"I fell out of a four story window and almost died..."

[0:00]  everybody welcome back to another episode of the heart and hustle podcast I'm super excited to have my boy Dorian in the house today going on y'all because me and you met because actually why don't you give us an introduction to yourself and talk about how we met actually yeah so my name is Dorian Warmsley I'm a fitness coach here in Las Vegas um I recently started training your sister Alexa shout out to Alexa for connecting us and through our first session I just spoke to her get a feel for what she does for work all these things she mentioned your guys's mental health um company that you started so then I shared my background when it comes to mental health um after about a week of me and her get to know each other she connected me and you thinking we a good fit similar mindsets and things of that nature so then we met got coffee somehow some way it turned in from a coffee to like a three and a half hour conversation just about life which was amazing and then here we are a week

[0:50]  later yeah man and the reason why I thought it would be so beneficial because Alexa was like hey man I just got this new personal trainer you have to meet him his life story is absolutely crazy and one of the things of why we record this podcast is to give people an understanding of life in itself gives us lots of hardships and we're always going to be dealt a different hand but the way we bounce back from those things is super important and that's why I really wanted to have you on the show today because you have an inspirational story about the things that you've been through just in life in general not beyond the incident that we'll talk about today but all the other things that we've come across so I think it's going to be incredibly valuable for you just to share your insights about what it's really like to have the hustle to be successful but on that when we have hardships in our life what it takes from a heart perspective right to be able to kind of overcome those huge challenges so why don't we kind of you know get

[1:38]  into it why don't you share a little bit about your background your story and let's rock yeah so um I'm originally from Orange County California just outside of a city called Fullerton so for those who don't know where it's at I grew up pretty much about 20 minutes from Disneyland so as a kid going to Disneyland all the time it's nothing new to me um went through a lot kind of over it but um growing up there at the age of about 10 me and my family became homeless so me and my mom my younger sister um from age 10 to about 12 about three years um we were just living in hotels hotel to hotel my mom would go stay at the shelter sometimes and then I would stay with my friends and at the time I thought it was fun I get to stay with my homies stay the night at my friends when you're that young it's just fun um then she moved

[2:26]  this year to Las Vegas when I was in about seventh grade so about for and once we moved here things just turned up for the better she got a job she was working at 99 Cent Store making 615 an hour fulltime and was just grinding got us an apartment stepdad got a job got a bigger apartment and we just moved up and things progressively got better um once I graduated high school didn't really know where I was going to go what I was going to do nobody in my life uncles Aunts Uncles nobody went to college or anything like that no real role model to look after look or follow through with so I just got into partying you know um I liked playing basketball but never had no guidance to how to go to college with basketball

[3:14]  or anything like that training or what to look for how to get into a junior college so once I graduated high school I used to live by unov so I began meeting a lot of people who went to unov and just started partying man to be honest um college parties you know frat parties football parties volleyball girl parties just party all week Thursday through Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday kind of just do whatever working little jobs here and there retail just enough to have money in my pocket and just living at home and then in 2014 um hanging out with some friends at this point in my life I had just got done experiencing with cocaine I was on a crazy like six to seven month binge of it to where I was just doing it all the time and drinking and at this point uh the end of 2014 I decided to just stop

[4:04]  doing it cuz my stomach start getting messed up and I just made a conscious decision like I got to cut this [ __ ] out turned into a crackhead in my eyes so um so one night it was a friend's birthday party and his girlfriend got him a party bus we were they lived in a complex called Rebel place which you're familiar with oh yeah it's uh off campus living for students they lived on the fourth floor so we go out to the party bus and that was the last thing I remember I woke up in the hospital I was tied to the bed I looked around and I'm like wait what it was like it was like a magic trick you know what I mean it felt fake like I was on a party bus and then I woke up and I was in the hospital had to be scary as [ __ ] oh 100% um that was probably the first times I really experienced anxiety U my heart just started pounding I started freaking out

[4:50]  looking around my mom looked at me and was kind of like trying to calm me down didn't tell me exactly what happened yet she was just telling me it's going to be okay after about a day when when I calmed down she kind of finally told me hey you fell out of the four story window and I'm like what the a lot of C four stories a lot of cuss yeah of course like tear it up yeah we're free here man I was like what the [ __ ] like what do you mean you know and she didn't know the people I was with she didn't know them too well so she kind of didn't know she thought it was some funny business that went down so she had had an investigator check the place out all these things to get put things together and at that time uh it took me about three weeks to recover you know I was in the hospital doing recovery and I didn't really even know what happened

[5:37]  either it took me years to finally piece together what I thought happened you know through stories of people who were there and things of that nature um and then um through that recovery process I was going through physical therapy and that's where I decided I was like man I want to do something like this for other people because following full story stories you know I've heard stories of people falling two stories and dying Yeah man so I felt very grateful that I was able to make it and through my physical therapy is what helped me come back to life so as I thought about being a become a physical therapist I got to had to get real myself that's a lot of school and I hate school yeah me too exactly and you know you got to become a doctor it's it's levels it's years right so I was like you know what how do I bring it down a notch physical therapist assistant okay that seems more doable

[6:26]  two-year program at at CSN they had and all these things but but even then you got to do prerequisites then the two-year plan so it took me like four years and I was just being stubborn I was like you know what maybe personal training is a stepping stone for it to where I can help people who feel Rock Bottom how I felt when I was on the hospital bed unable to move my body and then that's the route I went and then here I am I kind of just sold it so it shortly that way you have space to ask questions in case may be but yeah so I mean like one of the things that I want to go back to is Las Vegas so this place in itself is is amazing and fun but it's also incredibly dangerous yes because when I moved here in 2012 I moved from South Carolina like we talked about but I came into this new environment of all the drugs that were available and the

[7:12]  heavy partying and it seems like so many people get caught up in that Circle because it's the easiest thing to do and it's like when we start surrounding ourselves with our friends who do that as well it's easy to get caught up in that process you know what I mean MH and I think it's just very interesting how the people that we surround ourselves with often we don't see the impact that they really have on us if that makes sense yeah and when we get tied up in kind of the stuff it like either you have a wake up moment where something horrible goes wrong like you fell out of a four-story window yeah and that's kind of the thing that shakes us out of that moment you know what I'm saying yeah and it's unfortunate that it does have to come to that for some people you know I wish some people wake up sooner you know I don't want nobody to have to have a tragic action like me like I wish I didn't have to go through that to wake up and even then I didn't wake up fully you know what I mean once I recovered

[7:59]  and everything was good again I went back to the same [ __ ] I was doing you know I went back to partying and drinking and things of that nature and one thing CU I do have a life coach and one thing I talked to her about it and one thing that kind of in the back of my mind always I guess bugged me or rubbed me the wrong way was that to this day nobody who was around me or close to me ever like sat me the side or said hey you almost died drinking too much yeah maybe you should chill no you know what I mean not once and she brought to my attention like well kind of hard because for them to do that when they're in it with you yeah and it makes so much sense I'm like oh yeah they're drinking with me so why would they think I have a problem you know what I mean and um once I came to that realization I was like wow that's that's so true you know I don't hold it against nobody no friends or anything who were next to me or

[8:47]  didn't stop me you know because end day you got to save yourself yeah I mean I just think it's so easy for us to get caught up in the process of always just partying you know the one thing that I think when we're younger especially it's so easy to party because we don't really have like a purpose in mind right it's just like the things that we consume ourselves with when we're doing cocaine and we're doing drugs and we're drinking every single day it's something that gets us through today and often when you know as I've experienced and getting a little bit older we recognize that that kind of stuff doesn't serve us right and because it holds us back from getting to the next level which is a big kind of like maturation process for a lot of us yeah because I've had scary experiences as well where if you know anything about Las Vegas and you know like the what the fraternity sorority scene is here we don't go out to bars but we go out to some of the biggest clubs in the world yeah and one of the stories that you

[9:33]  know was really scary for me was one night me and my friend went to surrender if you're from Vegas you know all about surrender on Wednesday nights Back in the Day 2014 15 16 everybody would link up at The Encore hang out in the parking garage we'd kill handles of alcohol then we' go into the club get wild and then the scariest thing was we would all drive home and one night I'm driving home and one of my scariest moments was I was in the car with my friend and I crashed the car car while we were it was like 4:00 in the morning and that was my big Awakening moment but if honestly now I think about it and nothing against my friends or anything like that but at the time nobody ever said dude you guys could have died it came to the process of showing up at the party the next weekend and everybody was like what happened oh that's crazy take a shot you know what I mean and like that was

[10:20]  something that I reflect on since our conversation at the coffee shop I didn't have anybody in my life as well that kind of like shook me and was willing to say like yo wake the [ __ ] up and sometimes it's crazy because with the alcohol it's so socially acceptable MH to where in that for example what you said it's almost like I wasn't there but people probably like oh my god well we made it let's take a shot celebrate you know what I mean cuz I know for me once I came back to life and I was healthy again that kind of was the feeling I had like hell yeah I made it come on let's celebrate by taking shots yeah and when I think back on I'm like how stupid could I have been you know like I almost lost my life because my relationship with alcohol I'm going celebrate by drinking more alcoh alcohol mhm um but yeah just just interesting man so let's talk about kind of your accident a little bit so falling out of a

[11:07]  four-story window scary as can [ __ ] be and if you know anything about Vegas it's not exactly like we have a lot of grass everywhere you know what I'm saying so like you fall out of a window how do what is the story that people have told you about finding you that night so that night um like I said my friends lived at Rebel place and they lived in on the fourth floor mhm it's roommate style four bedroom it was three of them that lived there and there was an extra room which was we broke it open and I would crash there whenever you know hang H hung over but stay of the night if we were partying or whatever the case may be yeah so we go to the party bus like I said this last thing I remember was drinking quo Hennessy smoking smoking a blunt like that's the last thing I remember the story I was told was hey we came back to the house we went upstairs Afterparty Vibes we're drinking I got very drunk they put me in the room to go

[11:54]  to bed now the door is broken so I think what happened was they came in were trying to [ __ ] with me while I was asleep so I woke up slammed the door shut so they would stop [ __ ] with me mhm middle of the night they say they can hear me knocking on the door cuz I couldn't get out it was locked you need a butter knife to open it no bathroom in there either there's a bathroom yeah okay a bathroom got so they're I'm knocking on the door they can hear me and there's actually a video one of them I don't my friend still has it but footage of them coing to open the door kind of like uh a prank Vibe like oh let's see what he's doing he's knocking on the door they open the door they look at small room they look in the room they look in the bathroom they don't see me the window's open you can just hear the phone drop and then H them running out so they look over I guess out I I'm assuming they looked out the window saw me and then went down there yeah what

[12:43]  I'm thinking has happened is because the window was the corner of the building is that I panicked CU I couldn't get out and I thought I could climb down like shimmy down from the corner of the wall type Vibe and obviously I didn't make it and like most people say you know people in accidents or anything like that when they're drunk It's kind of good they're drunk because your body is so you're loose exactly so because of that I think that's part of the reason why I did was able to survive when I fell and I'm pretty sure I landed on my right side of my body because the right side of my body till this day still very tight but all my ribs on that side almost all my ribs were broke my clavicle uh fractured spine fractured I had brain swelling um and had like this crazy scar not scars but scratches down the whole right side of my back it

[13:30]  looked like Freddy cougar just went I'm guessing from the either raw the bushes something uh one of my friends found me tried to minister CPR uh ambulance came took me to the hospital and then they had me on life support pretty much and told my mom like you know we don't know if he's going to wake up if he does he might not remember you he might be in vegetative state we don't know and I was on it for about 3 4 days and then I came to life and I looked around I remembered my mom I remembered everything up until the point of the party bus moving forward I don't remember nothing yeah after that so I was very grateful after being able to wake up you know what I mean because it could have went a whole another route I could have literally been I think paralyzed to be honest yeah I've heard of less accidents happening to people

[14:18]  and them paralyzed like I was just listening to Inky Johnson on the way here if you know John absolutely his story going for a standard tackle that you do every time in practice whole life you're in college boom and now you're paralyzed on your whole right arm you know like a standard tackle here I am falling from a four story window not to compare stories but just I understand how lucky you were how yes basically how lucky I was to still be here and then to become a trainer of all things you know physically I'm able to run jump do everything anybody else can do low back pain things of that nature but that's a small thing that I have to deal with compared to what it could have been yeah I mean in the grand scheme of stuff man like like you said so many people have less fortunate accidents you know what I mean and they're paralyzed for life and

[15:04]  their entire life changes MH so the one thing I want to talk about now is the experience of having all those injuries brain swelling broken back ribs all tore up you have to basically learn to do everything again yeah so I had to learn how to walk again um when I was in the hospital I just made a decision that I wanted to get out of there mhm I was there for about a week and it was just horrible to be honest I couldn't move my arm my mom had to cut my food up um because all the medications and stuff I wasn't using the restroom I had a stomach tube um didn't shower when I was there and it was just a horrible experience just sitting there watching Tyler Perry movies every day liter is what I was watching I don't know why but um and after about one week we started physical therapy in there I started by playing with Play-Doh I had to just get

[15:52]  a Play-Doh cup take the Play-Doh out move it in and out that's all I could do after a few days of upgraded to bands little bands to get my upper body moving and I just made the decision in my mind like you know what I'm about to really give great effort during this rehab to get out here by Christmas time because this was around the end of November November November 9th 2014 it happened yeah and I was in there for Thanksgiving which was horrible too and after about 3 weeks they gave me a walker I was able to start walking like that and they discharged me and I went to physical therapy for about maybe two months straight before I was able to get rid of my Walker and at that point once I was able to get rid of my Walker I was back in the streets man I'm not going to lie

[16:39]  to you once I felt comfortable and confident with it again cuz at first I was scared to even leave the house because you never think that would happen to you f out four store window so I was literally scared to leave the house thinking like what else can happen like scared and then um yeah man that's where that's the journey right there man it's like the sometimes the universe resets us you know what I mean when we need to be reset and the feelings of insecurity I would say of having to kind of re-evaluate what's going on in those moments you know what I'm saying and like putting confidence back in our process is very difficult so when you say you were back in the streets what does that mean um I would say I that's a crazy term to use but just back out having fun with friends again I think I think by that that birthday it was 2015 yeah like 25th birthday I was

[17:27]  back to drink already yeah so literally less than 6 months after my accident and my whole thing was I was just lying to myself telling myself well as long as I don't black out I'm fine I'm fine you know what I mean let me just be in control I literally stopped drinking for maybe three four months and I think for sure by my birthday I remember April cuz I was out at a hookah lounge back to drinking yeah you know and back to doing it the same exact way like there was some days where I was just Tipsy but blackouts happened again you know what I mean and nobody stopped me yeah man it's just uh it just talks about you know at one point in time you start to realize why it's so important to surround yourself with good people you know what I mean and start kind of pursuing your own passions I want you to kind of dive into the process of your

[18:16]  aha moment where you were starting to think about maybe I shouldn't be surrounding myself with these types of people anymore and what did that kind of process look like for you so I think for me once I decided sto drinking I made that conscious decision because I became an independent trainer so working for myself MH and before that happened there were situations to where I was getting too drunk and too hung over and couldn't perform my job at a high level yeah you know I was working at a group fitness gym called Orange Theory and there were times where I had to call in because I was too hung over had an anxiety and couldn't work it happened two weekends in a row I remember happened two weekends in a row right before my birthday right calling on Monday and I wanted that third Monday off for my birthday before that happened they

[19:03]  pulled me into the office and we're like what's going on like two weeks in a row you've called in to get cover and I had to be honest it was embarrassing MH and I was just like yeah man I didn't tell exactly what it was I just said that I was dealing with anxiety which I was yeah and it was hard for me to work but I didn't tell them the anxiety was coming from the alcohol that I was over consuming yeah so that was a wake up moment and then there were times where where I had just started training people privately on the side I remember I had there was times where I canceled sessions the morning of because I'm hung over and I got mad at I'm like man you're really letting alcohol get between you and something you want to do and also money you know what I mean it's not fair to that person they can't come train now because you can't control yourself when it comes to drinking is that what happen so like you

[19:50]  cancel the sessions that means that person can't train either yeah so I was working orange therapy but I was also training people independently on the side privately on the side so I'd wake up like on a Saturday morning I'm like oh I'm kind of [ __ ] up uh no training today you know I'm not feeling well yeah and to me that was just not ethical and this is not who I wanted to be anymore yeah so towards the end of the year of 2021 I was like you know what I need to I need to I want to stop you know I I want to stop drinking had one last hurah went to like a rolling loud festival with some friends and even then I was hung over and I was feeling it and I'm like this ain't it no more like being hung over for days it just sucked so I think Christmas was my last day drinking I got messed up with my friend I went to Roberto's Christmas day

[20:39]  got some food we just got [ __ ] up for like a day and a half and that was my last time drinking and once I became sober I don't know my mind just started changing of what I wanted in life what I wanted to do and I went to Solitude you know I remove myself from any activities that weren't going to help help me be a better trainer at the time and I would gradually hang out with my friends again here and there you know what I mean and a lot of this events that we would hang out with involved drinking yeah and being around people when you're sober and they're drunk you can easily get annoyed because you you know and I was like damn that's how I used to be MH and the more I got sober the more I just realized that's not what I wanted to do or be around anymore because it wasn't serving me

[21:26]  like I'mma use my free time to get drunk and forget who I am you know what I mean it's almost like escaping it's what we all do yeah we're escaping the money through Friday and I didn't want to do that anymore I wanted to use my weekends to be productive so I started holding boot camps it was a way to keep myself accountable like okay you got boot camp tomorrow morning you told these people you're going to be doing it at 8: a.m. 9:00 a.m. if I drink tonight I won't be there tomorrow right so it was almost setting myself up for success in a sense and that's how I did it man and um I kind of lost track but you said about I mean just surrounding oursel with these people the types of choices that we're making you know what I mean and the one thing I want to kind of dive in here is you know when we are younger we think that we have to put ourselves in

[22:12]  these situations to drink with others because it's what everybody else is doing do you know what I mean and like me and you when we sat down for coffee we started talking about our life goals and the things that we want to accomplish and You by far do not have regular person dreams you know what I mean and unfortunately when we have that recognition there comes a time where we have to really start cutting people out of our [ __ ] Circle because we're not going to be able to spend time [ __ ] around the weekends drinking on a Thursday which turns into a Friday which turns into a Saturday not being able to show it for the people so I love the fact that you used like your boot camps as an accountability Factor right to show up for other people and that held you in a higher standard but also I'm guessing created a little bit of friction between you and your friends like you were talking about um yeah I mean as time went on and like I said my goals and ideas of what I wanted to do changed

[22:58]  um and there's nothing wrong against not nothing against people want to drink you know do your thing yeah but at some point you got to want more to life than just that MH and some people don't you know and I don't hold another against them that's what you want but for me I don't want to just be the another fitness trainer or anything like that I went through some real [ __ ] throughout my life not just my accident but being homeless as a kid overcoming that falling out a four- story window losing a best friend losing my grandfather to dementia like a lot of things have happened to where it's like I just want to impact others who are going through things because there's people who went through similar things I went through things worse things not as bad and are struggling to make it you know what I mean it's hard life's hard and for whatever reason I've been gifted the strength to be resilient through all these hardships so I want to use that my

[23:47]  energy my voice to help others understand they can make it too you know what I mean and that they're not alone in this and like I said as I got sober and sober more and more and that's and it was when I got around people who were doing things I wanted to do mhm for example there's a gentleman I met his name is Devonte Woodson he has a nonprofit organization here in Vegas where he offers and brings after school sports to elementary schools so they can play for free low-income areas who can't afford it that was me as a kid homeless couldn't afford playing sports one guy random white guy came up to me my friends at a park offered us to play Ice Hockey we all looked at like what do you mean ice hockey bro like what yeah we don't do that we don't do that yeah like what and it was a free program run by Disney all we had to do was show up once

[24:34]  a week learn about hockey and we would play one game a week for free at the M Ducks practice facility and I think that right there helped set the tone for how my life was going to go CU if it didn't if I didn't do that for three years who knows what I would have did being a homeless kid like life sucked that was like my little bit of Hope something to look forward to I guess I'll say through the week as being homeless so as I surround myself with Devonte I was like man he was my age maybe a little younger than me actually but he has his whole old nonprofit helping inspire and change the kids and I'm like man these are the kind of people I want to be around because they're doing ultimately the things I want to get into and do you know to live a grander life and yeah and it just at that point I

[25:21]  realized a lot of my relationships I had were based off just longevity you know knowing a long time is comfort there's nothing wrong with that yeah but I don't want to keep drinking anymore like that every time we hang out shouldn't be just drinking and gossiping talking about what celebrities or other people are doing that's not serving me anymore MH 32 we did that at 22 why are we still doing the same [ __ ] and that's where I'm at yeah I mean it's like when you start getting around other people they start when you start getting around other successful people they start challenging like your worldview you know what I'm saying it's like what is possible what things are necessary to get to those different places and I love the fact that you experienc and one of the biggest things that I think as being a little bit older now is like when you see someone who's younger than you or the same age and they're [ __ ] killing it it lights a fire underneath you CU

[26:09]  it's like what am I not doing and that sense of comparison is something that is a huge driver I've been around other people have been successful one of my best friends name is Dante when we were like 27 he was absolutely killing it and he's making a ton of money every single month doing marketing stuff like that but one of the things that I remember about him is he would lock himself in his room and we would be going out doing different stuff and Dante be like hey guys I can't go I got to get done I got to get this work done you know what I mean and like he was one of those people that reset my thermostat for what it takes to be successful and I started naturally comparing the people around me to what he was doing and they weren't doing the same stuff and eventually I had that conversation with myself it's like if I'm going to be successful like this kid then I need to start modeling what he's doing because I'm never going to be able to continue to be out here in the streets like we talked about just messing around and drinking and just putting our energy into things like

[26:56]  talking about cele celebrities and stuff like that like society today is so distracted with other people rather than focusing on ourselves I heard this one guy his name was Sam Evans one time he said I don't understand why people sit around and watch sports all day because everybody's like these guys are making hundreds of millions of dollars and we want to sit there and just watch and consume and veg on watching them do their thing rather than putting in the work and the effort of what it takes to become one of those people and that's something that always speaks to me in the back of my mind it's like dude if you want to be one of those 1centers it naturally means you can't do the 99% of the stuff that everybody else is doing mhm and it's crazy you say that because I heard a quote from my one of my favorite speakers Eric Thomas and he said something along those lines he was saying you know you're broke but you're still trying to look to be entertained he's like I'm sure the people who created Game of Thrones and all these shows they don't even watch it as much

[27:44]  as you watch it you're broke but you're sitting at home watching all the episodes all the sports and it hit me hard one time and I was um it was early in my fitness journey in my fitness coaching Journey before I even went independent to where I had I stopped watching um Sports as seriously I'm a huge Cowboys fan and it sat with me I was like man I really I really sit and make time change my schedule with call off work or whatever the case may be to make it to watch football Sundays M I was like damn how come I don't give that hour to myself I literally about two years ago I made the decision and I was like [ __ ] that I'm I'm doing it now so I would purposely not watch the Cowboys game even if I was free just to see if I can do it Lakers as well stop watching sport I really stop watching sports and it

[28:31]  helped me cuz now to this day I like watching it here and there but I'm not as invested any more of I'm going to move everything around my life schedule to watch it no I'm going to work do what I have planned and if I got the free time and the game's on cool I'll watch it you know before I go to bed or something like that and I'll say these things to certain people and it's just it's just crazy people who think I don't know that I'm crazy or something for thinking that way but this majority people will literally go out their way make time call off work switch up everything in their schedule to make sure they watch that UFC fight to make sure they watch the Super Bowl but we they really rarely give themsel even an hour 30 minutes of self-improvement yeah which could be an hour to cook cook your food so you don't

[29:18]  e have to eat out an hour to read that book you've been talking about an hour to start that course something that's going to help you get out of the position you're in and get you to where you want to be yeah I was at Eon this year and I was listening to Jesse etler talk about a 10-minute Rule and he was like if you just spend 10 minutes a day trying to hone your craft at whatever it is trying to be a better marketer a better trainer whatever that is for an entire year you will find yourself in that one to 10% group you'll be a top 10% performer but often we distract ourselves with all this other kind of [ __ ] that's going on that we don't put ourselves in the position to win and it's like oh I just don't have the time to do it and it's like everybody's got the same 24 hours so what's the difference between a Jeff Bezos or an Elon Musk or somebody who's successful that you look up to it's they're spending their time honing their craft and becoming better at what they do

[30:05]  they're not s sitting around blindly aimlessly just consuming Netflix and all that kind of stuff and it's like I wonder why everybody wants to [ __ ] about how far they have to go to be successful because you guys are wasting all of your time you know what I mean and that's just like something that I think more people need to realize it's like if you want to get to the places you need to get to you don't have time for the other kind of stuff I was sitting on the treadmill this morning talking with my friend as we were getting our cardio in before our lift and he was saying we were watching the kids who were being drafted this year for the NFL and they were talking about the top 10 rookies and he looked over at me and was like dog I don't even know who any of these kids are and then he quickly shot back and was like but we shouldn't because why are we going to spend our time consuming stuff learning about these kids and how successful they're going to be while we're just going to sit around and like what sit on our [ __ ] hands you know what I mean that doesn't make any sense no yeah I've

[30:52]  been trying so hard to get out of that I guess I call call consumer mindset you know and same thing not being so invested in all those stuff and we're so conditioned to do it as you grow up and you know you watch sports and it's just as some point you got to just hold yourself to that fire and be like you know what why ask yourself a question why does it even matter that I'm you know so invested in the pre-draft and all those things and um yeah man I agree it's just we get caught we can I used to be that person to get caught up and just I know everything about everybody you know what I mean all the gossip I know all the tea as they would call it and things of that nature but then I'm like bro my life's not where I want to be even until now it's not where exactly I want to be I'm working towards it but it's like investing my energy and time and knowing things that aren't getting me there for what yeah every day on the way to work I listen to this podcast it's called quote

[31:43]  of the day it's by a gentleman named Sean croxton and he shares every day it's a different speaker it's a quick little8 to 10 minute clip of somebody and the one I heard of heard today today was Eric Thomas and he was talking about Warren Buffett how he wakes up early in the morning and he reads doesn't just read any book he reads the financial reports of certain companies so we can learn about them and Eric Thomas was saying he's like when people ask me oh what book should I read and he's like why why do you want to read the books I'm reading are you trying to be a speaker yeah you see what I'm saying I was like damn yeah and I was like damn that's so true because we hear all the time people always ask successful people oh what books do you read what books do you read and it's like for what why do you want to know you're not going to get where I'm at reading the same exact books unless

[32:29]  you're trying to be a speaker you know you should be reading the financial report of a certain company if that's what you're trying to invest in if that makes sense yeah 100% And I was like whoa that's so true because I've been that person caught up looking at Jeff Bezos whoever the case may be y see successful trying to read their books when in a sense I'm not even trying to do what they're doing you know I'm trying to be the best fitness coach a speaker and help um help Inspire the world so I need to be reading books that going to help me with communicate better help me learn how to project my voice better and things of that nature if that makes sense yeah but one of the things that I like to talk about as well and I hear this topic is becoming more and more popular at least the stuff that's being presented to me right talks about the difference between reading and implementing do you know what I mean like there's a terminology which I shared when we had

[33:16]  coffee the first time it's called mental masturbation you know people today feel like they can sit on YouTube and they can watch the inspirational motivational videos they can read a book a week but it's like if you're consuming all that information to go back to that consumer mindset you were talking about and you're not actually implementing that stuff to get better you have no shot at getting any further towards your goals it's like you can sit on all the knowledge in the world but you can't read about doing push-ups you know what I mean and like I love that analogy because it's like there's so many books out there that everybody says you got to read these if you want to be successful but at the end of the day unless you're putting that craft to practice you're not getting any closer anyway you're just kind of like loading up the gun but you're not firing off any bullets information hoarders information hoarders that's what it's called I learned that term information hoarders they get all the information hoarding it in but not putting it to work um like this year for myself I've only read one

[34:03]  book so far yeah and for me at first I was hard on myself until right now to this just very moment I thought about as you say this it was one book it's called crucial conversations I read it because I was trying to learn how to communicate better not only with my clients but at the time I was seeing a girl and I was just want to be able to communicate better as a person and I still haven't mastered everything in it yet so I'm glad that is the only book I've read and I go back too and I practice I've been practicing the tools that's giving me it gives you to you know have crucial conversations how to communicate better when the stakes are high and emotions are running strong you know like those those conversations you got to have that are tough that we avoid whether it's with a girlfriend a boss uh classmate friend those tough conversations and yeah so it's just an example back to what you said like I

[34:51]  want to read more books but I'm like I haven't even implemented perfected that one to a te like honestly need to go back and read it again chapter by chapter chapter because it's easy to forget things yeah and it's like if you're not practicing it right you're never going to become put yourself through that process of iterating right and that's the one thing that I see so many people doing it's like hey I'm just going to continue to read these books but I'm not practicing what I'm preaching you know what I mean and that implementation process is really tough and it's the scary part you know what I mean so I love the book crucial conversations I actually have that on my list now since we talked about that I know there's a couple others as well that you suggested to me crucial accountability and crucial confrontation they all they have the same basis you knowe of things you need to do to have those typ ofers and typ of things but they're um I've only read the first one and I read sum of accountability which I

[35:38]  want to use because it's my job to keep people accountable I want to make sure I do it in a healthy way I don't want to just motivate people like come on you [ __ ] said you going to do this like that's tired bro it's it's deeper than that you know it's more it's more mental than that like there's a reason why that person's not adhering to what you're telling them to do so get deeper with them get to learn them as opposed to just trying to Guilt Trip them yeah into um staying accountable yeah and I think one of the best places to start is having those crucial conversations with ourselves oo yeah so one of the things that I've been focusing on and kind of really sticks in my mind consistently is I'm tired of having the same conversations with myself one of which is how many times you going to quit how many times you're going to tell yourself that you should have done this and then you end up two weeks one month six month a year later and you look back and

[36:25]  you're like man what would have happened if I never would have stopped and sometimes having those crucial conversations with yourself is one of the most important things that you can have because at the end of the day if you can't keep it real with yourself and you can't implement the things that you talk about coaching yourself you're never going to be successful and that's one of the things I think everybody's really good at is coaching others but not taking their own advice 100% you know what I'm saying I was just talking to another colleague of mine who I work with he's a he's a coach as well name is Ryan he's great um we talk about that all the time how it's so so easy for us to to coach others you know what I mean to keep them on point and give them advice and give them tips but then when it comes to ourselves we give ourselves so much leeway yeah it's crazy wow yeah I mean like it's easy to tell ourselves

[37:12]  that you know we don't have to wake up we don't have to do these things and when we were sitting down for coffee I shared that video of Conor McGregor with you and he talks about keeping promises that we make to ourselves before we keep promises to other people and it's like when you wake up in the morning and you know you're supposed to wake up at 5:00 a.m. and your alarm goes off but you hit the snooze button you sleep until 6:30 you're starting your entire day off with a broken promise to yourself and that kind of stuff just continues to Compound on itself and at the end of the day if you're thinking about being the best version of yourself you have to hold yourself accountable to the things that you say and when we don't do those things it kind of just infiltrates our mindset you know what I mean because one bad decision turns into well I'm just going to take the day off and that turns into two days and then it's just like an easier place to be able to not stand up for the promises that you kept your to

[38:01]  that you made to yourself but also holding yourself accountable towards what you need to get done because like this game of life in general nobody's coming to [ __ ] save you no you know what I mean and that's one of the conversations we had together it's like being a guy especially in this world of mixed ethnicity people are looking to you to prove yourself I don't know how many people are going to turn around and be like I'm going to give you the opportunities of the world just because you're deserving of so that doesn't happen you know what I mean like you have to go out and you have to grind and get your own [ __ ] done if you want the things that you say you really do no that's good it's just wild to me man you know one of the other things that I've been thinking about a lot is the process of self-improvement and self-development I saw a post on LinkedIn the other day where somebody and of course there's always going to be two sides and one of the things that I

[38:49]  really worry about in society today is how many excuses we make for ourselves and somebody made a post about self Improvement as being a trap because we always are going to find reasons and things that we can improve on ourselves and we shouldn't be doing that because that's unfair and that really kind of made me perk up and I was like that's interesting because that comes from my perspective of a mindset of somebody who's not trying to get to the next level you know what I mean it's very easy to settle but when we start making these social excuses for ourselves and we don't want to push ourselves to that next level even through something of personal Improvement or self-development that becomes a really slippery slope you you know what I'm saying so like what do you think about people who are like self-development is a trap and you don't have to improve yourself you're good enough as you are today like you said I think that's somebody probably who's just going to settle and be okay with

[39:37]  where they're wherever they're at in life yeah which is okay for some people you know I just think as humans we're meant I think we're here meant to help others yeah at the end of the day that's it and how do you help others by improving yourself how am I going to help you if I'm not right mentally if I'm not improving my communication how can I communicate to you to help you become better if that makes sense if I'm not working on myself physically trying to improve my health how can I help you work work on yourself physically um so I think that's really why we're here that's why I see it because life is hard you know um and the community is important so that goes back to what I'm saying is though we're supposed to he you to help each other yeah so I think self-improvement 100% is needed because there's so many different ways you can improve because we're so conditioned from since being a kid to be a certain way live a certain way um the different

[40:27]  kind of traumas you have as a kid some things you had no choice in but it happened so I think it's self-improvement part of that is healing those things you know even if you don't want to be the richest person in the world you want to be there better emotionally for your partner for your kids so self-improvement I think 100% is a must no matter what cuz self-improvement is different ways financially physically spiritually mentally emotionally there's so many levels to self-improvement that person is just um is interesting yeah do you think that because do you think that stance of self-improvement today is because we see so many other people in their living experience like when I think about self-improvement I feel like this is something that's become popular at least from my lifetime in the last like 10 years yeah right you see people who are coaches people want to push you

[41:14]  to get to the next level yada yada but it's like the world that we live in today there's so much opportunity to become better that it doesn't jive with the old mindset of like you just find a job when you're 20 years old you work until you're 60 and then you retire and die you know what I mean there's so many opportunities for you to continue to improve emotionally and physically and as a leader and as an individual and in your relationship that I just see like there's an abundance of areas that I'm still trying to push out in my own realm to become the best version of myself and I feel like that's something that maybe the older generation doesn't really understand because they always were taught you just show up you work every single day you do these type of things but it's like I just don't really [ __ ] with that mindset anymore no yeah now we're we're able to see more information

[42:01]  and more things so you're able to see more people's success and see more people self-improvement before social media you would only hear Word of Mouth of certain things you know what I mean and like you said it was a conditioned way to live you go to school you get your degree find your wife get married work your 9 to5 retire at whatever age and then boom and now we're with social media and just us what are we consider Millennials yeah we're y we're um starting to change that idea you know what I mean we're starting to learn you can really work for yourself you can start being creative get paid for being creative as opposed to just being forced to live a certain way that's how you become depressed and hate life bro like working a job you L hate but you have no choice cuz that's how you're going to make money you never had a chance to hone your skills and be

[42:49]  creative like there's job there's a job and way to make money with everything Tik Tok YouTube all that is a proof of that I saw an interesting commercial I think it a Tik Tok commercial um was it um Super Bowl or something it had been because it was an interesting commercial Tony Hawk I believe okay and it was W what was he doing skateboarding doing something crazy but I'm I can't even go into it because I can't remember it at all but the basic message was that you can make money doing anything yeah you know what I mean like if you go on Tik Tok and all these things you can see people doing it you just got to find your craft and learn how to just make money off it yeah not every fitness trainer is going to be super successful there's some who out there killing it because they learned how to

[43:36]  talk they learned how to sell better and now they're able to make just crazy money by perfecting their craft and learning to what's the word uh monetize off it yeah so yeah I kind of got lost for a second but yeah I mean you can monetize off anything today anything you know what I mean and the way that people monetize off of us is is our attention you know what I'm saying one of the things that I think about from the social media landscape today is when we graduated high school as an example Facebook was just starting to drop and I always use this example of like back in the day 2009 Facebook in itself was a timeline of everything that happened in the day if you remember what the feed on Facebook used to look like so people would hop on in the morning they talk about what class they're going to everything that's going on it would be a documented thread right of what was going on and then they had to figure out

[44:25]  how they were going to monetize that platform and what they found was they had so many eyeballs that advertisements and selling advertising to those eyeballs was the way to make money and now today we've seen another jump in social media because the algorithms are not designed to show you what your friends are doing like it once did but now we're just like literally pulling the hamster wheel or the uh not the hamster wheel the the roulette yeah the slot machine and we're shown things that are meant to gather our attention and so we're shown things that are completely outside of our realm and it's like so easy to get sucked up in that mindless consumption of that consumer mindset that you talked about and that's something that people have to realize as well if the product is free you are the product you know what I'm saying that's good yeah and it's easy caught in rabbit holes you know I'm not perfect I still have my days where I do get caught in

[45:11]  them yeah um but I've been very good at almost creating the rabbit holes I want to get into yeah because the way the algorithm works I feel like you start liking certain things and that nature that's what it's going to give you so most of my feed is Fitness stuff eating stuff motivational stuff things you can learn from it ain't just random celebrity tick toks or anything of that nature but I still do get caught in certain rabbit holes like um watching them cut mow the lawn yeah you know I just get mesmerized I don't know why I don't know why that's been my one of my things watching somebody cut the dirty lawn and just shape it up yeah and you know sometimes I'm I'm aware like I'll catch myself I'm like you know it's okay let me get five minutes of this yeah and then I'll stop one of the scariest post that I've seen from just a realization

[45:59]  of my mindless scrolling is there's a clip on Instagram or Tik Tok I forget where it's at CU they're all [ __ ] the same now but these guys are standing in a garage with a huge snowball and they're like we're going to throw a 50 lb snowball off the roof and they toss it off and you see it coming down and right before it hits the ground somebody pops on screen and goes look at you you're consuming High dopamine videos once again and you wonder why you haven't been successful because you're sitting here and you're feeding your brain these quick hits of dopamine and it's killing your motivation to do the things that you're actually supposed to damn yeah dude and I was like oh my God and then instantaneously every single time I come across it but I don't even recognize in the moment because it's video to video and I'm like oh my God these kids are throwing a snowball and then it cuts to it and every single time I catch that I hop off of Instagram or

[46:46]  Tik Tok and I'm like okay let me get refocused you know what I'm saying damn that's good that would have caught me too 50 lbs no boss right exactly but I mean the biggest thing I think people need to start recognizing is in order to train your brain to do the things that are hard you have to put yourself in really tough situations and a lot of tough situations because we live in the United States and we're all blessed as can be to have food and water and a a YouTube or a podcast studio and all this kind of stuff is you have to put yourself in those boring moments to be able to accomplish the things that you want and it's so easy for me to when I get bored just like pull out my phone because my brain is looking for that change of state that is so easy to get from this little device and I feel like that's why people have so many mental health issues that's why people feel so

[47:34]  isolated and so lonely it's because we're on this diet of little tiny connections right of dopamine to people who we don't even know and that turns into bigger mental health issues that we ended up suffering with let me um let me look at this quote real quick because it goes back to what you just said yeah it's so good I had it saved it's another thing people I said in my post before people love to share the posts read them all that and it's a quick motivation yeah I drop some sometimes too I love res sharing motivational stuff cuz I know could help people but the thing is you got to take that motivation and put it to use but most people just see it it's a quick 15 20 seconds oh yeah I'mma do it yeah but by the end of the day they don't do it you know what I mean um this one quote I found in I forgot where I found it in my

[48:22]  in my Daily Journal yeah I found this quote every day I journal in the morning um and it gives me a quote and this one said learn to be comfortable in adversity but most important learn to be comfortable when you're bored [ __ ] yes by Ma by Maxim legasi wow and I thought that was fire because that's what happens we don't get comfortable when we're bored MH so we sit there we get bored and then we just get on our phone or whatever and I'm like I said I'm never perfect at all I do all the stuff I talk about and the reason I talk about out loud is like I'm literally talking to myself you know when I post my little quotes on Instagram and things of that nature that's me talking to myself and just sharing what's going in my head that's going to help help you get out of your out of your mind in the right into the right space but um yeah like when I

[49:11]  I get comfortable or a board at home it's kind of uncomfortable sometimes just sitting there so then I'll put TV on go to YouTube and just try to find something yeah after like 5 10 minutes I'm like bro just turn it off right then I'll just turn it off and just sit through my thoughts mhm thoughts start going it sucks it could get uncomfortable your mind goes all over the place but I think it's important that people put themselves in those positions of boredom in nothing you don't need to always be engaged in something especially for me my job is very requires a lot of energy yeah you know not just physically but just mentally and all those things because I got to be there present for a person and sometimes they're dumping their stuff on me which I don't mind I'm there for it I want to help them but by the end of the day and I've you know trained eight to 10 people I do need that decompress I do need to listen to nothing hear nothing

[50:00]  see and be myself feel my thoughts for the day and see how I'm feeling what is it like when you have people who you're training and they want to come up with all the excuses or complain about why things aren't working for them do you have to ever have tough conversations with people and be like hey listen if this is what we're trying to accomplish surprisingly enough I really have come across and I've been doing it for about I've been do this about four years a year and a half just over a year and a half independently and I've really came across people who approached me with that yeah excuses I think because they know what I'm I don't know it's just my demeanor I have I think and they know my story and what I'm about and I think that's part of reason why they come to me and train with me it's rarely I get people who give me just BS excuses yeah of why things aren't working they

[50:49]  know why MH um but I don't mind having those conversations with them and there's been times where I had like text a client later on the day and almost apologized I felt like I madebe a little too hard on them yeah and they literally responded one one client in particular I was like you know I'm I know if I'm hard on you I'm sorry cuz she's a very sweet girl and she's like no I needed it that's why I come with that's why I come train with you yeah and I was like you right [ __ ] you say less now I'm about to really be on your ass yeah but yeah not too many people um I'll see some on Instagram or something like that people complain about certain stuff but um yeah for the most part no I haven't came I'm luckily enough not to come across people people who give me excuses yeah of why they can't do [ __ ] cuz I'm I'm a Solutions based person mhm I don't care about why you can't this how are we going to get to the solution of it yeah so one of the things that I want to kind

[51:36]  of take this conversation the direction of is we've talked about it a couple times today but let's take a little bit of a deeper dive do it when you've got people in your life who are not serving who you are becoming mhm what kind of challenges or hesitancies or fears do you have about especially when the people are your homies yeah cutting those people off and recognizing that they're not going to help you get to where you need to get to so what I've come to understand um I was dealing with this for a while and I work with it with my life coach and I think for me what the issue comes to me of not like cutting people off but just understanding that space needs to be separated for a little bit because not like I said no longer serving me yeah I struggle with the sense of belonging okay that comes back from being as a kid

[52:26]  not having my dad around and I was one of those kids who was a Class Clown all those things that's why when I was partying I love partying because everybody loved me when I was drunk and partying you know I'm life of the party so I always had the fear of dissociating myself with certain people because I'm like damn now I'm going to be alone now who am I going to have but as I become comfortable my own skin and understanding my mission in life it's been easier but it was hard at first cuz I felt like damn those are my people like but no it's okay maybe this season where you need to be selfish and open that space up to other people and huge shout out to your sister for connecting I got to give that shout out cuz I literally had a conversation with my life coach one day about this and I was just like man I think it's time I take away some of that space that's

[53:14]  for certain people and open it up to others who might serve me better and what I'm trying to do in life things I want to become and it was like on a Friday it was like on a Friday I think that night your sister sent us the DM to connect us right yeah yeah and I was like damn didn't think nothing of it but then we sat and chopped it up and had you know had coffee and what the case may be and I was like man these are the kind of people you're the kind of person that I want to be connected with you know what I mean just the mindset you have what you're trying to accomplish in life how you're trying to help and serve others and it was just crazy that I spoke it and it [ __ ] happened less than 24 hours yeah and I was I was telling you and I told your sister when I told her the other day she almost teared up during our session and I was I almost teared up when she did it because

[54:02]  for a long time as confident as I am and things that nature my self-worth and self- Lov isn't been the highest to where even when I get compliments from people I get uncomfortable yeah always oh my God you're so strong thank you for sh oh and I I get very uncomfortable for whatever reason I just don't feel like I deserve that praise um and I'm sure it's back to my childhood something I'm working on with my teach my life coach but I was telling your sister it was like it was was just it was amazing to see and know she wanted me connect me with somebody else she truly your sister so I know she loves you to death and you know you're not just a random person she's going to connect me with you know so she's not going to connect you with just a random guy that she felt comfortable and confident enough to connect me with you based off just our conversations I had with her you know her knowing my story knowing what what I'm about what I'm

[54:49]  trying to do in life and it was like an emotional moment man when she connected us on that on that DM that day I was like damn I really had to sit back and just think like I am going in the right direction you know and there was times where I didn't because like I said I love all my friends and the case may be but none of them are trying to do the things I'm trying to do right now yeah you know and they don't they're not big on trying to do charity events for others or trying to do too much self-improvement maybe in their private life they are I'm not going to speak on that maybe they do I don't want to say they're not doing anything but that's the space I'm in and I always felt alienated cuz my mindset was different we all get together hang out I don't want to sit talk about old times yeah you know a lot of the times that would bring up the old me and I don't want to hear about that [ __ ] yeah cuz the old me was broke not where he should have been in and out of jail drinking crazily to mask the inner

[55:38]  problems you know what I mean so yeah that's that's the struggle it's hard you know but if you depends how you look at it you know I don't look at as losing people I look at it as just like I said earlier the season is just for others yeah at this time and that's one of the biggest things I've recognized about getting older as well as like at some point in time you start to recognize that maybe these people just don't fit your season of growth you know what I mean and like hey we can always be homies and I'm always going to be here for you but like I'm really out here trying to accomplish as much as I can and my sense of accountability towards myself when I truly know it right when we really sit down with our thoughts like you're talking about in those moments of moments of boredom and you have the ability to ask yourself tough questions the answer the right answer pops up very quickly and it's like if I'm going to be doing these things like

[56:26]  partying on the weekends and hanging out with these people am I truly in alignment with who I'm becoming and is that future version of myself happy that I'm spending my time with these people often the answer is no but that process like you talked about from an alienation and that belonging perspective is something that you have to get comfortable with you know what I mean because like there's not a lot of people in my circle who are going to try and do the same stuff that I'm going to and it's like am I wasting time hanging out with you guys more so probably yes than no you know what I mean that doesn't mean I have any less love for you guys but now was my season of growth and I need to put all my chips in my bet Circle you know what I'm saying I can't carry around the weight of what we used to do you know we were talking a lot about Alex heroi right somebody who I look up to a lot and he put out a piece of content a while ago that spoke to me he's like I don't travel home for the the holidays anymore why because when I

[57:14]  get around other people they speak a version of myself that no longer exists upon me so like oh man Dorian you remember when we used to get like [ __ ] up and we used to drink like you're so crazy like you get loud you get all this kind of stuff you can drink you know what I mean it's like that type of attitude but even the people we surround ourselves in the language they use over the top of us is so detrimental especially when it doesn't align with who we are like naturally I start to feel like I don't even know who that person is anymore you know what I mean and I have to hold myself to the highest accountability because I'm not going to try and go backwards you know what I mean like there's a quote by Jay-Z's like someone said I changed it's like yeah do you think I work this hard to [ __ ] stay the same you know what I mean it's like you always got to be pushing yourself and I know that's a really scary process for a lot of people especially when it's the homies and

[58:01]  stuff like that but eventually you got to recognize if people are serving you or not and you got to cut those [ __ ] people off because the more time you spend with them the more opportunities you're creating for yourself to get dragged back down into that old version of yourself yeah and I mean for me it was like I said it started back when I stopped drinking that kind of helped me because you know I decided to remove myself from situations to where drinking in the beginning where I I say be enticed but more easily influenced to maybe like okay maybe one it's been two weeks you know I can have one you know yeah so I remove myself and like I said I was locked in for work I was an independent trainer so I just working home you know and after a certain amount of time and months I feel confidence where I was over drinking here and there I would sprinkle in some time with friends you know what I mean like yeah you know let's get together for somebody's birthday or just get together

[58:48]  for food or what the case may be but at this point now I've been a year and a half sober and it's just the times I do get around and it's just the same old drinking and like I said talking about old times it's just like bro I could be I don't know I could be using this time just home yeah it's like my question is like where in the [ __ ] are we going why are we talking about where we've been at you know what I mean and you know one thing I had thought about back to the belonging part earlier at the end of the year last year right coming up on my one year sober I made a post and I was like yo coming up on I'm about to hit one year next week or something like that how do you think I should celebrate and I put a poll I think the first answer was like stay sober drink some cucumber water

[59:36]  second second one pour up some tequila I forgot the third one is I had about I want to say about 25 or so votes five voted everybody voted sober five voted porps some tequila can you guess who those five were the homies people in your circle and for me like I said back to and I had this Epiphany just recently think about this the situation it's bugged me ever since but I never brought it up I never said anything because I still have that that fear of sense of belonging and of they're my friends I need to have them yeah but that [ __ ] bugged me and what did I do when it came up we're all hanging out the time when I read it out laughed it off yeah like but that [ __ ] really cut me like damn y'all

[1:00:23]  know me for years y'all see me almost die you've seen our other close friend pass away liquor involved but it's funny to you to oh yeah I don't think you know have a child tequila and that [ __ ] Bugg me and I they're I going to see this and I'm glad they do so they know yeah but that [ __ ] did bug me it cut me deep Bro I was like that's crazy I mean and that's the biggest thing that you know when we're talking about surrounding ourselves with good people you know what I mean the people who have your best intention at heart are never going to try and put you back in a place where you can relapse you know what I'm saying I'm not saying like relapse from an addiction perspective but if you recognize the cues that have brought out the worst behavior in yourself and some of the most detrimental moments in life and you still got people in your circle who are like haha I was just [ __ ] around but like you know what I mean like that is so disingenuine and for me

[1:01:10]  that would be an instantaneous thing of like I'm putting a [ __ ] X on your chest you know what I mean and like we can still you can have my phone number but don't be surprised if I get a new phone number and then you try and hit me up one day and that [ __ ] goes green you know what I mean cuz like I'm going to be on to the next one yeah and man it's just like at the end of the day if you're watching this video and you've got friends and listening to this and you've got friends who are trying to put themselves into the next position your job if you truly care and love about that person is to push them in the right direction you know what I'm saying like everybody wants to say like oh yeah they're doing all this kind of stuff yada yada and if they try and pull you back that is not somebody who you want in your circle and obviously you are a [ __ ] friend for reaching out and even putting that type of sentiment in somebody's world because that stuff is so detrimental man no it is and that was

[1:01:57]  one thing that sat with me over the past was been what six8 months now mhm cuz you don't [ __ ] forget that [ __ ] no I don't and it's narrowed in my head and it's crazy because that same night I believe it was a friend's like family celebration and we're talking about something from the year before talking about somebody's birthday like oh yeah last year someone's birthday and I was like damn where was I at because they were talking about it yeah and two of them responded and said I don't know you were being weird oh right but his mom said who barely knows me knows me a little bit was like oh he was probably working on himself yeah and had Epiphany moment I was like it's crazy like the thought process people have to think of it as a negative light rather than positive and at that point in life when we're talking about I was working on

[1:02:43]  myself I was working on not drinking anymore had to went completely sober y but I was trying to and by trying I was removing myself cuz I was I would do things as simple as all right well if I'm going to drink Friday night for your birthday or I'm not going to brunch on Sunday yeah it's one of the other you know what I mean and I was doing little steps like that to help me pull away from the alcohol and eventually did but those two situations within I want to say the same night were just in my head all the way up until this day so every time we get together and hang out and it just it was reminder reminder and I'm just getting closer and closer of like okay I need to be more mindful of how I choose to spend my energy and space I guess I'll say put it that way you know one of the things that I think about recently is leverage and The Leverage that other people have on top of you you know what

[1:03:33]  I'm saying so when I come across tough situations and I have a choice to make about what my character what my actions what my behavior is going to be in that moment I'm always trying to make the best decision for the future version of myself and it's very selfish because I think about the character that we represent in this world is finite you only have one piece of character you only have one reputation and when you protect that with all of your heart and you align your actions and behavior with that future version of your character it eliminates leverage that people have on top of you so a great example let's say somebody starts talking [ __ ] about you do you know what I mean and they're pissed off for some reason and they start talking to your other friends about it right people who really got your back and you've done nothing but do

[1:04:21]  right by those people how [ __ ] crazy do they sound for trying to talk [ __ ] on you and everybody else's opinion of you is like n dog like this kid's working on himself all the time I don't know who you're talking about but it speaks more about those people who are willing to try and pull you back down the ladder I saw a post on social media there day I was talking about when people are haters in your comments right they're like nobody who is successful in life is ever going to try and make fun of you or pull you back down or trash your name because they've got so much of their own [ __ ] going on that it's not worth it it's only the people who are [ __ ] behind you who are going to want to try and be like oh that guy's a piece of [ __ ] he drinks a lot he does all this kind of stuff and it naturally kind of if you're really good puts an indicator in that person of like this guy's a piece of [ __ ] you know what I mean like that

[1:05:07]  guy's not [ __ ] if he's making fun of other people or he's trying to put his friends in negative situations that's been something I think about a lot like DAV Gaga said I was telling you about too he says you'll never find a hater doing better than you [ __ ] yeah exactly better way to say it man yeah you'll never find haing it's so true and know I just call people haters I just think people aren't truly self-aware yeah I think that's one of the biggest things in the world not just social media what in the world as humans we need to learn to become self-aware and you only do that by I personally think by going to Solitude to where you're not always out every weekend because most people work a 9-5 job right Monday through Friday Whatever It Is 40 hours and then you spend your free time what do you do maybe you go home you go right to bed you watch a show on the weekends what do you do you got to do your adult thing get groceries whatever the case may be hang out with your friends you're constantly being on you know what I mean

[1:05:55]  rarely do people really sit to themselves and just be you know what I mean I think those moments are important because those are those are the moments where you get to talk to yourself like you said earlier and ask yourself those questions and learn and just be rather than always on and getting that dopamine yeah I heard a statistic there day that said 40% of our day is Habitual meaning we are on autopilot for 24 of the 24 hours that we're alive damn that's a lot that's a lot and if you think about the routine of what you just talked about of going to work from 9:00 to 5: coming home sitting down watching your Netflix making your dinner or ordering Uber Eats and then you go to bed and you wake up and you do the same thing over and over again by the time you're like 35 I heard a statistic it was like 80% of your

[1:06:42]  habits are literally habitual in your brain because you've done them so many times and no wonder people start looking back at life and they're like damn life just flew by or this year went by so fast it's because you're stuck in the same routine of doing the same [ __ ] over and over again you know what I mean and that scares the [ __ ] out of me hell yeah because it's like we have such limited time to get [ __ ] done these days that if you're not being proactive and you're not being intentional with the things that you do and you put yourself in these different types of situations it's no wonder life flies by and then you're going to look back with a huge like sense of regret damn that's crazy statistic I mean it's just like part of life man you know what I mean like [ __ ] just want to sit around all day and act like we are supposed to be given things in this life because we're in America we're already in the top percent of people who are alive

[1:07:29]  today but often people forget that you are in complete control of everything that you want to do and so that's why I love having the conversations about self-development because if you want the things that you want in life you're the only person who's going to be able to get them for yourself yeah that's it like you said ear nobody's going to save you nobody nobody saved my ass when I was drinking falling out of Windows losing friends and then came back and still drank still got blacked out nobody saved me I L had to own my [ __ ] and save myself you know understand that I deserve it's it's all about even learning you deserve better you know what I mean I had to realize that I deserve a better life than to just be drunk all the time and like I wasn't drunk every day but it was like every weekend enough and the only reason I wasn't drunk on certain days cuz I had to work MH so if

[1:08:15]  I wasn't working I probably still Co is a perfect example how many [ __ ] were drunk a lot during covid because nobody was working I was one of them out of seven days I was probably drunk four to five why not no job nothing to do the only reason people a lot of people don't drink as much as they probably would is because they have to work and that's a scary thing man you have to really sit and think to yourself like damn when's the last time I went sober people always like to or people ask me know how long I've been sober or why I stopped drinking and I like to think like why haven't you stopped yeah you know have you thought have you really sat and thought to yourself cuz I know people personally like have you really sat and thought to yourself when the last time you went Sober by choice cuz for me I there was times where I was sober but I was on probation yeah I didn't want to go to jail I had to be sober this last year and a half all by choice and now

[1:09:04]  was second nature and easy like I don't get enticed it's water the bridge I don't dare I don't think I'll ever drink alcohol again to be honest not even alcohol in my uh mouthwash yeah I don't even do that um but yeah that's where I'm at I mean what's that what's that sense of momentum feel like because when people are trying to make big changes for themselves we start on these activities right and then we have that little voice in our back of our head or that itch to go drink or could do all this different kind of stuff so what does that feeling of momentum look like for you when you are now a year out of drinking you are talking about not being enticed and it's water underneath the bridge was that something that was always easy or do you feel like that's gotten easier over time over time um like I said you have to have a a Clarity I guess you'll say I'll say of why you're doing it you know and not just oh

[1:09:52]  I'm just going to not do this weekend just because like no I have a real reason like I wanted to be healthier and be an example for my clients you know and I was able to sit back and think how all the bad things that happened to me in my life going to jail losing people almost losing my life alcohol was involved so it was like why would I keep doing this and initially it was hard but like I said I removed myself from situations to where I would be maybe entic or influenced and after a certain amount of time I started realizing just wasn't worth it anymore for me yeah but everybody's relationship with alcohol is different I was one of those people I'm either blacked out or I'm sober yeah all nothing that was me there's people out there who I know I have friends who do it they can you know take a shot or two I'm done they know and that's cool if

[1:10:39]  you can have your limit and know your limits all to you like do that but me I wasn't one of those people so when I talk about these ways to stop drinking is for those people who can sit back and be honest with themselves and think like damn I think I need I have a problem I need to stop and it's hard to admit that problem and it was Lally after that first no to myself when I thought to myself when I was enticed to drink one week in of me saying I was going to stop I thought about it and I was like you know what I'm going to take this on as a challenge rather than thinking oh my God I can't drink I was like you know what it's a challenge right here first first week can I say no and I said no and it just felt so empowering like I felt like okay I can do this and as time went on that power just grew and grew and grew and now it's almost like a flex to be honest yeah you don't meet too many people who can say they don't drink at

[1:11:26]  all and at least some especially that going from where I was at yeah and it's just a flex like I said there's not many people I can meet who are sober as me I know one I work with actually he's going on two years which I think is amazing but not too many people yeah man it is a flex you know what I mean because at the end of the day like you're proud of yourself you know what I mean it's not like that outward validation of people like oh you're so awesome but it's knowing that you can stick with something that you align to yourself and that power you know when I have those tough days when I want to do those bad habits I sit with those feelings sometimes and I'm like why do I feel this way right now what am I running from and then when I get on the other side of that feeling it feels so good to be like dude I'm proud of you we made it through another one you know what I mean like that sense of fortification of your own mindset and doing right by yourself

[1:12:13]  there's no better reward in my opinion I think talking to yourself is very important M um I have this book called transform your life that I've been using since 2014 it's a book it gives you a quote quot she'll break down the quote and then give you some homework to do relating to that quote and initially I thought it was kind of dumb some of the things they'll tell you to do yeah like every time you see the color green give yourself a affirmation MH at that point in time when I first first used it I was like uh some of the ones were easier like hey today every time things get tough think of the glass half full rather than empty and that's where I learned that we were condition minds and I was like what do you do when you want to have a a good better bicep stronger B bigger arms you condition you work it so I started talking to myself more often with that book and it helped me change my mindset on a lot of things

[1:13:00]  helped me become more open-minded and I think it's very important to have those selft talks like you said instead of just sitting there giving into that feeling of I kind of want to have a drink like why I don't have a drink like talk to yourself literally talk to yourself and it'll help you make better decisions rather than making emotional decisions just acting on that emotion then you regret it like [ __ ] I I didn't have to drink tonight I could have just been chill yeah yeah well I want to end this by asking you a question and this might be you know a piece of vulnerability yeah but knowing you for who you are looking at yourself from an outside perspective why are you so proud of yourself I am so proud of myself because I've been there's a few

[1:13:48]  reasons um I want to say more so than anything my resilience that's the biggest thing I've been living by and I think it's my stamp of who I am is I'm living example of resilience you know being homeless as a kid it sucked you know falling out a four- store window it sucked losing my best friend nine months later it sucked grieving in jail for two months it sucked L my grandfather's dementia it sucked getting dumped or whatever throughout the years those suck too but you know knowing that I never give up on myself I don't know why I just wake up and I get it I I don't know I just do every day I'm like you know what today it's going to be better you know even have a good day next day I wake up it's going to be better and I honestly can't tell you where that came

[1:14:34]  from man like to this day just this inner driving me to just always push forward because I always think it always be worse I've SE I've been and lived worst you know what I mean yeah being a kid homeless the BR sucked not going to lie I think back on it to this day as an adult and that's why I really want to get involved in the community and help the youth because I don't want them to go through the things I went through because not everybody's going to turn out in a positive light going through that kind of hard [ __ ] there's a lot of kids who turn out and become drug drug dealers pimps whatever the case may be so yeah to answer the question sorry to answer the question I would say I'm most proud of my resilience MH 100% well I mean I'm proud of you too man thank you I know like taking those compliments is tough you know it is it's like I said one thing I'm working with my life coach now for whatever reason it's she knows why obviously she's going to help me get

[1:15:21]  through it um but that's my next that's my next challenge is opening that thing up and figuring it out yeah well I just want to say thanks man for coming on the show you know hearing your story but also giving the examples because one thing that I always talk about is everybody feels like we're on our own journey and we're alone and nobody else understands what we're going through but I guarantee people who turn into tune into this episode are going to find their story in you and the things that you've been through and the fact that you've been able to overcome everything that you've been able to the fact that you show up every single day and help other people become better versions of themselves is something that you should be really proud of and everybody has the ability to do those things as well so I just want to say thanks for coming on the show bro I appreciate man absolutely guys great great show