak of a lot of opportunity. But like that's that's something that I've like recently seen over like the last month and how important it is to keep my mind open for possibilities. And like I see this open. I see this happen all the time where, you know, maybe, you know, for a few days, I don't really meditate the way that I know I should be meditating. I don't really journal the way I should be journaling.

And I'm not really focusing my mind on opportunities. And then next thing I know, you know, I see a literal, like, monetary dip in my business. But then all of a sudden, like, I start to really harness my mind. I start to really focus on opportunities. Next thing I know, you know, my business is climbing. It's hitting, you know, sales records, things like that. So that's like being one of the biggest lessons for him personally throughout this pandemic. and just like over the last month of like there's there's so much opportunity out there and

and i think a lot of people i don't know may get offended or may not like that if you say that but the truth is is it's out there and you know if you look at previous recessions you look at previous you know economic downturns in history and there's there's always a group of people who say you know what i'm going to start this thing or i'm going to start doing this and so i totally agree with you on you can totally come out of this way, way better, even though the situation may seem bad. And just like that reminder to make sure that your mind is doing that. And it's a, it's a daily practice. It's not something that, you know, you just like reach this mindset and then you have it forever. No, it's, it's every day. And if you do that, then you start to see the outside world change slowly

but surely. So I love that, man, for sure. Yeah. And it's funny because it does sound insensitive, right? but sometimes some of life's most important things are. I mean, the truth sometimes is insensitive. I remember, and I forget if I mentioned this on your pocket, maybe we met. Now, we met before the corona stuff. Yeah. But who's the author of Harry Potter books?

I'm drawing a blank right now. T.K. Rowling. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So she put out this message that was essentially like, you know, stop telling people to find the opportunity sometimes getting through is enough. And I remember, I'm like, ooh, you know, like I totally get the same. sentiment because people are going through hell. But I just remember thinking like that's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's the reality. Um, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. Man, I think, I think,

I think a big part of that is, is, um, is, you know, just because of like, you know, everyone has access to a cell phone these days. Everyone has social media. And so I think of like, personally for me, what I think is, I think whatever you have in your mind already, before you open up Twitter before you read that Instagram quote, I think that's largely going to be a reflection of how you feel, even if it has nothing to do with the post. It's a very good point. You know, so I think that's the massive part of it.

And yeah, I mean, the truth is, is, you know, I think there are good and right ways to do it to get people to focus on the opportunities. But yeah, I mean, I definitely think that we should all have compassion. I definitely, I feel like I've seen some people who have been a, little bit, you know, more like kind of insensitive. But I think that just comes down to like messaging and then just realizing that you're never going to be able to make everyone happy. And, you know, you have such great messaging. You know, like the way that you talk, the language, the concepts, the pillars that you've built under like your, your world within and everything you have

on your YouTube channel, that's so well built. And so you're a great example of someone who's, who's, I think, doing this the right way and definitely an inspiration to me. I appreciate that, Mark. Thank you. It's funny. I mean, it's like how you articulate the mad. Like, two people can say the same thing and the reaction can be, you know, very, very different. Yeah.

But you said something a few seconds ago that I want to make sure I didn't overlook. So you mentioned the hustling 24-7 thing, right? Because you're talking about the business you're building. Which, by the way, I think is an incredible. idea, right? Because it's essentially podcast consulting, right? Or you help people build podcasts. Both, both. Yeah. And then there's also like a program too for people who like just want to take our program that walks you through how to do the podcast. And yeah, I mean, it's it's it's, it's definitely been crazy like so far like just in the last month we've helped. We've helped various

clients of ours launch podcasts around like disrupting the health care system, making a podcast around human child trafficking, just like a lot of different things. And like personally for me, I started my podcast, not to like build my brand, but I started it to literally just surround myself with people who could help me change my life,

help my mindset. And there's so many other examples and so many other people out there who want to be doing the same thing. And so I just kind of launched this podcast accelerator, this podcast network to help build shows that are growth-minded that are accelerating human consciousness, whether that's from a mindset perspective or a business perspective.

So, yeah, I think for asking. Yeah, I mean, what a perfect time, though, right? We talk about finding the opportunity. Everyone's sitting at home with the microphone. Right. Yeah, literally. It's a godsend. Yeah. So, but, you know, the working 24-7 thing, you know,

you're a big advocate of, you know, everyone says grind, grind, grind, grind, but wait a minute. You know, let's think, let's be rational. So what do you mean by that? Yeah. Thank you for asking. Man. So a massive part of what I'm doing today has to do with, you know, kind of what happened to me when I was a young person. So, you know, for me, I got on the internet when I was like 12 years old

and I just, I started doing a ton of different things. I was launching YouTube channels. I was learning how to code. I made apps. I made websites. Started hustling a bit. Started to make some money for the first time. My first real big success was I started, I basically started the world's biggest Minecraft server. And Minecraft, it's like this video game. And long story short, I was like 15, 16 years old and I'm making six figures from having this Minecraft server that just totally blows up. We end up having like millions of users, some crazy, crazy stuff that I look back on. Like, man, I can't believe that actually happened. Yeah, that's unbelievable.

That's really something. Yeah, but anyway, you know, I really went from this kid who literally, you know, my parents immigrated to this country. We lived on government housing, food stamps to all of a sudden being like, you know, very well off self-sufficient in my income. And I truly just began to learn over a period of years by the time I was 18, where I was obese and depressed. And I had always faced social anxiety my entire life. But I was really in a time where I was socially isolating myself and I was suicidal. And the reason why is because I had thought that success was the one true antidote to finding myself, to, you know, once I have this amount of money or once I have this perceived social

status or once these people love me, then I'm finally going to be happy and I'm not going to have any problems. And so obviously as I was able to come out of that early on, and then honestly kind of run into the same cycles at sometimes like with me and my journey since 2015, 2016 of, you know, seeing my podcast grow, you know, being on like all these different things from Forbes to TEDx to being invited to do this Amazon Prime documentary series and writing a book and just have people look up to you and all these different amazing things that are awesome. but I've often found that that's just not a substitute for these things. And a lot of the times, you know, I've seen this pattern within myself, Eddie, where I start to receive a lot of validation

from the outside world. That might be social media. That might be people like in my real life, my friends, my family telling me I'm awesome, you know, making a lot of money, have kind of like all the right things checking off all the boxes. And, you know, what I've seen happens to me is I'm no longer really using my muscle of internal validation. I'm not really flexing that. And like what I mean by internal validation is, you know, what you basically do, like how you talk to yourself, how you ground yourself every morning.

You know, people do different things from meditation to exercising, to praying, to journaling, to, you know, a wide variety of things. And so I find that a lot of times if we have like this belief for like this false expectation of like success, especially from like kind of that outside societal perspective, if we can just get that, then we start to not really, you know, do the things that got us there in the first place when it comes to internal validation. And so yeah, I mean, that's like a massive pattern that I've seen, you know, I see it all the time like on social media with a lot of, um, like the entrepreneur kind of type of of influencers of just you know like you know hustling is is the most important thing but I think my perspective on that now is like you should hustle in every area of your life and what I mean by that is like you should hustle when it comes to figuring out how do I rest properly like you should hustle your rest you should you should hustle and try to work as hard

as possible to eat healthy, to make sure that your energy is good, to make sure that your mental healthy, your physical health is good. And so I think what I'm saying is we need to take just a multivariate approach of like, what does a human being actually need to be productive in the long term, happy and healthy? And the truth is is we're not just robots. You know, the truth is just because we are all quarantine and we're at home doesn't mean that, you know, you should be sitting inside, crouch down, sitting on a computer, and, you know, falling into all of different technologies, potentially like toxic cycles of distracting you, you doing something totally different. And so I think a lot of the conversation is like, how do we figure out as humans to sort of

fit in this new environment, technologically speaking, and then also with our work, to be able to ensure our happiness, longevity in the long term? And that's much more than just, you know, trying to focus on just being productive for your job because we're not, we're not robots. So that's my take on it. And I've seen the extremes of this and myself in terms of being suicidal. And so I know how important it is. And, you know, on my podcast, I've had people from the co-founder of Netflix to other billionaires who are like, yeah, you know, when I had X hundred million dollars in my bank account, I was literally going to kill myself. And so, I mean, I've just heard it from so many other smarter people from myself to, whether that's like a neuroscientist or an athlete, say like, the way that you become successful in life is not just by approaching success from a narrow dimension of getting followers, of getting money, of even getting social status, earning respect from others.

But it's really a multivariate approach that requires taking care of your brain, cultivating your mindset, being able to have the right amount of rest. balance that's good for you and so yeah that's that's the kind of approach I take and I think it's just so important because you know it's easy it's easy to like look at this if you're doing nothing it's like yeah you know I don't see how that's too hard but you know if you're a CEO if you're a founder of a company you know you're busy a lot of the times this stuff is especially even so much more important because the people that you directly interact with you present yourself and the version of yourself that you have sort of built in that moment. And if you haven't been able to

kind of like take a step back, rest, be fully kind of energized, be balanced, you know, you're not going to be the best kind of leader you can be. And so, you know, a lot of it is very much connected with many different parts of our society. But yeah, I think if leaders and a lot of us who are just trying to be busy, trying to make stuff happen in the world, took a step back and like, hey, how can we maybe like look at ourselves, how can we maybe develop our own self-development, how can we make sure that we put in the right systems, tools,

schedules in to make sure that we're putting in the right amount of effort for each person to make sure that they take care of their mental health and balance it out between just, you know, responding to emails and, you know, editing videos for social media. Yeah, I mean, God,

some powerful stuff. That's some really powerful. stuff. So for someone, let's say, depressed or even worse, God forbid, suicidal, you know, when you made that jump, you have, I mean, night and day, right? So was it changing your projects to better suit what you love? Or was it changing the way you look at your projects? Or I guess like a 10,000 foot view, right? You're talking to some young person sitting there with the world in front of them, but maybe they don't see it. And they just feel stuck. Like, what did that transition and tail for you. Yeah. So yeah, I mean, there's so many different things that I could go

into, but I think one of the biggest things that truly changed for me was, you know, I always took whatever my mind, whatever my brain told me, whatever I saw, like as the objective truth. If someone said something to me, if my brain thought a certain maybe social judgment was about to occur on like, oh, I think that person might be talking about about me or, you know, I'm just like this, this person living life. I always just took what my mind told me immediately. I took it objectively. I never questioned it. And for me, when I discovered like the scientific fact that we experienced the earth and our life itself as, as we are. And so what I mean is, by that is, you know, our mind, our brain, it creates this mental model of the world based on

what we've seen, based on what we've experienced, based on our traumatic past experiences, based on our assumptions, our beliefs. And it takes that in and it builds a model of how the world is in our head. And then our head plays that out regardless of what scenario we are in, for the most part, unless you have maybe another traumatic experience that forces you to maybe look at the world differently. And so for me, when I just realized that of like, hey, life is not like this thing that I should take personally of where all of a sudden I feel sad and then the world looks dark and then I start to think on how I have no friends and everybody hates me because these things are real. But then all of a sudden I started looking at it of like,

like, okay, my brain is this physical organ that has its own system of running things that have existed for thousands of years. And that is our neurotransmitters. Those are our brain cells. That is the various cognitive biases and assumptions and dispositions and distortions that our brain has created. And so like one of the most impactful things that I could get somebody to look at is if you go on Google and you type in cognitive bias codex, you're going to be seeing a graph, like this big infographic of a brain and all of the different cognitive assumptions that our brain has naturally formed through thousands of years to help create each person's reality. And so what I mean by this is like the most common example of this is the negativity bias. This is, you,

You know, if 100 people walk up to you today and 99 people tell you you're awesome, but then one person says you suck, your brain is just going to focus on that one person who told you, um, you suck. You know, another sort of cognitive bias that our brain does is it takes, you know, a very small piece of information and then it instantly tries to create the full picture. It instantly tries to create the full picture behind what we think is happening. happening based on a small piece of information that we got that may be truthful or may not even be based in reality at all. And so when I began to look at these things and I began to look at, oh, hey, let's take a scientific perspective of your brain of like there are multiple neurotransmitters.

You know, people talk about them all the time. One of the most common ones is like dopamine. Another one is oxytocin. These do different things in our body from like, you know, oxytocin is for love. You know, like when you, when you hug someone, you get like that really warm, you know, fuzzy feeling, that's oxytocin. One of the biggest neurotransmitters that, you know, I kind of talk about in my book that I did my research on that is so important for this stuff, mental health, especially suicide and depression, is serotonin.

And serotonin does a lot of things in our body and our brain from regulating our mood to our appetite to regulating how we function in social groups. And so it's super important for people who have social anxiety. And then it turns out that like, hey, most of the serotonin neurotransmitter, most of it isn't even in your brain. 90% of it is in this thing called your gut microbiome, which is this ecosystem of bacteria that kind of science has uncovered in just the last 10, 15 years, that has 90% of your serotonin. And so, So this is like where the importance of regulating your chronic stress and then also your diet is massive when it comes to these things.

And so basically, Eddie, what I'm saying is when I began to look at life and begin to see my life for what it actually is, is a series of various feedback loops running in my brain from a biological perspective. And that's where really things went from, hey, I'm Mark. I'm this 18-year-old who is obese, who. you know, can't talk to people who hates himself, who has never done anything of significance before because I can't really talk to people and I think there's something wrong with me. Maybe God just created me this way or maybe I was born this way. And then all of a sudden it went to,

oh, wait. So if I understand like at least basically what my brain is, I didn't, I kind of stopped taking it personally. I was like, wait, I'm depressed, not because I'm some like loser who doesn't have any friends. I'm depressed because of X, Y, Z factor happening in my brain. And that's where really things started to look like a science project from me. They went from like this moral, ethical failure to like, huh, this is interesting. I wonder what happens if I experiment. I wonder what happens if I do this or I try this out. What kind of output am I going to have? And so for me, that was one of the most empowering beliefs that I kind of slowly uncovered because once I reached then, then it was just like, okay, what do I need to do to just become more of myself?

What do I need to do to like rewire my brain and undo this sort of natural default conditioning that has happened to me over the last, you know, 10, 15, 18 years of my life? And so that for me was like one of the biggest things that one of the biggest things that one of I found that out, that's really where I did discover self-development, where I did discover, oh, wait, you can actually improve yourself because prior to that moment, it had just never occurred to me that you could change your life ever. So super interesting. It's fun. I mean, it resembles, you know, my transformation almost exactly, right? Because it's like you do. You see this world as this black and white thing and these parameters you have to live between. And you realize, no, I write the story. And

it's it's it's it's it's it's a game-changing thing um yeah so you can make an argument based on what you're talking about that anxiety wasn't you know something that you necessarily just defeated it sprung board everything for you right like it it's almost rewired the way that that you look at like for me it was evolutionary psych similar to what you're saying it's like the big thing is just control it's like oh my god I have control over things. And you know, you're talking about the negativity bias and all these cognitive biases that we have without realizing it.

And it's just this awareness. It's like, oh, my God, I pull the strings. And so sometimes you have to be low to realize you can empower yourself and become more. And man, what a story. Yeah, man. It's such a powerful story, especially because, you know, I think a lot of these things are connected.

And so, for example, like, I don't think there's any, I don't think there's any coincidence that, you know, I spent the first 18 years of my life, literally trying to hide from the world, not wanting anybody to know my name, having extreme social anxiety, never, ever publicly speaking, let alone just speaking my truth when I was with a friend or some other kind of social group to today, like literally doing the opposite of. all of that. And so I think a massive part of it too is like I definitely think, you know, part of me at least at like a like a spiritual level or like an existential level was definitely anxious just because I just simply wasn't the person who I was created to be. You know, I'm not created to be some shy person who can't speak up and can't tell the truth. No, I'm like the person who I am now that I've learned is like a very, you know, fun kind of brutal truth. honest guy, sometimes funny, sometimes creative, who, you know, just loves to say it how it is. And I think that's so important because, you know, for example, like I was in college at that time and I was

studying to be a computer science major. And I was just like, part of me was like, hey, I don't want to sit down on a computer and talk to a computer using computer language for the rest of my life. And I hate doing this now, which probably means like in four years from now when I graduate, I'm probably going to be working some job where I'm not going to be truly myself and I'm just sort of going to settle for doing this thing. And so definitely I think all these things are related of like, you know, I wasn't looking at life the right way. You know, I was coming from a background of a lot of conditioning. I wasn't really doing what I was supposed to be doing in life. I wasn't surrounded by the right people. I hadn't met the right people. And I think the other big thing too is like

when I, when I discovered like many different people, for example, you were one of them. And I remember you know, like on my walks where I had no idea what to do with my life and just going on Spotify and either searching for it was like entrepreneurship or motivation and then seeing you, your tracks come up. Just like knowing that people like you exist was a major thing for me. I was like, oh my God, I've like always thought about this the way in my entire life, but I just never knew that there were people out there who existed. When I first discovered Gary Vaynerchuk, that was truly the first time where I was exposed

to the idea that it's okay to be an entrepreneur versus like just being an athlete or being good at school, which I was neither one of those. And so a lot of it was just meeting the right people in my life that literally showed me, oh, it's okay to live your life like this. Whereas before, when I was surrounded by, you know, the people who just kind of like grew up with me in my small same town, my parents, you know, my family, my friends, you don't really get that. And so that was another massive thing of just surrounding myself with the right people. And I'm not even talking about literally. I'm just talking about virtually. You know, obviously you should put the right people in your life literally physically, but just like virtually knowing that certain people exist and then

potentially, you know, interfacing with them on some way. Like, you know, I started a podcast. I have a live stream series on my LinkedIn. That, that or like even reading someone's book listening to their podcast, I think that in and of itself is a massive way. And yeah, I mean, the last thing that I'll say is, remember listening to Tim Ferriss's podcast. And I had never listened to Tim Ferriss's podcast before. And the one episode that I happened to click on was when Tim was talking about when he was in college and he was suicidal as well. And the real power in what that kind of did to me was, it showed me almost in real time a story of somebody who was literally in the same exact position as I was in in college suicidal. But then I, you know, I googled Tim Ferriss. I looked him up. And I was like,

man, this guy is doing so many awesome things. He's writing books. He's speaking. He's influencing companies, influencing groups of people, really doing a lot of amazing things. Why can't I be like him? Or at least if this person found a way out, then it's possible. Let me look at his story. And yeah, I don't have to mirror it or copy it 100%. But I bet if I did some research, I bet if I looked it up and I took like an intellectual curiosity, then I would at least get some ideas of what I could do to at least put my first step or put my second foot forward to at least just start this journey, man. So yeah, you know, it's a it's a multi-pronged approach, but there's so much to it. But yeah, definitely surrounding yourself with the right people is so important. Yeah, absolutely is.

One, like understanding that there's, you can change. Nothing's permanent. And two, realizing that you have the power to do that, which you did. And I'm wondering, you know, you have a very successful podcast and, you know, you sit down with new people every week. And was it this, this realization that pulling in people's thoughts and ideas and implementing them into your own life, parsing bits and pieces of others, how they've done things? Is that what motivated you to get started on that route? How'd you end up doing that? Yeah. Yeah, yeah, it's a good question.

You know, for me, I remember being in a spot in my life where I had kind of started this new journey, like literally changing everything about myself, trying to uncover the truth of who I am, getting healthier from a mental perspective, physical, spiritual, psychological perspective. but also anyone who's also on this kind of similar journey, you know, the journey is very hard. You know, there's going to be many moments where you're going to face resistance. You're going to face moments where you feel like you're alone. You have no idea what you're doing.

There's no possible next step you want to quit. You want to go back to what you used to do. And so I was in one of those. And I remember going for a run in the woods one day. And I remember just like kind of looking at, my entire journey of being like, man, I literally went from someone who literally couldn't speak up, literally was just riddled with anxiety 24-7 that literally controlled his life to like really changing my life and really like just being proud of who I am and just having

peace in my head. And so I was super proud of myself for the decisions and the work that I was putting in. And I kind of likened it to like, you know, if everyone here is born on planet Earth and it's just sort of the default version, they're kind of like a humans version 1.0. You know, similar to like software technology, there's always like that version 1.0 that's going to have quirks, that's going to have issues,

that's going to have glitches and bugs. And then I started to think about this new lifestyle that I was living now, and I'm like, man, this is really like an upgraded kind of lifestyle. This is like a second version. And so I had spoken with many people about this. I'm like, hey,

I'm not the only person that's doing this. You know, we're like a humans, humans two point O, humans versions 2.0. And so it was kind of like that conceptual idea combined with the fact that, you know, at that time, I had changed a lot of my friends. I had changed a lot of people. But I still don't, I still don't have like enough people in my life where I would say I had like a totally transformed life. You know, I was still at that time stuck with, you know, to be quite frank, just a lot of people that I would say I don't want to really hang out with people who I've just always hung out with just to hang out with them. You know, we're not really similar in our values and our beliefs.

They may drag you down. And so a big part of the podcast was like, man, I just need to get out there. And, you know, of course, I was kind of coming from social anxiety, but I was definitely still in the social anxiety shyness realm. And so I'm definitely not the person that, you know, goes to an event and just like yells and like starts talking to everybody and starts meeting a ton of friends. I'm more definitely for short introvert. And so I was like, hey, let me create some kind of system where I could just get in front of

someone who's smarter than me every single week. And so I did that and then that became more than once a week. And it's taken on many different forms. But then you look back and, you know, like almost 600 episodes later. And then, you know, for example, like yesterday. day, I just put up an interview with Jay Shetty, which is awesome, which is literally somebody who I remember also alongside you, I learned from in my dorm room in 2016, and he taught me so many different things. And to be able to sit down with him in person, and we did this pre-COVID in

March, that's just crazy. And so that's like my life now. It happens to me like every week, every day and I'm just constantly surrounded by people who are smarter than me. I can take that information, give that to the people that I love. And it's, yeah, man, it's truly changed my life. And it's, I like to think of it as like my own education system. You know, like I say that I totally failed the education system. And I think it failed me too. But I created my own.

And it was literally just like, hey, I want to learn more about meditation. Let me go interview and find the top 10. meditation, teachers, masters. Let me, you know, I want to learn more about nutrition. Let me interview the top 10, you know, doctors, nutritionists, people out there in the world who are doing the work. And they're not just sort of theorizing about it or they're not just, you know, just like writing articles about it online.

So that was one of the biggest things of like, I need to get with the game shake, the shakers and movers. And the truth is, is they're probably not going to respond. And I was 20 at the time. They're probably not going to respond to an email. by some 20-year-old asking them to like pick their brain. And so, yeah, it was kind of strategic. It was kind of like a way to systematize my learning.

But yeah, man, it's truly an amazing journey. And it's truly just become a part of my life now. That's just an extension. Yeah. The computer science background makes humans 2.0 genius, right? That just always went over my head. I was like, yeah, second edition, but it's like software upgrade. That's really cool.

Yeah. I love how you, you know, like to me, one of the things that resonates is like you can succeed being who you want. Like it's okay to be an introvert. Make it work for you. You know what I mean? You don't have to be the loudest guy in the room. You just don't. And not only that, I mean, you can make an argument that it's better not to be.

But so many people think they need to change and rewire who they are. And it's like, no, take what you love and who you are and what you're about and make it work for you. And you've done that. That's so inspiring that. Yeah, I appreciate that. I mean, I think that's like such a like a nuanced message because, you know, I think the truth is is that I've always like now, I am the person who I have always been truthfully deep down.

But yet, you know, I think like maybe a few, like several years ago, I wouldn't be that person because I thought I had to not be this shy person. I thought I had to be like this loud person. And so I think the really interesting part that happens is like when you think you are supposed to be like that, but then you look at yourself and you're like, oh, why aren't I like that? And like rather than be motivated out of, you know,

like love, growth, wanting to transform yourself, wanting to help others, you're motivated by shame and guilt. and anxiety. And I think, you know, sometimes that could be good, but I think what happens is it's like a self-fulful in prophecy. You know, like I remember spending my entire life, literally in every single classroom,

every single room that I walked into, of like literally saying like, I suck, you know, if it was like, if I was in some kind of a classroom, it was like, oh, I really hope I don't get picked on. I really hope I don't speak.

Because if I do, then I'm not going to be as good enough as these people and this and that. And thinking that literally makes it true. Like it literally, puts you in like this weird feedback loop where what you're trying to run away from becomes even bigger and it becomes your reality. So I think what you said is such a nuanced message because I definitely agree that some people should definitely change themselves and rewire themselves. But it's like you're not just doing that randomly. You're not just doing that to find new things.

My opinion, my belief is you're short of trying to unlearn and just kind of like remove the pounds of BS that we've picked up throughout our lives as kids that just may not necessarily serve us for who we are and especially at this time in our life path. And so yeah, I think part of the journey is like being the person who you've always been knew you could be, but then also changing enough to almost like give give yourself the opportunity, give yourself the white space to be yourself by removing the crap that we have unconsciously or consciously maybe put up in a different time in our lives, but may still linger with us. That makes sense. No, that's a powerful differentiation, right?

Because you're not growing into who the world wants you to be. You're growing into a better version of yourself. Yeah. And that awareness is huge. Thanks. So, you know, throughout this process for you, right? a lot of it has been entrepreneurial to the core, right? You're creating businesses. You're creating podcasts. You're starting different things, different ventures, different projects. You mentioned sort of the

ups and downs. And one thing I've noticed here is like the peaks are really high and the valleys are really low. And it's tough, right? It feels like things come in bunches. And then there's, there's just, you know, dry periods. So how have you done? dealt with that, what advice would you pass to someone? Maybe it's a podcast, maybe it's not. But, you know, that don't understand that the highs are high and the lows. I mean, there's going to be tough times where you feel like you're marching through a desert. Yeah. Yeah, man, it's so difficult. And honestly, I feel like I'm in these, I'm in these a decent amount. You know, an example of this, for example, is, you know, like literally the day I launched my business, like literally the day I had

posted that thing on Instagram that you had commented on the day of day of launch. Honestly, I was hustling way too hard. I was kind of neglecting a lot of these like these self-care mental health habits that that I was kind of talking about before. And I was just like, no, it's, you know, it's all about the hustle. It's all about work, work, work. We got to focus. And really what ended up happening was, you know, I remember I had launched it on a

Friday. And, um, dude, I just caught myself bugging. Like, I literally caught myself in my car, not, like, not knowing what to do. Just like, really little anxiety. And that hasn't happened to me in, in a long time. And so I remember, um, meeting up with, uh, with my girlfriend. And, um, you know, she kind of knew I was super stressed out and whatnot. And, uh, this is something that really interesting happened. Um, and, you know, maybe we can use this as a lesson for everyone. But, she basically started giving me a massage and she put on like this meditation like song like this half music half meditation thing and at first when she put it on i was like man this sounds so like woo-woo it was something like um like give into the flow it was something like um like love

yourself uh let go of resistance it was like just that it was like very basic seem very woo-woo and um she put that on gave me a massage and then the craziest thing happened maybe about i don't know maybe 10 minutes in all of a sudden i felt my state of consciousness shift and all of a sudden i i felt uh just like such an intense concentration of emotions and um and that you know believe me or not next thing i know i basically start to have like this out of body experience where i start to think of like the the deep sadness that i felt as a kid and I started to feel about this sense of control that I had in my life. And it was the sense of control that I put on as a kid because when I was growing up,

I faced various problems. And in my head, I was like, man, nobody in life is going to come help me. Nobody's going to come save me. And so I put on like this mask of control, which led to me having social anxiety, trying to control how I am perceived in social interactions ever since then. And so it was like this extremely weird experience where I've only had a handful of experiences like that in my life. But after that, when I got up, I literally just started bawling my eyes out. And I started crying profusely in a way that I have never seen myself cry before.

And, and, you know, after just kind of after this event kind of processing with it, talking about it with my friends and my girlfriend and stuff, you know, you basically just really. that this growth, the journey is long. And you basically just realize that there's always going to be chapters. There's always going to be stages where, you know, like you, you remember a part of your past that you sort of suppressed or you disassociated from that has really been impacting your behavior. And so, like, for example, after that event, I, like, truly conceptually learned what I just told you before of, like, seeing this pattern, like, early in the podcast. And so, like, for example, the podcast between external validation and internal validation. And I had just, you know, started to cry for many reasons, but one of it was like, as an entrepreneur, I'm using entrepreneurship as a

coping mechanism for my stress, for my anxiety, when in reality, that's a vehicle. That's definitely an outlet. But it is not the answer. It's not the cure all for everything. And so I kind of saw these cycles happened in my life where, you know, I was a super low self-esteem, low confident, had no friends, social anxiety, depressed kid who had just like started to launch these different businesses and entrepreneurship and different things like that to just gain validation, to gain some sort of, you know, confidence from the world. And so I think for me, like just like a month ago when this kind of happened, I saw myself like almost kind of step into the same cycle. And I definitely think when that happened to me, I definitely think part of me at like a deep

level healed. And that's what I've come to learn of like these lows and highs, they're definitely there for a reason. And you know, if you are trying to grow yourself every day and you're being productive from the holistic sense, from every sense, then when these highs and lows come, They're just major, major lessons. And, and, you know, like, I'm 23 years old. You know, I'm sure there's some people listening to this that are older, some people that are younger. The truth is is that, like, every year of your life is truly just, like, an amazing journey. And it's all supposed to happen, the way that it's supposed to happen.

And now I'm, like, now ever since that event, I feel like I'm so much stronger. You know, I feel like I truly have a new level of conscious awareness that I haven't had. And honestly, Eddie, I know there, and again, I don't think you need like some dramatic thing like that to grow. But I know in my life that if I'm not facing these ups and downs, then I'm doing something wrong. Because that means that I'm trying to just live in the middle. I'm trying to do just like the least amount. I'm just trying to stay in the middle. I'm trying to say like, hey, I'm not really trying to grow anything new.

And I'm just sort of going to try to maintain what I have. And personally for me, I don't think that. really works and I want to be someone personally who is always growing. You know, I never want to be in a spot where I'm like, oh, you know, my mindset is perfect or or my business is that or I've read enough books or whatever because I know that's truly the moment where you begin to die. And so for me, I always want to be engaged in these highs and lows, even if they literally suck. But I want to be doing that every single month because it's so important. And like even before this quarter, quarantine, like in January and in February, I was growing so much. I was working on myself so much.

It almost feels like each one of those months was like a separate year and then kind of quarantine happened and then like it all just like mixed in together. And then I'm like, wait, we're in September now. So, um, so yeah, man, it's definitely interesting. But I, but I love those. I love the fact that life is putting us in like this very vivid painting that has all of our emotions, from sadness to excellence, to gratitude, to feeling hopelessness. Because I know that that's really what creates the richness of life. That's really what creates the vibrancy of life. And I know at the end of my life, I'm going to step back and I'm going to look at this

painting that I've made. And yeah, I mean, if it's all good, then it's just not going to be that meaningful. But if there's the ups and downs, there's the constantly pushing yourself towards growth, challenging yourself, your ego especially not becoming complacent in like sort of the way that you used to think about yourself or just thinking that you're perfect or you're great now and you don't need to hustle. That to me is the definition of hell. And I've been there a couple times and I'd rather face the ups and downs of the growth journey, man. So, agreed, agreed. Have you replicated that sort of meditation activity?

I haven't done it yet, again, since then. You're saving it in the arsenal for when you beat it most. Yeah, man, I don't know. I've really learned that, like, there's a lot of things in life that are extremely powerful. And, like, I've done, like, different, like, breath work before I've done this thing called holotropic breathing. That's freaking crazy.

I don't know if you've ever heard of it. Literally, we'll put you in, like, this psychedelic experience. But, yeah, man, there's a lot of powerful tools out there. I don't want to mess too much because I don't, you know, I think I'm good for now. But if I need them, then I'll go towards them for medicine. Then it's there. Beautiful. A few more questions.

And then, you know, we'll be respectful of your time here. But something that is kind of been an underlying theme. And I can hear it in your stories and I deal with it almost every day, which is why it pops out. But you talk about the external, almost benchmarks. You know what I mean? That we use when, like, so as a creator, for example, You know, the platforms that I use are YouTube and their Instagram and they're, you know, they're podcasting and the stuff on Spotify.

And it's like, you know that one, it doesn't define how good your work is. And two, it shouldn't be everything. But also as an entrepreneur, like the fun is watching your work and your brand and your business grow. And so it's really challenging to separate the two. In fact, it's something that I have to remind myself almost every day. It's like these numbers, they mean something, but they don't. And so how do you as a creator grapple with that and how has it brought you to where you are? Yeah.

Yeah, that's such a great quote. I need to frame that. The numbers matter, but they don't. I love that. You know, I think, yeah, and I think as a creator, it is difficult because of that kind of nuance that you said. you know for me what I say is like my personal take on this is to me I just remember how broad life is and what I mean by that is I just remember that there are multiple games in life from the perspective of you know this whole sort of like creator influence podcast stuff this is a game

you know there's like your happiness levels that's a game uh business is a game your relationships is a game. Your sleep, like how you sleep at night, the thoughts that you have in your head, that's a game. And so for me, I just realized that the game is much broader. And I think I say that because maybe it's like to not feel so bad about myself, but to me, I'm just like, hey, I have been in the spot before where my LinkedIn video has gotten like 3 million views.

And I have been in a spot where like, yeah, that feels awesome. yeah it's great for my business per se maybe um but then it's also like hey all of a sudden i have 200 people who are who are trolling me and crapping on me and so what i always remember is there's just multiple sides to everything and um and you know i think about this too especially when it comes to you know people who have like like a lot of money and like this is society's like latest um you know sort of hot take of like, you know, all these billionaires that have so much money, their lives are so perfect because they have this money and it's good for them.

And yeah, I mean, having money is obviously great and stuff. But there's a different set of problems that comes with that. You know, like I one time sat with one of my mentors who's a billionaire. And I mean, dude, I literally, man, I mean, I honestly got a little bit scared because like he was just telling me the different kinds of problems that he has now from different like lawsuits you're like once people see that you're super successful then like people you know they want to take a cut of that if they think that they deserve it even though they may or they may not and so you just get faced with so many different problems and so for me

I'm like you know don't forget that like hey mark even if you have a million views on this there are just going to be a different set of problems and so that's I think that's part of it. And then I think the other part of it too is just like, and you probably know this more than me, but I think a lot of people, they have like this obsession over going viral, right? And like at the end the day, if you're working hard on like a YouTube video, of course you wanted to go the farthest, to go viral. And I remember having this conversation with Jay Shetty, actually who I know who has like, I don't know, millions of followers, billions of views. And he was telling me, one of the best things that you can do is to like create a system of virality.

And what he said is like it's not the fact that like you want to create a video every day or every week. We're like, oh, I hope this goes viral. I hope this goes viral. And then if it doesn't go viral, then people hate me. And I don't know what to do with my career anymore. But what he was saying is like, you know, if I'm going to work really hard on like these six different video ideas, I have to be okay with knowing that they may not do the best. But if I know that I'm doing six video ideas a month or whatever that looks like for you,

I know maybe next month for all I know, one of them would sort of go viral. And so that's like a sort of another system to have. Just like make sure that like you understand there's a future. Because I think a lot of us we work really hard on something and then we put it out there and it doesn't get the response that we want. And we immediately have this sort of very, like this acute reaction. When, you know, you just look at it in the long term and it's like, hey, you know, like I'm sure you've had videos that have gone viral.

I'm sure you've had videos that haven't. And when you look at that from that long perspective of just like, hey, if I keep working, I'll keep honing my skills. and maybe in three months, I will have a viral video. However, I definitely think there is like a right balance to take with that because, you know, you could, you know, you could obsess over this so much. And, you know, you could watch TikTok videos all day in your bed. You could figure out how to make the best TikTok, the best formula, start doing that,

start having that a part of your life. And so I think the biggest thing is just like approaching it from that multivariate approach of just like life is long, even if I do go viral or if I do get all the numbers that I want, that's not necessarily going to make me happier because I know if I get there, I'm going to have a different set of problems. And then also just like realizing that, you know, these things take time and it's totally natural that even if you do put out a great video, it's not going to go viral. But, you know, for all you know, it may go later. And so yeah, yeah, I mean, I think that's part of it, and I think the other part of it too is like having other forms of validation in your

life. So like for example, you know, like when my, when this whole quarantine thing was happening, I was like, all right, I'm going to go super hard on social media and I'm going to work so hard. And then also another thing that happened was my sister, she lived in New York at the time and her husband's a doctor and she has a now 11-month-year-old niece. And so they had to quarantine separately. They had to be different. And so she came and she lived with me. And so I just like remember seeing myself, just like to illustrate the difference. I remember seeing myself like in my room in my office, like working hard and then like seeing my ego get hurt because this video only has, you know, 50,000 views on LinkedIn or whatever compared to the 100,000 that I wanted to be. And then

I'm like sad. And then I go outside. I step outside of my office. And then I just see, like my 10, 11 month year old niece who's just like laughing and who's just like smiling. And then I sit down and I'm in the present moment with her and we're playing. And then 20 minutes, 30 minutes pass by. And I'm like, wait, like what the hell was I even so worried about? You know, I was so worried about this one dimension of success being proven in front of me. When I know the truth is, is there are plenty of people out there who have millions of followers, but don't even have the love of their family,

but don't even have the love of their friends. And so I think just seeing that multivariate approach and just like seeing that contrast like with me and my niece versus, you know, getting uptight about views, I think that definitely helps a lot because you're like, hey, like this is what's really important. There's going to be it tomorrow. You know, there's going to be a next video.

There's going to be a next podcast. And so that's the way that I kind of approach it. What do you think? I think, yeah, I mean, in a world of likes and retweets, I think there's no more powerful message than that, you know. And in theory, it makes sense. And it's just having that coincide with reality. You know what I mean? Yeah. Because the power isn't emotionally detaching. It's in perspective. It's realizing like, yeah, this isn't going to kill me, right? And that's, and I'm telling you firsthand as a creator, you know, putting out multiple videos every week. And,

you know, I think it's subjective, right? Like everything, but some of my best work just hasn't been seen. And then, you know, when I totally agree, throw stuff against the wall, it gets millions of views. And so the idea of how we define success is just wrong and in a lot of ways. And when you said that message on Instagram, that's why it really resonated with me. That's why I wanted to talk to you about this because it's like, in so many ways, our benchmarks are just impossible. It's impossible to win if you're looking at numbers because someone with 20 followers goes through the same issues that Jay Shetty goes through just at a different scale. Like life doesn't just ultimately get better. So yeah, man.

Yeah. And like one thing that I would add to that too is, you know, one thing that really helped me on my mindset behind this too is I was actually listening to this interview with this musician rapper or logic. And he was basically talking about the fact. that like people think that like creators or people think that people who are putting stuff out there are super confident and are super motivated. And I don't know if that's true or not. But basically what he said is like these people who who seem super confident who are putting

out these whatever it is inspirational videos or what have you, every time they put out something like that, they're going to get both good and negative feedback from the world. And so every time when like you you really create something with your heart and you put put it out there, I mean your confidence, your selfist, I don't know about self-esteem, but your confidence is really just, it's getting a beating. And like, you know, I think that's why you look at people who like, whether they're a musician or some kind of creator where they have like, you know, these long careers of like 10, 10 years, 15 years of doing this. And then some of them, just like retire because they're like I'm no longer I don't really want to be playing in this specific game anymore because I know that it's just a game that you don't may you know depending on the person just may not be worth my my mental health and yeah man that's so true you know I create stuff all the time where I'm like man putting in so much work so much effort this should go out there nobody sees it and then I throw stuff against the wall and then stuff pops like an example for you

I mean, I don't know if this is like rude to tell you this, but you made this video the rabbit hole. And I watched it. And I didn't see the view count before I watched the video. I saw it after. And I was literally expecting this video to have like, literally like 65 million views. And the fact that I think it had like 60,000 views from like that, I was like, how? How? Like how?

That doesn't make any sense whatsoever. So yeah, I mean, it's definitely a problem that we all face. but yeah, I mean, I think if you're getting validation from other areas in your life, that can help balance that, that can help support that when you are in those moments. I think that's super, super important, man. Yeah. Well, hey, first of all, I appreciate that. And I agree.

It's perspective, right? It's not. And that's what, like, allows me as a creator to pull myself out, my friends that are creators. I know it's the same thing. Like when you become consumed with something, it's your world, right? but it's not. And so that's why I mentioned it's, it's every day for me,

because it is. I mean, your world within content trading is what, 12, 14, 15 hours my day every day, right? So the importance of being able to pull myself back, like you mentioned, and hang out with your family and realize how lucky you are,

how grateful you are, your perspective, whether it pops or doesn't, it doesn't even, it's not even an indicator of your work or your message or what you're bringing to the world. It's, again, like so many things, like so many things we've talked about

over the last hour and change, it's awareness. And, you know, I feel like you've worked very hard to create that for yourself over the years. And now you're working like a madman to help others understand that. And, dude, I appreciate it. And I'm grateful for everything you do. Likewise, man. And, yeah, it's a daily process. You know, it's always happening.

And, you know, I'm always cognizant of that. And yeah, having people out there like you who are doing it, I mean, dude, you're just another reminder to to keep going, man. So thank you for doing what you're doing. And then, you know, for also creating this platform like your podcast where you can talk to, you know,

other people because obviously, you know, you have amazing content on your world within. But I think, you know, you can like you, you get into a different space with someone else too. So I love the fact that you, you know,

you kind of started your own podcast, man. So good for you. Yeah, it's been fun. It's gone from the monologue phase to chatting with interesting people. And, you know, this has gone great and I'm excited to see where it goes. I really am. Where can people,

I know you have a big presence on LinkedIn and I know you're on Instagram. Where can people find you, what your handle? Yeah. Yeah. So people, you know, my name is Mark Metri. My last name is M-E-T-R-Y. People go check out my LinkedIn, my Instagram. I would say probably the best spot is just my website, kind of a central spot, which is just my first and last name.com. People can check out my podcast, my book, all that stuff, anything I have coming out. And yeah, Eddie, thank you so much for coming. I was supposed to say, thank you so much for coming out. I'm like a Batoosa podcast. He's wired. Seriously, man. But seriously, thank you so much for having me. I appreciate you both. Talk soon.