From Poverty To Film Director

In this episode of The Anthony Amen Show, Yaw steps into the spotlight to answer the question everyone keeps asking: who is he, and how did he get here so fast?

Yaw shares his full story, from growing up in New York with Ghanaian immigrant parents and facing real financial struggles, to chasing a safe path in medicine while quietly feeling unfulfilled. He opens up about discipline, hunger, and the pressure to succeed, and how a $400 camera became the turning point that changed everything.

The conversation dives into the early struggles of filmmaking, learning skills the hard way, dealing with rejection, and building confidence without external validation. Yaw also shares a major failure that cost him a client, and how taking ownership led to a second chance that changed his trajectory.

From there, the journey expands into international storytelling, filming in the Dominican Republic and Nigeria, and using content to create real impact. This episode is about risk, growth, and choosing your own path even when it goes against expectations.

If you feel stuck or unsure about your next move, this conversation will push you to think differently.

Subscribe for more conversations on business, mindset, and real growth.

Transcript

Six Years In And A Surprise

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hey guys, welcome to another episode of the Anthony Haman Show. We got a fun episode for all of you today. A little backstory. Just so you all know. Today is we're into March. We're in 2026, and Yao doesn't know this, actually, even at all. But we're six years into the show. For huh? Six years. Holy smokes. Wow. Damn.

SPEAKER_01 0:24

Sheesh.

Growing Up Poor In New York

SPEAKER_00 0:25

Our first episode came out April 2nd, 2020. Wow. Damn. Hey guys, subscribe for that. That's awesome. I really like that. Damn. Six years, 50 episodes a year. Wow. Wow. Yeah. Wow. We're we're cruising this. And look at the growth. Look at the growth, man. That's awesome. So I thought today would be a fun little special episode to do things about people that you want to learn more about and understand more about and hear more about. So I just thought I'd turn this entire episode without his knowledge. It's all about Yao. Are you serious, bro? Yeah. Today we're gonna break down Yao's life so we can understand who he is, where he comes from, why he does this, and hear a story from somebody who came into this life two months ago and now all of a sudden is here in all episodes with you, and I'm sure everyone wants to know why you're here. So that's so. All right. Expecting that. Well, uh, let's jump straight into it. Take us back, man. How did you get into the film industry? What was life like before you walked in the store instead of recording for the gym?

SPEAKER_01 1:35

Um, so life is funny, you don't know where it's gonna lead you. Again, you most of the time you grow up thinking you want to be this, and then it changes one day and you become something else. So initially I wanted to be a physician. Uh, my family was all in the medical field. My brother ended up being a uh physician assistant, my sister's a neurosurgeon. Um, my younger brother ended up being an engineer. He's the only one differently. My mom's a physical therapist, so she kind of pushed us in that direction um for job security. You know, healthcare is always job security because people are always sick. Dude, was your mom a physical therapist prior to immigrating?

SPEAKER_00 2:07

No, no, no, no, no, no. This just came over. She came in, yeah. How were conditions coming over? What age did she come over?

SPEAKER_01 2:13

In her 20s, early to like 21. Her first job was working at KFC. Yeah. You mean conditions when she arrived here? Yeah. Oh, very bad. We grew up very poor, man. Very what made her immigrate just Oh, a better life. United States, yeah, 110%. It's the best country in the goddamn world. The best, man. You can come from nothing. Her working her first job at KFC to becoming a f uh physical therapist and owning a house and provide an environment for us to be successful. It must have been hard for her. Yeah, man. I we grew up bad. I remember nights literally growing up so impoverished that I got free lunch at school. I would close my eyes and pray that when I open my eyes, the sun was out because I know the sun means school time, I get free lunch, free breakfast. That's how bad it was. And I would open my eyes again and still see the moon out and be like, damn, I'm so hungry, man. Trying to force myself to sleep, crackers and butter. I mean, that's how I grew up, you know, and and and I I don't I don't regret any of it. I'm so proud because it created this hunger that separated me from the average person. The average person quits easy. The average person doesn't understand working 24 hours around the clock. That's what created that passion and drive for me. Is that, you know, in poverty that I went through.

SPEAKER_00 3:16

So and how many siblings do you have? Uh four of us, all total. Was four of you all together? When did things start turning? Like when did she get finished PT school if we were able to get start doing that? Yeah.

Leaving Medicine For Film

Early Gigs And The Confidence Gap

SPEAKER_01 3:27

So first she became physical assistant, like helping out in the hospital, a physical therapy assistant. That's when she got a little more money. We always lived in apartments. My brother, my older brother and I would share a room, then a younger sister and younger brother would share a room. That's how it happened. Um, and yeah, it was always a two-bedroom apartment. Every I don't even know how she pulled that off. That was tough. But slowly we started, so we went from small apartments jumping around Long Island. I grew up in the Bronx. My parents separated. We came to Long Island, Dix Hills, Farmingdale area, went to Farmingdale school, and then we left, went to Holbrook, then came down to Bayshaw. That's where we settled. Was dad around or no? No, my dad lived in the Bronx. Um, great dad always pushed us to go to school. My dad worked in a hotel, he came, established himself, and then ended up getting a few houses from there and uh just work nine to five. From Ghana as well? Yeah, both. Both parents from Ghana. So we'd see my dad periodically every month, every month, maybe um yeah, about once a month. Would go over there, spend a few weekends there with my brother. Um, and just instilled the same thing my mom instilled in us. Don't drink, don't smoke, stay in school, don't hang out with these friends and stuff like that. It must have been hard. Single mom, four kids. Extremely, extremely. So uh um my so with that being said, I'm happy you said that. It must have been hard. It was to the point where my mom was always at work. My older brother raised me. How older is he? How much far apart are you guys? Probably four years. Four years. Yeah, so he raised, that's why I followed him. My father wasn't around, but anytime we go to my dad, like again, he always kept us in line, but I would you would always talk to my brother, make sure you lead Yao the right way. So I just followed my brother. He didn't drink, he didn't smoke, he stayed in school, working out, and just stayed in school. He always used to tell me, Yao, study, study, study, so we can get out of this in condition. So I just listened to him. But you only listen for so long. Eventually, the heart always wants what it wants, man. My heart, I was not interested in medicine. Thank you to all the medical professionals out there, but it just wasn't for me. Eventually, um, at 23 years old, I kind of forced it, mustered half of the strength to tell them, hey, I don't know if I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna try film. I, you know, I laid on my mom's couch at 23 one summer after finishing my biology degree. I was three credits away from my chemistry degree and just plugging away at this medical thing, but I realized I'm gonna end up in debt and very unhappy because my mom's not gonna live forever. No one's gonna live for me. And eventually I'm gonna find myself in an in a space and a condition where I'm going to regret. And the worst thing you can have as an adult and just a person is regret. It's the most disgusting feeling, man, because you cannot reverse time. It's just it's horrible. I rather do what I love and chase it and fail than to do what I hate every day. I'm telling you that feeling's horrible. And how do I know I I did it? I worked in a hospital, shadowed physicians trying to be a doctor, and I just couldn't do it anymore, man. And I sat down and went through each, you know, just I guess genre segment of what sector, rather, of what exists. So business, no, I don't know anything about business coming to find out. I would have fallen, I fell in love with business. Um, music, everything. And I said, film. I like telling stories. The fact that you can start off very small and end up telling a story that will resonate with people for the rest of their lives. Because essentially, all you have when you leave this earth is your story. Your kids, when you leave Anthony, they're gonna look at tapes, videos. When Dustin's 34, 50 years old, he's gonna look back and tell his kids, look, that's grandpa. Look, you see open the gym. It's all stories. That's what these things, these instruments are beautiful. They tell stories and they hold on to them longer than you will be here. So when I learned that, I said, I can use that to change people's lives. Not only that, I can master the art and change people's lives more so than someone else that has these instruments. How do I take it a step further? So I started doing short films in the neighborhood, going around telling different people, hey, I do films, let's try it out. I researched what position I wanted to play. I wanted to be the orchestrator. I wanted to be the person that orchestrates how the story is being told, as opposed to the person um in front of the camera being orchestrated. So I said, that's the film director. Okay, got it. That's the guy that tells the story. But none of these guys know anything from this neighborhood about film. You need microphones. I thought you could just press record on the camera and it comes out clean. You need mics. Ah. Then I would film. I said, man, it looks so dark. Something's wrong. You need lights. I got it. So we get light. I start learning every position, studying, then I started teaching each person. And that's where the delegation was coming in, but I didn't know about that. So slowly I was turning into the entrepreneur and businessman, but I didn't know. So I ended up doing that. I went to a hair show event, just putting out different ads because I need to garner income. I needed money while doing these things during the summer while off from school and studying for the MCAT. So now making money, I said, okay, I'm doing a few gigs here and there, oddball gigs and stuff like that. I landed a hair show event. When I landed a hair show event, uh during a hair show event at the end of the hair show event, the person that hired me said, Hey, you ended up filming, great job, but why don't you take the mic and tell people what you do? You never know what client people are here that can hire you. I said, Oh, that's okay, that's a good idea. But I always had a fear of public speaking. It's scary. For the first time doing it, it's God, I gotta speak in front of all these people that are eating dinner and looking at me. Oh my God, this is crazy. So I ended up doing it, grabbing the mic saying, Hey, I want to be a medical doctor. This is the one foot in, one foot out. I didn't, I didn't build that pride and that um um um confidence enough to say, I am a film director, this is what I do, because I thought other career fields or other people would look down on me. He's just a cameraman. That that was my ideology back then. So I was kind of scared. So I said, I want to be a medical doctor, but I'm also um a film director because I cared too much about what people thought. Because being in the medical field, especially a physician, is very prestigious. But I didn't know about the other world that existed, which is business. I didn't know about all this. So I didn't want to look frowned upon. And this is what led me to so many years in a field that I was unhappy about because a large part of that came from caring about what people think. And you have to kill that part of you if you want to be successful. You can't care anymore. Um, and that came later. So, anyway, long story short, a lady came up to me, which is now my mentor for 13 years since that day, Dr. Tochi Roku Miles, who's the head of family medicine in Northwell, chair, came up to me, hired me to do some filming for her residence. I went and did that. Um, and this is what I quickly found out that the people that I hired from this neighborhood had little to no skills when it came to business, being on time, being a student, a whole bunch of stuff. Even down to the attire, being professional, when going to these events and stuff like that. Um, so in doing so, hiring them led to my demise. I eventually ended up getting terminated from my mentor um after filming and having an event that um I was an hour late for. Um, and when arriving and playing the film that I was supposed to play, it never played. You're talking about a sea of 500 physicians and business owners and Northwell representatives pressing play, and black screen remains. I was like, what in the and slowly each physician stood up and started to walk out. Just walk out, and I was like, dude. And she looked at me and I never forget this face. She went, and I was like, dude, I just dropped the ball. She fired me. Uh, the people that came late and caused this, right? It's my fault, but the ones that I hired were eating, laughing, like nothing happened. They didn't care. So I just taking looking back now in hindsight, that reaction after getting terminated shows you how much they cared from the initial start. They never cared. It was always fun to them. So you have to really align yourself with people that care about it even more so than yourself. And that's how you become successful. So I ended up terminating those guys, and I mustered the strength to go back to our office one day and said, Hey, how you doing?

SPEAKER_00 10:52

Um stop there for a second. Because I want I want to clarify a few specific points. First, you mentioned to just to go back a little bit, your mom going PT, your brother's getting in the medical route, you doing medical route, right? You had a moment that I know that we talked about previously. You laying on the couch, going through that in your mind, and then having to muster that conversation to have that with your parents to not disappoint them. What was that like having that initial conversation with your mom? Because that's where a lot of people fail. Is that first conversation there? Yeah, um, that was hard.

Fired In Public And A Hard Lesson

SPEAKER_01 11:30

Because my mom, everyone was, again, everyone was in the same field. The medical, so everyone was following what my mom laid out, the tracks that mom laid out. And my dad also wanted us to be in the medical field. So telling my mom, hey, I don't think I'm gonna do this. First, I cleared my account. I forgot to add, I had$400 after my account when I purchased my first camera. Taking that leap of faith, everyone said you're stupid. You just blew$400. There's a lot for somebody that's 23 years old in college. You need gas, food, all this stuff. You just blew$400 on a camera. That was stupid. I didn't listen. I did I ignored it, man. Tough, very tough. I'm not saying it was easy, tough to not have that support, man. I ignored it. I would grab my tripod, my camera, and if you would go back 12 years from now to Bayshore High School, you'd see a young black kid out there with a camera, and that was me alone, walking around Bayshore, going to the train track and just taking pictures, learning about film by myself. And just I just kept going. I didn't listen to them film after film after film. My mom said you're stupid. And then one day, I remember my mom said, as long as you're happy with it and you make money, like you're, you know, you're gonna take care of yourself. I'm happy. I never forgot those words. And I just kept going. And slowly all the stupid and you're an idiot turned into, hmm, maybe he is good at this. When I started to get into Essence Magazine, when I got a John Singleton nomination from HBO. Only four directors in history have one. I'm one of the four. When I landed in BET Magazine, Urban World, ABFF, 17 Selection. I it just kept the resume grew. Clients, first six-figure deal, landed it. They everything changed. And my mom heard me on business calls, like, oh, this guy closes deals. He is good. And I remember we were going on a morning walk one time, and my objective was always to prove to my mom, even though I didn't follow you guys, I'm not good at this. I'm gifted at storytelling. Like I know how to tell a story, but the accolades and the success proved it to her. So one morning we're on a walk, and she heard me on a business call, and I closed the deal for 80K on a call. And that's when she said, within five minutes, she said, Oh, you're good. You know how to do business. And that that warned my heart, man. Because, you know, the parents are not gonna live forever. So you want them leaving knowing I'm happy I did it. I'm a success. That's the most beautiful thing is before your parents leave to let them know I made it. You did a great job, mom. Um, so yeah, so that conversation and you know their thoughts about me choosing this career path kind of died out, right? The resistance kind of died out once they saw success come from, but success didn't come until my seventh or eighth year into it. So, all prior to that, tons of film festivals, rejections, tons of money wasted, lost friends, girlfriends. It was just nuts. When I say nuts, nuts. I mean a crazy, crazy, crazy, crazy time period.

SPEAKER_00 14:11

So, what time period was then you finding the mentor, giving her a contract that said name, date, amount, and sign? How fun was that?

Apologizing And Earning A Second Chance

SPEAKER_01 14:20

So, so so uh after the mentor hired me, I started out with Northwell and her and said, hey, listen, she's the first one to take me overseas. I never left the country. Probably when I was young, I went to Answer, whatever, but I never really left. So she said, We're gonna go to the Dominican Republic. Because this is so after she fired me, I came back. I want to apologize. I chose the wrong people. It's not their fault. I chose them. So I take, I bear responsibility. But give me another shot. Because this is now me, Anthony, going home, studying film, understanding film, and not joking around at all, man. Really, really understanding it and knowing I don't need 50 guys. I just need one dude. I just need one dude, man. And you don't even have to be good. Just listen to what I say. I had to take it into my own hands instead of delegating and sitting back. You're jumping way ahead of yourself. Yeah, that's what I was doing. I said, if hey, you do this job, you don't do that. You don't know his past, you don't know what he's good at. You gotta play the his strengths. There's a whole bunch of stuff I had to learn. I said, give me, let me give you one guy. Come with me, I'll pay you a good wage. Just do this simple job. I'll do everything else. I came back to my mentor after like two years. Hey, I want to speak to you. I just one summer, I was driving by, I said, because now I'm I got stronger, I did films, my name is starting to go around Bay Show on Long Island. I said, now it's time. I knocked on the door. Her secretary, Maria. Hi, Miss Maria, if you're watching this, she said, uh uh who you here to see? I said, Dr. Opa. He said, give me one second. I'm like, when they say that, I mean it's not good. So she goes back there, says, she says, go to the back. I said, Hey, how you doing? She says, Hey, how's how you been? So, hey, listen, I just want to first off apologize for what I did. I embarrassed you in front of your co-worker, everyone, literally. And um, this may not even be in the stars for you, may not be aligned, but I'm just gonna go ahead and shoot my shot. Will you give me one more shot? Just one more chance. I've learned from the mistake, and then she asked me how, and I told her, I terminated all those guys. You won't see their faces anymore. I kept one guy with me, that was great. Um, I really dived into studying what went wrong. Um, I took full ownership over it, and I just changed my whole operation completely. These are the accolades I've garnered since then. These are the successes I got, you know, proof of that, of change. And she said, Okay, here's what we'll do. Let's go to Dominican Republic. I'm like, oh wow, that's a big jump. She says, let's go there. There's another physician that goes there every year and he gets back. CT machines, CAT scans, dental. They bring like 20 physicians, 30 physicians with them, different companies, sponsors that get back. I it's just crazy. Film it, see how it goes. Down? I said, Yeah, let's go. I kill it. I give everything. It's raining in the Dominican Republic. Everyone's like, get on the bus. She tells me, Yeah, get out there, go film. You gotta prove this is what you you're hungry. Don't say it's raining. Go out there. No excuse. So my friend that's with me says, Yo, but the camera's gonna get wet. Camera gets wet, you prove yourself, you can easily get enough. Forget about that. Put your shirt on, dude. Do what you have to do to win. I go out there, everyone's like, he's in the rain, he's crazy. And I just see her in the bus, just quiet, watching. I'm shooting shots of the freaking cows and DR, all this crazy stuff. I'm getting everything. I'm getting all these shots. I go back, I edit it, we have the event. Same type of event where the physicians came, but this time it played.

SPEAKER_00 17:26

How many times did you test that CD?

Dominican Republic Breakthrough Film

SPEAKER_01 17:28

What? A lot. I made multiple copies. Did you have six bags? I had multiple copies. It played. People in tears. I said, I knew it. I knew this is what I was supposed to do for us. I knew it. That was your moment. Yeah. That's when my life changed. Stand innovation. Wow. Holy. You took what we do every year, which is very basic to us. We help we're helping patients. And you turned it into a story. That is life-changing. Not only can we use this to influence others to do the same, but we can also get sponsorships off of this. And people that want to donate and help. This is phenomenal. You want to come back next year? Yeah. We'll pay you more. Thank you. People start gathering around me. This guy, something very simple, this plan, I can turn it into a story. That's a power. That's a gift. You have to know how to utilize it. And I learned how to utilize that power. Then she says, now let's go to Nigeria. I'm like, really? Yeah, you proved it with this one. Let's go. I am when I went to Nigeria. I am the first filmmaker in history to stay in a hotel in which Boko Haram, the terrorist organization in Nigeria, formed. And I stayed there that night filming, and the military Boko Haram were going at it. And I heard grenades and bombs in the hotel that night. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. First filmmaker in history. No one ever did it. That's why I was terrified. And I found out when I arrived. Lucky me, when I landed. You had no idea when you got there.

SPEAKER_00 18:58

Nigeria is just like Day Short.

Nigeria Mission Trip And Perspective Shift

SPEAKER_01 19:03

I was so shocked when I heard the gun at night and I'm oh, that was. Who was that with you? The doctor and them were, but the country's at war. So the military's actively fighting at this time, but we had to go and film the people that were, you know, captured or being mistreated by them. The military fought them off. So we were now filming the conditions in which the people were left in, you know, to try to get more help from outside, you know, countries and things of that nature. So I had to film it to get that. I saw kids eating mud, MUD, mud, no food, that that hungry and starving. And I it just changed me, you know, my mentality. I don't waste food anymore. It changed everything the way I looked at the world and how privileged we are to be Americans. I, dude, when I saw, I was like, man, this is next mud. This is next level. I've never seen poverty like this. This is, I thought I grew up, this is crazy, man. And I just saw that it just was crazy. The images are still in my head, the worms and all this other stuff, and how hungry the kids were. And I'm like, yeah, man. And then I saw another side of Africa, how beautiful and luxurious it was. I'm like, wow, man, the world, it's just there's life beyond what you see. That's what I learned. And to be to be grateful, man. And the fact that I can capture this footage and bring it back home to the United States to show people, that was my second win. I did it, and the story went on. Now, after conquering the corporate space and medicine, now I can get back to my dreams because I have a means of making money. Now I can get back to what I like. Storytell, narrative work. And then I started my narrative work, and that's what led to the 17 awards and all this crazy stuff. And then I grew from there. And then later on, the next phase came in. Now you make money, you're doing narrative work, but how do you do this for the rest of your life? And that's when a businessman was born. It's a wild story. Yeah, there's a lot of stuff in between, but you know, and it ended up doing now. I learned okay, now I gotta learn the business of film, hiring people, delegating, editing to save me more time, expand the company, create a content agency, a film production company, start doing commercials, then everything started growing. Now going to Los Angeles and all these crazy places and working with just tons of different people and garnering clientele. And um, now I do it for a living. That's it.

SPEAKER_00 21:13

And you mentioned you keep calling her mentor instead of employer. Why? Like what does she do beyond everything?

SPEAKER_01 21:20

This lady would this lady would take me, any she's any, pick up the phone anytime I call, questions. She literally treated me like her fourth, her fourth child, like her son. I never, I mean, you know, I asked her that one day, once I became like good, successful at this film. I said, why did you why didn't you let me? I made so many mistakes. And just for the the purpose of the episode, I'm keeping it short. There's so many times I failed with her. Um, but why did you why'd you give me a shot? Like what do you didn't owe me anything? Why? And I never forget the answer. You had something special. She said, there was something different about you. Your passion, the way you behave. I knew you had there's just something about you I knew it was different. You just needed the right direction. And um that mentor later on. Oh, this is so important. That my mentor currently later on after years, so that happened. I ended up going my own route doing narrative stories, traveling all over the country. And one day I get a call from her. Say, hey y'all, how you doing? I say, Hey, Zachro, how's everything you haven't here for in a while? I was wondering why I've been in the hospital. I had leukemia. Stage four. Excuse me. And just crazy. Brain bleeds. She almost died. Uh bone marrow transfus transplant. Just crazy stuff she went through in this time period in which she was gone. And she said, I don't know if I'm gonna live. And I remember being in tear shocked. But I want to leave my story with you. You tell my story for me. Man, Anthony, when I said that shook me, man. Wow. The lady that mentored me over 13 years. I mean, she did so much for me, man. So much. Just anything. Anything I need. Phone calls. Can you take a look at this contract? Just a whole bunch. Advances, everything. Always make sure I was okay. Like I'm a second mom. Now she may die. I hope I can't help in that space, in the medical aspect, you know, saving her life, but I can reserve her story for her kids and for other people to know who she is. And this is maybe what God was building me up to do is to tell her. So what does that look like?

SPEAKER_00 23:16

Is telling her story.

Building A Sustainable Film Business

SPEAKER_01 23:17

And she's still with us? Yeah, she's still she beat it. She ended up, thank God. Um but tell her a story from the origins of where she started, just her whole life story. Now I get insight into it. She's extremely private. I didn't find out stuff about her until year like eight, nine. I went over her house for the first time in the year 10. She's extremely private. So now I got insight into who she was and all this other stuff. Um, very humble. She gives more than she takes. I didn't even know her birthday. She wouldn't tell anyone her birthday because she didn't want any presents. It was crazy, man. That's you know how altruistic she is. So uh I ended up telling her story, man. And um, that took four or five years, and I'm at the closing phase right now. So this is like four or five years ago. So I'm literally at the closing phase. We're doing the music and we're done. The documentary's done. And where's that coming up? So I gotta keep it on the raps, but her c her cousin is a Hollywood A-list actor. And the cousin is requesting to see the film, so we're in hopes that the cousin EP's it and we can put it on Netflix or HBLs, things of that nature. So yeah. So festivals and that. So I'm at the closing phase now. We've been working on this for five years. I was gonna shoot her text yesterday uh about me making the move, and now I gotta finish it off. And that's it, done. So I end up telling her story. But through doing that and then telling other stories, um, I found out what I want to do. I don't just want to tell stories, I want to change lives through stories. There's a big difference between doing bang bang, shoot 'em up movies and cars exploding and then utilizing your, which is fine, but utilizing your skill set to change lives through entertainment and content creation. And that is one of the reasons why I fell in love with this place. When I heard your story, I said, if I can get in there, I can elevate this brand completely.

SPEAKER_00 24:50

Well, that was my next question anyway, because you came from, I mean, you mentioned an$80,000 contract here, contract here, contract here, and you there's money. Right? If you finally, I I always like to say you can find money. That's not it, that's not hard. No, it's simple, yeah. Very simple to do. But finding money in your passion into a specific niche you want to stick to. Bingo, that's tough.

Mentor’s Illness And Telling Her Story

SPEAKER_01 25:16

It's extremely tough. And the thing about film more so, and one of the reasons why I came here and got clientele that I like working with, where I'm changing lives, is film is very, it's one-off deals. It's not 80,000 a year a year, it's just one check for 80 grand. It's gonna run out. If no, if nothing's coming in, you're gonna run out of money. So you have to build a clientele base. But I rather have a blindele base where we're actually doing the work that I want to do, which is changing people's lives. If it's something like, um, hey, I just want you to film my cars for the year, I'm not interested. For me, it's not nothing's wrong with it, but for me, I again, because I know my time's limited and me seeing my mentor one day being extremely healthy to being a hundred pounds. Oh, you really understand what life is, man. When you see somebody you saw all the time, healthy, smiling, helping change people's lives, everyone's looking up to her to 100 pounds in a hospital and may die next week. Oh, it blew me away. And I said, I'm not playing around anymore. I don't, I don't, I was doing great stuff with film, you know, thrillers, horrors. My name got big, but I need to do something different. And that's when I started doing work with people that was like like Dr. Colbert. We did the film with him, with medical film, with just great stuff, man, in that in that suspense. And then when I saw this, I said, Oh, a gym, read a fine. And luckily for me, the owner of Gym U had an incredible story where you not just want to have a gym just for people to work out, but you really want to change lives, which led to the documentary that we're doing that's coming up. I said, This guy is very similar to me. He doesn't just want to have a gym, he wants to change people's lives. That's what I live for. And if we can make money doing it and then give back, you won, y'all. Let's do it. And that's what I do now.

SPEAKER_00 26:47

So, where do you see the future of y'all going?

SPEAKER_01 26:50

Just as as what?

SPEAKER_00 26:51

Like, where do you see yourself going in five, 10 years of? Oh, philanthropist. That's that's that's that's all I want.

SPEAKER_01 26:56

I don't care about the you know, I want to make sure I'm good, my kids are good, things of that nature. Of course, everybody wants that. You want to make sure you're financially good. So you don't have to worry about money and bills and stuff like that. But that's all I want to do. Tell stories, change lives, document you. I want to travel to different countries, um, doing documentaries and stuff like that, but at the same time giving back. So my film team to document me building schools in Ghana, going to Europe, going to South America, all just all different places around the world and helping people because Dr. Roku took me to these mission trips where she was giving back and it inspired me to do the same. So anybody that I can team up with that has that same passion and drive, I'm willing to do that, you know, and just create a team of people that I was put on to uh or collaborated with that did that. So that's all I want to do. Philanthropist work, man. I I think that's incredible. That's that's literally that's how I want to be remembered. Somebody that changed the world, that gave back through storytelling, and then other means that's it.

SPEAKER_00 27:47

If you have the opportunity to talk to someone 20, 22, that's following something they don't want to do, and they don't know where to go, but they know what they're currently doing, they don't want to do. What would be your advice to them? So they don't know what they want to do, and they're just doing something they don't like.

SPEAKER_01 28:02

Stop. What one one thing I love that Alec Mosey said that's stuck with me is burn the boats. Stop. Stop and find out who you are. Do you know what that expression comes from? Burn the boats? No, no. Well, I know what it means, but no, what where does it come from?

SPEAKER_00 28:15

I don't know the exact uh general that did this, but it was in South America during the 1700s. He had a fleet of 500 people, roughly, and they came over, and I think it was the Mayans that they were trying to conquer with the Spanish fleet. They came over and he told his men to burn his but their boats. And he burned every single one of their boats because he said to them, if I give you an option to go home or face an army ten times the size of ours, you're gonna go home. Of course. But if I give you no option, no option, and we just go straight through, like the only way out is through, we will succeed. They won. An army, they beat an army ten times their size. That's insane. Because they burned their entire fleet.

Purpose-Driven Work And Future Philanthropy

SPEAKER_01 29:07

So now you know that I love that. Wow, man. And and with that being said, that's what I would tell someone. Remember, see, my thing is I was always one foot in, one foot out. So I don't want to say regret, but the only thing I would change if I can go back was that I would burn the boats. I could not. And dude, when I say burn the boats, you have to. And this is why they say listen to people watching, because they've been through, they understand, they have experiences. Have no fear, man, regardless of who's done it before. Find out who you are. Usually when you follow people, you don't know who you are. I had to stop following my mom and all these people and say, what do I like? Because I'm gonna end up in a situation like most people are, most Americans, 40, 50 years old, that follow what their mom and dad told them to do, that are lawyers, doctors, and don't really like it. And they become miserable because money doesn't make you happy, man. Money does not make you happy. And if you think money makes you happy, you didn't have enough yet. Trust me, when you have money, man, and you don't like past living, you got it. You just nailed it. That's what I'm trying to say. Once you have enough to live, everything else is passion. Like, damn, I really hate this job. Well, you're stuck now because you decided to now make this change. And I think it's never too late, but it becomes increasingly harder the longer you wait. So I would say, whatever you, if you don't know what you want to do and you don't know what your passion is or what you want to do for the rest of your life, stop. Literally stop, regardless of where you are. You're not gonna die, man. Don't worry about just take that risk. Um, and that's the only thing I I would say, just looking, but yeah, risk, man. Be a risk taker. Don't be scared. It always works out. One thing Albert Einstein said is as long as you have a normal functioning brain, you can accomplish anything. Literally anything. And uh, yeah, I truly believe that now.

SPEAKER_00 30:39

I know you mentioned you went six, seven years with nothing. Right? It was fail, fail, fail. I'm trying to put time frames in my head and I want you to explain it a little more. When did you have kids? And when how did that impact your life?

SPEAKER_01 30:54

I had kids year eight, nine. So right when you started making money? Yes. Eight, nine, yeah. How did that impact your direction? Oh yeah, that changed me. Um, again, because of the the the um what do you call it? The values that my mom and dad already instilled in me. I already had a good head on my shoulder. I never drank alcohol before, I never smoked, I wasn't a party guy, always stayed home and was going to medical route. So that still en route to become a physician, still disciplined me enough. So it didn't change me drastically where I gotta stop drinking this booze, man. It didn't change me in that sense, but it changed me now more so now it's not for me anymore. Screw me. I gotta take care of those girls, man. I gotta the the hunger increased 10 times. Now, instead of me saying, Oh, it's 11 o'clock, I'll finish this tomorrow. Now I don't sleep. Now I don't sleep. There is no tomorrow. Rocky, there is no tomorrow. And I mean that there is no tomorrow, I don't sleep. That's why you can mess, that's why you get messages from me at 3 a.m. That's why you see messages. This is why certain people that work me on film sets can attest to this and say, one guy literally they'll never forget this, told me, with all due respect, I'm gonna be very serious with you, y'all. Are you on drugs? And I don't mean that in a joke. Are you seriously on drugs? I said, no. And I just look at the smile. He said, I've never seen someone stay up 72 hours straight. This is I swear to God, I've not I've never seen the same exact energy for 72 hours straight. I said, and that's what happens when you find your passion, when your heart's in it. You don't sleep. There's no alarm clock needed. Your passion wakes you up, and I love film. Like when I go home, there's more work, there's more work. It's never done. So that one day your kids walk into a place and say, Wow, your father's this person, and your success that you laid, those tracks you laid down, take care of your kids. That's what I want to be able to do. Make the road easier for them, and God willing, they take the road and make it easier for the next generation. But I know it starts with me, you know, as an entrepreneur, so that's why there is no breaks, there's no pauses. I gotta keep fighting, man. You know?

SPEAKER_00 32:49

I guess the sum of this all up, just to kind of give us a nice take home. What would what do you think is the most life-changing advice you could offer to somebody? If you had to summarize it down to one or two sentences.

Advice: Burn The Boats

SPEAKER_01 33:09

Find what your passion is, and then find a way to use that passion to change people's lives. That's it. Every human being on this earth wants one thing. You know what that is? To be useful. Everyone wants to feel like I'm important. And once you feel that way, man, it's a feeling that's indescribable. You you just feel full. I'm useful, versus I'm just a doctor. I'm just a business, I'm just a gym owner. I'm just a camera guy, you're not? That's why you have to find a way to use that skill to change the lives of others, man. There's no amount of money, dude. When you change someone's life, oh my god. When I did a series called Dreamers and we went back with a client of mine giving back to his neighbor, and I was able to document that experience and seeing the guy cry and give me a hug. Like, I chose him to be the recipient of this award, of this money that we're giving out, and just that feeling of fulfillment, it never left me. It's amazing. He'll always remember me. Wow, y'all, you changed my life. And these are adults in tears. Like, I didn't have money to pay for my house. It was a foreclosure. And now you guys found me on GoFundMe. I needed the money. I have kids, and you documented to your team. Thank you, man. There's no amount of money that can add up to that. The documentary we're gonna do with other kids that are suicidal and depression. I'm responsible. Just the responsibility, bearing the responsibility that Anthony chose me to tell that story. You can't fail. He chose you. That means the responsibility, he believes in you. That's how I see it. When he says, Yao, I want you to do this document. Oh, I don't joke around with that. I don't take it lightly at all. I treat it like it's my own. I give everything. I don't sleep until it is perfect. Um, and and that, you know, and in my heart's in it. I love it. I love film. So find out what you want to do in life, how you want to be remembered, and then find a way to utilize that skill set to change the life of others, man. And everything else will follow. The money, if you're looking for a husband, your wife, everything will just fall into place. The puzzle places. It'll just fall into place, just like you. So that's what I would say. And if I would have heard that piece of advice years later, I would have got here a little sooner.

SPEAKER_00 35:08

Yeah, I really appreciate telling us the story. Sorry I do this on your last minute. I promise I'll do it again. Guys, please don't forget, like, share, subscribe, and we'll see you next time. See you next time, guys. Goodbye. Peace.