Entrepreneurs on Fire Interview with JLD!! Gambling, Productivity and Gambling Advertising to Kids

Gambling doesn’t just take your money; it steals your attention, your calm, and your time. We explore how the “it’s just entertainment” narrative is crafted by an industry that plays the long game while your brain chases short-term highs. Our guest on the Entrepreneurs on Fire podcast with John Lee Dumas, is recovery educator Hugo, and he explains what actually happens neurologically during a bet, why even a $5 wager spikes anxiety, and how the rush mirrors stimulant patterns on brain maps. We look at why gambling feels “productive” compared to other vices, and how that illusion keeps people locked in and losing money.

From slot machine payout math to sportsbook design, we unpack the mechanics that ensure that the house wins. Hugo connects the dots between flashy Vegas spectacles, live betting on your phone, and subtle marketing that targets younger audiences through colors, sounds, and constant odds talk during broadcasts. With State endorsements normalizing sports betting and fantasy leagues blurring lines, it’s no accident teens and families are surrounded by wagering cues. The result is a drip-feed that trains the subconscious and erodes daily focus.

We turn from diagnosis to solutions with clear, practical steps. Hugo outlines how to spot early warning signs—compulsive score checking, secrecy, emotional distance—and then lays out accessible recovery moves that rebuild healthy neurochemistry. Replace the artificial spike with free dopamine from small goals, serotonin from sun, gratitude or meditation, endorphins from movement, exercise or laughter, and oxytocin from hugs, petting dogs and real connection. Add structure with therapy, peer support, and environmental safeguards, and you’ll feel productivity return as a side effect of a richer life. If the story you’ve heard is that gambling makes games more exciting, this conversation offers a better one: your presence, your relationships, and your health are the real win.

If this resonates, subscribe, share with someone who needs it, and leave a quick review to help more listeners find the show. Ready to take a step? Download Hugo’s Free Recovery Growth Scorecard at www.lifeiswonderful.love and start rebuilding today.

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Chapters

• 0:00 You Cannot Outthink Emotions
• 0:39 Entertainment Or Addiction
• 2:20 What Gambling Does To The Brain
• 4:14 The Long Game Of The House
• 6:00 Marketing To The Next Generation
• 11:32 Money, Time, And Productivity Costs
• 16:14 Spotting The Signs Of Gambling Harm
• 18:16 Practical Paths To Recovery
• 21:22 Free Tools, Next Steps, And Closing

Transcript

SPEAKER_01: 0:00

People disagree with.

SPEAKER_00: 0:03

Well, first off, life is wonderful. It's I always like to let people know you've got to enter the day with excitement and purpose. One thing I would always say, because this happens in my line of work dealing with recovery and addiction, is you cannot outthink an emotional issue. And that's what trips everybody up. They think they can outthink their past trauma, childhood, current relationships, and you have to work through it emotionally, not intellectually.

SPEAKER_01: 0:38

I love that. And it actually is perfect and on point for the theme that we're talking about here today, Fire Nation, which is an incredibly important topic. How gambling robs and affects your productivity. And I want to talk about entertainment or addiction, Hugo, because I want to start by just getting right into it with is gambling truly entertainment, which a lot of people like to pretend or say that it is, or is gambling or is just gambling dressed up to look like entertainment?

SPEAKER_00: 1:09

Oh, it's all premeditated by the gambling industry. Everything that they have ever done was to convince you that it's either not a big deal, it's fun. They're the ones who've always been pushing this narrative, gambling's entertainment. That's why everybody keeps talking about gambling's entertainment. And they also say betting on sports, sports betting makes the games more exciting, which in turn is false. Because we all know even if you have$5 on a game, your anxiety goes up, tension goes up. You want to win that, even if it's a small$5 bet. So it's all calculated by the gambling industry. It's no different than, yes, you can make one bet, no big deal. Just like you can have one alcoholic drink, no big deal. One puff of a, you know, a joint or a blunt, no big deal. But the problem is, is your brain, it starts affecting your brain. That's why people don't realize it's a slow, slow process.

SPEAKER_01: 2:14

Well, I'm glad you brought that up because that's actually what I want to move into next is inside the brain. I mean, Hugo, what actually happens in the brain when somebody gambles? And on that point, why can it be so hard to stop once that rush kicks in?

SPEAKER_00: 2:30

Yeah, that's usually what most people say. I can stop anytime I want. Uh uh, I win some, I lose some. Those are always the fallacies that a lot of gamblers like to tell themselves, just like anybody doing drugs or alcohol. They've done brain maps. The gambling brain lights up the same as though your brain was on cocaine. Because it's an upper. See, unlike what a lot of people do, drink or smoke weed, those are depressants. And your brain will light up differently and it affects your emotional brain, you know, your limbic area differently. And so it creates that almost like that up, that fake dopamine, and that's what uh that's what kind of creates that slow increase. And it's just the way it is. We can the problem with gambling compared to drugs, gambling will give you that false identity that you are you may actually do something good. Because when you drink too much or you do whatever drug or pill too much, you're not assuming that your go your whole lifestyle can change. But the gambler starts to believe that, oh, if they just hit the lotto, they hit this parlay, this team comes in, that they're actually doing something for their financial bank account, which in turn they're not. But that's the that that's the lie. I always tell people gambling just lies to you.

SPEAKER_01: 4:03

I mean, that's just a perfect phrase, maybe a motto or a tagline for all of gambling, which is gambling just lies to you.

SPEAKER_00: 4:11

Now, well, you know why it lies. Well, let me just finish that. Because 99% of gamblers will lose. Now, you may win one weekend, you may be on a winning streak, but the gambling industry plays the long game, the gambler plays the short game. The gambling industry knows that the odds are in their favor, they have more money than you, they can pay out any big win you may have, but they know the longer you bet, it's just a it becomes a statistical and a mathematical equation. You will lose. And because, and I'll finish this up, is the number one gambling instrument has always been slot machines, because slot machines are always designed where no matter how much money you put into a slot machine, you will lose. They are either geared at 85 to 93 cents. So every dollar you put into a machine depends on how they are regulated or how the casino or the bar wants to put the machine, it'll pay out only 85 to 93 cents per dollar. So over time, you will always start going back to towards zero, never going back towards one.

SPEAKER_01: 5:21

I mean, you just step back and look at the Las Vegas trip and you see these hotels, they are absolutely insane. They are opulence everywhere. I mean, the water fountains, you've got the magic shows, you've got the acts, you've got the sphere there, you've got all these professional teams that are reloading, relocating there because of the huge stadiums. I mean, it is absolutely insane. And why? It's because there's so much guaranteed money flowing in because the gamblers come, the gamblers lose, and the gamblers leave. Like that is a rotation that is always happening there. But what you and I really talked about in our little pre-interview chat, Hugo, that really struck a chord with me, because I I now have a two-year-old son, and I already see what's happening on YouTube, you know, when we like are like giving him a show to watch about brushing your teeth, about how it draws them in. They become mesmerized, and it's just incredibly scary the reality that's happening in this world. So I want to talk about marketing to the next generation. I mean, there's this huge growing concern that the gambling industry, they're subtly marketing to kids. So, what's your take on that? Is it really happening? And if so, how?

SPEAKER_00: 6:33

Oh, it is happening. Uh they will deny, deny, deny. They're no different than they use the same playbook as big tobacco. They're trying to make it cool, and they're trying to make it, it's not, it's not us, it's all on the actual person. A person needs to have their own discipline, their own responsibility, but they do not want to take responsibility that they are pushing an addictive product, no different than big tobacco, no different than any other drug that affects your brain. If you actually look at all the online casinos, and now there's just so many, it's not just the big players. You have them overseas. They're all focused on the colors, the sounds. It's no different than when if you had gone to Vegas in the 80s or 90s, the first thing you ever heard when you walked into a machine into a hotel was the slot machines. And that was done on purpose. The the actual loudness of the coins hitting the slot machine, or the carpets not having any patterns, so you would not get confused. There's no windows you cannot see. They would pump in certain smells, so that would almost intoxicate you. They feed you free drinks. It's no different than the online. The difference with gambling compared to any other addiction is now it's on our phones. And now our phones are becoming much more powerful with AI. So it's almost like anything you accidentally may hit and be curious about gambling. Now your phone is going to start feeding you a lot of gambling advertising. And it's going and then you constantly are going to be hit. So to me, the biggest problems are it's not so much, I mean America and the world has stated they like alcohol, they like gambling. The problem is the advertising and the live betting. That's what's actually getting people in trouble, and it's affecting kids. And so they're being manipulated because you cannot watch a baseball game. You couldn't watch the World Series last week without constantly being told about the gambling lines, whether the actual lines, the pitcher, the prop bets, and the announcers keep talking about it pregame. They keep and so it's constantly being pushed into your subconscious. And we all know our subconscious is what drives us. And so it's a subtle way to, it's almost this stamp of approval, and it's also coming from the state governments, because the state governments, uh whether we're talking about lotta, we're talking about sports betting, horse tracks, casinos, most states uh in one form or another have uh some form of gambling. So there's this approval from everywhere. And so when a child sees that it is socially acceptable, they're going to engage in it. That's why 78% of all high school students have placed a sports bet in the past year. And they're not supposed to be petting betting until they're 21. And it all starts with fantasy football, it all starts with the fantasy stuff. Just do fantasy, just so you start enjoying the games when you start learning about the teams and the players. It everything is and it wasn't all designed the way the sports books, it kind of just evolved over time. The way sp I I never got into sp fantasy sports, but I have friends. I'm 58, and I still have friends in their 50s that still do fantasy leagues. And so, yes, your child is getting your child is getting advertised and being slowly, slowly manipulated.

SPEAKER_01: 10:18

I mean, I'll tell you what, my dad's 74 years old and he plays fantasy all the sports. He's so into it. He does like all the crazy, like he'll like look, oh, is it nighttime with like a little westerly breeze? So I put in my left-handed picture as a result. I mean, it's like he's like going down, like he's a manager. So people get so into this. But what's crazy about this is that he's so against betting. Like he's so against gambling. He's never gambled his whole life, he's never bet his whole life, he's always against that. Like, even like whenever we would play like card games in the house, he's like, nope, we can never put money on this because it changes everything. He's right, he was always right about that. But guess what? The creep has even happened to him. Now he's in these fantasy leagues where he's actually paying money to be a part of these fantasy leagues. And his excuse, you know, that he uses he's like, Well, I just do it because now other people take it more seriously. And like, you know, that's like an excuse that he uses to now justify his gambling and just getting, you know, bigger and bigger and bigger every single year. And if it happened to somebody like him, I mean, what what what hope does in an 11, 13, 15, 17-year-old have? I mean, it's insane. We have so much more to talk about, Fire Nation, around this topic. When we get back, I'm thanking our sponsors. Here we're back. I want to talk money. I want to talk productivity. I want to talk impact. I mean, there are there real studies that are linking gambling to productivity levels and household income? I mean, what do the numbers actually tell us about the true economic impact that's happening as a result of this reality we now live in?

SPEAKER_00: 11:52

Well, unfortunately, there's just limited research, but it's becoming a bigger topic because people are looking at this as the next epidemic. So there are college professors. The problem is, is since the U.S. Congress, there's no federal law that's around gambling. It's limited federal dollars for research. So it's kind of limited people. But there is five professors, um Scott Baker at the University of Northwestern in Chicago, uh two other guys at the University of Kansas, two other guys at uh BYU. They just came out last December with a study uh trying to correlate how sports betting is now affecting household income. And I can easily send that uh to anybody. You know, I I have a lot of information if just people just want to watch stuff on YouTube or articles that have been written. But there are people are seeing, because I always say is you've got to just follow the money. It's two things it's money and time. And what I want people to understand when we talk about productivity, it's everyone wants to know how much money did you lose? It's always the fascinating question. It's not the money is the first thing you notice because you notice, uh-oh, that's a big number. Uh-oh, I don't have it. But the the bigger problem is, is after you start getting to recovery, you realize how much time was wasted. You talked about your father. It isn't so much that, oh, he's not putting money on it. But what else could he be doing with his time? I mean, technically he's following around 20, 30-year-old men playing a sport and getting so invested in it, just like anybody is. It's like the whole kids, you know, their brain isn't being developed. So that's where, to me, it always, you know, I try to tell people it's the amount of time you're wasting just watching sports. Watch a game here or there. But it's you know how you like to talk about your schedule and you know staying on point. But can you imagine spending nine hours watching college football every Saturday every Saturday? Oh, man. And then another nine hours watching NFL football on Sunday, and then watching the Monday night game. Oh, no, forget. Now we're doing Thursday night football. And now we go, oh, now we can watch basketball. I mean, you could be watching sports 24-7 and not get as much done. And that's what that's why I try to alert people. Compulsive gambling, what I did, it was about being in action. It wasn't about the money. The money was just a vehicle to stay in action, to stay high. Because I got high thinking about what I was going to bet on in the morning. That's when I was actually most high. And then the rest of the stuff was just a something that just had to be done. You had to place the bet, you had to figure out if you won or your loss. But that's how it really affects the productivity. And going back to your first thing about Vegas, I always say, you think Bank of America Chase handed out money to all the casinos to build more opulent hotels? No, they knew, they know that they're going to make money. So they're not lending out uh several million dollars for renovation or a completely new hotel. And the average, and it's still consistent in 20 years, the average person that lands in Vegas will lose$550. That is the same statistic that has gone on for the last 25 years. And even with more gambling on your phones or casinos in most in a lot of states, you go to Vegas, just put that into your budget. I will lose$550.

SPEAKER_01: 15:36

Man, I'll tell you. And that's Vegas. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 15:40

And at least in Vegas, you can have fun. I always tell you, go to a casino. I live in Texas. Go to a casino in Louisiana, or I've been to different casinos. Um, they're depressing. They're just like living morgues, in my opinion. I go, God, there's just there's no excitement. Everyone is just like dragging. At least in Vegas, you know, you got the lights, you can do, you can go to a spa, you can go to a five-star restaurant, you know, you can go to a show. You know, you can at least feel like you're having fun as you're losing uh 500, 1,000, whatever your number is.

SPEAKER_01: 16:14

All right, Hugo, let's let's talk real stuff now. Because there's probably people that are listening that are struggling with these things that we're talking about, but there's definitely people listening who know people close to them who are struggling with these things. So let's talk about spotting the signs. I mean, if somebody suspects that they or maybe somebody they love has a gambling problem, talk about the first step they should take.

SPEAKER_00: 16:38

First step is is not to ignore it or to think that, oh, they're just playing a lot of, they're watching a lot of sports and it's no big deal because it is, because what it people the gambling will actually create much more loneliness and isolation. So there becomes this greater need to be watching games, to be checking scores. Why are you at dinner and checking scores? It really is not that important. You are you're not in the moment, you're not connected. That's the first thing I would do is why is someone constantly watching a game? Unless it's a very important game, I get it. Uh you can also just look at just the way you you would pick up if you think someone is cheating on you. It's just body language. It's someone that feels much more distant. They're unable to talk about their feelings, their emotions, or even their dreams or their goals. Um, there's that slowed kind of depression where they're constantly, you know, feeling like they've something has changed. And because they're not getting there's and they're not drunk and their eyes are not dilated, people kind of assume, well, it's it can't be that bad. And the problem is it can be worse.

SPEAKER_01: 17:57

Because if we have spot signs, like what is recovery from gambling addiction actually look like in the real world? I mean, how can someone build trust or at least rebuild trust, rebuild stability and confidence along the way?

SPEAKER_00: 18:10

Oh, well, I'm a big believer in that recovery is like one of those things. If you're bleeding or if you have a broken bone, you immediately seek help. If you're dealing with some type of emotional issue and you have not dealt with any of this other depression, is is you can go to like the basic kind of three. You know, you can go to a treatment center, you can go to a psychologist, you can go to a 12-step room. And that's where I kind of stepped in, is it felt that that when you go to these things, it's people will say just trust the process. But the problem is, is people need to know what are concrete steps. And that's why I created things like a free growth scorecard where people can start to change your brain chemistry to increase what I would call free dopamine, free serotonin, oxytocin, and endorphins. And you can do this right now on how to get what's an easy way to get uh dopamine? Well, make your bet. It's all about, you know, having a goal and doing it, you know, doing uh following through on a task. Serotonin is just like prayer, meditating, gratitude list. Endorphins, obviously you can exercise, but you can easily, if you laugh, you're creating those endorphins. An oxytocin, just hug someone or pet your dog or your cat, socialize. Those are the easy ways, and that's why I created things that are free, to get people constantly almost like getting their mind because you have to start changing certain things in your life. And you've got to start getting interactive.

SPEAKER_01: 19:51

Go ahead, you go finish it off.

SPEAKER_00: 19:52

No, no, that's it. You just gotta start you start to go and embrace it. Because I always say a lot of people think that the first step is you have to admit. You have a problem and that you are powerless over your alcohol gambling. And I say there's a reason why only 10 to 15% of people who actually walk into 12-step rooms actually finish all 12-steps. Because that is not a way to it's not an emotional way to get someone to change their life. I always like to tell people is first just embrace the fact that you have to change something. Relapse is part of any, it is probably part of 90 to 95% of most people's recovery journey. When I stopped drinking, I never drank again because I started I still gambled for another three years. When I stopped gambling, it took about a month, but I already had been going to therapy. I'd already been another 12-step. I already had almost like a three-year kind of like jump start as I started to work on myself. But so it really you've got to kind of start building people up. That's why I'm big on okay, write down your goals. But also more importantly, is what do you tell yourself? You've got to be able to talk into your subconscious every day that I deserve recovery, I deserve love, I'm gonna have a good day today. That's why I always like to tell people I named my company Life is Wonderful, because I want to let people to realize you've got to enjoy life. Life should be enjoyed and be fulfilled, not survived.

SPEAKER_01: 21:25

That's powerful. And honestly, that's kind of one of the biggest benefits. There's a lot of benefits, of course, of having children. But man, one of the biggest benefits I've experienced from having a child, and now I have a two-year-old, is every day, so many hugs, so many laughs. And it's just like it's natural, it's just part of it. And before that, you know, that there just wasn't those opportunities to have all these hugs and all these giggles and all these laughs and all these things. And so, how do you put that into your life? Like, how do you make that something that you're getting that natural, healthy, you know, dopamine hit that we're talking about here? And there's so much value from everything that Hugo shared here today. So, Hugo, if Fire Nation is really connecting with this and they want to learn more from you, they want to connect with you. What is your call to action for our listeners today?

SPEAKER_00: 22:11

Uh, go to my website, lifeiswonderful. And yes, that is an actual, you can actually have that as a site. And there, because you gotta have love. I always tell people you've got to uh laugh every day, you've got to work hard, and you gotta love unconditionally. So, what I want people to do, call the action, is just download the recovery growth scorecard. It's right there on my home page. It's free. Start to incorporate things to, and most things are free on how to increase natural hormones, and you'll start to feel better. You'll reduce depression, anxiety, and you will then start moving forward. And then if you want to connect more, there's other ways to connect in terms of coaching, in terms of systems, core, especially if you have a serious, there's other ways. But I just let people go. I'm a big believer, is you're not gonna trust me until you number one, either you listen to my podcast, the 1% in recovery, and where I'll talk to you about the 12 steps, I'll talk to you about recovery, or I'll give you something free and go there and start to improve your life. Every day should be a a way to uh live life fully because in the end, our health is our wealth.

SPEAKER_01: 23:33

Our health is our wealth. And Fire Nation, you're the average of the five people you spend the most time with. You've been hanging out with H V and J L D today, so keep up the heat. For links to everything we talked about, visit eofire.com. Just type Hugo in the search bar, and the show notes page will pop right up. And Hugo, one more time, what's that URL?

SPEAKER_00: 23:54

Life is wonderful, and spell love life is wonderful.

SPEAKER_01: 24:01

Hugo, thank you for sharing your truth, your knowledge, your value with Fire Nation today. For that, we salute you and we'll catch you on the flip side.