The Johnjay Van Es Podcast
From the mastermind behind one of the most popular morning shows in the country, Johnjay Van Es brings his signature blend of curiosity, humor, and fearless honesty to the podcast world. If you’ve ever had a question on your mind but were too afraid to ask, don’t worry—Johnjay’s got you covered.
With hilarious, jaw-dropping conversations, amazing guests, and the inside scoop on everything you actually care about, this show is a wild ride through the stories you’ve never heard and the truths nobody else dares to say. Whether it’s celebrities, trendsetters, or just the most interesting people on the planet, nothing is off-limits, and no question is too bold.
Come for the interviews. Stay for the insanity. This is the podcast you’ll be talking about. Don’t miss it!
The Johnjay Van Es Podcast
Better Questions = Real Trust. Here’s Why!
Chris Tuff went from rock bottom to a life built on better questions, saved asks, and everyday courage.
We get into fun, practical tips for actually connecting—why “saving your asks” beats the LinkedIn spam, how a quick video message packs more punch than email, and how to turn small talk into something real.
Chris also shares his daily habits that keep him grounded and family routines that help teens survive the chaos. Packed with wild stories, laughs, and easy-to-try ideas, this episode shows how to lead, connect, and live with more joy.
Hit follow, share, and leave a review with your favorite takeaway.
Okay, so welcome to our podcast. This is a little bit different today because this podcast is a spin-off of our radio show. Well, what do you know about hydrogen water?
SPEAKER_02:I mean, all my friends walk around with that.
SPEAKER_04:The echo. Okay.
SPEAKER_02:And they always break.
SPEAKER_04:So get the exactly. Okay. So I saw this Gary Breca guy pushing the Echo water. So I bought one, it was like$400. I had it for like three weeks and it broke. I was so pissed. Then something happens with Gary Breca where he's not talking about it anymore and he's pushing these tablets. Put the tablets in the water away from the dissolve and it's hydrogen water. But I don't have that kind of time. And I find this company that is not in the United States. You cannot buy this anywhere. You cannot get this anywhere unless you're in Australia. This is the only place you get in Australia. So I meet them and they ship us a couple cases every once in a while. And I'm trying so hard to get them in the United States.
SPEAKER_00:Oh my God.
SPEAKER_04:So I was interviewing a guy, Craig DeMarco. He owns a couple, he owns a bunch of restaurants, but he has a couple markets. And he tried it. He goes, I got to get these in my markets. He calls the guy, his buddies are like the head of Sprouts. He's like, we got to get this in the Sprouts. I have a friend of mine that owns one stop nutrition. He's got 57 locations. I sent him a case. Like, you guys got to get these here. Because you just open it and drink. Pop one open. It's just it's hydrated water. You don't have to hit a button. Yeah, you don't have to hit a button. You don't have to do anything.
SPEAKER_02:That makes total sense.
SPEAKER_04:Right? You don't have to deal with the BS. You just crack it open and go. I drink one every morning before I go to work.
SPEAKER_02:That is awesome.
SPEAKER_04:Right?
SPEAKER_02:Well, yeah, they need a place closer in Australia. No, you can't drive.
SPEAKER_04:If you call them and say, Can I buy a case? They will not send you a case.
SPEAKER_03:I love it.
SPEAKER_04:It's the weirdest thing. I love it.
SPEAKER_03:So this is like a$7 water water after it's been imported through. That's funny.
SPEAKER_04:I have no idea how much it costs. You're probably right. Um, I met the person who's trying to bring it to the United States. That's how I got a hold of them. And it's awesome. Uh it's and it's it's you just crack it. It makes total sense. I know, right? It's and it's the new thing, or it's not the new thing. But nothing against Gary Breka. I don't want to piss him off, but you know. So Chris Tuff, thanks for coming on my podcast.
SPEAKER_02:I like interviewing you better. I that that was fun for me.
SPEAKER_04:Well, it was funny because we met at our friend Ian's uh mastermind called Of Course.
SPEAKER_00:Yep.
SPEAKER_04:And I was able to do a day and a half of that, and uh I don't know if it was three or four days, and I saw you, and you pretty much, in my opinion, were like the breakout star of the event. You just owned you owned the event. I remember seeing you talk to somebody, uh interview them on the at the event, and I was like, Who's that guy with the glasses? What's his story? And then since then I've got to pick your brain a little bit, talk to you. Then you interviewed me on the panel, yeah, and I was just blown away by your whole story. And then, you know, I had this rule on this podcast where I don't like to do a lot of research. I like to let it unfold as we talk.
SPEAKER_05:I love it.
SPEAKER_04:All right, but since my style, dude. But since, you know, I start following you on Instagram, and you know, I see you're the millennial whisperer. Let's get in, let's dive into that. Because how do you talk to the millennials?
SPEAKER_02:I mean, also, there's no worse way to be introduced than the millennials whisperer. Why? Isn't that what you named one of your books? My first book, yeah, it was my first book six years ago. That's kind of I mean, the backstory of it was I introduced myself um after I had I so go to my rock bottom. So I was crushing it in the advertising age, you know, world and you know you're part of some huge agency, right?
SPEAKER_04:Legendary agency.
SPEAKER_02:And then everything came tumbling down, and I was introducing myself seven months into recovery. I checked myself into a drug uh rehab for alcohol, crawled slowly out of it, and I went on a my first men's retreat, 13 CEO types, average age, kind of probably 55. And on a whim, as I was introducing myself around the fire, uh, I was like, uh, I don't really know what I do anymore, but I'm kind of like the millennial whisper. And it just came out. And then I shared my story and cried in every uh in front of everyone, and you know, all these guys who I didn't know, right? Their arms were crossed, they're like, man, these millennials suck. Another guy was like, You think millennials are bad? Wait till you see what's behind them.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, right.
SPEAKER_02:And uh, and then I I remember there's one guy who goes, uh, yeah, anytime I bring any of my young people into my office, they start crying even before I open my mouth. And I was like, time out, guys. The same reason you guys are here for connection, that's what they crave. And I started talking about the difference of parenting and the influence of technology, and finally someone was like, Chris, you gotta write that book. So the seed was planted, and how I do most things, which is all or nothing, wrote it in four and a half months and published about eight months after that, and then it just took off. Are you a millennial? I am right on the cusp. So I'm 45, I'm 1980. Officially, millennials start at 81. But the whole premise of the book was that we all crave the same thing, which is connection. But what makes young people so different, and you see this with your kids, I see it in my daughters who are 15 and 13. The two greatest influences of what makes us different is one, how we were parented, right? So I was parented as an Xer, right? Or how most, you know, when I sat at the table, I sat across from my very British father, and it was Christopher, how are your grades? Were you thinking about going to school? Like it was you fell in line, right? He he said the bars here, you go above it, right? And you do what you're told. And you juxtapose that uh that's how most of us were raised, right?
SPEAKER_04:Well, what you said, your British father. So my father was from the Netherlands. Okay, and he was very much could it be a European influence? It was your time to talk. He would ask you questions, then it was my sister's time to talk. And if I interrupted, it'd be stop, let your sister finish. We had the meat and potatoes, then my mom would talk. It wasn't a round table, it wasn't chaos.
SPEAKER_02:I will say, like, it's only as of the last few years that my dad and I do the awkward hug, but like hugging, all of that's off limits. Like it was very British.
SPEAKER_04:It was very tough. Uh my father got looser in the hugging as time went on. Yeah. Because my mother was Mexican and she was very touchy. Was it always awkward you're hugging with your with my not for me, but I mean, when I look back, it was. But uh, as we got older, he got more lovey-dovey and more emotional.
SPEAKER_02:Um, so that's so you juxtapose that to how we raise our kids. People are playing beer pong out back, being like, oh yeah, you know, it's much more of a camaraderie and your friends, right? And so young people come into our organizations and they're expecting that same sort of relationship that they had with their parents. They're like, why is my boss not taking a vested interest in my life? And so that's what kind of started me going out and being like, actually, if you break it down, it's pretty simple, which at the core is this if you can start with connection, everything else falls into place. But that takes a concerted effort, right? You talk about lawyers, dentists, like that engineering mindset, it's that doesn't come naturally to them. They're gonna do things the same way that it's always been done. Whereas, you know, uh, you know, you look at anything in the service industry, hospitality, um, you know, airlines, that's the other like it comes a little bit more naturally. And so that's what kind of set me off. And as I was doing speeches for Nike and others, I was like, crap, like this is this is kind of I'm on big stages now. And I was still at the agency and I was using that platform to get new clients for the agency. And then I was like, okay, well, I gotta write another book, which was the same idea of connection outward. And the title of that's called Save Your Asks, A S K S. And I'm not here to promote, I'll give away. I know you're not here to I asked you to come here. Yeah, I'm not here to like it.
SPEAKER_00:It was very tough to get here.
SPEAKER_02:No pun intention. But yeah, and so and that's the whole idea that we got to save our asks. And the younger you get, you see this with salespeople. So many of them are what I call an ask hole, right? Like it's like three asks, you get this all the time, right? Where it's like, hey, John Jay, can you give me tickets to the whatever? And then the next week they ask for a connection to something. It's like, dude, come on, man. Like, seriously, two asks in a row?
SPEAKER_04:Dude, that's my son.
SPEAKER_02:We well, okay. So it doesn't apply to family. You just get like, welcome to life. You just you you're never gonna win on the other side of that one. But so that was a flip of the script, especially for sales and networking, that if we save our asks, if we can get to connection faster, that's where the beauty lives. And that to me is actually what I get most excited. Like, because I mean, on the culture and the millennial whisperer stuff, that's pretty straightforward, right? The the save your asks thing, what in all my research, what I found is that it really comes down to one key element, and those are the questions that you're asking people. And I think I spoke about this at the retreat, but I actually created a list of a hundred of the best questions called tough questions, TUFF questions, that gets you to connection faster. And that is a muscle we need to build. And what I tell people is that if you start doing it, it becomes that muscle, right? And every, I mean, almost every single day, it might be someone I'm in line getting coffee next to, or it's someone I'm trying to break into their network, I use tough questions to get there. And my favorite tough question is when was the last time you experienced pure joy? So let's just say you're at that business dinner table, you're gonna talk about business the whole time. We got to talk about the stuff that drives us as humans. And my favorite tough question to ask is when was the last time? So let's play it. When was the last time you experienced pure joy where you got like tears in your eyes, goosebumps? What when was the last time? What's the first thing? Tears in my eyes, goosebumps. Like where you just got so excited.
SPEAKER_04:It's like trying to it's actually every morning I have these little mantras, and one of them is you know, something wonderful is going to happen to me today. And then when I I have a I have a very strange routine at four in the morning, and one of them is when I get out of the hot tub, is I today I want to experience joy and happiness. So I feel that every day I hit that. And at the end of the night, I try to think about where in my day did I hit that. So, but when you say tears of joy, like pure joy.
SPEAKER_02:I mean, it could just be goosebump moment, right? Or it could be maybe it is every morning when you're doing your mantra. Do you get that?
SPEAKER_04:That's so if I was stemming at Starbucks, you would ask me that question, and I'd have to have the answer by the time I get to the boost.
SPEAKER_02:Like if I feel the energy, I go there. Right. And that's what people ask me a lot. Like, once you build that muscle, you can get there a lot faster.
SPEAKER_04:But you're also very much an extrovert.
SPEAKER_02:Yes.
SPEAKER_04:Right? So do introverts work with uh created this, and we can link out.
SPEAKER_02:I I actually made cards with them on. I was like, I'm losing so much money selling these cards. It was like$35. I haven't manufactured, so I have a PDF of the hunt, but it starts with the introverts intro, and it's 20 questions that get you. So it's as simple as um one of my tough questions for something like that is if you could do one thing all day, every day, what would that one thing be? You know, stuff like that that kind of gets it. Is that on your PDF? It's on my website. I'll we can link out to the PDF.
SPEAKER_04:I'm gonna go over it on the air on my radio show tomorrow.
SPEAKER_02:But you so but it is a muscle, right? And so let me just put it into a context of uh meeting. So I was I was speaking for a private equity conference, right? And private equity people are it's a tough crowd. They're like, what's this guy gonna teach me, right? And so it was the night before, and you know this, you're like, oh, I don't really want to deal with everyone, right? And but uh I you gotta show up. And so I show up the night before, I'm put at this one table, and it's all these pretty well-known, famous female seat like entrepreneurs. And so I'm sat with them and I'm like, okay, perfect. Like I'm at home around girls and and women, right? Because I have two girls and my wife, like, I'm I'm the only male in the house. So I'm like, okay, perfect. This is way better than any of the other tables. And so there was about eight of us at the table, and to my right, there was this woman that was very quiet because there were some more outspoken individuals. And as the meal kind of unfolded, she goes, Are you speaking tomorrow? It was the only thing she really chimed in and said. I was like, Yeah, uh, I'm the keynote. And she goes, Well, what are you speaking on? I said, Well, why don't I just show you? She goes, All right, how are you gonna do that? I go, Well, it's called tough questions. When was the last time you experienced pure joy? And with all any hesitation, I could see her eyes well up, and she tells me a story how on that Tuesday, it was like a Thursday, so two days prior, she said it was at seven in the morning. She started to talk through her son, who's now 12. When he was first born, he was epileptic for the first massively epileptic, and they couldn't figure out what was wrong, exactly what it was. And it got to a place where once they finally figured it out, he's now at 12 years old, non-verbal, and in a wheelchair. And, you know, so she's crying, telling me all about this, and then I'm I'm now like leaning into her, and I'm like, all right, so and now, so she tells this story how every morning she plays a game with him. And uh at this point, it was on that Tuesday, she had played this ball game, and she was like, it was that was my pure joy playing this game with my son, and we're both lit up, and it's my favorite part of the day. And so I'm like, oh my gosh, I've got my hands in there's this camp that I'm involved with called Hope Heals that I know that like we can send him to this awesome camp in the summer and is this and that. And then 45 minutes goes by. I'm like, what just happened? Right? We the rest of the whole the rest of the table disappeared to us as we were deep in this conversation. And I was like, crap, I gotta go to my mic check. I gotta go. And uh I said, What's your name? And she said, My name's Courtney. I said, Wait, before I go, Courtney, how many other people at you've been here for two days, how many other people have you told about your son? She goes, none. I go, exactly, because we're asking the wrong questions. And then now it's cool, now eight months later or whatever, we we text all the time. I'm actually looking to do some work with her as a partner on one of my projects. And it's like, once again, going back to the core, if we actually go to the right questions, because we spend, if you look at the spectrum of where most conversations lie, it's the 95% of comfort. Oh, yeah. The you know, the Georgia Bulldogs, or go uh, how about Vanderbilt, right? Sports or weather or where are you from or how are the kids, right? Right. And on either side of that spectrum, there's dreams and fears. And if we can actually get to this place of dreams and fears faster in conversation, that's where connection lives.
SPEAKER_04:That's uh that's powerful, but also I think you have to look at how you're talking to people, who these people are. Like you wouldn't do that in line at Starbucks.
SPEAKER_01:No, uh like I see you can get there fast, right? You can get there fast.
SPEAKER_04:But you make me want to jump around a couple things. For one, I my my my pure joy. I try to experience it every day, but I was just thinking about when you when you asked me that, it's it's it it's it's confusing me, but I have an answer. And that would be yesterday. My wife, who's sitting over there, was on Instagram, and it was our middle son's one-year anniversary with his girlfriend, and he posted a beautiful tribute to her, it's really nice, but the post that the girlfriend made about my son made my wife cry. And she was crying, and she was like, This is so beautiful how much she loves him. And me seeing her love a girl that loves our son brought me joy. You know, does that make sense? 100%. Right. It wasn't a level of pure joy like what you were like, Courtney's. I mean, that's a whole different level of joy, but at that moment that was showing. Now, what about for you? When was the last time you experienced pure joy?
SPEAKER_02:So on Sunday, so my 15-year-old is grew up uh dyslexic, uh diagnosed at a young age, and the one thing that has been a constant where we invest a lot of money and time is horseback riding. It totally changed her life, and um you know, she's been doing awesome in school now, and you know, it wasn't that case even four years ago. And so she was at a horse show, and I knew at some point it was gonna click for her. And this past weekend my wife sent me a video of her getting first place, first place, and second place. And I do everything video text message, and so like with tears rolling down my face, I sent her a video text message how proud I am of her. And I mean, I get teared up talking about it because I mean, I think that to me is the the essence of what it is to not only support unconditionally, but to celebrate these wins, especially with our kids, you know, and to to watch the resilience and perseverance and how many times she legitimately got bucked off of that and she never stopped. I'm like, Finley, quit. Like, you're not good. Like, just stop, right? Like we at some point we gotta call, but she kept going and going and going. And and so for me to see that, and and I would actually go as far to say at least once, sometimes like 10 times a day, I I will get goosebumps. I call it like a resting joy rate. So I came up with this concept of a rest. Here's the pro so I'll go and do speeches or I'll be hanging out with Ian, and then people will pull me aside. They're like, because how do I get your energy and tempo?
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, you are a level 10, right? And it's like, yeah, it is. Yeah, you can't do it.
SPEAKER_02:And and I'm like, don't compare I what I say is don't compare your resting joy rate to mine. Right. Like I operate on a tempo that is high, and you know, I get down, right? But you shouldn't the name of the game is to try to increase our own resting joy rate. And for some people, it takes medication to get there, right?
SPEAKER_04:For some people, well, you can have joy and be mellow too.
SPEAKER_02:A hundred percent, right? Like my wife, right? My wife is my exact opposite, but a good barometer as to how joyful your life is is the answer to that question. When was the last time you experienced pure joy? I did this with a business engagement, and they were so taken aback because they just wanted to talk business. I'm like, dude, let's let's play a game. And I introduced them to it, and this woman said it was two years ago when she had taken her family on this amazing European vacation. I was like, listen, that's awesome, but you need more joyful moments in your life, right? Okay, good. That's what I was gonna say. And it doesn't have to be the European vacation, it could be something every day. Yeah, exactly. All we should be having these things all you know at multiple times through the day. And I think what the problem lies in the culprit being especially social media, is we're always comparing our insides to other people's outsides.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, right. Which also I want to go back to something you said earlier to see you about social media. We're talking about connection, yeah. One of the first things we just talked about. And I think connection is so important. In fact, hosting a radio show, I think one of the things that radio does better than anything else is create human connection. So, how does all the examples you gave of connection how does that change with AI?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. So I think, well, and we can apply this to almost anything, right? And I mean, you look at the salesperson that is overly utilizing AI, right? Where they can find who who their buyers are, right? They can send out these personalized even videos to all of these people. Right. And then when it comes time for going face to face, they have none of that human, they don't know how to interact with humans.
SPEAKER_04:No connection.
SPEAKER_02:There's no connection there, right? And so um, you know, this probably happened. I don't know if you're on LinkedIn, but I tell audiences and companies where someone will send you a friend uh LinkedIn request, you kind of research them a little bit. It's uh, it seems legit. And then all of a sudden you accept it, and nanoseconds later they're with an AI bot. Hey, my name is Rachel, and I'd like to give you a demo, and here's my countly. It's like, what just happened? I call that the pitch slap. Where it's like all of a sudden, like, whatever happened to the courtship, whatever happened to the connection, that by the way, our parents and grandparents did so well. And the younger we get, the less of that is in place, along with the fact that even when we were in high school, if we wanted to flirt with someone, we had to pick up a phone, we had to get through mom and dad, right? And so once we got through mom and dad, we would awkwardly talk to whoever that person was. And and that's an interpersonal muscle that we were able to build. That, you know, I watch my daughters and they're on Snapchat. They're doing it all here.
SPEAKER_04:It's it's crazy.
SPEAKER_02:And so what this I think is the most profound. This what we're doing here, what what I try to spend most of my day doing and why I hop on planes to come here to see you to hang out with Ian, I think there is so much power in that. And so AI, I think, is an enabler to make our to be a tool, but it it actually puts even more of an emphasis on the importance of not only this, but also continuing to exercise that muscle around developing face-to-face connection.
SPEAKER_04:Well, there's nothing like this. Giving an example, when I was in college, you know, I took a couple of radio classes, and one of the things they teach you is to know what you're gonna talk about. Don't pause, don't go, um, well, you know, that they don't want you to do that. In fact, we used to play games in radio called the um game. 60 seconds to talk about your your eyeglasses, but you can't say um or uh, right? And you try to try to get better at it. Now all the research says they want that because it's real. It's I got crucifies, it's human connection. So as a radio host, they want you to pause and think and go, um, uh wait, where's that piece of paper at? Where's that, where are my notes? They want that. So what used to be a no-no is a must in human connection. Yeah. Right. And also, I think when you brought up um, well, it's like um thank you cards, thank you notes. It's uh the older, old generation, like my father used to write a thank you card all the time, postcards. That's gone nowadays. It's very rare to get a written thank you card, right? So much so now when I listen to motivational speakers now, they almost forget about it and they'll say, shoot an email.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:You know, it was like shoot email. And now it's like shoot a text. And I saw you one time, you were talking about a video.
SPEAKER_02:The video text my whole arsenal, John Jay. It is by far the most lethal breakthrough. And I have hundreds of stories of how I've broken through. Like people, you you've got this spectrum of connection, all right? And the most powerful being this, right? And there are all these levels up to it. An email and a text, it's way over here. And then, you know, an audio text, like you sure that's like a step in the right direction, but all it's all native on your phone. You want to break through to someone, or you want to thank someone on your team, send a video text message. And oftentimes I'll talk to companies and organizations or even friends, and they're like, Chris, I am not set. Like, that is so awkward.
SPEAKER_04:Because it's forever. It's so, yeah, exactly. It is so you don't ever send a video text where you're pissed, do you?
SPEAKER_02:Uh listen to the phone. No, actually I don't. I haven't. You didn't turn that paper back. But I've broken, I mean, if someone's pissed at me when you send a video text message back with some optimism and excitement, it's kind of hard for them. Because what happens in email gets worse and worse and worse and worse. You can actually stop that with a video text message.
SPEAKER_04:It's really hard to process that because you have do you re-redo it, or is it one like do you make sure it's perfect?
SPEAKER_02:No, well, you it's also another one of those muscles. I I'm one take. Okay, it's uh it's uh it's almost fat. I mean, like like you're what when I'm texting with Ian or I've walked in on my wife sending you a video text. Yeah, you've gotten pretty good at it. Yeah, you've gotten pretty good at it. Yeah, yeah. And otherwise I would have responded back on the airplane, but I knew uh the video wouldn't go through. But one of the the things I do, especially for these stodgy executives that I'll do retreats with, um, is that part of these connection hikes um that I do with Ian is that we will take everyone and after they do the pairing up tough questions that they talk about to create that connection, I'll have everyone walk by themselves. And the question as they're walking for that five to ten minutes is that if your life was a road that forks to the right versus the left, think about the person that was the catalyst to help you go right versus left. Think about who that person is over the next 10 minutes as you walk by yourself and what you would say to that person and and really take the take in those emotions and and we're gonna meet at the you know, if we're on a hike at the top of the mountain. And everyone comes in and they start sharing these amazing really stories about these people that have had these profound influences on their life. And I'll then turn to them and say, How many of you have actually thanked that person for that influence that they had on you? And most everyone's like, I'm like, okay, so here's what we're gonna do. Everyone break up, get your cell phone, you're gonna send your first video text message. All right. And so these are people, they've never sent a video. I get goosebumps talking about it, and they've never sent a video text message before. And so people are awkwardly, it takes three or four takes, right, for them to get it. And they say, okay, for those that have the confidence to do this, then send it to that person right now. And it's the most beautiful five hours that unfolds for that duration as they hear back from that person. And in a lot of cases, they're sending their first video text message back. I remember on one of these, I I finally I was like, I need to thank my wife for being so awesome. And I, dude, I was slobbering, crying, and she couldn't even send a video text message back. But I'm like, what? Like, if we actually took more of a time out, right? And we're gonna be able to do that.
SPEAKER_04:But aren't you afraid someone could throw you under the bus and those videos go viral or something? Like, is it embarrassing?
SPEAKER_02:I I I've never seen a case where someone will take that. That's sacred to me. You know, I know.
SPEAKER_04:Oh my god, my husband is so beautiful. She goes, your wife says, I gotta send this to my mom. Look what he did, look what he said. And she goes, Oh my god, let me send it to my neighbor, and your neighbor goes, Oh my god, I wonder if BuzzFeed would like this.
SPEAKER_02:I haven't, yeah, I haven't seen that be maybe with you, but I haven't seen that ever be a concern.
SPEAKER_04:Well, that's it's that's a powerful exercise, though. It is so to thank the person that made the biggest impact on you and send them a video. And send them a video. And they'd be like, just what the hell? I'd have to cover up this big old blemish I have here. And I have to hold it like this. Hey man, thanks for everything you've done.
SPEAKER_03:There are ways around it. There are ways around it.
SPEAKER_04:So now you've written two books, like what do you what's your projects that are working on several different businesses, speaking engagements?
SPEAKER_02:What what is about a year and a half ago as I was on these stages and going around, I'm like, God, this is lonely, man. Right. And one thing, I'm an identical twin married to an identical twin, right? I I took I was hardwired for I can't I had a womb mate, right? Like I came into the world with someone right next to me. Is he just like you? Uh no, very different, very different now at this point in our life. But you know, me being an identical twin, married to an identical twin, right? It makes us our marriage is so easy because we always we're partners with others, right? Like so it's interesting just that social experiment to see how our twins have evolved because you become a new twin unit to a certain extent, right? But as I've been, you know, as I tried my way in sports, my wife was actually a pro soccer player. She and her twin were both pro soccer players, and I wasn't nearly as successful in my athletic endeavors. And you know, especially when I moved to the Southeast, I tried out for every sport and I thought I was good being in Boston in seventh grade, right? All-star team on baseball, didn't make the baseball team, went out for football. It was horrible. And I was like, okay, well, tennis, right? I'll practice every single day. I've I've played in the summers. I was ranked like 144 out of 145 people. And I'm like, okay, this isn't it. So I started the lacrosse team, and that's where I found my stride. I was like, oh, well, they can't beat me at this because they don't even know how to play the lacrosse. I started the lacrosse team and that became my jam. But one thing, as I look back on that experience, it was really the team element that got me so excited. And to a certain extent, as I've gone off and been doing, you know, traveling all over the world doing speeches, it's so lonely, right? I'm like high-fiving myself. I'm like, this sucks, right? I'm not, I'm away from my family. I just want to be in the huddle. Right. And so since that point, um, I started about a year and a half ago getting back in the huddle. And so I'm working on a couple big things that we'll be launching in January, February. Um, I'm Ian and I are are partnering up on. Getting more having more of an impact with of course, and that's why I'm in one of the reasons why I'm in Phoenix. And so yeah, I mean, uh, I'm getting back in the huddle and and being one thing I've realized, and Ian's been a huge influence on helping me realize some of these superpowers that I have, and then also these things I suck at. I'm a catalyst, right? I like being a catalyst for something and and lighting people up. And so being able to do that within a company, it doesn't matter what we do, right? It's so fun and and satisfying just to be with others, right? What do you suck at? Well, I suck at anything with Excel, like budgeting, oh that kind of stuff. Like, you know, uh, there's a lot like systems, processes, organizational charts, right? Like all that stuff. Uh, because I just want to do this all day.
SPEAKER_04:Right. Um, so what about as a parent? Um, have you taught your kids do they believe in your theories and your methods? Do they send video texts? Do they listen to you? That that you know, when you talk about uh extreme joy, um seeing my kids uh follow in certain things that I try to implement on them when they were little, as far as like health and fitness goes, because I was a chubby kid and I didn't want my kids to be chubby. So I had them working out as soon as they were born. And now they're all in their 20s and they all work out on their own, they're all in great shape, and I get such pride in that. You know, I'm so glad that they're healthy. They monitor their sleep, they wear sleep rings. One of my middle sons monitors sleep all the time, gets red light, gets he gets in the sauna, he gets in the cold plunge, he gets the daylight. So that kind of stuff makes me so happy. He measures his food. I love it. You know, that that kind of stuff as a dad brings me joy.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. Uh, I mean, from I think they definitely see me as like a foreign species with the other parents and you know, with their teenage girls, right? 15 and 13. And there was a well, there's been a period of time where they're like, Dad, please don't take me. And they'll like turn down the music because they're like, You bring enough attention, don't bring any attention to us. I'm like, come on, right? But one of the cool things that's happened recently is that I I keep a pack of my tough questions cards in the back, and especially my 13-year-old who's much more of an introvert. Um, it's the one thing that breaks the ice, and she'll proactively, if especially if she has a friend that's coming over or whatever, and I'm driving them around, she'll say, Let's let's play tough questions, right? So I'm like, Okay, right. Like now it's starting to work, like it's starting to make a difference. And and they also see me as a very ridiculous human. They see some of the people I hang out with and the adventures I go on that are also kind of business, you know, going out to surf ranch, and they're like, Dad, you're ridiculous, right? Um, but one thing I emphasize to them is you know, this entrepreneurial journey is tough. Like I'm working hard, and it doesn't always look like work to them. Like my my image of of a almost perfect life is where passion profession and when when when all these things there's no lines between passion profession and and my family. It's it all comes down, right? Where it all kind of melds together. I don't want lines. I want it all to kind of flow in and out. And so with that, my work doesn't really look like work, right? I'm I do I meet with my investment bankers, I make them cold plunge sauna with me, right? And and these investment, and then or we'll ruck, right? And then do a cold plunge sauna. Like, what is happening? But now I live this life where it's like everything kind of flows into the next. Um, but I do emphasize to them one, work doesn't always look like work, but I'm working my butt off. And two, it's hard, right? Like it's up and down, and some days are I'm super hopeful, and others I'm like, oh, I don't know, like better kiss that horse. I don't know if it's gonna be here tomorrow, right? But I think that's an important thing because because especially with social media, there's this idea that everything's easy and it's not, and I think it's important that we communicate that versus hide it as parents.
SPEAKER_04:Social media kind of sucks. And there's some career, like if I wasn't in the job that I have right now, I don't think I would have if I was a banker, I wouldn't be on so I wouldn't be on Instagram. But I feel because of my job, I have to be. And it was very tough for me not that long ago to just stop paying attention to likes and shares and posts because you get so consumed in that, right?
SPEAKER_02:Well, radio, I mean, radio was kind of the first social media, if you think about it. If you break it down, but without obviously a lot of the liabilities and issues that social media has, right? I mean, you look at the the I mean, even satellite, right? Like, I mean, there's so many elements of radio where now you look at social media, it's like you guys were kind of the first influencers, right?
SPEAKER_04:100%. Like in fact, we were we as radio personalities, you know, we do endorsements for commercials, they started calling us influencers now.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:And I'm like, wait a minute, I'm I'm doing an endorsement. No, you're an influencer.
SPEAKER_02:I'm like, okay, that's but you look at the impact, it is, it is, you have to be careful, right? You have to limit, um, especially with teenage daughters, um, the amount of time that they're in it, and you've got to push them into these environments. I will say the best thing that I've done in the last six months is um, you know, I think I shared this, but you know, I went through a very traumatic experience where I ended up running over my beloved eight-year-old dog.
SPEAKER_04:And it was you shared it with us at a seminar you were at. It was very fresh for you when you're emotional.
SPEAKER_02:Honestly, it was like the it was I mean, it's the most I've ever cried in a week. And it was, you know, in those low moments, you also see the best in your kids, and it was super special because my 15-year-old, whose friends just on Snapchat with Ian's son, reached out to Jedi and said, Hey, Jedi, will you have your dad call my dad? Because I think he's the only one that can help him right now. And of course, Ian with his beaming smile and mustache was that like light that I needed in that moment. Yeah, he did. Um but you so we go through that massively traumatic experience, and then um I took the family and we chartered a sailboat and went through the uh through the islands in Italy with no cell phone, no anything that was just connect, just reconnection.
SPEAKER_04:You made sure they didn't bring their cell phones?
SPEAKER_02:They didn't have service.
SPEAKER_04:Oh, okay, that's good.
SPEAKER_02:And it was the most epic seven days. That's great any of our, you know, probably it was the best vacation family vacation we've ever taken.
SPEAKER_04:That's the problem nowadays, is I think this generation, I think partly millennial, but mostly Gen Z and Gen Alpha, they don't know how to communicate. My son is 22 years old, he was at a party over the weekend that him and his friends threw, and he said he hated it because nobody was talking. Everyone's sitting there at a party. DJ's playing music and they're just on their phones. That's just isn't that weird?
SPEAKER_02:When you really think about like and as humans, we well, one thing we have to remind ourselves is that that's when they're snapping back and forth, like it's one thing doom scrolling or like TikTok, right? Like that's just nonsense, and we all do it a little bit, but you know, they're connecting when we used to be on the phone for like three hours a night on the landline, yeah.
SPEAKER_04:But you've been in your room doing it this right, right? But being at a party and and 15 people are standing there and no one's talking, right? Right. It's weird. Exactly. Like it's weird, but that's the way they deal with life right now. So that's why you have to do boat trips where you take away their cell phone or there is no connection. You have to.
SPEAKER_05:You have to.
SPEAKER_04:Um, you brought up rucking and sauna in cold plunging. What is your health regime? So because you look like you're in great shape.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I mean, for me, it's uh it's as much mental as anything. So I do sauna cold plunge every single day. So 15-2. Um uh between 190 and 200 in the sauna, 15 minutes, and then two minutes at 3435 in the cold plunge, and we can argue about the benefit. I just like making myself really uncomfortable. So I do that three times over.
SPEAKER_04:So I do that an hour, and I do a lot of meetings while I do you'll go 15 minutes in the sauna, two minutes in the cold plunge, and then go back in the sauna.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, three times. Holy shit. Every single day.
SPEAKER_04:Okay. Uh, what kind of sauna do you have?
SPEAKER_02:Uh, I have a Sisu sauna, and then I have a Moroseco cold plunge. Wow. And that was after exhaustive research, and I love them both so much.
SPEAKER_04:I have a sauna, but it can only go to the 175.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, dude, mine cranks. Wow.
SPEAKER_04:Is it the infrared too?
SPEAKER_02:Uh no, it's just it's the dry. Oh, okay. Mine's the dry finish one. But um, so like even this morning, I was coming here, I'd hop on a flight from Atlanta. Uh I woke up at 4 30 and I did that before hopping on the plane. Yeah, I'm not sure. For me, it's it's as much as I think.
SPEAKER_04:I'd sauna it in cold plunge before I came here.
SPEAKER_02:It's the best time. My second time today. It is. And I don't know, you know, it's both physical and for me, it's always a 40 to 70 percent increase in my mentality, meaning that if I'm anxious going in, it's like the anxiety is out the window.
SPEAKER_04:Wait, so 15 minutes sauna, two minutes cold plunge, and then another 15 minutes in the sauna.
SPEAKER_02:And then two minutes, and then 15, and then two.
SPEAKER_04:Wow, so don't you deplete your body of whatever it is that's in your body?
SPEAKER_02:I drink a lot of water. Electrolytes too? Yeah. Uh, so I'll do um the uh the little element.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, yeah, okay, do that too.
SPEAKER_02:I'll do like one of those in the sauna. But I mean, I stick to what works. So and then I'll do and I mix it with meetings, right? So I'll hop and then I'll do I have a 30-pound ruck that I do a three-mile loop with, and then I lift with two other guys and a trainer three days a week, and then there's like the stuff that I'll add into it, like mountain biking or whatever.
SPEAKER_04:Do you ever do the sauna thing and and one of those at the same day?
SPEAKER_02:Every day I do I do sauna every single day.
SPEAKER_04:So your sauna's your sauna thing experience is about an hour long. Yep. And then you will also do a workout.
SPEAKER_02:Exactly. Every day. Holy smokes, yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Every day. And you watch what you eat or no?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. I mean, I'm married to a professional athlete, so that helps things.
SPEAKER_04:Well, which brings you to this, like you you you brought up how she's an identical twin, you're an identical twin. But do you think that makes your marriage totally different where you can't give marriage advice? Because I think about No, I don't think we can. You can't, because I think it'd be a great book, Tough Marriage.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, yeah. Or some sort of tough marriage. When you're in a great marriage, people look at you, you know, you hear when you're getting vulnerable, I hear people I'm close with complain about certain elements or frustrations within their marriages. And then they turn to me and I'm like, yeah, we don't really fight or argue, right? But I'm like, guys, you gotta understand. We were we always had a partner, right? So partnership from when you're born all the way until you know, from my wife, when I met her, she and her twin were still roommates.
SPEAKER_04:So you always had to compromise, you always knew how to share, you always knew how to that's it.
SPEAKER_02:Communicate all of that, right? And so, and then the social experiment gets super interesting in that. So I branded my whole wedding doublemint wedding.com, and it actually got us on the front page of the Wall Street Journal. It but it was ridiculous. So, like my save the date was a big doublemint piece of gum with Julie and Chris on it, and then I built a wedding website and I filmed our engagement that Good Morning America flew down. Yeah, it was ridiculous. It was total, it was totally ridiculous. And this was like at the very start of social media as I was really immersed.
SPEAKER_04:Were you already at the uh at the PR firm?
SPEAKER_02:Uh yeah, so I was at a ad firm that I was building, a digital ad firm called Moxie that uh they kind of challenged me to get a viral video right before viral, it was before YouTube. So I put a I filmed myself running down one of the roads, famous roads in Atlanta Valley Road, and I called a friend from MTV The Real World to set up cameras. And I had a mic on, and he was in the back of a car where I uh at the third telephone pole, I pretended to sprain my ankle. And my wife and I, you know, she's laughing at me, kind of making fun of me. I have a camcorder in the tree. A guy's literally in the back of his car. He's been in the back from MTV, he's been in there for like an hour and a half waiting for me to do this run to finally where I pretended to sprain my ankle. And she didn't know, and she had no idea, and she's like, Oh, you know, kind of making fun of me. And then I pop the question, and it was a scale of emotion in three and a half minutes. The internet, no one had ever filmed an engagement before. And so I put it on ChristopherTuff.com and I get a call from my it's just really for our twins, and I'm like, okay, let's see if I can give this a little nudge, right? Because I was challenged to get a viral video, which is a million views of a video. Fast forward to the end of the week. My server guy was called me and said, Mr. Tough, you're getting a hundred thousand views every hour, and it's doubling. Like, you got to pay for this bandwidth. What do you want to do? I was like, let her rip. Good morning, America ended up flying down and interviewing us for, and it just was ridiculous, right? And so we branded on top of that. I then did doublemintwedding.com, created a wedding website, and then we themed our whole wedding around doublement and being twins. And it was funny because when they were announcing the bride and groom, we sent in our twins, and so everyone was like, Oh, the bride and groom, and everyone went wild, and we actually duped the wedding because then we came in behind them and they're like, Well, oh my gosh, of course, right?
SPEAKER_04:You should re-release that stuff.
SPEAKER_02:I don't recall it. So it's funny, so Julie got so annoyed with how many people ended up watching it that I made it private on my Facebook, um, like my Facebook profile. But yeah, I need to I need to bring it back out, especially because your marriage and how long you guys have been married?
SPEAKER_04:Uh almost 20 years. Right. So it's a successful marriage, but that type of video people would love to see.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, yeah, totally, totally.
SPEAKER_04:But there is no research on twins marrying twins.
SPEAKER_02:So I did a speech recent like two weeks ago to a bunch of endodontists, and there was a guy that came up to me and they're like, I'm actually a twin, an identical twin married to an identical twin. So I think it actually makes a lot more sense. Are there negatives? Yeah, it's as a parent, right? Like, so I remember when my 15-year-old was going through tough stuff at school, she would come to us and like say, Yeah, I had to eat by myself at lunch. I look at Julie. We always had twins. Oh, right. Right? We always had someone next to us, and so that that lonely element of what all kids kind of go through at some point we never had, right? So we can't really relate to that.
SPEAKER_04:That's probably another reason when you go on speaking tours, you hate being alone.
SPEAKER_02:I hate being alone, and it's also why I'm now gonna build companies, right? Because I just want to be with others.
SPEAKER_04:What does your twin brother do?
SPEAKER_02:Uh so he got sober four years before I was and was a huge catalyst to me. And so after he got sober, how he really found recovery was doing swims. Now, you gotta understand he'd never been swimming before. He started doing triathlons, and um he found like he really liked the swimming component. And so he started to do, he did a one-mile swim, a three-mile swim, a 12-mile swim. And then it started to get ridiculous, where every summer he would do, he actually swam from Block Island to Newport, Rhode Island in the world's sharkiest waters, right? With like a Coast Card. And I was like, Ben, I called him and I'm like, Ben, this was like four or five years ago. I was like, this needs to be a documentary. Like, and at the time he was a teacher, a private school teacher. He's like, Chris, what am I gonna do? Like, I don't know how to do a documentary. That next week, I was at, I was speaking for uh an adventure camp group, and the other speaker was a Mount Everest climber, and there was a documentary crew following him. So I pulled the guy away uh that was filming. I was like, dude, do you do documentaries? He was like, Yeah, I do documentaries. I was like, so like anything good? He was like, Yeah, chasing corals, social network. I was like, I've seen both of those. Like, I got this idea from my twin brother. You in? He was like, Yeah, I'm in. So we decided, I decided, and I was like, what a great way to rebond me with my twin, and I'll help him with this documentary. And so for a year and a half, we produced a documentary that paralleled this 19-mile swim that he ended up doing from Providence, Rhode Island, all the way to Newport, Rhode Island in one fell swoop, 19 hours against the tide. Did he do it in one of those cages? No, so so uh no, he had a he had a thing on his ankle that he got from Australia that puts the electric currents. Okay, and then there was this spotter that if a shark came within, it looks like a banana on the radar, that if a shark came within 30 feet, they'd pull him out.
SPEAKER_05:Okay.
SPEAKER_02:But yeah, so I'm like, dude, this needs to be a documentary. So we produced a documentary, um, it won like seven international awards, uh called Swim Tough, T U F F. And it parallels the swim with and the struggles of the swim with the struggles of mental health and sobriety.
SPEAKER_04:Is is his um did he transfer his addiction? Like it seems like he got addicted to swimming.
SPEAKER_02:He found yeah, I think to a certain extent. I think he found peace in it all, and now he's uh he's getting his license to be a therapist, specifically in the addiction space.
SPEAKER_04:So is the documentary available?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, yeah, it's on Amazon, swim tough, and it's about 45 minutes long. That's so freaking cool. Yeah, I got it. It was super beautiful how it brought us back together. Yeah you know, gave us a project because you know, he lives in the northeast. I'm all over the place doing and then he started becoming a speaker, and he still speaks to like schools and colleges around addiction, and then they'll are your parents still around, yes.
SPEAKER_04:Was it is it just you two, you two brothers?
SPEAKER_02:No, I'm the youngest of six. Oh wow, yeah. I was a double mistake because you know, like my brother was the mistake that I was like the add-on plus three.
SPEAKER_04:Are your other brothers and sisters in your line of work at all?
SPEAKER_02:Uh no, but all massive overachievers, like Ivy Leak. Wow. Um, and I think someone asked me recently, they're like, Chris, how much of like you I went to school at Vanderbilt, right? Stayed South, where all that like which was very different from my family. And I mean, I'm a pretty different, authentic human, right? And so someone was asking me yesterday, they're like, How much of you being in an environment from your family group made you this unique individual? And I said, and an identical twin. So I went to Vanderbilt and I was like, I'm gonna create my own identity, I'm gonna change my name from Chris to Topher. Like, we're so I tried, which by the way, I tried, and it was a month in. They're like, Chris, Topher's such a dumb name. And so I failed in that in that endeavor. But like, I then look at this, you know, route that I took way over here, and I think a lot of it is just, you know, in in that identity, struggle for identity and and finding it.
SPEAKER_04:But you wouldn't be this if you didn't do that.
SPEAKER_02:100%. Yeah. And and I think, you know, authenticity is so important to me. And and I think in this world, especially in the speaking world, one of my biggest frustrations is that you s you become friends or you know, you hang out with these people that are saying one thing and then they get off stage and they're doing the exact opposite. I'm like, screw this. Yeah, it's like I'll I'll do spe like I don't want to be that, yeah, right. Like, you know, I kind of ditched the podcast thing because I just I want to just make a difference. You'd be hands-on with yeah, and I did it for a little bit, and but it's it's a huge I don't want it to, I just want to make a difference with people, right? And and it was this huge flip that I had, which when you look at impact and our desire to have impact, you take it literally. I'm like, okay, I'm gonna write a book, and then I'm gonna do speeches, and then I'm gonna do, you know, social media, and I'm gonna make an impact. And the flip that I had is that my greatest impact is actually having impact and being a catalyst for others. And it's this impact multiplier, which at the end of the day ends up being way bigger. So I don't have to be the guy on stage, I don't have to be the guy behind the mic. Let me just be the guy at the center of the huddle, or sitting with you and getting you fired up and being that ignition and source to help you kind of. Well, this had to come from somewhere.
SPEAKER_04:Was your father like this?
SPEAKER_02:Your mother like this? Dude, no, really dad is like the most British, proper. He's both my parents were sent to boarding school at age seven. Dang. So my dad went to Eton College with you know, like very proper top hat, tail coat.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, like Prince Charles type of stuff.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, exactly. And then, no, yeah. So it's funny, people I I truly believe that actually when I went to rehab, right? So I went to rehab to the same place that my brother went to rehab, Silver Hill Hospital. And it was my brother that when I was having my rock bottom moment, he was like, Screw this, Chris. You're drinking too, you need to take the same route that I took, which is go to this one rehab up in Connecticut. So I was on my third day of vacation, all right, down in our favorite place, the Caribbean, where I, on a seven-day vacation, outed myself, turned to my wife with tears rolling down my face, and said, I'm gonna do what Ben told me, and I'm flying to New York, and then he's gonna drive me to this rehab. So I get to this, I'm like, what the hell just happened, right? I I gotta do this. I I have to see this all the way through. And I was at in rehab for 35 days about because I got stuck in the interim of Christmas and New Year's before I could actually go and do the program. And uh it was on day like 12 that this doctor came in. He's one of the leading doctors in addiction and mental health. And he had these bright, he was so excited because I'm an identical twin and he was is my brother's doctor. And he was like, like, great social experiment. I can compare your your blood types and whatever. And he was astonished as he took the blood and did all these analyses, and he was like, You guys are actually not alike at all. So much so that you're almost opposites. And Chris, your low point is like from a biological standpoint, if you look at the elements of your blood that we're looking at, your low point is like most people's midpoint. So he goes, Chris, I'm gonna tell you two things. One, you don't need to drink or do drugs because you operate on just don't do it, it's stupid. And then two, go give back to the world because you're one of these crazy you were you were given a gift. And that's also the whole like resting joy rate. Like I have this crazy, like I was God gave me this thing, right? And for some people, it's gonna take antidepressants, right? Like, so don't compare your, you know, that's why I say don't compare your resting joy rate to others, but I truly do take it as a responsibility to make a difference in the world.
SPEAKER_04:Well, let me ask you, has your father seen you speak? Yeah, he has. Has your father told you how proud he is of you, of your conversation? So he's British. Right, right, right.
SPEAKER_02:And so it comes out, so my dad has this amazing tradition, and I think this is a great thing for all parents if they can do it to do, is where after his retirement, he turned to all six children with you know, in a very proper like dining room, you know, he uh up at his house in Rhode Island. He was like, So, everyone, I've got a thing in my retirement, and what I want you to do is every single one of you is gonna take a trip with me, and it's gonna be between three and four days. You choose where we're going. It needs to be he was an international CEO turnaround guy, so he's been to every place possible. He goes, So you will choose where you go, and it needs to be a place neither one of us, a country neither one of us has never been to, under one condition. I will pay for it all, you plan it, but upon returning, you have to give a detailed recollection, an email to this immediate family about what transpired. And I will send an email at that same time of my recollection of how it transpired. And so my oldest brother was the first one, he's Jeff, um, 10 years older than me. They went to Cuba, right? And then my brother went to Iceland, and then it came time for me to choose. And I had just my first book had just been um translated into Portuguese, and so I did research, and actually in Lisbon is the oldest uh bookstore in the world, in Lisbon, and they were carrying my book, and I was like, Oh, I'm gonna go there. We're gonna go to Lisbon, and it was super beautiful because afterwards, in that letter to everyone, I could hear in him like how proud he was.
SPEAKER_04:He saw the book in the bookstore.
SPEAKER_02:Well, and and actually, our guide knew who I was. It was a British guy, he knew who I was because of my just postings and social and whatever. And he was like, Are you are you that guy that did the blank blank? I oh, I got I got a tattoo live on the Burt show. He somehow he'd seen me getting while I talked about that's what I did on release date. I got a tattoo all about my book while I talked about the book live on Burt's show. And it was a horrible interview because I could hardly talk. Because actually, if you look at the I needed a PR play, and Bert's like, seriously, Chris, you know, my audience isn't gonna read your book. I was like, Yeah, but if you if you look at it's gonna be a great PR play, and if you look at the statistics, the greatest difference between millennials and boomers is actually their acceptance of tattoos. And so I said, I'm gonna get a tattoo all about the book while you interview me for the book. And that's what the guy in Portugal ended up seeing. And my dad, in the letter to the rest of my family, it was like I could tell that he was proud of kind of what I've done.
SPEAKER_04:So when you go on a trip with your dad, do you guys share a room?
SPEAKER_02:No, no, absolutely not.
SPEAKER_04:No, no, so it's not like you're doing it. But it's wake up, have breakfast, wake up, go to lunch, walk around.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, so I I uh the kid plans the whole vacation. Right. And also, like, I mean, for those listening or watching, like what a great thing to do with your adult kids. Yeah, yeah. And I think it's something I was telling my wife recently, Julie, I want to do this like every two years. And you you can't bring your kid like that person. I'm not gonna, you're not allowed to bring your kids or your spouse. It's like truly bonding sessions, right?
SPEAKER_04:No, that's something else, but it's a four-day minimum.
SPEAKER_02:It's like around three to four days, so you can't go to like Australia.
SPEAKER_04:Right. How wild is that that your mom and dad both went to boarding school at eight? How are they as grandparents?
SPEAKER_02:Uh awesome. Awesome.
SPEAKER_04:So so awesome. Going to boarding schools, there's gotta be a disconnect from your family.
SPEAKER_02:Look at the reason why Eaton was established in the 1400s was so British aristocrats could go colonize the world. And the reason for boarding school was so you take your sons away from their family unit when you go and send them to India to go colonize the world, they're like, Yeah, sure, I'll go to India, right? That's part of the design of it.
SPEAKER_04:Did they try to do that to you?
SPEAKER_02:Send you to boarding school when my twin and I came along, they're like, Oh, let's see what this whole high school thing's about. All the rest of my siblings went to boarding school.
SPEAKER_04:No way. Yeah, so we were the only ones that are you close with all your siblings?
SPEAKER_02:Yes.
SPEAKER_04:They weren't pissed.
SPEAKER_02:Uh no, they're they saw boarding school as an opportunity, right? I mean, my if we wanted to go to boarding school, we could have done it. But did your mother work? She was a real estate agent when all I mean, all six kids were in school and college, and so she was a real estate agent to help pay for family vacations.
SPEAKER_04:But your dad turned around companies, yeah.
SPEAKER_02:CEO kind of turnaround.
SPEAKER_04:Companies we'd hear of.
SPEAKER_02:Um, John Harlan. So it was funny. He was in when I was in 11th grade, he had was worked for John Harlan, so a check comp checks, essentially, Harlan checks. But they also own Scantron. Oh, God. And so I was like, hey dad, I got I got SATs tomorrow. Can you get me a whole Scantron uniform? So I went to my SATs wearing a Scantron hat and a Scantron shirt, and I ended up changing in the bathroom because I almost got jumped by a guy next to the roof. But yeah, no, nothing but yeah, that was. But he's very, you know, he's the opposite of an entrepreneur, right? He he he had six kids, right? Right. And so he you you rise in the organization and then you get you know to the top. Very good.
SPEAKER_04:Do you think he will do trips like that with his grandkids?
SPEAKER_02:Not at this point. I mean, he's almost 80. Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Pretty good health.
SPEAKER_02:Great health, yeah.
SPEAKER_04:That's great. So you got good genes. Yeah. How did he feel about rehab? Did he think you needed it as well?
SPEAKER_02:I was super ashamed, right? Like you spend your whole life trying to impress your parents. Or I at that point, I spent most of my time trying to impress my parents and my siblings. And part of the issue that I tore down. Um, and then you're like, Yeah, I'm going to rehab because I'm drinking way too much beer. And it was just beer for you? It's yeah, it was just beer. Never drank anything other than that. Did you have a beer belly? No, I I was running marathons. God dang. But like, you know, deep down I would get that anxiety, and it was just this downward spiral that ended up, you know, manifesting and these nervous breakdowns. And at the root of it was a lot of stuff that I had to dissect. But the you know, if it was a soup, I say like the the chicken stock was the drinking and the beer that I mean you know, you know you go to the doctor and they're like, How many how many beers do you drink in a week? And I would go, right? And they're looking at me, I'm a marathoner, and I'm doing the math. And you know, at this point my kids are like three and five. It's a stressful time, and I'm also in advertising, I'm like a madman, right? And so I'm doing the math as I go into that, and I'm like, all right, probably like a six-pack, six to ten beers on a weekday, probably like fifteen beers in the weekend, so that's like one twelve in a week, 112 beers in a week, and then I'll just put six a six-pack. And the doctor's kind of looking at me, being like, dude, seriously, like you don't think I can see like your liver, whatever, right? And uh, I remember also after my brother went to rehab, I Googled, I was like, if your identical twin is an alcoholic, what are the chances that you're an alcoholic? It was like 99% chance, and so I had, but I'm like, oh, I've got the 1%, right? And so I went on for that for a little bit, and then I knew I had to. I it was presented to me from my twin, like buy yourself an insurance plan, do what basically would take a year of recovery, and just it's gonna be like camp all about you, right? I'm like, and that's kind of how he sold me on it. And then I get there, I'm like, what the hell? I've never cried that much in my life. Um, as my family's still on the family vacation in Turks. That's crazy. But I look back on that as a massively, you know, um catalytic, you know, it's a catalyst for me to really go down to my core, you know, my my metric of success up until that point was like impressing my dad and beating my brothers at the game of life. And so I finally was able to throw that out, and where now my metric of success is just impact and being a light.
SPEAKER_04:But you also did those two other things.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, yeah. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know about that.
SPEAKER_04:Um have you asked your dad any of your tough questions?
SPEAKER_02:So I tried. It was funny, I had a list of questions when I went to Lisbon with him, and some he didn't, he was like, Nope, not answering that. What would you say no to? Um, I remember it was something around um it was something super personal that he was like, Yeah, I'm not going there. I don't know if it's a good one. Yeah, yeah. And he's a he's incredible with people, right? Uh my 15-year-old was asking me, like, what elements do you think you got from your mom and what you you got from your dad? My dad can sit with anyone and dive into like what drives him as a human. Well, there you go. Right, yeah.
SPEAKER_05:So I'm very much an introvert. Yeah. Oh, he's very much an introvert.
SPEAKER_04:He's very much an introvert. I I I I can't help but think about when you're talking about your proposal going viral. Did anybody from social media platforms uh ever reach out to you?
SPEAKER_02:They weren't in existence. Oh, they weren't it was before YouTube. Oh, it was so it's not like Zuckerberg and these guys are like, or even later in life, they because I mean it sounds like you're like No, because that next day, I did that to basically get access to then help build some of the things around face. So it was 2006 that Facebook released to the public, and then I we got to work directly with that team as one of the first three advertisers and with Facebook? Yeah, that that was kind of the it was all it all happened at that moment. Wow, and then that's kind of as I started to do that, um that's where it started to, you know, I became known as like the social media guy in 2006.
SPEAKER_05:That's crazy, yeah.
SPEAKER_02:So if people ask me, like, Chris, have you ever hung out with Mark Zuckerberg? And we had I dinner with him once and didn't say one word, and that was in 2006, he didn't say one word to me. But uh, you know, then a lot of my friends around I I I remember in like uh telling my wife that even my dumb friends were becoming millionaires, like because it was just such a wild time as you know, I knew a lot of the teams at these different, you know, Snapchat and Pinterest and all these different places. The Snapchat thing is crazy too. It's crazy. So my daughter, it was funny. So I'm like, okay, I'm gonna speak my 13-year-olds, she won't always talk to me. And she was like, Chris, just get on the dad, just get on Snapchat. So I got on Snapchat, and she will not when I'm on the road for like three or four days, she won't answer the phone, she won't, and I'm now that I'm on Snapchat, I'm like a month into Snapchat, I'm horrible at it, but that's kind of she'll actually send me a video.
SPEAKER_04:You gotta be careful on Snap. We had we had a little issue with our son when he was 16. He was sneaking out of the doggy door and going to girls' houses. And uh finally we we compensated his phone. He had Snapchat. So my wife Blake and I are looking at the Snapchat, like, okay, what is this? And like hit a button and sent a selfie of her and I like this to all his friends. And then the text messages are like from his friends going, abort, abort, Dr. Parrots are on Snap, abort to be here. That's awesome. It was the biggest backfire of all time. That's awesome. That's awesome. Well, tell I'm I'm glad you came and jumped on my podcast. Dude, I appreciate it. I think you're awesome.
SPEAKER_02:It's it's it's so good to be here. I'm sorry it took a while to what are you talking about?
SPEAKER_04:I mean, I just met you like five months ago and I was blown away. I think about you all the time. It's pretty wild. I'm very impressed by the things you do, and it's so much I have to tell you, I'm an introvert and I'm so against the video text, but I feel like you're right. So I'm going to try to do it and see if it's like there's a guy. Watch what happens. There's a guy, and he's a tough dude, and I've only met him a couple times, and I feel like Ian might know him. Um but he called me and left me a voicemail message about an interview on the podcast about a having a very famous person on the podcast that he's friends with. And he called me like at 8 30 at night and I was asleep. I got the message at 3 a.m. And I'm like, do I call this guy back? I can't call him back at 3 a.m., right? So I'm gonna call him later. So at 10 15, I called him and got voicemail. And I feel like I screwed up the voicemail message because he hasn't returned my message. It's been about three weeks.
SPEAKER_03:Oh, yeah, video text it.
SPEAKER_02:If I go, hey man, just make sure. Watch, I remember I was trying to get a meet. This guy just kept pulling the Houdini. He wouldn't answer my text, wouldn't answer my emails. And I was flying into Austin. Um, and I'm like, okay, he had run Gigafun with Elon. And you know, he's very tough to get you know, get together with it. And so I sent him a video text and I said, Um, Larry, I'm coming to Austin tomorrow and we're going for a walk before my meeting. Where should I meet you? That's all I said. And sure enough, he goes, here's my address on that walk, right? I'm like, oh my God, this guy's freaking awesome. I love this dude. I was like, dude, I've got I've got one open seat to uh trip I'm doing at SurfRench next week. And I know you've you're, you know, it's it's a lot of really impressive, you know, a couple celebrities, whatever. Uh, why don't you just come? You want to come? He was like, hell yeah. And then that was the first, you know, and that's actually where I met Ian on that same trip. Um, and it was like instant connection. This Ian guy had I had I not sent the video text, Ian's pretty text as well.
SPEAKER_04:Ian Ian uh interviewed me on a podcast. It was the first time I've ever been on a podcast, and it never dropped. He never posted. Doesn't that sound like Ian? That's so we spent like an hour.
SPEAKER_02:Wait till you see what Ian has coming up. It's uh it's uh it's getting super exciting. I will say, you know, Ian and I, I was filtering everyone for you have to so, sir, French, it's 27 hours of bliss, right? And and you have to be very careful about the energy you curate, but you also want to meet new people, right? And so I reached out to a handful of people that I knew would be the right foundation, but then they would invite friends, but I'd have to interview them at you know before they got the green light. And a lot of people got the red light as they talked about like their$30 million houses. I'm like, you're out, right? But I get on with Ian and I'm like, oh my god, I love this dude. And I saw one podcast of him, and the rest was really history from then on. Uh, when was that? Was less than a year ago, right? What podcast were you on?
SPEAKER_04:No, I had you on mine. We did you were on that one where you jumped on. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That was good. Yeah, but anyway, I've got to do another one with you. 100% you. Yeah. One with his new book coming out. Oh, yeah. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh yeah. You were showing us the title the cover art yesterday.
SPEAKER_02:Dude, the best, the bat, that was one of the best things. So we get so John Jay, we get back from Surf Ranch, and I'm like, dude, I've written books, like whatever. Like, send me your stuff. And I read through it, and I'm like, dude, it's freaking this is actually really good, Ian. And can I give you a little bit of feedback? And he was like, Yeah, absolutely, right? Big smile. And there's no one better to give feedback than Ian because he actually takes it and he still smiles, right? And I was like, Your cover sucks. It's it's literally, it looks like uh, you know, something you find on you know a science book or something. And he was like, Yeah, you're kind of right. And as as we were on a FaceTime or a Zoom or whatever, and I see all the obviously Grateful Dead posters in the back. I'm like, dude, the guy, I know the guy that designs all the Grateful Dead and Fish posters. Why don't we get him to do it? Brian Steeley in Atlanta. So he was like, Oh my god, that's perfect, right? So I text Steely, I put him in touch with Ian. Steele's like, dude, I love spiritual gangster, and yeah, hell yeah, I meant. And so that was how the cover evolved. What does it drop? As Ian would say, of course.
SPEAKER_04:You know what else I think about with you often, quite frankly, my wife and I go on these long walks all the time, and you pop up in my head because of the owl story.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, dude, that was a crazy I get goosebumps.
SPEAKER_04:That's a crazy story, man. Crazy. It's a crazy story. Absolutely. An owl crashing through your window or something, and you have that painting of an owl in the back.
SPEAKER_02:After after we, you know, so we, you know, Blake. I met Blake really through Ian's daily meditations that he does. Yeah, which is a byproduct of oneness, right? Right. And and by the way, Mike Posner, the singer who's a good, you know, we we all really bonded. And we're so I'm on with him. Yeah. Right behind me. Oh, I thought he came on after, of course. No, you were oh wow. So Posner Posner and I get a random text from Ian said, Hey guys, uh, join this Zoom. He didn't even say it was a meditation, join this Zoom call in 10 minutes. And Ian's one of the few people where anything he says it's green light, right? I so I show up with Posner and it's meditat this meditation. By the way, like I'm not a meditative guy, right? I I'm the opposite of meditative, but I've always aspired to do it and I've done calm, nothing's really worked. And I was like, holy, this is awesome, right? And then, you know, I'm I'm at what three, three to four times, three, three days a week, probably if I'm not traveling, I'm I'm on the Zoom calls. But when I went through everything with my dog, and was like, I need you to, I'm gonna put you in touch with one of the most powerful humans ever. And it took forever to um to schedule. And I I wanted Julie on there too. And so um what how how do I pronounce her name? Was it she printing? Samiji. Samajee? Oh, she's great. She's a monk. Yeah, so Samiji gets on and she's so calm. And kind of Julie's a little bit awkward because she's like, Chris, like you're really going far off, and we're on with this. Um, like what's happening here? And then, you know, 15 minutes in, you know, Julie's starting to tear up as we're working through what had just happened with this traumatic experience, two two months after the whole dog thing, losing, you know, running over my dog. And so she's talking us through all this stuff, and it comes towards the end after like 50 minutes time starts just like rolling by super quickly. And she goes, Do you mind? Can we pray together? And uh, I was like, Absolutely. So we we start praying together when out of nowhere, the loudest hoot you've ever heard, right? And by the way, we're in our like family room. They the the owl had to come through like all this stuff, and the owl's right there, and she like it interrupts the whole prayer, and she's like, I don't mean to interrupt, but is that an owl? And Julia and I are like, Yeah, she was like, Do do owls come by often? We're like, no, owls don't come by often. And she goes, Well, that's kind of crazy because oneness world leaders, it's it's owl. That's our that's our thing. And I said, and I started crying, and I'm like, an owl, that's like my spirit animal. And when I do our meditations, I do it in front of an eagle owl. The eagle owl was a gift from a friend of mine who's now a pretty famous photographer, where I was the catalyst for him to actually pursue photography versus going into insurance sales. And he now has, you know,$15,000 to$20,000 prints. When we moved into our first house, he goes, Chris, I'm gonna give you the coolest nature print ever. It's an eagle owl because you were that eagle owl for me, because you saw something for me that I didn't see in myself. And so it's an eagle owl looking out the window. And so I'm like, What are the And there's a real owl, and then there's a real owl that comes up as we're praying, and the monk is on the zoom.
SPEAKER_05:And the monk is on the zoom saying, owl, oneness world leaders. It's beautiful, man. It's beautiful, it is beautiful. Life is beautiful.
SPEAKER_02:This is beautiful.
SPEAKER_04:The oneness people are so nice, they're unbelievable.
SPEAKER_02:I love the ones, it's unbelievable. I'm so much better for it, and and I, you know, it's always a work in progress, but it's changed my life. Ian's changed my life, right? Blake has changed my life. It's it's the best.
SPEAKER_04:You guys are great. I'm gonna interview Ian and Blake on a podcast. I love it. Well, Chris, thanks, brother. Thank you, dude. Okay, so welcome to our podcast. This is a little bit different today because this podcast is a spin-off of our radio show.
