February 18, 2025 • 56 mins
Some of the most legendary comebacks in history came from people who refused to stay in one lane. Kobe Bryant went from NBA icon to Oscar-winning storyteller. Steve Jobs got fired from his own company, only to return and change the world with the iPhone. Robert Downey Jr. went from Hollywood outcast to Iron Man, leading the biggest movie franchise of all time. Reinvention isn’t just about bouncing back—it’s about leveling up. If you’ve ever felt like it’s too late to start over, this episode will change your mind.
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Speaker 1 (00:06):
Let me talk about talk. There we go. He said,
you live in life as a gringo where you questioned
where you fit in every time you mingle, they say
you do. This would not that my rapping really mad?
This life as a gringo. Yes, hello, and welcome to
another pisode of Life as a Gringo. I am dramas
(00:26):
of course, and man, I hope y'all are doing well.
I hope y'all are doing well. I was racking my
brain on what what was like, you know, the I
guess the pressing issue or the thing I wanted to
kind of bring to the table today, and just sort
of thinking about many conversations I've been fortunate enough to
(00:49):
have with people who listen to this podcast or those
who I've talked to throughout the time with the Just
Be Social Club, my Mastermind group, and I think and
even in general, it's interesting. I was I was at
a like a meetup kind of like a holiday party,
(01:10):
not holiday party, with a bunch of DJ friends of
mine for the company that does a lot of my
my bookings throughout New York and New Jersey. And you know,
I'm talking to another another DJ friend of mine who's
like roughly around the same age as me, kind of
been in it in the game for a minute, had
(01:32):
some you know, big moments as a DJ for a
big artist, and he's kind of at a crossroads in
his life where he he kind of feels like he
fell off a bit in comparison to what he was
doing to where he is now, and it's sort of
falling out of love with the craft, if you will,
(01:57):
of djaying, or or maybe not even with the craft
of it, but the business itself, right and where it's going.
And you know, he was kind of expressing that to
me and like, you know, sort of talking to me
as well, and kind of like, you know, the thing,
I guess things that I've shared on here before, right
about feeling like I don't know if I've shared it
(02:22):
directly on here, I want to say, but like the
thoughts of all these things that I used to do, right,
you know, I was definitely like far more heavily involved
in celebrity culture and meeting celebrities and in that world
right if you like, you know, go back to my
Instagram pre twenty twenty one. It's like, you know, all
(02:45):
these posts of me with celebrities, of the radio station
all these different things, and since then, I've kind of
pivoted and moved into different spaces and you know, kind
of grown a lot as a human being and whatever
the case may be, and sort of welcomed to the
best of my ability, welcomed the pivot, welcomed the change,
(03:09):
and never sort of feeling like I would I could
get too comfortable or trying my best to not allow
my ego to make me feel like I needed to
stay in a particular place if spiritually it was no
longer serving me. And I don't know, I think I
still i'd be lying to if I said I didn't
(03:31):
at times struggle with the idea of like what if
the outside world thinks that I've fallen off and all
these different things, And you know, I'd be lying if
I said that that sort of commentary of that conversation
didn't cut a bit deep with me when I was
having it, and I had to kind of like, you know,
like have a conversation with myself to sort of check
(03:53):
myself and sort of let myself know that like, hey,
I'm not not involved in that stuff because I couldn't
hack it, or because you know, I wasn't good enough
I made a decision based on what was best for
me and based on what would make me happier, and
you know, put myself in a position where my life
(04:14):
is in a far better place than it was back then,
you know, in terms of what my goals are and
in terms of what my you know, my I don't know.
My personal tastes are right now, right my lifestyle, you know,
choices and what I appreciate at this point in my life.
(04:37):
And even with that, it's also like never too late
to kind of go back and rediscover that maybe you
liked something far more than you thought, right. I've talked
about that with music, and I think I'm being around
the bush a little bit, but I'm sort of wanting
to hone in on the idea and the power of
reinvention and the idea of it never being too late
(04:58):
to pivot. And even when you've achieved greatness, let's say,
or achieve goals, you know, what you still don't you know,
should never feel like you have to be stuck in
that particular zone or that particular position. Right. I think
that the happiest people in this world are the ones
that allow themselves to embrace reinvention or never see a
(05:24):
failure as the end, and never see the sort of
the success or the attainment of a goal as sort
of now they just live on the mountaintop. Right, I
think you're always having to move towards something and sort
of you want to grow, you know, you want to
(05:46):
grow in a graceful manner that matches who you are,
right and not sort of hinder yourself playing small because
it's an identity that you've grown comfortable with. Right. And
I'm trying not to like, I don't know, I feel
like I'm talking a little bit all over the place here,
But I think many of us stay in situations that
(06:13):
no longer serve us because we have this fear of
letting go, or we have this fear of not being
enough to rise to the next occasion. Right, And we
often self sabotage, and we do this in various forms. Right,
I'd say these different examples, but they really at its core,
(06:35):
this is a conversation of letting go and understanding that
oftentimes the next thing or what's best for you involves
letting go of certain things that are normal to you,
or certain aspects of your life or certain parts of yourself. Right.
(06:58):
And I know we've talked about this various forms on
the podcast before, but I think this is one of
those sort of ever evolving concepts that we kind of
continuously need to be reminded of or get refreshers on.
And truthfully, as I as I sort of sit here
(07:20):
and we are guys, we're only about we're less than
maybe we are exactly At twenty episodes left of season
three of Life as a Gringo, three years of doing
this podcast, and I've been doing a lot of reflecting
(07:43):
as we sort of you know, started this year, and
in my core thinking to myself that the identity of
life as a Gringo, right, this idea of being a
quote unquote gringo, I no longer feel like that person anymore.
I know, no longer sort of relate in the present
(08:05):
tense or future tents to the concept of feeling like
an outsider. I think like through the course of this
podcast and doing it and meeting everybody that I have
and and just sort of talking things out and finding myself,
I've evolved into somebody who's really comfortable in their own
(08:25):
skin and understands his place and his community and has
found community. Right. And I think many of you share
and a lot of that sentiment as well who have
maybe been along with the journey for a while now.
And I think for me, you know, kind of coming
to season three and only having had the promise of
(08:52):
like of three seasons, you know, being fully transparent as
far as, like, you know, business side of things go,
it was sort of like, Okay, I mean, is this
something that I see continuing on in its current state?
(09:14):
And truthfully it's not. I think We've sort of had
the conversations that I've wanted to have, right more than
I could have ever imagined. You know, they're here on
the feed for anybody to reference for you know, forever, forever,
how long time exists. Essentially, it's archived here. And I
(09:36):
think I've evolved sort of past the core of this podcast,
and there are other discussions and other things that I
want to do, and you know, I'm still working out
a lot of those those details, you know, personally business wise.
(10:00):
But I guess I'm having this conversation because in real time,
I'm telling myself to not have fear of letting go
of something that has changed my life for the better
in so many different ways. But sort of being like listen,
you you you created this thing. It went beyond what
(10:20):
you could have ever imagined. I legitimately only thought I
would get one season and then it'd be canceled. You know.
That was what my original idea, what my original like
even just goal was for the podcast, and we ended
up doing it for for you know, the full three
seasons and and you know, three years of my life.
I'm almost four at this point, including with the breaks
and everything. So it's wild. It's wild to sort of
(10:45):
like be in this place. And but I think it's
like if I was to say, hey, we're going to
keep doing life as ale, it's like, hey, I'm not
staying true to who I am as a person now
that the version of me that has evolved, and that
to like strike fear in anybody's hearts or make anybody
say that if you love this podcast, you know, I
have other things planned, you know, hopefully, and we'll kind
(11:08):
of see what ends up happening. But this is like
a message to myself as well. It's like, hey, there's
there's a power in letting go and understanding like you're
going to step into the next evolution of who you
are as a person, and that next evolution is is
you know even better, right, it's a it's a person
who has learned so much more and now has so
(11:28):
a far deeper purpose in their life because of the
self discovery they've gone on. So you know, we'll get
into more of that kind of as the season begins
to get to a close. But I just want to
kind of, you know, touch on a couple of things,
and I guess to share a bit of my own
journey with with these concepts, but also I wanted to
(11:48):
talk about some people that inspire me when I think
about their evolution and what we could take away from it.
So yeah, without further ado, let's let's kind of just
dive into some stories that continue to inspire me. In
a segment, call for the people in the back, say
a lot for the people in the say a lot
(12:12):
of the people in the say a lot of the
people in the So I I'm like the biggest fan.
I talked about this all the time. Anybody knows who's
been like fobbing for a minute. I talk about the
idea of like I have virtual mentors, like people I've
never met, some of them aren't even alive anymore, but
(12:34):
whose stories I sort of keep with me in the
back of my mind and I reference as I go
about my own journey, and one of those stories in particular,
and this one, I mean, listen, at the end of
the day, this person. We can make a lot of
arguments for corporate greed and the products that the company
is making and how they're being made, but in general,
(12:55):
his story never ceases to fascinate me. And that's somebody
like Steve Jobs and I start here because maybe some
of us are going through an incredibly low point in
our life right now, right maybe there's so much uncertainty,
maybe you've had so many things taken away from you.
(13:16):
I mean, I know I've talked about this, like I
really do think twenty twenty four was one was probably
the most brutal year of my entire life. It was
one of those years where it just seems like everything
I touched turned to shit almost and it was like
I couldn't get like on the board to save my life,
(13:39):
like in a in a in a sort of you know,
basketball reference, and you know, well, I'm just gonna allow
the conversation to flow as it will. Usually I would
like segment this like, Okay, now me hit this talk
about me, but I'm just kind of go where the
(14:01):
flow goes here at go with the flow, if you will.
But this low point now in reflecting, and not to
say I'm still not dealing with moments of frustration or
(14:23):
that I feel like I'm sort of in a rebuilding phase,
if you will, or not even rebuilding, but reinvention, I
guess is the key word of this today's show. But
I think that low point, as cliche as it might be,
as I think about it now and we kind of
(14:44):
talk it out here together, and now I can sort
of see like hindsight, you know, twenty twenty tip thing.
I'm like, oh, I kind of needed all of these
sort of like low moments to make me sort of
slow down and realign with what truly made me happy
(15:09):
or what truly makes me happy? Right, Like, what is
the life that I actually want to live? What do
I want to do on a regular basis? Who am
I at this point in my life? Right? And I
think having that much downtime or sort of failing at
(15:30):
things that I wasn't very passionate about or that I
wasn't passionate passionate enough about to like make my main
focus or to provide me with real fulfillment when those
things began to fail and not work, like the quote
unquote easy money grabs if you will, right, or the
the things that just made perfect sense on paper but
(15:52):
like just didn't fucking pan out as they should have
those shortcomings or I mean even you know, things like
you know, losing contracts or things not getting renewed or
whatever it might be, Like those shortcomings made me sort
of have to like, you know, get back to ground zero,
(16:16):
right and almost just be like, you know what, and
instead of trying to replicate business success, instead of trying
to make more money than you did the previous year,
or trying to duplicate what you did the previous year,
or trying to get the next ego metric. You know
(16:38):
that makes it makes you feel like you're doing something.
Let's just get down to basics of like what is
actually currently making you happy? Like where are the moments
of joy that you're sort of finding amidst all the chaos,
amidst all of the shit. You know, And I think
(16:58):
sort of when you lose I don't want to say everything,
when you lose a lot, you inevitably I think end
up going through this there's really these stages of like
blissful creation almost, right, like you almost get back to
being a kid again, where you're just sort of creating
(17:23):
and you're not really concerned with the financial aspect of it, right,
It's like a non issue at this point for you, right,
And that's like the beauty of being in that stage.
It's like, you know, and in reality is when you
start at ground zero, there's only one way to go,
and that's up. And that's what's exciting and almost like
to be envied about when you sort of quote unquote
(17:44):
lose it all, right. And a story that I reference
or a person that I reference when I reflect on
on that is Steve Jobs from Apple. He co founded Apple.
And when you look at his story, right, he gets
you know, it starts Apple, it's successful, right, and then
it goes through this phase in the eighties where it
(18:06):
is you know, a failing a failing company and is
no longer successful and to the point that he actually
gets kicked out of his own company. This happens in
nineteen eighty five. And I think about what it must
have been like to be in in you know, his
(18:28):
head at that point, what the emotions he must have
been going through, right, the idea that his company that
he started in a garage with a friend of his
and grew to be this you know, name brand computer company,
that he just got fired from it, and he got
the company taken away from him, he got his baby
(18:50):
taken away from him. And then the ego metrics of that, Right,
how publicly humiliating that must have been, and how low
he must have felt, and how much he must have
questioned about his ability to reinvent himself or to find
(19:14):
success again. And even the idea of like, you know,
that sort of public humiliation from a career perspective, I'm
sure to a degree hurt his reputation and his ability
to secure a similar position. And you think, okay, well,
(19:35):
what did he end up doing? At this point? The
irony is this probably was the greatest thing to ever
happened to him, because he gets fired from Apple, his
own company, and he goes on to start Pixar, like
the movie company that like now that it Disney owns,
that created a toy story and all these things, right,
(19:59):
literally goes on to found a revolutionary company that changed
the course of like children's movies, of cartoons and animated films,
then also returns to Apple in nineteen ninety seven, reinvents
the company completely right, launching the iPod and the MacBook
(20:20):
and the iPhone, not even changing the company to change
the world as we know it. And again we can
make arguments, but for the better, for the worse, sure,
but really changed the world as we know it. And
again in comparison, I sort of am like Man, I
(20:43):
really without ever having spoken to him ever, really I
never spoke to the man, but without really having dug
deep into, you know, the story of Steve Jobs. Like,
I'm not a historian by any means, but I relate
to it because I think, as with sort of the
(21:05):
cliche saying of like there's an opportunity and everything, and
I always talk about that, or I always strive to
live that mindset, there really is, you know, a silver
lining or a blessing, even in what seems like the
biggest curse, if you will, right. And I think sometimes
(21:27):
we need a wake up call. Sometimes life happens right,
and it's moving so quickly and we get so caught up.
It's almost like a gust of wind and before you
know it, you've been blown into you know, in an
area that you don't even recognize anymore, or you've been
transformed into a person that you don't recognize. That it
sort of living far more in reaction than creation, if
(21:52):
you will. And I think that this happens throughout the
course of our life in multiple stages, and it's important
to sort of be cognizant of it. It's easy to
get so caught up in life, and especially as you're
creating opportunities or being given opportunities, Like it's a gift
and a curse to have an endless amount of opportunity,
which you know, in today's world we kind of do.
(22:14):
But you know, even at the moments where you're like
killing it at your job and all these different things,
new promotions, like they demand more of you. They might
demand more of your time, which means less time with family,
which means less time for the things that that you're
passionate about, the things that fulfill you. And before you
know it, you're just like this person who's been working
their ass off, you know, found great career success, but
(22:36):
like at what cost? Almost right, And I'm using this example,
or in a relationship where you sort of you've gotten
swept up in the idea of love, and you've begun
to normalize certain things that are just not healthy in
terms of being with a partner, or you've gotten so
comfortable with having a partner that you've sort of numbed
(22:58):
yourself to the fact that you don't even really care
for this person anymore in that way, right, as harsh
as that might sound, And because life is happening and
you want to check certain boxes and you're just caught
up in what's become the norm. And it's not until
you know you have that big dramatic blowout with this person,
or you have some sort of crazy life moment that
(23:21):
like shakes you to your core and makes you stop
and causes you to be insane the present that you're like,
holy shit, what am I doing? And that's when you
begin creating and reinventing and and sort of rediscovering again.
And I wanted to include that story for anybody who
(23:44):
is going through some sort of low point in their
life where it seems like just nothing is working, everything
you try is failing. And for me, what I can
say is, you know, as I begun this year, I
think for me kind of getting back to I guess
my stories, I kind of tie it together when I
(24:06):
stopped saying, all right, like, let's just stop chasing what
quote unquote makes sense. Let's stop trying to create what
feels like the easy pathway towards the check and you know,
is something that we're interested in, but not like something
we're you know, incredibly passionate about. Let's just get back
to basics of all the things that you're doing, what
(24:30):
is the one thing every time you do it you're like,
oh man, I'm like actually really enjoying myself today. And
for me, I looked to music like throughout this year,
you know, this last year, as it felt like nothing
was working. The one thing that was like really providing
me joy and was working in the moment was like
(24:51):
when I got to go DJ and specifically the one
club that I'm I, you know, have a residency at
in Jersey City, New Jersey. It was like every weekend
I can count on it just being like super fun
and just enjoying myself and being able to confidently like
look at myself and say like, what, you're good at this,
(25:12):
You're great at this? Right Like that the wind that
I was I needed and it kept giving it to
me and this again. Like music, I've had a tumultuous
relationship where I've I've tried to let it go and
know this sort of finds me. And even with that,
it's like, am I really going to like go back
down this path again? Like? Or am I really going
to like, you know, set another goal in this and
(25:35):
embarrass myself or let myself down or whatever it might be.
But then I, ironically, as I as I sort of tried,
I let go of of trying to make it make
sense in like real world terms, and I just sort
of said, you know what, let me just keep scratching
(25:55):
this itch, and what are the goals that are interesting
to me in regards to this, you know? And with
that I had, like, you know, the first sort of
big potential breakthrough, right and and that sort of maybe
that I got from somebody then led to me saying, Okay,
(26:16):
this is the new goal and what are what's the
course of action to make this goal a reality? And
that you know happen to think December ish, and from
December to now, I've had purpose every single day because
I've had this sort of checklist of what are the
(26:38):
things that I need to get done, what are the
things that I need to add to my resume in
order to possibly make good on that maybe that I
had in December and turn it into a yes. And
that sense of purpose has added so much joy and
fulfillment into my life. And with that sense of purpose,
(26:58):
because I had a clarity of a goal in mind,
now I've been able to check off, you know, a
lot of things, check off a lot of boxes, and
stack up these little wins that hopefully will accumulate to
this bigger vision that I have. But again, I don't
think I would have given myself that grace or allowed
(27:18):
myself the time that I needed these past few months
of just sort of saying, hey, head down, little winds
day by day. I don't think I would have been
able to do that without sort of just hitting that
rock bottom because I was I was too fixated on
maintaining a certain status or fixated on you know, being
(27:39):
an adult quote unquote right. And it was only until I,
like it felt like everything was going wrong that I
then was able to tap into what I truly wanted.
And once I did that, doors began to open here
and there. And don't don't let me, you know, don't
I'm not gonna tell you that it's been all sun
(28:00):
and rainbow. There's been so many fucking little setbacks and
stupid things that have happened along the way that are
incredibly frustrating. But you know, as I'm sort of getting
to the end of that checklist and I really only
have one last thing that I need to check off
that checklist before I revisit that larger goal, I can
sort of say, hey, you know what, even with those
sort of disappointing moments along the way, we still had
(28:22):
a bunch of wins that accumulated to exactly what we
needed and what we set out to do, and much
of it actually worked out the way we sort of
vision it in our head. But I think that, again,
is only because I had a clarity of a goal,
and the goal was coming from a very pure place,
(28:42):
a place of like genuine passion for what I was doing,
allowed all of this to sort of culminate into these winds.
And I think that's what I was lacking this last
year in a lot of ideas that I loved, a
lot of things that I wanted to do, but not
things that I can genuinely say were one hundred percent
(29:03):
my heart was invested in it, and like, if that
was the only thing I was able to do in
this life, I would be happy doing it. I couldn't
say that about a lot of the things I was
working on in twenty twenty four. Again doesn't mean I
didn't love them, but as far as like day in
day out, no, they're not. They weren't something I wanted
(29:23):
to do day in day out, And I think that
is sort of what got me to again the clarity.
It was the heavy failure of basically the first time
in my life feeling like an entire year was like
on paper, just a giant failure. Again, in retrospect, the
lessons learned the mindset created not a failure, but that
(29:46):
was a year where I just felt like nothing worked.
But again, I think it's led to some of my
best creations. I mean musically, you know, we just signed
a record and it happened fairly easy, like far easier
than any other a production I've ever done. And there's
a lot of little things in the works like that
where it's like, oh, I've been working my ass off,
(30:06):
but also creatively, I'm in the best place I've ever been,
and I think it's because of that sort of rock
bottom moment, and I look at Steve Jobs, you know,
for that as well. And we'll take a quick break here.
I want to touch on a couple other examples that
I think I relate to and that I think others
can relate to, depending on where you are in your story.
(30:29):
So we'll touch on that, but first we'll take a
quick break, and then we'll be right back. All right,
we are back, And somebody else's story that really fucking
fascinates me, like to no end is Robert Downey Jr. Yes,
the actor who plays Iron Man. Now, I'm old enough
(30:52):
as a kid to remember hearing in like the background
of like you know, TV on my parents. My parents
have some you know, as a little kid, the stories
or like when he was going through his legal traumas
and his drug addiction and you know, jail time and
all these different things. And I think there was a
(31:16):
show called Alan McBeal that he was on, if I'm
not mistaken. I was very young, but I remember that,
and it was like this guy who was talented, had everything,
just went down a really dark path and was on
the verge of losing it all or burned a lot
(31:40):
of bridges and was pretty much blackballed by the industry
as a result. And now you look at him and
you're like, how is that even the same fucking person?
And you look at him, and I think, looking at
(32:00):
iron Man and how that has changed the course of
his life. I sort of see it as like two things.
I see a it's never too late in the game
for you to become the person you know you can be,
or to rEFInd yourself, or to prove the naysayers wrong right,
(32:27):
like you've never fucked up enough. And on the other
side of it, I look at it as you just
need that one win, like you're one win away from
rewriting your entire story. Him getting cast as iron Man
(32:47):
was a win that rewrote his entire life from there. Now,
obviously he had to do the hard work. He had
to get clean, he had to get his life together,
and I'm sure there's a lot that went into even
being considered for a role like this one. But he
(33:09):
did the hard work and was given this opportunity that
changed everything. It allowed him to reclaim his spot as
one of the prominent actors in Hollywood, in his field.
It allowed him to reclaim his greatness. And again I
(33:35):
relate to this because it's like, Okay, we've all made
some wrong decisions in our life. We've all turned our
back on things or people and maybe regretted it. You know,
I think if I'm relating and sort of being vulnerable
(33:56):
to where this sort of hits me right now, I've
talked about like where I was twenty nineteen in the
same Industryman. Now, as far as like music goes, you know,
I really self sabotaged a lot. And you know, for me,
(34:18):
it wasn't through things of addiction or legal troubles. It
was you know, a sense of not believing in myself
or not being grateful or appreciating it as I should have.
But I made some decisions that took me away from
this thing that I've been passionate about since I was
(34:39):
a kid. And again, hindsight's twenty twenty. I would love
for it to not have been such a long, you know,
sort of journey or or take myself away for such
a extended period of time. But once I've sort of
(35:00):
done that inner work and figured out what I was
running away from and learn to appreciate myself and my
talents and recognize the place that this thing has in
my life, and how passionate about it I am. It's
allowed me now to sort of come back stronger and
more focus and more sure of myself than maybe I
(35:22):
ever have been, you know, and allowed me to create
potential opportunities that are that one thing that changes everything,
you know. I feel. I feel like I'm on the
verge of that. I see it very clearly, like the
steps are right there, and it's inspiring again to know
(35:48):
that like a what's meant for you will never you know,
will always be for you. What's meant for you will
always be for you. But in his case as well,
it's like, yeah, we all have these ghosts of our pasts,
but with enough work they become irrelevant to our future success.
(36:14):
And once we have that success, they then become like
these badges of honor of how far we've come, and
they give us this sort of credibility, and they give
us just this. I don't think they give us stories
that we can continue to use to inspire ourselves and others.
(36:39):
They just add something special. And I'm again not a
Robert down Downing junior historian, but I would imagine that
experience of sort of losing it all if you will,
and then being able to sort of come back bigger
(37:00):
than ever and reclaim your place and beyond. I'd imagine
he probably appreciates it a bit more and he's living
a far more fulfilled life than he was prior. And
I don't know, that's just incredibly inspiring to me. And
(37:24):
the last one I want to touch on is Kobe Bryant.
And Kobe to me is an example of the idea
that your greatness is non transferable. And what I mean
(37:50):
by that is, I think so many of us we
get into these spaces where we do see success, we've
achieved it, right, our greatness is on display. We finally
get that validation, that feeling of recognition that we've worked
so hard for. But then there's like the curse of
(38:15):
greatness because it's almost like you have this identity crisis,
thinking that this is this is you know who I
am now? Right, Like this is you know when you
become great at something or you you know, enter into
(38:36):
sort of these bigger spaces, right. I think for me
in you know, in radio and New York and things
like the Breakfast Club, a lot of the ideas like well,
it doesn't really get any bigger than this. Right, A
lot of the people would say, how could you leave
something so big? Right, Like you're there, You're a part
of the biggest thing, and that that's like a curse
(38:58):
because you then operate from the place of fear of
losing that right. Your identity is tied into that. If
I'm not this person from that, then who am I?
Almost like that conversation, I started with the idea of
quote unquote falling off right and sort of living with
(39:22):
like this feeling of like I'm not doing the things
that I used to do. I'm not on that level anymore, right,
And there's a fear that comes along with that, and
it hinders you from growing and from achieving your next
great thing, right, Like I have this, you know, for
(39:43):
a long time, and I've gotten over it. But I
I had this fear that, like we all in life,
we only have like a limited number of great ideas.
And I would reflect, I'm old projects or goals that
I had that didn't pan out, like old yeah, like
(40:05):
old brands or whatever that I created, or old things
I was working on, And I look back and be like, man,
that was a great idea. What if I never topped
that idea? Like, what if you know, because you know,
my partner bailed on me and everything was shit, or
because this happened, now it didn't work anymore. What if
I like, that was my opportunity and I fucked up,
(40:26):
or if I did something stupid and now it failed
as a result. And I think just the idea, like
your great ideas never stopped. Maybe maybe at some point
when your mind is not there anymore, that we can
make that argument. But I think greatness is transferable. The
things that you have achieved are not unique to the
(40:49):
industry or unique to the situation. They're unique to you
the person. So you the person, has the ability to
achieve greatness in other things. You just have to sort
of understand the mindset that allows you to achieve that
greatness in that particular field, Right, that same mindset and
(41:16):
your ability to sort of create a plan of action
and like you know, break down information and use it accordingly,
you can utilize that in any other space that you
choose to occupy. Now, obviously there are certain limitations as
far as like, you know, it's just because you're a
successful accountant doesn't mean you're gon be a successful NBA player, Right,
(41:39):
You need to have a certain god given physique to
go along with it that leads to that success. But
outside of those sort of few examples, your greatness is
transferable to whatever new thing, new venture, new idea you
decide to give your energy to, and as long as
(41:59):
you attack it with the same veracity that you did
the previous one, there's no question that eventually you will
achieve some form of greatness in that new goal, that
new task, that new version of yourself. Right. And Kobe
is a great example of this because Kobe was a
(42:23):
guy who was obsessed with the game of basketball from
you know, early days as a kid, like this is
all he did. We talked about this idea of like eat,
breathe and sleep a certain thing, but that's what Kobe did.
He was obsessed with it and became a great as
a result. But then what did he do after retirement? Right?
(42:46):
And a lot of a lot of players struggle with
this because I think they sort of view their greatness
or their achievement in basketball in their sport as like, Okay,
that was a window and time and that's it, and
they don't realize that they're bigger than this one thing
(43:09):
that they did. They have the ability to utilize what
made them successful in that into whatever else they feel interest,
passionate about, and they have to allow themselves to not
let their entire identity be wrapped up in this one thing,
but instead the ability to say, I'm not just a
(43:29):
basketball player. I am anything I want to be. And
that's what Kobe did. You look at it. And Kobe
became an Oscar winning filmmaker with his short film Deer Basketball. Now,
obviously it's basketball related, but he was on the other
side of things with that, right. He built Granity Studios,
(43:52):
which was to tell sports and life stories for young athletes. Right. So, granted,
he was still involved again in a game he loved,
but it was from a different perspective and he was
achieving greatness in that. He also reinvented himself as a mentor,
(44:14):
an investor, and an advocate for women's sports, right because
of his daughter Gigi. So he was walking into the
next chapter of his life with open arms and not
being wrapped up in the idea of I have to
be Kobe Bryant, the basketball player and that's all I am.
(44:35):
He said, No, I'm Kobe Bryant now the storyteller, the filmmaker,
the mentor, the entrepreneur, and he was finding success in
those fields because he was attacking it with the same
mindset that gave him success in basketball. Because again, the
(44:57):
greatness is bigger than the the identity. Right, he was
just a great thinker who happened to be born with
a certain natural gift for basketball. But there are a
lot of people born with that natural gift that don't
achieve the level he did, right, So, really, the secret
(45:19):
sauce is the way that his mind worked, which then
led to the way that he was disciplined and the
way that he was able to devote all that time
and energy to getting better at basketball and really becoming
a student of the game. And again, those are skills
(45:40):
that could be transferable to any other industry that he
chose to get into after basketball. And that's why he
was getting these accolades as a filmmaker and in these
different avenues. And I'm sure if he hadn't sadly passed
away so early, there would have been all kinds of
crazy shit that he would have had his and in.
(46:01):
But again, it's because greatness is transferable. Don't allow yourself
to make what you're doing your entire identity and then
believe that you just have to stay there even if
it's no longer serving you, or even if you're no
longer able to do it at the level that you
once did. In his case, like for me, I guess
(46:22):
I'll leave you on this example. What is kind of
coming up for me? What got me into the rooms
like the breakfast club or being on the radio here
in New York on zer one hundred. The mindset, the tenacity,
the ability to sort of think a couple of steps
ahead to get into those you know what got me
in those rooms, all the little things, that is the
(46:46):
same thing that has gotten me into other rooms When
I was in a band, That's what got us management,
got us on tours, got us doing you know a
record you know, got a record deal on the table.
As a DJ, That's what got me from playing I
have bars, to playing you know, gigantic clubs and festivals,
and you know, got me from making you know, crappy
(47:07):
music and that nobody want to listen to, to working
with other record labels and signing music and getting put
in commercials like that same blueprint, that same mindset that
I have, and I think the ability to break down
information and the self awareness of how I fit into
it is what keeps allowing me to get into the
rooms that I am passionate about at that moment. And
(47:31):
if I'm no longer passionate about a certain room, I
have to be okay with letting go of the ego
metrics and be confident enough in myself to say, I
don't know how long it's going to take, but eventually
I will get get into a similar level room, but
instead doing something that I'm incredibly passionate about. And I
(47:57):
think along sort of, you know, and I think, now
I'm like, what is sort of in twenty twenty four?
Where was the shortcoming with that? In twenty twenty four?
I was too concerned with I made the room itself
(48:18):
the priority or the goal, rather than saying the passion
has to be the priority and then second to that
is the room itself and the goal. Right. I think
it always has to start with, like how you reinvent yourself?
How do you reachieve success? It always has to start
(48:40):
with like what is the burning desire? Don't think about
the money, don't what is the burning desire. Once you've
identified the burning desire, then all of the skills that
you have accumulated that have allowed you to find success
in the past at other things, you can then retool
(49:00):
them to work for this new burning desire that you have,
and that greatness that exists in those tools and exists
inside of you can then be applied to this new
endeavor as long as you have that burning passion, that
same burning passion that you have for the other things
that you found success at. And I hope that makes sense.
(49:23):
But yeah, I think again, with all these different stories,
no matter what's happening, no matter where you are, reinvention
is there for you. You just have to be unafraid
to take a step in that direction and be unafraid
to pivot from the life you know and the identity
(49:48):
that you have sort of come to rely on, if
you will, And I'll table it there because I think
I want to kind of summarize it a little bit
clearer and conclusions due. But first we'll take a quick
break and they'll be right back time for company, all right,
(50:18):
So just to kind of summarize this entire concept of
reinvention and being unafraid to pivot, recognizing that it's never
too late to pivot, recognize that it's never too late
to reinvent yourself, that the greatness of your past is
(50:41):
just evidence of your ability to create more greatness going forward.
And if you haven't had that moment yet, which I
think we've all had it in little ways, but if
you haven't had that moment yet understanding that we all
have greatness inside of us, we just have to match
it with the right passion and the right moment and
the right opportunity or create the right opportunity. And again
(51:04):
it's it's it's sort of looking for opportunity and everything.
I think is kind of the takeaway from like Steve Jobs, right,
his biggest failure became a blessing because he found he
had the clarity to sort of go and really go
(51:24):
into the deeper parts of his brain and challenge himself
to do something new and different. And it led to Pixar,
and it led to you know, reinventing Apple as a
whole with things like the iPad, iPhone and MacBook. I
look at somebody like Robert Downey Jr. Where all the
mistakes he made still did not hold him back from
(51:47):
reclaiming his spot and going beyond even that right. He
did the hard work to clean up his act on
a personal level, and once he did that, he was
able to care the opportunity to get him back to
where he was supposed to be. And the part be
to that is it only takes one opportunity to change everything.
(52:11):
So no matter what you're going through, no matter where
you feel like you're stuck and you feel like you're
so far away from where you want to be, understanding
that it just takes one win to change everything, that
one win sets you up on a completely different path.
So it's not about racking up all these gigantic things.
(52:31):
It's literally just trying to find that that one yes,
that next yes, so that next yes leads you to
the next thing. And then with Kobe, it's understanding that
greatness is transferable. Your greatness in one area can be
replicated to the next thing, as long as it's something
(52:53):
you're passionate about, as long as it's something that you
can give the same energy to that you did on
the previous thing that you found success at. And don't
be afraid of the next thing. When you've outgrown something,
don't feel like it's the end of the world. Don't
allow it to take over your identity. And dictate who
(53:16):
you are as a person. You're more than just the
one thing that you're doing. You have the ability to
continue to do different things and reinvent yourself and recreate
your life. Anytime you see fit. You have that inside
of you. The things that got you to that other
place that you're proud of will also get you to
the next evolution of your life, the next chapter, the
(53:37):
next story that you can be proud of again. Greatness
is transferable. And I think with me, as I kind
of you know, was started talking about life is going
to go on all these things. It's being unafraid to
say what's next. I appreciate and have done all this stuff,
(54:01):
but I'm also understanding that I'm not going to allow
myself to hinder my creativity or my growth by just
trying to stay in what's comfortable and what has worked.
I understand that I'm destined for even more, and I've
had the blessing of failure on a deep level, which
(54:26):
has then allowed me to have no choice but to
go inside and really rediscover the thing that burns inside
of me, the passion that's inside of me. And as
a result, I'm feeling far more like myself and far
(54:47):
more excited for what comes next, and it's never too
late to pivot. And in fact, I think life is
just a continuous series of pivots in some way, shape
or form in different areas of our life until you know,
one day the lights are out essentially, and our happiness
(55:07):
and continued fulfillment are always on the other side of
you know, taking account of what's not working, and being
unafraid to reinvent ourselves, to challenge ourselves to say, hey,
what's next, what does this version of myself want? I
know some of this might sound a little bit done
(55:29):
episodes on this in the past, but I think it's
important to sort of have these these reminders, like these
core concepts, which I really do think the art of
pivoting is a core is a core concept that we
all need to like ingrain in our brains and allow
it to live in the back of our head that
we can then like you know, reference it when needed,
(55:49):
because it's something that always exists in our life and
I think is ever evolving. So with that said, thank
y'all so much for tuning in. I hope this was
you know, insightful. Let me know the DMS at dj
Dramos on Instagram. Whenever you get something from the episode,
I really do appreciate hearing your feedback with that set.
I'll catch you on Thursday for our Thursday Trends episode.
(56:10):
Till then, stay safe and we'll talk soon. Race Life
as a Gringo is a production of the micro Thura
podcast network and iHeartRadio
Let me talk about talk. There we go. He said,
you live in life as a gringo where you questioned
where you fit in every time you mingle, they say
you do. This would not that my rapping really mad?
This life as a gringo. Yes, hello, and welcome to
another pisode of Life as a Gringo. I am dramas
(00:26):
of course, and man, I hope y'all are doing well.
I hope y'all are doing well. I was racking my
brain on what what was like, you know, the I
guess the pressing issue or the thing I wanted to
kind of bring to the table today, and just sort
of thinking about many conversations I've been fortunate enough to
(00:49):
have with people who listen to this podcast or those
who I've talked to throughout the time with the Just
Be Social Club, my Mastermind group, and I think and
even in general, it's interesting. I was I was at
a like a meetup kind of like a holiday party,
(01:10):
not holiday party, with a bunch of DJ friends of
mine for the company that does a lot of my
my bookings throughout New York and New Jersey. And you know,
I'm talking to another another DJ friend of mine who's
like roughly around the same age as me, kind of
been in it in the game for a minute, had
(01:32):
some you know, big moments as a DJ for a
big artist, and he's kind of at a crossroads in
his life where he he kind of feels like he
fell off a bit in comparison to what he was
doing to where he is now, and it's sort of
falling out of love with the craft, if you will,
(01:57):
of djaying, or or maybe not even with the craft
of it, but the business itself, right and where it's going.
And you know, he was kind of expressing that to
me and like, you know, sort of talking to me
as well, and kind of like, you know, the thing,
I guess things that I've shared on here before, right
about feeling like I don't know if I've shared it
(02:22):
directly on here, I want to say, but like the
thoughts of all these things that I used to do, right,
you know, I was definitely like far more heavily involved
in celebrity culture and meeting celebrities and in that world
right if you like, you know, go back to my
Instagram pre twenty twenty one. It's like, you know, all
(02:45):
these posts of me with celebrities, of the radio station
all these different things, and since then, I've kind of
pivoted and moved into different spaces and you know, kind
of grown a lot as a human being and whatever
the case may be, and sort of welcomed to the
best of my ability, welcomed the pivot, welcomed the change,
(03:09):
and never sort of feeling like I would I could
get too comfortable or trying my best to not allow
my ego to make me feel like I needed to
stay in a particular place if spiritually it was no
longer serving me. And I don't know, I think I
still i'd be lying to if I said I didn't
(03:31):
at times struggle with the idea of like what if
the outside world thinks that I've fallen off and all
these different things, And you know, I'd be lying if
I said that that sort of commentary of that conversation
didn't cut a bit deep with me when I was
having it, and I had to kind of like, you know,
like have a conversation with myself to sort of check
(03:53):
myself and sort of let myself know that like, hey,
I'm not not involved in that stuff because I couldn't
hack it, or because you know, I wasn't good enough
I made a decision based on what was best for
me and based on what would make me happier, and
you know, put myself in a position where my life
(04:14):
is in a far better place than it was back then,
you know, in terms of what my goals are and
in terms of what my you know, my I don't know.
My personal tastes are right now, right my lifestyle, you know,
choices and what I appreciate at this point in my life.
(04:37):
And even with that, it's also like never too late
to kind of go back and rediscover that maybe you
liked something far more than you thought, right. I've talked
about that with music, and I think I'm being around
the bush a little bit, but I'm sort of wanting
to hone in on the idea and the power of
reinvention and the idea of it never being too late
(04:58):
to pivot. And even when you've achieved greatness, let's say,
or achieve goals, you know, what you still don't you know,
should never feel like you have to be stuck in
that particular zone or that particular position. Right. I think
that the happiest people in this world are the ones
that allow themselves to embrace reinvention or never see a
(05:24):
failure as the end, and never see the sort of
the success or the attainment of a goal as sort
of now they just live on the mountaintop. Right, I
think you're always having to move towards something and sort
of you want to grow, you know, you want to
(05:46):
grow in a graceful manner that matches who you are,
right and not sort of hinder yourself playing small because
it's an identity that you've grown comfortable with. Right. And
I'm trying not to like, I don't know, I feel
like I'm talking a little bit all over the place here,
But I think many of us stay in situations that
(06:13):
no longer serve us because we have this fear of
letting go, or we have this fear of not being
enough to rise to the next occasion. Right, And we
often self sabotage, and we do this in various forms. Right,
I'd say these different examples, but they really at its core,
(06:35):
this is a conversation of letting go and understanding that
oftentimes the next thing or what's best for you involves
letting go of certain things that are normal to you,
or certain aspects of your life or certain parts of yourself. Right.
(06:58):
And I know we've talked about this various forms on
the podcast before, but I think this is one of
those sort of ever evolving concepts that we kind of
continuously need to be reminded of or get refreshers on.
And truthfully, as I as I sort of sit here
(07:20):
and we are guys, we're only about we're less than
maybe we are exactly At twenty episodes left of season
three of Life as a Gringo, three years of doing
this podcast, and I've been doing a lot of reflecting
(07:43):
as we sort of you know, started this year, and
in my core thinking to myself that the identity of
life as a Gringo, right, this idea of being a
quote unquote gringo, I no longer feel like that person anymore.
I know, no longer sort of relate in the present
(08:05):
tense or future tents to the concept of feeling like
an outsider. I think like through the course of this
podcast and doing it and meeting everybody that I have
and and just sort of talking things out and finding myself,
I've evolved into somebody who's really comfortable in their own
(08:25):
skin and understands his place and his community and has
found community. Right. And I think many of you share
and a lot of that sentiment as well who have
maybe been along with the journey for a while now.
And I think for me, you know, kind of coming
to season three and only having had the promise of
(08:52):
like of three seasons, you know, being fully transparent as
far as, like, you know, business side of things go,
it was sort of like, Okay, I mean, is this
something that I see continuing on in its current state?
(09:14):
And truthfully it's not. I think We've sort of had
the conversations that I've wanted to have, right more than
I could have ever imagined. You know, they're here on
the feed for anybody to reference for you know, forever, forever,
how long time exists. Essentially, it's archived here. And I
(09:36):
think I've evolved sort of past the core of this podcast,
and there are other discussions and other things that I
want to do, and you know, I'm still working out
a lot of those those details, you know, personally business wise.
(10:00):
But I guess I'm having this conversation because in real time,
I'm telling myself to not have fear of letting go
of something that has changed my life for the better
in so many different ways. But sort of being like listen,
you you you created this thing. It went beyond what
(10:20):
you could have ever imagined. I legitimately only thought I
would get one season and then it'd be canceled. You know.
That was what my original idea, what my original like
even just goal was for the podcast, and we ended
up doing it for for you know, the full three
seasons and and you know, three years of my life.
I'm almost four at this point, including with the breaks
and everything. So it's wild. It's wild to sort of
(10:45):
like be in this place. And but I think it's
like if I was to say, hey, we're going to
keep doing life as ale, it's like, hey, I'm not
staying true to who I am as a person now
that the version of me that has evolved, and that
to like strike fear in anybody's hearts or make anybody
say that if you love this podcast, you know, I
have other things planned, you know, hopefully, and we'll kind
(11:08):
of see what ends up happening. But this is like
a message to myself as well. It's like, hey, there's
there's a power in letting go and understanding like you're
going to step into the next evolution of who you
are as a person, and that next evolution is is
you know even better, right, it's a it's a person
who has learned so much more and now has so
(11:28):
a far deeper purpose in their life because of the
self discovery they've gone on. So you know, we'll get
into more of that kind of as the season begins
to get to a close. But I just want to
kind of, you know, touch on a couple of things,
and I guess to share a bit of my own
journey with with these concepts, but also I wanted to
(11:48):
talk about some people that inspire me when I think
about their evolution and what we could take away from it.
So yeah, without further ado, let's let's kind of just
dive into some stories that continue to inspire me. In
a segment, call for the people in the back, say
a lot for the people in the say a lot
(12:12):
of the people in the say a lot of the
people in the So I I'm like the biggest fan.
I talked about this all the time. Anybody knows who's
been like fobbing for a minute. I talk about the
idea of like I have virtual mentors, like people I've
never met, some of them aren't even alive anymore, but
(12:34):
whose stories I sort of keep with me in the
back of my mind and I reference as I go
about my own journey, and one of those stories in particular,
and this one, I mean, listen, at the end of
the day, this person. We can make a lot of
arguments for corporate greed and the products that the company
is making and how they're being made, but in general,
(12:55):
his story never ceases to fascinate me. And that's somebody
like Steve Jobs and I start here because maybe some
of us are going through an incredibly low point in
our life right now, right maybe there's so much uncertainty,
maybe you've had so many things taken away from you.
(13:16):
I mean, I know I've talked about this, like I
really do think twenty twenty four was one was probably
the most brutal year of my entire life. It was
one of those years where it just seems like everything
I touched turned to shit almost and it was like
I couldn't get like on the board to save my life,
(13:39):
like in a in a in a sort of you know,
basketball reference, and you know, well, I'm just gonna allow
the conversation to flow as it will. Usually I would
like segment this like, Okay, now me hit this talk
about me, but I'm just kind of go where the
(14:01):
flow goes here at go with the flow, if you will.
But this low point now in reflecting, and not to
say I'm still not dealing with moments of frustration or
(14:23):
that I feel like I'm sort of in a rebuilding phase,
if you will, or not even rebuilding, but reinvention, I
guess is the key word of this today's show. But
I think that low point, as cliche as it might be,
as I think about it now and we kind of
(14:44):
talk it out here together, and now I can sort
of see like hindsight, you know, twenty twenty tip thing.
I'm like, oh, I kind of needed all of these
sort of like low moments to make me sort of
slow down and realign with what truly made me happy
(15:09):
or what truly makes me happy? Right, Like, what is
the life that I actually want to live? What do
I want to do on a regular basis? Who am
I at this point in my life? Right? And I
think having that much downtime or sort of failing at
(15:30):
things that I wasn't very passionate about or that I
wasn't passionate passionate enough about to like make my main
focus or to provide me with real fulfillment when those
things began to fail and not work, like the quote
unquote easy money grabs if you will, right, or the
the things that just made perfect sense on paper but
(15:52):
like just didn't fucking pan out as they should have
those shortcomings or I mean even you know, things like
you know, losing contracts or things not getting renewed or
whatever it might be, Like those shortcomings made me sort
of have to like, you know, get back to ground zero,
(16:16):
right and almost just be like, you know what, and
instead of trying to replicate business success, instead of trying
to make more money than you did the previous year,
or trying to duplicate what you did the previous year,
or trying to get the next ego metric. You know
(16:38):
that makes it makes you feel like you're doing something.
Let's just get down to basics of like what is
actually currently making you happy? Like where are the moments
of joy that you're sort of finding amidst all the chaos,
amidst all of the shit. You know, And I think
(16:58):
sort of when you lose I don't want to say everything,
when you lose a lot, you inevitably I think end
up going through this there's really these stages of like
blissful creation almost, right, like you almost get back to
being a kid again, where you're just sort of creating
(17:23):
and you're not really concerned with the financial aspect of it, right,
It's like a non issue at this point for you, right,
And that's like the beauty of being in that stage.
It's like, you know, and in reality is when you
start at ground zero, there's only one way to go,
and that's up. And that's what's exciting and almost like
to be envied about when you sort of quote unquote
(17:44):
lose it all, right. And a story that I reference
or a person that I reference when I reflect on
on that is Steve Jobs from Apple. He co founded Apple.
And when you look at his story, right, he gets
you know, it starts Apple, it's successful, right, and then
it goes through this phase in the eighties where it
(18:06):
is you know, a failing a failing company and is
no longer successful and to the point that he actually
gets kicked out of his own company. This happens in
nineteen eighty five. And I think about what it must
have been like to be in in you know, his
(18:28):
head at that point, what the emotions he must have
been going through, right, the idea that his company that
he started in a garage with a friend of his
and grew to be this you know, name brand computer company,
that he just got fired from it, and he got
the company taken away from him, he got his baby
(18:50):
taken away from him. And then the ego metrics of that, Right,
how publicly humiliating that must have been, and how low
he must have felt, and how much he must have
questioned about his ability to reinvent himself or to find
(19:14):
success again. And even the idea of like, you know,
that sort of public humiliation from a career perspective, I'm
sure to a degree hurt his reputation and his ability
to secure a similar position. And you think, okay, well,
(19:35):
what did he end up doing? At this point? The
irony is this probably was the greatest thing to ever
happened to him, because he gets fired from Apple, his
own company, and he goes on to start Pixar, like
the movie company that like now that it Disney owns,
that created a toy story and all these things, right,
(19:59):
literally goes on to found a revolutionary company that changed
the course of like children's movies, of cartoons and animated films,
then also returns to Apple in nineteen ninety seven, reinvents
the company completely right, launching the iPod and the MacBook
(20:20):
and the iPhone, not even changing the company to change
the world as we know it. And again we can
make arguments, but for the better, for the worse, sure,
but really changed the world as we know it. And
again in comparison, I sort of am like Man, I
(20:43):
really without ever having spoken to him ever, really I
never spoke to the man, but without really having dug
deep into, you know, the story of Steve Jobs. Like,
I'm not a historian by any means, but I relate
to it because I think, as with sort of the
(21:05):
cliche saying of like there's an opportunity and everything, and
I always talk about that, or I always strive to
live that mindset, there really is, you know, a silver
lining or a blessing, even in what seems like the
biggest curse, if you will, right. And I think sometimes
(21:27):
we need a wake up call. Sometimes life happens right,
and it's moving so quickly and we get so caught up.
It's almost like a gust of wind and before you
know it, you've been blown into you know, in an
area that you don't even recognize anymore, or you've been
transformed into a person that you don't recognize. That it
sort of living far more in reaction than creation, if
(21:52):
you will. And I think that this happens throughout the
course of our life in multiple stages, and it's important
to sort of be cognizant of it. It's easy to
get so caught up in life, and especially as you're
creating opportunities or being given opportunities, Like it's a gift
and a curse to have an endless amount of opportunity,
which you know, in today's world we kind of do.
(22:14):
But you know, even at the moments where you're like
killing it at your job and all these different things,
new promotions, like they demand more of you. They might
demand more of your time, which means less time with family,
which means less time for the things that that you're
passionate about, the things that fulfill you. And before you
know it, you're just like this person who's been working
their ass off, you know, found great career success, but
(22:36):
like at what cost? Almost right, And I'm using this example,
or in a relationship where you sort of you've gotten
swept up in the idea of love, and you've begun
to normalize certain things that are just not healthy in
terms of being with a partner, or you've gotten so
comfortable with having a partner that you've sort of numbed
(22:58):
yourself to the fact that you don't even really care
for this person anymore in that way, right, as harsh
as that might sound, And because life is happening and
you want to check certain boxes and you're just caught
up in what's become the norm. And it's not until
you know you have that big dramatic blowout with this person,
or you have some sort of crazy life moment that
(23:21):
like shakes you to your core and makes you stop
and causes you to be insane the present that you're like,
holy shit, what am I doing? And that's when you
begin creating and reinventing and and sort of rediscovering again.
And I wanted to include that story for anybody who
(23:44):
is going through some sort of low point in their
life where it seems like just nothing is working, everything
you try is failing. And for me, what I can
say is, you know, as I begun this year, I
think for me kind of getting back to I guess
my stories, I kind of tie it together when I
(24:06):
stopped saying, all right, like, let's just stop chasing what
quote unquote makes sense. Let's stop trying to create what
feels like the easy pathway towards the check and you know,
is something that we're interested in, but not like something
we're you know, incredibly passionate about. Let's just get back
to basics of all the things that you're doing, what
(24:30):
is the one thing every time you do it you're like,
oh man, I'm like actually really enjoying myself today. And
for me, I looked to music like throughout this year,
you know, this last year, as it felt like nothing
was working. The one thing that was like really providing
me joy and was working in the moment was like
(24:51):
when I got to go DJ and specifically the one
club that I'm I, you know, have a residency at
in Jersey City, New Jersey. It was like every weekend
I can count on it just being like super fun
and just enjoying myself and being able to confidently like
look at myself and say like, what, you're good at this,
(25:12):
You're great at this? Right Like that the wind that
I was I needed and it kept giving it to
me and this again. Like music, I've had a tumultuous
relationship where I've I've tried to let it go and
know this sort of finds me. And even with that,
it's like, am I really going to like go back
down this path again? Like? Or am I really going
to like, you know, set another goal in this and
(25:35):
embarrass myself or let myself down or whatever it might be.
But then I, ironically, as I as I sort of tried,
I let go of of trying to make it make
sense in like real world terms, and I just sort
of said, you know what, let me just keep scratching
(25:55):
this itch, and what are the goals that are interesting
to me in regards to this, you know? And with
that I had, like, you know, the first sort of
big potential breakthrough, right and and that sort of maybe
that I got from somebody then led to me saying, Okay,
(26:16):
this is the new goal and what are what's the
course of action to make this goal a reality? And
that you know happen to think December ish, and from
December to now, I've had purpose every single day because
I've had this sort of checklist of what are the
(26:38):
things that I need to get done, what are the
things that I need to add to my resume in
order to possibly make good on that maybe that I
had in December and turn it into a yes. And
that sense of purpose has added so much joy and
fulfillment into my life. And with that sense of purpose,
(26:58):
because I had a clarity of a goal in mind,
now I've been able to check off, you know, a
lot of things, check off a lot of boxes, and
stack up these little wins that hopefully will accumulate to
this bigger vision that I have. But again, I don't
think I would have given myself that grace or allowed
(27:18):
myself the time that I needed these past few months
of just sort of saying, hey, head down, little winds
day by day. I don't think I would have been
able to do that without sort of just hitting that
rock bottom because I was I was too fixated on
maintaining a certain status or fixated on you know, being
(27:39):
an adult quote unquote right. And it was only until I,
like it felt like everything was going wrong that I
then was able to tap into what I truly wanted.
And once I did that, doors began to open here
and there. And don't don't let me, you know, don't
I'm not gonna tell you that it's been all sun
(28:00):
and rainbow. There's been so many fucking little setbacks and
stupid things that have happened along the way that are
incredibly frustrating. But you know, as I'm sort of getting
to the end of that checklist and I really only
have one last thing that I need to check off
that checklist before I revisit that larger goal, I can
sort of say, hey, you know what, even with those
sort of disappointing moments along the way, we still had
(28:22):
a bunch of wins that accumulated to exactly what we
needed and what we set out to do, and much
of it actually worked out the way we sort of
vision it in our head. But I think that, again,
is only because I had a clarity of a goal,
and the goal was coming from a very pure place,
(28:42):
a place of like genuine passion for what I was doing,
allowed all of this to sort of culminate into these winds.
And I think that's what I was lacking this last
year in a lot of ideas that I loved, a
lot of things that I wanted to do, but not
things that I can genuinely say were one hundred percent
(29:03):
my heart was invested in it, and like, if that
was the only thing I was able to do in
this life, I would be happy doing it. I couldn't
say that about a lot of the things I was
working on in twenty twenty four. Again doesn't mean I
didn't love them, but as far as like day in
day out, no, they're not. They weren't something I wanted
(29:23):
to do day in day out, And I think that
is sort of what got me to again the clarity.
It was the heavy failure of basically the first time
in my life feeling like an entire year was like
on paper, just a giant failure. Again, in retrospect, the
lessons learned the mindset created not a failure, but that
(29:46):
was a year where I just felt like nothing worked.
But again, I think it's led to some of my
best creations. I mean musically, you know, we just signed
a record and it happened fairly easy, like far easier
than any other a production I've ever done. And there's
a lot of little things in the works like that
where it's like, oh, I've been working my ass off,
(30:06):
but also creatively, I'm in the best place I've ever been,
and I think it's because of that sort of rock
bottom moment, and I look at Steve Jobs, you know,
for that as well. And we'll take a quick break here.
I want to touch on a couple other examples that
I think I relate to and that I think others
can relate to, depending on where you are in your story.
(30:29):
So we'll touch on that, but first we'll take a
quick break, and then we'll be right back. All right,
we are back, And somebody else's story that really fucking
fascinates me, like to no end is Robert Downey Jr. Yes,
the actor who plays Iron Man. Now, I'm old enough
(30:52):
as a kid to remember hearing in like the background
of like you know, TV on my parents. My parents
have some you know, as a little kid, the stories
or like when he was going through his legal traumas
and his drug addiction and you know, jail time and
all these different things. And I think there was a
(31:16):
show called Alan McBeal that he was on, if I'm
not mistaken. I was very young, but I remember that,
and it was like this guy who was talented, had everything,
just went down a really dark path and was on
the verge of losing it all or burned a lot
(31:40):
of bridges and was pretty much blackballed by the industry
as a result. And now you look at him and
you're like, how is that even the same fucking person?
And you look at him, and I think, looking at
(32:00):
iron Man and how that has changed the course of
his life. I sort of see it as like two things.
I see a it's never too late in the game
for you to become the person you know you can be,
or to rEFInd yourself, or to prove the naysayers wrong right,
(32:27):
like you've never fucked up enough. And on the other
side of it, I look at it as you just
need that one win, like you're one win away from
rewriting your entire story. Him getting cast as iron Man
(32:47):
was a win that rewrote his entire life from there. Now,
obviously he had to do the hard work. He had
to get clean, he had to get his life together,
and I'm sure there's a lot that went into even
being considered for a role like this one. But he
(33:09):
did the hard work and was given this opportunity that
changed everything. It allowed him to reclaim his spot as
one of the prominent actors in Hollywood, in his field.
It allowed him to reclaim his greatness. And again I
(33:35):
relate to this because it's like, Okay, we've all made
some wrong decisions in our life. We've all turned our
back on things or people and maybe regretted it. You know,
I think if I'm relating and sort of being vulnerable
(33:56):
to where this sort of hits me right now, I've
talked about like where I was twenty nineteen in the
same Industryman. Now, as far as like music goes, you know,
I really self sabotaged a lot. And you know, for me,
(34:18):
it wasn't through things of addiction or legal troubles. It
was you know, a sense of not believing in myself
or not being grateful or appreciating it as I should have.
But I made some decisions that took me away from
this thing that I've been passionate about since I was
(34:39):
a kid. And again, hindsight's twenty twenty. I would love
for it to not have been such a long, you know,
sort of journey or or take myself away for such
a extended period of time. But once I've sort of
(35:00):
done that inner work and figured out what I was
running away from and learn to appreciate myself and my
talents and recognize the place that this thing has in
my life, and how passionate about it I am. It's
allowed me now to sort of come back stronger and
more focus and more sure of myself than maybe I
(35:22):
ever have been, you know, and allowed me to create
potential opportunities that are that one thing that changes everything,
you know. I feel. I feel like I'm on the
verge of that. I see it very clearly, like the
steps are right there, and it's inspiring again to know
(35:48):
that like a what's meant for you will never you know,
will always be for you. What's meant for you will
always be for you. But in his case as well,
it's like, yeah, we all have these ghosts of our pasts,
but with enough work they become irrelevant to our future success.
(36:14):
And once we have that success, they then become like
these badges of honor of how far we've come, and
they give us this sort of credibility, and they give
us just this. I don't think they give us stories
that we can continue to use to inspire ourselves and others.
(36:39):
They just add something special. And I'm again not a
Robert down Downing junior historian, but I would imagine that
experience of sort of losing it all if you will,
and then being able to sort of come back bigger
(37:00):
than ever and reclaim your place and beyond. I'd imagine
he probably appreciates it a bit more and he's living
a far more fulfilled life than he was prior. And
I don't know, that's just incredibly inspiring to me. And
(37:24):
the last one I want to touch on is Kobe Bryant.
And Kobe to me is an example of the idea
that your greatness is non transferable. And what I mean
(37:50):
by that is, I think so many of us we
get into these spaces where we do see success, we've
achieved it, right, our greatness is on display. We finally
get that validation, that feeling of recognition that we've worked
so hard for. But then there's like the curse of
(38:15):
greatness because it's almost like you have this identity crisis,
thinking that this is this is you know who I
am now? Right, Like this is you know when you
become great at something or you you know, enter into
(38:36):
sort of these bigger spaces, right. I think for me
in you know, in radio and New York and things
like the Breakfast Club, a lot of the ideas like well,
it doesn't really get any bigger than this. Right, A
lot of the people would say, how could you leave
something so big? Right, Like you're there, You're a part
of the biggest thing, and that that's like a curse
(38:58):
because you then operate from the place of fear of
losing that right. Your identity is tied into that. If
I'm not this person from that, then who am I?
Almost like that conversation, I started with the idea of
quote unquote falling off right and sort of living with
(39:22):
like this feeling of like I'm not doing the things
that I used to do. I'm not on that level anymore, right,
And there's a fear that comes along with that, and
it hinders you from growing and from achieving your next
great thing, right, Like I have this, you know, for
(39:43):
a long time, and I've gotten over it. But I
I had this fear that, like we all in life,
we only have like a limited number of great ideas.
And I would reflect, I'm old projects or goals that
I had that didn't pan out, like old yeah, like
(40:05):
old brands or whatever that I created, or old things
I was working on, And I look back and be like, man,
that was a great idea. What if I never topped
that idea? Like, what if you know, because you know,
my partner bailed on me and everything was shit, or
because this happened, now it didn't work anymore. What if
I like, that was my opportunity and I fucked up,
(40:26):
or if I did something stupid and now it failed
as a result. And I think just the idea, like
your great ideas never stopped. Maybe maybe at some point
when your mind is not there anymore, that we can
make that argument. But I think greatness is transferable. The
things that you have achieved are not unique to the
(40:49):
industry or unique to the situation. They're unique to you
the person. So you the person, has the ability to
achieve greatness in other things. You just have to sort
of understand the mindset that allows you to achieve that
greatness in that particular field, Right, that same mindset and
(41:16):
your ability to sort of create a plan of action
and like you know, break down information and use it accordingly,
you can utilize that in any other space that you
choose to occupy. Now, obviously there are certain limitations as
far as like, you know, it's just because you're a
successful accountant doesn't mean you're gon be a successful NBA player, Right,
(41:39):
You need to have a certain god given physique to
go along with it that leads to that success. But
outside of those sort of few examples, your greatness is
transferable to whatever new thing, new venture, new idea you
decide to give your energy to, and as long as
(41:59):
you attack it with the same veracity that you did
the previous one, there's no question that eventually you will
achieve some form of greatness in that new goal, that
new task, that new version of yourself. Right. And Kobe
is a great example of this because Kobe was a
(42:23):
guy who was obsessed with the game of basketball from
you know, early days as a kid, like this is
all he did. We talked about this idea of like eat,
breathe and sleep a certain thing, but that's what Kobe did.
He was obsessed with it and became a great as
a result. But then what did he do after retirement? Right?
(42:46):
And a lot of a lot of players struggle with
this because I think they sort of view their greatness
or their achievement in basketball in their sport as like, Okay,
that was a window and time and that's it, and
they don't realize that they're bigger than this one thing
(43:09):
that they did. They have the ability to utilize what
made them successful in that into whatever else they feel interest,
passionate about, and they have to allow themselves to not
let their entire identity be wrapped up in this one thing,
but instead the ability to say, I'm not just a
(43:29):
basketball player. I am anything I want to be. And
that's what Kobe did. You look at it. And Kobe
became an Oscar winning filmmaker with his short film Deer Basketball. Now,
obviously it's basketball related, but he was on the other
side of things with that, right. He built Granity Studios,
(43:52):
which was to tell sports and life stories for young athletes. Right. So, granted,
he was still involved again in a game he loved,
but it was from a different perspective and he was
achieving greatness in that. He also reinvented himself as a mentor,
(44:14):
an investor, and an advocate for women's sports, right because
of his daughter Gigi. So he was walking into the
next chapter of his life with open arms and not
being wrapped up in the idea of I have to
be Kobe Bryant, the basketball player and that's all I am.
(44:35):
He said, No, I'm Kobe Bryant now the storyteller, the filmmaker,
the mentor, the entrepreneur, and he was finding success in
those fields because he was attacking it with the same
mindset that gave him success in basketball. Because again, the
(44:57):
greatness is bigger than the the identity. Right, he was
just a great thinker who happened to be born with
a certain natural gift for basketball. But there are a
lot of people born with that natural gift that don't
achieve the level he did, right, So, really, the secret
(45:19):
sauce is the way that his mind worked, which then
led to the way that he was disciplined and the
way that he was able to devote all that time
and energy to getting better at basketball and really becoming
a student of the game. And again, those are skills
(45:40):
that could be transferable to any other industry that he
chose to get into after basketball. And that's why he
was getting these accolades as a filmmaker and in these
different avenues. And I'm sure if he hadn't sadly passed
away so early, there would have been all kinds of
crazy shit that he would have had his and in.
(46:01):
But again, it's because greatness is transferable. Don't allow yourself
to make what you're doing your entire identity and then
believe that you just have to stay there even if
it's no longer serving you, or even if you're no
longer able to do it at the level that you
once did. In his case, like for me, I guess
(46:22):
I'll leave you on this example. What is kind of
coming up for me? What got me into the rooms
like the breakfast club or being on the radio here
in New York on zer one hundred. The mindset, the tenacity,
the ability to sort of think a couple of steps
ahead to get into those you know what got me
in those rooms, all the little things, that is the
(46:46):
same thing that has gotten me into other rooms When
I was in a band, That's what got us management,
got us on tours, got us doing you know a
record you know, got a record deal on the table.
As a DJ, That's what got me from playing I
have bars, to playing you know, gigantic clubs and festivals,
and you know, got me from making you know, crappy
(47:07):
music and that nobody want to listen to, to working
with other record labels and signing music and getting put
in commercials like that same blueprint, that same mindset that
I have, and I think the ability to break down
information and the self awareness of how I fit into
it is what keeps allowing me to get into the
rooms that I am passionate about at that moment. And
(47:31):
if I'm no longer passionate about a certain room, I
have to be okay with letting go of the ego
metrics and be confident enough in myself to say, I
don't know how long it's going to take, but eventually
I will get get into a similar level room, but
instead doing something that I'm incredibly passionate about. And I
(47:57):
think along sort of, you know, and I think, now
I'm like, what is sort of in twenty twenty four?
Where was the shortcoming with that? In twenty twenty four?
I was too concerned with I made the room itself
(48:18):
the priority or the goal, rather than saying the passion
has to be the priority and then second to that
is the room itself and the goal. Right. I think
it always has to start with, like how you reinvent yourself?
How do you reachieve success? It always has to start
(48:40):
with like what is the burning desire? Don't think about
the money, don't what is the burning desire. Once you've
identified the burning desire, then all of the skills that
you have accumulated that have allowed you to find success
in the past at other things, you can then retool
(49:00):
them to work for this new burning desire that you have,
and that greatness that exists in those tools and exists
inside of you can then be applied to this new
endeavor as long as you have that burning passion, that
same burning passion that you have for the other things
that you found success at. And I hope that makes sense.
(49:23):
But yeah, I think again, with all these different stories,
no matter what's happening, no matter where you are, reinvention
is there for you. You just have to be unafraid
to take a step in that direction and be unafraid
to pivot from the life you know and the identity
(49:48):
that you have sort of come to rely on, if
you will, And I'll table it there because I think
I want to kind of summarize it a little bit
clearer and conclusions due. But first we'll take a quick
break and they'll be right back time for company, all right,
(50:18):
So just to kind of summarize this entire concept of
reinvention and being unafraid to pivot, recognizing that it's never
too late to pivot, recognize that it's never too late
to reinvent yourself, that the greatness of your past is
(50:41):
just evidence of your ability to create more greatness going forward.
And if you haven't had that moment yet, which I
think we've all had it in little ways, but if
you haven't had that moment yet understanding that we all
have greatness inside of us, we just have to match
it with the right passion and the right moment and
the right opportunity or create the right opportunity. And again
(51:04):
it's it's it's sort of looking for opportunity and everything.
I think is kind of the takeaway from like Steve Jobs, right,
his biggest failure became a blessing because he found he
had the clarity to sort of go and really go
(51:24):
into the deeper parts of his brain and challenge himself
to do something new and different. And it led to Pixar,
and it led to you know, reinventing Apple as a
whole with things like the iPad, iPhone and MacBook. I
look at somebody like Robert Downey Jr. Where all the
mistakes he made still did not hold him back from
(51:47):
reclaiming his spot and going beyond even that right. He
did the hard work to clean up his act on
a personal level, and once he did that, he was
able to care the opportunity to get him back to
where he was supposed to be. And the part be
to that is it only takes one opportunity to change everything.
(52:11):
So no matter what you're going through, no matter where
you feel like you're stuck and you feel like you're
so far away from where you want to be, understanding
that it just takes one win to change everything, that
one win sets you up on a completely different path.
So it's not about racking up all these gigantic things.
(52:31):
It's literally just trying to find that that one yes,
that next yes, so that next yes leads you to
the next thing. And then with Kobe, it's understanding that
greatness is transferable. Your greatness in one area can be
replicated to the next thing, as long as it's something
(52:53):
you're passionate about, as long as it's something that you
can give the same energy to that you did on
the previous thing that you found success at. And don't
be afraid of the next thing. When you've outgrown something,
don't feel like it's the end of the world. Don't
allow it to take over your identity. And dictate who
(53:16):
you are as a person. You're more than just the
one thing that you're doing. You have the ability to
continue to do different things and reinvent yourself and recreate
your life. Anytime you see fit. You have that inside
of you. The things that got you to that other
place that you're proud of will also get you to
the next evolution of your life, the next chapter, the
(53:37):
next story that you can be proud of again. Greatness
is transferable. And I think with me, as I kind
of you know, was started talking about life is going
to go on all these things. It's being unafraid to
say what's next. I appreciate and have done all this stuff,
(54:01):
but I'm also understanding that I'm not going to allow
myself to hinder my creativity or my growth by just
trying to stay in what's comfortable and what has worked.
I understand that I'm destined for even more, and I've
had the blessing of failure on a deep level, which
(54:26):
has then allowed me to have no choice but to
go inside and really rediscover the thing that burns inside
of me, the passion that's inside of me. And as
a result, I'm feeling far more like myself and far
(54:47):
more excited for what comes next, and it's never too
late to pivot. And in fact, I think life is
just a continuous series of pivots in some way, shape
or form in different areas of our life until you know,
one day the lights are out essentially, and our happiness
(55:07):
and continued fulfillment are always on the other side of
you know, taking account of what's not working, and being
unafraid to reinvent ourselves, to challenge ourselves to say, hey,
what's next, what does this version of myself want? I
know some of this might sound a little bit done
(55:29):
episodes on this in the past, but I think it's
important to sort of have these these reminders, like these
core concepts, which I really do think the art of
pivoting is a core is a core concept that we
all need to like ingrain in our brains and allow
it to live in the back of our head that
we can then like you know, reference it when needed,
(55:49):
because it's something that always exists in our life and
I think is ever evolving. So with that said, thank
y'all so much for tuning in. I hope this was
you know, insightful. Let me know the DMS at dj
Dramos on Instagram. Whenever you get something from the episode,
I really do appreciate hearing your feedback with that set.
I'll catch you on Thursday for our Thursday Trends episode.
(56:10):
Till then, stay safe and we'll talk soon. Race Life
as a Gringo is a production of the micro Thura
podcast network and iHeartRadio
Host
DJ Dramos
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