Transcript
We hosted a slumber party with 12 billionaires (our minds are blown)
0:00 Alright, Sam, we just had an insane weekend together. We Gotta talk about it. I feel like I can rule the world and no way Be what I want to
0:10 We just lived in a house for a weekend with Twenty five other founder entrepreneur types. Probably. Five to ten of them were billionaires, a bunch of others were close, and we didn't just like talk or hang out. We literally like slept under one roof.
0:30 Uh sat and saunas together, played basketball together, w went to Walmart together a bunch of times. My Airbnb had bunk beds, so we we bunked We bunkbed together. It's as close as two men can get. So we had an experience and I have in front of me Several
0:48 Sticky notes of Golden lessons learned. And I phrased each of them. I don't know if you did this, but I've raised each of them. To make it fun because nobody wants to hear your vacation story. That's one of the great rules of storytelling is just never tell a vacation story. 'Cause it's so fun for you, but they weren't there and nobody cares. But I I think we should tell
1:06 The the biggest lessons learned with the story that backs them up. So it's real, not just a generic lesson. And I phrase all of mine like it's Confucius, like You know, Bruce Lee whispered this. Into your ear. Yeah, I dig that. And to give the background, basically, I think like three years ago you tweeted out I want to play basketball with interesting people. I think Mr. Beast like DM'd you and you're like, Wait, is this real?
1:28 You ended up phoning him and he was like, Yeah, come to my place. I wanna meet interesting people the first year It was like you and Ben organized it. It was like nineteen of us in an Airbnb and we were like, What are we gonna do? So we played basketball. The second year you organized it a little bit more and you had like an itinerary this year, you guys killed it. It was awesome. It w it was a an amazing event. I I do like meeting interesting people when I go to conferences or events. I just hate conferences or events. Like I get a pit in my stomach when I have to go.
1:59 And I know it's good for me and I know in the end I'll meet some cool people. I just hate the format. I hate the structure. So it was like Well what's you know, instead of just complaining about it. What's the structure I would like? It's like well, I don't know. What if it was just doing the thing I love, it was playing basketball.
2:14 with those people. We basically play ball all day and then we talk at night. And that was the the core idea is to use basketball as the icebreaker. And you broke your knee in the first two hours. Yeah, yeah. So this was an event where uh you could tear you could tear up your knee and be done in the first hour and I still had a good time. That means it must have been a good event because Normally that's pretty brutal. I I did have a little pity party for myself, but I feel better now. Are we allowed to say who is there? Yeah, I think we could say some of the people that were there. Yeah, let's go for it. So Mr Beast who Uh, like, you know, everyone knows him as the guy on YouTube with hundreds of millions of subscribers. I think he's a paper billionaire. I think that's public. Yeah, he's one of the youngest billionaires in the world. I think he's twenty six years old and he's worth a few billion dollars. He's one of the most famous people also in the world, one of the most recognized entertainers in the world. And when you hang out with him, he's also one of the like
3:04 Most intense. Yeah. Fun to be around. Yeah, just wants to play all in. Like somebody said this once about Elon, they go He's playing. He's playing life as if the as if the simulation theory is true. You know Elon has a simulation theory just be one of many simulations.
3:20 And so he he therefore just goes all in because Okay, whatever. Let's let's make this the most entertaining version of that simulation. I think that's how Jimmy plays plays life too. So we are with him. It was uh the f one of the founders of Airbnb who, like on paper, like according to Forbes, is like the hundredth or ninetietth richest person in the world. It was uh another billionaire who was one of the first investors in Tesla and SpaceX. It was uh the founder of Reddit. It was Jesse Itzler who's on the podcast. You, me, Al Done, who runs like a quilting company that does nine figures a year. Tons of people. David Perell, Nick. It was awesome.
3:57 You wanna start first? Yeah, let's do it. All right, I got one for you. Here's one of the lessons I I picked up. And this is about The business ideas that these guys were thinking about.
4:07 So If you're out there and you're wondering kind of like where's the opportunity, what should I be working on? Here's what I picked up. From some of the most successful people in America. And it says
4:16 Fish where the fish swimming. Not where the fishermen stand. Confucius, aka me. Did you just make that up? You saw me write it these five minutes before we were. I thought you had heard that. Did you hear that somewhere else? There's a scratch out on it, right? But did you get like Chinese food last week and that was like a fortune cookie? Dude, I've had my share of gungfly chicken. Alright, let me just tell you some of the ideas that I heard from people who were in
4:41 Um at this event. So you mentioned you mentioned Jesse Itzler and I think one of the public things that he's done is He got really into racing, like running running endurance races. So he just followed his curiosity. Hundred mile races. Hundred mile races. He started to do hundred mile races. While he's doing hundred mile races, he notices that the runners. that are trying to do these amazing physical feats are drinking coconut water. And coconut water was a big like a big part of that niche, super niche community.
5:07 And he became a believer and spent time hunting down what he thought would be the best coconut water company. Ends up finding Zico Coconut Water. partners with them. And Zco now is a a big success. They ended up selling, I think, to Coke and Yeah, they're they're in Whole Foods or they're you know, it's one of the big coconut water brands. And he found it when he was small and just like Just exploring These uncharted territories. So here's some other ones that I heard.
5:30 There was somebody there who's making hundreds of millions of dollars a year. Selling board games. I never even had that on my bingo card. I didn't even know that was an option. I did not even know that you could do that. There was somebody there that was Investing millions of dollars into women's sports. Like
5:47 You know, uh and not even just women's sports, like They're trying to do things now where the you just buy a piece of a college program. I don't even know you could do that. Like that's for sale. What the f w says what is that for sale? Where is this listing? I uh I went to a talk recently with m this billionaire who owned like The Timberwolves, Mark Lazary or something, and he was talking about the Bucks. The Bucks. And he was talking about how he's trying to buy college. Do you buy the rights?
6:12 They're going to like the University of Alabama or whatever, and they're just like, Cool, we'll give you five hundred million dollars. For the Alabama sports program that we want to own fifty one percent of the do they buy the future earnings? Is that what it is? They're basically I think what's gonna happen is again, it's uncharted territory. You don't know exactly how this would play out, but the I think the short version is The college will spin out the program, their their athletics program as its own business entity. They'll sell equity in it. They'll use the equity to finance
6:40 all of their sports like women's lacrosse, like things that aren't gonna be the big revenue generators. So they use it to to fund all their programs and maybe even school stuff. And then those And then and the costs now are are borne by the the private equity person, but now it's this asset that didn't even exist before. Like these college programs can make a lot of money, media rights and all this stuff, but they weren't even for sale. Somebody was doing that. There was something somebody there that was like Yeah, seven years ago.
7:05 I just got really obsessed with water. Like yeah, meat. Two, I thought my whole life is like No, like I got really obsessed. Like Do you know what kind of water you're drinking? And I was like, Uh no, like is this bad microplastics? What's going on? And he was just like, Yeah, like I got obsessed.
7:20 And so I just started studying where's the clean water from, where's the healthiest water from? And I realized that water was gonna become like oil. That people were gonna more and more be drinking not tap water, but they wanted They're gonna want basically bottled water, canned water, things like that. And that water's gonna have to come from somewhere. And I wanted to find the best sources of water. And so I went to West Virginia and I bought this aquifer. This is the spring. I bought this giant water source. And he was like, You see that drink you're drinking right there? It's like some brand like popular brand. And he's like,
7:48 That's our water and they use our water. So that's good one. And I was like, what? This was just a side quest. That he went on. And again, it was curiosity driven. Was this one of the billionaires? Yeah, basic I mean not not billionaire, but yeah, like whatever, close. Close enough.
8:02 There's a guy there, Al, who started a quilting company with his mom. A Missouri Star Quilt Company and they sell Fabrics. For people who want to make quilts.
8:12 His co founder is his mom. I have a planned vacation to so he owns this thing. The the company's called Missouri Quilting Company, and he basically bought he did a podcast three years ago with us where he explained where he bought I tell it. Is it ham Hamilton, Missouri? He bought like an eighteen hundred person town where they own every building and they're building the Disneyland for quilting. Just the thought of that. So first to go into quilting. Smart guy, like you know, could do could have done any business. Goes into quilting. It's like what are you doing, man? You're throwing it all away on quilting? Does a business with his mom, right? Like again, independent thinking, not just following the herd. So then starts the business. Her mom his mom does the YouTube channel. He does the business side of it.
8:52 Business keeps growing. And then it's like you know what we could do. We could create the Disneyland for quilting. And he literally goes and buys a town. Again, who's is that for sale? Can you do that? How do you do that? And that m that just kept happening, which was like
9:05 People who were playing games that Didn't even seem uh popular. lesson there's there was a person there who had sold a piece of their company to Chernin. And Cherning is now kinda known. I first heard about it maybe like ten years ago. And Chernen is this really interesting
9:23 They're most famous for T C Yeah, they're they're you know the Peter Turnham was the CEO of Fox, so he's like a big swinging dick. He's been a baller for years, but their most pa famous amongst like normal people because they bought Barstool when it was nothing and helped make it something. And they just had this again independent thinking where they were like, Hey, I think these things that other people see as small kind of toys, things that aren't gonna make a lot of money, you know, media brands, blogs, YouTube channels. I think these things are gonna be big.
9:52 I think basically and they had this thesis which was con uh content to commerce. It's like I think if you're kicking ass at content, you're gonna be able to instead of just making your money through ad revenue and sponsorships. You're gonna be able to sell stuff to those people. And they have this content of commerce thesis and they go and they buy Barstool.
10:08 Content. It ends up being this juggernaut with commerce. They buy um Uh they bought exploding kittens and they bought uh meat eater and they bought line that all these niche content brands. We had a guy on the pod the plant daddy. I met with them uh a couple of times. There was like early discussions. Well
10:25 you know, three meetings with the the that I had with that the hustle and I was like What the fuck do you guys know? Didn't get that one right. Turns out they know a lot. They they know a lot. Did he just like slide a P L across the table and he's like I'll leave you three minutes alone. Like they told me the story and I was like You're full of shit. You don't know what you're talking about. Like do
10:48 You you're you're talking about my company, right? Uh it's like you know, like Like the but they were right. I think with the the the premise was correct. Uh but I yeah, I I I I didn't have that confidence that we're talking about now. Dude, they're made a fortune'cause the market overlooked these brands. These brands were not valued like high flying tech companies, but they became
11:12 You know, multi hundred million billion dollar brands. It's it's I really admire what T C did because the best. There's so many investors that all love to sound like they're smart and contrarian and they're all just What's your thesis? AI, the f you know, AI is gonna be the future of everything, right? It's like okay, you you're not wrong in that, but like There's something really impressive.
11:31 About somebody who looked at just like this magazine or this blog or this. We've actually probably had three or four people who sold their company on the pod to to those guys. Right, right. And and they've been right. And they've been right in a very, very big way. Um so I'm very impressed by them. So to me that that's the principle fish where the fish swim. So fish where the real opportunity is, not where the fishermen are standing, not where everybody uh all the entrepreneurs are are huddled up. This this sports cookie says Man does not s sell chocolate.
12:00 She must be. become chocolate. Okay, so what does this mean? Three years ago when we did the first version of this event. Jimmy, aka Mr. Beast, had launched his
12:10 Chocolate brand feestibles. And it was like, okay. Selling chocolate to little kids. I had the opportunity to invest. I think at a forty million dollar valuation was like the the series A. And I pass in uh in like the beast empire or chocolate. In feastables itself.
12:27 So Um Kinda thought about it. I was like, I don't really get it. I didn't really know much about the chocolate industry. I thought his involvement was gonna be like this. Normal influencer brand is I'm doing my thing. I create my content. Oh.
12:40 My manager hands me this. Hey, uh buy this. Smile. Yeah. Put it down, move on with life. So I thought he's just gonna influence it. I thought he's just gonna hold it up and buy it. I didn't what I didn't realize
12:51 Is that this guy was gonna go so deep into the world of chocolate and end up knowing everything about chocolate and up running this company. Like an absolute maniac founder. If I had known that, if I had known he was gonna bring his inten his full intensity at this I probably would have thought about it differently. I thought he was just gonna hold up the chocolate bar and see how many people clicked the link. Um, I was dead wrong. So I wanna tell a a quick story. You were there for for one of the Walmart runs, right?
13:15 No, but I have a bunch of Walmart stories. We're sitting there, we're about to record, he walks in, he's like, Hey Before we do this, do you guys want to go to Walmart? Which I realize like at the time sounded like a sort of a a strange request. Nobody's ever asked me on it on a mandate to Walmart. We walk in and um
13:31 He takes us to the chocolate aisle. And basically gives a like 10 minute master class. on the chocolate industry right there in the aisle. And while he's doing it, he's not just like explaining like, Well, this is how it works, this is how we do this is our revenues, this is whatever He's also simultaneously restocking the entire aisle. Like he pulled the cartons up to the front because they were like three inches recessed. They were pushed back too far. Some of the bars had fallen over, they were crooked. He straightens every single one of them out. He puts the right flavors in the right spots. If a bar was crinkly or broken, he's like he'd throw it to his chief of staff, be like, Hey, can you buy this? I want to have like we should only have good bars. No broken bars up front. And he would basically restock the thing.
14:08 But his hands were moving at a speed which showed you this is not the first time this guy's done this. So he he restocks it. One of the popular flavors was out and so he takes out his phone. And he's like, Oh, I have a badge. And so he just badges into the back of Walmart and goes and gets the box himself and restocks it. And I was like, Does any vendor get to do that? And he was like, No, not exactly, but they know like I Like I just do this. I care. I really care. And Yeah.
14:31 Kinda two things stood out to me. The first was obvious, which was When High intensity obsessive people wanna win. They do the same things that the rest of us do with the knob dialed up to twelve. Like they just they just take the knob and they just crank it past even where you think it could go and he and for example, he was like I think you were there. He was telling the story about
14:50 Like missing a flight or something like this. He like told a story about how apparently he flew to D C and had a connecting flight to North Carolina or something wherever he lived, and he was like, You know what? Screw it. I'm driving from D C to Greenville, North Carolina. It's normally like I don't know, a three hour drive or something, but I noticed that there's 14 Walmart in between on that route. I'm gonna stop at every single one of them to learn. And it turned like a three hour drive into like you know, a twenty hour drive. And he told me at one point, he goes, I have scanned I guess he's got some app where you scan things in Walmart and it teaches you about each skew. He said he scanned every single product in Walmart. And I don't know if he was like if someone said, Oh no, I've scanned all of them, you'd be like Oh, so it's like saying it's a thousand degrees outside. You're just exaggerating. But with him I was like Oh, I bet you you've literally have scanned every single one of them.
15:37 In the podcast we did, he was like, Yeah, like you know, we want to do a thing where you buy every item in Walmart. for somebody in a video and he's like, you know, but it it's sixteen point two million dollars. It's like he knew the actual cost of the total total inventory if you bought one of everything in Walmart, like what it cost. I forgot what the number was, but So but I don't want to make this a just a Jimmy Love Fest because there was another guy. Who was a top seller in Target.
15:59 Yeah, man. I heard'em nerding out. It was wild. He took us to this shelf and he was like, This shelf right here. He's given us a tour of Target and it shows you how the store works. He's like this shelf right here is the high the most profitable shelf in Target is the highest profit per square inch, which is how Target measures, you know, success. And he's giving us this target master class. And we were like, Are you also in Walmart? He's like, Yeah, we're in Walmart, but we're not doing so well. And uh I asked him, What's exciting for you coming up? And this guy runs a billion dollar plus company, I assumed he was just gonna say I've got some board meetings to line up. I'm going I'm taking the family to to Aspen.
16:34 And he goes, Actually I'm working the next three weeks, um As a Walmart associate. I was like, what? And he goes, Yeah, I'm I'm gonna be uh he's goes our sales in Walmart are not the same as in Target. And I've been trying to figure out why. What I found remarkable is that you expect the people who are the most busy, the most accomplished, the most high net worth. To be above.
16:55 These tasks. Jimmy restocking the skewes himself. This other guy w going to be a Walmart associate for three weeks. You know, they don't have to do any of this. But they're gonna do it anyways. They're not just doing it now, now that they're successful. That's how they got here.
17:08 And so that was the first really big takeaway from this whole thing was The intensity with which certain people play the game of business and how that Leads to success. That guy who you're referring to was the quietest person there, or one of And there was a point where I was hanging out with him, he goes, Can I get your guys' opinion?
17:26 You know, I think in I'm thinking about Potentially like making some type of business move which would value us at this Valuation. And we were like, What valuation? And it was like in the
17:37 Billions. And we were like Do Do you know who we are? Why are you asking us this question? Like what like what are you what are you talking about, man? Like you I don't know who you asked this question to, but not like he was the most Uh like humble person there.
17:53 And he was crazy successful. It was pretty wild, uh, that that guy who you're talking about. Um all right, I have one. Confidence beats IQ. So You know, there are a lot of like really successful people out there. Like when I read Warren Buffett's biography. He he does the opposite, where he is like, Oh, you know, I'm just this guy and it's like dude you're
18:13 You're bona. Yeah. It's like you're a baby genius. Like he was like when he was like four, he was like making 10 grand a month selling Pepsi. But in general, the group of people who we had there There were some people for sure who are genius. Uh I think Jimmy's one of them actually. I I think when you talk to him You know, he's like uh brilliant. But
18:35 And like Mario from Oscar was one of them. Mario uh co-founded a company called Oscar, which is a health insurance company, which is one of the hardest things ever to do. It's worth publicly traded four billion dollars. So he's like the man. And he doesn't even speak English, or or he does. That's a second language. So like it he you know, he's from Germany. So he's just genius. Dude, imagine going to Germany and revolutionizing the German healthcare bar. You know what I mean? Like it's it's pretty wild. Extra degree of difficulty to just go to someone else's motherland and fix their shit. Yeah, which is wild. But You know, he was a genius, but in general, dude, the wealthiest people there I noticed we're not even close to the smartest. And here's an example.
19:13 One of the billionaire guys was there, he goes, Man, AI is just gonna change the world because I don't think you guys get it. Like I use it every day, and I was like, How do you how do you use it? He goes, I could show you right now. And he pulls out his phone and he talks to chat GPT and he goes, Hey, ChatGPT, you know I have a question. And he like starts like reading a question to it and then he's like, Now watch how amazing it is. And he like it repeats the answer, and I'm like Oh, so you're saying that you just use chat GBT like all the time. Like yeah. And I was like Well like have you like trained it? He goes
19:45 Tra you could trade it? Like like he didn't know that you could do these things. And this particular guy I ran a company doing billions a year in revenue. I guess what I mean is like this the the the percentage of intelligence greater than me or you or someone else there versus the impact or net worth was not like that. It it wasn't core. Totally. Totally totally agree with that, which is that uh when you sit in a room like this, two things happen. One You just get to sample like it's Costco and it's noon at Costco, and you're just getting to sample Different life style Oh, what do you do? Oh wow, you seem kinda stressed out. Gotcha. Like not interested in going down that aisle. Yeah. You seem like you're having a lot of fun. What do you do? How do you think about this?
20:24 Uh, you got kids too. How are you doing both, right? And you get to sample people's lifestyle when you're hanging out with them like this for like You know, forty eight hours straight. Um On top of that You also get to do the measuring stick thing.
20:36 Which kinda sucks'cause you're measuring yourself against like some of the most creative, successful, ambitious people in the world. But a big part of it is you're trying to figure out the diff. Right. It's like those scene those little children's games. These two pictures. What's the difference between these two pictures? And on one side is me and the other side is them. And I'm always looking at what's the difference. And sometimes if it's like Amari or whatever, it's like, Oh, cool. Like His brain has an extra library in it. There's an extra wing that somebody donated to that brain. All right, cool. Like
21:04 I can I can live that. I can sleep easy. But there were other people where It was like, Oh, it just seems like they didn't limit themselves. That's what I mean. They just kinda went for it. Or they have their courage was just on a little bit higher supply than mine. And you're right that when you look at the diff, very very rarely was the diff these people are smarter than me. Or they had some advantages I didn't have coming up. Right. It's like in fact it's usually the opposite. It's like damn, they had this huge chip on the shoulder because their dad wasn't around and because of this happened and they were dyslexic. There's a bunch of people over there that were dyslexic. I wish I was dyslexic. Yeah, I think autistic was the goal. Dyslexic. Dude, every dyslexic guy there somehow was a good freestyle rapper.
21:40 Did you notice that? Like not only rich, but also cool in a group of of men huddled around together, right? Like I wish I was charismatic, like a dyslexic guy. Like that's crazy. It's like if you're if you're if it's like if you're blind, you're a good like piano player and if you're dyslexic, you're like the most charismatic guy on earth. Yeah, exactly. I have a related point, which is I just wrote these two words. I don't know if you give me this. I am I am. So
22:12 My trainer has a like a clothing brand that he creates. It's called Superconscious Girl. So one of the shirts he gave me that from Superconscious G my favorite shirt. It just on the side it just says I am And then it's after and afterneath it says. The two most important words in the English language for whatever comes after them will define your life. If you think you are destined for greatness, if you think you belong
22:33 At that table. You'll make different decisions along the way. And then it becomes sort of self fulfilling, right? You'll work at a different speed, you'll take different risks, you will you will go for it in a different way. Several conversations I had at this event Where I realize Damn, a lot of the
22:47 A lot of the downstream decisions Start with The little voice in your head, the little director of your movie. Who's deciding, like What kind of movie is this? Is this like a indie budget?
22:58 Is this a tragedy? Is this a comedy? Are you a joke? Or Is this a hero is this a Marvel movie? Are you the hero saving the world, right? And like I'm not saying one is better than the other, but you get to decide. What that little voice in your head is gonna tell?'Cause the director says
23:12 You know, what happens in the story, where you stand, where what you say, all of those things. And I thought Damn, a lot of what I'm seeing in how people are living their lives and what they're doing differently. comes from The little voice in their head just has a different script in mind for that what their life is all about. The I am statement. Or like here's a small example. How about Jesse
23:30 Bringing his sauna. The Jesse Itzler brought his sauna. And he had two guys and I was like, What do you guys? Oh we Bring these saunas. Like whenever he wants to go. Yeah. He's like, whenever we go, when he wants to go to like a conference or something, like this sauna's like a really cool way to like create a bonding experience, which it was, by the way, just chilling on the sauna was freaking awesome. And I was like, Wait, Jesse, you got these two guys whose just like job is like trail around this like sauna like across the country to break to events. That's the coolest thing I've ever heard of. He's like, Yeah, isn't it great? We get to hang in this song. I was like, Yes. And that's like another example of like intensity, but like on a more relatable scale. Right. Alright, I have one.
24:06 You could take your billions and shove it up your ass. Yeah. Yeah. Put yeah, uh put that on a on one of those inspirational posters that you see in your office. W there is this one guy who was one of the first investors in a variety of Elon companies.
24:25 And presumably a a a billionaire. Like uh you know, investing in Tesla at a sixty million dollar valuation, I or a hundred million dollar valuation, you know, I don't know what that Is that like a I is it like a hundred thousand times? So something like that. Yeah. We we don't do public math. Yeah, like a lot It's now a trillion dollar company. Yeah. So it it's a big deal. Um
24:48 You know, there was this funny story where this guy was telling a story about working really hard and like he Uh, was grinding and his kid was sick and he's like, I gotta take a week off to like go and help my kid and you know, I That was a big deal'cause I was working so hard and then this other guy came and he goes, You know how you guys are all talking about working sixteen hours weeks uh sixteen hours a day On your companies.
25:08 Um right now I'm doing that as well, but my company is my family. And I have retired from business and I work Sixteen hours a day as the CEO.
25:19 Uh My family. And when he said that, I was like This is awesome. Um and he I imagine he was exaggerating a little bit'cause I imagine he still does some type of uh
25:31 uh deal making or something like that. Um you know, I don't know'em well enough to know. But I thought it was so cool. When he said that, and I thought like you have it figured out. Same with Jesse Itzler.
25:43 These two guys who um I don't want I can't say the first guy's name, but Jesse also had the same energy Where I was like this is This is the way. And This is all personal preference, you know, Jimmy wanted to be Elon, cool. Go do that.
25:56 But when I heard these this other way of talking, I was like You know, after This is easy to say because everyone was wealthy. But after some number, I don't know what that number is, ten, twenty, thirty, some millions of numbers. Not of a lot of it really matters and just like having a good time with your family is something I really admired. And I and I thought it was really cool that that guy said that. And it made me Realized that I was getting sucked in this vortex of like money, money, money and achievement, achievement, whatever.
26:24 But when I saw these guys talk and their energy, I was more drawn to that than anyone else there. Do you agree? Yeah, a hundred percent. I think When when I go to events like this, my instinct is to figure out Oh how do you win?
26:37 Oh how do you win? How do you win? What tactics, what techniques. What strategies, what approaches work. And instead the better question almost every single time is what game are you even playing? And Picking the right game.
26:50 Matters way more than figuring out how to win. The wrong game. Dude, there was people there Who are like mini gangest cons, where it's like they want to dominate. Like they get joy out of War and domination.
27:03 They wanna build cities, they wanna dominate industries, they wanna do that. That's a g that's one game you could play. And by the way, no judgment. Great. Do whatever game you want to play. I just want to know what the games are so I can pick. And then other people were like, I wanna be CEO of my family full time and I'm like Yeah. I've done a four hour stretch with my kids like I think I'm more of a
27:20 Forty five minutes a day. Forty five minutes at a time, four times a day. That's that's my ideal. So okay, I'm not gonna be CEO of my family. 'Cause I I would actually be miserable if I was a full time stay at home dad, personally. But I but okay, that's a game I could play. Then uh I talked to Jesse and I was like, Jesse, what do you do? Like, what do you do every day now? I'm training for races and I'm coaching my kids sports things. I do public speaking because I feel like it keeps me sharp and I get excited to get up on stage and
27:45 Say some shit that lights people up. He's like, I'm selling calendars. He's like, it's not gonna make he's like, I'm not making a fortune. Like these guys, you know, they'll they'll do that in a in in a day or two to f a week. Well, we'll do in a year, but I I I don't know. I like doing it. I'm doing what I wanna be doing. And he was very at ease with that. He's at peace with that. And I think Obviously some of that comes from maturity, but a lot of it comes from It's easy to be at peace when you're actually doing the thing that puts you at peace, when you're doing the thing you like.
28:11 And if you're kind of Mm. uh I don't know, like masquerading around trying to just do what you think you should be doing. I think that becomes very exhausting. And so I'm with you that figuring out what game to play seems like the must much more important question. At every phase of your life. And the game I wanted to play in my twenties is different than the one I'm I'm playing currently in my 30s. And it's probably gonna be different than what I play in my 40s and 50s.
28:32 And I just gotta kinda Reinvent myself. Dude, there was one guy there who said he worked with Elon and apparently She had to do a meeting. Or something? With Elon and like
28:41 The secretary told him, like, all right. You're gonna do this meeting, but I need you to know That Elon makes His companies every one hour. So this better be a
28:53 twenty million dollar Meeting. I heard a similar thing from a guy who worked with him that he was like Uh Elon was Have a meeting, but he would
29:02 There would be like forty or fifty people in the meeting. And the reason why was not because that makes for a more effective meeting, but because it was like if the right if the person who we need to talk to is not in this room. It's such a colossal waste of his time. That we'll just fly everybody here. And we're gonna have this
29:21 You know, forty five minute block and that way everybody's here because all of your time collectively is not worth as much as his His hour. Which is like such a such an absolute. Like it's hard to it's hard to fathom this. Uh let me tell you one a really quick one. Which is hard work amongst this group. Not universal. So there was one guy, I you weren't there. You were yeah. Sean like busted his knee in the second hour or something like that and had to sta stay at home for like this whole one whole session. And there was this guy there who was explaining how hard he grinds.
29:53 And then there was this other guy Who was uh one of the more successful guys there. He was like I work like twenty hours a week. He's like once my companies got to be like some type of like predictable, stable like All right, if we just keep doing this for ten years, we're gonna grow
30:09 Fifty percent a year, hopefully like it's gonna whatever. He was like, I started working twenty hours a week and he's like I wouldn't work Fridays. Uh and it was really interesting to see that Not everyone worked hard. Did you get that sense from people? The thing I pulled from it was
30:25 Some people were basically operating like monopolies. And other people We're not. Uh, meaning there were some people playing a game where the competition is so vicious. I yeah, like an example is YouTube.
30:38 If you stop uploading. The the game stops the music stops. There's literally a million other businesses in that same exact space doing the ex same exact thing. Exactly. And every idea you put out there in a video, somebody else is gonna copy. And a lot of people do copy the the exact videos that he does and the exact script. It's all public information. It's all super competitive. There's no gatekeeping. And then there's other people who are like Yeah, all we had to do was get to this. Like.
31:04 We just had to get this shelf space. Like there was one guy who was showing us a shelf target. And he was like Basically, seven years of the company was just dedicated was just like hard work dedicated to getting on the shelf, but once you're on the shelf, It's almost impossible for anybody else to get on the shelf. All we have to do now is stay on the shelf. By the way, this shelf right here, like this little rack you're looking at. This is three hundred million dollars a year.
31:27 And you're just looking at it, you're like Oh damn. Like Wow, one shelf in Walmart. One shelf in uh in Target. Is a is like the entire revenue streams of like these online only companies, but You're extremely defensible compared to other businesses where
31:42 The moment you take a s take a break. You have the entire internet competing with you on that same thing, you know what I mean? Yeah. Yeah, it uh uh th that that was an interesting thing. Do you have um I have a quick one.
31:55 Health is wealth. Uh In a room full of very wealthy people. How many fancy clothes did you see? How many fancy watches did you see? How many fancy cars did you hear people bragging about? Everyone but Joe Gebia look schleppy.
32:09 Joe Gebbiel looked great. Fantastic style. Even in work out gear. He was wearing some nice shits. Dude, he looks like he should be in like a Taylor Sheridan show. Like if he if he made an if he made an appearance on Landman I wouldn't even I wouldn't even blink. Everyone besides him d do you know he's a b on the board of Tesla? I didn't know that either. Like he he does a lot of interesting stuff. Um everyone besides him looked Like we're like it we're like at a slumber party. Well we w we were also. Yeah, but during the day.
32:36 Yeah. That should be the title of this. Slumber party with billionaires. So the but the health is well thing was very real. There was a lot of flexing On Stuff you're doing for your health.
32:50 What you're eating and not eating. How much Who's your doctor? Who's your what's your protocol? that jacked or ripped or anything. Were were they other than Joe? Uh yeah, I thought people were in pretty good shape. If you go to other industries, non kind of like tech, internet, not our bubble, right? But like Go to like
33:09 A conference with the wealthiest people in finance. Or oil. Or whatever. Like pick any industry. Their body shape looks a lot different. No, everyone's way different. They looked like a healthy fifty five year old. Dude, after
33:21 Basically our day was go play basketball for three hours, like an intense basketball game. Come home. Go into a two hundred and fifty degree sauna. Then when you're tired of the sauna, go into this pond that was like f freezing cold in North Carolina and go plunge for three minutes. Then go back into the sauna, then go back into the plunge. Then there's like a masseuse doing body work and myofascia release for you. Then you're eating and everybody's eating clean. Every single person's eating clean while we're there, right? Like It's like dude, that was the norm. I got that is not normal. You know, if you were drinking something out of a plastic bottle It's like basically doing heroin at this event.
33:54 Dude, me and Nick Hubert got Taco Bell at midnight. Secrecy. Yeah, like we didn't want to tell anyone. Secretary. feestable bar in my like I like hid it in my hoodie and and it crutched over to my bedroom and ate it like in shame over there because
34:11 What do I can do? Sit here and eat a chocolate bar in front of these men? Hayes is fifty-two years old and ripped. Yeah. I was like wow, this guy is you know on the Forbes, you know, self made billionaires list. And also just rip for fun as a side quest. Dude, yeah, yeah. I mean he looked great. Uh and then Jesse's fifty six and runs hundred mile hundred mile races. How many fifty year olds are ripped and run hundred mile races? Nobody does that shit.
34:35 Especially successful guys. Jimmy wanted to do like a taste test. He had everyone like gather around to do a taste test of like Hershey's versus his stuff. And like I like pretended like Oh. Wow, Jimmy, your stuff is great. I've never had this before, but like
34:48 At every Air B and B. In the kitchen. Did you see this at every Airbnb? It was Like Literally one hundred candy bars. And
34:59 I literally had two thousand calories per night of his candy. I ate so much of it. I could tell you About all of it. Like I could I could I did I I didn't need a taste test. I could tell I'm already an expert on I can tell you about all all the flavors, the peanut butter ones, the dark chocolate ones, and you don't have to lick the wrapper for the taste test. No, but this is just how I'm thorough. Like I've already I'm like Timmy, like I already know. Like I've I've eaten all of them and I I had Ms and Uh Hershey bars on the plane on the way here. Like I I could tell you about it. Just try a piece of this one. You don't have to eat the whole thing, but like, you know. It's more for younger people, but like whatever. That's what he's going to say because it's for kids. It's for kids and he's like he giv he'll give you like the dark chocolate flavor. Yeah, with like cookies and cream all over my face and I'm like, I like it. I like the cookies and cream one. It's like my daughter just learned how to do it. Yeah, my daughter just learned how to say more in it, but I feel like this more.
35:58 More. I was throwing this all time. More, more, more. Can I give you some some of the negative ones? How about the guy who goes? At that point I was broke. I think I only had like twenty million dollars. Yeah.
36:16 Yeah, he's tell some story. Well there's a there was a hilarious conversation about prenups, which is Yeah, nothing more can be said except for there was an in incredible conversation about prenups. I was about to go outside. Me and someone else were gonna go outside of the sauna and someone said, Hey, can I ask you guys about pre dup? And we were like Uh.
36:32 Let's just sit right here and I just want to listen. Let's say that. It was one of the mo that like next three hours was one of the most entertaining three hours of my life. Like I I don't think I've laughed that hard in Uh five, ten years. Like I was literally like belly laugh crying. Some shocking. Set setups.
36:49 People have some billionaires. Are not like you and me. If you're listening to this, billionaires exist and they're not like you. They're not like you. The midwit meme was in full effect.
37:00 I'll give you one example. So The way we played our basketball is three teams. Uh and we played and then It was supposed to be the you know, the top two teams play for the finals.
37:10 But ever but all the teams finished the same record. One like we all had one win, one loss after everybody played each other. So it's like okay, well which two teams advance to the finals? And so I But everybody's getting tired, so I had to make something up. So I was like, all right, we're gonna do a like a penalty kick shootout. So what's the most exciting You know, like thing in sports is in hockey or soccer where they do the shoot out. Um, and it's not gonna take up a bunch of energy'cause like we're old guys and people are getting hurt. We gotta like
37:32 We can't play an extra game to figure out who's gonna go. So we said all right, everybody step up to pick f every team each team pick five guys. They're gonna shoot a free throw and then The team that makes the least. Like pressure's on, everybody's watching you. So it was interesting one team, my team was like
37:46 This is a dictatorship like Y'all are the five best to the other guys. They're they're better than you. These five are shooting. Who was the dictator? Well I I was a dictat. I didn't even think there was another way. I was like, Of course we're just gonna pick our five best and do this. Like honestly, I didn't even consider another method.
38:01 And I was the coach of my team'cause I had gotten injured. I'm on crutches, so I was like doing that. The second guy, uh the second team did it merit based. And the the third was like kind of like a volunteer voting system or whatever. And in the merit based thing, well a funny thing would that happen was One of the guys who's probably less good at basketball overall made it in the practice shot.
38:21 And one of the guys who was one of their better players on the team just happened to miss. So it's like damn, are y'all really gonna Not have one of your best players shoot and have this other guy shoot. I'll I'm just watching. I'm like, I just want to see what happens here. I want to see what happens with the egos. I just need to know. I need to see this. The guy was like You sure? You wanna do it? He's like No no you should do it. You made it. If you want to, I'll do it.
38:40 And then the guys like No, I mean, I don't know. I think I'm gonna do it. He's like, Okay, go ahead and do it. So so the guy steps up. And he shoots. And he makes it. The guy who's probably like you know the weaker basketball players. Makes it, clutched it up.
38:53 And has this awesome moment and his team advances to the finals. And I feel so happy for this guy. And I'm like, that was amazing. I'm like I'm I'm glad that they kind of honor it. He had his Rudy Moment. He honored it. He made it. Good for him. That was awesome. Under pressure. I love I wanted everybody to have like gold moments during the during the event. But then. After the final and this their team goes on wins the finals. Happy, they're holding the trophy. It's all good.
39:16 Afterwards we're all like packing up to leave and he's like He goes up to that guy. The other guy who sat out. He's like, Hey I want can you and me go shoot free throws? I wanna know if that was the correct like E V decision statistically.
39:31 And the guy's like, no, man, you already made it. Like you already made it. We already won. Like you're good, dude. You did it. He's like No no no I I need to know. I need you now. And he's like, No, like it's it's like honestly, it's done. You I'm glad you did it, you made it. He's like I need to know. And he's like, All right, so they go and they shoot.
39:48 And of course the guy who's played basketball his whole life. makes more of the free throws in like the with the larger sample size. And then the other guy was like kinda head down for like He's kinda bummed out about it for a second. And I was like
40:01 What I What an intelligently stupid thing to do. Right. Like he wanted to know, like, was this a positive EV decision? Was this statistically the correct move? What does E V mean? Expected value. It's like if you're playing poker, you can you bet your chips And even if you lose, you're still happy because you made the right decision, even if the result didn't pan out. So funny. There's chances.
40:20 And so I was like way to snatch D like way to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. And there were so many of these little moments where like there's this guy there who's like he's a total catch. He's like smart, he's good looking, he's ripped, he's uh successful, all these things. And he I I just thought a guy like this could walk into a coffee shop
40:40 And like the cute barista would want him to talk to her. There's a I've always wanted to be that guy. Th this guy could have been that guy. He could've been it could be so easy for him to just meet someone amazing. And instead You wanna describe like so all right. I think what he did was did he scrape Well, he built a program that scraped LinkedIn. He's like, I want a beautiful, intelligent
41:04 Successful woman or something like that. I wasn't there for the whole thing. Someone who fit his like heritage. And so he was like, Cool. So he built an AI bot to crawl LinkedIn to then scrape all the like successful beautiful women like trained on images of women that he thought were beautiful. Like every woman who was like Of a certain like look. In New York. uh who was between, you know, whatever, twenty two and thirty or whatever. He had like a database. Yeah. He had binders of women. Yeah, binders of women. It was hilarious. And then he had this like whole system for how we could reach out to them with like a it was amazing. I wanna I don't want to go into all the details but like she had a dedicated iPhone there. He goes, This is my iPhone and I He goes, I have two full time engineers who have built this program that auto DM'd them this particular DM on Instagram. Let me uh send send her a voice note. I go, You send her voice notes? He goes, I have found that voice notes convert better. And like he like showed me the voice note
41:59 As he told this whole system, it's like what's that thing called the Rochak test or whatever, where you see the blot and it's like you either see like, you know, a killer or an angel or whatever. His it was like some people were like this is the most impressive thing I've ever seen. And then some people like the married who are like, you know, fifty, forties and fifties were like Brother. Your
42:16 It's too much. You're doing too much here. You gotta just Like Just see a cute girl and go talk to her. It's okay. Let it let it roll organically, baby. It's gonna work better that way. And I just thought it was hilarious. Um I'm really late. I gotta go. I'm supposed to be speaking at something right now. I gotta I gotta jet. I just realized I'm I'm way over. That's it. That's the pod. I feel like I can rule the world, I know I could be what I want to I put my law in it like my day song On the road less travel never looking back
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