Influence vs Manipulation — Do You Know the Difference?

What are you scared to say out loud? That is where this conversation with Brett Bartholomew starts.

We get real about the stuff people usually avoid:
• Fertility struggles
• Frozen embryos
• Messy divorces
• What dating looks like when you are trying to stay open without inviting chaos.

Then we get into Brett’s wheelhouse. Communication, persuasion, and why trying to “be logical” in an argument almost never works. We talk about how people actually make decisions, how to motivate someone who does not want to listen, and how to influence without turning into a manipulative jerk.

We also get into introverts, social burnout, and a simple relationship tool Brett calls “hot zones” that can save you from a lot of unnecessary blowups. Plus a look at his book The Anti-Hero Advantage and why the idea of the “perfect leader” is mostly nonsense.

If you want better conversations, stronger boundaries, and a few honest laughs along the way, this one delivers. 🎙️

Transcript

Welcome And Radio Show Spin-Off

SPEAKER_02 0:05

Okay, so welcome to our podcast. This is a little bit different today because this podcast is a spin-off of our radio show.

SPEAKER_01 0:23

Yeah, look at you. You look like you look well rested. Have you been traveling a lot?

SPEAKER_02 0:28

Did I what?

SPEAKER_01 0:29

Have you been traveling a lot or anything?

SPEAKER_02 0:30

I have you're in Hawaii like the last eight times I texted you. The last seven weeks I've been every weekend because Kemp Kemp Division II kept making it. They kept winning in their March Madness. You know, they kept going. So we were in San Diego one weekend and we had to wait to see if they won, and they won. Then we had to go to we had to go to San Francisco for the next weekend. And then at halftime, they're up by 12. And I'm like, man, we're gonna go to the and then they they lost by four.

SPEAKER_01 0:56

Speaking of, and this is my ADD brain, when you said San Diego, you met your wife in San Diego, right? You got 30 years coming up, don't you?

SPEAKER_02 1:04

How do you know that?

SPEAKER_01 1:05

Dude, you think I don't do my research? You don't think I pay attention? Wait, how long have we known each other? You just think I sit here and come to talk about me? I know shit about you that you don't even know I know about you.

SPEAKER_02 1:15

She's uh, yeah, it's her birthday today, as a matter of fact.

SPEAKER_01 1:17

I have my own version of like Lord, you watch Game of Thrones? Yeah, like Lord Baelish? I got my own little little version of the Lord Baelish, you know? I got spies all around you. That's that's true.

SPEAKER_02 1:29

Did you did you really do some Googling before you?

SPEAKER_01 1:31

No, I literally think I don't pay attention to you, but I wouldn't know I barely know my anniversary. Uh, you and I have a lot of commonalities, like a lot of similarities that you don't know. We just never get a chance to talk about them.

SPEAKER_02 1:41

Like a foot fetish?

SPEAKER_01 1:42

Uh fertility journeys, fucking having boys.

SPEAKER_02 1:46

I didn't know you you were going through fertility stuff.

Travel Stories And Marriage Milestones

SPEAKER_01 1:48

Yeah, yeah. I did that's how I got my son. I did. Yeah, Bronson was a miracle. We had everybody in the world tell us we weren't gonna have it, lost embryos. Oh, yeah. Yeah, all that, yeah, yeah. I mean, even like with the divorce, you know, like we lost an embryo in the process of trying to have another child, but then, you know, the byproduct, unfortunately, of the divorce is there's certain embryos that you know lost in that. But yeah, Bronson was like a miracle.

SPEAKER_02 2:10

You mean you got a divorce and there's frozen embryos?

SPEAKER_01 2:12

So we had five embryos when we went through our fertility journey, right? And this was after, oh, it's never gonna happen, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I feel like, you know, everybody's got a story of a doctor like telling them that. It's like they go to some school or they're like, just tell people this. And then it feels like more of a miracle, mindfuck them to the max. You know, and then we were blessed to have Bronson. And so we had four other embryos. Um, one, we lost in that process, like when I was still married. And then, yeah, unfortunately, due to certain laws and regulations and divorce, you know, you don't always get to decide what happens to the remaining embryos.

SPEAKER_02 2:43

Well, so but what happened?

SPEAKER_01 2:44

Uh, well, in this case, uh, they're gonna be dissolved. Oh, they're gonna destroy.

SPEAKER_02 2:50

Yeah. We have, I have, I have, I'm sorry, let me put my phone away. I have, or my wife and I have um one more frozen embryo, and it is my youngest son, Dutch's twin.

SPEAKER_01 2:59

Oh, really?

SPEAKER_02 3:00

Yeah. So it's kind of crazy to think that there's another one of him.

SPEAKER_01 3:04

And wasn't he like a miracle, miracle, miracle?

SPEAKER_02 3:06

Like the Well Kemp, my middle son, and him are twins. Okay. But they're just two years apart. Yeah. You know how they do that. The first arrest. So from the same thing. Yeah. But there was one more there. So we like pay rent on him in Tucson. He's in a fertility clinic in Tucson. Yeah. Still. Uh I think it's like a hundred bucks a year or something like that. But it's like, what do we do? And then I thought, wouldn't that be wild if like he goes through infertility and then his wife was able to carry that egg, which is his twin? Because you know what's gonna happen. It's gonna get crazy as that.

SPEAKER_01 3:33

Right on, right? Yeah, and I mean, I at one point in time, my my now ex-wife, but we had a friend that was having trouble, went through a terrible journey, and we were considering, well, she was to be a surrogate. And so, like, yeah, lots of I mean, you know. We did that.

SPEAKER_02 3:46

We did that too.

SPEAKER_01 3:47

Yeah, I remember with Kemp, right?

SPEAKER_02 3:48

Kemp, yeah, Blake's sister carried him. Yeah, by the way, the podcast is on.

SPEAKER_01 3:52

That's the I understand. So I mean, it's good. No question, nothing's off limits, is it?

SPEAKER_02 3:56

No, it's not with you, is it? No. No, no, not at all. Okay, good because that's good. Because I know we I had you last time I saw you, you were on my radio show trying to find you a woman.

SPEAKER_01 4:04

Yeah, well, that was uh, oh my god. I have I have quit dating, thankfully. Have you really? Uh yeah. I mean, is everything really on? Like we can talk about whatever. You don't have like a sensitive, crazy, weird woke audience or anything.

SPEAKER_02 4:16

I don't think so. Okay, good.

SPEAKER_01 4:17

I don't think so. Yeah, I mean, I think I went on eight dates. Uh with the girls I set you up with? Or no, I think there was one because we went out, I met with two. Well, there was only three on that Tate. Yeah. Um, one uh maybe asked me about their kid like 30 times, was like quizzing me if I remembered the name of their kid. Like we could barely get through a conversation about just regular, like, hi, how are you? Like, you know, let's get into an actual conversation. It was then I get that. Like you hear about people's journeys. There are people that, you know, whether they were married before, dating before, some people like I love being a dad, and I knew what I signed up for being a dad. It's the best thing in the world, right? But you know, there's people on all sides of the equation that you meet as like, oh, my partner's not really a part of my son's life, and that could be men or women. But I was like getting tested constantly. If I remembered the name of, I'm like, yes, I know that you have one son, I know that he's 13, I know that he has a soccer tournament in Globe, like I'm paying attention. Um, had a lot of folks that wanted to ask me just how deep my belief in Christ went, and it was never enough to just be like, okay, yeah, I believe in a higher power. Yes, okay, I believe in Jesus. Yes, but did you know he died for our sins? And so I once again, this is the first 10 minutes of discussion. And then the most recent date, which definitely I'm now done done dating for unless it's like introductions from friends.

SPEAKER_03 5:34

Right.

SPEAKER_01 5:35

Unless it's introductions from friends. Went to a beautiful restaurant, had a great conversation for about 15, 20 minutes, and then I heard about everything her ex did to ruin her life. How him, uh apparently, along with everybody in today's world, is a narcissist. And you're listening, you know, you're trying to casually like steer a conversation elsewhere while showing. Um, but then at one point she started screaming about something he had done to her about like parent-teacher conferences and a pickup. And people at the restaurant thought she was yelling at me. So I'm trying to balance this dynamic of, you know, really being present for her. Because, you know, you're empathetic, you genuinely care. It seems like she went through a lot, but I'm also like, yo, people think you're screaming at me. Like, I don't know you. Like, I don't want that.

SPEAKER_02 6:22

So, what do you do? Get up and leave.

Fertility Journeys And Frozen Embryos

SPEAKER_01 6:24

No, no, I just I gently like touched her hand because she kept pounding the table, talking about this gentleman that that apparently had done her wrong. And I just said, Hey, I I'm genuinely listening, but could you please not scream? Because I think, and I was trying to be diplomatic. It's not, I think people were looking at us. A lot of people in the restaurant were looking at us. And so I just kind of put dating on the backburn. I mean, when I I was in just let it happen. Yeah, I was in a marriage for 10 years. I was, you know, with my ex 15 years. Like, I didn't have to deal with apps, you know. That was it. So I did that just enough to be like, what's the lay of the land here?

SPEAKER_03 7:01

Right.

SPEAKER_01 7:01

And then I realized, and I'm very aware of my own stuff too, but I I grew up in the Midwest. You don't talk about your ex, you probably don't start conversations with politics and religion. Just be genuinely present. Right. Like I try to be with you. You're a friend. We're just gonna give a shit about what you say and let it go from there.

SPEAKER_02 7:17

No, I think you're incredible. I think you're no, I really think that like you are there's so many uh single guys, there's so many single women, and you just can't find a good guy.

SPEAKER_03 7:28

Yeah. Right. So that's what they say.

SPEAKER_02 7:29

Like, I think that to find you the right, like I almost partly want to make it like my goal to find you the right person.

SPEAKER_01 7:36

One one thing I've found that works against me is I can't tell people what I do for a living anymore. Why? Um, one of the first women I went on a date with, and she was brilliant. I think she was like a biophysicist, really enjoyed talking to her. Um, and then at one point she just said, you know, I don't really think that I could see myself dating somebody like you. And I'm like, oh, clutching my pearls, someone like me. And she was like, Well, you said that you teach people how to deal with power dynamics and difficult personalities. So you basically teach people how to manipulate for a living. And I'm like, well, yes, but no. I turn like there are many people that use those things for ill-gotten gain. Like, I teach people how to deal with people for good. You know, we all know, I mean, anybody listening to this in the carpool lane knows that sometimes you have to say a certain thing or do a certain thing to get a result. I mean, even with our kids, you know, you have to kind of trick them into eating their vegetables or you have to do this. So I just teach people principles around persuasion and influence and behavior change for good reasons. You know, but I'm like, really? I can't say that I teach communication and persuasion.

SPEAKER_02 8:41

Well, where'd you how'd you go from that? Because you were, I mean, back in the day when I met you or 10 years ago or so. In fact, I remember when you got engaged. Right? That was I remember I remember that old. That's Australia on the bridge. Yeah, good memory. You do your research too. It wasn't research, I just remember. I remember when you went and then you came back, and it was like, whoa, yeah, what a story. Yeah. Um but you were a trainer. You were a strength and conditioning coach, right? So from there, and then I remember I remember we were like doing push-ups because you were training me and you said, Hey, I want to ask your advice on something. And I said, What? And you said, I had an opportunity. This is you saying, yeah, an opportunity to go be the Miami Dolphins strength and condition coach or uh able to own your own gym with somebody in LA, I think it was, right? And I I and I can't remember what my advice was, but I re if I was to think back then, I would think I would tell you to go to the gym to ownership.

SPEAKER_01 9:31

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 9:32

Right.

SPEAKER_01 9:32

Yeah, well, I think I mean, similar to uh like I didn't want to leave Arizona, right? And like I think you've had opportunities in New York, and I know you've lived in Cincinnati and Houston and all these things. And so that point in my life, I really loved Arizona. I had found a niche in what I wanted to do and how I got into strength and conditioning would make a lot more sense of what I do now. It led to kind of how I also got out of it. I've always been interested in psychology, helping people overcome obstacles, kind of figuring out what drives them, what makes them tick. I think early on, that was strength and conditioning related because that was just a tool to help people overcome psychological obstacles. And I was an athlete, but as you also know, I nearly lost my life due to poor communication in a healthcare setting. So for me, I liked coaching more than anything. And so when I was a strength coach, and even during that time that you and I had met, like what I really wanted to do was find like, how can I expand beyond this? Because it's great making people bigger, stronger, faster, more agile, all of that. But like that wasn't the main thing that I loved. I loved the psychology. How do I get these guys, men and women, that are worth millions of dollars, who are world-class to do things inherently many of them don't want to do. Like Kemp likes to train, right? Yeah. He'll train two to three times. He'll do it. Yeah, he loves it. Right. I mean, this doesn't, this may not surprise you. A lot of those guys, and I'm gonna use that term universally, they don't always want to train. Like they want to play their sport.

SPEAKER_02 10:55

Oh, they want to play. But that but that's also good.

SPEAKER_01 10:58

Yeah, that's fine. You're right. But like my job as a strength coach was to get them to, you know, you're having them do things that they're inherently not always great at. Uh, they may not be great at deceleration technique, or they might be weak in an isometric hold of a certain extra. Like, and so my job was to expose them to their weaknesses so that they'd be less likely to get injured, so on and so forth. So that took a lot of communication strategy, right? Like the easiest way to get people to do something is you have to speak to their self-interest. And so they they wanted to play more, they wanted to make more money. And so I was always fascinated by what makes people tick. That was the through line.

SPEAKER_02 11:35

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 11:35

And so when I wrote conscious coaching, and that took off, that was my first book, and that took off into other industries. I was like, holy shit, I'm really now, I have an avenue to do what I really love doing, helping people, no matter what their profession is, what their walk of life is, deal with how to influence, get more effort out of people, uh, deal with difficult personalities, basically help people make more progress. So now I do conflict uh resolution stuff with companies. I go in and do all kinds of clinics and seminars on everything from how to build buy-in with staff or how to get more out of this person or how to deal with a dickhead boss. Ironically, done a lot of relationship counseling now, um, which I thought my credibility on that would have taken a hit, given a lot of people.

SPEAKER_02 12:17

Were you talking about serious like one-on-one with a couple?

SPEAKER_01 12:19

Yeah, I mean, like just people that were coming to me for executive coaching, let's say from a certain company, right? And initially they wanted to deal with uh how do I manage this staff and what have you. Now they're like, well, can I shift gears and talk to you about some things I'm dealing with with my husband? So for me, I loved coaching. And I think that's also where like I loved that you had an improv background because I started a lot of what you have to do when you deal with people. I would imagine when you're interviewing me or when you're on John Jay and Rich, you have to rely on your background to ask certain questions to understand where to steer that conversation or how to help them. So I always love people, and and that's kind of how that convergence took place is how do I help people deal with deep dark shit that they all deal with?

SPEAKER_02 13:00

So let me jump back to manipulation. What is a what is a tool that you've used when you're dealing with someone because you're dealing with football players, right? I mean, in the beginning. In the beginning. I know some of the guys you train, big football players, famous football players. Sure. If they wouldn't do something, is there a trick you use, just kind of like you with your son?

SPEAKER_01 13:17

Yeah. So a common uh like question, and this will lead to the example is a coach was asking me recently how I say coach, you mean coach like Yeah, this is a real, this is like a sport example.

SPEAKER_02 13:26

Like, yeah, but when you but when the example, is it a coach that we would know? Is it a coach that's yeah, but I can't say the name, just yes. You say is it NCAA or N C double A. Okay. Yeah. What sport? What sport? Football. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 13:37

And there are certain things that are not mandatory, just like in the NFL or like NFL, they have uh collective bargaining agreements where certain athletes they can choose whether they show up for certain workouts at certain times, right? But this guy's like, how do I incentivize it so they make the right choice? They come, they do the workouts, they and I'm like, well, the thing about incentives, whether it's kids, whether it's getting your spouse to put you know their dirty laundry away or maybe cook dinner once a night, like once a week or something, is pay attention to what they already care about. For athletes, a lot of that's recognition. You know, they want they want a social rewards, they want to be known as the hardest worker, they want to be known as this. For certain people, of course, it's money and financial rewards. So I'm like, you're not having trouble incentivizing them. You're not paying attention to what already incentivizes them. And I ask them, what does this person care about the most? What do you mean? I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 14:30

You ask the coach, not a player. What does it because that's what does this player care about the most? Yeah. And he says, I don't know. Yeah.

Dating Apps And Emotional Landmines

SPEAKER_01 14:35

And then I push him a little bit more. And he's like, well, he wants to be recognized as, you know, he likes being known that he's the hardest worker in the room. And I'm like, well, use that against him. All you have to do is use a little of what's called a pooria. And kind of some people would say this is gaslighting.

SPEAKER_03 14:49

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 14:49

Okay. But a pooria is like, hey, you consider yourself one of the hardest workers on the team. You consider yourself the one of the most dedicated guys on the team. You say that, right? Yeah. Well, then why isn't your ass showing up for the voluntary workouts? Set the example that you say you want to set every day. So sometimes, I mean, and I do that with my son. He wanted to be a T-Rex when he was five. I go, buddy, you're not eating your dinner. Wouldn't a T-Rex eat all of his dinner? You're not gonna be a very big T-Rex. So it can be simple things like that. But as you know, people are not rational. So they'll the I think here's a better answer. The least effective way to get somebody to do something, whether it's your mother to go to the gym two days a week, somebody to save money for their retirement, their kids to eat their vegetables, whatever, the least effective way is using logic. People don't want stats and all of that. They don't. People are emotion driven, right? They're they're inherently, we're all inherently selfish to a degree. I mean, is there anybody that really doesn't know they need to get more sleep, brush their teeth, get outside? You can give them all the stats in the world. They're not gonna do it. That'll make them push back.

SPEAKER_03 15:52

Right.

SPEAKER_01 15:52

So I always try to get them to understand the emotional levers of what makes people do the things that they want to do.

SPEAKER_02 15:58

Yeah, logic is a big pushback for me. Like being a firstborn, being a Virgo, like that's uh like there's certain things that fall under that umbrella of being, and sometimes I'll tell my wife when we get in arguments, I'll be like, okay, logically, blah, blah, blah. And then I'll sit there and I'll go, it's emotion. Yeah, for the emotion.

SPEAKER_01 16:14

Logic is never that our first, when people are like, think logically, that biologically goes against how we're hardwired, right? The the amygdala, all these parts of what people colloquially call our like reptilian brain, that makes the decision first.

SPEAKER_02 16:29

And then your vocabulary is awesome. I forgot about that, Brett.

SPEAKER_01 16:32

Our prefrontal cortex is just like, oh no, now do this. So somebody gets an iPhone, they don't think, oh, well, this can help me with this. And they're like, that shit looks cool. They're gonna do this. And then they're like, oh, but it would also be good for work. So we always go emotion first, human beings, and then we reinforce that with logic. So that's logic is the worst way to persuade somebody if you really want to know about how to effectively manipulate. And also that term, somebody listening to this has manipulated the volume. Right. Yeah, they manipulate the thermostat. That term just means to wield something skillfully.

SPEAKER_02 17:07

But most people think it's negative.

SPEAKER_01 17:08

Yeah, they think it means to like shit on somebody, you know, or like just do something unethically. Right. But that's their own experience with that language.

SPEAKER_02 17:15

But where did this all come from for you? Like, I mean, you you you were where'd you go to college in Nebraska? No, Kansas State.

SPEAKER_01 17:21

Kansas State. It came from when I was hospitalized.

SPEAKER_02 17:23

I mean, when I spent that's where you learned everything.

SPEAKER_01 17:25

Yeah, when I was in, I mean, and I don't know how deep you want to go in, I'll cover whatever. But I mean, I spent uh collectively eight plus months of my life in an eating disorder hospital as a teenager.

SPEAKER_02 17:35

Right. I saw the pictures are unbelievable.

SPEAKER_01 17:38

And you would hear nurses and doctors talk about patients as if they were things. Oh, like, can you believe this person's doing this? And, you know, it wasn't so much treatment as what's really going on here. As you know, with like with addiction or any kind of underlying disorder, it's it's never the thing. Like most alcoholics aren't like, oh my God, I love the taste of vodka.

SPEAKER_03 18:00

Right.

SPEAKER_01 18:00

You know, there's something underlying that people are either running towards or running from. For me, my eating disorder at that time is I didn't know how to deal with stress. Parents were going through a divorce. A lot of my friends got into hardcore drugs, things like that. Working out was a refuge for me. And I took it to an extreme. It was how I dealt with anger, it was how I dealt with anxiety. I started doing radical dying, eating low-fat uh dieting, eating low fat, low carb, because that's what men's health told me. I'm like 14. But when I was in this hospital, they're not really worried about the root cause of why this 56-year-old woman's in there or why I'm in there. They're just giving you medication, Zoloft, they're tri they're feeding you six, seven thousand calories a day. And for me, my interest was always like, how the fuck can people like how is this reality? How is this treatment? How are these people that are supposed to be caring for people, like, how is this what they think is helpful? And they would treat you like shit. They would talk down to you, they'd be rude to you. And so, like, that was when I started looking at the room of other patients too. This woman was the middle of nine children. Her eating disorder was a way to get attention early on in her family. Another one, husband cheated on her. I think I've told you this, a junior Olympic wrestler, his dad beat him after not making weight. So every day was a PhD in psychology.

SPEAKER_02 19:21

Are you taking mental notes?

SPEAKER_01 19:22

Are you taking are you like I mean, as much as a 14 to 15 year old, I'm taking mental notes thinking, holy, there's like we have these group therapy sessions, and I'm understanding that these people and that work for the hospital are not really listening. And when they leave the room, the patients talk about the real stuff in their lives. And I think that was my first understanding of people were very rarely reveal to you what they're thinking, what they want, what they need, unless it's informal or they're in a psychological state where they feel comfortable around you. And so that would be another quote unquote ethical use. I'm not gonna say that every time I, you know, like manipulation, like the one thing I teach my son, even at this young age, is in essence, if you want somebody to change your behavior or do what you want in a good way, the first step is get them in an emotional state where they're ready to even receive that message. You know, it doesn't matter what you have to say. If they're stressed or they're coming from some, you know, they've had a bad day or they're defensive, they're not gonna listen to you anyway. And you would see these doctors and nurses, a lot of them didn't care about what uh we all had to say. In their opinion, you had an eating disorder, it's one size fits all, antidepressants, anti-anxiety, stuff you with food. That should cure the issue. You know, and it doesn't.

SPEAKER_02 20:42

You know, when you talk about like teaching your son, it kind of gave me things that I do without study. Like I there's something that just happens as a human being, right? Like I try to make somebody laugh. Yeah. And when we're laughing, smiling, having a good time, then I ask him for what I need to ask, right?

SPEAKER_01 20:59

You're so that what that would be called an ingratiation tactic. You are incredible at this. You will use humor to disarm people.

SPEAKER_03 21:08

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_01 21:08

You you downplay your own intelligence a lot, too, to kind of it's kind of like play a fool to catch a fool.

SPEAKER_02 21:14

You're good at this. Yes, you don't. I'm very disagreeable.

SPEAKER_01 21:17

Even when I watch you interact with you, you are so filled with humor and joy and a fun energy. It's incredibly disarming. And so you could have Demi Lovato here, Taylor Swift, Marshall Mathers, and they're all gonna open up to you to a degree because you don't seem like you have an agenda.

SPEAKER_02 21:33

How come you didn't say Eminem?

SPEAKER_01 21:34

You said Marshall Mathers.

SPEAKER_02 21:35

I mean, because I mean Sounds like your friends.

SPEAKER_01 21:38

For all you know, he's a client. Have you trained? You can't. No, no, no, no. No. Um, but you are good. You need to like that is something that I study from you. I and I you don't know this, but I've actually used you when I give lectures. I talk about, and I I I don't always use your name because I want to respect your privacy. But you are incredibly disarming, and your interview style is so organic and natural, and you can tell that you have an impact. Prov background because you're loose with it, but you can always take that through line that maybe was 10 minutes ago and bring it back to close something out. And that's that's a byproduct of your mind.

Persuasion Versus Manipulation In Real Life

SPEAKER_02 22:10

And I would imagine some aspect of your well, it's just that when you when you write a book like conscious coaching, like your your background, you're using a lot what happened to you in the hospital, right? But also your college education. But like you just came up with the words that I was using. Are those words you are those definitions you came up with, or those are real definitions? In terms of like, you mean like when I told you what I did. It's called ingratiation.

SPEAKER_01 22:31

Yeah, well, that's just like a blend of like I understand there's a wide range of listeners. Some people just like the common term, like getting, but that also is a research term. Like that's my doctorate. Right. That's so like I went full nerd as I transitioned into different careers. Cause I mean, again, my fascination with what makes people tick, and then how can I help others? Because I think social connection is the most important thing in this world. Like, uh like if I had, I've thought about doing a non-for-profit multiple times where I help kids in school learn how to be better communicators, express their feelings, be more.

SPEAKER_02 23:02

Because of social media and texting and phones. I mean, I think that amplifies. I feel there's a massive disconnect with the world. The social attributes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like I read this thing that most kids like uh under 24 haven't been on a date, never talk to anybody at a bar, never do anything. I believe like most people under 24 are virgins.

SPEAKER_01 23:20

They they show that all cause mortality now, like when you look at when people that don't get enough sleep or smoke cigarettes and all that, obviously that raises mortality risk. They found that poor social connections raise all cause mortality as high, if not higher, than smoking in certain circumstances. Because think about that anxiety and depression and feelings of isolation and COVID only amplified that. And so, like, my job and what I do for a living actually is teach people social agility, no matter what this person's personality is, and if that person's hard to get to, like, how can you find an in-roads with somebody that seems even the most closed off or neurodiverse or really angry? Because there's a lot of people that, and this is a lot of what my next book is about. How do you open up the anti-heroes of the world, the misfits, the underdogs, those of us that oftentimes are kind of looked down on because we're different, they're the most interesting people a lot of times.

SPEAKER_02 24:14

So, will you do drills with these people? Yeah, a lot of improv. Do a lot of improv drills, like uh uh a freeze tag?

SPEAKER_01 24:19

So we'll do things like that to kind of warm them up, you know. But like when we do it, we'll literally put them in scenario. Think of athlete scrimmaging. So, like, think of Kemp if he was working on a certain drill in a certain scenario, or if if somebody plays another sport, or even like when I box competitively, okay, this round, I want you to work the body. We would take somebody and say, what stresses you out or what opens you up? What's give me some context? And then we'd put them in a role-playing scenario that's like, okay, you have three minutes to try to get this person to just relax, open up, maybe laugh, use anything you can. And then we don't give them any tools at the beginning. We try to just get an idea of where they're at. And then over the course of you know, the hour or the two days, however long the course is, we give them little techniques and tactics and we put them back in those scenarios.

SPEAKER_02 25:07

But you do this to them in front of other people. See, that's like so. I I do you know who Jesse Itzler is?

SPEAKER_01 25:13

Uh I've heard his name. He used to come. Wait, he came to Exos a couple times ago. Did he he's the guy triathlete?

SPEAKER_02 25:19

Oh, he's definitely a runner. I know. Yeah, runner. He's a guy who's like um he started Zico Coconut Water. He started uh a bunch of different companies. I maybe think somebody else. He's a really now he's speaking and doing he's like you know, he's just on tour. I've met him a few times, and I went to his house in Georgia in how it was a little town called what town was it? Some little town outside of outside of Atlanta. And I met his house, there was about 20 of us. And it was a sauna cold plunge day. Yeah, right. So I'm excited to be there.

SPEAKER_01 25:49

You got a whole retreat he's running?

SPEAKER_02 25:50

A little retreat for one day. It was like one day, get there, whatever it was invitable. It was really cool. For elites, but for what? For elites, for like high class people. No, it was no, no, no, no. There was 20 of us, but there was like you know, 19, 20 year olds, there was a lady who lost her house in the Palisade Fire, there was a couple athletes, you know, and then it was me, and I, you know, I didn't fit in. And uh, I was sitting there and it was he was talking, and it was so interesting to hear this guy speak. And then he says, where someone like me, my stomach just uh oh, he says, I want everybody to get up here and stand up in front of the group and tell us your story.

SPEAKER_01 26:23

Oh, that's brutal for anybody.

SPEAKER_02 26:24

Yeah, I wouldn't want to say that. Yeah, oh my God, I didn't sign up for I don't want to. If I would have known we're gonna do that, I don't want to come here. I I want I didn't, I was praying to God it wouldn't come to me. And at one point, they they go around, we're sitting on a hill in his backyard, and we're they're going, This person is going, this person's going. Then it's coming to me, and the guy next to me, this guy right here, he taps me on the knee and he goes, You're gonna be okay. He goes, You're gonna be okay. And I thought it was so weird, like he could tell that I was like so stressed. Yeah, paying attention. And then I got up there and I did it, and I was fine. But it's like this is what you do for a living. Yeah, but it's it's not. It's like I sit in a room, in a little room with people that I know. When you're out of context, and I think too, go ahead. And I think talk about it. That's it. It was just so I can't imagine. Think of that person next time you say, hey, in front of the group, get up and tell yourself. We want you to get up and do it all.

SPEAKER_01 27:11

Uh yeah, we are so we don't do it like that so much as, and I probably did a poor job explaining.

SPEAKER_02 27:15

Very poor.

SPEAKER_01 27:15

We'll break them, we'll break them out. So let's say everybody in this room was doing it, or let's say there was eight people in the room. We won't bring people up and be like, in front of everybody, mortal combat fight, you know. We we have them break off. And we what we do is we we create very low stakes situations early on. And then just again, like athletes, and this is where my background as a coach helped, you know, it'd be like somebody comes in the weight room the first time. You don't throw them into a murder workout. You know, you're like, hey, let's make sure your squat form's good and let's do this, let's set you up for success. So we we warm them up into it, you know, we may, and then we make sure that everybody's spread out. We'll say divide up. Like we just did this with the Texas Rangers during spring training, uh, their staff and and uh some members of their front office and the Boston Red Sox as well. We've done stuff like this out at Apple. And so we'll we'll kind of set the stakes for them, low stakes, and then we'll say divide up, find a partner, lock and load.

SPEAKER_02 28:08

And when you say that, it's give giving you the point of view. I'm gonna sorry to interrupt you. No, you're fine. But to be like uh find a partner. Oh God, I don't know anybody here. Why do I gotta find a partner? Yeah, I'd rather you tell me that's my guy. But we'll do that for some good. So like I'm giving you the point of view of someone who's insecure, antisocial, introvert for most part. Yeah, no, I'm like when I go to church, growing up, when I go to church, I was Catholic. When they did Peace Be With You, you know the part of the hard, yeah, it was the worst. Now, as an adult, when I know it's coming, that's when I go to the bathroom. That's smart. Yeah, and then sometimes I'll come to the bathroom, I come back and they hadn't done it yet. And I'm like, oh my God.

SPEAKER_01 28:38

Well, and correct me if I'm wrong on this, but I think something that like so one of when you had me on for the speed dating, and I'm thinking of the idea.

SPEAKER_02 28:43

You were great, you were great.

SPEAKER_01 28:44

Thanks. Um, but I had never done anything like that. And I'm like, what's one question that could teach me a lot about somebody without them feeling like they've been interrogated? Because that stuff's important.

SPEAKER_02 28:53

I don't want to feel that on the date.

SPEAKER_01 28:55

Yeah, no, no, no, no. You you wanted me to have some questions. Oh, right, right, right. Right? Yeah, yeah. And one question that I asked that I made sure to answer myself first, that that relates back to what you're just saying, that existential dread of like, oh my God, I don't want to was what's one thing most people misunderstand about you? And there were some interesting answers on the speed dating, if you remember. But I thought, well, what is that for me first? Because I always turn my own stuff on me first. There's nothing I teach that I I like to turn myself inside out. I have just the right amount of self-hate because like I've turned myself every which way. I know all my flaws, I know all of this. And um, I'm like, well, I think what most people misunderstand about me is that I like to talk a lot or that I want to be the center of attention. I don't. I don't want to, I would, I would be the same way if you were on if I was on that couch. Because in my context of what I do, I have to be that center of attention because I'm being paid to speak or consult or, you know, and I have to be on sometimes for two to three days at a time teaching. When I'm not in that context, I'm kind of reclusive. Like if you were ever around me without microphones on, whatever, like I'm boring. I'm I like to chill at home. I like to go hike alone. I like to yeah. I mean, like if I had when I was with a partner, I'd have, but like I very much like my solitude and I'm chill. Like I had to go. I uh do you know CB Dolloway used to fight in the UFC?

SPEAKER_02 30:29

I feel no, I'm really nice guy.

SPEAKER_01 30:31

Sounds familiar, but yeah, he's retired now, but his daughter turned one and he was like, Oh, I'd love you to come and meet my daughter, and I'd love you to meet my wife. And of course, as a friend, I want to do those things. So this is not a reflection of C B. But the fact that I had to go be social on a Saturday night on a rare case that I wasn't teaching or anything like that, I was like, I don't want to do this. I want to just stay home, probably rewatch Game of Thrones or success.

SPEAKER_02 30:54

How long are you there for? Two and a half hours. Oh man, that's a long time.

SPEAKER_01 30:58

Yeah. But you know, I then what I try to do is just make it about other people. Right. I, you know, I try to ask his wife a lot of questions, genuinely. I give a shit. Um, same reason I would rather not talk about myself the whole time. I'd rather talk about you. You have an absolutely intriguing story, and every time I'm around you, it's always about me.

SPEAKER_02 31:14

Well, I'm interviewing you. It's a conversation then. You know what I was gonna ask you this? Maybe this is really stupid. Look at he did it so ready. No, no, I was thinking about your book, Conscious Coaching. First of all, I I always have the visual of Tom Hanks holding that book up from Instagram. That is so cool. How'd that happen? Was that do me a favor, hold this up?

SPEAKER_01 31:29

Or I think uh a friend of a friend of a friend made something happening. You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_02 31:34

That's so good. Yeah, that's so good.

SPEAKER_01 31:35

But it's like that. So that's an example. Can I interrupt you real quick? Yes, yes, yes. That's an example of something that I'm horrible at sometimes, or that um marketing. I'm not horrible at it, but like it, like the average person, it makes me uncomfortable. So for my next book, the one that comes out this December, we just got a four-star general, Stanley McChrystal, who led the uh special task force for the United States against Al-Qaeda to write an endorsement. Steven Pressfield, who wrote The Legend of Bagger Vance and a book that inspired the movie 300, wrote an endorsement for the book. And I had to reach out to these folks and find the right way to convey genuine respect, make my book make sense to them in the shortest amount of time possible to not waste their time, and then ask two people who are world-renowned who don't know me to read my manuscript and endorse it. That terrifies me like it would the average person.

SPEAKER_02 32:28

So you you reached out to the general on your own through a friend, a friend of a friend?

SPEAKER_01 32:32

Well, my editor knew his editor, okay, and I said, I want to, I would really love based on what this book talks about, to see if we could get an endorsement. Now, mind you, I have certain people that are like behavioral economists at university. They're like, I don't have time. Or there's another thing. Oh, I get shut down all the time.

SPEAKER_02 32:54

Right.

SPEAKER_01 32:54

And and like then there are some that are like, uh, I don't do blurbs. You know, they've apparently gotten to such celebrity status, they've forgotten what it's been like to do this. And you know, like you come with humility. I could sit here and name drop and whatever, but like I know you can. I like, but it's tough because you have to choose people that relate to the material. It's not like I would just like cold reach out to Josh Brolin and be like, hey, I have a book called The Anti-Hero Advantage when you you have to understand their world and reach out to them. But like that stuff is not comfortable.

SPEAKER_02 33:24

You can reach out to them and ask them to give you a blurb as Thanos.

Eating Disorder Hospital And Learning People

SPEAKER_01 33:27

Exactly. Well, because that was a misunderstood. And so that's the thing that again I admire you for is you think about all the people you've interviewed, whether as part of John Jay and Rich or your own endeavors, you have to find the through line and the thing that they care about and find a way to open them up and make them feel genuinely cared for, interested in. And I think it works for you, unlike a lot of people, because you are genuinely interested. But that takes a lot out of you, does it not?

SPEAKER_02 33:51

Sometimes exhausting.

SPEAKER_01 33:52

That's what I mean.

SPEAKER_02 33:53

Yeah. Like what you said about Saturday night. That would have wiped me out. Yeah. Right? But you did, yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 33:58

I and that's I think something that what's something miss most people misunderstand about you.

SPEAKER_02 34:04

You know what? That's a good question. But I try to be an open book as much as I can. So I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 34:08

Sometimes it has nothing to do with not being open.

SPEAKER_02 34:11

Well, people think that I'm a I'm an extrovert, and I don't think I am. I think I'm very far from that. Like, I like the happiest I am is when I'm totally bored.

SPEAKER_01 34:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 34:21

That's the happiest that makes sense. I got a new couch today, and I've been working on this couch trying to find a couch for three months. It got delivered today, and I sat on the couch and I had a tub of yogurt and I turned on the TV, and I thought, this is freaking awesome. I would love that. Do you know that I had about two minutes where I had to turn it off and go? Yeah. But those two minutes were freaking awesome.

SPEAKER_01 34:39

Well, and like didn't when you came on my podcast, I think you were talking about you sit in the hot tub in the mornings.

SPEAKER_02 34:44

I still do. So that's oh, go ahead. Yeah, no, I when I so when I get up in the morning, I have a little routine. Part of it is I I I have it put a gym in my house. So I do, I don't want to call it a workout. I do I try to, you know, movement is medicine. Yeah. So I try to get my body moving every way possible so that the blood's moving and everything trampoline. Yeah, the trampoline. Then I go and I get in the hot tub, and in the hot tub, I take time in there to out loud go over to the things I'm grateful for in my life.

SPEAKER_01 35:10

At 3 a.m.

SPEAKER_02 35:11

At 3 a.m. And I do it out loud, and there's nobody there, and I look at the stars, and I just feel it total peace. It's like my time. Then I get in the cold plunge. Then when I'm driving to work, I don't have anything on in the car, and I just and I do it again out loud. A little bit more spiritual, where I'm talking to God. Yeah. Or I talk to my parents. My both my parents have passed. So I talk to my parents on the way to work, and it gives me this like this reset every day that I that I do. You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_01 35:37

Yeah, without a that's that's what I was gonna, and there's a lot of connection points of that. The one thing, this was another question I asked in the speed dating, is like, what's one thing that instantly relaxes you? For me, that's a hot tub as well. I'll sit in the hot tub and I do like to do the same thing. I mean, people think I like certain friends think I'm touched because I'll sit out there and look at the stars for like three hours in the hot tub. I'm like, no, this is just like amazing. Yeah, it's great. And when we taught this, we I taught a course called Imperfect Relationships, and it was like a play on words. The I am is like, it looks like I'm perfect because you know everybody wants bullshit, like their relationships. Just Instagram, pray here's all our fall photos, here's this. In the meantime, you know, they have like a sex dungeon downstairs and they haven't let their husband speak in three weeks.

SPEAKER_02 36:16

Um, so like there's the dark bread.

SPEAKER_01 36:19

Yeah, oh, we can go anywhere. We can go if I didn't do what I did now, I would be a criminal profiler or a sex therapist. Wow, yeah. But um, we're talking about something I wish I would have known earlier in my relationship, is what's called a hot zone. One thing that I definitely needed to work on is I'd get home from teaching two days. I'd be traveling, what have you, I'd be on all the time. And this relates to what we've been talking about. And I'm kind of like a hot nerve then, because people will hit me with really hard questions. And I want to make sure I'm OCD about trying to help people with their prop. That's what they pay me to do. So I put a lot of pressure on myself. So when I come home from two days of teaching, I just kind of need to unwind. I need to decompress. And there would be times where my now ex-wife would come out and try to tell me like what was on the slate for Monday and the next week. And I'd be like, yo, like not, you know, this is not a great time. And I realized, you know what? I had not done a good enough job at labeling, you assume your partner knows these things. And that's the worst thing in communication.

SPEAKER_02 37:18

It sure is.

SPEAKER_01 37:19

It's the worst thing in communication. And I'm like, so when we put together this course, I was like, everybody needs to do something called hot zones. Go to your spouse or your partner or somebody you're dating or your sex slave and say, hey, here are three, here are three times where it's probably not great. And not because I don't love you or care for you or respect you, but because I'm wound up or I need to decompress. And so one of those was like the signal for me is if I'm in the hot tub, just know that I'm probably kind of chilling. And that's not, you can talk to me and I would love to listen to you, but don't tell me what I have coming up. And I think that was especially because I had my doctorate going, the book, and this book took me forever. And then I have my day job, and you know, you have all the things as a dad. And so you need some time to just chill. And so I think that's a worthwhile thing for anybody listening, is think of the three things that you would tell somebody you love or care about. These are times where I probably just it's not that I don't love you, but look at that.

SPEAKER_02 38:11

Well, in other words, you got to communicate. You gotta communicate and everything. Yeah, yeah. Um, your book, well, we get back to what I say about conscious coaching. So this is maybe a stupid question, but I've always tried to get the vibe of when you're writing a book. Are you had you have your laptop open and you're just like, are you going chapter one? When I was in, like, are you like are you just going to be?

SPEAKER_01 38:28

So conscious coaching was very different than this most recent book. Um, so do you want me to answer what it's like most recently now?

SPEAKER_02 38:33

I want to go conscious coaching first because that's a book that's out, was very successful. In fact, I have to do let me uh we're we're both AD.

SPEAKER_01 38:39

This book's out now, too.

SPEAKER_02 38:40

Oh, they said pre-order.

SPEAKER_01 38:41

Yeah, that it'll be in bookstores and airports December. It's available for pre-order now.

SPEAKER_02 38:45

What's it called?

SPEAKER_01 38:46

The anti-hero advantage through Penguin Random House.

SPEAKER_02 38:49

Okay, hold on. Oh, that's so legit, dude. You're so big time. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 38:52

You are controls me so bad. What are you talking about?

SPEAKER_02 38:56

Most people write a book, it's self-published on Amazon. Yeah. That was my first one.

SPEAKER_01 38:59

It took that to get this deal.

SPEAKER_02 39:01

So what you got so you so conscious coaching goes out, it's huge. And then Penguin Random House reaches out to you? Well, that's not how that went.

SPEAKER_01 39:08

Which question do you want me to answer first so I can respect your process? Oh, I don't care.

SPEAKER_02 39:11

Okay, wait, wait, wait, okay. Let me answer this one first. Oh, I'm gonna jump around. My my trainer that I have now, who has a very similar background to you, he's incredible. He is he is so starstruck that I know you.

SPEAKER_01 39:24

He shouldn't be.

SPEAKER_02 39:25

He so I actually invited him to come here today. He said no. He got out of the shit. He said yes, he's in here. He said yes, and then he freaked out and said no.

SPEAKER_01 39:32

Why?

SPEAKER_02 39:33

Because you're you're the guy.

SPEAKER_01 39:34

Oh, I just disappoint him.

SPEAKER_02 39:35

You you're the guy, like he came up this right behind you. Like he even talked about he met you one time. He's such a great guy. You would love this guy.

SPEAKER_01 39:42

It'd be like uh Robert Downey Jr. in Tropic Thunder. I'm the dude pretending to be the other dude playing this deal.

SPEAKER_02 39:48

He was so so anyway. I wanted to tell you that. His name's Chris. Maybe you can leave Chris a note.

SPEAKER_01 39:51

Yeah, well, Chris a note.

SPEAKER_02 39:53

Tell Chris something.

SPEAKER_01 39:53

In my illustrious five-year-old handwriting. Chris, you should have came.

SPEAKER_02 39:57

Yeah. You should have came. Yeah. Okay. Now, how'd you get how'd you get this publishing place?

SPEAKER_01 40:02

Uh yeah, it was not a fun process. So I reached out to, I knew I had something to say. Like, I don't think you should ever write a book unless something's like actually tearing out your soul. And a lot of stuff was for a long time. And then also just transitioning out of what I used to do to what I knew now. It was important for me. Like, I wanted to have something that was kind of a springboard for that, right? And allow me to kind of advance into working with the audiences I do more of. But long story short, I reached out to a buddy, asked if he knew any agents.

SPEAKER_02 40:28

This is after conscious coaching.

SPEAKER_01 40:30

Yeah, I wrote my first book in 2017. Um, I got told many times I was a pissant nobody. Uh, publishers had no idea what a strength coach was, right? Like, because a lot of people that write books through either former tech people or military people or surgeons or their famous TED Talk people or whatever. Um, uh almost every publisher I talked to is like, what's a strength coach? Why would we pick up a niche book written for strength coaches? Which at the time, to be fair, it was. But then it got picked up with a huge crossover.

SPEAKER_02 41:00

It's kind of like the inner game of tennis.

SPEAKER_01 41:01

Yeah, exactly. Right? Yeah, yeah. It's like any game, like when you look at your bookshelf, it's really like any book. You know, I have a million books by people in so many different trades, and it's never about, oh, I need to own a restaurant. It's what is this book fundamentally about? Same with film, right? Doesn't one of your sons like work at a movie store or movie theater or like love and we did he did work in movie theater?

SPEAKER_02 41:20

He did, right?

SPEAKER_01 41:20

Jake? Yeah, right. So, like movies, you can go see a movie like a Star Wars movie, and it's not really about whatever the Star Wars shit is, it's fundamentally a movie about a relationship or treachery or whatever. So, conscious coaching was really about like in in many fields that are obsessed with X's and O's, whatever that is, you could build rockets, like the technical part. How do you come back to the human piece? And how do you deal with different personality archetypes? Because you're gonna do that, whether you're working at NASA or what have you. So, yes, by the I self-published that by the grace of God, at some point it outsold like Dan Rather and Phil Knight. I have the screenshots to prove it for haters and all the science fake. Yeah, I outsold Shoe Dog at one point in time. Shoe dog's a great book. I mean, great book. This is not me telling you my book's better than Shoe Dog. Stop, I know. And so all of a sudden this book started picking up steam, and I get invited to go here and there, and I'm like, oh shit, like I need to like actually. I came from a profession that meant the mentality is like a coal miner. You're told when you're a strength coach, you are to be seen, not heard. If you have a brand, you're a sellout, first in, last out, be miserable. I got told that I would be blacklisted from that industry if for writing a book. It's just it's that kind of industry. People love being miserable. So at this point, like I just embrace it. I start speaking, I build a different company, the one that I run now. And so I had reached out to some other people saying, hey, I'm thinking about writing another book. Conscious coaching, you know, has been translated into six languages. It sold well over a hundred thousand copies. And I got people that I thought were friends telling me my agent won't touch you. They only like career writers like a Ryan Holiday, or people that write book after, but they don't want. And I'm like, time out. And I genuinely didn't understand.

SPEAKER_02 43:03

Ryan Holliday, he's the stoic. Yeah, the stoic guy.

Social Agility And Improv Style Drills

SPEAKER_01 43:05

Or just people that what they do is just write books. Right, right, right. All they do is write books. They might speak periodically, but they're not out actually like doing the thing they write about. They're writing about it. And that's not to demean Ryan Holliday. It's just he's that's what he does. And um, and so I'm like, time out. I'm getting like blacklisted because I'm actually out there teaching members of the military and organizations how to deal with the dark side of leadership. But like, because I'm not a career author, like your agent won't talk to me. So that went and went and went eventually. Somebody who's actually the son of the agent who represents John Grisham.

SPEAKER_02 43:43

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 43:43

And and who knows? You know, I I like him. He's a great guy now, but maybe he's just his dad was like, take this piss aunt client and get him off our so his son was getting into the agent. Oh, wow. The agent of John Grisham, his son is my agent.

SPEAKER_02 43:56

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 43:57

And I think he just took a shot on me. I at some point I'm gonna.

SPEAKER_02 44:00

Get him drunk and find out the real story of like he uh does he have lots of clients?

SPEAKER_01 44:03

I don't I like we don't we haven't gotten to that line he keeps everything very uh we're friends enough that I give him shit for going to a Glow Rilla concert and being the whitest guy that I know in my life, and you know, but like you you very much still get that sense, and I wouldn't care if he heard this that like he's waiting to see what this book does.

SPEAKER_02 44:21

Right.

SPEAKER_01 44:21

And so first they didn't believe me that conscious coaching did what it did. So I had to like open up the kimono and show them the Amazon stuff. I had to write a 50-page like proposal of why I think people will give a shit about this book. They want to know everything about superficial because they want their money back. And then you pitch them on the book, they send it out to publishers, and you sit down behind Zoom and you're like, all these publishers are like, why should we give a shit? Why should we do this? And I pitched the book. I said, listen, there's a lot of books written about kind of bullshitty leadership stuff. Just be charismatic and positive, and it's gonna solve all your issues. Like you and I know that's not the case. The world is a dark place. There is a lot of egos and dipshits and personalities, and people will not always say yes to you. As a matter of fact, the majority of the time they're not. And I don't think there's a book that tells people how to deal with that. And I think it relates to 13-year-old girls who can't figure out why their friends are being catty. And I think it uh also relates to CEOs who need to understand how to get their team of people back on track. And they're like, we love it. So Wow.

SPEAKER_02 45:23

So what's it called again?

SPEAKER_01 45:24

The anti-hero advantage. Okay. It's on Amazon right now.

SPEAKER_02 45:28

So who are some famous anti-heroes? Uh Walter White. And I think that's a good point.

SPEAKER_01 45:33

So, like, that was one of their concerns. Right. They didn't want to name it that because they thought people would think of Walter White, who technically would be uh an anti-villain or more villainous. So Walter White was.

SPEAKER_02 45:43

You're rooting for him, though.

SPEAKER_01 45:44

Well, at the beginning, right, you know, and I like with marketing, no, no, this was stuff that they push me on because we're like, we can't have people think that you're writing a book telling people to be assholes.

SPEAKER_02 45:54

Right.

SPEAKER_01 45:55

And I'm like, well, that's not what the book is about. The book is simply this do we or do we not have a lot of narratives of what a leader or a hero or a good person or a great person should look like, be like an actor.

SPEAKER_03 46:07

Right.

SPEAKER_01 46:07

Yeah. They all have to have this perfect morning routine and they can't, they have to be brave and always know the right thing and be super well communicated.

SPEAKER_02 46:14

Positive. And that's know the janitor. Know the CEO knows the janitor, CEO knows everything, C knows everything. Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_01 46:19

And that's not actually the case. If you look at people like um Winston Churchill, right, had uh depression, was pretty much an alcoholic. You look at even Martin Luther King Jr., had some mental illness in his past, you look at all these people that nobody's ever really told you the real story about, but there's a lot of research that shows that darkness, that struggle, those things that made them less than in some people's eyes, is actually what helped them be tremendous leaders in a given context.

SPEAKER_02 46:48

And so you know what it reminds me of a little bit of Tim Grover. I've never Tim Grover was Michael Jordan's trainer. Okay, and he talks about the dark side. In what context? Uh the dark side of there's certain athletes, the best of the best of the best, Tiger Woods, dark side. Yeah, they have to have a certain other thing. Dike dark side, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 47:08

But also keep in mind that also applies to the 38-year-old woman in the carpool lane right now. And like for some, when I talk about an anti-hero, essentially I'm talking about somebody that they have a good balance, right? They can be empathetic, they can be loving, they can be caring, but they also know when to dial up that ethical dark side and be a little bit more assertive and set a boundary. Ethical dark side and tell somebody to piss off.

SPEAKER_02 47:30

Right. Yeah, yeah. That's what so what you're saying is it's okay to have that side. You have to. Right.

SPEAKER_01 47:34

We in society, my soapbox is this we need more balanced, socially agile people. Jake, Kemp, and Dutch need to know how to be gentlemen and thoughtful and loving. And they also need to know when to put the foot down and step a stand up for something and be a steward of like, you know, a good steward of your community doesn't mean just doing things for people all the time. It means setting boundaries.

SPEAKER_02 47:56

It means so good.

SPEAKER_01 47:58

And so, like for me, my version of that, like I'm naturally assertive. I don't have a problem with that. My my balance where I have to balance more of that anti-hero kind of ethos, is sometimes I have to be a bit more patient. I need to be a bit more calm, right? Like, what would say is your balance of opposites? What's your more natural state? Give me some terms that would describe you. My more natural state? Yeah, like I just said I tend to be more assertive, I tend to be more direct. Give me some two or three things that describe you.

SPEAKER_02 48:28

I think I'm well, I mean, I I I think I'm insecure about stuff because I like I wish I could put my foot down, like you're saying, but I'm afraid of the backlash.

SPEAKER_01 48:37

Okay, so that's a great example. So, and this would be most people, whether they, and I'm not saying you identify as this, but a lot of our audience, a lot of my audience are overthinkers, people pleasers, huge overthinker for me, huge. All of that. Um, some of them will be avoidant because they don't want to piss people off or are afraid of the backlash. In the book, we give them tools of saying, hey, here are some things that you actually need to integrate because you have an alter ego in you. You have an alter ego in you, whether it's Deborah or John Jay or Michael, whatever, that really you know that there's this part of you that you've been waiting to let off the leash. And we give you tools to do that. Here's how you can actually integrate that.

SPEAKER_02 49:15

That's brilliant. Wait, okay, anti-hero what?

SPEAKER_01 49:17

The anti-hero advantage.

SPEAKER_02 49:19

The anti-hero anti or anti-does it matter, anti-hero. Anti-hero. Yeah, plus it's a Tito Swift song.

SPEAKER_01 49:24

Yeah, I didn't know that. Every social media post you made. Now everybody's gonna think. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 49:28

Hey, it's me, I'm the problem. That's her song.

SPEAKER_01 49:31

So those are the two parts of the book. How do I get over this version of my how do I become a more balanced version of myself? If you are a people pleaser, overly analytical, whatever. Like, what's this kind of ulterior mindset you can build? Oh, and then also how do you deal with the world as it is and the people in it, knowing how do I deal with difficult personalities, egos, attitudes, and agendas?

SPEAKER_02 49:52

So, how'd you write it? Like when like again, did you have a laptop open and you're like chapter one?

Writing A Book And Landing A Publisher

SPEAKER_01 49:57

Sporadically, because I have a date. I mean, I you know, I don't have a guaranteed income running a business. And so this isn't like uh uh JK Rowling. I didn't get to abscond to a castle with my huge advance and be like that cat gif. Um, so a mix, yes, sometimes with a laptop. Main thing is my home office, which looks like somewhere between a nightmare and a laboratory, because I have research papers everywhere or other books and you're researching this.

SPEAKER_02 50:25

That's what I'm saying. Like it just doesn't come from your head.

SPEAKER_01 50:28

Sure, some of it does, but your core message does.

SPEAKER_02 50:30

Do you know off the top of your head the first few words of your of your in this case?

SPEAKER_01 50:34

I did, yeah. Because I had very strong feelings about shit. Like you're like the very first words of the original manuscript, because the editor, you know, kind of took them out. They have their version of it.

SPEAKER_02 50:44

Uh how many pages is it?

SPEAKER_01 50:46

Uh 65,000 words, 272 pages. You have a hard limit.

SPEAKER_02 50:50

Is it done?

SPEAKER_01 50:50

Yeah, it's done.

SPEAKER_02 50:51

So why do you have to wait till December? Why can't it be?

SPEAKER_01 50:57

Why are we not able to see Avengers Doomsday today?

SPEAKER_02 50:59

Well, that's all that's to me, I think, is because we're gonna wait until July 4th weekend when it's Well, it's December. No, no, no. I'm saying Avenger. No, December, you're right. December 20th. That's right, that's right, right.

SPEAKER_01 51:09

So, like they gave me the same explanation. I have no control over this. So they have, okay, you turn in the manuscript, we take it to copy editing, we take it to this, we have to go through graphic and cover approval, several renditions of that, then we assign you a publicist, and then we do this. And originally it was gonna be September, and I go, why December? And they're like, well, because midterm elections and we don't want to compete with the media for that. Right, right, right. So it was super upsetting to me, to be frank, because I spent three Christmases, like I had to balance some things. One, while I was going through the divorce, you know, because I I have my son the majority of the time over those Christmas holidays, and I want to give him the best Christmas, just as I normally would, right? Not as a byproduct of being like a Disneyland dad. Oh, right. We do the holidays big.

SPEAKER_02 51:51

So you'll be on a tour during Christmas.

SPEAKER_01 51:52

Yeah, but I also, no, no, no. Oh, I was writing. I'd have to write.

SPEAKER_02 51:55

No, but now when the book comes out, you're gonna do publicity.

SPEAKER_01 51:58

We'll see. I mean, that I wouldn't imagine that's a smart time to do media, but what I was referencing is they told me you have to have this book done by January 5th, 2026. And I would say, well, why? If it's not coming out until September. And that's when they explain the whole rollout process. And then they have other authors in their pipeline. So boom.

SPEAKER_02 52:16

Is it like in the movies where they give you in advance or they give you, they pay you in advance and you get a percentage of the stuff?

SPEAKER_01 52:21

Yeah, so like conscious coaching, and I wish other authors would talk about this, by the way. This is I couldn't figure out any of this shit. I'd try to figure out how uh Stephen King or Ryan Holliday or any of these, nobody talks about this for some reason. So maybe this will get me blacklisted again.

SPEAKER_02 52:36

I think you do well blacklisted.

SPEAKER_01 52:38

But kinda conscious coaching, I get a cut of uh like if somebody bought it today from Amazon, I think I get like six bucks, right? This is different. They give you an advance, so they give you one payment up front that's like go write the book. Well, at that time I had five staff and I moved cross country, so that money was gone before I got it.

SPEAKER_03 52:56

Right, right.

SPEAKER_01 52:56

Um, then they pay you when your first draft, like the actual draft that they accept, like, yes, this is the book. That's done. I think I just got that payment. Mind you, this started in 2021. So, like, this doesn't equate to minimum wage.

SPEAKER_03 53:10

Sure.

SPEAKER_01 53:11

Then you get paid the day it comes out and one more payment, and then you never see another red cent unless it out earns its advance. Wow. Because the studio's got to recoup their money. And they say most authors never recoup their advance, which is interesting to me.

SPEAKER_02 53:26

So why don't you start uh why don't you ask some of the uh high baller guys that you've trained and women that you've trained when the book comes out to help you talk about it?

SPEAKER_01 53:34

For the same reason you probably don't call up celebrities you've interviewed and asked for favors.

SPEAKER_02 53:38

Well, I don't have anything to promote. Well, I mean, I mean, I mean, I happen to know some of the people that you've trained. I would think if you're like, hey, uh, do the blurb thing.

SPEAKER_01 53:50

Yeah. So well, so that's that's different too. So conscious coaching, I could get blurbs, like we had a Super Bowl champion, a full colonel in the United States military, other folks.

SPEAKER_02 53:58

No, for anti-hero.

SPEAKER_01 53:59

I know I'm telling you, for this book, I was told it mainly has to be authors, or if I did go with like celebrities, it has to have be somebody that would so like the actual Josh Brolin thing would be a valid idea.

SPEAKER_03 54:10

Right.

SPEAKER_01 54:10

Right? They like, we want authors mainly only that have adjacent content, or if you did go with a media personality, it has to be somebody that it makes a connection. So somebody that understands or has played a character like that or spoken about that, or they have something that relates, it has to be an aha. So you can't just go to athletes for this.

SPEAKER_02 54:29

I could see motivational speakers taking this book and making it their own, right? Like I can see totally.

SPEAKER_01 54:35

You mean trying to pirate it? Yeah, well, just like, oh, this is a great idea.

SPEAKER_02 54:38

Let me do this.

SPEAKER_01 54:39

They can't do that shit now. I got the intellectual property rights.

SPEAKER_02 54:41

You've got anything anti-hero, I own now. You're Taylor Swift.

SPEAKER_01 54:45

Well, originally they wanted the book to be called You Don't Have to Be Liked. And I said, No. Like, what's there's nothing intellectual property or unique about that. And I'm not insinuating I knew more than Penguin Random House. That's the OG. Yeah, so they're watching.

SPEAKER_02 54:59

That's big time, dude. And so I like heard of them, and I don't read.

SPEAKER_01 55:02

Yeah. So who do you think I should pitch for the anti-hero advantage? You know, who's in your black book of secrets there?

SPEAKER_02 55:07

I mean, honestly, dude, I mean, I have a friend that knows freaking Brian Cranston. Okay. I mean, he's the ultimate anti-hero. I mean, but he's not, he's Walter White.

SPEAKER_01 55:15

Yeah, well, this is what they said. They'd have to have the distinction of like Walter White makes sense at the beginning, pure anti-hero. Right. But you're rooting for him, whatever. What they were saying, and this was early on when they were scared about the name.

SPEAKER_02 55:26

Jason Bateman. There you go. Ozark. There you go. Right? Because you're rooting for him the whole time.

SPEAKER_01 55:30

Fundamentally, the pitch is simple of what I tell people is we're often told what a good person or is and what and that false selling that to kid, you want to, this is dead serious.

SPEAKER_03 55:41

Right.

SPEAKER_01 55:42

Selling that idea of like even my six-year-old son being like, Daddy, does this mean I'm not brave? Does this mean I'm not this? Because I'm scared and this person's not scared. I have to have conversations daily with my son of like, buddy, that doesn't mean that you're not this, and that like we talk about what it means to be. I'm like, don't worry about being a hero. Those things don't exist. The perfect people don't exist. The reason daddy wrote a book, and I dedicated the book to my son, the the first words since you asked are the same moments that may break you are the exact moments that will make you. I love you always, Daddy, because I'm trying to teach my son that you don't have to live up to this polished, sterile, asepticized, optimized bullshit that society sells you. Being an anti-hero means something very different. At its core, it means being adaptable, it means being strategic, it means seeing the big picture, and it means being balanced in who you are, flaws and all of that, and who you actually want to be. And like that shit tears me up because I'm trying to like, I don't like what we're told societally about, like what I dealt with that. That was a big part of the hospitalization. I'm like, you're not this, you're not that, all these fucking labels. And think about people listening to this right now. Who listening to this doesn't have something in their past that they feel bad about or they're ashamed of or they wouldn't like this, and what that's supposed to define them? And so I think that people don't want cheesy superficial shit. I want something that says, hey, you got some demons and darkness and chaos in you.

SPEAKER_02 57:10

That's good.

SPEAKER_01 57:11

Let's use it for good.

SPEAKER_02 57:12

Yeah, that's good. You know, some more anti-heroes I was thinking about. Um uh like uh uh uh uh um the the chef, Gordon Ramsay.

SPEAKER_01 57:21

Yeah, didn't your sister run?

SPEAKER_02 57:23

Yeah, she she used to run it run his whole, now she runs Mr. Beast.

SPEAKER_01 57:26

So I would be interested in hearing from her because I would imagine like you like her, and I know you want to keep deflecting from you, but I'm your and I'm your friend, so I'm giving you shit about it. You channel different parts of your personality. Think about what she has to do. I would love to follow her for a day.

SPEAKER_02 57:40

She's insane.

SPEAKER_01 57:41

And watch how, but that's an example of what we're talking about in the book. That's social agility. One way with Gordon Ramsay, one way with Mr. Beast. There's certain dynamics that probably overlap.

SPEAKER_02 57:50

Plus, she's in a in a male-driven business. Like, I mean, I she's come up with so many brilliant ideas, and then someone takes them. Yeah. It's brutal, right?

SPEAKER_01 57:58

And that that that is another thing that I told the publisher, and I think we were right about is this book, oddly enough, appeals uh a lot to women because talk about a subset that is always told what they should be or how they have to behave. And you know how many women are like, fuck that.

SPEAKER_03 58:12

You know what I mean?

Anti-Hero Leadership And Healthy Boundaries

SPEAKER_01 58:12

This is and so, like, and I think people too are tired of motivational rhetoric. And so that this is kind of written in more of like a way that you have to be okay with a cuss word here and there. Like, we didn't pull punches with it. But I would want to meet your, I would love to, if she ever does take your kid to work day, tell her I want to like dress up like a little Dutch boy and like go in a few.

SPEAKER_02 58:32

I think everyone wants to know. I'm getting lots of text messages during this interview. What happened to your finger?

SPEAKER_01 58:36

What happened to my finger?

SPEAKER_02 58:37

I see a band-aid on your finger.

SPEAKER_01 58:38

Yeah, listen. Um, like I told my son, I got into a fight with a lot of ninjas the other day. Um, they weren't expected. It turns out they held a grudge. Um, no, there's this was actually from uh deadlifting. It got cut on a neural.

SPEAKER_02 58:50

So let me ask you about such a clown.

SPEAKER_01 58:54

You won't even let me ask him a question. He's so defensive.

SPEAKER_02 58:56

I want to talk about longevity and health. Okay, let's do that. Is there any what do you do?

SPEAKER_01 59:00

Sending your taint is the biggest thing that you've done. I've done that, dude.

SPEAKER_02 59:03

I imagine show me your technique. I met this guy here, I interviewed him here. Certified health freak. Was it? He drinks his own urine and he goes, he'll sit. I'll show you my kick that. Oh, yeah, your brother's talking about sending his taint. I'll go like this, and then and then the and then the sun goes. It's really difficult, especially.

SPEAKER_01 59:18

Can you show that to Kep and like?

SPEAKER_02 59:20

No, it may have come out before. I've done it in the backyard, but I'm like, I don't want them to.

SPEAKER_01 59:23

What does Blake say when you do it?

SPEAKER_02 59:24

She freaks out, especially if she comes home out of the way.

SPEAKER_01 59:26

She's so forgiving, like she just sees the shit that you do.

SPEAKER_02 59:29

Happy birthday, hon.

SPEAKER_01 59:30

Yeah. Oh, it's her birthday today.

SPEAKER_02 59:31

Yeah, today's her birthday.

SPEAKER_01 59:32

And then you were surprised nobody got to see this because it wasn't. You were surprised that I knew it was your 30th anniversary coming up instead of coming up.

SPEAKER_02 59:37

Yeah, that's wild. That's wrong.

SPEAKER_01 59:38

And wasn't she in sales? Like she was in radio sales.

SPEAKER_02 59:41

She was in radio when I met her.

SPEAKER_01 59:42

Is that what you'd call that radio sales? Radio.

SPEAKER_02 59:43

Well, they sell all the commercials here on the radio. Oh, okay. She was one of the best. She's yeah, she's the best.

SPEAKER_01 59:47

You do a good job with that too. You inspire me when I have to do my podcast because you'll do like green mango and you have a perfect, like, if you I love walking around barefoot, I love that in the summer. Yeah, I don't want to step on bug. You'll, I'm like, man, John Jay.

SPEAKER_02 59:59

Like, I know. Oh, wait, wait. Is it I want to try this? I want to try it. Can you sit down? So uh yeah, so sit down. All right. So you guys are kind of in the same space.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:08

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:09

And and uh thank you for being flexible. So you both have books out, um, and you both are in the uh I I guess the the strength and conditioning space at some point or another. This is Brett Bartholomew. He's got a book called Conscious Coaching and a new book coming out called Anti-Hero Advantage.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:24

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:25

And Joe, your your book is yeah, it's called Life Switch.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:28

And it's uh it's a mindset book, but as you can probably tell, I'm very intense physically too. But I just, you know, top to bottom, inside and out. I I think there's a way you can live, and that's either on all the way or off. I want to hear more about this. That's what I'm saying.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:42

That's why I thought it's more interesting than I am.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:45

So I thought maybe this is kind of a cool crossover thing.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:48

Now, are you gonna tell him what we were just talking about prior to him walking in?

SPEAKER_02 1:00:51

I forgot what we were talking about.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:53

I'm not gonna bring that one out.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:55

Oh, oh, oh, sunning your taint?

SPEAKER_01 1:00:57

He wanted to ask me about longevity things, and all of a sudden the next conversation goes to him stunning his taint.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:01

You know, this was wait. Well, this guy's got an incredible sports background. He's worked with many teams. He owns he owns a G League team.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:08

Oh right. So like he's the team. The Nuggets G League team. Awesome. So they're out of Grand Rapids, and they're actually here tomorrow night. So this all worked out, even though it wasn't the plan, it worked out better than the original plan.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:20

Oh, great, great. So, but he's coached uh uh or you know.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:24

I was just trying to conditioning coach for 20 years, so predominantly worked with NFL, uh, major and minor league baseball, special forces, and then combat sport athletes.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:32

But then also, right now, the other things you're doing, like with the Rangers, with the Oh, you're talking about now.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:36

Yeah, right now, so I after my first book, now I work in more communication strategy, how to deal with difficult personalities, get more effort out of people. So I coach coaches, yeah, coaches and leaders in different contexts, specifically how to deal with kind of those power dynamics, as I'm sure you're very aware of. People that are resistant to change, how to help them overcome those kinds of obstacles.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:57

I love that because I find a lot of coaches are coaching because they had a problem. They kind of solved it, and all of a sudden they're a coach for other people.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:06

And I feel like you would make sure that the BS meter is not beeping too loudly, making sure that they are an actual coach who has experience outside of dealing with their own stuff.

Surprise Guest Joel And Coaching Reality

SPEAKER_01 1:02:15

Yeah, you read that well. Yeah. So a lot of our stuff is very, it's non-motivational, you know, jump up and clap your hands. It's cut the BS. Let's find out what really drives people. Let's also normalize a bit of conflict when you're dealing with high performers in any context, you're gonna have that. And you would get coaches that would just be like, why doesn't this athlete do this? Or why is the front office like that? And it's like, well, why inherently do you just expect them to trust you? You know what I mean? Like, you we don't, we're not all easy to trust, and you shouldn't be. You should have a healthy amount of skepticism. So helping them understand different perspectives of like, you need to ethically influence people. That's your job as a coach or a leader in any context. And you just need to spend some more time either building this relationship or figuring out what makes that person tick if you actually want to get anything done.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:00

Yeah, I agree with you a thousand percent. If you don't understand how someone's wired and how they tick, how can you help them? Yeah, and so there's a lot to coaching other than just, hey, do this, hey, do that. Yeah, you know, and throwing darts at the board and seeing what sticks.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:14

Yeah, and he's spot on about go ahead.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:15

No, I'm just saying, see what I mean? This is great. This is what I was talking about. This is what I was hoping would happen.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:19

And so you're also spotted, it's what he was asking me, one of the things that got me into it. And at one point I just remember thinking, like, okay, am I actually a good coach? And I went through a quarter, quarter life crisis and started researching like what makes a good coach. And you find, as you alluded to, a lot of coaches, if not for the reason you mentioned, get into it because, or at least they model their behavior off of people they perceive to be successful coaches or the individual that coached them in the past. That's not a great model, you know, that assumes a lot of one size fits all, but it's natural. And then you realize, well, most of them don't get training. Surgeons will get training for what they do, members of the military will get training, and then you're like, ah, a lot of coaches actually don't get training on how to deal with people, like in strength and conditioning. All of our certifications were X's and O's based. You know, and so anyway, but I want to hear more about him. Pepper in with some of these questions here.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:09

Well, no, I mean, I wanted just you guys cross over that. I was gonna do a totally different interview with him. Yeah, that's fine. I think you guys, because you you speak to groups of people, he speaks, right?

SPEAKER_00 1:04:16

Both of them I'll make sure I'll get your information from the I feel like I jumped onto a treadmill that was already on 10.0, and I just jumped off. You did a great job into it. Yeah, why not?

SPEAKER_02 1:04:26

This is but I didn't I foreshare, I said this is what I like to happen. We're gonna be talking. He comes in, sit down, let's talk. I'll wrap up the interview. But I do want to ask you this real quick. Um, I should have you guys switch back again. Really? No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Um, because you know, we do um our two foundations, Love Pup and Love Up, and Love Up, we work with a lot of foster kids. Uh, I think it'd be great if you came and spoke to our foster kids. I'd be honored. We every year we do a big graduation for all these kids that are aging out of the foster care system, and to know that you know, just you give them some kind of hope and some kind of those are the ultimate anti-forwards.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:56

Exactly. I'd be honored. I know, I know. And I'm I always enjoy talking to you, man. You're amazing. We don't get to do this often.

Foster Kids Graduation Invite And Wrap

SPEAKER_02 1:05:01

He's also single, we gotta find him a nice woman. Some good-looking guy. We're gonna do a dating segment now.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:06

I hope that you go all of these same places with him. I hope that you're subject to all of it as well. Joel, right? Yes. All right, pleasure meeting you, Joel. Joel as well. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:14

Joe or Joel? Joel. J-O-E-L. Yes. Okay, Joel. Yeah, yeah. Okay, okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, so welcome to our podcast. This is a little bit different today because this podcast is a spin-off of our radio show.